‘Your sister lives here,’ Xas said, ‘and her husband the stonemason.’
‘Antoine helps at harvest, and the remainder of the year runs his business. I meant Léon to have this house.’ Sobran shrugged. ‘There are a few fearful souls who won’t buy Jodeau-Kalmann because of Antoine’s workshop – but some more whimsical who favour Antoine’s headstones because of my wine.’ Sobran stroked the cool dusty face of a fresh stone. ‘It’s good to have them close – Sophie is hardier than Céleste, and a great help to us.’
‘They keep no dogs,’ Xas said, looking at the dog, who paused to hear herself referred to, her back foot at her ear. She got up, shook herself and urinated against a tombstone.
‘Antoine dislikes them. And I think it might be bad for business.’ Sobran scowled at his dog.
A light came behind the shutters of the second storey. Xas jumped against the wall, between the stones, and stood very still. The shutters opened and a head poked out, asked who was there.
‘It’s Sobran.’
‘Jodeau, it’s a wonder you can do a day’s work, walking about half the night.’
Another head appeared, a long dark plait hanging against the sill. ‘Poor Céleste, heaven help her,’ Sobran’s sister scolded. ‘No wonder she frets – you’re always abroad.’
‘Mama!’ a child called out. Sophie cursed and disappeared from the window.
‘Go home!’ Antoine said, then kinder, ‘My friend – I know you don’t come here to speak to either me or Sophie. But Baptiste Kalmann is dead.’
‘Goodnight, Antoine.’
The shutter was pulled to. They waited a moment. The dog yawned and began to scratch again. Sobran took her by an ear and walked back into the vineyard. He heard the sound of wings, felt the shadow cross him and watched Xas fly to the crest of the hill, land, and wait for him. Sobran went reluctantly, knowing what Xas would ask him, but not anticipating with what eagerness.
‘Is it Baptiste you miss – still?’
‘I miss him.’
‘He was your lover.’
Sobran glared. ‘Baptiste was my elder by three years. He taught me – uses of my body. Boys do that, despite what the Church teaches. He also shared his whores with me, when I was young, before I met Céleste. And we often shared when we were campaigning. I’m ashamed of it.’
‘I thought you were so troubled by Céleste because you were ambushed by desire, and didn’t know how it felt when it came on.’
‘It was the love that was new to me. I didn’t love Baptiste in that way. What were you to know – how could I share my impure knowledge with a pure angel? I hoped to have time to atone for – my carnal youth.’
‘And two years after you wed you followed Baptiste into the army.’
‘There were things I didn’t tell you – that’s all. I never pretended to be better than I was. I used to believe you could see into my heart – so why bother to tell you?’
‘I see,’ Xas said, reasonable, and as if he thought Sobran’s explanation reasonable. The angel let go of despair like a breath, was as resilient as one of those striped mountain flies which are impossible to crush. He said, ‘I’ll walk you back to Baptiste’s headstone.’
‘Fly me, angel, before I’m too fat and middle-aged for you to carry.’
‘I’ll fly you when you’re old and your bones have shrunk.’
‘And I can’t hold my water, and am afraid for my life.’
‘Come the day,’ Xas said.
1824 Vin tranquille (still wine)
Sobran waited, hat in hand, behind a butler at the door of one of the château’s long dark parlours. The Comte had asked him to come at his own convenience, when the day’s work was done – but meant at six, Sobran’s dinner hour, yet before the château’s family dined.
The butler opened the door and Sobran saw the Comte and three women – the Comte’s niece, her maid, and a nurse. All four adults stood, heads bent, around a dark-haired boy in a white velvet suit, listening and smiling. Then the nurse took the child’s hand and the boy offered his cheek to the Comte, to his mother and, to everyone’s amusement, to the maid, who kissed him and curtsied. The butler opened both doors and the women and child walked out past Sobran, who kept his eyes down.
