‘I’m not hungry,’ he said.
‘You must eat. You’ll get sick if you don’t.’
‘I went out for a bite. As a matter of fact, we went down to the new harbour cate. Quite a place. Hell of a crowd.’
‘We?’ she queried.
‘Angelo and I.’
The name of his employer always brought a feeling’of unease and vague, undefined jealousy. Absurd to think this way, she lectured herself.
Carrying Jules, she walked across the kitchen and switched off the stove. That was a wasted effort,’ she grumbled as she took out the food. ‘Strange that you should spend so much time with Angelo,’ she blurted out. ‘After all, one would think you had enough of each other’s company, working together all day as you do.’ Why could she never keep her mouth shut? Michel’s lips were pursed into a thin, tight line. His eyes flashed with anger.
‘My friends are my business,’ he said curtly.
‘I’m entitled to ask. I sit alone night after night. I’m your wife.’
‘Wife,’ he spat at her. ‘How you love that title. You try to goad me with it. Quite honestly I’m sick of it. Leave me alone, Sybilia. I’ll try not to interfere with your life, if you keep out of mine.’
Strange talk from a husband. She put Jules into his crib and sat at the table. Suddenly she felt overcome with a curious apathy. She was so tired, almost too tired to go to bed. Sadness makes you tired, she thought. She tried to pull herself together as she told Michel about Jean Perrier’s strange request.
‘Oh, come on, Sybilia. You can’t expect me to make your decisions,’ he said. ‘You must do as you feel best.’
What a letdown! She felt anger welling up. ‘Oh, you miserable imitation of a man,’ she said bitterly. ‘As if you cared. I’m just the fool who married you. All your feelings are for Angelo. Don’t think I don’t know about you two,’ she went on, noticing how shocked he looked. ‘I might have been naive when I married you, but I’m learning fast. I listen to the women downstairs. They all know about Angelo and his past affairs!’
Suddenly she crumpled, her rage spent. She buried her face in her hands and wept.
Michel knelt at her feet and laid his head on her knees. ‘Oh, God,’ he moaned. ‘I’d rather die than hurt you.’ He gave a long, convulsive sob. Then he reached up and shook her shoulder. ‘I’m not like you think. Maybe it’s true about Angelo - I mean, his affairs. You’re probably right. But not with me. I’m fighting it,’ he added lamely. ‘Help me.’
She looked down at him and frowned. Even the way he clung to her was more like a woman than a man. What hope did they have? When she saw the anguish on his face she flung her arms around him. ‘Of course I’ll help you,’ she promised. Intuitively she sensed the depth of Michel’s confusion. He was so frail and oversensitive. A girl’s mind thrust into a man’s body. She was so much stronger than he. Never again would she ask him for more than he could give.
How old she felt as she made love to Michel that night. He wanted to be wooed, so she wooed him. She kissed him gently, reassuring him, seeing his face, so virginal, while she straddled his shivering, passive body.
You won’t get him, Angelo, she vowed. You never will.
Later she whispered, ‘I’m sorry, Michel. I didn’t understand. Don’t worry about anything… I mean, about Jean Perrier. I can make my own decisions. I’m strong. Lean on me.’
Was she really so strong? she wondered when she awoke next morning. She had dreamed of a tall, handsome man whose body she worshipped and whose strength she relied upon. ‘If only… if only… ‘ she muttered as she fetched Jules from his cradle.
Chapter 25
‘We never see you any more. I’ve been longing to see my little Jules.’
It was Maria’s voice.
Sybilia laughed happily, and the sound rippled in her throat. She paused in her long climb to Taita and shaded her eyes as she peered toward the top of the ledge. The sun was almost at its zenith, and against the glare she could see only the dark green outline of the cliff and the brilliance of the sky.
‘Where are you?’
‘Here, above you.’ The soft voice caressed her. Sybilia looked back for Michel, who was carrying their baby, but there was no sign of him. ‘Your son is a lazy layabout,’ she called out. ‘I left him far behind.’
She glanced back toward the sea, twinkling china blue beyond the forests. Splashes of autumn colours blazed around her. The scent of the maquis was bittersweet, like her memories of Taita, soothing as incense, heady as mountain wine. She took a deep breath and murmured, ‘This is Corsica. The real Corsica. Not Bastia! Never Bastia. It’s like a foreign city.’
