2-8

 

8.

England was in the semifinal of the 2007 Rugby World Cup. No one had predicted that. No onehad believed England was any good this time round, and now they were on the verge¹ of winning itall. Millions of Britons were swept away with rugby fever, including me.

So when I was invited to attend the semifinal, that October, I didn’t hesitate. I said yesimmediately.

Bonus: The semifinal was being held that year in Paris—a city I’d never visited.

The World Cup provided me with a driver, and on my first night in the City of Light I askedhim if he knew the tunnel where my mother…

I watched his eyes in the rearview, growing large.

He was Irish, with a kindly², open face, and I could easily discern his thoughts: What the feck? Ididn’t sign on for this.

The tunnel is called Pont de l’Alma, I told him.

Yes, yes. He knew it.

I want to go through it.

You want to go through the tunnel?

At sixty-five miles per hour—to be precise.

Sixty-five?

Yes.

The exact speed Mummy’s car had supposedly been driving, according to police, at the time ofthe crash. Not 120 miles per hour, as the press originally reported.

The driver looked over at the passenger seat. Billy the Rock nodded gravely. Let’s do it. Billyadded that if the driver ever revealed to another human that we’d asked him to do this, we’d findhim and there would be hell to pay.

The driver gave a solemn nod.

Off we went, weaving through traffic, cruising past the Ritz, where Mummy had her last meal,with her boyfriend, that August night. Then we came to the mouth of the tunnel. We zipped ahead,went over the lip at the tunnel’s entrance, the bump that supposedly sent Mummy’s Mercedesveering off course.

But the lip was nothing. We barely felt it.

As the car entered the tunnel I leaned forward, watched the light change to a kind of wateryorange, watched the concrete pillars flicker³ past. I counted them, counted my heartbeats, and in afew seconds we emerged from the other side.

I sat back. Quietly I said: Is that all of it? It’s…nothing. Just a straight tunnel.

I’d always imagined the tunnel as some treacherous⁴ passageway, inherently dangerous, but itwas just a short, simple, no-frills tunnel.

No reason anyone should ever die inside it.

The driver and Billy the Rock didn’t answer.

I looked out of the window: Again.

The driver stared at me in the rearview. Again?

Yes. Please.

We went through again.

That’s enough. Thank you.

It had been a very bad idea. I’d had plenty of bad ideas in my twenty-three years, but this onewas uniquely ill-conceived. I’d told myself that I wanted closure, but I didn’t really. Deep down,I’d hoped to feel in that tunnel what I’d felt when JLP gave me the police files—disbelief. Doubt.

Instead, that was the night all doubt fell away.

She’s dead, I thought. My God, she’s really gone for good.

I got the closure I was pretending to seek. I got it in spades. And now I’d never be able to getrid of it.

I’d thought driving the tunnel would bring an end, or brief cessation, to the pain, the decade ofunrelenting pain. Instead it brought on the start of Pain, Part Deux.

It was close to one o’clock in the morning. The driver dropped me and Billy at a bar, where Idrank and drank. Some mates were there, and I drank with them, and tried to pick fights withseveral. When the pub threw us out, when Billy the Rock escorted me back to the hotel, I tried topick a fight with him too. I growled⁵ at him, swung on him, slapped his head.

He barely reacted. He just frowned like an ultra-patient parent.

I slapped him again. I loved him, but I was determined⁶ to hurt him.

He’d seen me like this before. Once, maybe twice. I heard him say to another bodyguard⁷: He’sa handful tonight.

Oh, you want to see a handful? Here you go, here’s a handful.

Somehow Billy and the other bodyguard got me up to my room, poured me onto my bed. Butafter they left I popped right up again.

I looked around the room. The sun was just coming up. I stepped outside, into the hall. Therewas a bodyguard on a chair beside the door, but he was sound asleep. I tiptoed past, got into thelift, left the hotel.

Of all the rules in my life, this was considered the most inviolate⁸. Never leave yourbodyguards. Never wander off by yourself, anywhere, but especially not in a foreign city.

I walked along the Seine. I squinted⁹ at the Champs-?lysées in the distance. I stood next tosome big Ferris wheel. I went past little book stalls, past people drinking coffee, eating croissants.

I was smoking, keeping my gaze unfocused. I have a dim recollection of a few people recognizingme, and staring, but thankfully this was before the age of smartphones. No one stopped me to takea photo.

Later, after I’d had a sleep, I rang Willy, told him about my night.

None of it came as news to him. Turned out, he’d driven the tunnel too.

He was coming to Paris for the rugby final. We decided¹⁰ to do it together.

Afterwards, we talked about the crash, for the first time ever. We talked about the recentinquest. A joke, we both agreed. The final written report was an insult. Fanciful, riddled¹¹ with basicfactual errors and gaping¹² logical holes. It raised more questions than it answered.

After all these years, we said, and all that money—how?

Above all, the summary conclusion, that Mummy’s driver was drunk and thereby¹³ the solecause of the crash, was convenient and absurd. Even if the man had been drinking, even if he wasshit-faced, he wouldn’t have had any trouble navigating¹⁴ that short tunnel.

Unless paps had chased and blinded him.

Why were those paps not more roundly blamed?

Why were they not in jail?

Who sent them? And why were they not in jail?

Why indeed—unless corruption¹⁵ and cover-ups were the order of the day?

