faldoni
eric chevillard
Translated from the French by Brian Evenson
—Excuse me, sir, would you agree to take our picture? Saying this, they hold the
camera out to him.
—No.
That’s Faldoni.
Then he continues his interrupted movement. His left hand grasps the iron rod.
The right vigorously works the crank. What do you think he’s doing? What do you
want him, Faldoni, to be doing? He is lowering his metal roll shutters. He puts all
his heart into it. Not the sort to opt for automatic shutters, Faldoni. He insists on
accomplishing the maneuver himself. All that iron which he extracts from on high,
it’s tremendous.
Later, he is seen again. Faldoni walks with baby steps in the square, not far
from his shop. He holds in his hand a plastic bag, white. One wonders what is inside.
Faldoni is wearing a pullover made of light brown wool, seemingly faded, beige to be
completely frank. And dark pants, a little roomy, which pool against his shoes. He’s
a rather corpulent man, Faldoni. A small, rather corpulent man. The pullover fits his
figure tightly: his preadolescent breasts, his excessive stomach. His belly button also
stands in relief, amazingly. His head is that of a mastiff. There is a certain placidity
to Faldoni. He wears glasses with thin frames. But the lenses are slightly tinted. He
has real jowls. Take a look at that buffoon.
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Faldoni has stopped, there, just in front of us. Maybe around sixty years old. He
is no doubt younger, but he seems older. Sixty is a happy medium. Brown hair going
gray, thinning, combed back, plastered to his skull. Would there be a Mrs. Faldoni?
He seems to be waiting for someone. Poor Mrs. Faldoni!
Flabby statue in the middle of the square, Faldoni. From where he is, he can see
his shop. Double window-front, to either side of the door. Double metal roll shutters.
Faldoni’s Place. A tourist comes up to ask him the time. But Faldoni has his hands in
his pockets. And then, this tourist could have had a watch. That’s Faldoni.
The plastic bag hanging from his wrist dangles down the length of his leg. It
seems heavy, this plastic bag, white. Heavy and quite full. What is inside? Nobody
really cares. Are you going to make a character out of Faldoni? The wrinkles running
from the corners of his mouth extend the malicious curve of his lips. He’s a miserable
character. Chubby and miserable. He is shod in large dark shoes, without any other
characteristics. The elemental shoe. The biped’s first idea. Just a base for Faldoni.
No adjective more out of place than stylish to sketch this character. Elegant would
also clash nastily with his appearance. The round neck of the beige pullover lets the
collar of a blue shirt appear, as well as the knot of a black tie. Faldoni! The curve
of his skull begins at the arch of the eyebrows. The forehead doesn’t stand in its
way. The nose is at once strong and turned up. A spud-trumpet. All this isn’t very
fortunate. One judges that Faldoni is hardly concerned with his appearance. His
charm lies elsewhere. No one knows where.
Worry about his appearance is one less worry for Faldoni, who is a worried man.
His placidity shouldn’t deceive us on this point. Faldoni knows anxiety and doubt. He
shifts his balance, one leg then the other. Imperceptibly, Faldoni dances. We restrain
ourselves from applauding. (No need to tie our hands behind our backs.) It’s a sign of
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uneasiness, however, or anguish. Something is working away at the fat man. A black
worm is gnawing the Faldoni fruit.
Why this bitter grin? His face has sagged like a body whose knees first gave
way, then the shoulders. Faldoni carries weight. He is heavy. He isn’t only ballasted
by his weight. From time to time he moves. He takes a step to the side. He moves in
slow motion. He slips in glue. Unquestionably, there is something of the gastropod in
Faldoni.
He has removed his hands from his pockets. The plastic bag, with its mysterious
contents, rests against his stomach. One can’t stop oneself from putting forward
hypotheses. What is Faldoni looking at? Another subject for question and debate. On
his tinted glasses are reflected the double iron roll shutters of his shop. It is perhaps
thus that he sees himself. Contemplative, with dead eyes.
Faldoni brings Loqueteau to mind a little bit, for those who knew him. Loqueteau
had the same general appearance as Faldoni. But first of all, Loqueteau has been dead
for a good fifteen years now. Second, Loqueteau was the salt of the earth. This takes
nothing away from their likeness. Whoever knew Loqueteau will be reminded of
Loqueteau in seeing Faldoni. But will we be many in this case, those who having
known Loqueteau encounter Faldoni? Loqueteau, like Faldoni, wasn’t very energetic.
Only great travelers will have had the chance to cross Loqueteau’s path and then
Faldoni’s. The two roads of sand and mud lead to these two sticks-in-the-mud. But
how not to prefer Loqueteau? Faldoni immediately inspires antipathy. It’s a gift, a
grace. There’s nothing to be done about that.
