‘I see. Well, of course, Monsieur de Tramont, I have a lot to do. Running a farm, even a small one like ours, takes up a lot of time.’
‘Of course. How selfish I am ‒’
‘But in the evening, m’sieu … About nine o’clock?’
‘You’re free then? That’s splendid! We dine early at the manor house, you see. I could come out ‒ where could we meet?’
She had no idea. There were lanes and corners where village lovers could find solitude, but those were hardly suitable for a play-reading.
‘I know!’ cried Philippe. ‘There’s a ruined summer-house on the edge of our land ‒’
‘Oh yes, I know it, the one where the honeysuckle has reached the roof ‒’
‘That’s it, the Jacobins pulled the building down ‒’
She could have told him that the villagers of Calmady had taken a lot of the stone away for their own building purposes during the long years when the ownership of the estate was in dispute. But it was true, the original wrecking had been carried out by vengeful gangs in the first days of the Revolution, so she’d been told.
‘Shall we meet there? Tomorrow? At nine?’
‘Not tomorrow, m’sieu ‒ I’ll have to catch up with the work after taking today off. But next day ‒’
He shook his head, sighing. ‘That’s Sunday. It’s difficult for me to get away on Sunday ‒ we go to Mass at the Cathedral and the whole day is thrown into commotion …’
She said nothing. Perhaps after all it had only been a passing fancy on his part.
‘Monday? Would you be able to come on Monday evening?’
Now she smiled. She didn’t know how much pleasure she allowed to show in that smile. ‘Yes, I could manage Monday.’
‘Then that’s a promise. Monday at nine. I’ll bring Duel of Wits to read to you ‒ it has some very good things in it.’
‘I look forward to it.’
He stood watching her as she hurried down the street towards the factory that stood on the far corner. It wasn’t just that she was pretty. The carriage of her head, the eager briskness of her tread …
Suddenly he felt that Monday was a long way away.
Nicole had more to occupy her than Philippe, but even so she thought about the coming meeting with happy expectancy. She went about the daily round singing to herself. From her wooden armchair by the window, her mother looked out to watch her comings and goings, and wondered to herself. Could the child have met some handsome young vineyardist in the party that went to Rheims? If so, how long before he came a-visiting? And if he didn’t come, how long before the songs died on the girl’s lips?
It was part of Nicole’s routine to go out after the day’s work was ended to take a last look at the goats. Sometimes, particularly in wet weather, they trampled their patch of pasture into a chalky mud. Last thing at night she would re-tether them if necessary, and spend a little time wandering around the little domain, breathing in the scent of the wild thyme on the nearby slopes and the meadow rue by the river.
Her mother generally went to sleep soon after eight at night, but would wake when she heard the door open and close on Nicole’s return. A murmured exchange soothed her back to sleep. It never occurred to her to ask the time nor to query Nicole’s doings.
On the Monday, Nicole made no change to her working clothes except to hide her good shoes under her apron when she went out. When she had looked to the goats, she walked along a hill path to the edge of the farm, sat down on a bank to exchange wooden clogs for leather shoes, and then jumped down into the lane. A scramble up the bank on the far side, a brisk walk through wooded grounds easily entered through gaps in the ruined walls, and she could see the roof of the summerhouse below her.
The villagers called it ‘the temple’, for it had originally been built in the Greek style as an amusement for a former marquis. Now there was nothing to be seen from the distance but a hummock of wild honeysuckle, with an occasional glimpse of white marble shining through in the evening sunshine. As she drew near, Philippe stepped out. He waved, came to greet her. ‘I was afraid you weren’t coming!’
‘Why? I’m not late, am I?’ She had no watch, but the old clock in the cottage kitchen kept good time and she knew well how long it took to walk from her home to any point in the landscape.
‘No, no, of course not, I just thought you might have changed your mind.’ He held her hand to guide her into the shady interior of the summerhouse. The air was heavy with the scent of the blossoms.
