The room was small: a single bed, a bureau with a lamp, a wooden chair and, in one corner, a washbasin with a medicine chest above it. They deposited on the bed their two suitcases and the canvas bag that contained the cat. From the window there was a fine view to the south, and they could see the City Hall, which resembled a gigantic pair of hands, curved and pointing to the sky.

“It must be gorgeous at night, with all the lights,” said the girl.

She took off her dress.

THE SCHOOLBAGS lay abandoned at the foot of a tree.

Théo went into the gazebo and whites and Indians gathered around him. He was the oldest and the biggest and also the most learned, because he had read all sorts of books.

He told the story of Etienne Brûlé. He had a special way of telling it: with many gestures he mimed the events so that everyone could see how Etienne Brûlé, arriving in New France with Champlain, had obtained permission to live with the Indians so as to learn their language, and had become, at eighteen, the first coureur de bois; how he lived like the Indians, who adopted him as one of their own, and how he had led a number of expeditions into the Great Lakes region and had made his way south to Chesapeake Bay.

“WILL YOU LEND ME a pair of jeans?” asked the girl.

She was wearing nothing but her white underpants.

“Of course,” said Jack.

“I’m going to disguise myself as a male guest,” she said.

He avoided looking at her. He walked around the room, scratching his head, then rummaged in the canvas bag.

“Why don’t you look in the suitcase,” she suggested calmly.

“The suitcase? . . . Oh, yes, of course. I can’t think straight.”

The jeans were indeed in the suitcase. They were the right length, a bit loose around the waist, but with a belt they would do.

“They fit fine,” she said.

She put her hands in the pockets and swiveled around to give him a look. The jeans were u.f.o. brand, and those letters appeared at the top of her right buttock.

“They look as if they were tailor-made for you,” he said, exaggerating slightly.

She smiled.

“Can I ask you something else?”

“Of course,” he said.

“Can’t you guess?”

He shook his head.

She drew closer and stood facing him, hands on her hips.

“Can you see anything?”

“Nothing special,” he said insistently.

“I need something to go with the jeans. A shirt or something.”

“Why not a T-shirt like you usually wear?”

“Because of these,” she said, pointing to her breasts. “I know they’re small, but they still show, don’t they?”

“Of course. As a matter of fact I could see them all the time, if you really want to know.”

“So now you understand why I need a shirt,” she said. “One with two pockets would be best. Then people would just think I have something in my pockets. Get it?”