In the Moon

by Alan Holmes

  In the autumn of 1937, I returned to the Dennis School and started what would be an exceptionally good school year for me. My relationship with fellow students and masters was on an even keel for the first time in my scholastic life, and I liked every aspect of the daily school routine, even when things went a little haywire.

  That winter, it was bitterly cold for ten days. The old mansion that served as our school building had no heating, and the so-called classrooms were so cold that a glass of drinking water left there overnight froze solid. Sitting all day in those glacial classrooms without any kind of heating was out of the question. Mr. Dennis called a school meeting in the palatial drawing room that, in spite of a fire blazing in its huge fireplace, was barely warmer than the classrooms. He announced to the assembled school, “We could send you all home, but that would be highly inconvenient for your parents, who are expecting us to keep you productively engaged throughout the day. My plan is to move tables and chairs from the classrooms into this drawing room.”

  Bundled up in overcoats and mufflers and wearing our wool bérets inelegantly pulled down over our ears, the eighty of us spent the first hour of that school day hauling chairs and tables from the classrooms to the drawing room. Then we scrambled amicably to find places as close as possible to the hearth, where a hearty fire was kept ablaze all day. By late afternoon, the room, warmed by eighty boys and seven masters, managed to acquire what the British students among us called “a jolly good fug.”

  Mr. Dennis’ scheme had created a one-room schoolhouse with eighty students. At first, the masters tried teaching us in the usual group fashion, but the arrangement was too noisy and it wasn’t working well. So he switched us to the “rainy-afternoon-mode,” where all seventy-nine of us listened to one of the older boys reading aloud from Dickens’s Great Expectations.

  Each day, we sat there bundled up, listening to the story, watching the steam from our breaths, and staring at our blue knees protruding from our overcoats. I don’t think any of the boys owned a pair of long trousers—boys that age never wore such garments in France.

  After a week, the cold eased up, and we went back to using individual rooms for each class, but it was still cold, and we continued to wear our overcoats all day long and our bérets over our ears for two more weeks.

  In the middle of that school year, Mother decided that I should take something she called le solfège. Twice a week, I attended une école de solfège (a music school) in the neighboring town of Saint Cloud. Dictionaries (both French and English) describe solfège as the act of going up and down the musical scale (vocally). The school in question did indeed have us sing do, ré, mi and so on, backwards and forwards, and play the scales—endlessly and monotonously on the piano. We also did other musical exercises which interested me more.

  One of these involved something that looked suspiciously like fractions, a part of arithmetic that I hadn’t yet covered in school. In a state of extreme boredom, I found that playing with these quasi-fractions (on paper) was quite amusing. The class was told that a little black golf club with one flag dangling from the top of it represented an eighth note. If it had two flags at the top of it, a sixteenth note, or half the value, in time, of the eighth note. It took two such sixteenth notes to equal the time duration of an eighth note. Each time a flag was added to the little golf club, it cut the note in half once more, so a little club with four flags was a sixty-fourths note.

  I was catching on to fractions fast and started using notes with numerous little flags—sometimes as many as seven flags, which was a five-hundred-and-twelfths note. I found it fun to add all these tiny fractions within a measure, and having to adjust their various sizes and number so that their arithmetic total came to the value of the larger fraction found at the start of the musical line. This was exactly what we were supposed to do, but we were expected to use fewer and larger fractions, which the teacher could verify without doing a lot of extra arithmetic with pencil and paper.

  The music teacher thought I was deliberately trying to annoy her, which really wasn’t the case. I defended my calculations as correct and challenged her to persevere in her verification of my work. After the second lesson involving such exercises, during which I grew even more proficient and adventurous with my fractions, the teacher must have reached her limit. When Mother came to fetch me, the teacher announced, “Je ne peux plus supporter cet enfant et je vous en prie de ne pas le ramener á mon école.” (“I can no longer stand this child and I beg you not to bring him back to my school.”)

