A day

He fulfilled his only desire every day without effort. He stood up and counted in his mind the time it took to do it. He counted the time he had thus mastered as he escaped. He knew its age, but he insisted not to be surprised by its effects. He called on his mind and body to keep them alert, vigilant, and aware of the decline that was battling them. He dressed with presence, and, in a meticulous protocol, plunged and clenched his two fists in his pockets, the left on his handkerchief rolled into a ball, the one that his wife had given him, and the right on a small cross which he had also been offered, but he no longer knew by whom. Reassured by their symbolic presence, he finished getting ready.

He succumbed to another ritual, that of sitting in his armchair and drinking a bowl of coffee while looking out the window, in front of him, at the hilly landscape and the gorges which fractured the distance. He thus gave free rein to his imagination and the book of his memories. He appreciated the kaleidoscope of images. He loved this river of images, one day a stilled stream, the other a bubbling water; it summed up his life, rather sharpened it, restoring to him the extraordinary happiness that sparkled in each of its fragments and imposing on him an inestimable motivation.

As soon as the spring dried up, he got up. For a long time, he considered himself serving the book of his life. When and how had this happened? Since the death of his wife. With a certain agility, he closed the book and did not try to return to it, even if his mind urged him to do so. He managed to get confused, to bury himself, to forget himself, to forget that he was forgetting. It tasted like your morning coffee. At first, he thought he was lost. The loss of his personality haunted him. Then he understood. He heard his wife's voice whispering to him what he knew deep down, but that he was denying himself. Since then, he has snuggled up against this word and adjusted himself to its memory.

As he closed the book of his life, he did the same with the door of his cabin. He approached the flagpole that stood in front of his door and raised his colors. A little pennant with a nugget blooming from a flower. He told his friend, Albert, that everything was fine and that a new morning was beginning. The two men had been dating for two decades. The old man dined at his house once a month. He came into possession of a bottle of elixir, because Albert produced his own brandies. Albert represented the only soul who found favor in the eyes of the old man now that he lived alone. He had so many relationships with his deceased friends that he no longer intended to form new relationships. In the morning and evening, the two friends waved their flag to tell the other that he was alive. They greeted each other intimately from afar. 

The old man then took the path behind the house, he was careful not to slip on a rolling stone. The path wound through the dry earth in the middle of the moor to the river. He was suspicious of everything. He increased his concentration as if he were facing an opponent stronger than him. The steep path, the blazing sun, and his softer, less sure legs, his unstable balance... His body was leaving him. He was moving towards something else. The old man knew it, and he decided not to worry, to let it happen. He wasn't going to cry out against her body. Who would have shouted at whom? His body would triumph without firing a shot. The old man knew it, he couldn't fight, he didn't try, his body was losing itself, it was inevitable. He accepted it.

The old man took a step every day, always the same. The path stopped and made a bend at this point, as he had golden fingers, he had built a small hut in which he stored his gold panning belongings: pipes, bucket, shovel, bat, sieve, gloves... “The castle of his tools”, as he nicknamed it. He didn't use a metal detector, ever! He refused to do so. He didn't feel the need. The arrival of technology bored him. He saw in it the source of a will to power, a power that eluded man, because we delegated everything to the machine. The gold prospector was wary of the will to power, he had seen so many gold prospectors take refuge in the will to power to excuse themselves for their greed for profit. We couldn't survive in this profession when only profit fueled passion. The old man remembered a weirdo who became a gold prospector. He disembarked with state-of-the-art equipment and settled on the other bank, facing the old people. He lasted quite a while for a beginner. He was wasting away day by day. He used his metal detector everywhere. In short, he thought his material would make up for his lack of ambition. He returned his apron. He got rid of his equipment, leaving it in a recess in the rock. The old man wondered about this act. Did he intend to return later to resume his activity as a gold prospector? Anyone could take this material, resell it... The old man didn't understand why people have so little interest in valuable material and even less in their passion. The old man hated fickleness and any form of superficiality and he rarely visited the world anymore; “poisoned fruits are fermenting in the world which was running towards its own destruction”, he liked to think.

