Does God Protect the Innocent?
by
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It was with a great deal of apprehension that Marc Constant approached the ramp of the Air France Boeing 747 which would transport him with his two young children to Paris. He was quite visibly uncomfortable as he carried Anne, aged one, in his arms while his son Patrick who was five years old walked beside him, clinging desperately to the sleeve of his coat. With every step that brought him closer to salvation, he anticipated some dramatic turn of events would arise to make his plan of evasion fail. Nothing happened to stop him and he entered the plane and walked past the smiling flight attendant. Relieved, he quickly found their seats and as best he could settled the children for the long trip. Breathing a strong sigh of relief, he wondered if just being on the plane immediately gave him extra-territorial protection. Of course it did not for they were still on American soil, but the mere thought of that possibility gave him some comfort. Before he could ponder this question further, the huge jumbo jet lumbered down the runway, gained speed and took off.
After dinner, Marc had called for the aid of the young attractive flight attendant many times to help him and the children. She first put a pillow behind Anne’s neck to make her more comfortable and then she took a blanket and covered Patrick with it. He was physically exhausted and desperately struggled to clear his thoughts so he could make the right decisions as to what he should do with the children. The idea of living in Paris already had crossed his mind, but he was convinced that Lilian, his ex-wife, would find the three of them there in no time at all. He decided not to make any more decisions while in this state of mind. He wanted so much to go back to the French capital where he spent his younger years as a student in the Lycee Michelet where the education was similar to that of an American high school and it was also where his older sister, Mary, and other relatives had moved after leaving their native Morocco. Patrick, on his right and Anne, seated at his left side, finally went into the dead sleep of children who had not been able to nap because of the series of long trips taken during the day. Looking at them sleeping peacefully, he could not but think that of all the things the picturesque town of Charleston, the place of their birth, had given him, they were the best gifts of all. His thoughts turned towards the Military College of the Citadel, where he had taught French for over four years. He vividly recalled images of the Corps of Cadets marching proudly on the parade grounds to the sound of bagpipes. They looked so handsome in their dress uniforms. To his great surprise, the faces of the cadets seemed to change constantly, while the Corps itself, or rather its spiritual embodiment, remained totally unchanged. Very distinctly, he recalled a time when he imagined he would have a son who would attend and graduate from the institution, with its grand history and proud traditions...a son that had not yet been born to him. Tenderly positioning more comfortably the frail body of his son Patrick, who slept quietly in his seat, he sadly began to doubt he would ever see him wear the proud gray and white uniforms of a Citadel cadet. Marc had so fervently dreamed of one day returning with pride a salute from his son, flesh of his flesh, blood of his blood, as a young second lieutenant. The plane was dark now. In that darkness, Marc allowed himself to relax just a bit, calmed by the sound of the plane’s engines. Day’s end had finally come. It had been punctuated by a long and anguished escape by car. Sinking into his seat, he went into a deep sleep...
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About the Book
In the mid-sixties, Charleston, S.C. is steeped in the colonial atmosphere of the South. In this picturesque city where one can still listen to "gullah", the language spoken by the blacks of "Porgy and Bess", a dangerous relationship is going to blossom. However, in a very spectacular fashion, that relationship will destroy a man and a woman whose personalities are diametrically opposed. A French instructor at the Military college of The Citadel, Marc is responsible for the training of cadets, a few of whom will go, after graduation, to wage a detestable war in Vietnam... and will not come back. At the same time his gorgeous wife Lilian is a whimsical and unstable person. Throughout the novel, the beatings of quintessential pulsation of a world in turmoil can easily be felt. In that world, husband and wife are condemned to live together; yet later they tear each other apart. An unqualified anguish created by solitude frightens Marc, who knows he will be left alone if he files for divorce. Thus, he tries desperately to cling to a marriage which has been doomed from its beginning. Very quickly, indeed, he realizes that the physical beauty of his spouse is not at all the reflection of a beautiful soul, but what can he do? He is madly in love with the diabolical body of that woman, whose caresses can calm him down as would a drug, but a drug without an antidote. As for Lilian, she dissimulates her intellectual mediocrity by wielding her power of seduction over her husband. Thus, the central theme in the novel focuses on the weakness of a man obsessed with the evils of the flesh and on a woman of strong character whose questionable virtue reminds us of Bess in George Gershwin’s opera. For five years, Marc will ride an emotional roller coaster, vacillating between love and hatred for his wife. When he finally wakes up from his nightmare, he decides to escape from his world of lost illusions by kidnapping his two young children, who have been born into this unhappy union. It seems that fatherly love, much more than the wounded pride of a deceived man, is what will allow him to seek total salvation. Finally, then the novel presents a provocative drama about morality, as it carefully examines the American institutions of marriage and divorce vis-à-vis a judicial system which is not so perfect. By fleeing with his children, Marc is convinced that god protects the innocent; and maybe he also desires to prove to himself that deceptions and failures are not necessarily attributable to fate or to a certain genetic curse... will he, in the end, come out enriched after this experience?
About the Author
Professor Marcel Crespil was born in Morocco and educated in France. In 1956, when touring the U.S., he decided to make this country his permanent residence. From 1964 to 1968 he attended Florida State University and wrote his doctoral dissertation on Albert Camus. After graduation, he taught French and Spanish at the Citadel in Charleston, South Carolina. During that time, he translated important documents pertaining to the Vietnam War for Gen. Mark Clark, president emeritus of The Citadel and former hero of World War II, North African invasion. Between 1974 and 1978 Dr. Crespil taught English in the Moroccan Law School in Fez, while supervising a program to train Moroccan troops in English and telecommunications at the U.S. Navy CEMS School in Kenitra. When the military base closed, he came to Texas and since then has been teaching French and Spanish at Texas Southern University and English as a Second Language at the Houston Community College.