‘I didn’t see anything and neither did you. Don’t project your crazy ideas on to my son.’
‘What’s happening here is bigger than Isaac.’
Madenn got to her feet and handed Goulven a candle. She faced Alan, standing straight and calm, certain of what she was doing, filled with a confidence that bordered on arrogance, because she knew, she understood the divine, she understood all the things that Alan could not yet grasp. In that moment, she looked like one of those sanctimonious sorts who vaunt their faith, who see it as the ultimate virtue, who pride themselves on being better than other people.
Alan took a deep breath and drew on his last reserves of patience.
‘Pack up all of this stuff before someone sees it.’
‘I’m not taking down that altar.’
‘Madenn, I won’t say it again …’
‘No, absolutely not.’
Seagulls glided above the shore, laughing, amused by the scene playing out beneath them. It was a conflict in which there could be no winner, a clash of words that could not be reconciled; faith and denial, between those drawn to the unseen and those rooted in reality. A light drizzle fell on the coast, a linen veil that blurred its contours, and suddenly, behind them, in the heart of this nebulous space, Isaac appeared out of nowhere, like a ghost materializing. As soon as he saw his son, Alan raced over.
‘I forbid you from coming here!’
He took the boy by the arm, less roughly than he had the day before, because he simply wanted to be heard, to remind the boy of his authority, to make him see reason, something everyone around him seemed to have forgotten. He took a step closer, his eyes red with exhaustion, and in a whisper blurted out the words he could not contain:
‘You draw more than enough attention to yourself already, Isaac.’
At that point, everything happened too quickly for Alan to grasp: Isaac falling to his knees in a trance; Madenn quaking as, with trembling fingers, she lit the candles; a gentle hand being laid on his arm, the hand of a nun Alan had not heard arrive, as though she too had simply materialized, as though on this headland, things had ceased to obey the laws of reality.
Sister Anne had followed Goulven back from Roscoff and had stayed out of sight, watched the scene play out, right up to the moment when the boy fell to his knees. It came to me in a dream last night … Now, she walked around the kneeling boy, deaf to the prayers of the two witnesses, fighting a feeling of intense vertigo. I saw it as clearly as I see you standing here … When she stood before the boy, she recognized him: that teenager she had glimpsed the day before, the one she had seen from Michel Bourdieu’s car; she clearly remembered the pale, anxious face. A sense of foreboding took her breath away. She reached out a hand and lightly touched the boy’s closed eyes with her fingers: his lashes did not move at all. She turned around and, like him, she gazed into the sky, scanning the heavens for what Sister Rose had promised, for what she too was supposed to see: light streamed through a gap in the clouds, illuminating each tiny droplet of rain, creating a shimmering veil that spanned the space and disappeared into the grey sea.
Again, the downpour in the garden. The lawn mired in boggy puddles, the pink tricycle rusting beneath the raindrops. Sister Anne turns away from the window, weary of this drowned garden. In the half-light, the girl is sitting on the edge of the bed. Quietly, Sister Anne steps closer, never taking her eyes off the child who sees nothing but the closed door. Rain drums on the roof, a deafening roar in the darkened room. There is a creak at the bottom of the stairs; the sound of footsteps climbing. Someone is coming. The child stiffens, stares at the door behind which the danger lurks. The door. In one bound, Sister Anne is there, blindly groping in the darkness for a key, a lock. Still the footsteps climb; there is now no other sound in this house apart from the approaching figure which is far more threatening than the rain hammering the tiles, more terrifying than the sky dark with thunderclouds. SisterAnne searches for a key. Her eyes scan the dimly lit room and she sees the little girl, her face contorted into a howl, a silent scream that may be heard only by the dead, her tiny hands tugging at her skirt, trying to cover her bare legs, to hide this thing she has not chosen. A dull thud outside the door: he has reached the landing. Sister Anne presses her body against the door, digs her feet firmly into the carpet, and struggles against the force taunting her from the other side; suddenly the door flies open, and she is thrown back and left sprawling on the floor. Quickly, she turns over: there, in the doorway, he has come again.
She sat up with a jolt. With one hand she pushed away the duvet, and with the other pulled her nightdress down to her ankles. She sat, gasping for breath. In the murky gloom, the dolls had disappeared from the walls. There was no sound of rain. The door was closed; above it, a simple wooden crucifix. She swung her legs out of the bed and set her feet down on the cold floor. The roar of the sea drifted into her room. She listened to the distant waves, clinging to the sound, trying to root herself in the present. She did not have the strength to get up: some dreams take time to shake off, requiring a patience known only to those who are wakened by the night, those who know they have to bide their time, to leave the world in which the spirit is wandering, to return once again to the body.
After a moment, her eyes were caught by a glimmer of light: outside, one of the streetlamps was flashing, sending a signal up to her window like Morse code. The light illuminated her bedside table; next to the Bible, a statue of the Miraculous Virgin. Sister Anne felt her gorge rise; her hands gripped the mattress. Yesterday. The deserted island. The headland above the shore. The boy who had fallen to his knees. ‘Return tomorrow. The multitude will be with you.’ These were the words he had reported. The phrases he claimed to have heard. This memory swept away the nightmare, and Sister Anne got up from her bed, struggling to recall every detail: the rapt face, which she had watched waiting for a smirk, a twitch, the slightest indication that might expose this as a sham, reveal that the boy was merely trying to dupe people – out of malice, out of boredom, because he needed the attention.
