by Paul Thomas
‘A pretty pricey one, by the sound of it.’
‘Mum, I know what I can and can’t afford. When I’ve blown what’s in the budget, I’ll come straight home like a good little boy.’
‘I can remember when you were a good little boy. It seems like another lifetime.’
She withdraws into memories from the age of innocence. I feign an interest in her magazine’s cover story, an update on Hollywood anorexia.
Eventually she says, ‘Well, I hope it turns out all right,’ without sounding as if she’d put money on it.
‘Why shouldn’t it?’
‘I know Paris is a beautiful city and all that and you obviously enjoyed living there but I don’t have fond memories of it. That’s where your father started to go downhill.’
Jesus, what? ‘Go on.’
She holds up her empty glass. I fill it.
‘He used to write — stories and such. That’s why he spent so much time in that damn shed.’ She observes my astonishment, possibly with the slightly cruel satisfaction that people often get from dropping bombshells. ‘He kept it from me, too, Max; I found out purely by accident. The deputy headmaster rang up in a state one weekend. There was some sort of drama: grog, probably; this was before the boys took up marijuana. I went down to the shed but he’d gone for a walk without telling me. The desk was littered with pages covered in his handwriting and you know nosey old me. It was a story about a married teacher having an affair with a colleague’s wife and for once it was perfectly true: I really couldn’t put it down. In fact, I was so absorbed, I didn’t hear him come back. Well, did he do his nana. I’d never seen him so worked up, banging his fist on the desk and going purple in the face. I was very silly: instead of calming him down, I got cross and made a fuss — why that particular subject and why the secrecy? Do you know what he did? He grabbed the pages, screwed them up, took them to the incinerator and set them on fire. “Happy now?” he said.
‘It took him a couple of days before he could talk about it. He’d been writing on and off for a few years. Occasionally he’d get completely fed up because he couldn’t get it quite right, chuck it all in the incinerator and vow never again. Writing didn’t do him much good, Max. He’d shut himself away down there so he could write, then he’d get depressed because it didn’t come out quite the way he wanted. God knows how much stuff he threw away. Towards the end he made me promise that after he’d gone, I’d go down there and burn everything I could find — without reading it first, needless to say.’
‘Why, for Christ’s sake?’
‘He didn’t want anyone else to read it until it was perfect and it never was. Having said that, it wasn’t completely desperate. Sometimes he’d stroll in with that little smile of his and, after some prompting, admit to being rather pleased with his day’s work. So he got something out of it but when you look at the other side of the ledger, it wasn’t enough. Not nearly enough.’ She pauses before cutting to the chase. ‘Personally, I’ve always wondered if the real reason he didn’t want anyone to see it was that they would’ve cottoned on pretty quickly that it was about him — what’s the term?’
‘Autobiographical.’ I dread to think where this could end up but I feel I have to try, for both their sakes. ‘Leaving aside that story, did Dad give you any reason whatsoever to think he was playing up?’
‘No, but if he could keep the writing a secret, it stands to reason he could keep other things secret.’
‘No, it doesn’t. As you’ve pointed out, he was slightly batty about the writing.’
‘Yes, but how could I be sure?’
‘There’s no such thing as absolute certainty, Mum. There’s only absolute trust.’
‘Of course I trusted him,’ she says shakily. ‘And I never, ever stopped loving him. But there was that tiny nagging doubt I couldn’t put out of my mind. Believe me, I tried.’ Her eyes leak and her voice cracks. ‘And when I finally did manage, it was too late — I’d lost him and I couldn’t get him back.’
She balls her little old hands and squeezes them into her eye sockets. I hug her until the shaking stops and she insists she’s fine.
I should let this lie but I need to know the whole story. ‘What happened in Paris?’
‘He was pleased when you went to live there,’ she says. ‘“That’s the place for a young writer,” he used to say. He had a book, something like The Reader’s Guide to Paris, that told you where famous writers had lived and their favourite watering-holes and whatnot. While I was shopping, he’d wander off to have a Campari where Hemingway or whoever used to drink.’