He asked if she’d got home safely on the cask-cart, told her an amusing little incident about his own drive home. He seated her on a marble bench. A copy of his play was lying there. ‘You read from the text,’ he said, ‘and I’ll say the words.’
‘You know it so well?’
‘I wrote it! Here, it’s this page.’ He turned over the script before handing it to her.
She was startled to find it was handwritten. She had expected a printed book. Somehow there was something very personal, almost physical, in holding in her hands his own handiwork. She felt herself blushing as if in some strange way it was a caress.
The scene he repeated was between a man and a woman, the man arguing in favour of adventure, of going out to face the world, the woman attempting to state a case against it because she knew that, if he left, she would lose him. Gradually the dialogue grew more passionate. At last the woman betrayed her feelings: ‘Ah, Sebastien, if you go, how empty you will leave my world!’
Nicole gave a half-sob of sympathy. Philippe paused. ‘You like it?’ he asked with eagerness, sitting down beside her.
‘Oh, it’s wonderful!’ she cried, putting a hand on his sleeve to press it in emphasis.
The next moment she was in his arms.
Chapter 3
Nicole recovered first from this momentary madness. She pushed herself free from Philippe’s embrace, her fists against his chest.
‘No, no, we mustn’t ‒’
‘But yes we must, darling ‒’ His lips were against her hair, he was pulling her back towards him.
‘No, you know this is silly ‒’
‘How can you say that? Nicole!’ At his use of her first name, she stared up at him, brown eyes swimming in sudden tears. He saw that she was wavering and went on quickly, ‘It was meant to be, wasn’t it? We met and met again. And now we know we’re in love ‒’
‘No, it’s not love! And we’re as far apart as geese and swans so how can you ‒’
‘If you mean because our families ‒’
‘Yes, our families, our families! We live in different worlds ‒’
‘But that’s just convention, Nicole. Besides, we’re not in the eighteenth century any more ‒ people can be valued for what they really are and you’re so special ‒’
His naive liberalism was so genuine that she checked the bitter laugh on her lips. ‘Philippe, look at this.’ She took one of his hands from her shoulders and held it alongside her own. His was soft and white. Hers was hard and brown. ‘That’s what I mean when I say we’re from different worlds. As people … yes, perhaps we have much in common, perhaps we could understand each other. But you’re a gentleman and I’m a peasant, and …’ She broke off.
‘All right, let us accept that. I’m a gentleman, you’re a peasant. What of it? We’re in love, despite that.’
To her, the case she had stated was self-evident. Gentlemen of course pursued the local girls, and nothing good ever came of it. Whether there was love, or merely a flirtation ending in an affair, the result was always the same. There came a time of parting, the girl was paid off according to the good nature of the men ‒ and according to how much her good name had suffered.
Nicole moved away in a kind of muffled anger. ‘I have to go home now.’
‘No, not yet!’
‘I must, Philippe. It’s late. I have to be up in the morning early.’
‘But you’re upset, unhappy. Don’t go like that. Tell me you love me. Tell me you’re happy because
we’ve been lucky enough to find each other.’
Stifling a sigh, she said, ‘I’m happy to have known you. In a way it’s an honour to have had your interest, that you liked me enough to read me some of your work. But that’s the end of it, Philippe.’
‘What?’ He grabbed her as she was about to slip out through the tangle of honeysuckle into the growing dusk of the July night. ‘It can’t end like this! We’ve got to meet again!’
‘No, Philippe, it’s gone too far as it is. I should never have come here in the first place.’
‘Don’t say that! Promise you’ll come again tomorrow night.’
‘No.’ She shook her head, unclasping his fingers from her arm. ‘No, this is goodbye, my dear.’
‘But why? Why? You love me, I know you do ‒ I felt it the moment you came into my arms.’
‘No I don’t. That was … well, it was a mistake. I don’t know why I let it happen …’
‘Nicole, promise you’ll come tomorrow night.’
‘No, I told you. I can’t come.’
