The Forgotten Summer

by Carol Drinkwater

  ‘Fallen olives rotting on the ground are home to the hibernating olive flies, where the little blighters winter, ready to rise up in the early summer and lay their eggs for larvae in the next season’s fruit. It’s the same problem here as with the vineyards, Jane, land management. It all comes down to land management. Without the clearing and cleaning of the grounds, we’re asking for trouble, for disease, fire and undernourished crops.’

  She swung on the soles of her boots and turned to face south. The sun was full on her face; the noise of the machines buzzed on the hillsides behind her. The view to the distant glimmering sea was spectacular, as though the entire country was spreadeagled at her feet, sweeping to the distant blue ocean. Jane had not visited the olive trees for years. She had forgotten their beauty. Then a memory crept back from these groves, of climbing in the gnarled old trees with Luc. It must have been that joyous first summer, so full of wonder and discoveries, or perhaps her second here. She had never climbed a tree before. Luc had led her by the hand and together they had scaled towards the upper branches, perched on their wooden thrones within touching distance of the endless blue sky.

  ‘When I die I want to come back as an olive tree,’ Luc had declared, roosting high in his branch, drinking in the view, scanning the sky for birds.

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Because they live for centuries and then you don’t have to keep on dying and coming back again. You can be the same tree for a thousand years.’

  She smiled at the memory, taking heart that Luc was present here somewhere, watching over her.

  20

  It was raining. One of those almighty South of France summer storms when the gods go to war and the sky’s imaginary platelets crash and collide against one another, causing lightning and deluges of water, irrigating the baked earth, feeding, saturating the fruit of the land, dampening all talk of potential summer fires.

  It was Friday, late afternoon, 4 July, Independence Day in the United States and always an occasion for celebrations along this South of France coastline; it was when the US Mediterranean navy, its Sixth Fleet based in Naples, anchored offshore and extravagant firework displays illuminated the beaches at the major resort towns. With all Claude’s warnings about fires spinning out of control in areas where the land was desiccated and unruly, Jane had been fearing the worst, so the rain was a blessing. They were two days into the land clearance. The dramatic change in the atmospheric conditions might halt the proceedings for a day or two but it had eased off the fire threat. And it was the weekend, so the cutters could rest and she wouldn’t be obliged to pay them overtime.

  Jane was alone in the house and for the first time since Luc’s death she had music playing. His iPod plugged in, she was listening to Pablo Casals. She had just replaced the receiver on a call to Peter’s care home.

  ‘He’s been asking for you. He’s getting a little fretful,’ Frances had told her. ‘He’s not been going out in the garden as much as he used to, though I know one of the nurses always puts her head in and offers to have a stroll with him. It’s a shame because the days have been quite warm. “I best not go now, dear,” he says to the nurse. “My Jane’s on her way. She’s running a bit late. It’s the traffic.” I popped up to see him myself, to remind him that you’re away and will be back soon. His face lit up as though a switch had gone on. He told me then that you were on location with Luc in Algeria.’

  Jane felt her heart split. She had been neglectful. It was almost two months since she had seen her father. In spite of his dementia, he had observed the passage of time more acutely than she. A trip was beckoning. ‘Thanks for telling me, Frances. Can you put me through to him, please?’

  Jane waited, listening to the extension ringing in his first-floor room. Trilling and trilling. Was he staring out of the window, his back to the phone on the table, its flashing light not visible to him? His hearing was poor, and he was blithely unaware of the urgency with which she wished to hear his voice.

  ‘Hello?’

  ‘Dad! Dad, it’s Jane.’

  ‘Hello, love.’ There was a long pause.

  The lump in Jane’s throat was almost choking her. I have a sister, your daughter, she was thinking.

  ‘Luc’s been in, but I haven’t seen Jane. Is she away?’ His voice was weak, insubstantial.

  ‘Dad, this is Jane. Dad? I’ll be there soon, I promise.’ After a few more incoherent exchanges, she replaced the receiver and stared out at the trees waving in the summer storm, blossoms blown from their flowerheads flying everywhere. She was feeling melancholy. And then she smiled, remembering how Peter used occasionally to sing to her, ‘My Melancholy Baby’. Calling to his ‘favourite’ girl to come to him.

