he poured the beer from the last bottle into our two glasses, leaving a little in the bottom.
“C’est un bon pays pour la chasse,” Fontan said. “J’aime beaucoup shooter les canards.”
“Mais il y a très bonne chasse aussi en France,” I said.
“C’est vrai,” Fontan said. “Nous avons beaucoup de gibier là-bas.”
Madame Fontan came up the stairs with the beer bottles in her hands, “Il est catholique,” she said “My God, Schmidt est catholique.”
“You think he’ll be the President?” Fontan asked.
“No,” I said.
The next afternoon I drove out to Fontan’s, through the shade of the town, then along the dusty road, turning up the side road and leaving the car beside the fence. It was another hot day. Madame Fontan came to the back door. She looked like Mrs. Santa Claus, clean and rosy-faced and white-haired, and waddling when she walked.
“My God, hello,” she said. “It’s hot, my God.” She went back into the house to get some beer. I sat on the back porch and looked through the screen and the leaves of the tree at the heat and, away off, the mountains. There were furrowed brown mountains, and above them three peaks and a glacier with snow that you could see through the trees. The snow looked very white and pure and unreal. Madame Fontan came out and put down the bottles on the table.
“What you see out there?”
“The snow.”
“C’est jolie, la neige.”
“Have a glass, too.”
“All right.”
She sat down on a chair beside me. “Schmidt,” she said. “If he’s the President, you think we get the wine and beer all right?”
“Sure,” I said. “Trust Schmidt.”
