“Don’t worry, we won’t stay long. I see you’ve taken away the big painting. How come?”
“Just like that, no reason.”
Antoine checks out Frédéric discreetly, a little bit at a time. This is the man who spends his nights with his son. The man Jonathan loves. A man dressed like a teenager, who must spend hours in a gym. He knows that they’re the same age, but Frédéric is far from showing his. Not a trace of grey in his short, brown hair. A face with no apparent wrinkles, freshly shaved, almost aglow in the living room’s dull light.
“Are you listening?”
Antoine, deep in thought, has lost the thread of the conversation.
“You were saying?”
“I was telling you that Frédéric would like to talk to you about something.”
The two men look at each other.
“And what would that be?”
“Your wife’s novel. Here’s my idea: to adapt A Pure Heart for the movies. This story of love betrayed has tremendous potential. Alice Livingston had a good instinct in presenting this idea of purity of heart. But adapting it for the screen would require, how shall I say, a certain amplification … a dramatization that gives more importance to the visual … I’m thinking in particular of the end of the novel.”
“Tell him about Carrie.”
“Let me talk, Jonathan.”
“But tell him about Carrie, it would be simpler.”
“Okay. You must know Carrie, Monsieur Ste-Marie? A film that was a huge success, adapted from Stephen King’s novel. At first glance, there doesn’t seem to be any connection between Carrie and A Pure Heart. But when you think about it, it’s obvious. Stephen King gives you an adolescent persecuted by her puritan mother, who is obsessed with religion. Carrie, like Philippe, represents the story’s pure heart. A heart that is being betrayed, humiliated, abused. Everyone remembers the famous scene where Carrie has a pail full of pig’s blood poured over her head. The idea I’ve had is to make Philippe a kind of male Carrie. So imagine that the Saint-Jean-Vianney mudslide is due not to a natural catastrophe, but to a supernatural catastrophe. It’s Philippe’s anger, his rage, his need for revenge that triggers the destruction of the village.”
“Yes,” Jonathan goes on, “imagine that Philippe has destructive psychic powers like Carrie’s. Copying her, he manipulates objects from a distance. He makes windows shatter, rips houses from their foundations, twists lampposts out of shape, destroys streets and sidewalks, and wipes Saint-Jean-Vianney off the map. Can you picture it?”
“I think Jonathan would be perfect to play the part of Philippe. What do you say?”
He waits for an answer from Antoine that doesn’t come.
“A few weeks ago, I made a call to your wife’s publisher. He seemed thrilled by my project. He told me that I ought to talk to you, because it’s you who holds the rights for now. He needs your consent for my idea to go forward.”
Antoine doesn’t react. He retreats into his silence. He doesn’t understand what they are doing in his house.
Destructive powers, his son in the role of Philippe in a film – none of it makes sense. Jonathan approaches his father and bends over him until their faces are almost touching.
“You don’t seem well,” he whispers. “Is it Frédéric’s proposal that’s the problem? You wouldn’t like to see me playing the role of Philippe? It might bring back happy memories. So, will you give Frédéric your consent?”
“You think I’d like to see myself playing a bastard on a big screen?”
“Mama’s portrait of you in your youth is a good likeness.”
“Your mother invented everything.”
“Me, I recognized you, and that helped me understand a lot of things about you.”
“It’s a novel, Jonathan.”
“You haven’t changed with the years.”
“I don’t get what you’re trying to say.”
“Do you want me to refresh your memory?”
“Shut up! I’m asking you very calmly.”
“You’re afraid I’m going to talk in front of Frédéric? Don’t worry, he knows already.”
“He knows what?”
“Your little games.”
“You loved me like that, have you forgotten?”
“I was six years old!”
“Get out of here, both of you! Leave! You aren’t going to turn my life into something out of Stephen King!”
“I don’t care about the film. You want to know the truth? I didn’t come here to talk about cinema. Even less to wish you a Happy New Year and celebrate the new millennium with you. I want you to tell me what was in your mind when you slipped into my bed. Don’t you have anything to say about that, Papa? You with your theories about everything, explain to us why a father abuses his child. Explain to us what leads him to corrupt that child, to rob him of his innocence. Frédéric and I, we’re going to drink in your words. There must be a reason, a logic, something that escapes most people – but surely not you. Come on, get out of your chair and give us a lecture on the subject. What are you waiting for? Are you embarrassed? Is it because your pyjamas are stained and wrinkled? Might you be ashamed of yourself?”
Jonathan grabs his arms and forces him up. Antoine stands in the middle of the room, his face haggard.
“Tell Frédéric what you did to me. Show him your moves. That will help him to imagine the only true film he dreams of making. Recite the beautiful words you used to make me accept your way of loving me. Have you forgotten them? Talk!”
Antoine tries to say something. The words are stuck in his throat. He has trouble breathing. Sweat is running down his face. An unbearable pain courses through his body. He brings his hand to his heart.
“Jonathan, help me …”
As soon as he has finished reading Alice’s manuscript, Louis-Martin calls her to set up a meeting. The next day, Alice takes a deep breath and walks determinedly into her publisher’s office. Louis-Martin greets her in his usual manner, that of a man