The Comte called Sobran in, asked him to take a seat by the fire, and poured him a glass of wine. It was very good wine and Sobran hoped he wouldn’t be asked to offer his opinion on it – which would involve a description. He waited to hear the old man say, ‘What do you taste?’ It had been a game the Comte played with Sobran’s father, and with Sobran when Sobran began to go with his father whenever Jodeau Senior had business at the château. It was a game Sobran had been led to believe he was very good at. The Comte seemed to appreciate his fanciful descriptions. Then one day, on the way home after one such session, Jodeau Senior told his son to ‘stop playing the ninny’ – couldn’t he see that the Comte was making sport of his ignorance?
But the Comte didn’t ask, instead he said, ‘Five years ago you’d have turned up unwashed, to show how hard at work you had been.’
‘I hope not,’ Sobran said.
‘Yes, you would have.’ The Comte went on, ‘I’ve lived much longer than I anticipated. Every night I climb into bed thinking I’ve got away with another day. God has overlooked me. But in the winter he’ll be back with his beaters and will get me in the first sweep. I am seventy-seven years of age. Do you know that I was a friend of Lazare Carnot? We shared a confessor, Father Lesy. That was after Carnot voted for the death of the King. Carnot didn’t like politics, he liked family life. I helped his family join him after the restoration for, you see, he liked to think he’d been some help to me in the days of the republic.’ The Comte sighed. ‘And I knew André Chénier. If you know who he was.’
‘A poet.’
‘Father Lesy said to me ten years ago that your brother Léon was the scholar but you are the reader.’
Sobran laughed. ‘Poor Léon.’
‘Ah yes, poor boy, never loved for his excellence. How is he?’
‘Working very hard in St Lawrence, clearing land, keeping cattle. Or trying to – half the settlers live by hunting and trapping, not husbandry.’
‘And your cellar is finished, I hear.’
‘For now.’
‘Ho!’ The Comte enjoyed Sobran’s answer so much he was compelled to lean forward, take up the poker and prod at the fire.
The Comte’s niece came quietly back into the room, lit another branch of candles and carried them to the table by her half-finished firescreen, which stood directly behind the Comte’s chair. She set a basket on her knees and began to sort thread, match it to the many greens for her hunting scene.
‘Have you got Kalman’s vines back in order?’
‘We had three seasons of sleep in the grape, sir. And now four seasons clear. There was a recipe, a solution. We washed them as they began to fruit – changing the rags all the time. My daughters went without petticoats all summer. And we’ve been grafting to the three rows of gamay vines in Kalmann. I can’t afford to take them up, but would prefer not to make blended wines.’
‘You should press that south slope of yours separately.’
‘I can’t afford to, sir.’
‘Very well, but don’t forget.’
‘I have twenty bottles of the 1806 to refresh my memory.’
‘Do you want me to make an offer? Is that what you expect?’
Sobran shrugged. He saw the Comte’s niece was watching him, her gaze quiet without being placid. He looked back at the Comte, who was smiling at him, because his attention had wandered, and because of where it had wandered. ‘There was a matter in my mind,’ the Comte said, ‘I wanted to speak to you about. Something I’d like you to remember, and to assert yourself about, if and when the time comes. My niece has all the documents concerning the death of those poor girls – Geneviève Lizet and Marie Pelet – copies of everything, statements, the doctors’ and magistrates’ notes. If there is ever another
murder, I’d like you to go over it all.’
‘Yes, sir, I will.’
‘Unless of course Aurora remarries and then I suppose all that will fall to her husband – or to Paul when he’s sufficiently mature.’
Paul was the boy in white velvet. Sobran said, ‘You are imagining quite a long career for this killer.’
‘No. But I’m imagining that one day someone other than a priest will hear his confession, either as a confession, or as a boast. I imagine he’ll kill again because I know he’ll outlive me. It’s my gloomy conviction. None of us knows who he is – but I will never know. If I think you will take an interest then I can have some hope justice will be done.’
‘You are overestimating my wit, sir.’
‘You should thank me for my confidence in you – churlish youngster. And it isn’t your wit I want to employ, but your character. Aurora has enough wit for the whole province.’ The Comte turned his head as far as his stiffened neck would allow, to order his niece: ‘Leave off that fiddly nonsense and come closer.’