A couple of foreign tourists approach him in the square. The man unfurls a map
under his eyes. With emphatic gestures, the woman tries to make herself understood.
It is clear that they are asking their way. It is bad to experience Faldoni. Loqueteau
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in similar circumstances would have given his help with attentiveness, misgivings,
and confusion. Of that one can be sure. For those who are still looking for differences
between Loqueteau and Faldoni, here’s one of them. Loqueteau was kindness itself:
gruff, sheepish, a little dopey. Faldoni doesn’t bother to respond to the little couple.
It’s as if he hasn’t seen them. All they have to do is learn the language, these two. And
anyway Faldoni doesn’t really like to be mistaken for the office of tourism. He slowly
looks away. Here’s his profile. At least there is no risk of seeing the other side while
this one is displayed. But that’s really the only satisfaction that this sight gives.
Do his friends dub him Faldo? His friends! Why not also his lovers?!
We are speaking of Faldoni: neither friends nor lovers. Poor Mrs. Faldoni!
What is he thinking of? Because Faldoni is thinking. At the least he is thinking
about something. It is a thought that darkens that head, that obliterates it. But is it a
torment or a dream? In the end, there is much mystery to Faldoni. This might only
be denseness, the opacity of a dirty windowpane. That bag, however: there really is
something inside.
At once massive, static and blurred, cloudy, Faldoni. One might see him scatter
without surprise. For now he stays standing there, immobile as a milestone. His face
hardly changes expression, frozen in disgust and refusal.
—No.
That’s Faldoni’s brief speech.
His beige pullover is really too tight for him. Did he buy it too small? Has he
swollen within it? We observe Faldoni and new questions endlessly come to us. He
pivots on his hips: here he is again facing his shop. You don’t dare think that he is
there on guard duty, as a sentinel, that he’s keeping watch over it. As if those double
iron flat-faced roll shutters weren’t defending it enough. Against what? In any case,
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against the untimely intrusion of customers. One cannot deny it, Faldoni touches a
certain form of perfection. Faldoni, to the tips of his podgy fingers and better than
even Loqueteau, embodies Faldoni. All perfection is fragile, there is almost nothing
to it. One word too many and everything comes apart.
At the end of his arm hangs the white plastic bag whose folds conceal the shape
that it contains. You won’t say as much for Faldoni in his beige pullover. You will
say the opposite, without lying. His beige pullover hides nothing of Faldoni. It’s
unfortunate. This beige or beigish wool could be Faldoni’s own pelt. His drab and
short-haired coat. Nothing left to shear to clothe those who are naked. Not a twig for
the nest. That said, hard to imagine angora Faldoni. Merino, vicuña or mink Faldoni
is improbable. His beige pullover is a sheath, a scabbard, a special Faldoni case. His
beige pullover is Faldoni’s mossy bark. His beige pullover is Faldoni’s fluffy skin.
A beige pullover that must be completely stretched out. Shapeless. Absurd without
Faldoni inside it. What became of the pullovers of Loqueteau, now dead? The question
is posed. Where did Loqueteau’s pullovers go? It would be a godsend for Faldoni to
get his hands on that wardrobe. And, for Loqueteau’s beige or beigish pullovers, a
second life.
Faldoni lifts his chin slightly. One won’t go so far as to say that he sniffs the good
sun. Why not also squat down to smell a little flower? Faldoni! Fat man, hands once
again in the bottoms of his pockets. Flabby statue, Loqueteau knock-off. Hostile.
Poor Mrs. Faldoni! It is not known if she exists, but how she is pitied! One would
like to be able to smile at her kindly. Suddenly, one wonders how Faldoni would react
if one among us approached him calmly and hugged him. Placed by surprise a kiss
on his cheek. Lightly tickled the nape of his neck. Slid a soft hand beneath the beige
pullover. Any volunteers?
We are forced to note that our searching looks hardly bother Faldoni. He persists
in his being with astonishing unconcern. Our eyes, which would like to annihilate
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him, don’t even manage to irritate him as much as flies would. He would instead swell
up, Faldoni. It is an understatement to say that he doesn’t collapse. He obstructs. One
sees only him.
Loqueteau was no doubt less compact, less opaque than Faldoni. Loqueteau was
closer to whipped cream, cheese soufflé, there was wind in him, flight. But he didn’t
take off. There was also some Faldoni in him, enough to ballast him. But Loqueteau
was a limpid pool compared to Faldoni. You saw to the bottom of him. He didn’t have
a plastic bag. Would that it were only that. He wasn’t a secretive man. Shortish, yes.