We were united on all these points, and also on next steps. We’d issue a statement, jointly¹⁶ callfor the inquiry¹⁷ to be reopened. Maybe hold a press conference.

We were talked out of it by the powers that be.

 

1 verge   

n.边，边缘；v.接近，濒临

参考例句：

• The country's economy is on the verge of collapse.国家的经济已到了崩溃的边缘。
• She was on the verge of bursting into tears.她快要哭出来了。

2 kindly   

adj.和蔼的，温和的，爽快的；adv.温和地，亲切地

参考例句：

• Her neighbours spoke of her as kindly and hospitable.她的邻居都说她和蔼可亲、热情好客。
• A shadow passed over the kindly face of the old woman.一道阴影掠过老太太慈祥的面孔。

3 flicker   

vi./n.闪烁，摇曳，闪现

参考例句：

• There was a flicker of lights coming from the abandoned house.这所废弃的房屋中有灯光闪烁。
• At first,the flame may be a small flicker,barely shining.开始时，光辉可能是微弱地忽隐忽现，几乎并不灿烂。

4 treacherous   

adj.不可靠的，有暗藏的危险的；adj.背叛的，背信弃义的

参考例句：

• The surface water made the road treacherous for drivers.路面的积水对驾车者构成危险。
• The frozen snow was treacherous to walk on.在冻雪上行走有潜在危险。

5 growled   

v.（动物）发狺狺声， （雷）作隆隆声( growl的过去式和过去分词 )；低声咆哮着说

参考例句：

• \"They ought to be birched, \" growled the old man. 老人咆哮道：“他们应受到鞭打。” 来自《简明英汉词典》
• He growled out an answer. 他低声威胁着回答。 来自《简明英汉词典》

6 determined   

adj.坚定的；有决心的

参考例句：

• I have determined on going to Tibet after graduation.我已决定毕业后去西藏。
• He determined to view the rooms behind the office.他决定查看一下办公室后面的房间。

7 bodyguard   

n.护卫，保镖

参考例句：

• She has to have an armed bodyguard wherever she goes.她不管到哪儿都得有带武器的保镖跟从。
• The big guy standing at his side may be his bodyguard.站在他身旁的那个大个子可能是他的保镖。

8 inviolate   

adj.未亵渎的，未受侵犯的

参考例句：

• The constitution proclaims that public property shall be inviolate.宪法宣告公共财产不可侵犯。
• They considered themselves inviolate from attack.他们认为自己是不可侵犯的。

9 squinted   

斜视( squint的过去式和过去分词 )； 眯着眼睛； 瞟； 从小孔或缝隙里看

参考例句：

• Pulling his rifle to his shoulder he squinted along the barrel. 他把枪顶肩，眯起眼睛瞄准。
• I squinted through the keyhole. 我从锁眼窥看。

10 decided   

adj.决定了的，坚决的；明显的，明确的

参考例句：

• This gave them a decided advantage over their opponents.这使他们比对手具有明显的优势。
• There is a decided difference between British and Chinese way of greeting.英国人和中国人打招呼的方式有很明显的区别。

11 riddled   

adj.布满的；充斥的；泛滥的v.解谜，出谜题(riddle的过去分词形式)

参考例句：

• The beams are riddled with woodworm. 这些木梁被蛀虫蛀得都是洞。
• The bodies of the hostages were found riddled with bullets. 在人质的尸体上发现了很多弹孔。 来自《简明英汉词典》

12 gaping   

adj.口的；张口的；敞口的；多洞穴的v.目瞪口呆地凝视( gape的现在分词 )；张开，张大

参考例句：

• Ahead of them was a gaping abyss. 他们前面是一个巨大的深渊。
• The antelope could not escape the crocodile's gaping jaws. 那只羚羊无法从鱷鱼张开的大口中逃脱。 来自《简明英汉词典》

13 thereby   

adv.因此，从而

参考例句：

• I have never been to that city,,ereby I don't know much about it.我从未去过那座城市，因此对它不怎么熟悉。
• He became a British citizen,thereby gaining the right to vote.他成了英国公民，因而得到了投票权。

14 navigating   

v.给（船舶、飞机等）引航，导航( navigate的现在分词 )；（从海上、空中等）横越；横渡；飞跃

参考例句：

• These can also be very useful when navigating time-based documents, such as video and audio. 它对于和时间有关的文档非常有用，比如视频和音频文档。 来自About Face 3交互设计精髓
• Vehicles slowed to a crawl on city roads, navigating slushy snow. 汽车在市区路上行驶缓慢，穿越泥泞的雪地。 来自互联网

15 corruption   

n.腐败，堕落，贪污

参考例句：

• The people asked the government to hit out against corruption and theft.人民要求政府严惩贪污盗窃。
• The old man reviled against corruption.那老人痛斥了贪污舞弊。

16 jointly   

ad.联合地，共同地

参考例句：

• Tenants are jointly and severally liable for payment of the rent. 租金由承租人共同且分别承担。
• She owns the house jointly with her husband. 她和丈夫共同拥有这所房子。

17 inquiry   

n.打听，询问，调查，查问

参考例句：

• Many parents have been pressing for an inquiry into the problem.许多家长迫切要求调查这个问题。
• The field of inquiry has narrowed down to five persons.调查的范围已经缩小到只剩5个人了。