“And I missed you, too.” Her voice sounded different. I sensed a reserve in her tone that alarmed me.
“Come now. I have so much to tell you,” I instructed. “I’ll be waiting for you.”
I didn’t have to wait long. Claudine arrived in her coat and hat, a stripy scarf tied around her neck, brown-stockinged legs in sheepskin boots. She let me hold her, but I felt her body stiffen. “Are you all right?” I asked.
“Let’s sit down,” she suggested, and my stomach plummeted. I followed her to the iron bench where we had sat the morning of our first meeting.
“What’s wrong? Are you having doubts? What’s the matter?” She took my hand and looked at me steadily. I sensed fear behind the veneer of confidence.
“You were at Mass,” she said. I was astonished.
“I was,” I replied, making an effort to sound casual. “You were with Laurent. I didn’t want to make trouble.”
“But you followed me home.” Again I was amazed. There was nothing for me to do but come clean. I leaned forward and placed my elbows on my knees, rubbing my face in my hands.
“I’m sorry if I was out of order,” I said.
“Why did you follow me, Mischa?”
“I wanted to see how Laurent treats you.”
“Why didn’t you ask me?”
“Because you didn’t seem to want to talk about him.”
“I don’t want him to spoil what we have.”
“His very position as your husband does that.”
“When I’m with you, I don’t want to think of him.” I was relieved when her eyes shone with tears. I hadn’t lost her after all. “I love you, Mischa. When we’re together I can pretend that Laurent doesn’t exist.”
I sat back and took her hands. “He doesn’t have to, Claudine. You can leave him and come with me to America.”
“I can’t.” She turned away and wiped her nose with the back of her hand. “You don’t understand.”
“Of course you can. Your children are grown up. There’s nothing for you here in Maurilliac. It’s a desert. We can start a new life together in New York.” She turned to face me. “You’re young and beautiful,” I said, tracing my fingers down her cold cheek. She took my hand and pressed her lips to it.
“I’m afraid,” she whispered.
“Of Laurent?”
“Not of Laurent. I pity Laurent. He can’t rest unless he controls the world around him, including me. He has grown into a bitter, angry man. Now he senses me drifting away, he is desperate to hold on to me. He never wanted to make love and now he wants me all the time. I’m weary of making excuses.”
“Then who are you afraid of?”
A frown darkened her brow and she looked at me sheepishly. “I’m afraid of doing the wrong thing. I’m afraid of God.”
“Of God!” I wanted to laugh with relief. Then I remembered her closeness to Père Robert. “Have you confessed?” She nodded. “Why, Claudine? You know he’ll never condone adultery.”
“I had to. He’s been so kind to me all these years. He’s been the only support I’ve had. In the beginning I couldn’t stand up to Laurent. He taught me how. I can’t lie to him.”
“You can’t remain in an unhappy marriage just to keep a priest happy. You have to follow your instincts and put your happiness first.”
“I feel guilty. Laurent is the father of my children. We’ve known each other since childhood. Shared a bed for twenty-six years. We made vows in church, before God. I am breaking one of the Commandments. I’ve never done that before.”
“But you haven’t done anything yet.”
“The intention is there.” She looked so solemn. I couldn’t believe she was taken in by it. Didn’t she know it was all a load of rubbish devised by priests to control people?
“For Christ’s sake, Claudine, I’m not going to let another priest destroy my happiness.” I took her in my arms and kissed her with passion. “Let it go. Stop hiding. I can cope with you being afraid of Laurent, or of the future, even of yourself, but don’t hide behind the Church. You love me?”
“Yes.”
“Then that’s all there is to it. I’m not leaving without you.” She smiled at me with gratitude. She seemed to swell in response to my resolve, as if she had needed proof of my affection. I suppose that, on the brink of leaving all that was familiar to her, she needed reassurance that my love was strong enough not to let her down. Once gone, she could never return.
“I want to make love to you,” she said suddenly. “I want you to take me, Mischa. I want to be yours.”
