Scene 8

Whether it might be possible for a fish to chirp?

While having a bath in his hotel the previous evening, Maille's thoughts had wandered not just to another place but to another story altogether. That was quite exceptional for him. While holding his breath as he splashed around underwater, he had seen himself clambering over the roofs of a Japanese village, fleeing from a bunch of gun-toting policemen. He sensed how a bullet had ripped out a good piece of skin and a minute bit of flesh from his shoulder. And he enjoyed the pain, the burning sensation all the more because he knew that he would very shortly fall through a roof into a house, where his cook and Marie would be waiting anxiously for him, ready with open boxes of bandages. That was just as it ought to be.

But before he could reach the nurses' station, his lungs ran out of air and he shot out of the water, gasping. His head was back in the trivial reality of his mission – which was evident by the simple fact that still the same old chanson was blaring out of the hotel TV. His shoulder burned slightly under the bath foam – quite as if it was still stuck in the true agent story. This then was the typical western dichotomy of body and head – inacted as a bathroom drama.

continue