A shiver ran down her arms; she grabbed her shawl and wrapped it around her bare skin. She paced the room, arms folded, hands gripping the edges of the shawl as if this could prevent her from falling. This teenage boy would not be the first hoaxer; many before him had fooled the masses, claiming the Virgin had appeared to them, whether they were simple crooks or people who genuinely believed they’d had a vision, or devout followers claiming a unique connection with the divine. And every time, the masses allowed themselves to be convinced, deceived by their own hope, by their longing to believe that the Virgin was always watching over them: She who interceded where men failed.
Outside, the streetlamp stopped flickering. Sister Anne moved through the shadowy room and knelt before the small bronze statue of the Virgin, whose palms were open, inviting prayer: She, the most humble, most merciful; She who appeased all sorrows even before they were spoken. Sister Anne tried to say the familiar words but failed. Again and again her mind repeated: ‘Hail Mary …’ but her voice remained silent. She had failed to detect any deception yesterday. She had hoped to expose the boy, to remind him that it is wrong to mock that which is sacred, to simulate faith as though it were a matter of choice. She had said nothing. She had seen nothing but the pure radiance of his face, and an inexpressible pain had begun to tighten around her throat.
In that damp room where night had woken her, she remained on her knees, her throat obstructed by that pain, unable to speak to the one who had chosen to appear to another.
‘In other news, residents in Plouguerneau had an unpleasant surprise when they were awoken in the early hours by an earthquake. Measuring 4.6 on the Richter scale, it was a particularly powerful quake for the region. This follows an earthquake off the coast some days ago which could be felt as far away as Brest …’
Hugo set his fork down on his plate and turned towards the television: on the screen, people were giving accounts of the dawn quake, talking about picture frames that had fallen from walls, the beds that had moved as though the devil himself were shaking them, the family china found smashed on the kitchen tiles; but mostly, they talked about the noise, the thunderous rumble of the earth that they could still hear even now. Hugo glanced at his parents.
‘Plouguerneau … that’s about an hour from here.’
At the head of the table, Michel Bourdieu eyed his son scornfully; he often looked at Hugo as though seeing him for the first time, having to remind himself that this boy was his son.
‘So what? Did it wake you up this morning?’
He was bothered by Hugo’s response and, without saying a word, he took another bite of roast lamb. His younger son inspired a hostility in him that he could not fathom. Perhaps the boy’s temperament was too different, his sensibility too refined. It lacked the grit he felt was necessary in a man. He had tried to cherish the boy, tried to see the qualities in this son who was utterly unlike him. But the effort had been too much for him; some children were to be tolerated at best.
‘The ground shakes a little here. It’s nothing to worry about.’
He was no longer looking at the boy, but his tone was gentler, almost an admission that he regretted his earlier harshness. In the background, the local news was followed by the weather report.
‘When are you coming back, Papa?’
On the other side of the table, Julia was staring at the suitcase that had been brought downstairs into the hall. Their father was leaving to attend the funeral of the priest who had officiated at their wedding in the basilica of Notre-Dame-des-Victoires in Paris.
‘The day after tomorrow. I’ll be on the first boat back to the island. Now eat up your green beans.’
This command vexed the little girl; with the tip of her fork, she speared the beans she had buried under her mashed potatoes, vowing to hide them better next time. The doorbell rang, and Michel Bourdieu got up and left the dining room.
Outside, one of the parishioners took off his beret when Bourdieu appeared.
‘Michel … have you heard?’
Realizing that the news had not yet reached Bourdieu, the man took a step closer.
‘There’s a boy who claims to have seen the Blessed Virgin. Here. On this island.’
Michel Bourdieu glanced over his shoulder to make sure no one could hear. He leaned against the doorframe.
‘Who is it?’
‘The son of your neighbour, Alan. You know, the widower …’
‘I know who you mean.’
‘Four times he’s seen her, apparently. They say she’s spoken to him!’
Michel Bourdieu looked at the house that sat at the base of the hill. It was so derelict that when he’d first seen it, he had assumed no one was living there.
‘I need to go away for a couple of days. I’m sure it won’t come to anything.’
‘This isn’t something we can take lightly, Michel. This lad is going to have the whole island in a tizzy, and all for a bit of attention.’
The man settled his beret back on his head and walked off. Michel Bourdieu closed the door then stood gripping the handle, staring vacantly at the hallway.
When he finally returned to the dining room, he pretended that François had come round to offer his condolences. He sank back on his chair, surprised to feel a sluggish heaviness overwhelming him. He picked up his cutlery and mechanically went back to cutting up his lamb. The bread was silently passed around the table. Knives and forks clinked. Everyone remained bent over their plates, vaguely listening to the opening credits of an early afternoon soap opera. Suddenly, Michel Bourdieu stopped what he was doing and stared at the son he had only just remembered once more.
‘Are you friends with Isaac? The lad who lives at the end of the road?’
Hugo stiffened in his chair. He racked his brain, trying to work out how he had betrayed himself, what he had done to prompt such a question, since his father was anything but perceptive.
‘I’m first in the class for maths and science. I don’t have any friends.’
Michel Bourdieu studied the boy, his knife and fork suspended in mid-air; around the table the rest of the family froze, waiting for his reaction, surprised by the tense atmosphere that had settled over their meal. In the background, the television drama offered a recap of the previous week’s episode.