“Where?” I needed no persuasion.
“I know a place.” She stood up and took my hand. “Come, Mischa. Let’s start our future today.”
We walked along the riverbank for a while, hand in hand like young lovers. I remembered what it was like in summertime and my heart swelled with nostalgia: the grass verdant, full of crickets; the trees sheltering within their branches clusters of cooing wood pigeons; the scent of pine and rosemary heavy in the air. Claudine represented all those things and I knew that if she came with me to America, I’d take the very best of summer with me. After a while we reached a farm and I put the past away. There were barns and stables but, as far as I could see, not a soul around. “I used to play here as a child. Do you remember Antoine Baudron?” I didn’t remember him but I knew that he was probably one of the boys who had listened, gripped, while I spun my lies of miracles and holy visions in the school playground. “This was his home. He married and moved away, but his father still runs the farm.” She led me playfully up the concrete road, past buildings, ducking and hiding every now and then, which reminded me of my games with Pistou. At last she pulled open the door of a barn. “This is where they put the calves in springtime. Upstairs is a hayloft. I bet there will still be some hay there. We can make a nice bed.” She giggled mischievously and beckoned me to follow.
“Some people never grow up,” I teased.
“That makes two of us, then, Mischa,” she replied, climbing the ladder into the hayloft.
Our playful mood grew somber as we lay down together, out of the cold. “Hold me against you,” she said, pressing her body to mine. “I need warming up.” We lay entwined in the dim light that filtered through the gaps in the wooden roof and through a small window whose pane was stained with mildew. We began to kiss, slowly at first. I brushed my lips across hers, over her cheeks, her feathery eyelashes, and her brow. She smelled woody, like the forest, and I closed my eyes to sharpen my sense of smell so that I could savor it. She burrowed her hand inside my coat and up my shirt. I felt her icy fingers against my skin.
“Your hands are cold,” I said.
“They won’t be for long. You’re boiling in there.” She inserted the other and traced them up and down my spine. I felt them dwell a moment on my scar before moving on. As our kissing grew more ardent I felt my arousal strain against my trousers. Our breath grew hot and our cheeks flushed cherry red. My hands were warm, like dough straight from the oven. I pulled her blouse out of her skirt and released the clips of her brassiere. Her breasts were soft and spongy, no longer the firm breasts of a young woman who has yet to give birth, but I loved her maturity. I loved the marks that time and motherhood had left on her body, because they made her real and gave her a pathos that moved me. I wished the children she had borne had been mine. I wished we had grown up together. I buried my face in her neck and lifted her clothes so I could take her breasts in my mouth and feel the texture of her skin on my lips. She let out a low moan and ran her fingers through my hair. She wore a knee-length tweed skirt. I slid it over her hips to find her brown stockings were attached to a suspender belt and she wore silky panties. It excited me to feel the white plains of thigh above the lace. She smiled at me, her eyes shining, her lids heavy with pleasure. I pulled down her underwear and she lay exposed and abandoned, without shame, for me to caress. We made love all morning, pausing to talk, then starting all over again. “I haven’t made love like thi
s since I was a young girl,” she said, blushing with delight. “I thought I had lost all sensuality in the banal domesticity of my life.”
“You’re a feast,” I told her, taking in the beauty of her face. “Sex suits you.”
“Who’d have thought, when we played with marbles in the Place de l’Eglise, that we’d come to this?” She laughed, climbing on top of me.
“What do you think Monsieur Baudron would say if he found us in his hayloft?”
“I would have to leave Maurilliac forever.”
“I hope he comes,” I said, turning serious. She stared down at me for a long moment. I wished I could read her thoughts. “Come with me, Claudine. I can’t leave without you.”
“But you haven’t found your painting.”
“Yes, I have.”
“You have?” She was amazed. “Tell me.”
“Not until you promise that you’ll run away with me.”
