He felt stupid, but mainly he felt hampered by the slow-moving crowd; he must have come at the busiest time. It was unfortunate that he, who no longer ate meat, found himself stuck in front of a large red stall, an immense stand right in the middle of the market, a giant altar dedicated to meat. He looked at all the refrigerated carcasses and thick pieces of nauseating flesh that were magnified by the little display cases. And yet the display of death fascinated him, especially as the smell of grilled chicken wafting from the rotisseries rekindled a childhood memory, taking him back to his grandmother’s house. She would open the oven and the room would fill with the smell of grilled chicken, a smell to make your mouth water.

There were so many people that the crowd was no longer moving forward. Franck thought he would suffocate, but he didn’t dare push. Despite himself he watched the butcher, a big man dressed in a white apron stained with red; he saw him busy at work like a priest performing some religious ceremony. He was spellbound as if watching a horror movie. Good Lord, the butcher was huge, stationed behind his stall with the bright-red awning above his head and a crimson canvas stretched behind him. The sun beating down gave the backdrop a surreal radiance. As well as being big, the butcher was standing on a platform, a bit like the priest at Mass. He looked like a deity in his little sacrificial theatre, but a pagan one; powerful and bloody-minded. You could imagine him stuffed full of all the meat in front of him. He was made of the same flesh as the enormous côtes de bœuf he handled and as the sides of beef his assistants grabbed with both hands. As the crowd thinned, Franck could better make out the parts of animals. Al the way along the display were livers and kidneys, and even a calf’s head on a square of white marble, a poor, deathly-pale little animal with its eyes closed, a meditative head which had pride of place in the profane hubbub. Next to it were lots of pig’s trotters, pigeons and quails lined up like cadavers, rabbits hanging up by their back legs, and heaps of little dead animals, little nothings oblivious to their own death. Good grief, how could people still eat these things?

‘And for monsieur?’

‘No, I’m just looking.’

‘Tourist?’

‘No. Well, yes, a tourist if you like, but French …’

‘Then you are like my meat! Everything here is French. And bred in France!’

‘OK. OK.’