Arch of Triumph Read Online Free PDF Page B

There were two beds in the room; in the one next to the wall, the body of the man was lying. He lay there yellow and stiff, with curled black hair, in red silk pajamas. His hands were folded; a small cheap wooden Madonna on whose face were traces of lipstick stood on the table beside him. Ravic picked it up—on its back was stamped “Made in Germany.” Ravic examined theface of the dead man; there was no rouge on his lips nor did he seem to have been that type. The eyes were half open; one more than the other, which gave the body an expression of indifference, as if it had grown stiff in eternal boredom.
    Ravic bent over the corpse. He took stock of the bottles on the table near the bed and examined the body. No trace of violence. He drew himself up. “Do you know the name of the doctor who was here?” he asked the woman.
    “No.”
    He looked at her. She was very pale. “First of all you sit down over there. On that chair in the corner. And stay there. Is the waiter who called the doctor for you here?”
    His eyes skimmed over the faces at the door. There was the same expression on each of them: horror and greed. “François was on this floor,” said the charwoman, who was holding a broom like a spear in her hand.
    “Where is François?”
    A waiter pushed his way through the crowd. “What was the name of the doctor who was here?”
    “Bonnet. Charles Bonnet.”
    “Do you know his telephone number?”
    The waiter fumbled for it in his pockets. “Passy 2743.”
    “Good.” Ravic saw the face of the patron emerging from the crowd. “Let’s close the door first. Or do you want the people from the street to come in, too?”
    “No! Get out! Get out! Why do you stand around here stealing my time for which you get paid?”
    The patron chased the employees out of the room and closed the door. Ravic took the receiver from the hook. He called Veber and talked to him for a short while. Then he called the Passy number. Bonnet was in his consultation room. He confirmed what thewoman had said. “The man has died,” Ravic said. “Could you come over and make out the death certificate?”
    “That man threw me out in the most insulting manner.”
    “He can’t very well insult you now.”
    “He didn’t pay my fee. Instead he called me an avaricious quack.”
    “Would you come so that your bill can be paid?”
    “I could send someone.”
    “You’d better come yourself. Otherwise you will never get your money.”
    “I’ll come,” Bonnet said after some hesitation. “But I won’t sign anything before I’m paid. It amounts to three hundred francs.”
    “All right. Three hundred. You’ll get it.”
    Ravic hung up. “I’m sorry you had to listen to this,” he said to the woman. “But there was no alternative. We need the man.”
    The woman already had some money in her hand. “It doesn’t matter,” she replied. “Such things are not new to me. Here is the money.”
    “There is no hurry about that. He’ll be here right away. Then you can give it to him.”
    “Couldn’t you yourself sign the death certificate?” the woman asked.
    “No,” Ravic said. “We need a French physician for that. It is best to have the one who treated him.”
    When the door closed behind Bonnet the room became suddenly quiet. Much quieter than if just one man had left the room. The noise of cars on the streets sounded somehow tinny, as though bounced against a wall of heavy air through which it could penetrate only with difficulty. After the confusion of the past hours thepresence of the dead man was now there for the first time. His powerful silence filled the cheap small room and it did not matter that he wore bright red silk pajamas—he reigned even as a dead clown might reign—because he no longer moved. What lived, moved—and what moved could have power, grace, and absurdity—but never the strange majesty of that which will never move again, but only decay. What was completed alone possessed it, and man reached