But as if naked. Wholly offered to our gaze. All ivory. He hid nothing from us.
What exactly do we know about Faldoni? Would we say for example that he is an
honest shopkeeper? That would be promising a lot. But he is well established, to that
we can attest. His name spreads across the pediment of his shop. All the same you
wonder if it isn’t dirty money from some trafficking with which he has filled his bag.
You would hardly be surprised to see this sack pass gently into the hands of a graycheeked henchman. Let’s stay alert. Or else, then, it’s the head of Mrs. Faldoni. The
head of poor Mrs. Faldoni. Bagged up. Whereas to our knowledge there never was
a Mrs. Loqueteau. Poor Mrs. Loqueteau. She might, though, have been very happy
with that dear Loqueteau.
Why did Faldoni kill his wife? Ha! Will the Faldoni enigma one day be penetrated?
What eye would be shrewd enough to bore to the heart of the adipose bulk? And
what eye patient enough to stroll through it? What eye would like to give him all its
blue, all its black, and no longer open itself except for him?
Sometimes, you believe you have hold of Faldoni, and then that’s it. He gives way.
A person this imposing, who would have believed it? A will-o’-the-wisp! Dugong,
manatee, sperm whale, hippopotamus or walrus, Faldoni. Here are the comparisons
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that come to us, preceded by a loud lapping sound. He’s an eel! All his fat is only suet.
Faldoni slips between the fingers. All his being insensibly tossed around, constant
evasion. Slippery Faldoni, elusive Faldoni. Water, sand, a dreaming, Faldoni, a dream.
We are going to wake up, red and sweaty, strangled by the sheet.
Like a ball of yarn beneath the paw of a cat. Faldoni. One hundred and twelve
kilos of beige or beigish wool slipping away. Loqueteau, you could shake his hand.
The sweat at the joints of his digits was a solid paste. You held to it. The difficulty,
rather, was to then regain your freedom.
Ah! but you would like to lay into him with your fists, this flat slob! Faldoni!
Who is now pretending to be smoke, evanescent steam. Look at that rogue manner.
That weary arrogance. That mastiff ’s head. That belly: you would like to lay into it
with you fists. Aim for Faldoni’s liver, Faldoni’s spleen, Faldoni’s stomach. Hit, hit,
from the right, from the left, into Faldoni’s fat. Annihilate this rascal. Skin him alive.
Burst that goatskin. Squash that shit. Bust Faldoni open. He really killed his wife.
Simple working hypothesis, okay. But the bag. There is still the bag. Isn’t that a clue,
that, the bag?
Faldoni takes a few steps. Thanks for distracting us a little. Then he returns to
his place. That’s it for action.
Loqueteau moved more. Don’t get me wrong, Loqueteau wasn’t a piece of living
theater either. There was flabbiness to Loqueteau as well, a laziness of muscle and
bone. Consciousness aware at each instant of the weight of the body. But sometimes
Loqueteau’s eyelid unquestionably blinked. We saw on several occasions a smile make
its knifelike way through the squid-like flesh of his lips. We saw his big fingers play
with a pencil. Loqueteau had a gift for movement. While Faldoni could just as easily
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roll along, carried forward down the slope. Or moved by a sudden whirlwind. Then,
momentum broken, regain his initial position, there, before us.
This man is born of a woman. It is hardly to be believed. Was a child. Skipped.
Faldoni! Nonsense! Faldoni has always been there. It is his place. He is too well
ensconced to be a passing thing. At this place in space, there is Faldoni.
An accident on the surface of the globe, like a mountain, Faldoni. He will not
grow older, will not become wizened, will not shrivel up. His bones are not among
those which will end up underground. They are already interred, uselessly scattered
within Faldoni. Mountain, no: mountain is to dream of peaks and chamois, to touch
the sky, we lose our way in those altitudes. Heap says all there is to say about Faldoni.
Heap names the thing. Faldoni? A heap. Large of hip and belly, narrow shouldered,
topped with a head which is shrinking, Faldoni. Collapsed pyramid. A heap, but a
coherent heap, homogenous, not a heap of loose stuff, of various things. Of Faldoni.
Of Faldoni piled there.
Because here is Faldoni: covered with Faldoni, lined with Faldoni, stuffed with
Faldoni. No other substance, no other material: 100% Faldoni. You would swear that
his pockets too are full of Faldoni. He was a clay, a paste or a glue the source of which
is now dried up, the lode exhausted. Faldoni soaked up the last drop of the puddle
to become Faldoni. At the thought of all that might have been done of use with this
soft and ductile material, we wring our hands. We weep in silence. Imagine someone
who would have confiscated this rubber. It’s a pity, decidedly. There was something
there to get the town dancing. We find ourselves with this fat man. This nodding
elephant.
