The Lonely Crowd will feature a new short story by a different author each month throughout the remainder of 2025. For July, we are delighted to publish a new work by Tadgh Muller.

And the dog started barking, charging around like she might rip down a curtain or knock over the table. My missus went to the window. I was at the stove watching the hob.

‘The truck has stopped…’

I stumbled upstairs, pulled on a sweater, and went back down. The missus handed over the shawl I’d worn the night before. It’s damn cold here and there are endless storms, the wind is a devil too, and fog is worst of all. I’m about done with the cold, with this place.

On the Rue, underfoot the ancient cobbles felt caked in fat and slippery. Somewhere above the sun was struggling to rise, a person might disappear in the fog, like they passed behind something concrete.

The driver was standing there. White as the fog, rambling to himself, overcome, horror-stricken. Had I reached for him through the fog and dark?

Again, I seem to remember this. Already within the moment it had the feeling of a dream. Though it wasn’t. But more than anything I remember the emptiness, the silence, and the cold.

The day had not yet advanced as far as a first coffee. I hadn’t completely come to, yes, I was in the dream state, more pronounced by the deep cold and my body’s desire to stay asleep, to stay warm, to limit the use of energy. God, I hadn’t even had a cigarette! That explained it.

And before me, a body pressed to the earth, and part stretched beneath the back of a truck.

I went to my knees and leaned in very closely, as if I might kiss her, or whisper something sweet into her ear. Almost intimately. Wake up, the sun is on its way, wake up, its cold down here, and dark, and moist, you’ll catch a chill or something worse.

She was an old woman with a pair of spectacles balanced on the bridge of an aquiline nose, what crystal clear lenses, and not so much as a smudge let alone a crack or break, and the eyes thrown wide open. The mouth made a perfect ‘O’ as if she had been caught by surprise. The light had gone out abruptly.

And I looked below the waist, cleaved in half, the mess of bone and organ and flesh and liquid. Splattered on the pavement, squatted like a fly. A Doctor would have listed the broken organs one by one. Yes, it was like a butcher’s block, market day dans la Loire.

The walking stick was at an acute angle to the body, stick and woman like the line of a bent blade of grass.

I stood up and looked around, no one was on the street. Where had the driver gone, had he been there, was it all in my imagination? The mist, and the fog, and the dark, and the deep cold, all played tricks on the mind. Time walks its path.

I stood up, and looked around, and turned to walk into the boulangerie. Inside the boulangerie the driver was sitting on a plastic chair, shop staff surrounded the driver, and the driver buried his face in his hands, then raised his hands and peered from face to face, all the time muttering. A customer was there holding a dog, the dead lady’s dog, a toy dog, freshly clipped and going crazy just like the driver, the two of them besides themselves, what a miserable pair.

There is nothing to be done here – I said to myself.

I turned back into the fog.

The head baker was pacing up and down the Rue, did he see me a moment ago, was he out there with me?  Had he watched me, or had he only now just arrived? He too was at a loss.

What a great mess. The remains of everything beneath the waistline. And that beautiful little mouth on a strangely colorless face. Like she was made of wax or chalk, drained not just of life, but color and being.

I draped the lambswool shawl over the body. The shawl covered the face and the eyes. I hoped it preserved some dignity. But as for the bottom half, it didn’t cover much. The baker went to his van, his movements all hurried as if he had someplace to be. The poor bastard, that damn truck flattened his customer. Goddam, that truck was his delivery. Maybe he knew madame?  It was sadder than a supermarket moving into town. I made the sign of the cross very hurriedly like much depended on it.

And from the back of his van, the baker pulled a sheet. I picked up the walking stick and with it stretched the sheet to cover the ruined body and the battered remains.

The episode passed in silence.

I looked back at my work and saw a solitary finger stretching heavenwards from the sheet, stiff and pointing to the sky. It was like an accusation. I bent down and draped the tip of the shawl over the hand.

Inside the house the dog was quiet. Almost solemn. The coffee was burnt and still on the stove. I fumbled for a cigarette.

And then the sun was somewhere high, but the fog wouldn’t budge. I watched from the window.

When the Gendarmerie arrived, they pulled back the shawl, then covered the lady once more, and lit cigarettes.

And a monk from the Abbey arrived. He pulled the shawl back too, and, convinced that the lady was dead the old man moved to the footpath, bent to his knees, he pulled the book and began to pray, a rosary draped around his hand swinging like a grandfather clock, heavy like time. And he was old, he didn’t appear to mind the cold, the damp, and the fog, he didn’t seem to mind much of anything, didn’t seem to be in a hurry to be anywhere, no rush to his prayers.

And the detectives, like carpenters or ants, with tape measures, yellow spray paint, pads, and cameras. And finally, the area was cordoned off.  I yelled at the top of my voice!

‘Don’t look out that window, they are taking away the body’.

The empty road looked like someone had smashed up a crate of watermelons, the vision was worse than the body, more disturbing than the driver, the pink pavement was worst of all, bright pink with the sun coming up, the pavement bright pink and juicy. And the fog is now white, not grey, the sun piercing it like a skewer. Then they hosed and sterilized the street, all that was left were the diagonal lines. Like speech mark, marking nothing, but absence. Silence.

And that was it. Shows over en la Grande Rue.

I stepped outside and crossed the Rue, and a long line had formed outside the boulangerie. It was a glorious sign and bore testament to how good the bread was, how it was always warm, and fresh, and the baking never ceased until the day had finished, didn’t even stop for the dead. Now we all line up quietly and wait for our loaf.

The simple things they get right here: like bread and death.

And I saw the monk in the line.

And the Detectives.

Even the Gendarmerie.

It had been a busy morning for everyone in town.

And there was a young lady with glasses, her mouth shaped like an ‘O’. Everyone stepped aside for her as she passed. I guessed she’d inherited the dog.

A look passed between the baker and I, solemn, nothing was said, not even a smile, smiles are not trusted in this country. There was recognition. The bread was chosen carefully, wrapped with a sheet of paper, either end sticking out, the crust gold, a deep, fresh, bready smell, like it had been pulled just now out of hell, where it had been cooked to perfection, with my name and my star and my destiny on it.

I nodded twice and turned back out. And the bread was good. And there were no shadows. Death faded with the sun.

 

 

 

 

 Main photo by John Lavin