Cupid's Arrow

by Isabelle Merlin

  I said as much to Mum. She smiled. 'That's a bit cynical, Fleur. I think he's just trying to look sincere.'

  'Exactly. Look at him.'

  'Fleur, stop it,' she said, laughing. 'I'm sure he's a perfectly nice man. He's certainly really involved in Arthurian things. His heart's in the right place, anyway.'

  'His Glastonbury Heart Magic, you mean,' I said sourly. 'With branches in a town near you.'

  She gave me a sharp look. 'Fleur, you really must try not to be so suspicious and disbelieving about people and the world. Like Shakespeare says, there are more things in heaven and earth than are dreamed of in –'

  'Yeah, yeah,' I said, hastily, knowing I was about to get the full lecture if I didn't stop it there, but also deciding there and then I most certainly would not mention the notebook I'd found. 'Okay. So Wayne Morgan's the real deal. It still doesn't mean he should get Raymond's notebooks.'

  'Of course not,' said Mum calmly. 'I'll have a look at the notebooks first, read my Lady of the Lake cards, and make a final decision after I meet him. I think that's what Raymond would have wanted.'

  'Why didn't he say anything about Morgan in his letter, then?' I said, stubbornly.

  'I don't know. Perhaps it wasn't the right place. Perhaps he forgot. Who knows?' She looked at her watch. 'Look, Fleur, I'm going to continue on with this cataloguing for two or three hours more, and then we can think about some dinner. Is that okay?'

  I shrugged. 'Sure. Do you want some help? Maybe I could start having a look at those notebooks.'

  'No, it's okay. I'd better have a look at them first. You just go off and enjoy yourself.'

  'Okay, then. Actually, can I borrow the Blackberry for a little while, Mum? Just need to check if I've got any emails.'

  'Sure,' she said vaguely, already turning back to her task.

  Upstairs in my room, I logged onto my Gmail account and got into my inbox. There were a couple of emails from mates that I answered quickly, and a couple of spam things I deleted. I went to Google then and looked up Wayne Morgan again and put in Raymond Dulac's name with it. All that came up was a list of Raymond's books that were sold in Morgan's shops. It proved nothing one way or the other. I just didn't like that guy but for no real reason, really, if I was being fair. Which I wasn't. I just had a feeling something was odd about the way he'd approached Mum, and his insistence on having the notebooks.

  After a moment, I tried Raymond Dulac and dreams. Up came a few references, mostly things people had quoted from his books. I typed in Gustave Doré dream pictures Arthurian legend and came up with some references to the rarity of the engravings but nothing about what they meant. And then, just because my mind was going in that direction, I remembered that other Gmail account I'd created back home, when I wanted to contact that Dreaming Holmes person. I logged onto it, and there, in the inbox, was a message from Dreaming Holmes himself. Or herself, I supposed it could be. It was long.

  Dear Caroline (remember, that was the pen-name I had used)

  Thank you for writing to me, and sending me your dream. I can understand it must have been a very troubling and frightening one.

  Pursuit dreams usually mean you are fleeing from something. An anxiety, a situation, perhaps even a person. Quite often, you do not see who is chasing you. That is also a feature of such dreams. It means you are not sure what's wrong. The fact you hid among rocks indicates that whatever this thing is that's bothering you, it could assume major proportions if you do not deal with it. Hiding is the last option. The fact that you saw someone – or at least a hand – with a bow and arrow, and that you felt this was aiming directly at you, for your heart, suggests it's something to do with someone close to you.

  The fact you have dreamed this twice suggests your subconscious knows the matter must be dealt with soon. You say you are afraid that this dream felt so real it is going to happen. Don't be! Dreams are rarely genuinely premonitory, and the majority of those that are, are usually about trivial events. Those that are not are very, very rare. You need a high level of psychic awareness to generate such dreams and even then they are often hard to decipher if you have no training. I have had this training and I have certainly had dreams of this sort, but rarely. Please do not worry that this is happening to you, it is most unlikely, especially at your age. (I had said I was a teenager.)

