Xavier let his horse go free to graze the fresh grass. He reached for his saddle bag and took out a bottle of brandy, which he would share. Meantime he took a swig, wiped his moustache, and sat on a tree trunk.
The hunting party arrived in twos and threes. They passed the bottle of brandy around and sat discussing the news quietly among themselves. They seemed to sense Xavier’s mood of introspection, and they let him be. A month ago, on 3 September, Britain and France had declared war on Germany. Corsica, as a province of France, was at war. That was all they could talk about. As yet there was no visible sign of the war. You could say that nothing had changed, yet underneath everything had changed. Take this morning’s hunt… that had changed.
Take fat old Rene Guerrini, groaning quietly on his old mare, red and swollen with exertion. He was here because he was too scared to stay away. Why was he scared? For the simple reason that he had canvassed support for unity with Italy for many years, but now he had to show he was one of them — a patriot — a true Corsican — ready to do whatever had to be done with the rest of them. What better way was there than by joining the boys in the morning’s hunt?
Take Maria! She had it firmly fixed in her mind that there would be shortages. She and Sybilia had gathered every single fallen olive and with gritty determination squashed each one in the homemade press. She had exchanged the oil at the village store for coffee and sugar — enough to last them a year. Now she was walking around clutching her back and claiming she had slipped a disc with all that effort.
Take Michel! He had joined the hunt, and that in itself was remarkable. There he sat with a supercilious look on his face, as if humouring a crowd of overgrown children. When Michel put on that look, Xavier longed to wipe it off with the back of his fist. He had long since given up persuading his son to come hunting with the men. Come to think of it, he had long ago given up on Michel — full stop. But now Michel wanted to find out which way the land lay with the Nationalist movement — so he had tagged along. Xavier had never agreed with Michel on politics. He couldn’t understand the boy’s contempt for Corsica, his longing to be French. Nevertheless, they would be political allies at least until the war was fought and won.
The Bertoli twins were there, together with several other fugitives from the Marseilles crime syndicate. They were both diminutive men in their forties with identical faces, like cherubs, but with minds as savage as wildcats. They had opted out of their very profitable beat in the smuggling ring and the Lord knew what else in order to sit out the war years in Corsica. They would fight like demons if they had to, but only to protect their beloved island.
Antoine Romanetti had tagged along, too. The shepherd was a loner who never joined their hunts. Xavier had always considered him to be slightly demented because he hated any creature to be killed. Many evenings, after a good shoot, they’d had to listen to Romanetti’s lectures, thinly disguised as poems, which he’d sung to them in the bistro. He must have changed his views because he wanted to join the Resistance. He’d come along today to make sure he wasn’t left out.
And the rest… The shepherd Ambrosini was there because he was a tough fighting man. Normally he wasn’t invited along. He stank, and there was something vile about him. Marcel Leca and Francois Castelli were there, naturally. They were his aides in the party, but temporary allies only, for they were communists. Right now they had need of each other.
Xavier mounted his horse and gave an impatient wave to the rest of the party. They were all good men, he knew. With the exception of Michel, they were utterly dependable for bravery, if not for logic. In an argument their emotions won every time, yet they were courageous, loyal, and proud. Each one was fiercely independent, yet together, when hunting or fighting, they formed a composite body of men who could act as one without instructions. Curious, that. A sort of mental telepathy, a sense of oneness, born of centuries of hunting, fighting, and living in close confinement in their isolated villages. It was something he had always taken for granted until he had joined the French navy and found that it was a Corsican trait.
As he led his hunting party into the mountains, some of his excitement was transmitted to his horse, which was bucking nervously and working up a lather. The dogs were in a frenzy. They’d caught the scent of game. Xavier was in no hurry for that special moment when he sighted his quarry down the barrel of his gun. It wasn’t the killing that fired his enthusiasm for hunting as much as the chance to get up in the mountains, away from roads and newspapers and the mucky invasion of the outside world. Then his heart sang with the earth and the wind. His mind became in tune with that of his prey and plunged with it on the wild, canny flight into the maquis, even at its moment of death.
