Night Night Des...

By Danü Danquigny

When readers take a deep breath and dive into “A Day in the Life” they think to themselves when they’ve finished this short story, that the French city of Rennes must be a good place to write novellas like this. From Pontchaillou Hospital’s grimy halls to road races and hunting down criminals next to Thabor Park, we’ve almost forgotten Paris’s traditionally dark detective novels. Though it has a short format, its main protagonists, Corynthe, Louise, and even the thug, Baloo, all have deeply profound and developed characters. 

• Language: English
• Publisher: La Salamandre Liseuse
• Release date: Sep 14, 2019
• ISBN: 9781071506332

Book preview

Night Night Des...

Desmund Sasse’s Journal

Danü DANQUIGNY

© La Salamandre Liseuse

Original Title: Ces vices...

Introduction by Market Corbel 

Translated from French to English

by Jacquie Bridonneau

When readers take a deep breath and dive into A Day in the Life they think to themselves when they’ve finished this short story, that the French city of Rennes must be a good place to write novellas like this. From Pontchaillou Hospital’s grimy halls to road races and hunting down criminals next to Thabor Park, we’ve almost forgotten Paris’s traditionally dark detective novels. Though it has a short format, its main protagonists, Corynthe, Louise, and even the thug, Baloo, all have deeply profound and developed characters. 

But what’s actually reflected, when we’re lucky enough to personally know the author, is that this infamous Desmund Sasse does have quite a few points in common with him. It’s probably a sure bet that Danquigny, just like Desmund, also dragged his heels in the streets and on the rooftops of the universities in the same city. More seriously though, between rural whodunits that overrule inherent social critics for this type of novels and dad’s urban ones, A Day in the Life is digging its own hole in urban short stories.

Marek Corbel

Desmund Sasse’s Journal, Tuesday

A Tuesday afternoon in the scorching heat of an overly hot summer that’s already killed who knows how many. The cardio-pneumological ward, still not completely finished, only has two silent and bushed occupants: my colleague and myself. Polite like I am, I ask him his name.

Depends on what time! He answers innocently.

I don’t see what he’s getting at, and just look at him. He’s pushing fifty, a little shorter than me, ruddy complexion with a mustache, gray hair and thick and deep features, this guy looks a little like Super Mario wearing his blue plumber’s outfit that our security firm forces us to wear as uniforms. His alcohol-ridden breath and broken veins on his cheeks tell the sad tale of his drunken life.

I don’t get it.

It’s Peter in the morning and Petered Out at night!

He belts out a hearty laugh at this dumb joke, one I’m sure no one really finds funny. I force myself to do the same. Then on our surveillance screen he’d changed into a television, the jingle of international Tierce horse races quickly catches his attention. He remembers he forgot to bet. I get ready to comment on this brilliant observation when a couple of people stroll into the building.

I’ve got it, I say, glad for an excuse to get away.

No problem here, I easily direct these two wandering souls towards the dermatology ward and decide to do a walk around inspection while I’m at it. I go out, bypass the block, go back in through the underground parking lot, go two floors downstairs (was this door open before?), go back out again, see a window open on the second floor, push the security portal open and slowly walk upstairs to close it. With this heat, workers often open windows, both for some fresh air and to have a cigarette. But, Friday was the last time they were here. Yesterday the other guards didn’t have much to do.

When I go back to the lobby, I see Peter - Petered Out talking to four people. He sees me coming and points towards a tall, thin man with greying hair, classy and distinguished guy.

"This is Professor Boisleau, he wants to show these people around...

The guy cuts him off.

And I don’t have my pass on me.

I glance at his companions, three old people, including one lady.

I’ll take you.

I grab a set of keys and follow them.

First stage of the tour, the university facilities, library, amphitheater (and incidentally also where we played darts when our nights seemed endless and I was working with JP), red carpet, columns, huge offices and a bar. One of the old men, snow-white hair and a black coat, turns towards me.

When we studied medicine sixty years ago, we didn’t have all this stuff.

The other one, wearing a cap and hunting jacket, nods. The lady listens to the professor babbling on, seemingly interested in what he has to say.

The old fart continues.

At the Hôtel Dieu facilities, the buildings were made out of brick and it was cold. Not the same thing.

I smile back at him wondering how much of modern medicine he still understood. We go back through the lobby to head to another wing. The professor, with his slim-fitting brown coat, asks me if I could start the elevators up because his father would be finding it hard to walk up the stairs. I smile  back at the white-haired doctor and head towards the stairwell. I trot up the seven stories separating me from the elevator controls, go across the hall, race  down the stairs one floor below, hop into the cabin and meet my little group again on the ground floor. We go up to the second floor, a series of offices and rooms full of complex equipment that no one really understands what it’ll be used for.

"... cutting-edge equipment, the very best money can buy. And this is a prototype that a lab in Kuru developed.  It just got here yesterday. And believe