The Wine Widow

by Tessa Barclay

  Everyone in Calmady knew that the growing success of the Tramont champagne was due to Jean-Baptiste Labaud. The villagers greeted him with the humorous respect that masked something like awe.

  ‘Well, then, Jean-Baptiste, how much money have you piled up for the great lady, eh? Earned enough for her to buy back her title yet?’

  Jean-Baptiste, tall, bony, dark-browed, shrugged off such remarks. ‘All I know about is wine,’ he would say.

  His wife was also respected in the village. Jean-Baptiste had married young, had three young children. Everyone in Calmady agreed that they were a credit to their mother, bonny, well-shod, and as far as one could tell, likely to do well in the world if they inherited their father’s abilities.

  Nicole thought well of Jean-Baptiste. He was as important in his way as the mayor of the village, or the priest. It always pleased her if he singled her out for some responsible task when she reported for work at the de Tramont vineyard. In a way, she would have been sorry to miss the opportunity of being under his supervision, had Philippe remained adamant about not having her work on the estate.

  ‘Well, then, so there you are, young Nicole,’ Jean-Baptiste grunted when she presented herself as usual on the first morning of the hoeing period. ‘Prettier than ever, if that’s possible.’

  ‘Thank you, Jean-Baptiste. And you’re taller than ever, I declare.’

  ‘Huh. Men don’t grow after the age of twenty: except outwards.’ He consulted a list he had in front of him in his little portable shed on the edge of the vine rows. ‘You’ll be on the north edge, working on the Prelous rows.’ The Prelous were the family from whom de Tramont had bought those particular vines. Nothing was ever forgotten that had to do with the growing of grapes. Almost every row was known by some name or nickname.

  He nodded towards the pile of shallow baskets, which were for the weeds when they had been picked from the earth. Nicole moved off, collected a basket.

  ‘Nicole!’

  ‘Yes?’ She went back at his call.

  ‘Everything all right in your family?’

  ‘Yes, why?’

  ‘Are you worried about your mother? She never seems to come to the village any more.’

  ‘No, the rheumatism has got into her hip joints now, Jean-Baptiste. It wears her out just to go to the end of the garden.’

  They both knew it was inevitable that the disease should progress in this way. It was common among the villagers, brought on perhaps by the continual kneeling, stooping and trudging through the clay soil of the Marne district.

  ‘Anything I can do?’

  She shook her head. What was to be done, even by Jean-Baptiste?

  When her day’s work was done for the de Tramonts, there was still her own work on the Berthois farm. Her mother could manage to hobble out to keep an eye on the goats from time to time, but the milking morning and evening was Nicole’s task, and then there were the vegetables to tend and their own vines to hoe.

  Exhaustion cut down her meetings with Philippe. She would fall into bed each night and stagger out again in the mornings, with no energy left over for secret walks to the ruined temple or the joys of love.

  Yet in the end the longing became too great. Momentary contacts as Philippe surveyed his workers in company with Jean-Baptiste, secret smiles when no one else was looking ‒ these became insufficient.

  ‘Come tonight to the temple, Nicole,’ Philippe whispered as she walked past him to empty her basket of weeds on the heap at the end of her row.

  She walked away without comment. But the yearning in her face was his answer.

  That night, when she had finished the farm chores, she was wringing with sweat in the sultry August heat. She drew a bucket of water from the well to splash in and cool herself. Then in a mood of sudden defiance, she fetched her good clothes from the chest in the bedroom and there, in the kitchen, she began to put them on.

  She had already helped her mother to bed. Marie called drowsily from her pillow: ‘What are you doing, Nicci?’

  ‘I’m just washing off some of the grime, Mama. It’s been a hard day.’

  ‘All right, dear. Don’t be long coming to bed.’

  ‘I think I’ll sit outside and read for a while, Mama. I’m too tired to sleep.’

  Marie Berthois understood easily enough. Sometimes when the body had come to the end of physical resources, nervous energy took over. And after that, time was needed to unwind before sleep would come. Men sought relaxation in a pipe and a drink, women would sometimes find it in sewing or the tending of window plants.