  I suggest you really think carefully about what it is you might be afraid of or even anxious about. Think of those around you. Has anyone 'ambushed' you, psychologically speaking? Do you feel neglected? Abandoned? Has someone close to you – a friend, a family member – betrayed you in some way? Think of your relationship with your parents. How do you feel about that? Is there perhaps an affair of the heart that bothers you? (The arrow is Cupid's symbol, of course, and may signify a dangerous love.) Or is there something at school that is troubling you? Think carefully about it, allowing your mind to conjure up the images from the dream. There will be clues in them that you should not ignore, and the answer will most likely come to you. If it does not, though, and if the dream occurs again, consider going to speak to a counsellor or a psychologist trained in the interpretation of dreams. But don't hesitate to contact me again should you wish to do so.

  Hoping this has helped,

  with all good wishes,

  Dreaming Holmes.

  Hmm. I read the message through again. All very sensible and down to earth. Except that I wasn't, as far as I was aware, scared of anyone or anything, I mean, not specifically, not right now. My life had been pretty humdrum up till now. But now, with Raymond's murder, Mum being left his library, us going to Avallon, Raymond's letter, that Morgan guy ringing, those pictures in the library, that notebook I'd found: I'd tumbled head first into a very different world.

  I then thought about the sketched forest in the notebook. Was it like the one I'd seen in my dream? Heart beating fast, I pulled it out from under the pillow. I squinted at the sketches. Hmm. It could be. But one forest was much like another one, right? Trees and stuff. There were no rocks or boulders in the sketches, though, but a castle. No castle in my dream though at first – yes! – I'd thought in the dream that the rocks looked like some tumbled down giant's castle. But that was only a coincidence, and a pretty vague one at that. There were too many differences – in my dream there was no knight, no horse, no faces in the trees, just me running fit to bust and someone after me with a bow and arrow. Quite different. Besides, back when I'd had the dream, I hadn't known about the notebook or any of that stuff at all so it couldn't be connected. In any way, canny or uncanny. Right, Fleur? That dream in the book, that was Raymond's, not yours. End of story.

  I thought I should write back to Dreaming Holmes so I fired off a quick email:

  Dear DH,

  Thank you for your message and for taking time to help decipher my dream. Your advice is very useful, I will try to follow it. I was wondering, have you ever had a case where a dream really was a premonition of something that was going to happen? And have you ever known people to separately have the same dream?

  Thank you.

  Yours sincerely,

  Caroline

  It was weird, signing myself as someone else, but then, that's what the internet's like, isn't it? You're never sure that people really are who they say they are, if you don't know them personally, I mean. Dreaming Holmes, for example, could be anyone at all. Man, woman, even child, who knows?

  Hunting call

  The rest of that day passed pretty quickly. I actually fell asleep for a while, a heavy, dreamless, jet-lag sort of sleep. I woke with gritty eyes and a thick tongue and for an instant when I opened my eyes, couldn't work out where I was or what I was doing. It was almost like I was another person. It made my heart beat a bit faster, with fear or excitement, I don't know exactly. Then I got up, splashed water on my face, stared at myself in the mirror and suddenly thought of that boy, Remy. He must have been as surprised as I was, suddenly hearing a voice in a spot he thought was deserted. What had he thought of me, yellin
g at him like that? How embarrassing. What on earth would I say if I saw him again? I wondered who he was. He must be a village boy. But no, he hadn't come from the village, but from the other side. From the woods I'd seen up the slope from the river. Maybe he lived up there. Or maybe he'd just been walking his dog.

  When I went back downstairs, I found Mum in the kitchen, tossing a salad. She'd pulled something out of the freezer and it was going round and round in the microwave. She said, 'I was just going to come and wake you. Dinner's nearly ready – veal stew, the label said. And there's a frozen meringue thing for dessert, it looks great. Hope you're hungry.'

  I sat at the big table and had a glass of very cold juice while she got everything ready. It was a beautiful evening. Mum had left the windows open and a lovely soft little breeze was blowing into the kitchen, smelling of roses and warm herbs. That same breeze carried sounds from outside: a cow mooing, someone laughing, a tractor in the distance, a dog barking. Perhaps it was Patou. Or perhaps not. I said, 'Mum, I went for a walk down to the river earlier.'

  'Did you, darling?' She pulled the stew out of the microwave. 'Ouch, this is hot. Well, was it a nice walk?'

  'It was lovely. I went for a swim.'

