This is the nature of great tragedies, they hatch in the bowels of the earth, one day a small crack appears, at night you hear a rumbling and wonder whether it might be an earthquake, then just when you begin to think there may be hope, the world caves in and crumbles into rubble. An immense column of pain rises into the sky. Silence falls and with it a colossal emptiness. You are shocked, crushed, shattered, your dignity is torn from you and you slump into prostration, into autism, one step closer to the end. This is where I was now, in utter darkness, 9.0 on the Richter scale and, insofar as I was able to see in such an abyss, I was alone. More alone than anyone in the world. In saner moments, I told myself that all this suffering stemmed from the fact that I was some strange dreamer, a fool in a world of recurring nightmares, clinging to the idea of a simple, graceful, everlasting life. But more often, like dear Adolph sitting in front of his poisonous Schnapps, thought nothing at all: dreams, life, harmony, simplicity were words that held no meaning for me. What right did I have to use such words knowing how my father had flouted them? I was in a strange position. Excruciatingly painful. Utterly devastating. I was inside the skin, inside the skeletal monotony of the concentration camp prisoner waiting for the end, and I was inside my father’s skin, jealous of his vocation which brought about that end. In me, these two extremes had come together for the worse. Like the jaws of a vice.

Ophélie’s lawyer came by. A pretty tubby little woman who seemed to have asthma. Or maybe she panted and wheezed to impress her clients and alarm the opposing side. Her cheeks were perfectly pink, her breasts so white they could blind oncoming traffic. She gave me a fiercely professional smile and offhandedly asked me to sign some papers. I did as she asked, not bothering to read them and said to her, ‘You don’t have to give me the silent treatment, it’s only fair that everything goes to my future ex-wife. I would be grateful if you would intercede on my behalf, I’d like to stay in the house until I can find a place somewhere far away from here.’ She promised she would, and gave me a sympathetic smile. On that note we went our separate ways, each happy with the outcome.

I must have done everything mechanically. I don’t remember anything. One morning, I found myself at Roissy Airport clutching a boarding pass for Frankfurt, carrying a small rucksack with a change of clothes, Papa’s military service record and the big notebook I’ve been carrying around with me since . . . since April 1994, or maybe a little later, since Aïn Deb, when the thing entered into me.