  ‘I’m on my way, Dad.’

  When the knock came, a rap on the back door, Jane had already placed the plate from her solitary early-evening supper in the dishwasher and was considering a nightcap – a little premature, perhaps. She wasn’t expecting anyone. She was at her computer, at her temporary desk – the breakfast-room table – going through her accounts, firing off invoices for three translation contracts she had managed to complete during these turbulent weeks. Importantly, she had just finalized her booking for a flight to London and was feeling rather excited at the prospect of stepping back into England and seeing her father again. Her bank account was showing a credit for the first time in a long while. Robert was nagging her to let him invest the capital sitting in her current statement unless she had plans to purchase a property immediately, which she hadn’t. Whichever, a trip to London was essential, most urgently to see her dear father, then to discuss her options with Robert and to move her funds somewhere sensible. She wasn’t intending to let him know that she was shelling out her hard-earned income and personal savings for the upkeep of Luc’s family estate.

  Matty had promised to take good care of Clarisse during Jane’s brief absence. Bless dear Matty, who was getting it in the neck on a daily basis from Clarisse, foul-mouthed and ungrateful. Every time Matty drove over to change the sheets, clean the house, bring the patient hot homemade food, loathsome bile greeted her, recriminations about the theft of Clarisse’s child.

  ‘It’s painful, I can’t deny it,’ confided Matty to Jane, ‘but she’s never had the sweetest tongue, we all know that.’

  ‘It happens,’ the duty specialist told Jane when, desperate to put an end to this behaviour, she had rung the hospital.

  ‘Is there nothing you can prescribe?’

  ‘Ask her GP to up the level of sedative,’ was his response. ‘I wouldn’t worry greatly, Madame Cambon. Your mother will probably pass through this phase. They usually do.’

  Mother!

  The knock on the back door was repeated, a little more firmly this time. Jane frowned, glanced at the time on her phone: seven forty-seven. She definitely wasn’t expecting anyone. She rose and crossed through the pantry to the back door, running her hands through her unbrushed hair, tired and ready for a warm bath rather than a bracing starlit swim in the rain. She frowned, thinking she’d heard a dog barking. Arnaud? Was it Arnaud with his hunting hounds? Christ, she hoped not.

  She released the latch.

  It was Annie, sopping wet in yellow wellingtons and a hooded yellow rain jacket. ‘Don’t say it, I look like Paddington Bear.’

  The two women stood facing one another in silence. In Jane’s head ran the message she’d seen on the flowers: Our lives will never be the same again without you.

  ‘May I come in?’ Behind Annie, the rain was falling in solid sheets.

  ‘Yes, of course.’

  Charging about in the yard was a very muddy and almost demented Walnut. ‘Walnut, oh, viens içi! I’ve missed you.’ Jane drew open the door and shuffled backwards to allow Annie to pass. She bent low and clapped her hands for the dog. The arrival of such an unexpected guest was a little overwhelming, the last caller she had expected.

  Annie shucked off her boots, threw the coat to the floor where it settled, like melting butter, in
a pool of water, and headed in stockinged feet directly through to the table where Jane had been working, as though she instinctively knew the pulse of the house. Puddles spread across Matty’s clean tiles in her wake. Jane waited for the dog.

  ‘I brought wine.’ Annie grinned perhaps a little over emphatically, drawing a bottle of red from a shoulder bag with a wink. ‘Un peu crazy, but I didn’t feel I ought to raid the house cellars. I thought a glass or two would break the ice. You do drink, don’t you?’

  Jane nodded, fazed, remaining where she was. Annie returned to the kitchen to collect a corkscrew. ‘You don’t mind if the hound comes in, do you? He’s very wet, I’m afraid.’

  ‘No, I want him to – I called him.’ Surely Annie knew that Walnut was her dog.

  Annie was back at the scullery door whistling for the spaniel, who bolted inside and began jumping frenziedly against the hem of Jane’s skirt, smearing her legs and feet with mud. She laughed loudly and ruffled his warm black head, hugged him hard, filthying herself, and crossed to the dresser where the everyday china was stored. She pulled out a low-rimmed bowl and filled it with water. He slurped thirstily and splashed even more dribbles all over the floor with an energy that was almost alarming. She bent to his side and stroked his ears as he gulped. ‘Take it easy, boy.’