  Attending this music course had required that I miss two afternoons a week at the Dennis School, which I much preferred over the music school, so I was secretly jubilant over what I had unintentionally achieved. Nevertheless, this was my third expulsion from school. Mother, who was neither amused nor sympathetic, asked me crossly, “Alain, are you planning to spend your life being expelled from schools?”

  Back at the Dennis School, we sometimes had Boy Scout outings instead of sports or games. On these occasions, which began after the first period in the morning, after the petits pains recess, we would ride a bus to some bucolic setting in la banlieue de Paris (the countryside around Paris). There, we prepared an elaborate meal out “in the field” (actually, out in the woods).

  The Scout Master prided himself on being a great chef. He was French and not part of the regular staff at the Dennis School. On each of these expeditions, he brought along three small cast-iron cooking stoves and several sacks of soft coal, all of which he tied onto the rear luggage rack of the bus. The stoves were the most important items on the trip, absolutely essential for un repas sérieux (a serious meal), for this was no mere picnic, and it was also a lot more than just an outdoor weenie roast.

  Whenever a Scout had participated sufficiently and successfully in the preparation of a specific gastronomic delight, the Scout Master awarded him one of several scout badges which could be earned for each of various dishes. I believe this was the only basis for which Scout badges were awarded in this troop. I don’t know if this was the universal Scout practice in France at the time, but it wouldn’t surprise me if it were.

  Unfortunately, I never had an opportunity to do anything that might earn me a badge. I was the youngest and smallest Scout (I was actually un louvteau, a Cub Scout), and although it was never mentioned, the whole school seemed to know that I was permanently enjoined from using the elegant penknife that hung from my belt. Most of the boys were aware that there was little I could do to actually prepare food under these circumstances. They therefore assigned me to the task of inserting coal into the stoves, sparing them the problem of having to handle the food with soiled hands.

  The stoves were small, and were kept burning at a high temperature, so all I did on these outings was the stoking of the fires. Given my proclivity for blackening myself, I didn’t lack enthusiasm for my assigned task. Regrettably, there was no badge awarded for stoking.

  Nevertheless, I made an effort to remain clean. I was, after all, seven years old and, armed with my newly acquired reasonableness, I was convinced that if I did my part in this effort, Divine Providence would do the rest and somehow intervene between me and any large amounts of clinging coal dust. However, in spite of sound intentions, all reasonable care, and my fervent belief in Divine Providence, our cooking excursions left me in a filthy condition. By the time I had to go home, I was even filthier than I was after the daily games at the base of the smoke stack when the wind was blowing the sooty smoke our way.

  At the end of four happy terms at the Dennis School, Mother announced that the place was distinctly unhygienic and that I would not return there next fall. I was bitterly disappointed and pleaded with her at length, but to no avail.

  Despite the fact that class assignments at the Dennis School usually required a lot of hard work, there was never any unpleasant pressure. I had looked forward to every day at that school, and it had been a remarkably sati
sfying experience. I couldn’t believe that some dirty rings around a bathtub could topple such a good thing. I don’t think Mother ever appreciated how much I learned at the Dennis School and how much I loved the place.

  In June of 1938, we went back to Villa Champs de Mai in Condette. I was barely out of the car before I headed up the grassy track to the Baichant farm. Michelle and her mother greeted me with open arms and hugs. Over the winter, Michelle had outgrown me by two inches and now seemed sturdier and more feral than ever.

  When I returned to the house from my happy reunion, Mother asked where I had been. I told her without hesitation that I had been at the Baichant farm. “Since when have you been so close to the Baichants that you have to leave us before the car is even unpacked?” she complained impatiently.

  I replied with my third official white lie—that I wasn’t close to the Baichants. I belatedly remembered how careful I had been the previous summer to keep my activities at the farm covert, and I was furious with myself for being so careless.