For a moment she forgot her aching legs, the blister on her heel, her thirst, and the flies that were tormenting her. ‘Just listen to that waterfall,’ she cried out. ‘I’d forgotten how lovely it is.’
‘You should come home more often.’ The soft, girlish voice was slightly reproving.
‘We’re here, aren’t we? Well, almost.’
She lurched forward panting and pushing her shaking legs up the last steep slope. Her face was red and swollen, and sweat trickled down her clothes. ‘Oh, my, it doesn’t get any better.’
She clasped her mother-in-law tightly and then pushed her back for inspection. It was always a shock to look into Maria’s blue eyes, so vivid that you forgot the rutted skin and eroded teeth, like finding violets set into a crack of a granite mountain face.
‘My, but you’re so thin,’ said Maria. ‘Just look at you. Are you ill?’
‘No,’ Sybilia said, smiling wistfully. ‘It’s good to be home.’ She meant it, that was the strange part. She had not forgotten the vow she had made on her wedding day, and she had never returned to her parents’ house in Chiomia. Taita was her home for better or worse. During the past three years in Bastia, she had longed for the old house. It had something to do with the peaceful atmosphere, the strange twilight of mellowed stone and seasoned wood, the perpetual gurgling of the mountain stream in the garden. Or was it Maria and her kindliness? Sybilia never really knew. She had been looking forward to returning for her son’s christening. Now that they were here, she felt happier than she had for months.
‘Here’s Michel with Jules,’ Maria cried out.
‘Enjoy him, and your son. I’m going to rest.’Sybilia hugged Maria again and went to change.
Their tiny attic flat was always ready and waiting. There was a stone jug filled with wildflowers on the table, the linen was starched to crackling newness, floors and furniture gleamed from Maria’s stout efforts. A new quilted eiderdown, handmade from tiny remnant squares, lay on the bed. Even the curtains were freshly laundered. Sybilia flung down her bags and opened the shutters, then drew in deep breaths of mountain air. She rummaged in her bag for clean clothes and went down to the basement to bathe. Of course Maria had the bathwater steaming on the old copper, with the tub taken down from the wall and standing ready on the floor with soap and towel and lavender essence. If Maria was mad, then let the whole world be mad, Sybilia thought, sinking into the steaming scented water.
A little later Maria knocked on the door. ‘Can I come in?’
‘Of course you can come in. I didn’t hurry. I thought you’d want the chance to talk to Michel.’
Maria looked at Sybilia. She noticed with silent pride that her daughter-in-law’s breasts were swollen with milk and she had a slightly misshapen stomach.
To Sybilia she said, ‘Michel’s gone with Xavier to the meeting, and they’ve taken Jules with them. Xavier’s so proud. He wants to show off his grandson to the whole world. How you’ve changed him, Sybilia, and how pleased I am with both of you.’
As usual, Maria seemed freer and more talkative in Xavier’s absence. While Sybilia dressed and accompanied her to the living room, she babbled on about the cat’s new litter, the bad season for the vines, the chestnuts which were better than last year, their record tomato crop from the garden.
Then she turned a little sad as
she recalled how Carlotta had broken her hip and had to be carried down the mountain on a stretcher, groaning all the way. She would never see her home again, Maria knew that. She had seen her face in a nightmare and then she had found a dead cat in the stream, so she knew for sure that the poor woman was going to die.
‘But you told no one about your premonition. You promised me. Remember?’ Sybilia chided her.
‘Of course I remember,’ Maria said. ‘But I have told you, so when she dies you will stop thinking of me as a mad old woman.’
‘I never think that, Mama,’ Sybilia said.
As they sat talking and the shadows deepened, Sybilia noticed that crowds of people were gathering in the square. ‘Why, look! Half the village is down there,’ she said, peering through the muslin curtains. ‘What’s going on?’
‘It’s the war, but what has it to do with us?’ Maria’s voice was flat with anger. ‘The villagers are divided. Tonight, Xavier will chair the meeting, and several party men from other villages are going to speak. They’re recruiting for the Resistance, ready for the invasion.’