One Evening

The old man went back to his house after putting his weapons in his shed. He took down his flag and entered his home. He grabbed some dried meat and poured himself a glass of elixir and sat down in his chair. He began to rock slowly, eating the meat and slowly drinking gulps of the nectar that burned his throat. He looked out the window as the day faded like a cloud of mist across the plain. He opened his book. He saw his wife come into the house and kiss him on the forehead, pushing back his lock of hair. He dreamed with his eyes wide open. He took endless pleasure in it. Every evening. Without exception. The program was changing. He didn't choose it. Nothing had more value to him. Not even this nugget he had found a decade earlier and which had established his reputation. A 22 carat nugget, superb. Everyone respected him for this reason. He said: “The nugget calls you as much as you call it. »

The old man, who was a little younger then, agreed to have a class come and see his work. He had wasted the day, but he enjoyed being surrounded by children and showing them how to use the sieve. Their eyes filled with stars, because the idea of ​​easy wealth intoxicated them. He loved their presence until that moment, when the lure of gain became so strong that they became unbearable. They were missing out on research. The teachers also realized this and the day ended. The old man returned home early that day, disillusioned and anxious. He said to himself that if he had had a child, he would have taught him that the value of research, of craftsmanship could he have said, yes that was it, the craftsmanship of his profession, this endless experience challenged by the new day. It was what kept him alive, and it was priceless... He went to bed with his mind disturbed by these negative thoughts of these young people missing the essential, their life, their real life, the one that they might never know... It wasn't like him. Sadness did not succeed in stemming his joy. When he thought of his wife, he regretted not having had children with her. It was his only regret. Nostalgia invaded her, but the joy of the moments spent together surpassed her like the wave that never goes away and returns to the rock as if nothing had happened, like an eternal time. Nothing could cut the old man deeply.

As far back as he could remember, the old man had been looking for gold since his childhood. Quite by chance, near a river, when he was a child, he found a nugget the size of the white of a fingernail. He remembered this moment, hypnotized by this little sparkle, captivated by a reflection. Without any tools, without any particular effort, he found a treasure. He kept his vocation. He held many positions related to gold after becoming a recognized specialist. His life revolved around his passion. And he never hesitated when he passed near a gold-bearing river to stop there. His wife said to him: “You look like you're praying when you're looking for gold. » The old man was not confused. He distinguished his activity and prayer. And he didn't mix them. But he took his wife's reflection as a compliment, because it denoted an intensity, an interiority and a sensitivity unlike any other.

Why did he continue to search the placers? Because they were no doubt calling him, but above all because the old man didn't know how to refuse it. He admitted it easily. You didn't have to push him much. “Everyone replays their life until the last second ¹ ” he liked to say. He thought he was a pretty good actor.

A new day

Each of his actions brought him closer to his wife. Since he had lost her, the old man, conscious, was in no hurry. He eliminated temptations. When he discovered the nugget that established his reputation, the old man sifted the glory that threatened to intoxicate him. He put his trust in the future and the future for him, materialized in the reunion with his wife. He didn't have much religion, but if hope meant anything, it animated every second of his life.

The old man plunged both hands into his pockets to begin the action. He grabbed his distinctive shovel with its triangle handle and headed toward a large, gnarled stone, and then his attention turned to the roots a little further away, which he had been eyeing for a while. He moved an ancient stone that blocked the entrance to the roots, “a little mangrove,” he said to himself, remembering a stay in the Caribbean, distant but significant. He threw his shovel, scooped it up as if in a martial posture, and deposited the contents into the sieve placed on the bucket. He repeated his movement several times. As usual, the more he produced it, the more a wave of freedom enveloped him. Secretly, he always hoped to find that enthusiasm for digging again. He shook the sieve. He stood up. He looked at the effect of his work and saw that the place was his, man's hand on nature, but tomorrow nature would take the place back. Nature and man were going head to head, and no one would win, he was sure. He threw his shovel again with vigor, he moved the sieve with enthusiasm, he laid down the gold panning mat and spread what he had dug. He scrutinized the deposits in the gaps. He waited patiently. He was observing. A fervor gripped him today. He had “the soul of a beginner,” he thought. He saw it as crucially important. Keep this youthful heart. He stood up. It all came to nothing. He thought his enthusiasm was feigned. He knew that it was possible, that the mind could become intoxicated with nothing and deceive us. The foam of what we are comes out in emotions.

