Hector Finds Time. Francois Lelord

once, he’d gone to a very hot country. When the door of the plane had opened, it had been a little like opening the oven door to check if the roast is done. Well, here, it was like opening the freezer door or even falling right into the freezer.

      Also, it was still dark outside, and all you could see were the lights laid out on the ice, no doubt to guide the plane.

      ‘Hector!’ someone called.

      Then Hector caught sight of his great friend Édouard, also dressed like a bear, arriving on a snowmobile and waving to him.

      Later, sitting behind Édouard as they skimmed along, Hector thought to himself that this was a nice image for time going by: a snowmobile zooming through the Arctic night.

       HECTOR IS COLD

      THE camp was made up of several very modern tents, and people from different countries lived in them – Hilton and his team of bubble researchers, the pretty pilot when she couldn’t set off again straight away in her little plane, and also Édouard.

      ‘Over there, in the distance, that’s the Inuit village,’ said Édouard.

      Hector could make out some faint lights in the dark. The effects of the champagne had begun to wear off and Hector wondered what on earth he was doing in such a cold place, so far from his bed and Clara. Every minute began to seem like an hour to him. Another new experience with time, he thought, but this one was rather painful.

      In the not-very-well-lit tent, Hector felt a little better as he listened to Édouard explain things.

      ‘We didn’t set up too close to the village so that we wouldn’t interfere with their way of life. But, of course, we help them, with medical check-ups for example, and we find ways for them to buy and sell, but at fair prices.’

      ‘But what are you doing here?’ asked Hector.

      ‘Once a banker, always a banker,’ said Édouard, laughing.

      This was Édouard’s new job: he had organised a way for the Eskimos to sell furs but at good prices for them. He had also asked his organisation to lend them some money so that they could buy themselves snowmobiles and pay them off little by little.

      ‘In any case, their way of life is going to disappear, just like it has for other tribes. Now they want snowmobiles and modern medicine for themselves and their babies, but with my system it’s progressive. They still keep their identity as hunters, they learn how much things cost, they don’t get ripped off and they don’t end up living on handouts either.’

      Édouard explained that, at one time, white people passing through here would agree to trade a knife with the Inuit in exchange for a pile of fox furs as high as the knife standing on its end!

      ‘These poor people were so badly exploited,’ said Édouard. ‘The only luck they had, compared to the American Indians, is that since no one wanted to settle on their land they were never massacred.’

      Édouard poured Hector a little more coffee. Hector thought that Édouard had really changed: before, every time they met, he’d always served Hector wonderful wine.

      ‘It’s getting late,’ said Édouard. ‘Time to go to bed, otherwise you’ll be exhausted tomorrow, and, here, the first rule is to keep yourself in good shape.’

      Hector realised that he didn’t know what time of day it was any more and, looking at his watch, he didn’t know if it was midday or midnight.

      Édouard explained that this was perfectly normal, what with the time difference between Hector’s country and here, and then the journey in the little plane at night.

      ‘All right,’ said Hector, ‘but what about the old monk?’

      ‘The old monk?!’ asked Édouard with a look of surprise.

      The old monk hadn’t even entered his head when Hector had asked for news of someone they both knew! Édouard had thought that Hector was talking about a nice Chinese girl they had met over in China. Back then, she’d been in quite a bad situation, but Hector and Édouard had managed to get her out of it. And now Édouard could reassure Hector that Ying Li (that was what the nice Chinese girl was called) was still doing well, so much so that she’d just had her second baby with a husband who loved her. She was happy, and what more could you wish for anyone?

      Hector was glad to hear the good news about Ying Li, but it wasn’t a lot of help to him in finding the old monk. Édouard told him that he also usually exchanged messages with the old monk over the internet, but for a while now the old monk hadn’t replied to his messages, which had never happened before. Hector was upset. What if the old monk really was dead after all?