literally stories

The M’sieur Fleurnoir depicted in the press was not a far cry from the M’sieur Fleurnoir with whom I dined at the Cabaret Mort. There was the same baleful  demeanor, the same pale gleam of malice in the eye, and his remarks, few as they were, never failed to be less than cutting. His silences of course were legendary, and as they grew in stature, so too did his ambition to attain the kind of silence the press described as “towering.”  For those who liked their Fleurnoir undiluted, Wednesday’s interminable evenings were considered the best time to catch him. Being one of his few old friends, rather than one of his many ex-friends, I was permitted to sup with him, and sup we did, after a fashion. The odd oyster, a Vin Mariana or two, followed perhaps by an apricot or a dollop of blancmange.  Fleurnoir always ate with an air of distaste, seeming to savour his reputation as one who’d subsisted for decades on a diet of raisins and boiled cabbage. He told me he’d never in his life tasted boiled cabbage – that, he said, was a newspaper invention!  He had however lived for years on a diet of stale chocolate and gutrot coffee. Stickler for detail, Fleurnoir.  Especially if the subject under discussion was himself.