She stopped smiling. “Do you promise that you’ll never leave me? That you’ll look after me? That we’ll grow old together and love each other to make up for all the years we have missed? Can you promise me all that, Mischa? Because, if you can, I’ll run away with you.” I pulled her down and rolled over so that she lay cradled in my arms.
“We might not be young anymore, but we’ve got many years left to share. I promise you, Claudine, that I will love you and look after you until death us do part. I only ask you to trust me because, if you had known me for the last forty years, you would be reassured because I have never loved like this.”
“Where did you get that scar?” she asked.
“In a fight,” I replied, knowing that I would now divulge the full horror of my wasted youth.
“How did it happen?”
“It all began when Coyote left…” She listened intently while, layer by layer, I shed my skins. They were tougher towards the outside, like pieces of armor, designed to keep people out, while at the same time keeping me in and out of reach. Now I let them go one by one, feeling lighter and happier as each was peeled away. I told her about Captain Crumble’s Curiosity Store; Matias and Maria Elena; the day we were broken into and that heartbreaking moment when Coyote embraced me for the last time; my mother’s constant and irritating laying of his place at the table, her unwavering hope, her slow drift away and my descent into the world of street gangs and violence. I told her about the theft, the vandalism, the terror I engendered. I wasn’t proud of what I had become, but I wanted her to know it all. I didn’t want to have any secrets from her. If Linda hadn’t been able to reach me, I wanted Claudine to delve inside and hold my heart in her hands. I wanted her to have it. It had always belonged to her.
Then I told her about the fight that nearly cost me my life. “I watched helplessly as my gang ran off into the night, leaving me alone and bleeding on the wet pavement. It was at that point that I saw my whole life before my eyes. What a waste I had made of it. All because of one man.”
“No, Mischa,” she said, gazing at me with soft, inquiring eyes. “He triggered it, but he wasn’t the reason for your breakdown. You were a damaged little boy. Who knows, you might have done the same thing had Coyote never come into your life.”
“But Coyote rejected me and I carried that burden around like a bag of lead. It just got heavier and heavier until I unloaded it in my first fight. With each brawl it got lighter and lighter.”
“That knife wound probably saved your life,” she said with a smile.
“It made me consider my life. After that I turned it around. I worked with my mother in the store, learned about antiques…”
“Girlfriends?”
“Mainly one, Linda. We were together for nine years, but, to be honest, I never opened up. She struggled from day one to ‘save me.’ I think that’s why she liked me. I was her project.”
“Did you love her?”
I considered a moment. Now that I loved Claudine I realized the difference between love and need. “I was comfortable,” I replied. “I needed her. But no, I didn’t love her.”
“How did your mother take to her?”
“Not well. She never liked anyone I dated.”
She chuckled. “That’s because she wanted you for herself. You were all she had. I don’t blame her.” She traced her finger down my cheek. “I’d want you all to myself, too. I pity Linda and any other girls you took home. They wouldn’t have stood a chance.”
“Do you remember my mother?”
“I remember her as being very beautiful but icy. She always walked tall, with her chin up. She had these incredible cheekbones and flawless skin. I don’t recall her smile.”
“She had an enchanting smile, when she wanted to give it. I think she’d have liked you.”
“Why’s that?” She was grinning now, unconvinced.
“Because you were the only child who was nice to me. She’d like you for that.”
We ate baguettes that she had brought with her, sitting on the bridge in the sunshine, watching the frost melt. Then, in the afternoon we walked to keep warm. She took me to a little hamlet the other side of the Garonne because her father was buried in the churchyard and she wanted to say good-bye. I left her alone beside the headstone, crouching on the grass, so that she could speak to him in private. I wandered around with my hands in my pockets, toying with the rubber ball, wondering whether my father had a gravestone somewhere in Germany, suddenly longing to speak to him too.
It was then that it caught my eye. A simple headstone, covered in moss and weeds, neglected and left to the ravages of time. I stared at it in astonishment, my heart suspended with my breath. In large letters was the name “Pistou.” Beneath it, Florien Roche, 1941–1947, beloved son of Paul and Annie. Always in our hearts. I knelt down and picked away at the mildew with my fingernails. Pistou hadn’t been a figment of my imagination after all, but a little boy of my age who had never been allowed to grow up.