‘Why didn’t he say so? I would’ve happily gone along.’
‘It was all part of the secret. And knowing your father, he probably thought you, being a real writer, would think that sort of thing was beneath you.’
I let out a groan.
‘That’s the way he was, Max. But it seemed to tip him off balance, going to these writers’ haunts and seeing you in your apartment working away. I think that’s when he started to feel as if he’d wasted his life. Bear in mind he really didn’t talk about it so some of this is guesswork but I suspect he’d always had an ambition to be a writer. He really admired the fact that you’d just gone ahead and done it, ignoring the people who were telling you to get a steady job and write in your spare time. He often pointed out that you’d gone off to Europe to be a writer at practically the same age he came out from England to be a teacher. “There’s my son being published all over the place,” he’d say, “while I’m scribbling away in a garden shed writing stuff no one will ever read.”’
‘Why didn’t you tell me this before?’
‘Because he wouldn’t have wanted me to. He’d be beside himself at the thought, God love him. And I wouldn’t have if it wasn’t for this Paris thing bringing it all back.’ She frowns at her empty glass. ‘The wine probably helped.’
I offer a refill.
‘Why not?’ she says. ‘I only have to get myself up the stairs and I can do that on my hands and knees if need be.’
‘So a few years down the track what was Dad saying about my brilliant career?’
She looks away. ‘Nothing in particular that I can remember.’
‘Come on, Mum. That old holy-roller Logan dropped some pretty heavy hints after the funeral.’
‘Did he?’ she says, flaring with indignation. ‘What on earth gave him the right?’
‘He sees himself as the keeper of the flame. You’ve got this far, Mum, you might as well finish the story. I can handle it — I’ve had a bit of practice lately.’
She grimaces. My porno past is one skeleton we won’t be rattling. ‘There was nothing specific but I think he worried about how you’d cope if it didn’t quite work out for you. You always had to read between the lines with your father: he’d say something about himself and later the penny would drop that he was also talking about you.’
‘For example.’
‘Well, he used to say there’s a lot to be said for only having to please yourself because once a book’s published, it’s no longer just what the author wrote, it’s what other people say about it.’
‘But he couldn’t please himself.’
Before she can reply, the doorbell rings. That will be my driver. We’re out of time. I kiss my mother goodbye and leave her to her memories and her regrets.
Stanley tosses an A4 envelope and a paperback in bookshop plastic onto my lap.
‘Guess where they found your sprog.’
‘Sydney.’
‘Why Sydney?’
I shrug. ‘It seems to be popular with middle-class English kids on their gap year.’
‘She’s not English, she’s French.’
‘What?’
‘All will be explained. Have a look at the book.’
The cover is a cityscape; I’d recognise those pink terracotta walls and roof tiles anywhere. The book is La Ville en Rose: The Toulousain Way of Life by someone called Patricia Morville. I’ve heard of it, indeed br
iefly contemplated buying it when it came out last year, supposedly breathing fresh life into the Year in Provence sub-genre. I’ll get to it after the Dellasandro, which I’m coldly determined to overcome before we land at Charles De Gaulle.
Stanley tells me to check out the author bio. It begins: Patricia Morville has been coming to the Languedoc region of France since before she could walk. In 1995 she finally surrendered to its seductive charms and moved her family (daughter Emily, black Labrador Smudge, cat Nikolai) over from London, married a local and has never looked back …
‘I looked her up on the net,’ says Stanley. ‘She’s shifted nearly half a million copies of the fucker.’
‘Nothing surprises me any more. So I don’t even have to cross the channel?’
‘You don’t even have to leave Paris,’ he says. ‘The fruit of your loins is a student at the Sorbonne. There’s some photos in there.’
‘I’m not opening this envelope until I’m at cruising altitude clutching a glass of champagne.’
‘Suit yourself,’ he says. ‘No offence, Max, but are you absolutely sure she’s yours?’
