XXXII
Nothing had changed in St Louis. In their quarter the same tranquillity prevailed. The tame marabouts that lived on their roof clacked their beaks, as they sunned themselves, with the same sound of dry wood, such as is made by the cogged wheels of a windmill.
The negresses still pounded their everlasting kouss-kouss. Everywhere the same familiar sounds, the same monotonous stillness, the same calm of prostrate nature.
But Jean was growing more and more weary of it all.
Day by day he drew further away from Fatou; he was utterly out of conceit with his black mistress.
She had grown more exacting and also more malicious, more especially since she had realised her power over Jean—ever since he had stayed behind on her account.
Scenes were frequent between them. At times she would exasperate him from sheer perversity and spitefulness.
Latterly he had acquired a habit of striking her with his riding whip, not very hard at first, but as time went on with increasing violence. His blows sometimes left marks like parallel scorings on Fatou’s bare back—black on black. Afterwards he would be sorry and ashamed.
One day, as he was returning to his dwelling, he had seen from a distance a Khassonké, a big, black gorilla of a man, beating a hasty retreat through the window.
On this occasion he did not so much as say one word. After all, he was indifferent to anything that she might do.
He had come to the end of any sentiment of pity, or tenderness even, that at moments he might have felt. He had had enough of her; he was tired of her; disgusted with her. He kept her, simply because he was too lazy to get rid of her.
He had entered upon his last year; everything pointed to the end, to his departure. He began to count the months.
Sleep had abandoned him, a common sequence to a long sojourn in these enervating countries. At night he would spend hours leaning on his elbow at the window, breathing in with rapture the cool air of his last winter season—and above all, dreaming of his return.
The moon, in her quiet course over this desert land, generally found him there at his window. He loved these beautiful, tropic nights, the rosy glow upon the sand; the trails of silver on the gloomy waters of the river. Each night the wind wafted to him from the plains of Sorr the distant cry of the jackals—and even this doleful cry had come to be a familiar sound.
When he reflected that soon he would be leaving all this for ever, the thought seemed to cast a vague gloom upon the joy of his return.