In partnership with Rocambole, the app for reading differently, we are offering a new episode of Tina Bartoli's literary soap L'Ancre Noire every day at 5 p.m.
Summary of previous episodes: Clémence, consultant overwhelmed by her success, dreams of becoming a writer. She won a three-week coaching session with Jean De Saint Geores, an author whom she admires. He welcomed him to his property in the Vosges, the former home of the ruined colonial merchant of the 18th century. The atmosphere is heavy in the house, the coach imposing on the young woman a frantic pace.
Venturing into an unexplored wing of the boat, Clémence came across four 18th century anchors, one of which particularly disturbed her, that of L'Espérance. The young woman indeed knows very well the history of this boat, since her former companion Abel, professor of history had reconstituted this frigate with a group of pupils. Together they planned to recreate the route of this ship converted at the end of the 18th century in the slave trade, and disappeared during a storm in the Caribbean, swallowing up a treasure that Abel had the ambition to find. But the professor had never returned.
Discovering her secret, De Saint Geores sequesters Clémence in a cellar and the sum of finishing the book she is writing, otherwise she will disappear without a trace… Octave, the son of her executioner, seems ready to help her escape. But one evening in the bathroom, Clémence discovers terrifying photos of women engulfed by the lake. She tries again to escape through the dark corridors of the manor pursued by De Saint Geores but finishes her blocked course in the anchor room. Next to the anchor of L'Espérance, a camera awaits him.
EPISODE 11 - The evil farandole of hell
I was not alone in the room: Octave was there, his face scrawled with capricious wrinkles resembling an abstract painting. He swung from one foot to the other, wringing his hands. In the shadows, something began to shine: it was the barrel of the revolver that De Saint Geores pointed in my direction. His cavernous, cynical voice rose in the dark.
- It's time for the signing session, dear Hope! Good work, you will have even spared me the difficult choice of attributing to you a companion for posterity.
Suddenly he changed his tone:
- Octave, the souvenir photo, hurry up.
But the latter did not react. He continued his stubborn pendulum; I guessed a new loop on her lips: "Mum, mum, mum…. "
De Saint Geores repeated his order, without success. He began to howl with rage and this time pointed the revolver at poor Octave. Out of the corner of my eye, I spotted the sacks of coal that were sleeping a few inches away. I rushed over to grab a handful and threw it with all my might at De Saint Geores. Surprised, he dropped his revolver. As he leaned over to pick it up, Octave took the opportunity to open the stone door slightly. I threw myself there, trying to drag him with me, but already de Saint Geores was rushing at us. Octave abruptly folded the door on him, leaving me alone in the rat corridor. Frozen, I heard Saint Geores howl like a beast. Suddenly two shots were heard.
I could not restrain a cry of hatred and helplessness. I started running again. Tears burned my cheeks to the rhythm of my frantic race. I shamelessly crushed everything in my path, it was a real carnage, but the rage that gripped my chest increased my strength and my will. As I walked down the dark, damp hallway, an unpleasant odor of oil spilled my heart. I looked down: the floor was now covered with a sticky liquid. The rodents had abandoned the game and I was now alone in the long corridor. My steps echoed against the cold stone, my jerky breathing filled the whole space, a violent headache surrounded my head. I finally arrived on a landing where the corridor separated in two. I took a left, but after a few meters I came across a closed wooden door. I turned around and launched myself into the second pass. As I began to see the end of it, intense heat began to fill the whole space. The smell of petrol was unbearable. A sinister rumble arose behind my back. Alerted, I turned my head and saw the flames of a gigantic fire galloping towards me. Accelerating, I reached the end of the corridor, climbed three steps and found myself on a dead end: I was in a stone coffin. Exhausted, desperate, to let me die underground, devoured by this burning hell, seemed to me at this instant the only possible epilogue to my sad adventure. However, looking up, I saw a small hatch made of thin sheet metal. I pushed her with all my strength, in vain. It was locked. The flames were coming, ready to engulf me. I knocked on the sheet with all the violence I could do, but it refused to give in. Suddenly, I thought of the little nail clipper that I had kept in my pants pocket. I buried it with the ferocity of despair in the sheet metal and tore it in several places. Intensified by the call of air, the mad rush of fire accelerated dangerously towards me. I finally managed to spread the glowing metal and, as the first flames began to lick my feet, I managed to hoist myself outside.