  ‘He’s excited,’ observed Annie.

  Glad to be home, thought Jane, while deliberating about whether she could ask for the dog back or was that too unkind, too selfish? Had Luc given Walnut to his half-sister and nephew?

  ‘Are you all right?’

  ‘I was wondering about the dog, about why –’

  ‘Oh, Lord, do you want me to chuck him back outside? I never fuss about the mess he makes at our place but maybe you or Mum object.’

  Mum? Jane raised her eyes and looked Annie full in the face.

  ‘I meant Matty,’ Annie said softly. ‘Matty’s my mother, whatever else … you know.’

  ‘And what about Luc?’

  ‘He’s … he was my friend, best friend and big brother.’ Annie strode past Jane to the dresser and drew out two long-stemmed glasses. She sloshed a good serving of red Shiraz into each. ‘It’s Aussie wine. I hope that’s fine with you. Not as grand as the estate homegrown stuff here but cheaper.’ She laughed nervously. ‘Let’s go and sit down, shall we? You look a bit …’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Green.’

  ‘Green?’

  ‘Sick. Freaked, maybe? At the sight of me. A golden vision in sopping plastic.’ Annie let out a small chuckle. She had Peter’s eyes, indubitably, and a little of his brash, swaggering style too. Jane’s heart swelled with warmth.

  The urchin and the princess. On that long-ago night of her wedding party, what if she had known, guessed, that the little girl, the intruder, this woman, was her half-sister? Such a deft hand of Fate.

  ‘Do you mind?’

  ‘Sorry, what?’

  ‘I hope I haven’t barged in?’

  Jane shook her head. ‘I’d thought of calling you.’

  ‘I’m down for a few days to see Mum and Dad and I thought we should talk, you know, you and me. Mum said you and she had had a bit of a chat.’ Annie was calling over her shoulder as she led the way, glasses and bottle in her hands, through to the breakfast room, sipping at a glass as she travelled.

  Jane followed. ‘Apologies, it’s a bit of a mess. I’ve been working. Why don’t we go through to the library?’

  ‘Mess doesn’t bother me, but we can, if you like. After you, then. The only time I’ve been in those front rooms was for Luc’s funeral. I was never allowed up here.’

  Jane entered the room first, followed by Walnut, who settled his dripping self, coat reeking of drowned dog, on the mat by the fireplace, which had been decorated for the summer with pine cones and dry olive logs. He was panting and comfortable, tail thumping. He was home. Jane stood and looked towards the window, to the rain beyond. It hadn’t rained like this, as far as she was aware, since the day of Luc’s burial.

  ‘How is it that you have our dog?’ she asked, as Annie placed the bottle on the small table between them, then slid a glass towards Jane. Jane gathered up a box of matches from the fireside and lit two candles in tall tulip-shaped glass holders. The glow softened the light in the room.

  ‘Yes, Walnut belongs here, I know that. À la tienne. It’s good to meet you properly at last. Luc spoke of you so frequently.’

  ‘Cheers, à la tienne. Did he? He never mentioned you or Patrick to me, ever. I seem to have been kept in the dark about quite a lot of … rather vital information.’

  ‘I know and I’m sorry, truly.’ Annie lifted her glass and took a sip. It was already close to half empty, Jane noticed, while she cradled hers, untouched, at chest level. ‘Please sit.’ A formality, stiffness, had overtaken her and she seemed unable to shake it off. She was unsure whether she should throw her arms around Annie and hail her immediately as her sister or be angry with her for not coming forward sooner, for stealing the dog, for the debts, for so many resentments Jane had built up against the unknown woman who, thank God, had not been Luc’s mistress.

  Annie, seated, picked up on Jane’s discomfort and it tempered her initial approachability. ‘Walnut is yours,’ the younger woman confessed. ‘Luc left him with us for Christmas and then … and then when we heard the news and the awfulness of everything, I couldn’t bear to part with him, for Pat’s sake as much as mine. Pat loved Luc like a father. His own dad is, well, he’s a bit of a shit, to be honest.’

