Free Invisible Love by Éric-Emmanuel Schmitt, Howard Curtis Page A

about to enter a period of mourning. But whom was she mourning? Samuel or Argos?
    She must have read my thoughts because the next thing she said was, “I can’t think of Daddy without thinking of Argos. One never went without the other. Daddy knew his own limitations, so he relied on his dog to grasp what escaped him. I often had the impression he consulted him, depended on his decisions. Argos was like part of Daddy, the physical part, the empathetic part, the sensitive part. Argos was a little bit my father and my father was a little bit Argos. Does what I’m saying sound crazy?”
    â€œNot at all.”
    I made some more coffee. We didn’t need to talk: we had reached that degree of calm that we reach not when we have discovered the truth, but when we come close to a mystery.
    As I poured the coffee, I asked, “Do you think the last Argos had something more than the previous ones?”
    She quivered, grasping that we were approaching the main subject of the day. “He was remarkable and unique. Like his predecessors.”
    â€œDid your father love him more?”
    â€œMy father was more of a recluse.”
    We both sat there openmouthed. Each of us wanted to talk, but neither dared.
    â€œEveryone here thinks he killed himself because of the dog,” she said at last, looking me straight in the eyes. “Don’t they?”
    â€œIt’s absurd, but . . . yes,” I stammered. “Given that we don’t have enough information, that we didn’t know your father well, we can’t help linking the two events.”
    â€œHe would have hated people to say that.”
    I almost corrected her by saying, “You hate people to say that.” Luckily, a vestige of tact held me back.
    She leaned forward. “Help me.”
    â€œI’m sorry?”
    â€œHelp me to understand what happened.”
    â€œWhy me?”
    â€œBecause Daddy liked you. And because you’re a novelist.”
    â€œBeing a novelist doesn’t mean being a detective.”
    â€œBeing a novelist means being fascinated by other people.”
    â€œI don’t know anything about your father.”
    â€œYour imagination will make up for that. You know, I’ve read your books, and I’ve noticed that when you don’t know something, you fantasize. I need your genius for hypotheses.”
    â€œHold on a minute! I write what I like because my stories don’t have consequences. I’m not looking for truth, just entertainment.”
    â€œWhy should the truth be any uglier than silence? Help me. Please help me.”
    Her big green eyes were imploring me, her flaming red hair blazed with anger.
    I liked Miranda so much that, without thinking, I agreed.
    Â 
    *
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    That afternoon, I joined her at her father’s house, where we undertook to go through his papers in the hope of finding something.
    After two or three futile hours, I exclaimed, “Miranda, your father’s dogs all came from the same place. A kennel in the Ardennes.”
    â€œWhat of it?”
    â€œIn the last fifty years, the contracts have been signed by one person, a man named—”
    At that moment, the doorbell rang. Miranda opened the door to the Comte de Sire, an elderly man in riding boots, dressed with archaic refinement. Behind him, his horse, tied to the gatepost, neighed when it saw us.
    His family, which had once owned several farms and three châteaux, now lived on an estate some seven miles away.
    He had come to offer his condolences, and was hopping from foot to foot, red-faced with embarrassment.
    Miranda showed him in and indicated one of the high armchairs that formed a semicircle in front of the fireplace in the drawing room. He stepped forward humbly, looked around the room, and thanked her in a muffled voice, as if she had allowed him to enter the holy of holies.
    â€œYour father was . . . an exceptional man. I’ve never in my life known anyone