Excerpt from the novel “Blue”

Efterpie Araouzou

The ghost of Elizabeth d’Esperance, holding a volume of the Occulta Philosophia of Heinrich Cornelius Agrippa von Nettelsheim, followed by other ghosts bearing names such as Olga, Pupa, Mina, as well as by the ghost of Lola Montez, sometime mistress of King Ludovic of Bavaria, noiselessly crossed the streets of the Champs Elysées and Faubourg Saint Honoré, leaving behind them a faint rustling, like sheets drying in the breeze. At exactly six in the afternoon, the ghosts arrived at the Ritz on  Place  Vendôme. With light movements and without creating strong draughts and unnecessary commotion, as less sophisticated ghosts would have done and to the inarticulate notes of some distant violin, the ghost of Elizabeth d’Esperance and her entourage, entered the suite of Ambroise de Laon, who stank of vodka, like the muzzle of a cat reeks of tinned meat.

Ambroise de Laon was sitting in a green velvet armchair, his eyes covered with a black handkerchief, two lit candles in champagne glasses on the table in front of him. With both hands spread on the table, one of them looked bigger than the other, perhaps the result of some inner struggle. His chin was trembling, if you looked at it closely, waiting to hear some unhoped-for truth. The ghosts clapped their pale palms  to make their presence felt, while the room filled with meaningless  echoes of some sort of human conversation, laughter, sudden cries of sorrow or joy. Soon all these sounds however were  muffled by the silk-covered walls and everything vanished as suddenly as it had begun. All was now quiet again. A womb of ideas.

Ambroise de Laon raised his head, removing the black handkerchief from his eyes. He lowered his arched eyebrows. He sat erect in his chair. He did not appear surprised by this supernatural hubbub.

The opposite, rather.

With slow, careful movements, sliding his hands methodically on the table, he began to draw strange hieroglyphic runes, calligraphy shapes of unknown origin. Who was the girl he had met yesterday evening outside the Gare de Lyon, was his first question. The one with the dishevelled hair, as if she had just emerged from some nightmare still reflecting its dark shadow over her blue eyes.

The ghost of Elizabeth d’Esperance raised it’s  arms  causing rhythmical tremors on the table, evidently comprehended  by Ambroise de Laon, who nodded his head in affirmation.

No one knew her name. Those few  who knew her called her Blue. Because of the colour of her eyes. No one had much to say about Blue. A few years ago she was living with her father in a filthy flat in Montmartre. In order to earn some money, her father hired her body to wandering artists. They plunged  some thin sticks similar to those of the Japanese Mikado game into diluted henna and  etched with them strange marks resembling disorderly spiders on her naked body. She hated  this, it hurt, Blue dared tell her father. In response, he  pierced her body  with the same sticks, bent over her, eyes glazed  with passion and  kissed the blood of her wounds. Then he went to the tavern next door, while Blue writhed in pain, naked on the grimy kitchen table. To forget the blood oozing from her wounds Blue grabbed some old books from the shelves and with her face buried in the yellowed pages smelling of mildew and mouse droppings, read until her lids dropped over her blue eyes as the  sand covers the  sea with the ebbing tide.  Ever since then, whenever the failed artists etched disorderly spiders’ marks on her naked  body,  Blue grabbed a book. She immersed herself in reading.

Until the blood on her wounds dried out.

One day, Blue, her mind dazed with ideas which she had dug up from the yellowed pages of the books, decided that she wanted to write her own book too.

What is a book?

A great thought scattered over many pages, replied a painter, Jean, with a dash of cheap wine  in his breath.

So  she would write her own book. She would collect her own great thought.

She threw some things into a scuffed bag and began to do whatever work she could to survive. Fortunately, her father was permanently too drunk to look for her. So, she began her studies undisturbed.

She rented a cheap room on the left bank of the Seine, doing odd jobs when and where she could. She read until   late at night with a break from time to time to jot down her dreams and fragmented messages of a subconscious source on the blank pages of her exercise book. All is in  vain, she wrote and rewrote,  until the first rays of the sun squeezed through the skylight of her room. In her little free time, she frequented ill-reputed bars and arty cafés that  smelt as strange as  holy relics.

To collect a great thought called a book, she replied once to a passer- by who asked her why she was lying down   with her eyes wide open on the wet parapet of the Petit Pont.

She rolled her own cigarettes spent hours discussing with strangers and acquaintances questions to which there were no answers. There is only one answer. Blue understood this in time. She wrote the answer on one of the yellow papers in which she rolled the tobacco for her cigarettes and having curled it into a tiny ball, popped it into her mouth. She chewed it carefully, taking pains to mix it well with her saliva so she would digest it better.

Death.

Ah, yes. And something else. There was no sign of a mother. This was strange. All the ghosts joined forces to try to find out something more but they were unsuccessful. As if the Devil had given birth to her naked and grown-up on the dirty kitchen table.

This was all they knew. They had to go. They could not stay here for long. It would soon be dawn.

One more question. The last one.

Ambroise de Laon’s hands glided now with great agitation over the table as if they no longer belonged to him but were guided by some uncontrollable supernatural power.

Does happiness exist?

The ghost of Elizabeth d’Esperance opened the volume of Occulta Philosophia on her knee. The other ghosts stood around to attention, while Ambroise de Laon waited anxiously for the answer.

The next morning, as the  residents of the hotel were having their breakfast off starched tablecloths  each decorated with a pink rose, coffee, frothy milk and croissants, wondered if others too have heard strange noises in the night.

However, no one could say for sure.

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