‘I can’t make champagne this year.’
Charlie stepped back further with a look of puzzlement as he regarded her. ‘Why ever not?’
She gave a small shrug of hopelessness. ‘We have no sugar left. We’ve used the last of it for the first fermentation of this year’s crush. We have nothing for the disgorgement, topping up, balancing to make this year’s champagne.’
‘But you don’t add more sugar, do you?’
‘I add as little as possible, it’s true. So little sometimes as to be negligent, but I must have it available to balance the liquor if I need to. Going ahead knowing I have none really would be wasteful and unforgivable.’
He let out a disappointed sigh. ‘Can you buy from others?’
She walked away. ‘No one has any. I had the most plentiful stocks at the start of the war because I do use less than most; I prefer cane and pay the much higher price for it. But we cannot get any more at present – not from Africa or the Caribbean. Beet is local, but . . .’ She sighed, looking dejected.
‘Where does the sugar beet grow?’ he pressed, determined there had to be something they could do.
‘In places that are now nothing but battlefields . . . besides, there is none to be had for none has been planted, and what is left is being used to feed people, livestock. We have to wait until the land can recover and the crops can be replanted.’
There was more, he could tell. ‘Or there is Louis.’
‘He has access to sugar somewhere. He either knows where to get it, or he has actually accumulated sugar, knowing it would likely become a desirable commodity as war pressed on.’
‘No, Sophie, no!’
‘You know it’s a choice I have to make.’
‘Then wait!’
‘For what? Years for sugar beet to grow successfully again? Or for commerce to recover and ships to get through with cane from overseas? Years in which my vineyards will grow, their fruit left to wither?’
‘So be it.’
She blinked at him with annoyance ‘You have no idea what you’re asking.’
‘I’m asking you to be wise. To be good to yourself. Forget me in all of this! But Louis? He will destroy you.’
‘He will leave me alone. We could live separate lives, as he suggests.’
‘Sophie, you are not thinking clearly. You’re being emotional. Do you really think this is what Jerome would want?’
She couldn’t answer him, or chose not to.
‘I am going to think on this.’ He didn’t mean to make it sound like a threat. ‘And I am going to find a solution that does not involve marrying your brother-in-law for sugar, or for security, or for the sake of your dead husband’s vines.’
He sounded angry and just a little disgusted. He couldn’t blame her for the edged comment that followed.
‘So, you are going to magic up sugar for me, are you, Charlie? Perhaps you can magic up my dead husband as well! This is the only way I’m going to be able to make the wine in honour of Jerome, or be able to use the juice from the first-ever grapes to flourish from that vineyard. Sentimentally, emotionally and professionally, being able to make champagne from those grapes this year means everything to me. You make it sound like I want to have Louis at my side.’
‘And you make it sound like you’ve discovered the easy solution.’
She slapped him. Hard. Strength gained from years in the vineyard powered it. His head whipped to the side and Charlie lost his balance but regained it fast. He knew that if he looked in a mirror right now he would be able to see the print of a woman’s hand on his face. It wouldn’t be the first time – or perhaps the last, because he had a way of infuriating women – but he doubted a similar mark would ever be left again by someone he loved as much as Sophie. And he hated that she was squandering herself for a ghost. He looked back at her, wounded, sad and angry.
‘Oh, Charlie . . . I . . .’ She put her fighting hands to her mouth and her eyes filled with tears.
‘Don’t apologise. I deserved that. But you don’t deserve Louis. So before I leave, Sophie – and I am leaving you,’ he said, a flinty edge to his voice, ‘I’m going to put my chemist’s brain to work for you. If this is the champagne that heralds the end of the war and means more to you than the rest of your life, then it must be made. But you certainly do not need Louis’s ring on your finger to make that happen.’
‘Then work some magic for me before you leave, Charlie,’ she said, her voice small, apologetic even, but also accusatory. He’d hurt her with his words as much as she’d hurt him with the blow.
Charlie left her standing in the vineyard of the chardonnay she loved so much, and as he turned his back on her, he already believed he knew the solution – but he had to act before Louis could load any more pressure onto those narrow shoulders.