At seven thousand feet, after they had lost the trail of the boar and even missed a hare, they camped for casse-croute, a heavy meal of ham and cheese, bread and wine with a great deal of eau de vie to drink.
It was cold and fresh, but even the mountain scenery could not pull Xavier from his morose mood. ‘We’ll win the war, of course,’ he told them, ‘but we won’t win the peace. The postwar era will bring changes we’ll all have to accept…’
Xavier’s vision was not a pleasant one, but he held them spellbound as he explained his premonition. It was of roads and trains and airstrips, and all the paraphernalia of the modern world — the rape of Corsica, he told them several times. Of tourists flocking to Corsican beaches, for in all his worldwide travels he had never seen beaches to touch those of his island. Of the gradual erosion of Corsican morals and mores. Of divorce, women lying naked on beaches, of mass entertainment and the loss of crafts and patience. The property developers would come, and the money-makers and flocks of expatriates from every nation in Europe, coaxing the Corsicans to sell their houses for high prices, not realizing that inflation would whittle away at their capital. In the end they’d be the poorer and homeless, too. ‘Everyone in the world will want a slice of this paradise, once they find out about it,’ he told them. ‘It’ll be up to us to hang on to it.’
But that was another fight for another day.
His words were received with gloomy silence, each man unwilling to show his feelings.
‘In the meantime we must pull together,’ they all agreed. ‘Let’s drink to victory,’ they roared. ‘Victory or death!’
‘Victory or death!’ Their voices echoed around the glade.
They discussed what they would do when they were invaded. They would join the resistance fighters — that was taken for granted — but each had a specific skill to offer.
‘We’ll be ready for the Macaronis. They’ll be so shit scared they’ll run back across the water,’ one of the men crowed.
‘They won’t come yet.’ It was Guerrini who had spoken, and a sudden hush fell over the rowdy men.
‘You think that? Or perhaps you know. Perhaps you have special communication. Out with it, Guerrini. We all know you’re a fascist. What’ll they make you when they come — a commandant?’
Guerrini shook his fist under the nose of Castelli. ‘Don’t joke about something so serious,’ he snarled.
‘What’s so serious about those bastard Macaronis?’ Bertoli yelled.
‘There’s something serious about accusing me of treason, Guerrini murmured, fingering his knife.
‘Knock it off!’ Xavier’s quiet voice was enough to bring instant silence to the gathering. ‘I don’t like to hear you talk like this. We’ve come here today to consolidate our unity. That’s what this hunt is all about. We’re going to sort the men from the boys. Let’s face it, we’ve all got our ambitions for Corsica, but we’ve always stuck together when she’s threatened.’
A murmur of assent ran around the crowd.
So it stands to reason that for the duration of the war, we’d be wise to put our differences aside. We’ll sort them out later, when we’ve shown the French how to fight, and sent our enemies packing.
Michel watched and wondered. He had been on these hunts before. They were merely an exc
use for a get-together. Corsicans were all highly skilled hunters, and so were their dogs. They knew the terrain intimately, and game was plentiful. So there was no need to become serious about the killing until an hour or so before sunset.
The rhetoric went on and on, and it seemed to Michel that they would sit there all day repeating themselves and assuring each other of their manhood and bravery. There were more roars, more toasts, more backslapping. So far Michel had not totally agreed with what his father had said, yet he had been stirred by Xavier’s passion. There was no mistaking the power of his leadership. Michel had many contradictory feelings toward his father, part admiration, part hate, part jealousy, but never indifference. Impossible to be indifferent to a man who could stir such loyalty from his followers.
Primitives, all of them, Michel thought as he leaned against a tree looking bored and superior and watched the hunters leaping on their horses with bloodcurdling cries. Then they were off up the mountain, driving their mounts to extremes.