She brushed the skeins into the basket and put it down, got up and moved the little table that stood between the men. Sobran stood to fetch a chair closer to the fire for her and they did an irritable little dance around each other.
‘Uncle, you shouldn’t let Paul carry this table near the flames,’ Aurora said. She sat down, nodded thanks to Sobran then said to him, ‘The table has a wax top.’ She pointed. ‘Beeswax, with ferns and flowers and bees and butterflies set in it, like fruit in a cold collation. Uncle hates it – memento mori made to look like midsummer, he says. The beeswax is very old and hard now, but Paul carries it near the fire hoping it will melt and all the insects will be resurrected. He’s persistently hopeful about that kind of thing. When we visit his father’s grave he doesn’t reflect dutifully – he commands, “Get up, Father! I’d like to meet you!”’
Sobran smiled. ‘My second son, Martin, is like that. Imperious. And Sabine was a tyrant to her grandfather, which he enjoyed. Now she’s quite a lady – for which my wife and I thank you.’
‘It was Father Lesy’s idea. Your daughter has written to me and says she enjoys the convent – which I find difficult to imagine.’
‘And you sponsored Aline Lizet also. She and Sabine are good friends, and keep each other company. Autun does seem very far from home for such young country girls.’
‘I’m sure, being a Jodeau, Sabine is quite capable of saying if she isn’t content,’ the Comte said, putting a stop to their conversation. He seemed amused and annoyed that they were talking over the top of him.
Sobran asked, ‘Is there anything else I can do for you, sir? Or rather promise to do.’
‘No. That will be all.’
Sobran got up. Aurora stood too and took his glass, setting it on the wax-topped table. Then she stooped to retrieve his hat, which he’d put down by his chair. She gave it to him. Sobran bowed to the Comte and his niece and took himself out the door.
‘So, Uncle,’ Aurora said, ‘why didn’t you air your theory about the mad Jules Lizet?’
‘Because it isn’t a theory, it’s a pet suspicion.’
‘You’ve never suspected Jodeau?’
‘Do you?’
‘He’s secretive.’
‘I thought he talked very freely to you. He’s a man with easy manners. His wife has become a little mad. That’s his secret. Or rather it’s the commonly held knowledge that no one in the province may mention to him or any member of his family.’
‘Because she’s a beauty?’
‘That is a remarkably murky thought, Aurora. Beauty hasn’t much currency among old neighbours.’
‘I suppose Monsieur Jodeau’s neighbours don’t defame his wife because they value his good opinion. Which is more or less the way you have been treated all your life in your own circle, Uncle. People are very respectful of your feelings.’
‘Hmm. The respect was never consistent enough for my liking.’
Aurora laughed.
‘Tell me, niece, do you still dislike Jodeau?’
‘I remember that he is on your list of those I can trust.’
‘Did I say that? Trust? No, dear, employ him. Link your fortunes. He’s a very able man – and lucky. I remember I had to remind you who he was – the tall bearded one in clogs.’
‘Men your age shouldn’t snigger. I may have said, “Remind me”, but – yes – I did know who you meant. Paul’s nurse had pointed him out to me as a poor example of a mourner; she frowned on his ostentation. I watched him. I saw that in his manner of mourning Jodeau seemed to say: “Be careful, let no one forget I’m a wounded man.” For the same reason his neighbours are afraid of his poor opinion. He has a manner that implies he has depths, and a temper, and untapped resources of temperament. That is why you like him, never mind his ability or his “luck”. When I was a girl, Uncle, there’d be seasons we visited when everything pleased you, and others when you were disappointed with everything. Mama would read out your letters to Papa. I remember one autumn before the hunting season Papa saying, “Oh no, not another overcast visit. I can’t take this.” That was the year we arrived with the two barrels of gunpowder and you and Papa spent three weeks blowing things up, and the magistrate sent a letter to the Emperor filled with silly speculations about Vully’s conspiracies to revolt.’
‘They were marvellous people, your mother and father.’
‘Yes, I remember.’
They sat in silence for a few minutes, thinking about the typhoid in Venice. Then the Comte sighed. ‘Perhaps I should employ Jodeau now – before I die. Wish him on you.’
