The Panda Theory Read Online Free PDF Page B

memories were stored in a little imitation-leather album labelled ‘Holiday 2002’. She sat down next to Gabriel and opened her bible on her knees. Every photo showed white sand, coconut palms, rolling waves, a riot of flowers, a blindingly blue sky above a turquoise sea, all framing Madeleine’s perfect body, sitting, lying, standing, swimming or frolicking with the clown fish. A celebration of Madeleine as God had made her.
    ‘If you only knew how beautiful it is over there. Everything smells great, everything feels soft, everything tastes sweet …’
    ‘Even the sea?’
    ‘Even the sea. Here, hold this. All I have to do is close my eyes and I’m there. Close your eyes. Can you hear the sea?’
    As the album slipped onto the floor, Madeleine leant against Gabriel who shrank back into the sofa.
    ‘I don’t think it would be a good idea, Madeleine.’
    ‘Don’t you like me?’
    ‘Yes, I do. You’re very beautiful.’
    ‘Do you think I’m a nympho?’
    ‘Not at all. Anyway, there’s nothing wrong with that.’
    ‘Do you prefer men?’
    ‘No, it’s not that.’
    ‘Are you ill?’
    ‘No, not that either.’
    ‘So why not then?’
    ‘I don’t know what to say. But what does it matter? I cooked for you.’
    ‘So?’
    ‘So nothing. It’s just how it is. There’s nothing to understand. Don’t be offended. I like you a lot.’
    Carefully, Gabriel extricated himself, got up and smoothed down his hair. He was as pale as a plaster saint, haggard, tired of a life that was bringing him down.
    ‘I’m sorry. I would have liked to make you happy. Don’t hold it against me; it’s not your fault.’
    Madeleine stared at him from the depths of the couch like a discarded rag doll, her legs and arms splayed.
    ‘You’re weird. Really weird.’
    ‘See you tomorrow, Madeleine.’
     

     
     
    The wardrobe took up most of the shop window. It was a beautiful piece and the owner of Obsolete Antiques must have been proud of it to display it so prominently that it overshadowed everything around it. Made of blond wood with a shiny satin finish, it was the perfect size, a classic, devoid of cumbersome ornate embellishments. Gabriel’s reflection in the shop window fitted it perfectly. It was as if it had been made for him. The wardrobe’s door was invitingly ajar. The perfect sarcophagus. The journey into the afterlife would be a cruise.
    ‘Eight hundred euros you say?’
    ‘It’s solid birch. And well built. Dovetail joints. No nails or screws.’
    ‘Edible then?’
    ‘I’m sorry?’
    ‘It’s edible. There’s no metal in it.’
    ‘I don’t understand.’
    ‘Forget it. It’s very beautiful. Thank you.’
    It was a shame that Mathieu was dead. He would have liked to buy it for him. Mathieu had already eaten one, the one in which his wife had died. She had locked herself in by accident, the door closing on her, and had suffocated amongst her own furs. Mathieu had been infatuated with his wife and the grief had driven him mad. He had blamed the wardrobe and vowed to eat every last bit of it. It took him years. But bit by bit, splinter by splinter, he had eaten the entire thing. Each morning, using a penknife, he had sliced a piece off and chewed it with the single-mindedness of which only a spurned lover is capable. It had been a mahogany Louis-Philippe wardrobe. He took barely two years to finish one door.
    ‘You know what, Gabriel, it’s the fittings that are the problem. The wood itself is fine. It’s the fittings that slow me down. That’s what’s annoying about a Louis-Philippe.’
    But Mathieu’s appetite for revenge eventually diminished, and even though he was loath to admit it, his hatred for the wardrobe had turned into the same all-consuming love he had felt towards his wife. He savoured the object of his resentment with a gourmet’s relish.
    ‘I boiled a corner piece in water yesterday and you know what? It tasted just like veal!’
    One night Mathieu called Gabriel in