‘Believe me, they won’t need much persuasion,’ Sybilia said.
Maria sighed. ‘Then they’re fools. We’re cannon fodder for the French, always have been. Thirty thousand of our young men were lost in the First Great War. How many this time? Our sons Maria stopped talking abruptly. With her face so pale and eyes so bleak, she looked her age suddenly.
‘What is it, Mama? Tell me what’s upset you so.’
Maria looked away evasively. ‘War, of course. The war upsets me. If you had any sense, you’d be upset, too.'
Sybilia’s mouth hung open with astonishment. It was not like Maria to scold her.
‘Forgive me, dear Sybilia,’ Maria said, struggling to smile at her daughter-in-law. ‘I forget how young you are sometimes. For the young the unimaginable can never happen, but it happens all the same. Yes, believe me, the impossible becomes reality with such speed that it leaves you breathless.’
Her eyes wavered. Suddenly she was lost in her own world of strange omens and disconnected events as she sat hunched in the corner, wrapped in gloomy foreboding.
Sybilia made some tea and chatted about Bastia until Maria recovered her good humour. Then she said: ‘Mama, we’re going to go to the meeting. Come on! Please don’t say no. I need you for moral support. Please, Mama, come with me,’ she begged. ‘I won’t allow the men to keep this war to themselves.’
‘You go. I’ll look after Jules. You can’t leave him by himself.’
‘Oh!’ Sybilia gasped. For a moment she had forgotten Jules. What a careless woman she was. How could she forget her own baby? ‘Thank you, Mama,’ she said contritely.
Michel returned with Jules and hurried off again. The two women bathed the infant and put him to bed. He was sleeping soundly when Sybilia took a shawl and hurried into the square.
It was October. After sunset, the mountain mists had drifted down and enveloped Taita with damp cold. The villagers stamped their feet and sent the children to fetch shawls and jackets. The lanterns flared and hissed, and the air was charged with tension. Everyone was longing for something to happen. The Corsicans had been champing at the bit ever since the Vichy administration, under Marshal Pátain, had become the legal government of the island.
Only one of the Corsican-elected representatives, Xavier Rocca, had refused to vote for the transfer of full power to Pátain; for the rest — two had abstained from voting, and three had voted in favour But de Gaulle’s Free French broadcasts, his promise that victory would be theirs eventually, struck a responsive chord in Corsica, and several groups of the Resistance were beginning to get organized. The most vigorous was the National Front, led by Xavier but containing many prominent communists.
That evening Xavier was in charge of the meeting, and he was sitting at the centre of a long trestle table right under the church steps beside the fountain. Michel was there, too, Sybilia noticed, along with several men whom she had not seen before. Behind the table was a large printed poster with Xavier’s face grinning down at the crowd. ‘Follow the Wolf to Freedom,’ read the slogan.
‘All right. All right!’ Xavier bellowed, hammering on the table with a mallet. ‘We haven’t got all night. Let me introduce Pierre Landy on my right and Daniel Campinchi on my left. They’ve come from Ajaccio, where they are leading figures in the National Front. The others I think you all know. To put this matter in a nutshell, we’ve all got our own ideas on what’s best for our beloved Corsica. Am I right?’
A slow chorus of assent flickered from the crowd.
‘Landy here’s a member of the Communist Party, as some of you know. You probably know, too, that I oppose the communists, yet my own son, in his wisdom, has joined the Party.’ He turned and scowled at Michel, who remained gazing impassively into the darkness. ‘Guerrini, on the other hand, has been known to voice his heretical opinion that Corsica should be linked with Italy.’
There was a chorus of groans from the crowd, and Guerrini, red-faced and sweating at the end of the table, leaped to his feet. ‘Not any more, I assure you. I’m here to swear my wholehearted personal support. As the spokesman of the Veterans’ Association I speak for many more. Let’s not waste time with ancient feuds, Rocca. The present situation is entirely changed. There’s nothing wrong with my patriotism, friends, believe me. That’s why I’m here tonight.’