Suddenly we know why we’ve dragged this quiver around since childhood. We
know why we trained ourselves to hurl knives every night in dreams. And why we
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didn’t miss any saber lessons, any tiger lessons. Something in us had been warned.
One day, there would be Faldoni, there, before us. One day it would be our big crisis.
That’s what happened. We had a premonition, yes. Sir was announced. He didn’t have
to appear suddenly. He was there.
We opened our eyes, he was there. Faldoni in person. Not even Loqueteau.
Faldoni. He was there like an armoire is there. Inevitable. Bulging with Faldoni,
stitched up with Faldoni. Full to bursting with Faldoni. For whom all this Faldoni?
For Faldoni! And for whom Faldoni? Poor us!
We don’t want any. Sooner two Loqueteaus than one Faldoni. You should be
able to live with two Loqueteaus there before you. You can’t imagine such a thing
possible for long with a Faldoni. Sooner two big gray velour Loqueteaus than one
beige knitted Faldoni. Sooner three, four Loqueteaus. A thousand Loqueteaus, okay,
okay, if you remove Faldoni and his white plastic bag.
He won’t leave by himself. He takes a few steps sometimes, as if to give us hope.
Then comes back to stand squarely there before us. Here is one of his secrets: his two
legs are four paws.
Without lying, it now seems to us that Faldoni exceeds Faldoni. Neither eruption
nor flood however. Rather an oozing, a Faldoni coulis. It is an exudation of his whole
body. Faldoni beads like sweat on Faldoni’s skin, on Faldoni’s wool. Nothing better
will ever come from the fellow. We would in addition be quite naïve to wait for
something else. It’s a permanent suppuration. Will Faldoni end up by emptying
himself of Faldoni? Is he in the process of ridding himself of himself?
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We are dreaming, my friends. Faldoni secretes Faldoni. Faldoni is very pleased
to be Faldoni. And adds to it. Faldoni incarnates the joy of being Faldoni. The glory
of being Faldoni. All his person says I am Faldoni. And says only that. Has never said
anything else. But repeats it without let-up, without weariness, infinitely.
Faldoni
Faldoni Faldoni
Faldoni Faldoni Faldoni
Faldoni Faldoni
Faldoni
Faldoni
Someone in this world exults in being Faldoni. And this is, of course, Faldoni.
Which is not our business. There before us Faldoni puffs out his breast. He purrs
with pleasure. Do you realize? It’s him, Faldoni! He dreams of a cow’s tongue. Large
as a hand and long as an arm. To lick himself all over, on all his surfaces. And in
the folds, the double-folds, in the holes. Faldoni would like to be able to suck himself
like a candy. To roll in his saliva. To know the moist and warm caress of his mouth,
cradle of his mucous. You imagine Faldoni to be still very eager for Faldoni. Never
full, never replete. Faldoni. Always a craving for Faldoni.
Faldoni made but a mouthful of Faldoni. Like the serpent did the rat. Swallowed
round, Faldoni, who gave his shape to Faldoni. Alas! But one feels something like
a regret perhaps, there. Faldoni blames himself for his voraciousness. Today he
wouldn’t act like that. He has become more of a gourmet. Each day a new little morsel
of Faldoni. A Faldoni aiguillette. Chewed at length, pressed between the tongue and
the palate to squeeze out all the juice, a thimbleful of Faldoni. Slice after slice, fillet
after fillet, strand after strand, to make this culinary delight last as long as life itself.
This is how Faldoni would savor Faldoni today.
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Let’s not deceive ourselves, there is still passion in him. No question of attacking
the feast with a winkle pick and a mocha spoon. Faldoni didn’t let those nasty little
pointed teeth of his grow for nothing. How willingly he would sink them into the fat
of his thigh! And how he would tear apart his sides! How he would devour his own
stomach! And how round his calves are!
Faldoni nourishes a visible passion for Faldoni. Faldoni adores Faldoni. Never
would Faldoni have loved Loqueteau as he loves Faldoni, for instance. He is his little
Faldoni, his sweet Faldoni, his dear Faldoni. Privately no doubt Faldoni calls himself
my little hen, my duckling. He calls himself Darling, Baby. Faldo-Faldo.