‘No, let me deal with him when you’ve gone, Uncle. I’d prefer him to owe me a debt of gratitude.’
‘Ah yes. Offer him the bit with a handful of sugar. Very good, Aurora.’
1825 Vin sec (dry wine)
Xas gave Sobran seeds. ‘Quinoa, it grows in the Andes in Spanish America. It’s very tough, like heather, but in the colours of an autumn wood. Odd. Céleste will puzzle about it when it comes up.’
1826 Vin viné (fortified wine)
Sobran told Xas that Léon’s letters took eight months to reach him. ‘I try to have one for every ship, to time our visits to Sabine in her school to coincide with the mail from Nantes. There’s a broadsheet up outside the house of the magistrate in Autun, about passages to Canada. I carry letters for two of my neighbours, write them also. It’s like writing into mystery – I could be chattering on after Léon is dead of a fever, or wolves, or Indians. He’s keenly aware of the difficulty – take the tone in which he asks about the children. He’s thinking of Nicolette. I look at your flowers from the Andes, Xas, and I’m tormented by temptation, to ask you just to look in at him, to make a hole in his tar-paper window one night and look in. I even dreamed you were standing in the snow, and there was steam rising from your wings, and you were doing just that, pushing your finger through the paper on the window of Léon’s house to make a peephole.’
Xas listened.
‘I didn’t forgive him graciously. I was always pompous – acted very big and generous. But really he took nothing from me – he lost his own portion of father’s estate and we had to cover his debts so as not to sell. But, in effect, we bought Jodeau from Léon. Now he struggles in the Protectorate while I’m becoming a wealthy man.’
‘I’ll go and see how Léon is, Sobran. It isn’t as if you’re asking me to take another message to Heaven.’
‘Bless you, Xas, you’re a kind friend.’
‘Oh – a demotion.’
‘Pardon?’
‘Never mind.’
1827 Mut (balanced)
‘My dear friend,’ the letter read, ‘I am aware of the risk I take placing this letter here’ (under a rock on the boundary stone). ‘I am worried that it will rain, though it seldom does at midsummer. Or that someone will find it, remove it, or that it will have slipped its stone and blown away. Don’t go down to the house – I’m not there, though Sophie and the you
nger children, hers and ours, are. I’ve had to go to Nantes to meet Léon’s ship. Céleste and Sabine are with me. Léon has been ill and decided to return to France. He wrote that, having survived his fever, one night he saw an angel. The angel came into his room while he was reading and assured him it wasn’t yet his time but that he should take himself back to his family. “This land is too strong for you,” the angel said. Léon wrote that it was then midwinter, with snow piled up against the door and that, in the morning, Léon saw that the angel had, like a wolf, dug the snow out to enter, not simply walked through the wall.
‘I thank you again. We must be waiting when he sets foot on shore. You have sent him so far back to us we must take very good care of him. I don’t know if you will consent to vary our agreement, but I hope to be back within six weeks, so please come again, my dear friend.
‘I am in your debt.’
The house was a hot black cave – and full of aspiration, seven breathing bodies. The weather was overdue to break, the sky covered in melting, indistinct grey cloud. All the shutters were open. Sobran lay on his back, a sheet between his legs and sweat crawling like flies through the forest of hair in the valley of his sternum. He was asleep – or so he thought – then irritably awake. A hand touched his face. Two fingers pressed his lips and another hand clasped his shoulder. The hands were cool. Sobran opened his eyes.
Again he saw Xas, his hair stiff with frost and an accretion of pulpy ice sliding from his wings. Sobran stirred, carefully disentangled himself from the sheet. Xas backed through the door.
‘Mmmm?’ Céleste said.
‘Shhh, go back to sleep.’ Sobran picked up his nightshirt from the floor and followed Xas down the stairs, outdoors, up the slope between the vines.
Xas leaned against the shade tree, his head in the space between its first fork. He had intended only to spy, not interfere with Léon, he explained, but the winter was stored death – as he saw it – a pressing backlog of bad luck. Léon looked thin and yellow. How could he survive much more of that?
The Vintners Luck Page 8