‘Hear my prayer, oh Lord, please let her not be a prude or a prig.’
Tossing her cigarette butt to the ground, Sister Delphine straightened up and waved. The other nun eventually noticed her and, picking up her suitcase, left the gaggle of travellers. She did not seem unduly tired after the long journey from Paris: she walked briskly, keeping her eyes on the road, and had no trouble carrying her luggage. She was one of those figures people would notice, though she did not seek attention, still less seem to enjoy it.
‘Hello, I’m Sister Anne.’
She took Sister Delphine’s hand in hers. It was a warm, affectionate gesture. A few crow’s feet lined the corners of pale green eyes that were gentle yet perceptive, inspiring trust and affection. Her veil neatly framed her perfectly proportioned features, but for an unruly lock of chestnut hair that fell across her forehead. Looking at her, one scarcely noticed the dark blue material that symbolized her faith, the white collar that signified a life of self-abnegation, the formless shift that marked her out as one committed to the service of the poor: Sister Anne wore her habit as if it were a second skin.
‘I was much saddened to hear about Sister Bernadette.’
Few things saddened Sister Delphine less than her recent bereavement, the dearly departed having been the most sanctimonious madam she had had to put up with for the past two years. She casually crushed the smouldering cigarette with her shoe.
‘Oh, I have shed many a tear. Shall we go?’
She turned on her heel and headed towards the historic centre of the town. The dark granite facades of the buildings were dotted with strange figures: an angel carved above a wooden door; a saint perched on the corner of an alleyway; gargoyles, shipwrights and dragons peering down from the rooftops of this ancient port where pirates and corsairs had once plied their trade, a city frozen in time for five hundred years that only seemed to rouse itself now that night was drawing in.
As they came to the crossroads, Sister Delphine pointed to a squat ancient building with a small clock tower.
‘That’s the old chapel dedicated to Saint Anne. You’ll see her name everywhere here. Bretons are very attached to their patron saint.’
Glancing over her shoulder, Sister Delphine saw that no one was following her. She was completely alone.
Sister Anne had walked across to the quay and was gazing out at the ancient harbour, her suitcase at her feet. Her eyes scanned the jetty, searching among the moored boats for the vision Sister Rose had foretold a fortnight earlier. One morning, shortly after Lauds, as the other Daughters of Charity were silently making their way to the refectory, Sister Anne was lagging behind, still lulled by the dawn prayers, when a gnarled hand gripped her arm: ‘It came to me in a dream last night – you’ll witness an apparition of the Blessed Virgin in Brittany.’ Turning, she had seen Sister Rose smiling at her, as she always did when night presented her with intimations of the future; as she always did when time proved her predictions to be correct. In her hoarse, gravelly voice, she whispered: ‘I saw it as clearly as I see you standing here.’ When they reached the refectory, the two women fell silent and did not speak of the matter again. Three days passed. Then news of a death in one of the provincial communities had reached the convent: Sister Bernadette had been called to God, leaving only one holy sister, who could not cope alone. A volunteer was urgently needed. The community in question was in Brittany, at the northern tip of Finistère.
‘Sister Anne.’
Looking round, she saw Sister Delphine – teeth chattering and visibly annoyed – beckoning her to follow, so she headed back along the quay. Great looming clouds, coal-black and threatening a storm, now blanketed the harbour and the granite city. It came to me in a dream last night – you’ll witness an apparition of the Blessed Virgin in Brittany. Clutching her suitcase, Sister Anne glanced back at the harbour one last time, as though the promised vision might appear at any moment. I saw it as clearly as I see you standing here. A soft roar cleaved the darkness; a pleasure cruiser coming in to moor alongside the jetty. Dozens of white shapes bobbed and dipped in the harbour, a ballet of ghosts upon the dark waters. The cruiser cut its engine and became one more phantom among a host of others. Night called all things back to land, and all respected its law.
Reluctant to keep the other nun waiting, Sister Anne hurried back up the quay under the glow of the streetlamps.
‘Do you have any plans for the holidays?’
His mother plunged a plate into the sink and scrubbed at it with a dish sponge. Next to her, drying the glass she had just handed him, Hugo gave an amused smile.
‘I haven’t signed up to a gym, if that’s what you’re wondering.’
‘It would do you good to take a little physical exercise. There’s the football club in Saint-Pol-de-Léon. Or you could play basketball.’
She took the plate from the water, rinsed it under the hot tap. Plumes of steam rose, leaving a mist of condensation on the tiles; outside the window, the winding island paths merged in the darkness.
‘Well, if you don’t want to go running around after a leather ball, why not take up a martial art? Judo, maybe? That’s something you might enjoy.’
Glancing over her shoulder, she was unsurprised to see her son’s sardonic smile. Dimples creased his chubby cheeks. The dark peach fuzz that shadowed his upper lip did little to change his boyish features. Some days earlier, Hugo had turned sixteen; he seemed to be coasting through his adolescence, without any need to challenge authority – or resort to the cliché of teenage rebellion – to find his identity. Some rebels found their cause in books.
‘Any sport, it doesn’t matter. It would make your father happy.’
The phone ringing in the next room startled her: she was not expecting a call for at least two days. Hurriedly, she turned off the taps, handed the wet plate to her son, and struggled to remove the rubber gloves as she heard her husband calling out from the living room:
‘It’s Mathias on the phone!’
‘Coming.’
Hugo dried the plate, indifferent to the flurry of excitement created by these phone calls: since leaving home, his elder brother had managed to turn his absence into a virtue.
His mother tossed the gloves into the sink.
‘Can you finish up without me?’