24
LAUSANNE
August 1918
It had been weeks of regular visits from the doctor, long walks around the lake and a summer to be remembered as much for its warmth and clear skies as for its sense of freedom. Internees were encouraged to join in sport as best they could and Jerome, in spite of his damaged leg and no use of one eye, was not backward in participating in everything from easy hikes to canoeing. His lungs felt to be improving, which was a surprise, and he put it down to having a nourishing diet again.
He had admitted to his doctor that he was looking forward to trying tobogganing, which the Swiss clinical team felt was fine for the soldiers who had suffered from poison gas but not necessarily those who had lost limbs. He could read that last bit in their troubled gazes.
‘Let’s hope you don’t have to do a winter in Switzerland, Lieutenant,’ his nurse said as she was changing the dressing on his eye. ‘You’ve got the doctors worried that you’ll take up an inappropriate sport.’ They shared a conspiratorial smile. ‘I must find you a more elegant eye patch.’
‘Why?’
‘So you can attend the events and look very handsome.’ There was a flirtatious note in her tone that unnerved him.
He gave a soft snort. ‘There’s a dinner and a concert tonight, isn’t there?’ he said, to distract her and move into safer conversation.
‘Will you be going, Lieutenant?’ She grinned. She was a pretty little creature, ten years his junior and new on the team that looked after him. It wasn’t hard to understand that she’d taken a shine to him . . . and he was careful not to encourage her. He wanted to counsel her some time when it was appropriate that she needed to be careful around the younger soldiers – especially any French ones – with her open and friendly countenance. Most hadn’t been touched by a woman or even seen one in an age. And here, where they enjoyed relative freedom, lots of spare time and access to liquor, it made for a daring mix for men who had been starved of female company for years.
He thought better of the counselling now; it may be patronising if she didn’t see his advice as big brotherly. As it was, the nurse seemed confident and smart; he was sure the matrons had made all their charges aware of the complexities of the role they performed. ‘Yes, of course,’ he answered.
‘It’s a pity you’re not singing tonight. I did check the program.’ Jerome gave her a shrug. ‘But I gather there’s a special treat on tonight of raclette. Do you know this in France?’
‘The cheese?’ He frowned. ‘I thought Switzerland was on rations? Two and a half thousand calories per internee, I am assured,’ he said in a lighthearted tone to show how grateful he was for every one of them.
‘Not when it comes to our favourite cheese, it seems.’ She winked.
‘I might have tasted it in my childhood when we visited.’
She smiled, impressed. ‘Have you tasted it served properly though . . . the Swiss way?’
He shook his head. ‘I can’t recall.’
‘You wouldn’t forget. It’s not made for eating raw. The wheel of cheese is heated, and as it melts it is scraped off onto plates and we enjoy it with some vegetables. I can remember my grandmother serving it
with cherry brandy on special occasions,’ she said, eyes widening with pleasure at the memory. ‘Either way, you are in for a treat, Lieutenant.’ She smiled and sighed slightly as she continued with her ministrations. ‘So, what is special to your part of France?’
He knew she was keeping him talking because the liquid medicine she was about to drop in his eye was going to sting roundly. He obliged; after all of the pain of his war, the eye drops were a mercy.
He couldn’t help but enjoy the feel of her soft hands as they touched his face, gently tipping his head back.
‘Well, now,’ he began, trying to ignore the hint of perfume he could sense rising above the general smell of antiseptic as she hovered above him. ‘We have our own special cheese in the Marne region. It’s soft with a bright white rind and, like yours, made from cow’s milk.’ The first drop went in and hurt like merry hell and although he winced he kept talking. ‘It’s creamy and crumbly and it has a mushroomy smell. It can be dated back to medieval times when the monks of the Champagne region used to make it.’
‘One more,’ she warned. ‘Go on, what else is special in that region?’
He grinned. ‘Well, apart from the champagne, there are truffles.’
‘Ooh,’ she cooed. ‘I have only tasted these once. Aren’t they supposed to be an aphrodisiac? Little sting,’ she cautioned.
The cold liquid pain arrived once again to make him blink and close his eyes. He chose to ignore her query and changed topics again.
‘If it’s dead, why are we doing this?’
‘I am assured it will retain the eye. You don’t want it removed, surely?’
