The woman was annoying them. They were only interested in the capture. The firemen, six of them, climbed the gate, surrounded the house and began to clamber up the walls on all four sides. But no sooner had one of them got onto the roof than the crowd started calling out to warn the victim, like children at a Guignol show.

“Do be quiet!” shouted the woman, which drew cries of “There’s another one! There’s another one!” from the onlookers. Hearing their shouts, the madwoman armed herself with tiles and flung one at the helmet of the fireman who had made it to the top. The five others straight away climbed down again.

While the shooting galleries, fairground attractions and stalls on the place de la Mairie were bemoaning the lack of customers on a night when the takings should have been pouring in, the most audacious delinquents climbed the walls and thronged onto the lawn to watch the hunt. I’ve forgotten what the madwoman was saying, with that underlying note of mournful resignation in her voice that makes someone sound as if they are right and everyone else is wrong. The louts who preferred this performance to the funfair still wanted the best of both worlds, however. Afraid the lunatic would be caught while they weren’t looking, they rushed off to have a quick ride on the merry-go-round. Others, more sensible, settled in the branches of the linden trees and were quite happy letting off Bengal lights or firecrackers.

One can imagine how fearful the Maréchauds were, shut up inside their house amongst all the noise and light.

The town councillor who was married to the lady of charity climbed onto the low wall beside the gate and gave an impromptu address on the spinelessness of the house’s owners. He got a round of applause.

Thinking the applause was directed at her, the madwoman gave a bow, a pile of roof tiles under each arm, because every time a firemen’s helmet glinted she hurled one at it. In her unwordly voice she thanked them for finally understanding her. She reminded me of a female pirate captain alone on the deck of her sinking ship.

Wearying of her, the crowd dispersed. I would have liked to stay on with my father, while my mother, to satisfy that need children have for making themselves feel sick, took the others off to the roller-coaster. And it was true, I did feel that peculiar need more keenly than my brothers. I loved it when my heart beat quickly and erratically. Yet I found this performance, which was deeply poetic, more enjoyable. “You’ve gone quite pale,” said my mother. I made out it was the Bengal lights. I told her they made me look green.

“I’m still afraid it’ll upset him,” she told my father.

“Oh, there’s no one more impervious,” he replied. “He could watch anything, except someone skinning a rabbit.”

My father only said it so I could stay. But he knew that I was overcome by what I was seeing. I could sense that it had deeply moved him as well. I asked him to lift me onto his shoulders so that I could get a better view. The truth was, I was about to faint; my legs were giving way.

By now there were only about twenty people there. We heard trumpets. It was the torchlight procession.

All of a sudden the madwoman was lit up by hundreds of flaming torches, as if the soft glow of the footlights had given way to the glare of flashbulbs, photographing the latest star. And then with a farewell wave, either believing it was the end of the world or simply that they were coming to take her away, she threw herself off the roof, smashed through the awning with a terrible crash and landed in a heap on the stone steps below. Up till then I had been trying to withstand everything, although my ears were ringing and I was devoid of feelings. But when I heard people shouting: “She’s still alive,” I fell off my father’s shoulders, unconscious.

When I came round, he took me down by the Marne.