Free Sila's Fortune by Fabrice Humbert Page A

yawning?
    Simon drained his glass of wine, hoping for some miracle, for a warm rush of Dutch courage.
    â€˜Anyone want more couscous?’ he asked pathetically.
    Nobody answered.
    Reaching behind Matthieu’s back, he touched Julie’s arm.
    â€˜Are you okay? Would you like some more couscous?’
    â€˜Perfect, I’m all set,’ she said politely before turning away.
    Simon gazed up at the sky. Wisps of blue still streaked the darkness. The moon had risen. He stared at the translucent circle, longing to join the tranquillity of the stars, far from frustrations and humiliations. To become one with the heavens.
    But it was not he who melted into the heavens. Some hours later, high above the party, as the evening wound down and the last notes of the music faded, as the guests sat or sprawled on beanbags sleeping off the wine, as the cooks, having tidied the kitchen, headed home with the serving dishes, happy to have been feted and handsomely paid, up on the roof terrace Julie, naked, stared into the heavens, in the passion of a fleeting embrace, quivering with the pleasure of this single, ephemeral, never-to-be-repeated evening, her eyes taking in the moon, the stars, the bright nimbus of the city lights and Matthieu’s face, contorted with pleasure.
    No, it was not Simon who became one with the heavens.
    Sila lived in a derelict warehouse in the suburbs of Paris, in a quiet neighbourhood not far from the Bois de Vincennes. There were about a dozen people living there, and since most of them had papers, police raids had become desultory and rare. When there were raids, Sila would quietly creep down into the cellar and hide in an old oil tank. The cops, bored and tired, would try to work up a little aggression for the occasionto prove that they too could be hard men, like the Robocop units who dealt with more difficult suburbs. But they had no riot helmets, no boots. At the end of these courtesy visits, there was always someone who would shout: ‘See you soon, guys. Nice of you to drop by.’ At which point the cop in charge of the squad would nod and say, ‘Watch it. Don’t go taking the piss. And I’ve told you a thousand times, this warehouse isn’t safe. One of these days it’s going to collapse on top of you and you won’t be laughing then.’
    For some time, the local council had been planning to evict the residents of 14 rue de Verdun in order to demolish this dangerous warehouse which was unfit for human habitation, but two associations had complained and taken them to court and so, in spite of the mayor’s aggressive posturing, discussions dragged on from one council meeting to the next. Given the usual swiftness of the law and the city council, the residents at 14 rue de Verdun could probably expect to stay for another decade. This was a good thing, because the warehouse was a convivial place, even if the makeshift communal showers and the Turkish toilets set up in one corner of the building, though they were scrubbed down every day, did not quite provide the level of comfort modern man has come to expect. The warehouse had been partitioned to create comfortable rooms, most equipped with televisions, whose only drawback was the lack of soundproofing, which meant it was impossible not to overhear people having sex and, nine months later if contraception had failed or been forgotten, the wailing of a healthy newborn baby. The best room was on the first floor where Roger lived with his wife, a Cameroonian woman of about forty with a noble,thoughtful face. Roger behaved as though he owned the warehouse – though no one knew whether he actually did – and he had picked the best space. His apartment of bare breezeblock walls, well furnished and pleasantly warm compared to the ground floor, which was freezing in winter, had lovely views over the city and the rolling expanse of the Bois de Vincennes through the huge window of what had clearly once been a