‘You can’t see a resemblance?’
‘There is no fucking resemblance.’
‘Now that you mention it, I’ve only got Patricia’s word for it.’
‘Did she try to screw some dough out of you?’
‘Not a cent. She just wanted me to fuck off.’
‘Well, that sure as hell doesn’t sound like any woman I’ve ever heard of,’ he says. ‘Maybe it was all a mind-fuck.’
Stanley pulls up outside the international terminal. ‘Well, mate,’ he says as we shake hands, ‘I hope everything works out a treat.’
‘I suppose I should say the same.’
‘Brigit?’ He chuckles mirthlessly. ‘Speaking of mind-fucks … I can’t work the bitch out. Can you shed any light on the subject?’
‘Which subject?’
‘Where she’s at.’ He flutters his hands like a mime artist. ‘Adultery-wise.’
‘Remember where this all started? My view hasn’t changed.’
‘Ah, fuck it,’ he says. ‘Maybe I’ll just forget the whole thing.’
I clap him on the shoulder. ‘Plenty more fish in the sea, brother, and most of them are queuing up to take the bait. See you in a month or so.’
‘Email me,’ he says. ‘I might come over. We could do a bit of a tiki-tour, like a couple of old fags on their dream holiday.’
The bloodhounds have been thorough, creepily so. Emily is studying philosophy, politics and literature; she flats with a couple of other students in the thirteenth, near the Mitterrand Library. There’s an outline of her routine, right down to the cafés she frequents. There are photographs of her standing in front of a metro station fiddling with her iPod, examining a peach at a market, and getting a light from a young black guy outside a café. The thought of her being tailed and spied on at my behest makes me queasy. I remind myself about omelettes and eggs.
There’s no particular resemblance but then she’s a pretty eighteen-year-old with punked-up chestnut hair and retro spectacles. I can’t tell how tall she is and although it’s springtime in Paris she’s wearing an overcoat that reaches down to her ankles. I study these photos minutely but they give up no clues as to what reaction I’ll get.
Eating and drinking in moderation, I forge through the Dellasandro and make a mental note to track down Tania’s review to see if she’s still capable of humility. I arrive in Paris feeling faintly virtuous on account of my restraint and application and in that spirit resolve to tell the truth at all times. France opens its doors to me and I emerge into pale sunshine hoping that when I return to Charles De Gaulle Airport, I’ll have something to show for my visit.
twenty-three
I’m in a third-floor apartment on Boulevard des Grands Augustins, booked through a boutique travel outfit that Brigit put me onto. It overlooks the river opposite L’Ile de la Cité, a few minutes’ walk from the Sorbonne.
Who first? Unless Samantha really has been transformed, she won’t be hostile or rudely dismissive but she might find my presence intrusive or discomforting. (‘You call that a stalker? Listen, there’s this guy I had a ships-that-pass-in-the-night thing with in the late eighties, really a glorified one-night stand. Well, last week I answered the buzzer and there he was, all the way from New Zealand, would you believe, looking at me as if to say “Now, where were we?”’)
She might have a tight little circle and a comfortable routine or be in a relationship and resent having to put herself out for this fool from the end of the world. She might even be offended by my unilateral decision to disturb the memory of that interlude whose magic was largely generated by the context: no outside world, no consequences and, above all, no future.
Emily, on the other hand, should be clear-cut: she’ll either give me the time of day or she won’t. If it’s the latter, I’m really no worse off because you can’t lose something you never had. With Samantha, though, there’s a risk that I’ll walk away the poorer, having tarnished a treasured memory.
I’ll start with Emily.
Her main daytime hangout is a café on Boulevard St Michel, near the Luxembourg Gardens. On day one I spend four hours there in three separate shifts — coffee, beer and wine. I read Patricia’s book, which is an unimaginable divergence from what she used to do. Her writing, never notable for its dense muscularity, is now a sugary froth that threatens to float off the page and evaporate. Her intention, which was often unclear, is now unmistakable: she’s out to make middle-class England envious.