Michel followed more slowly. By tacit consent he was always left to bring up the rear. Were he not Xavier’s son, he would not be included in the hunt. What a bloody bore it was, but he had to come, for he intended to join the Resistance.
An hour later he was still climbing. By now the sea had turned a deep peacock blue, and the sun was a glowing orange ball as it dipped slowly below the horizon. Far above he heard the frenetic baying of the hounds and the men’s shouts.
He had no intention of driving his horse to near extinction, but after a while it seemed that the chase was moving southward and it occurred to Michel that he could take a shortcut. He surveyed the territory. It must be a buck of some sort, for a boar would dive into a thicker bush and head uphill. It seemed to be making for the river. It would probably come downstream, to try to throw the dogs off scent and pick up more speed. Well, if he could cut across the bush here and make for the river, he might save himself hours of riding.
It would not escape. Night was falling, and the huntsmen would be intent on their kill. A feeling of desperation fell over him. The trees bending over the track seemed to be menacing him, the interplay of shadows in the thicket were like fleeting glimpses of spirits haunting the maquis. However much of a Frenchman he might feel himself to be, Michel could never shake off his superstitious fancies. Age-old fears kept him hurrying through the bush.
By the time he reached the river it was quite dark and weirdly silent. He climbed on a boulder overlooking the waterfall and clutched his rifle.
He saw now with a sudden shock of dismay that it was all but over. A huge roan antelope stood on a rock, foolishly hesitating when it should plunge into the torrent. Safety lay that way.
The huntsmen had moved up in position around both riverbanks, and the buck was surrounded. The dogs were baying on the shore. As if by tacit consent among the huntsmen, the final coup de grace was to be administered by Xavier. Michel could see him on the crest of the hill, down on one knee, his rifle on his shoulder as he took careful aim.
Still the antelope hesitated. Michel could see his magnificent antlers, see the fear in his eyes, and almost smell his frenzy, although he was at least eighty yards upstream, much closer to Xavier.
One shot! Just one shot would frighten the beast into taking its plunge for freedom into the river. To hell with Xavier. Without a second thought Michel flung up his rifle and fired over the beast’s head.
It dropped. Oh, God! It dropped! He had never been a good shot, and now he had hit the antelope clean between the eyes. Time seemed to go into slow motion as he watched the poor beast crumple from the knees. It was still jerking and sliding down, about to slither into the water, when the first huntsman clambered up, knife in hand, and grabbed its antlers.
‘God damn it! Why? Why?’ Michel hurled his rifle onto the ground and leaned forward, blinded with tears of remorse.
He tried to keep his face devoid of expression as Xavier, roaring with approval, clapped his shoulder over and over and told the men proudly that Sybilia had turned his boy into a man.
It was an excellent shot, they told him repeatedly. Gean through the brain. The meat would be superbly tender because the beast had died before pain had tarnished it. Its brains had been blown through the back of its skull, they told him excitedly. They had never seen such a good shot — straight between the eyes. What a sly, dark horse Michel was, leading them all to believe that he hated hunting.
Michel sat silently on his horse and tried to choke back his nausea.
Chapter 19
She found him in the woodshed, stroking the cat. She would never have known he was there, but for Gus patiently waiting outside. He smelled of sweat and dirt, and his face was muddy and tear-streaked.
‘Oh,’ Sybilia said. She took a step backward and began to tiptoe away, but what was the point since Michel had seen her? He was crumpled on a pile of sacks in the shadows, and he looked at her as if he hated her, along with the rest of the world.
‘I thought you were the big hero, but I find you crying like a small child,’ she said. She hated hunting and had been appalled to discover that Michel was as thoughtless as the rest of the village men.
‘Hero!’ He spat the words out. ‘Any fool can kill. The cretins! If I were a hero, I would sabotage their damned hunts. Oh, Sybilia! I tried. I fired to frighten the buck into the river, and I missed. Oh, God! It was such a beautiful animal. Magnificent, powerful, free. Now it’s supper.’
