The not very illuminating works by [Madeleine Blancasall and Nicolas Beaucean] I am able to consult with no difficulty. But [Un Tresor merovingien a Rennes-le-Chateau by Antoine l'Ermite] proves altogether more elusive.
A Merovingian treasure at Rennes-le-Chateau is the book which I had ordered during my visit to the Bibliotheque nationale with Gerard de Sede. On that occasion, it had been communiqué - unavailable as another reader was consulting it. I am surprised to find, this few months later, that the book is still communiqué. On each of my three working days in Paris, I reorder the book. On each occasion I am informed that the book is communiqué. This is very frustrating - but the fact that other people, too, are delving into the Rennes-le-Chateau mystery is, perhaps, not surprising. For the moment, I must accept the frustration as 'part of the job.'
A month or so later, a friend tells me that she is about to take a short holiday in Paris. Is there, she asks, any commission she can undertake on my behalf? I ask her to pay a visit to the Bibliotheque Nationale; to order up the evasive Antony Hermit and, if possible to photocopy a page or two. But she returns with the by now familiar lack of success. Communiqué. I am beginning to smell the proverbial rat. At the next possible opportunity, I must endeavour to trap it. Yet more months are to pass before I can make the attempt.
At last I find myself back at the Bibliotheque Nationale. Again I order the book. Again it is communiqué. I make enquiring noises at the librarian's desk. But - no, I am told, communiqué means communiqué. There's nothing I can do about it. Somebody is reading it. 'For months on end?' I query plaintively. But an unhelpful shrug is the only response. What seems a not unreasonable idea occurs to me. 'Can I, Madame, order it up now for tomorrow morning, so that mine will be the first request of the day?' This suggestion is greeted by a glare of utter horror. This is not part of the Bibliotheque Nationale's routine. I must present myself at the desk each day, put in my order and await - with patience - until the other reader has finished with it. ...As a final desperate throw, I ask: 'Is it possible for you to indicate to me the desk of the other reader?' Total shock renders the librarian speechless. Her eyebrows pole-vault toward her hair line and her eyes close to block out the sight of such uncouth temerity.
...First it is necessary to track down the book in the library's main catalogue and make a a note of its reference number. In the Reading Room, a form must be filled in, in triplicate, for each book requested and then handed over at the librarian's desk. One is required to enter one's name, the title of the book and the catalogue reference number. A desk number is then assigned. In due time, one's book - or books - will be brought to the indicated desk, where one is now free to begin work. Of the three copies of the form, one is retained at the librarian's desk, and the other two disappear into the cavernous recesses of the Library's store. When the book is found on the shelves, the second copy of the form is placed inside its cover so that it may now make its way to the appropriate reader's desk. The third copy - known as the fantome - is placed in the space vacated by the book, where its ghostly presence holds sway until the volume is restored to its rightful home. If the book is communiqué, then the fantome is duly marked and placed on the reader's desk as notification of the fact. Is there any way in which I can take advantage of this elaborate routine?
'No' seems to be the only answer to my question. Lengthy discussions with functionaries of various sorts have always found me butting my head against the solid wall of the rigid rules and regulations. As I ponder upon this seemingly obdurate scenario, I begin to wonder if my command of the French language is not, for once, a disadvantage. I find myself remembering how helpful people used to be in the days of my jeunesse, when my fluency was less than adequate. Can I solicit aid by 'forgetting' the French language and presenting myself as a pathetically confused foreigner? Why not give it a try? Plainly, it will not work here, in the Reading Room where Madame l'Ogresse already knows to the contrary. I abandon my desk and, clutching my form emblazoned with the dread word communiqué, I make my way back to the Catalogue Room.
Two or three officials are to be found manning the catalogue, to provide assistance in case of need. I choose an elderly gentleman with a genial smiling and helpful air. ...Taking shameless advantage of his limited English and my for-the-moment well nigh incomprehensible French, I laboriously explain that I am a writer, attempting to research within his hallowed walls, and finding difficulty in understanding the system. ...I show him the communiqué form. He explains about communiqué and I explain that the damn book has been communiqué for months. ...He agrees that it is not habituel for a book to be communiqué for so long. I ask in yet more painful and halting sentences, if he could please confirm for me that the book is, indeed, with another reader. As I had been desperately hoping, he decides that it will be quicker and easier simply to make a physical check, rather than engage in any more exhausting attempts to communicate advice and/or instruction. Taking my form with its needful catalogue number, he disappears. I wait.
At last he reappears, wearing a worried frown. The book, he tells me, is not there. The fantome on the shelf bears, not today's date - but a date several months in the past. The book has been stolen. Moreover, it appears to have been stolen by one of my compatriotes. How does he know this I ask? The name on the fantome is recognisably English, he tells me. Can he give me the name? Well, of course, he shouldn't. But my sterling efforts to speak to him in his own language have, he thinks, earned me a tiny bending of the rules. He gives me the name. And now I KNOW that the rat I had smelled all those months ago is still alive and lurking in the wainscot. The name he has so kindly provided is that of my friend who had also been given the communiqué story. Why? And why has her fantome been left on the shelf? What game is being played? And by whom?
I decide, however, not to let the matter lie. Through my local library in England, I eventually make contact with an official of our library service who concerns himself with international loans. I explain the curious story to him and he agrees to write on my behalf to the Director of the Bibliotheque Nationale. To my total astonishment, barely a week later, Un Tresor merovingien a Rennes-le-Chateau by Antoine l'Ermite drops through my letter-box. It proves to be a tiny pamphlet, just a few pages long. ...The matter is growing curiouser and curiouser. ...As I scan the pages of my hard-won copy, I realise that I have read it before. It is the chapter dealing with Rennes-le-Chateau in a recently published book by Robert Charroux: Treasures of the world. But not simply photocopied from the book. The pages are completely differently set and there are very tiny alterations in the text. ...Why should anyone wish to go to all this trouble to publish a copy of a sketchy, incomplete and garbled account of a story which is already in print? And why make it so difficult for me to lay my hands on it? There is never to be an explanation of this additional mystery. [Lincoln, 1998]