  During the next few days, I deliberately played it safe by not going over to the farm, hoping the matter would fade from Mother’s memory. However, the issue was revived a week later when Mother was taking a walk and crossed paths with Madame Tourneau. The Tourneaus were our neighbors to the west; the Baichant farm was east of us.

  Like us, the Tourneaus had been new residents of Condette the previous summer. They used the same communal grassy track to reach their house as we did on the way to ours. They drove by our house on the way to theirs, so we could hardly miss seeing them occasionally. I was thoroughly mystified as to why we had never spoken to them even though the family had three boys. The youngest was probably the same age as Brenda, and the eldest was clearly older than I. But in the middle was a boy who might have been only slightly older than I was. I longed to have the three brothers as playmates, but mysteriously, they always seemed to move out of “greeting range” whenever I made a deliberate attempt to approach them.

  On this first face-to-face meeting of the two neighbors, Mother told Madame Tourneau that she had noticed her three sons and thought it would be nice if they all came over pour le gouté (for afternoon tea) so we could get to know each other.

  However, Madame Tourneau responded frostily to the idea and said bluntly, “I thought your children preferred to play with the little farm girl next door to you, and since I don’t want my boys doing this, I told them to avoid your children.”

  Mother was stunned and replied, “But my children don’t play with the little farm girl—where did you get that idea?”

  “I beg your pardon, Madame,” replied Madame Tourneau haughtily. “I saw your son on several occasions as I drove past the farm, all smeared in mud or cow dung and apparently enjoying himself thoroughly in that little girl’s presence.”

  Mother, brought up short, returned to our house in a fury and ordered me into the drawing room. Being called for a tête-à-tête in the drawing room was always a sign that there was trouble afoot.

  “I now understand why you were so anxious to run over to the Baichant farm on the day we arrived,” she said crossly as I walked into the drawing room. “How often do you go over there?”

  I noted her use of the present tense and was able to reply truthfully, “I haven’t gone over there except once, on the day we arrived.”

  “What about last year? Did you become smeared in cow dung when you went over there? How often did you do that?”

  “I never got smeared in cow dung. Who would do a dirty thing like that? Sometimes I got muddy if we were planting vegetables on a day after it rained.”

  “What were you doing planting things at a neighbor’s farm? And how often did you do this?”

  “It started when I went over there to feed their ducks, which Madame Baichant said I could do after I lost Ploof. There was nothing to do here at our house. I saw Michelle and her mother working in the vegetable patch, and it looked like fun, so I started picking vegetables with them. Michelle is lots of fun to play with, and I like her.”

  “Did Raimond and Françoise know about this? And was Brenda with you?” asked Mother.

  Then came the next white lie. The “greater good” I felt, was saving Raimond. “I don’t think Raimond and Françoise knew—I didn’t tell them about it. Brenda didn’t go over there, except once. She didn’t like it and never went back after that.” At least the last statement was more or less true.

  “Well, it’s going to have to stop. I had a talk with Madame Tourneau, and she doesn’t want you playing with her boys if you’re also playing with Michelle. And of course, it’s more appropriate that you play with them. So, from now on, I don’t want you visiting Michelle and Madame Baichant or planting things at their farm. Is that quite clear? I will punish you if you go over there.”

  I was stunned, but I could see that Mother had already made up her mind about Michelle and wouldn’t budge. I dreaded telling Michelle and Madame Baichant that henceforth I was to avoid them. I was wretchedly miserable and angry over the matter, and remained in a sulky mood for several days after this exchange. I postponed indefinitely a farewell visit to the Baichants, clinging to the faint hope that Mother would relent and let me resume playing at the farm. I pestered her daily, saying that I was bored stiff and that there was nothing to keep me busy or amuse me here in Condette.

  I tried to befriend the youngest Tourneau boy through a hole in the hedge, but he just ran away as if he had seen a ghost. I told Mother about this, and she said she knew the Tourneau boys had been told not to play with us. “What a shame, really,” she said, “but it will change after a while if you stay away from the farm.”

