It is an extraordinary thing
That from the grey this man’s clear voice breaks away
I approached this lost expression that speaks while ignoring us
The little man
People who saw us often said: and so spectres come in fives.
Five older or younger brothers.
Or five myselves, multiplied as many times as there was work in this asylum where
we served the clients as though the House of Usher were playing on the public square.
I know that at the time, our parents were still there but then they disappeared, leaving the machinery to work on its own.
The clients returned and everything was done in pairs, with a crazed rigour.
I then dare to ask
Me
What happened then?
He began to laugh while answering.
The little man
She came to my home.
She simply crept in like a thing.
There was so much to do in this hotel that she wasn’t even introduced. She fit in.
People are leaving, even though things stay.
We therefore had to hurry and it was André, the only one to get out by becoming a hobo,
I believe, who first seduced her.
And then Théo, the eldest, the intellectual, surely the craziest of all, killed himself for her.
But I, I won her over little by little
I liked her strong legs, like those of an ostrich or a grasshopper.
And then she disappeared.
Me
And so?
The little man
So I smashed the dishes and started a fire.
The china scattered about.