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. She gets close to Octave, the handicapped son of De Saint Geores whom he makes work as a servant. Orphaned by a mother, he ends up calling Clémence “mom”.
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 and Clémence had since tattooed "L'Espérance" on his shoulder blade.
Discovering his secret, De Saint Geores entered into a mad anger. As she tried to escape from him, he ran into her with his car ...
EPISODE 7 - The trap
I painfully opened one eye, then the other. My body was sore, the slightest movement required an effort. I recognized the slats from the ceiling of my room: I was in my bed, naked. This finding made me uncomfortable and my pathetic attempt to escape came back to me. It was daylight outside. What had happened since De Saint Geores knocked me over in the night? All the horror of my situation then resurfaced and a sinister intuition hugged my heart. I didn't really understand what was happening to me, but I knew now that I had to flee this cursed place at all costs.
Laboriously, I tried to get out of bed. My body was covered with bruises, my left wrist had doubled in size, the shock had been severe. The house was silent. In haste I got dressed and carefully tried to open the door to my room. I discovered with fright that it was locked. Passed by a wind of panic, I ran to the window. The iron bars jumped to my face like the dismal testimony of my confinement. The gargoyles seemed to taunt me, their grimacing faces sounded like so many funeral warnings. I then noticed that my computer had been placed on the small desk, facing the window in the other room. The few small field flowers awkwardly placed on the keyboard did nothing to soften the terror that this vision gave me. This time, I understood: the strategy had changed, the trap was closing. I did not need the great writer, it was he who clung to me. Why ? I didn’t know. But I knew I had to find a way to escape.
I went out onto the small iron-rimed balcony. He was perched fifteen meters above the ground.
Even if I could slip between the solid bars, a fall from this height would be fatal. I looked up at the roof: worse. However, I noticed a bare iron blade. Taking an irrepressible desire to try the impossible, I grabbed it and hung myself on it. Under my weight it flexes, clearing a hole large enough for me to slip into. Wrist painful, I tried with all my might to pull myself up. Finally, I reached the gutter to which I clung firmly. But as I pushed with my legs, it fell off in a rusty iron cry. Leaning on the iron grating, I restrained myself and, with one last effort, managed to reach the roof. My progress was difficult on the old uneven coating. And above all, I did not really know what I was looking for: at more than fifteen meters from the ground, what way could offer me the tarabiscoté roof of this old house?
Yet an ally held out my hand to me; a large spruce waved its branches above the top of the house. I rushed. Alas, these were too frail, they could never bear my weight. Only one solution: jump into the void to reach, a little over a meter away, a branch closer to the trunk and therefore more solid. Driven by fear and despair, I don't think long. I backed up a few meters, gained momentum and rushed into the void from the edge of the roof. I bounced at first on a weaker branch which cracked and I fell a few meters before I managed to grab hold of a more solid branch. Covered with needles, sticky sap, bloody hands, I tied myself to my buoy and let myself be lulled for a moment by the cool breeze that crossed the forest. Then, slowly, carefully, I started my descent along the trunk. When I finally touched the ground, I immediately felt a cold metallic object on my neck. It was the barrel of a revolver. The voice of the man I was trying to flee rose, ironic and chilling:
- Recreation over, return to square one.
And as he brutally pushed me towards the entrance of the manor, he added:
- It was very distracting, thanks for the circus act, and he laughed cruelly.
We crossed the kitchen and he threw me on the staircase which led to the cellar, in which were stored the replicas of anchors which I had inadvertently discovered the day before.
- I'll leave you cool with your girlfriends. It will give you food for thought and I am sure it will inspire you for the rest of our book.
The door slammed behind me. I heard the sound of the lock being locked, then there was silence. In the dark, groping, I walked along the cold stone wall. When my fingers recognized a plastic case, a wave of relief passed through me; it was a switch. I turned it and a dirty, gloomy yellow light came from a tired overhead light.
I inspected the large wet room: there was nothing except the four anchors and, in a corner, old sacks of charcoal that must have languished there for a hundred years. No way out, the room was perfectly airtight. I had no choice but to wait for my jailer to come and set me free.
Approaching "L'Espérance 1788", I undertook to detail it to check if the little drawing I was carrying on the shoulder was indeed identical. They were similar in every way, except for the date that was not on my tattoo. I was going to turn away from it when a series of small characters inscribed in the ring caught my attention:
என் இதயத்தின் லாரா
I set out to observe the other three cast iron objects. None of them wore the same formula. I had never seen this curious typography and above all, I knew that my tattoo did not show these signs. Was Abel aware of this detail? While mechanically tweaking a small ball of paper forgotten in the pocket of my jacket, I tried to concentrate to retain this strange series of characters. Too bad, I had nothing to copy it. The idea suddenly struck me: a piece of paper in my pocket and some coal right next to it! I rushed to the bags in the back of the room, took the old receipt from my jacket, applied it to the mysterious letters, and started rubbing the paper with my piece of coal.
Suddenly, the sound of the lock at the top of the stairs was heard. I had not finished my work, I redoubled my zeal. I could see steps coming down the steps. I was still missing some signs! Trembling with stress and fear, I persisted in my poor receipt. The light went out, then turned on again. Like the headlight calls, it played with my nerves. At the last moment, I plunged my fist holding the precious little piece of paper in my pocket and turned around. There he was, at the bottom of the stairs, his sadistic smile hanging on his lips. He was pointing his revolver at me:
- I see that you are getting to know L'Espérance. What a coincidence, isn't it? You were meant to meet, or rather to find yourself, it seems. Regardless, L'Espérance will delight you!
His little Machiavellian smile suddenly disappeared and, with the tip of his revolver, he ordered me to go up the stairs. After the kitchen we started to climb the plaintive steps that ended in my dungeon. Octave was waiting for us on the doorstep of my room. He swung from one foot to the other, wringing his fingers. The corners of his mouth fell like two commas getting lost in his chin. He then murmured a shy and inaudible "mom". A furious and uncontrollable rage came to my throat; ignoring the revolver pointed at me, I threw myself on him, yelling:
- Never call me mom again, do you hear ?!
De Saint Geores kicked him with the butt in the jaw and Octave fled sobbing on the creaky stairs.
When I entered my room, I noticed that the window on the small balcony had been closed with the help of solidly nailed wooden planks. In the next room, De Saint Geores threw me bluntly on the chair of the small desk on which my computer rested. The window was screened with barbed wire.
- Now you finish me this book, he said, threatening
- No, I will not work under duress.
- You finish this damn book or I'll kill you right away! he yelled, pointing his gun at my temple.
- Go ahead, shoot! I provoked him.
As he did not move, I added:
- That's what I thought, you need me to lay your book, because you can't. You are a shabby, a failed writer!
At these words, he took my neck and tapped my forehead on the computer keyboard in a fury of blows, again and again, always louder. Blood spurted from my nostrils, spilling all over the keyboard. I felt the hot liquid run down my thighs.
He screamed in a loop:
- You will write, you will finish it! You're going to write, you're going to finish it!
The blows finally stopped. He concludes in a cold tone:
- Tomorrow morning, the next chapter, otherwise you will disappear without leaving a trace. Understood ?
(…)
Check out the next episode right here on March 31 at 5 p.m. or on the Rocambole app for iOS or Android.
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