  Her clever little Nicole would find it, of course, in reading. ‘Don’t strain your eyes when it gets too dark,’ she warned, but then dropped off into the paradise of pain-free sleep.

  Nicole sat for half an hour with a book on the bench outside the cottage door. Then she tiptoed away to take the path towards her own particular paradise.

  Philippe had been there for hours. He had slipped away from the house the moment his mother settled down to cards with the housekeeper. Seeing him go, Clothilde de Tramont had said to herself: ‘Some village girl, I suppose. Well, when we find him a suitable wife, all that will be at an end.’

  When Nicole came into the temple, Philippe was overwhelmed. ‘How beautiful you look! It’s just like the first time I saw you!’

  She flew into his arms. If he was surprised at the passion and urgency of her lovemaking; he was delighted too. Fierce at first, they came later to a long, tender interlude, filled with caresses and whispers and little jokes. Then they lay in each others arms, happy almost beyond words.

  ‘ “Behold thou art fair, my love,” ’ quoted Philippe, ‘ “behold thou art fair!” ’

  She knew he loved these little word games of exchanged quotations. ‘ “I am my beloved’s, and his desire is towards me,” ’ she responded.

  ‘ “Thy breasts shall be as clusters of the vine”.’

  ‘ “And the roof of thy mouth the best wine for my beloved ‪…” ’

  They fell asleep with the sultry night for a coverlet.

  When Nicole awoke it was to find daylight seeping in among the leaves of the thick honeysuckle. ‘My God!’ she cried, sitting up. ‘It’s after dawn!’

  ‘What?’ muttered Philippe, trying to awaken. He had seldom been up at dawn, except on hunting mornings.

  ‘Philippe, it’s daytime. I must get home. My mother ‒’

  She had sprung up, was darting about the temple collecting scattered garments. Her limbs gleamed like ivory except where the sun had tanned her hands and wrists, and her neck down to the deep cleft between her breasts.

  ‘No, darling, don’t hurry away,’ Philippe exclaimed. He caught her hands as she was about to slip her fine cotton chemise over her head. ‘Don’t go yet.’

  ‘But I must, Philippe. You don’t understand! The day’s begun ‒’

  ‘Not for me, not yet, not yet,’ he whispered, locking her in his arms.

  She meant to fight free, but this was the last moment, the last precious moment, before they had to part. Who could tell when they might find an opportunity to be together again? She let the world of everyday things slip from her like the discarded chemise. In its place came a whirl of passion that caught them up, joyous, intense, inevitable.

  As she ran home she didn’t care if her mother was awake and ready to cross-question her. She would make up some story to protect Philippe, she’d say she’d been with one of the migrant workers from the city who were beginning to arrive for the grape harvest. Her mother would be shocked but it didn’t matter.

  Marie had awakened earlier and called for her. But there had been no reply. She had dozed off again meanwhile. Nicole was able to slip indoors, take off the tell-tale finery, bundle it up in a work basket for future bestowal in its chest in the bedroom. Then she donned her working clothes of blue blouse and bodice, thick black skirt, and clogs. By the time Marie Berthois woke again, her daughter was tending coffee on the kitchen fire.

  ‘Nicci,
where were you? I called about an hour ago.’

  ‘I was probably over the far side of the hill. One of the goats got loose.’

  Nothing more was made of it. Her luck had held.

  Yet she began to doubt that in the days that followed. She knew the cycle of her own body as well as she knew the cycle of farm work and vine culture.

  She was expecting a baby.

  The dawning realisation obsessed her. Her mother remarked that she’d become careless and inattentive but she couldn’t alter her attitude. She was wondering how to tell Philippe, and what his reaction would be.

  She could make a good guess. He would be upset, but would promise to make provision for the child so that it would never know want. Neither, however, would it ever be acknowledged by its father.

  Well, that was how these things were. Her mother would be dismayed, there would be a short scandal, her hopes of making a good marriage to some worthy man would be damaged for a while.