He remembered another gold prospector who came to this river. It attracted curious people. Everyone knew that he lived there and that he continued to look for gold in this place, and in people's minds, it was simple, if the old man who had found so many nuggets was looking for gold in this place, then there was gold in this place. People didn't care if the old man found gold, his reputation alone worked for him, without him. Besides, he still lived frugally... But no one worried about that. This young gold miner settled in as if he were on conquered territory. Very quickly, the old man noticed his talent through his gestures, his manner which was not born from experience, but from talent; but he was unknown to him and only the old man bore witness to it. This young man, in love with himself, didn't delve into anything. He would have educated him well, but that wasn't his job. He wondered for a long time whether he was acting properly. Should he tell him he was talented or not and guide him? Unfortunately, he didn't have time to decide. The young man found a magnificent nugget. He stood on the other side of the bank and looked at the old man. The latter smiled at him. He knew this feeling which was more than a feeling, but which threatened to tip very quickly into the will to power. The old man saw him topple over, and he never saw him again. Sadness filled him, because this young man was wrong on only one point, he had a talent that he thought was his, even though it had been given to him. “Without gratitude, there was nothing to hope for in this life.” Gratitude represented the essential safe passage. It took him a while to recover from the loss of this company, he dreamed of having spoken to the young man, of having protected him against the will to power, against vanity. He stood up, buried his hands in his pockets and clutched his fetishes.

The old man decided that the roots no longer offered any flavor. He turned and found himself slender in his movement to regain the other bank. He stepped over large stones that he did not recognize and promised himself to save their discovery for another day. As soon as he reached the other side, a spike to the liver pierced him. He paid only secondary attention to it as he was still riding the euphoria of his newfound slenderness. But the pain increased. She was giving him a fight that he hadn't seen coming and which surprised him. So much so that she exposed herself and pierced him right through when he thought he had finished this part. He blamed himself for letting his guard down. A moment was enough. What was this moment in the light of his entire life? He was losing the game for a quarter of a second of inattention, of casualness... "a kind of will to power" he thought. He fell to the ground like the stones he threw back into the water. He lay inert, compartmentalized in his body, on the edge of the river with no other possible choice. A little water licked his face. Inert, he appreciated the new sight of the river so friendly and so tender towards him. She said goodbye to him. The old man still had time to raise his hand towards his pocket to hold the hard ball that formed his handkerchief, his elbow under his head, he opened the book of his life one last time. He listened to the river in an unknown way. He told himself that there was always something to learn from this life. He told himself that he would not lower his flag this evening and that Albert would come and raise it. He kept his eyes open for a few more seconds, long enough to see his wife coming forward. He closed the book.

One day later

Albert transported the old man with the help of his two sons. The three of them took turns to watch over the body for a day and a night as tradition dictated. Still with their help and that of the undertaker, he placed the old man in the coffin. He passed his hand over his face. He lingered on her forehead. With authority, Albert grabbed the small cross from the right pocket, and from the left pocket he took out the handkerchief rolled into a ball which he began to tear apart. After a moment, the handkerchief revealed a splendid, haughty and conquering nugget. The two sons and the undertaker widened their eyes at this spectacle which they did not expect in the least. Albert put the handkerchief back in his pocket, placed the cross and the nugget on the old man's heart, and crossed his two hands over his two treasures. The coffin was closed. Albert looked at the closed coffin as if it were about to open again.