He stood staring at her, his eyes burning in his pale face. She was about to turn away in finality when he said: ‘I’ll be here tomorrow night. At the same time, here, waiting for you. And you will come.’
‘No, I won’t.’
‘You will, you will. You won’t be able to bear the thought of leaving me here, aching with longing for you.’ He summoned a half-smile. ‘ “If you don’t come, Nicole, how empty you will leave my world.” ’
He spoke the line with an actor’s passion, but he meant every word. In the dimness there was a glistening of tears as she darted away from him into the tangled wilderness of the old woodlands.
All next day she tried to shut her mind to the memory. But when a rainy evening set in, with clouds rushing across the sky, her mood of determination died away. She was depressed, close to tears. Her mother asked if she was unwell. ‘I’m all right, Mama. This weather is enough to make anyone miserable.’
But a rainy day had never before made Nicole Berthois as miserable as this.
Nine o’clock came. Madame Berthois had gone to bed and was asleep. Stoically Nicole sat down with some mending. The ticking of the old wall clock measured out the seconds. At almost half past nine she got up, put on her cloak. She must make her nightly round to see that all was well.
She had no intention of taking the path that would lead her to the de Tramont land. Yet when she had seen to the livestock and walked along the vine rows, she found herself going in that direction. At the lane she paused. She knew if she jumped down the bank and up the other side, she was committed.
She wasn’t going to go. In any case, even if Philippe had come to the trysting place, he would have gone home by now. It was almost ten at night. And he wouldn’t have come in the first place because it had been raining hard at nine.
She would just go out of curiosity, to assure herself that he had never come to the rendezvous. It would show that he was like all the rest of the aristos, unwilling to put himself to any inconvenience in pursuit of his amours.
She jumped down into the lane, climbed the bank, walked through the dripping woods. Her cloak was by now soaked through, her bare feet in their clogs were cold. She was angry with herself for getting into this state, she was angry with Philippe for trifling with her, she hated the wet landscape, the dripping trees, the bushes whose leaves lashed at her cheeks as she pushed her way through.
When she reached the temple there was not a sound, not a movement. Just as she’d expected. It had been all talk, all nonsense. She wheeled about to hurry home. The bushes rustled loudly at her action.
‘Nicole?’
His voice swept away all her doubts and confusion. She ran into the ruined building. He seized her and held her close. ‘Nicole, I thought you weren’t coming!’
‘I’m sorry, forgive me! I didn’t mean to make you wait!’
‘Nicole, Nicole! My angel. Oh, I’ve been in torment all day, wondering if you really meant what you said last night!’
‘I meant it, Philippe. I meant it then. But now … Oh, now, nothing else matters.’
They kissed and embraced. He realised she was soaked through, untied the strings of her cloak and spread it to dry on the marble bench. She was shivering, with cold and reaction. He gathered her in his arms, warming her with his body.
And then, as naturally as if it had always been intended, they made love. Without reservation they gave themselves to each other, in the shadows of the summerhouse, with the sound of the rain for music and the blown leaves of a hundred summers for a bed.
Thereafter they met as often as they could, but it was never easy. Without ever discussing reasons, they knew their affair must be kept secret.
Theirs was a courtship the rest of the villagers would have thought very strange. They didn’t walk sedately to church side by side nor sit awkwardly in the best parlour with the parents looking on, stealing kisses and caresses in moments when no one was looking. Instead they spent long hours in each other’s arms, murmuring their secrets, voicing their innermost thoughts.
Or, to tell the truth, Philippe did the talking.
Nicole found him so strange and wonderful that she scarcely dared to interrupt. She understood that he had a poet’s visions: she was thrilled and flattered that he bothered to share them with her. He would tell her about Paris, about the bohemian friends his mother disapproved of so severely. He described the theatre, he recited Corneille and Molière. When she intervened now and again to ask what the women were like he would give vague descriptions ‒ and she was secretly delighted, because it meant he had never really been in love before.