  Marriage to some worthy man … How impossible that had become. She knew in her heart that if she were left to bring up Philippe’s child, she could never marry anyone else and let that man be stepfather to the baby. The baby belonged to herself and Philippe ‒ no one else.

  At last there came an opportunity to meet at their trysting place. This time she didn’t risk changing from her working clothes. She came in a mood that was a mixture of apprehension and determination.

  ‘What’s the matter, my darling?’ Philippe asked as she came in. ‘Is something troubling you?’

  Now was the opening to tell him. But she couldn’t, not yet. This might be the very last time they would be together, for once he heard the news his feelings towards her might change.

  ‘It’s nothing,’ she said with forced lightness. ‘The vines are a little affected by yesterday’s rain, that’s all.’

  ‘Oh, the vines, the vines ‒ let’s forget about the vines!’

  When at last she lay in his arms, full of tenderness towards him for the pleasure he had given her, she caressed his cheek with her palm. ‘Philippe, I have something very important to tell you.’

  ‘Indeed? About the vines, no doubt.’

  ‘No, be serious, darling. It’s about us.’

  ‘I’m all attention.’

  ‘Philippe, I’m going to have a baby.’

  There was a silence. His brows drew together. He stared at her.

  ‘I know it’s a shock ‒’

  ‘A shock?’ He threw his arms about her and held her close. ‘It’s wonderful! A baby? Our baby?’

  She nodded, against his chest. ‘It was that last time … you remember, Philippe …’

  ‘That’s just how such a wonderful night should be blessed ‒ with a child of our own. How long have you known?’

  ‘A week or two. Nothing need be decided for the moment, because it will be some time before there’s any sign that I’m carrying a child ‒’

  ‘What has that to do with it? We must get married at once.’

  ‘Married?’ She was so taken aback that she actually jerked away from him.

  ‘Yes, of course, married. A baby needs parents, doesn’t it?’

  ‘But Philippe ‒ the difference between our families ‒’

  ‘Oh, that! Nonsense!’ But then he paused. ‘Well, of course, my mother isn’t going to be very pleased. No, that’s true. It’s always been part of her plan that I should marry a rich girl.’ He gave Nicole a smiling glance. ‘I suppose you haven’t got a sockful of gold hidden away in a mattress?’

  ‘If only I had!’

  ‘No, I thought not. And even a sockful wouldn’t be quite enough, I fear. Mama has been looking for a rich girl from the bourgeoisie, but they’re not so easy to catch. She might just possibly say yes to a rich peasant girl, but I think it would have to be a mountain of money.’

  ‘And then there’s her family pride ‒’

  ‘Oh, I don’t think that’s so important. Of course she’d ideally like to have the family allied to some other aristocratic clan, but they don’t have the cash these days. Living in exile as a child taught Mama that having a roof over your head and soup in the pot is more important than blue blood ‒ what she wants from my supposed marriage is security.’

  ‘She won’t get that if you marry me, Philippe. She’ll never agree.’

  ‘No, she won’t,’ he admitted. ‘All right ‒we’ll elope.’

  ‘Elope!’

  ‘Yes, run away and get married. We can marry as soon as we’re safely out of her reach ‒ once we’ve left the Marne, for instance.’

  ‘But where would we go?’ she asked, at a loss at these sudden vast horizons.

  ‘Paris, of course! It’s an ideal place to hide from angry relations.’

  ‘But … Philippe, what would we live on?’

  As usual, Philippe in his enthusiasm had bounded ahead of what was practical. ‘Well, that’s a difficulty. I don’t have any money of my own, you know, only the salary I get for managing the estate. My father left the property to Mama in his will ‒ he knew she needed to own the place, for security.’

  Nicole could make no suggestion. His flow of ideas was leaving her breathless.

  ‘I tell you what!’ he exclaimed. ‘I could contact some of my theatrical friends! Perhaps I could get one of my plays put on. It’s time I started taking my writing seriously.’

  ‘Would that make much money, dear?’

  He had no idea. There were rich playwrights, that he knew ‒ Sardou, for instance, had plenty of money. But then Philippe had no desire to write like Sardou.