  For me, the real shame would be when I had to face Michelle. When we drove by the Baichant farm on our way out, I always squinched down below the level of the car window so I wouldn’t see Michelle or be seen by her.

  It finally dawned on Mother that I was not my usual bouncy self, and she took me to see a doctor in Boulogne, who could find nothing wrong with me except possibly my tonsils which, though not inflamed, were larger than they should be.

  After the doctor’s appointment, Mother visited a nearby antique shop; she was still furnishing the house and never missed an opportunity to discover a hidden gem while rummaging in the piles of bric-a-brac at the back of such shops. On this occasion, she stumbled on a set of miniature golf clubs. The set even included a well-made and appropriately sized leather golf bag to hold the small clubs. Mother bought it on the spot, declaring, “This is how we’re going to keep you busy and amused.”

  The next morning, she took Brenda and me to the Hardelot Golf Club, but the instructor refused to give us golfing lessons, insisting that we were too young.

  “Very well, I will teach them myself!” replied Mother indignantly.

  Mother played nine holes with Brenda and me that morning, but we were observed replacing divots on a green. When we returned to the clubhouse, Mother was politely asked not to let Brenda and me play on the course. She was miffed but not defeated.

  That afternoon, Mother set off across the huge cow pasture in front of our house, carrying a sack of empty tin cans gleaned from a cache Raimond kept in the garage. She also carried a spade and several straight sticks which she had asked Raimond to round up for her.

  Brenda and I followed Mother around the vast meadow and watched as she dug small holes a couple of hundred yards apart from each other, and spaced around the periphery of the vast pasture. In each hole, she placed a tin can flush with the roots of the grass, taking care to press pieces of the removed sod back into the space around the open mouth of the can. Close to each can, she inserted a stick into the ground and on the upper end of the stick she tied a brightly colored rag. Et voilà! In the space of two hours, Mother had created a golf course!

  She spent the next week playing on our nine-hole course with Brenda and me, giving us pointers
and encouraging us in this difficult game. After a week or so, we were enjoying golf, and Brenda and I both had scores of around 120 for the nine holes.

  The course had its share of obstacles. The cows had cropped the grass to a little over an inch high, but the terrain was pockmarked with mole holes and the imprints of hooves made when the ground was soft due to rain, so that when the ball was putted, it seldom traveled in a straight line. Twice, the ball completely disappeared into a mole hole.

  The meadow was generously dotted with tussocks of marsh grass, which the cows did not seem to relish. Well nourished by manure, the marsh grass grew in healthy clumps all over the place. Golf balls had a nasty habit of landing or bouncing right into the heart of a tussock from which it was nearly impossible to play them.

  Other hazards included the cows, which refused to let us play through and stood in the line of play so long that we eventually had to play around them. Mother had strictly forbidden us to play over a cow or a herd of them, even if doing so was the most direct path to the next hole. There was also the lake in the middle of the pasture and patches around the lake where the grass was so waterlogged that Brenda and I sank into it as if in quicksand. There was no end of diversions on the little course, but they kept the game from being dull.

  After church one Sunday, Brenda and I decided to play a quick round of golf before lunch. Since we had to be properly dressed for Sunday lunch, we decided to play in the clothes we had worn to church, so that we wouldn’t have to change clothes back and forth all morning. Brenda was wearing a white organdy dress, her very best.

  On the seventh hole, my ball landed near a meadow muffin and rolled onto its hardened surface, coming to a stop at its center (the surface of a meadow muffin dries and hardens with age). Mother had emphasized that—unlike croquet, where one is sometimes allowed to relocate the ball if it’s impossible to play—in golf, one has to play the ball wherever it comes to a stop. Brenda and I agreed that mine was a tricky shot but not impossible, and that I had no choice but to play it from this unusual tee. I rehearsed my swing several times without hitting the ball, as Brenda, who stood facing me some ten feet away and to my left, chuckled mischievously at my predicament.