Maria Elena had understood. I had believed in Pistou as a child, when he had come in spirit to play among the vines. He had been there when I had needed him, when I had no one else to talk to. I knew that I would never see him again because the adult world had wrapped itself around me like cement, deafening my ears to his voice. But, as I tended his grave, I remembered him with love, as if he had been a brother. I had no flowers to lay there, but it didn’t matter. I spoke to him instead. “Pistou, my old friend,” I whispered, imagining him there beside me, smiling in amusement as if he had deliberately led me here as a game. “So you were a little boy like me. I never thanked you for your company when I had no one else to play with. I hope you still run around the fields and down by the river, perhaps with another little boy who needs you as I did. Judging by the state of the gravestone, I should imagine your parents are with you in spirit. If you see my mother, say hello for me. And if you’re ever inspired and able, make yourself known to me again, one last time, so I can say thank you.”
That evening I packed my case. We planned to leave the following morning. Claudine would come to the hotel and we’d drive to the airport together. It was a simple plan. I couldn’t imagine it going wrong. She said she’d leave a note on Laurent’s pillow. She confessed she’d find it almost impossible to tell him to his face. I understood. They had been friends all their lives and, although their marriage had grown cold, those years meant something. He was, after all, the father of her children, the man she had shared a bed with for twenty-six years.
I bathed, lying back in the water and imagining our life together in New York. How different it would be with her. I’d clear out my mother’s apartment, sort out her mail and her papers, and move on. I wouldn’t be alone anymore. We’d have each other, Claudine and I.
Downstairs I ordered a drink in the library, by the fire. I noticed Jean-Luc enter with an anxious look on his face, but I ignored him. I turned my eyes back to the magazine I was reading, sipping a large glass of warm Bordeaux. I felt deeply contented, as if finally all the pieces of my life had come together like a compl
icated puzzle. I knew where my mother had got the painting from. I wasn’t certain about the reasons, but that no longer mattered. My curiosity was satisfied and besides, Claudine had quelled my compulsive searching.
“Excuse me, Monsieur.” I raised my eyes to find Jean-Luc gazing anxiously down at me.
“Yes?” I replied good-naturedly.
“I was wondering whether you wouldn’t mind sharing a table with a very charming guest.”
“Go on.” The thought of having to chat all evening to a stranger was disheartening.
“She’s called Mrs. Rainey. She’s alone and, as she’s American, like you, I thought it would be pleasant for her to have some company. She’s elderly but very nice and she’s a good client of ours.” I was about to decline, but knew it was selfish.
“It would be my pleasure,” I said, wondering how I had suddenly become so agreeable. Jean-Luc’s face brightened. “Thank you, Monsieur. I will present her to you at eight.”
I returned to my magazine. It was churlish to be irritated at the prospect of having to dine with an old lady, in the light of my impending flight with Claudine. Perhaps she would be a welcome distraction. I hoped she wouldn’t be dull or, even worse, one of those enthusiastic women who ask endless questions. I didn’t want to talk about myself.
At eight Jean-Luc appeared with Mrs. Rainey. I drained my glass, put down the magazine, and stood up to greet her. “Madame, may I present you Monsieur Fontaine.” We smiled at each other politely until it dawned on us both that we had met before, a long, long time ago.
“Joy Springtoe!” I exclaimed, my jaw falling in astonishment. She hadn’t changed all that much. She was just older.
“Mischa?” She was as astonished as I was. She shook her head, and her blue eyes shone with happiness. “You can talk?”
“It’s a long story,” I replied.
“I can’t wait to hear it.”
“Then you shall.”
“You’re American now?”
“We moved to America when I was six years old,” I replied, taking her hand and kissing it in the French fashion. I raised my eyes, my lips still pressed against her skin. “But I never forgot you.”
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