June

On the eleventh of June, at nine o'clock, two eighteen-year-old boys sign their apprenticeship contracts in the mezzanine office.

Salomé is there because the chamber of trades is sending an adviser and the adviser is hearing. It is an assignment like any other: an hour and a quarter, two contracts, an apprenticeship record book, the training agreement.

She interprets correctly. She interprets everything.

She interprets the adviser's questions about the firm's capacity to provide the training, Yanis's answer about Momo's thirty-one years of experience — Momo will be the supervising craftsman — and the adviser's remark that this is perfect. She interprets the articles on working hours for minors — both are eighteen, so it does not apply, but the adviser says it anyway. She interprets a joke about their not being paid to do nothing.