He shrugged. ‘It’s ugly.’
‘Yes, but you are not . . . not by a long way,’ she admitted. He could hear her romantic youth in the remark and deliberately dropped his chin out of her grip, not so fast that she might be offended but firmly enough that she might believe he wasn’t registering her soft tone and intent. ‘It will change your face to have your eyelids stitched closed and flat. We don’t want that. Besides, when you wear a well-fitted patch, you’re going to look even more dashing, Lieutenant.’
‘And then there are the pink biscuits,’ he finished, determined to stop her flirting, if she was.
She frowned as she put the stopper back in the bottle.
‘Roses de Reims, they’re called. Crunchy, flavoured with vanilla and very light in texture – they are a very old tradition.’ A thought struck. ‘My wife makes them.’
She looked surprised. ‘I was told you had no family.’ He could hear her disappointment.
‘The notes will say so because a mistake was made with me years ago,’ Jerome explained quickly. ‘Will you help me, Agatha?’
‘In what way are you asking?’ She sounded instantly suspicious, and that reminded him he was a prisoner and she unhappily one of his keepers.
He smiled. ‘I’m not trying to escape. I need to reach my family.’
Relief relaxed her features. ‘Oh,’ she said, smiling. ‘Well, there’s a whole team of —’
‘No, I don’t wish to go via that team.’
Those smiling features, fresh and not wearied by war, tightened into a frown again. Grey-blue eyes narrowed. ‘I don’t understand, Lieutenant. They can make contact faster than —’
‘I know this,’ he interrupted, smiling his apology for doing so again. ‘Their hands are tied.’ He gave a gesture to reinforce this as she looked at him, perplexed. ‘You see, I’m not Jacques Bouchon – I never was.’
‘I am lost, Lieutenant,’ she admitted, pushing back a stray curl of blonde hair.
‘I understand, but you see I didn’t know who I was when I was imprisoned, because I had lost my memory.’
It was dawning on her now, lightening her expression, but she was also backing away, just a single step. It was obvious she knew what he wanted from her. ‘No, Lieutenant, I can’t help you.’
‘Agatha, I’m pleading with you – a letter, that’s all,’ he begged. ‘How can that hurt?’
Agatha shook her head, all flirtatiousness having seeped away. Her pretty doll’s face looked deeply hesitant. ‘There are rules. They are very strict.’
All he could do now was appeal to Agatha’s romantic heart. ‘I know you like me, Agatha, and I feel blessed to have you take care of me. If only all the soldiers had you to look forward to when they have to have painful drops put in their eyes.’ He bent to catch her downward gaze and won the twitch of a smile he needed. ‘I am very, very grateful to be here – and grateful to you for being so kind to me.’
Now she looked coy. ‘That’s my job, Lieutenant.’
‘Which I’m guessing you do better than most because you’re so cheerful and, if you don’t mind me saying so, heartbreakingly pretty.’ Agatha trembled slightly at his compliment.
‘I don’t mind.’ She shrugged, her voice breathy.
‘My wife is beautiful like you. The day we married we learned about the war and I joined up the same day.’ He watched her mouth open in silent shock as she absorbed this. ‘She wanted a baby so much but we didn’t have time . . . we only had twenty-seven days together before I marched away in uniform, making her promises that I would be back by Christmas. Three Christmas days have come and gone since then, and although Sophie is my everything, I’d forgotten who I was for most of the war and she will have been told I’m dead. Can you imagine what that has done to her?’ Jerome stepped forward to fill the space between them. ‘I’d like to hear from my wife, just one more time, before I die.’
‘Die?’
‘Did you know I was gassed? My lungs catch fire sometimes. I fret I will die before she learns I have been trying to get back to her for more than three years.’
‘Oh, Lieutenant, no, don’t say that.’
‘The thing is, Agatha,’ he said with a soft smile, ‘if to die soon is my fate, I will accept it calmly if I could just reach her and let her know one more time how much I love her, how her very existence made mine ten times brighter than before I met her.’ He heard Agatha sigh gently. ‘I want her to know I remembered her, us, our love, before I leave her for the final time.’
Agatha’s eyes were moist, touched by his romantic words. ‘You must not speak like this, Lieutenant. Let me ask the family unit as a matter of urgency.’
