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Back The Inheritors Save as PDF
Chapters (17)
  1. Cover Page
  2. Title Page
  3. Copyright
  4. Chapter 1
  5. Chapter 2
  6. Chapter 3
  7. Chapter 4
  8. Chapter 5
  9. Chapter 6
  10. Chapter 7
  11. Chapter 8
  12. Chapter 9
  13. Chapter 10
  14. Chapter 11
  15. Chapter 12
  16. Acknowledgements
  17. Back Cover

‘I’m told that in Paris, with all the factories closing, there isn’t such a shortage of men. That a day labourer working for three francs would largely prefer to be a substitute . . .’

‘Oh, is that right? They told you that? Well then, if it’s that easy, why don’t you go find yourself a worker who feels like getting killed in your place?’

‘My father will never pay that amount,’ said Auguste, his face buried in his fine, girlish hands. ‘He has made provision for 10,000 francs for an impeccable recruit,’ he added in a whisper.

He turned on his best puppy-dog eyes – more mortally-wounded-deer – but though this worked so well on his mother it served only to make the horse trader laugh.

‘Seems to me life in the barracks won’t be such a walk in the park the way you’re carrying on like a witless girl. But what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger, so they say!’

After swallowing his last mouthful of sausage, Anquetin wiped his mouth with the back of his sleeve and tossed off some final advice to Auguste with a malicious smirk.

‘Careful on your way home. They say the neighbourhood isn’t safe.’

Chapter 3

3

THE FIRST DAY OF APRIL, eighteen hundred and seventy-one at half past four in the afternoon.

The birth of Renan Astyanax de Rigny, of male sex, at the domicile of Clothilde de Rigny, at 43 Rue du 4 September, to Auguste de Rigny, student, of Saint-Germain-en-Laye, aged twenty-one years, son of Casimir de Rigny, and to Corentine Malgorn, farmer, of Brest, aged twenty years, daughter of Yann Malgorn, is hereby formally declared and acknowledged. This declaration is read aloud by the child’s father and mother before Aimé Perrachon, student, aged twenty-two years, residing at 10 Rue du Port Mahon, Paris, and Albert Trousselier, aged twenty-three years, residing at 8 Boulevard de la Madeleine, Paris, witnesses by their signature to the said declaration, and in the presence of myself, the undersigned Civil Registrar.

My forebears Renan, Corentine, Auguste and Casimir, Auguste’s university friends Perrachon and Trousselier, Clothilde de Rigny, the aunt in Paris who had taken him in . . . With its restrained vocabulary and basic syntax, there was no better stylistic form in the world for setting out the contents of this formal document written in pen and ink.

Let’s pick up the thread again, paying close attention.