‘I won’t eat a mouthful,’ Sybilia said simply. She sat beside him and attempted to wind her arms around his shoulders. ‘Don’t be sad,’ she said. ‘It’s over. There’s no point.’
‘Oh for goodness’ sake, take your trite words of comfort and water the cemetery with them.’
‘Why do you hate me so?’ she said.
‘I don’t hate you,’ he murmured. ‘I hate what you represent. You are my gaoler; they key that was turned on me, locking me here in this hell they call Taita.’
Sybilia sat thinking about that for a while. She looked as dejected as Michel, sitting cross-legged on the sacks with her head in her hands. Then she said: ‘You’ve never learned to be honest with yourself, Michel. You always blame other people, but you are your own victim. Look at the Bertolis and the Lecas. They left Taita after they were married. They only come home to spawn children. They make their money in Marseilles.’
‘Don’t hold them up as examples. They’re criminals."True. But if Bertoli wanted to be a sculptor, he’d be there in Paris doing just that, I promise you.’ She folded her lips into an obstinate line and waited for her words to sink in.
‘It would be years before I made any money.’
‘Not “would”, mil. You don’t seem to have any faith in your dreams. Don’t worry Michel. I am much stronger than you. I will get a job — after the war. I’m sure it will be easy for me, because my English is excellent. My German is good, too, and I speak Italian fluently.’
‘Who doesn’t?’ he said. ‘You’d be a drag on me.’
‘Then go by yourself,’ she retorted, finding it hard to be patient with him. ‘Give yourself five years. If you haven’t succeeded by then, come back and be a farmer. You’d do better with me,’ she added thoughtfully. ‘I could keep you."You crazy child. I’m supposed to keep you.’
‘You’re so conventional,’ she said. ‘I thought artists were different. Anyway, we’ll have to wait until after the war. Who knows, it may be over by the end of next year. That’s what everyone’s saying.’
‘A year! It might as well be a century.’
‘No, it will pass quickly. If only you had some optimism."Life has knocked it out of me.’
She stood up and moodily kicked at the sacks. What a martyr he was, never happy unless he felt victimized. ‘If you were my brother, I’d tell you what a coward you are,’ she said at last.
‘Why bother? Everyone else has told me already.’
‘But you don’t believe them, do you?’
‘No.’
‘Th
e poor, misunderstood Michel.’
‘Something like that. Oh, all right, maybe I’m a bit scared. Not of going, not of starving, nothing like that, Sybilia. I’m scared I may find out that I’m no good.’
She looked at him in surprise. He wasn’t often so honest with her. ‘Yes, I can see that’s a terrible fear,’ she said.
‘Perhaps we should stay here all our lives and never know what might have been. Just pretend that you’re a great artist who never had a chance.’
‘You’re a bitch,’ he said, standing up and brushing down his clothes. ‘I don’t know why I bother to talk to you. Other husbands would beat you.’
‘Michel.’ She caught hold of his shoulders and shook him violently and could not help noticing his passivity at her touch. ‘Listen to me, Michel. Give it a chance, give your talent a chance, and please, Michel, give me a chance. You’re all I’m ever going to have. I’ll work myself to death for you to succeed.’
He bit his lip and stared away over her shoulder toward the house where noisy shouts were coming from the parlour. Xavier’s post-hunting party was a great success.
He sighed. ‘You want all this? This rooting and rutting, spending your life in back-breaking work just to survive, growing a little food, cooking, getting pregnant every year?"We won’t be like that,’ she said bravely. ‘We’ll be fashionable, and you’ll be a famous artist, and we’ll entertain and have a lovely flat in Paris.’
Michel’s depression seemed to be lifting under the force of her dream. ‘I never thought of you that way,’ he said, ‘but you could be an asset, I suppose. You can come home at night and cook supper and then model for me.’
‘Of course,’ she said. ‘That’s how it will be.’
Not far below them the antelope was turning over the spit — a delicious smell was wafting toward the house.
The Corsican Woman Page 10