Hugo nodded tolerantly. His mother stepped over and ran her fingers through the thick dark hair that was so like her own.
‘Just make an effort, Hugo. It might bring the two of you closer.’
She turned and left the kitchen. The room was silent. Hugo opened the cupboard door and stacked the plate on top of the others. He had sometimes wondered whether his brother did it on purpose; whether he deliberately telephoned just after dinner so that Hugo would be forced to do the dishes by himself, a reminder that he could wind his little brother up, even from a different continent. He instantly regretted the thought; he was pitted against his brother too often by other people to want to do it himself. The window was covered with thick condensation. He reached out, wiped the glass and stared at the darkness shrouding the coast: there were no clouds now, and stars blazed in the night. A smile lit up his face and he quickly finished the washing up, gave the sink a final wipe, left the kitchen and headed up to his room, taking the stairs two at a time. He turned on his desk lamp – an illuminated globe of Mars, showing every crater on the surface. Above the desk hung posters of constellations and maps of the solar system. Taking a craft knife, Hugo knelt on the floor next to a package. He had let it sit, untouched, since his birthday, having decided only to open it when there was finally a cloudless night sky. He peeled off the Sellotape and ripped away the wrapping paper to discover a thick layer of bubble wrap protecting the result of two years of pleading with his parents.
Carefully, he picked it up: the astronomical telescope weighed less than he’d imagined. His hands moved over the instrument. He examined the mounting plate, the eyepiece, the optical tube; quickly skimmed through the user’s manual. Here, on his knees on the floor, his exploration of the heavens had already begun as he focused on every detail of this apparatus that could perceive what mankind could never constrain: the universe and the myriad worlds contained within it. Glancing at his watch, Hugo quickly got to his feet and pushed the empty box next to a pile of books he had not yet had time to read. Having recently discovered the theory of parallel universes, he had ordered books on the subject by Brian Greene and Michio Kaku. He pulled on his anorak, grabbed the telescope and left the bedroom.
Out in the corridor, he slowed as he passed a closed door: no sound came from within. Julia was probably sound asleep. She had been coughing all through the previous night and had not settled until dawn; Hugo had jolted awake each time her hoarse wheezing started up, each time his parents went to take turns sitting by her bedside. Ever since she was born, his little sister had had to endure nights when it seemed she might never catch her breath. He decided against knocking on her door and headed downstairs.
In the living room, the television was on:
‘… In other news, a minor earthquake measuring 4.7 on the Richter scale has been recorded off the coast of Finistère. Tremors from the quake were felt as far away as Brest and Quimper, but those living on the coast were told there is no risk of a tidal wave …’
His father was sitting on the sofa watching the end of the news, with one hand on the armrest and the other draped across the leather back. Michel Bourdieu was staring at the screen in exactly the same way that he stared at his students, with the commanding air that never left him, even at night, when he was not lecturing pupils about history. The calfskin cushions bowed under the weight of his hulking frame; the floor beneath the sofa creaked. His father’s mere presence seemed to weigh on everything.
‘Where’s Maman?’
Without looking at his son, Michel Bourdieu picked up the remote control and changed channels. A cross hung on the wall above the sofa; Christ seemed to be leaning down to study the balding pate of the master of the house.
‘She’s up in her room. She was very upset by your brother’s call. There’s been an explosion in Mali, in Ménaka – a car bomb. Thankfully, Mathias wasn’t hurt, but two of the soldiers in his regiment were killed.’
Michel Bourdieu finally turned towards the doorway and studied his younger son, who lacked both the stature and the self-assurance of his brother, and whose very presence was enough to spark a feeling of contempt that he could not control. Some children are defined by all the things they are not.
‘Are you going out?’
‘I’m going to try out the telescope. I’ll be back in an hour.’
‘It’s pitch-black outside.’
‘That’s kind of the point?’
Michel Bourdieu grumpily turned away. From around his neck came the flash of a gold crucifix. Gritting his teeth, he switched channels again.
‘Try not to fall into the sea. You can’t swim, remember?’
A strident political debate filled the living room. Hugo stared at his father’s implacable profile as though this man were a stranger, as though he needed to convince himself that they were indeed related. A child is never really sure that they are from their parents’ blood.
A sea breeze ruffled the grass of the lawns along the coast. Closing the garden gate behind him, Hugo walked down the deserted path using his flashlight to guide him. Although he knew the island now, he had not yet learned to trust the bluish glow of cloudless nights; until this point, the only glow that had illuminated his nightly walks had come from the streetlights in Paris. He set off. The lapping of the waves accompanying his footsteps was a constant reminder of the shore below. Halfway down the path, he turned right and took a track that led up into the sand dunes. Behind him, the sea finally fell silent. It was here, amid the tall grasses, that he had first discovered true silence; a silence that he had never experienced in Paris, where every instant was troubled by some echo of the city. It was only when he’d come here, to live on the Isle of Batz off the coast of Roscoff, and had walked up into the dunes, that he had discovered this stillness. It was like a forgotten language that had existed before all others; before Tamil and Sanskrit, before the first language ever to be heard on earth.
He carried on walking. From a hollow on his left rose the ruins of an ancient chapel, a sinister structure that seemed to come straight from a child’s nightmare. Hugo continued up the dunes until he reached a flat headland. The vast star-speckled sky soared above the island and the calm sea. Even with the naked eye, he could easily make out the diaphanous tracery of the gauzy threads that linked the constellations weaving a glittering chain above the bay; looking at this pattern, it was impossible not to wonder whether, when the first spider wove its silken snare, it had modelled it on this celestial web.