  ‘Yes, Matty told me …’

  ‘If Luc hadn’t stepped in and helped us … well, I don’t know what would have become of me. I’d’ve been back living with Mum and Dad, bringing Pat up here, where everyone would gossip about my divorce.’ She shuddered. ‘Village life. Give me big-city anonymity. How’s the wine? It’s OK, isn’t it? Not plonk.’

  Jane hadn’t tasted it. She was still standing, still trying to get a handle on Annie’s arrival.

  ‘I’ll leave Walnut here when I head home next week. I shouldn’t have kept him, should’ve given him back months ago. Sorry, big-time. It was really selfish, but I couldn’t bear to deal Pat another blow. The loss of Luc … Pat’s taken it very badly.’

  ‘Where is he now?’ Jane finally sat, sinking into the sofa opposite Annie. She sipped the wine and placed her glass on the table. ‘It’s rather good, this Australian Shiraz.’

  ‘Yeah, I like it too. I buy it at my local Carrefour. He’s doing a few days sleepover with school pals in our neighbourhood in Vincennes before they break up for the summer holidays. They all go horse-riding in the park. He’s a great kid. You’ll love him.’

  The two women looked at one another, then smiled, and uncertain laughter broke out between them. Jane was thinking how beautiful Annie was, radiant. She seemed to have inherited the best features from both Clarisse and Peter. The eyes from her father, Clarisse’s magnificent mane of auburn hair, the hour-glass figure she had so seductively flaunted when she was younger.

  ‘Have you been to see Clarisse yet?’

  Annie shook her head and raked a hand through her long locks. ‘Nor do I intend to. We don’t speak, I’m afraid.’

  ‘She was asking after you, after Annabelle, when she was hospitalized recently.’

  Annie shrugged. ‘I’m not Annabelle and nor have I been since, well, literally since day one, although Luc often called me by that name in deference to his mother.’

  ‘Are you not on speaking terms because she gave you away?’

  ‘The good news is I got Matty and Dad in exchange. I lucked out there. It was a terrific piece of good fortune. No, not because she gave me away – I can sort of understand that, although I’m bringing Pat up as a single parent – but because she always kept me at arm’s length, never let me play or hang out anywhere near her or Luc or the main parts of the property, as though I was a contamination, a nobody. My existence was completely denied. I thought I was rubbish – very bad for a growing girl’s se
lf-esteem, because I didn’t know the story back then. And because she insisted Mum sign a paper swearing her to secrecy. I would never have known the truth about myself, my origins, if Mum, Matty, had held fast to the contract. When I eventually found out that I had been adopted, I contacted Clarisse and tried to arrange to talk to her, but she refused to see me, put the phone down on me. So, no, I won’t be paying her a visit.’

  ‘She’s quite ill.’

  ‘Mum’ll help her. She always does. Always has done. Even so, until you came back, she would have kicked my parents out – she’d taken their jobs away. She’s got no heart.’

  Jane wondered whether Annie’s observation was true. Everybody has a heart, but whether Clarisse’s had grown cold for reasons unknown to those around her, Jane couldn’t say. She must have suffered deeply when Peter and Jane had disappeared, knowing she’d lost someone she loved and that she was pregnant. Had she been intending to reveal to Peter that she was having his baby, hoping to persuade him to leave Vivienne? Who knows what the future might have held if Jane had not discovered them together and not blurted out the facts, baldly, to her innocent mother, who had taken it so badly.

  ‘Penny for them?’

  ‘Do you know the identity of your father?’

  Annie shook her head and took a sizeable gulp of wine. ‘Claude’s been a great dad to me. He’s my dad, but my biological father … I would guess some local toff, high-ranking official or other, probably with a family so he couldn’t marry Clarisse. I don’t know and I don’t want to know. I’m not even un petit peu interested in Clarisse’s past. Do you mind if I have a cigarette?’

  Jane was not fond of smoking, particularly indoors, but she nodded that it was fine. ‘I’ll have to find an ashtray.’ She was about to rise in search of one – since Luc’s death, the ashtrays had been in cupboards – but Annie said, ‘Don’t worry, I’ll just chuck it in the fireplace. Or maybe I won’t light up. Don’t go. Let’s just sit and listen to the rain and talk, maybe get a bit sloshed together.’