His eyes never leave his shop for long. But it’s from not knowing how to direct
them as he pleases. And never to look elsewhere than into himself anymore. Nothing
fascinates Faldoni but the spectacle of Faldoni. To be physically in the impossibility
of seeing inside himself is true suffering for Faldoni. A heartbreak. Something
dreadful. It’s like a mourning, a separation. It is to be a bit deprived of Faldoni. But
we can’t understand. Faldoni would live so happily in the contemplation of Faldoni’s
organs. He would pay richly for a glance at the lungs, the liver, the stomach and the
spleen of Faldoni. He is reduced like other observers to making out the hypertrophic,
tuberculous bulks, burgeoning under the beige wool. Unlike us, however, he has the
opportunity to follow their contours with the flat of his hand. Happy man. He doesn’t
deprive himself. He palpates them with the ends of his fingers, he masturbates them.
He pats them like a child’s cheeks.
But Faldoni would prefer to be in our place. Our gaze embraces his person. Let’s
say rather that our gaze includes him. (Not everything holds up.) Quite willingly,
quite willingly, we would yield our place to him. But then we would find ourselves
occupying his. And it would still be for us the impregnable view of Faldoni. Oh,
despair is never far away.
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Pigeons wander about in the square around Faldoni. They look like him. The
same family of oafs, of louts, of klutzes. More gastropodal than the gastropods. We
recall having seen snails and slugs on spindly stalks.
Faldoni rapidly half-opens his white plastic bag. He verifies the presence of an
object within. He seems reassured. Poor Mrs. Faldoni! We know it, this banal white
plastic bag doesn’t fool us, Faldoni is hiding something from us. Something else as
well: what is behind Faldoni? We must have seen what he hides from us today. It was
so long ago. A monument? An ocean? The unobstructed horizon? We have forgotten.
Faldoni is the only landscape. He is to the left, he is to the right, he is at the center of
everything. He sometimes has, in addition, a small, satisfied smile.
Loqueteau wasn’t as intrusive. Unquestionably, Loqueteau took up space.
Loqueteau could also happen to block our view. We still had the sky. We felt for
Loqueteau a tender and mocking compassion. We laughed among ourselves about
the excessive protuberance of his genital apparatus within his pants. When they
perform an autopsy on his cadaver, they will find a bone there, joked Pommard. It
was quite frightening. From this perspective, Faldoni makes less of an impression.
His pants are large, his proturberant belly intervenes. One doesn’t see much. Must
one however consider the existence of a progeny? A population of young Faldonis
procreating in their turn new Faldonis, can one believe it? Boys and girls—girls!—of
all ages, formed in the image of their father. Poor Mrs. Faldoni!
There isn’t however room for two Faldonis. No, one truly doesn’t see how another
Faldoni would hold out there, next to Faldoni. Should one rejoice over this? Two
Faldonis would be able to confront each other. Fratricidal war which would be just
what we need. They would weaken one another. They would perhaps kill each other.
Imagine what layer of softness and joy would spread over the bodies of two Faldonis
lying on the tiles. Unless they didn’t fight, but got married. Suctioned together by
the side. Unless they made a bloc. Faldoni plus Faldoni. Double buttocks of Faldoni,
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double belly of Faldoni, double head of Faldoni. Double fat double. Double curse.
Have mercy!
The police do nothing, the army does nothing, the church does nothing, the
medical profession does nothing. The lumberjacks do nothing, the garbagemen do
nothing, the laborers do nothing. Faldoni remains, imperishable, rotproof. There,
before us. Sometimes, the flabby statue trembles slightly on its base. An internal
laugh perhaps moves it. Faldoni wriggles imperceptibly. Is he laughing at us? Is he
instead rejoicing in thinking of the contents of the plastic bag? Provisions for his
dinner or something else? What? Pastry? Hardware? Lingerie? A thought, friends,
for Mrs. Faldoni.
Faldoni attracts, inhales, absorbs the surroundings. If we stand up to leave, we
could be swallowed up. Assimilated. End up in the amalgam. It’s a risk that we know
not to run, no? At the idea of that dreadful blending, all within us retracts. Contorts.
Instead, stay here endlessly. Unmoving, to the end. Before oneself, Faldoni.
Or is it the end already? Are we already at the end? Is it because we are at the end
that Faldoni is there? Would this end be Faldoni? Is there nothing behind, nothing
after Faldoni? For the first time our gaze crosses his. We weren’t mistaken. A cruel
smile notifies us of this. We don’t dare to turn around. Behind us, also, already, is
Faldoni. No more steppes, no more desert without Faldoni. To close our eyes? Don’t
dream of it! It is to make him come beneath your eyelids. The entire mass of Faldoni
squashed into your skull. Instead, look at him head on. And fall silent. How did we
not think of that sooner? Perhaps Faldoni will disappear if we fall silent? We have to
attempt everything. Let’s try.
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