‘Exactly,’ Xavier cut in, impatiently signalling him to sit down. ‘We’re here to plan our strategy, and to sort out the men from the boys. If the Boche or the Italians — or both — are stupid enough to invade our island — well, my friends, we’ll be ready for them — with our guns, our stilettos, our pitchforks, and our fists.’ There was a bellow of approval from the crowd. When it had quietened, he added: They’ll find things a little hot for their taste.’
He wiped his forehead with a big red handkerchief and turned to smile at his supporters. ‘Well, what I was trying to say to you, when our friend Guerrini here got all hot under the collar, was that we’re still one family, and we’ve got something very important in common. We all love our island home, our beloved Corsica. When she’s threatened, we put our differences aside, as we have always done. We all know the fascist press is calling for the assimilation of Corsica into Italy. Believe me, they’ll use this war to get their way. The invasion is coming. That much I can promise you. Only I can’t tell you exactly when. So we must be ready for them. It’s up to us to show the world the stuff Corsicans are made of.
‘One thing I’ll promise you now. If we don’t show the Western world our total abhorrence to all land-grabbing powers…’ His voice was shaking with passion. ‘I say to you, if we don’t show them that we’re tough… yes, tough and nasty…’ Now he was moving toward a crescendo, and the crowd was roaring its approval. ‘If we don’t show them we’re tough and nasty and capable of fighting for what’s ours, if we don’t make a stand…’
There was a sudden pause. The crowd was hushed and expectant, hanging on every word as Xavier looked around. ‘Then… after the war… when the big powers get together… these victors… when they pat each other on the back and sit around a table handing out bits and pieces of other people’s countries, like prizes at a party, as I promise you they will, we could end up as booty, tossed like a bone to a dog. To Italy…’ he roared, ‘or America!’ letting his imagination run away with him. ‘Or the Greeks, or the Algerians. One thing’s sure, my friends. When you lie down like a door mat, people wipe their feet on you. Is that what we want?’
‘No,’ the crowd roared in approval.
‘Do we want the dirty Bosche goosestepping all over the island?’
‘No!’
‘Do we, hell! Or the Americans?’
‘No!’ The roar was louder now.
‘Corsica for Corsicans! Corsica for Corsicans,’ the crowd chanted, and Sybilia, who was caught up in the heady feeling of mass elation, sang with them.
There was a great deal more rhetori
c, oaths were sworn and resworn, strategy was mapped out. All the able-bodied men of the village were to take to the maquis, Corsicans’ traditional strategy, and from there they would work in isolated guerrilla bands from a central control near Bastia. Fishermen would smuggle in arms and ammunition and maintain clandestine radio contact with Free French authorities. The villagers, who to a man preferred fighting to herding sheep, were clamouring to join the Resistance. Young and old, fit and infirm, lined up to sign their names and swear the oath: ‘Victory or death.’
Xavier caught sight of Father Andrews and called out tauntingly: ‘Who’s side are you on, Father Andrews?’
‘On God’s side,’ he answered glibly, neatly sidestepping the question.
‘And I’m wondering which side God might seem to be on, in the eyes of an Irish priest, nursed on anti-British sentiments and schooled in Rome? Could we have your holy opinion as to the merits of the fascists? Just so that we know who we’re dealing with.’
He grinned wolfishly and once again Sybilia noticed the uncanny resemblance and smiled inwardly at his nickname.
‘When I go hunting I like to know the type of man I have behind my back,’ Xavier went on. ‘That way I know I’m safe. So let’s hear you speak, priest. Which side are you on?"I am a representative of the Catholic church, which is above petty politics and uniquely concerned with the spiritual well-being of each individual.’
‘Petty politics is it? Well, I’ll tell you this to your face. Climb off the fence to one side or the other, Father Andrews, or you’ll find yourself impaled upon it with a stake up your arse.’
The crowd was becoming angrier. Father Andrews watched them with misgiving as they yapped and bayed as one. Like Xavier’s dog, he noted, and as cunning and obedient to his will.
‘I’ll not be threatened by you, Xavier Rocca,’ he roared. ‘You can come to church on Sunday and listen to my sermon, if you're so interested. I aim to define the Catholic duty in the event of an invasion, for the benefit of my congregation. You are a member, are you not, my son?’
The Corsican Woman Page 14