  'Really? That's great.' She put the food down in front of us, cut up some bread. 'That's to soak up the sauce. Couldn't be bothered cooking spuds, I'm afraid.'

  'I saw a boy there. A boy and his dog. Patou. I mean the dog was called Patou. The boy's called Remy.'

  'Oh, I'm glad you've met one of the locals,' she said, smiling at me. 'Did you have a good chat?'

  'No, not really,' I said. 'I only just met them.'

  'Oh, okay. I guess you might meet them again in the village,' she said vaguely, ladling out stew onto her plate.

  'I don't think they live in the village,' I began, but Mum wasn't listening. She said, 'You know, I did a quick three-card spread.'

  'What? Oh, right, about Wayne Morgan.'

  'Yes. And do you know what?'

  'Tell me,' I said, forking up some of the meat. Yum! It was delicious. Tender, with a creamy, lemony, peppery sauce, herbs and mushrooms. Most of my friends hate mushrooms but I love them. Especially tasty small ones like these.

  'I asked the cards, what needs to be fulfilled? And I drew the Empress first,' she said, her eyes shining. 'That is wisdom. Then I drew the Ace of Cups. From that I understood I should have an open heart, a trusting heart. And then the Lady of the Lake herself – the High Priestess. You know how she represents self-trust, intuition and balance. And sometimes they say the Lady of the Lake's name is Morgana. That's close to Morgan. So ...'

  'So it means you're going to give Wayne Morgan the notebooks,' I said, glad I'd kept the news of the other notebook to myself. 'Jeez, I hope the cards are not telling you fibs, Mum, and he's really a big crook.'

  'If he was a crook of any size, he'd have asked for something valuable,' said Mum, with dignity. 'I mean, something you could actually sell. And there are lots of those kinds of books here. Besides, I've had a look at the notebooks. They're interesting to anyone who's fascinated in how writers work. But they're not valuable, as such. They wouldn't fetch money. Not much.'

  'They might one day,' I said.

  'Maybe. But a crook doesn't go for that sort of thing. They want returns now, they don't want to wait for maybes and ifs. He is genuinely interested, I'm sure of it.'

  'Hadn't you better wait till you meet him before you say for sure?' Honestly, sometimes I think it's me who's the adult and Mum who's the kid. She does live in a funny old dream world sometimes. Much more than I do, even with the dreams I have.

  'Of course. But I feel more settled about it now. And that's the main thing. Hey, how about that cake then? Ready for it?'

  'Sure thing.' I was pretty full of stew and bread and salad, but you can always fit in cake, yeah? That's what I reckon, anyway. And that cake was something else. You might not think a frozen meringue cake would be that nice but you'd be wrong. It had this gorgeous coffee ice-cream sandwiched in between hazelnut meringue and then a layer of chocolate ice-cream and roasted sugared hazelnuts on top and it was just one of the best things I'd ever tasted. We had it with more of the whipped cream. Well, why not go the whole hog, eh? And we were just so full by the end of it that we could hardly move to make coffee. But just as Mum got up to put the kettle on, there was a big thunderous knock at the door and we both jumped almost out of our skins.

  'Who on earth can that be?' said Mum, looking at her watch. 'It's nearly nine.' It didn't look that late because Mum had said that in summer in Europe it doesn't get really dark till ten o'clock or something. But she got up and went to the door and I trailed after her, remembering what had happened to Raymond and scared for no real reason. A killer would hardly knock at the door, would he?

  The next moment, I felt really silly because there on the threshold stood this thin little woman in her early thirties or so, with big specs and blondish hair scraped back with clips, dressed in jeans and a neat shirt. She said, 'Good evening. My name is Marie Clary, I would have come earlier but I have been in Vezelay all day. I clean here three days a week,' she added, helpfully, as we looked blank. 'I came to see if everything was okay and if you needed anything.'

  'Oh, I see,' said Mum. 'No, no, we don't need anything. Thank you. We have everything we – But, Madame Clary! It was your stew and cake we just ate, wasn't it?'

  'I hope it was satisfactory,' said the woman, with a little smile.

  'It was excellent. Delicious. Wonderful. Wasn't it, Fleur?' I nodded. Mum went on. 'Madame, we were just about to have a cup of coffee. Would you, perhaps like to –'

  'Thank you, yes, Madame Griffon,' said Marie Clary, briskly coming in. She'd obviously hoped to be asked.