No one else in Calmady would have understood. Nicole didn’t even tell Paulette, until then her usual confidante. It wasn’t that she feared Paulette would betray them, it was simply that she knew her sister would be terrified at what she was doing.
It was strange about Paulette ‒ so like Nicole in appearance, pretty, neat and trim, and yet everything spoiled by an inborn timidity. In a social gathering, Paulette would dissolve into embarrassed giggles when spoken to. In business matters, she would tremble visibly if she had to disagree over anything. Her wages at Madame Treignac, negotiated by her father when she first went as an apprentice, were never likely to be increased by any effort of hers. Dearly though Nicole loved her sister, she would never discuss Philippe with her. The mere mention of the de Tramont name would cause Paulette to go white.
Philippe was free more often than Nicole. He was not very interested in the wine business, didn’t feel himself bound to give it his attention because their chief of cellar, Jean-Baptiste Labaud, could be relied upon to see to everything. His chief interest lay in the theatre. Madame de Tramont considered the theatre if not wicked, then certainly frivolous. But she had almost given up scolding her son about it.
Yet even Philippe had to take some part in the work of the de Tramont vineyard as August progressed. The last spraying of the vines had to take place, at least a whole month before the grapes would be picked. Then came another trimming of the leaves, then the last hoeing to keep the weeds from drinking up the rain which the grapes needed so much to fill them out.
For this last task, every able-bodied man, woman and child in the district was called out on the various vineyards. The work had to be done painstakingly by hand. Philippe learned, to his dismay and chagrin, that Nicole was to be employed on the work on his vines.
He was outraged. ‘I won’t have it! You aren’t going to stoop and scrape on my land ‒ it’s medieval ‒ I couldn’t bear the thought!’
‘But, Philippe, I need the money,’ she replied with a sigh.
‘I’ll give you the money! I’ll give you what you’d earn if you did the actual labour, but I can’t bear the thought of ‒’
‘And how will you explain that to Jean-Baptiste? How will you explain paying wages to someone who doesn’t appear each morning?’
‘I’ll think of a way ‒’
‘And
my mother? What will she say when I stay at home working on our own vine-rows when I should be up at the manor house?’
‘Nicole, I simply will not allow you to work like a slave on my land ‒’
She put an arm around him and laid her cheek against his shoulder. ‘My love, I understand how you feel. It makes you uncomfortable ‒’
‘Uncomfortable!’
‘But it must be, it really must. To change the routine so completely would only cause comment. Jean-Baptiste is no fool, you know. If you start discussing special arrangements for me, he’ll quickly guess our secret.’
Nicole had a high respect for Jean-Baptiste. Like herself, he was something of a notable in Calmady. He could read and write and calculate, even without paper and pencil to write down the figures. He had always done well as a worker for others, and when Claude de Tramont needed a steady man to oversee his cellars it was Jean-Baptiste’s name that his lawyer came up with.
Jean-Baptiste had given up a good job to take on the role of chief of cellar for the de Tramonts, at lower wages and with somewhat shaky prospects ‒ for who could tell whether the de Tramont blend of champagne would be successful? But all had gone well, weather and vintage permitting. The Tramont brand of champagne sold to capacity. Indeed, it was well-known that if only the family had more cellarage, they could increase their business almost as much as they wished.
The growing, making and selling of champagne obsessed the people of Calmady and all the other villages of the Champagne district. They knew or could guess how much each firm was making. The great champagne houses were of course household names throughout Europe ‒ Moët, Ruinart, Heidsieck. To the people who made their living by tending the vines and blending their wines, their fame was in the air they breathed, the bread they put in their mouths.
The smaller firms, too, were a source of constant interest. Who knew when one of the smaller houses might not, with luck or guidance, take the path to greatness? The choice of the right grapes for the blend, the perfect care needed during the maturing and working of the wine, and something else ‒ perhaps intuition, perhaps salesmanship ‒ all these could come together at one of the lesser estates to produce a great champagne.
The Wine Widow Page 4