The Honest Folk of Guadeloupe by Timothy Williams Page A

wave and a grin. He chose not to see her, his attention taken up in helping the older woman.
    Overhead, the slowly swirling fans moved through the sluggish air. The dry season was over.
    “They’ll give me breakfast?”
    “Of course you will have breakfast.”
    “I’m returning to France tomorrow. It seems a bit strange to …”
    “Tomorrow? You can stay in the hotel for several days, if you so wish. I imagine you’re tired. With the time lag of six hours …”
    “Stay in the hotel?” The woman sucked at her lip. “That’d be very nice.” She walked slowly and leaned on Trousseau’s arm for support. Anne Marie noticed swollen veins beneath the thick, skin-colored stockings.
    “After the long flight you must want to sleep. Then in the morning, there’ll be somebody to fetch you and we can see about all the formalities.” Anne Marie tapped the woman’s arm reassuringly. “There’s no hurry.”
    They moved out of the terminal into the damp night. Trousseau directed her toward the car. The policeman in the plastic raincoat had disappeared.
    “It’s very warm, isn’t it?”
    Trousseau replied, “You soon get used to that. It’s like the cold in Paris for us West Indians.”
    “That noise? What’s that noise? There.” Madame Vaton held her pale head to one side. “A kind of chirping.”
    Trousseau ran his finger along his moustache. He smiled. “Frogs,
madame
.”
    “They make that din?”
    “After a while you no longer notice it.”
    “How horrible!”
    Trousseau opened the door of the Peugeot and helped Madame Vaton into the back seat. “Like the sound of the traffic in Paris.”
    “Frogs? It certainly doesn’t sound like frogs.” She must have been about sixty years old. Her white hair had been recently permed. She smiled at Anne Marie. “There was so much to eat. They keep waking you up to give you more food. And to think that I’d always been frightened of taking the plane.” Madame Vaton’s smile broadened. “I really enjoyed the journey.” A glance at her watch. “Eight hours? The time just flew by.”
    Anne Marie got into the front seat beside Trousseau.
    The car pulled away from the curb. Trousseau had closed the windows to the warm, humid air.
    “The hostesses were very nice.”
    Anne Marie found the woman’s
eau de cologne
overpowering.
    “One hostess kept bringing me food and drink. Lovely girl. Very attentive and very black.”
    Anne Marie sneezed all the way to the hotel.

21
Bed
    “A woman’s pubic hair is normally coarser than a man’s.”
    “Go to sleep, Anne Marie.”
    “You always say that, Luc.”
    “You worry too much.”
    “Have you ever been to an autopsy?”
    “It’s over—forget about it.”
    “You ever been?”
    “Why do you think I became a pediatrician? Try and get some sleep.”
    “I can’t.”
    “At least let me sleep.”
    “Sleep if you want to.”
    “Not with you tossing and turning beside me. Worrying and fidgeting and sneezing.”
    “I took something to stop the sneezing.”
    “And just for once, Anne Marie, turn that light off.”
    “I always sleep with the light on.”
    “Just once, as a favor, Anne Marie.”
    “Luc, I’m hot and I can’t sleep.”
    “I can’t turn the conditioner up any further. Take a shower. Close your eyes. Breathe deeply and relax.”
    “I’ve got a bad cold coming. I don’t like these hotel beds.”
    “We could’ve stayed at your place.”
    “With the children?”
    “Take another aspirin, Anne Marie.”
    “Thanks for the sympathy.”
    “Stop thinking about the autopsy.”
    “Why did you become a pediatrician, Luc?”
    “The one branch of medicine where the patients survive.”
    “It’s true, isn’t it?”
    “What?”
    “The difference in pubic hair—between men and women.”
    “I don’t know.”
    “But you’re a doctor, Luc.”
    “Then I must’ve forgotten. Funny, things I did in third year anatomy—I forget about them at this time of the night.”
    “It’s not the