  ‘We’ll manage somehow, my darling. The first thing is to get to Paris and get married before Mama can intervene.’

  ‘Philippe, you’ve spoken a great deal about your mother. What about mine?’

  He was startled. To tell the truth, he’d forgotten Nicole had a mother. ‘What about her?’ he asked, perplexed.

  ‘She hasn’t anyone but me. She can’t get about without help. If I go, who will look after her? Who will run the farm?’

  ‘Oh, lord …’ He had heard Nicole speak of her mother’s ailment. And there was no one else except the sister he had glimpsed in the showroom in Rheims, who had made so little impression he couldn’t even remember her features. ‘What about Paulette?’

  ‘She doesn’t understand the vines. And besides, she’d get swindled in any business deals.’ Nicole had thought on beyond Philippe’s idea. If she left Calmady, in the end her mother would have to offer to share the profits of the farm with some hard-headed villager. But that didn’t solve the problem of someone to keep house and care for her. If she had to pay for that too, there wouldn’t be enough money.

  They discussed the dilemma for some time. Then she said, ‘I must go, Philippe, it’s getting late. We don’t need to solve it tonight, there’s time enough.’

  He was unwilling to let her go and for the first time over-ruled her embargo about escorting her to the door. It was dark, a bird piped in the bushes after being disturbed by their passing.

  ‘Goodnight, wife,’ he murmured as he gave her a last kiss.

  ‘Goodnight, my husband.’

  As the September days drew on and the grape harvest was about to begin, Nicole’s thoughts were elsewhere. When she went to the village to read the announcement of the vintage dates, one for red grapes and one for white, she scarcely heard the discussion and comments of the other vineyardists. As she bent, knelt, and stooped among the low-trained vines, her brain was busy with her problem. What could be done to ensure that she and Philippe could marry and bring up their child?

  A chance encounter with Jean-Baptiste Labaud gave her the answer. They were walking back from the Tramont vines towards the village one evening in a group of workers when he fell into step at her side.

  ‘Well then, young Nicole, you’ve worked hard today.’

  ‘So has everyone else.’

  ‘True enough, and plenty yet to do.’ He jerked his head back towards the estate they were leaving. ‘S
ome good grapes on the Tramont vines. And I’ve advised Monsieur de Tramont to buy yours and Bestulet’s and Lavauge’s.’

  ‘The Lavauge vines have done very well ‒ more bunches than I’ve ever seen.’

  ‘Aye, and fine grapes, fine grapes. Ah, we’ll make good champagne this year, I feel it in my bones.’ He laughed. ‘The only problem is, where are we going to put it all, eh?’

  ‘In bottles, Jean-Baptiste, in bottles ‒ where else?’ called someone from the edge of the group.

  ‘Aye, and where shall we keep the bottles, eh? Under the beds?’

  This old joke was greeted with the usual laughter. It was supposed to be a token of ineptitude to keep bottled wine under the bed, for lack of good cellarage.

  When at last the grapes were all safely in the press house, Nicole had thought her problem through to a solution ‒ or at least, to the possibility of a solution. She had decided to face Clothilde de Tramont with the news that she and Philippe were about to marry. She hoped something she had to offer would reconcile Madame de Tramont to the match in the end.

  But the first interview would need careful stage-managing.

  Chapter 4

  When Nicole disclosed the first stages of her plan to Philippe, he was aghast.

  ‘Confront my mother? Nicole! The idea is grotesque!’

  ‘In what way?’ she asked, with a calmness that astonished him.

  ‘Well … she would be very angry … she would …’

  ‘She would what? She can’t prevent us from marrying, Philippe. You are of age, after all.’

  The conversation was taking place in the shelter of the vat house on the Tramont estate. The juice from the grapes harvested earlier in the month had been transferred to the vats from the press house, which stood higher up the slope. The transient workers had moved on elsewhere, but the juice intended for the de Tramont champagne now stood in a great round wooden vat, waiting for the main impurities ‒ twigs, pips, grains of dust ‒ to fall to the bottom: and when fermentation began, the permanent labour force would begin the long process of turning the juices into champagne.