  'Please. My name is Anne.'

  'And mine is Marie. I heard you are from Australia. You speak very good French. No trace of an accent.'

  'I was born in France. My parents are French. They went to live in Australia when I was a small child.'

  'Ah. That explains it. You are bilingual then. How marvellous. Your daughter must speak French well then too?'

  'No,' I said, blushing, 'I understand just about everything, but I do not speak well. I–I am too slow when I speak.'

  'You do not speak too badly at all,' she said judiciously, 'and if you practise you will speak even better. You must make friends here. You will soon learn to be quite fluent,' said Marie Clary, sitting down at the table with a decided air. 'I will introduce you to –'

  'Fleur has met someone already,' said Mum, ignoring my glare. 'A boy called Remy, and his dog. Does he live in the village?'

  Behind her big glasses, Marie Clary's blue eyes swivelled to me. She said, 'No. Remy Gomert does not live in the village.' There was an odd expression in her eyes. 'He and his mother, Valerie, live in the woods. She is, well, they don't mix very much with the rest of us.'

  'I see,' said Mum, who clearly didn't.

  'She's an artist. An illustrator. She used to do work sometimes for Monsieur Dulac,' said Marie Clary, sipping on her coffee. 'She has a thing about the world outside this little valley, though. Won't go anywhere else, hardly even to Avallon. Remy does the shopping for her. She is, you might say, a hermit. But then, poor thing ...' She paused. 'When you have a face like that –'

  'Like what?' said Mum, wide-eyed. She can never resist a good gossip. Well, not many people can. Certainly not me. I was all ears, just like Mum.

  'A terrible thing happened to her back in Quebec, in Canada, where she comes from, originally. Someone set fire to her house and she got badly burnt. She got over it, but one side of her poor face – well, it didn't heal up really well, you see.'

  'My God, that's awful!'

  'Even worse, her husband and her brother died in that fire. Remy was a baby when it happened, thank the Lord he wasn't in the house, he was at her sister's, that's why he was okay. That's what I heard, anyway,' said Marie Clary, leaning forward. 'If you meet her, just remember not to ask any quest
ions.' She looked at me. 'And if you see Remy again, don't tell him you know. He's a good sort of boy, but a bit strange, if you know what I mean. Spends too much time by himself in those woods with that dog. He's seventeen, but he's never gone to school. I mean, his mother teaches him. Very clever she is, apparently, and he has done well in his studies, I believe, but still, is it right, I ask you? And they don't have electricity or TV or anything like that at their house. I think you shouldn't try to live outside your own time, it's not natural. And how will he cope, out in the real world, once his mother, well... ?'

  Mum shook her head. 'I suppose he will, somehow. Young people are very adaptable.'

  'Perhaps you are right,' said Marie Clary. 'Still, Fleur,' she said, turning to me, 'I think we can introduce you to other young people as well, yes? Julien and I don't have children, sadly, but my sister Angele, she has twin girls and a boy, very nice they are, I am sure they would like to meet you. An Australian! Well! They will want to ask you a million questions. Many young people in France dream of going to Australia. The last frontier, yes?'

  'We live in a city,' said Mum, smiling, seeing that I was struggling to answer. 'So for us coming here is like the last frontier. Avallon. The land of King Arthur.'

  'Oh, that,' said Marie Clary, getting up. 'Monsieur Dulac was very interested in all that.' Her vague tone suggested she didn't share that interest. 'Anyway, I'd better get off home. I am glad you are well-settled. I will be in tomorrow to clean, and Julien will come to do the garden. We usually arrive about eight. I have a key, so you do not need to let us in. I knocked tonight because I didn't want to give you a fright.'

  Mum and I looked at each other, smiling. She was clearly not at all aware of what big a fright she'd actually given us!

  Not long after Marie Clary left, we went up to our rooms. Before I went to bed, I stood in my pyjamas at the window, looking out over the park, as I was now calling that big garden. There was still a bit of light left, a kind of grey light that made everything look a bit strange. The big trees loomed in that half-light like frozen giants with many twisted arms, and the grass rippled gently under the little breeze. It looked like a scene from a dream, or rather from some movie that's trying to look like a scene in a dream.