La poudre aux yeux

A nostalgic voice recalls the quiet streets of Vendôme, where the narrator spent childhood afternoons at the modest home of Judge Quinqueton. In the garden’s narrow stream they built makeshift boats—paper‑thin vessels that carried their imaginations far beyond the hedgerows, toward distant, invented ports like Seringapatam. A faded portrait of a bearded poet hangs unnoticed in a pantry, a silent witness to their games and the whispered stories of a forgotten brother of the judge.

The boys’ rivalry turns each launch into a theatrical contest: one rushes to the finish, the other pauses to “send telegrams” and “load exotic cargoes,” turning a simple pear tree into a Red Sea. Around them, the kindly housemaid Pacaud offers cool towels and gentle praise, while the judge’s boastful tales of his Saumurois estate add a layer of adult intrigue. These early adventures set the tone for a tale where memory, imagination, and the ordinary intertwine, inviting listeners to wander the same garden pathways and wonder where the next imagined voyage might lead.