Breathless, lying on the ground, I let the raging wind whip my exhausted body. The night was clear, I saw the tops of the spruces agitated by the storm like so many arms of a crowd celebrating the victory. I looked around: I was under the little bandstand at the back of the park. Quick, I say to myself, I have to flee and reach the forest quickly to blend in. In the roaring night, I ran to the perimeter wall and along the edge to hope to find a way out. But the fortress seemed impregnable: robust and well maintained, the wall was perfectly smooth. As I approached the heavy wrought iron gate, I finally discovered an opening that let a small stream pass at the base of the rampart. Before diving into it I took a last look at the house of my captivity. I discovered with amazement that it was on fire, devoured by gigantic and crackling flames. I recognized the balcony of my room, the bars of which were already red and melted, the gargoyles had transformed into incendiary dragons and were dancing in the agitated night the evil farandole of hell. Suddenly an explosion made me utter a cry of terror in spite of myself: it was the glass roof of the library which had just exploded. On the ground, I was about to slide into the little bed dug by the stream, when, in the madness of the wind and the fire, I saw the gate close on the slightly vague shape of a black sedan.
***********************
After a terrifying night of wandering in the dark and rustling forest I was picked up in the early hours of the morning by the side of the road by a truck driver. Frightened by my outfit and my speech, which he must have judged to be completely incoherent, he dropped me off at the police station in the nearest town. Heard by the police for several hours, I was finally able to return home after having undergone a compulsory passage through the hospital to treat my injuries and check my psychiatric health. I did my best to be psychologically capable, but I must admit that I myself doubted the veracity of my story. However, the memory of the polaroid victims of De Saint Geores, kept on me during my entire flight, reminded me grimly that this nightmarish adventure was now part of me. An investigation had been opened and I was hesitant as to the position to be taken; worry about it as little as possible and do everything to forget or on the contrary follow its progress. So many questions still remained unanswered: how had De Saint Geores succeeded in bluffing the literary world for so long? Who were these "negroes" recruited by him to write and die? How did they fall into his trap? What cursed secrets still contained Hope and the mysterious inscription on its anchor?
As the only living witness, I was forced to participate in the investigation which raised new questions for me. The staff of the publishing house had never heard of my candidacy for the writing competition organized by De Saint Geores. The lake had been dredged, there were found four corpses hanging on anchors. But where was the remains of Madame De Saint Geores, Octave's mother? I discovered that the basement of the mansion I had borrowed was soaked in oil because it was located on a deposit that was exploited a little further, at Merkwiller Pechelbronn. To get rid of me De Saint Geores had set the oil slick on fire, but when I opened the small hatch of the bandstand, I had caused a backlash that had set the whole castle ablaze. De Saint Geores had been declared deceased in the fire at the manor house, a burnt out carcass had been found there. However, I did not believe this hypothesis for a moment: I had heard the two shots fired at Octave at close range, the corpse found charred was his, not that of his father. Dumbfounded, I learned that De Saint Geores had a son, but his name was Joachim. Investigators charged with tracing him mysteriously lost track of him from 2008.
Each new element of the investigation made what I knew more incoherent, like a crazy puzzle, impossible to put in order. Each new track studied ended in a dead end. By dint of returning all this information in my head, I ended up doubting everything and, before being diagnosed with severe schizophrenia, I decided to disappear in my turn.
I put my papers in order and then, one morning, I took a one-way trip to Corsica and settled in an almost abandoned hamlet of Deux-Sorru. Alone, in the middle of this rough and untamed land, I finally felt free, for the first time in a long time.
One clear summer morning, when I opened the tumbling door of my quirky little house, I found a small, dark box on the mat; it looked like the jewel case. Looking around, I saw no one; only the wind gently stirred the branches of the olive trees. I opened it and my heart stopped: it was a black anchor. A small paper folded in four completed the present. A big clumsy and slobbery writing had traced these few words:
"Mom, I have a market to offer you. "
(…)
Check out the next episode right here on April 4 at 5 p.m. or on the Rocambole app for iOS or Android.
- Investigation
- Literature
- Books