His mother approached him, muttering, “Everything alright, son?” With one gesture, Philippe commanded her not to come any closer, to keep her distance. The father and mother exchanged glances. Was their son sick? Mad? He was scarily pale. He had the same look as on the morning of July 14th, 1993, when they had taken him to the scene of the tragedy. He’d aged by twenty years.
“What the hell were you doing at the château on the evening of the fire?”
The father glanced at the mother, waiting for permission to reply. But as usual, it she was the one who spoke. With the voice of a victim, of the nice little girl she had never been.
“Armelle and Jean-Louis Caussin met us in the village of La Clayette before dropping off Catherine . . . that is, Léonine, and Anaïs at the château. We said we’d meet them in a café, we did nothing wrong.”
“But what the hell were you doing over there?”
“We were at a wedding in the Midi, you know, your cousin Laurence . . . we made the most of the drive back to Charleville by visiting Burgundy.”
“You have never made the most of anything, NEVER. I want the truth.”
The mother hesitated before replying, setting her lips and breathing in deeply. Philippe stopped her immediately:
“Do me a favor, don’t start sniveling.”
Never had her son spoken to her like this. The polite, well brought up boy, who said: “Yes, Mommy,” “No, Mommy,” “O.K., Mommy,” was well and truly dead. He had started to disappear when he had lost his daughter. He had completely disappeared once he had buried himself with Violette. Philippe had warned them, “I forbid you from setting foot in the cemetery, I don’t want you bumping into Violette.”
Before the tragedy, the only times he had disobeyed his mother were when he went on holiday with her brother Luc and his young wife, whose skirts were far too short. Philippe had always been drawn to lower-class women. Girls, bottom-of-the-range, the gutter.
Chantal Toussaint’s voice regained its hard, unforgiving tone. That of a prosecutor.
“I had arranged to meet the Caussins because I wished to see what your wife had put into the suitcase of our granddaughter. To ensure that nothing was missing. I didn’t want her to feel ashamed in front of her friends. Your wife was young and Catherine was too often neglected . . . Her long nails, dirty ears, stained or shrunken clothes . . . it made me sick.”
“You’re talking rubbish! Violette looked after our daughter very well! Her name was Léonine! Do you hear me?! Léonine!”
Awkwardly and roughly, she refastened her dressing gown.
“Armelle Caussin opened the trunk of her car, I checked the contents of the suitcase, while the girls played in the shade, near your father and Jean-Louis. There were plenty of things missing, and I had to throw away her cheap or worn clothes, replace them with new ones.”
Philippe imagined his mother calling Armelle Caussin on a false pretext and rifling through his daughter’s little dresses. This right to interfere that she’d always claimed disgusted him. He felt like strangling this woman who had made him despise others. She lowered her eyes to avoid seeing the look of hatred he was directing at her.
“At around 4 P.M., the Caussins left for the château with the children. Your father and I didn’t want to start driving back to Charleville before nightfall, because of the heat. We decided to stay in the village. We returned to the café for a bite to eat. When I went to the restroom, I saw Léonine’s doudou next to the sink. I knew she couldn’t fall asleep without it.”
Chantal Toussaint grimaced.
“It was filthy . . . I washed it with soap and water—in the heat it would dry fast.”
She went to sit down on the sofa, as if the words were too heavy a burden. Her husband followed her, like a faithful mutt expecting a reward, a look, a sign of affection, which would never come.
“We entered the castle without any difficulty: no one around, no supervision, doors wide open. Léonine happened to be behind the first door we opened. She was already in bed. She was surprised to see us. When she saw her rabbit sticking out of my handbag, she smiled and discreetly grabbed it so the other girls wouldn’t see her. She must have looked everywhere for it, unable to say anything for fear of being made fun of.”
The mother started sobbing. Her husband slipped an arm around her shoulders, she slowly pushed it away; used to this, he withdrew it.
“I asked the girls if they would like me to tell them a story. They said yes. I read them a Grimm fairy tale, Tom Thumb. They all fell asleep straight away. Before leaving, I kissed my granddaughter one last time.”
“And the water heater?!” Philippe screamed.
His parents, in tears, cowered pitifully before their son’s rage.
“What do you mean, water heater, what water heater?” his mother finally muttered between sobs.
“The one in the bathroom! In the room, there was a bathroom! And a fucking water heater! Was it you who touched it?!”
The father opened his mouth for the first time and let out, with a sigh:
“Oh, that . . . ”
At that moment, Philippe would have given anything for him to say nothing, as usual. Or say a prayer, any one. But for one hour, just one hour, the man had felt useful in his wife’s life, instead of just hanging around, waiting for her to finish reading the story of Tom Thumb.
“Your mother asked Léonine whether she was sure she’d brushed her teeth before going to bed, she said yes, but another girl told us that no hot water came out of the tap, that the cold water had hurt her teeth. Your mother asked me to have a quick look, and indeed, I saw that the water heater was switched off, so I . . . ”
Philippe fell to his knees in front of his