I finish it in a tiny restaurant in St Germain where the menu hasn’t changed since I last ate there almost twenty years ago. I contemplate hoofing it over to Samantha’s place — she lives in the seventh, in the shadow of the Eiffel Tower — but do the sensible thing and go home to my duty-free single malt.
I’m sitting in the café on Boulevard St Michel with a brioche and the Observer when Emily blows in with half a dozen others. Her hair is now dirty blonde — natural or not, I can’t tell — and she’s mothballed the overcoat and squirmed her way into drainpipe jeans. She’s Patricia’s height — between short and average — but more sinuous than her mother was pre-motherhood. It’s hard to get a sense of her personality because the group vibe is high-decibel animation.
She has café au lait and toasted baguette with jam. The others have cordials or tea. Their conversation is a free-for-all. They talk over and around one another, sometimes swirling off into brisk one-on-ones, in rapid-fire, looping sentences that never seem to finish. There are two males: one is coupled up, the other’s keeping his options open. Four of them, including Emily, smoke; a fifth snatches the odd drag on her boyfriend’s cigarette. None of them look as if they’re doing university the hard way — op shop clothes, third-hand textbooks and the smell of an oily rag. What could be finer than being eighteen and a student at the Sorbonne, with Mum the bestselling author 600 kilometres due south?
I’ve found my daughter but I can’t approach her while she’s locked into this tight little crew. Apart from the difficulty and potential embarrassment of making my pitch in front of an audience of French teenagers who seem unlikely to hear me out in respectful silence, I need to be sensitive to Emily’s situation. Patricia could have told her just about anything or nothing at all. She mightn’t know I exist and certainly wouldn’t want to find out at the same time as her friends. But if I do nothing, they’ll probably leave en masse and I’ll be left with the choice of coming back tomorrow or following her, with all the risks that entails.
Emily and another girl stand up, shouldering their backpacks. The others stay put. The two of them head for the door in a crossfire of ciaos. They brush past my table but pay me no attention. I have the bill so I leave a handful of coins and follow them out. They set off towards the university arm in arm.
I catch them up. ‘Excuse me,’ I say. ‘Emily.’
She stares at me through her sunglasses.
&nbs
p; ‘Sorry to turn up out of the blue like this but I’m Max Napier. Does that name mean anything?’
She gasps. Her friend starts chattering but Emily cuts her off.
‘Max Napier,’ she says, as if she’s trying to get her tongue around an exotic place-name. Her accent is pure French. ‘My old penfriend.’
I nod.
She tells her friend Josette to go on without her but Josette has a powerful need to know. Emily says she’ll explain later. Josette looks me up and down, rehearsing the description she’ll give the authorities, then goes on her way with a sulky hitch of her backpack.
‘So, Mr Napier,’ says Emily, ‘we meet at last. It’s like a line from a Victorian melodrama.’
‘Would you mind very much taking off your sunglasses?’
She obliges, the corner of her mouth curling with amusement. ‘I have you to thank for my baby blues.’
‘But not much else.’
She shrugs. ‘So am I as you imagined?’
‘You’re as I hoped: happy and healthy. Pretty is a bonus. How about me?’
She laughs. ‘Well, you don’t have these.’ She puts her fists to her temples and makes horns with her index fingers. ‘You don’t look like a shit but I guess if you did Mama wouldn’t have fallen for you in the first place.’
‘I take it she hasn’t let bygones be bygones?’
‘I shouldn’t think you cross her mind very often,’ she says. ‘What do they say about the best way to get revenge?’
‘Living well is the best revenge?’
‘Voilá. She has a very nice life.’
‘I read her book yesterday. She’s done well.’
She shrugs again. ‘Yours are more to my taste.’ Before I can exploit this opening she says, ‘What do you want? My lecture starts in two minutes.’
‘A little of your time.’
‘When?’
‘Whenever,’ I say. ‘I’m here for a week or two.’
‘You came from Australia?’