‘I am assured that the team is looking into this matter,’ he said, trying not to sound frustrated. ‘But I might be dead before all the protocols that need to be followed have been adhered to.’
She nodded. ‘Everything does seem to take a very long time.’
He brightened, an idea striking him. ‘Agatha, I’ll tell you what. I have a brother in Paris. If you could make a telephone call for me, that’s all it would take.’
‘I’m not sure I —’
‘Just a quick call,’ he pressed, not allowing her to resist. ‘You can remain anonymous. All I need is for you to tell him Jerome is alive and where I am. He will do the rest. You can forget I ever asked this favour after that simple two-minute call.’
‘And then what?’ She frowned.
‘Louis will be like a cat after a mouse. He will not rest. And his senior connections mean that he might be able to speed up procedures so I can be put in touch with Sophie before . . . well, before it’s too late.’ He took Agatha’s hand and kissed the pale skin. It was intimate and even wicked but he kept it brisk so it couldn’t be considered amorous; his only intention was gratitude and pushing her to action. ‘Will you do this for me? A phone call? I will repay whatever is required.’ He raised his gaze to her and hoped she really did find him handsome and dashing because he was relying on his charm alone now. ‘And then we can go dancing and celebrate.’
‘Dancing?’
‘Yes! Ignore my limp and I shall take pleasure in twirling you around the dance hall at the next opportunity. My happiness will have no bounds when I know I may see or even just speak to my wife one more time. I shall dance until you’re exhausted.’
She giggled as he reached around he
r waist and whirled her in a full revolution, careful to let go immediately so no impropriety could be read into the action.
Agatha gave a sigh of resignation. ‘I can try, Lieutenant, but I must not contravene the rules for prisoners.’
His heart felt like it was leaping around in his chest with excitement but he had to convey calm. ‘Try is all I ask. Here is his number – see, I can even remember all of this now. It’s incredible.’ He needed to keep her talking so he didn’t spook her, as he quickly scribbled the address of Louis’s apartment and his telephone number on a piece of paper. ‘This is my brother, Louis Méa.’
Her features became serious. ‘All I am prepared to say is that Lieutenant Jerome Méa is in the care of this hospital in Lausanne and is a patient under the name of Jacques Bouchon. I will not give my name.’
‘That’s it!’ he urged her, thrilled. ‘Thank you, Agatha.’ He took a risk and quickly kissed both of her rosy cheeks. ‘I hope to see you at the concert tonight.’
Now her entire face flushed pink. ‘I do too. Don’t touch your eye – let the medicine work, no matter how it itches.’
He grinned, blew her a kiss as she departed and sighed his intense relief, feeling exhausted from the tension. Maybe, just maybe, his darling Sophie was a step closer to being in his arms again.
Jerome moved to the small window of his attic room, his eye still stinging from the treatment but now covered with a bandage. He cast his gaze down to the shoreline of Lake Geneva. It was a picture of pleasure with no indication that a massive, destructive, traumatic war continued to unfold across its border. The summer sun encouraged plenty of people to play on the small sandy beach, and the waters twinkled an inviting sapphire as bathers enjoyed the warmth. Many of them would be internees, he suspected. Perhaps he should take a swim, no longer be self-conscious of his hollow frame – such a far cry from the strapping man he’d been when he asked Sophie to marry him. He imagined she would be past the shock of grief, living now with the knowledge that he was gone and she must make her own future. She would. Sophie was the most independent woman he’d ever met. She was strong of will. She would meet someone else; she was young enough to start again, start a family too . . . and if he could just speak with her one more time, he would tell her all of this. He would make sure she understood that he wanted her to have a good life, a happy one that searched for joy through a new marriage and family with his blessing. But he also wanted her to know how everything in his heart right now during his incarceration was selfishly only about them and how much he regretted leaving her – and especially that she’d been forced to live with no letters from him. It would be a shock for her to know he was a prisoner. His mind was racing to consider all the possible angles from which the news that he was alive could be viewed. He calmed himself and made a promise to be patient now and hope that Agatha could get through to Louis and that his brother would make all the pieces fall into place.
The Champagne War Page 29