The Seventh Function of Language

“Well, uh … The whole room is saturated with symbols: the paintings, the wall hangings, the moldings on the ceiling … Each object, each detail is intended to express the splendor and majesty of republican power. The choice of Delacroix, the photograph of Kennedy on the cover of the book on the escritoire: everything is heavily symbolic. But a symbol has value only if it’s on display. A symbol hidden inside a box is pointless. In fact, I’d go further: it doesn’t exist.

“At the same time, I don’t suppose this room is where you keep your screwdrivers and spare bulbs. It seemed unlikely that the two boxes were for holding tools. And if they were for storing paper clips or a stapler, they’d be on your desk, where you could reach them. So the contents are neither symbolic nor functional. And yet they must be one or the other. You could put your keys in there, but I imagine that at the Élysée, the president isn’t responsible for locking up, and you don’t need your car keys either, because you have a chauffeur. So that left only one possibility: a dormant symbol, one that does not signify anything in itself here, but which would be activated outside of this room: the miniature, mobile symbol of what this place symbolizes. Namely, the grandeur of the republic. A medal, in other words. And, given where we are, it has to be the Legion of Honor.”

Giscard exchanges a knowing look with Bayard. “I think I see what you mean, Superintendent.”

21

Hamed sips his Malibu and orange as he talks a little about his life in Marseille, and his companion drinks in his words without really listening. Hamed knows what those spaniel eyes mean: he is this man’s master, because the man is overcome by the desperate desire to possess him. He’ll give himself to him later, or not, and maybe he’ll find some pleasure in it, but that pleasure will undoubtedly be less than the feeling of power he is experiencing now by knowing he is the object of desire—and this is the upside of being young, handsome, and poor: without even thinking about it he can calmly despise all those prepared to pay, in one way or another, to have him.