Night by Bernard Minier

Author:Bernard Minier [Minier, Bernard]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781473678170
Publisher: Hodder and Stoughton
Published: 2018-12-17T05:00:00+00:00

27

An Apparition

‘Martin.’

No reply.

‘Martin!’

His voice was low, soft, forceful. Martin opened his eyes.

‘Papa?’

‘Get up,’ said his father. ‘Come with me.’

‘What time is it?’

His father merely smiled as he stood by the bed. Martin got up, groggy and lethargic, his eyelids heavy. In his blue pyjamas, barefoot on the cold tiles.

‘Follow me.’

He had followed him. Through the silent house: the corridor, the stairs, the front room full of light, rays of dawn flooding through the curtainless windows on the east side. He glanced at the clock. Five o’clock in the morning! He was very sleepy. And he wanted only one thing: to go back to bed. But he’d followed his papa outside because he’d never dared disobey. In those days, you didn’t disobey. And because he loved him, too. More than anything on earth. Except – perhaps – his maman.

Outside, the sun was beginning to peer over the hill, 500 metres away. It was summertime. Everything was still. Even the ripe wheat. There wasn’t a shiver, either, in the lacy leaves of the oak trees. He had squinted as he stared at the sun’s rays flooding the countryside all around. The morning calm was bursting with bird song.

‘What is it?’ he asked.

‘This,’ replied his papa, opening his arms wide to take in the landscape.

He didn’t understand.

‘Papa?’

‘What, son?’

‘Where should I look?’

His father smiled.

‘Everywhere, son.’ He ruffled his hair. ‘I wanted you to see this, just once in your life: the sun rising at dawn, the morning …’

He could hear the emotion in his father’s voice.

‘My life is just beginning, Papa.’

His father looked at him with a smile and put his big hand on his shoulder.

‘I have a very smart little boy,’ he said. ‘But sometimes you have to forget your intelligence and let your senses and your heart do the talking.’

Servaz was too young at the time to understand, but now he knew. Then something happened: a deer appeared at the foot of the hill. Silently, cautiously. Like an apparition. She had emerged from the woods into the open, her neck outstretched. Little Martin had never seen anything so beautiful. It was as if all of nature was holding its breath. As if something was about to happen that would splinter this magic into a thousand pieces. Servaz remembered: his heart was pounding like a drum.

And indeed, something did happen. A sharp popping sound. He didn’t immediately understand what it was. But he saw the deer freeze, then fall.

‘Papa, what happened?’

‘Let’s go now,’ said his father, his voice full of anger.

‘Papa? What was that sound?’

‘Nothing. Come.’

It was the first shot he had ever heard, but not the last.

‘She’s dead, is that it? They killed her.’

‘Are you crying, son? There, there. Don’t cry. Come on. It’s over. It’s over.’

He wanted to run to the deer, but his father was holding him. Then he saw the men come out of the woods at the foot of the hill, their rifles over their shoulders, and he was overwhelmed with rage.

‘Papa!’ he screamed. ‘Are they allowed to do that? Do they have the right?’

‘Yes.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.