by Tony Hawks
How marked the contrast then as soon as we emerged from the tunnel and began to drive through Normandy. The farrago of vans, lorries and cars that had so clogged the latter part of our British drive seemed to dissipate the instant we touched French soil. Quite where it all went remains a mystery but the roads were empty and, like magic, large vistas of green rolling hills opened up around us. Tired though we were, it felt good to be in a new country, especially in a nice safe vehicle with no fears of imminent breakdown, and with an engine volume that allowed easy conversation.
The fact that we hadn’t hit Calais until 6pm local time did mean that we were hopelessly behind schedule. We pressed on heroically, however, circumnavigating Paris with some difficulty and finding ourselves, much to our surprise, eulogising on the merits of the M25. Paris lacks a simple peripheral motorway and the road signs that are supposed to guide you around the city are like coquettes that lead you on with the promise of your destination only to disappear at the moment your passions are most aroused.
By lam we started to fade and left the peage in search of a place to lay our weary heads. Fortunately we were in a country whose entrepreneurs had taken it upon themselves to cater for the travelling motorist who chooses to push on into the night. France is well served by newly constructed budget hotels situated on industrial estates near major roads. They offer very little, but to be fair they only ask for 20-25 euros in return. Armed only with a credit card, the guest can struggle with a machine (in our case, bad temperedly) and then be given a slip of paper containing four digits that allow access to a small room. The accommodation is spartan but the bed is so welcoming to the exhausted driver that it matters little. However, what did matter on this occasion was that we were inheriting a room from the man with the smelliest feet in France. The moment we opened the door the smell was quite overpowering. We were immediately faced with a major drawback of these hotels: none of one’s dealings are with human beings. However much Tim and I wanted to, it would have been fruitless to go back to the machine and bellow at it until it had the common decency to provide us with a room that didn’t smell like a cross between a cheese shop and a rugby changing room. So instead we collapsed resignedly onto the disappointingly hard beds.
“Well, Tim, it’s been an interesting day,” I said. “What mark would you give it out often?”
Tim mused for a minute.
“I think a five would be fairest.”
And he was right. We had successfully avoided death, injury, robbery and assault and we were in a new country where we’d found a bed for the night and a roof over our heads.
We couldn’t shut the door though. That would have been too risky. There was too grave a danger of passing away peacefully in our sleep as the first known victims of’lorry drivers feet’, so we had to sleep with our coats on and with the door wedged open, leaving ourselves hopelessly vulnerable to a random theft or mugging.
“I remember the last time you slept in that leather jacket,” said Tim, wriggling around in a futile search for comfort. “It was in that dodgy hotel in Salamanca.”
“Oh Christ,” I said. “Don’t remind me about that weekend.”
It had all looked so promising. Many years previously the two of us had headed off to Spain for a long weekend and we’d ended up in the picturesque Spanish town of Salamanca. On the Saturday night we’d met two fabulous girls and we’d had the most amazing evening. They were both beautiful, spoke fluent English and, happily, Tim and I each fancied different ones so we weren’t fighting over the same girl. Their interest was reciprocal. We drank wine, joked, laughed and danced into the night. It was incredible. Tim and I were smitten. So smitten in fact that we made no attempt to try and kiss the girls other than in a polite way when the whole magical evening drew to a close. What was the hurry when they were that gorgeous and that much fun? Besides, we were going to spend all of the next day and evening together. We had agreed that we’d all head off in our hire car to Portugal together.
At midday the next day, as arranged, Tim and I waited for Arantxa and Mercedes in front of the cathedral. We were ready for the most romantic adventure of our lives thus far.
The girls were late. No sign of them by 12.15.
OK, we thought. A woman’s prerogative.
The girls were very late. No sign of them by 12.30.
OK, we thought. A Spanish woman’s prerogative.
By 12.45, still nothing. We were running out of prerogatives.
At 1pm we began to wonder if there was another cathedral and we were at the wrong one. There was absolutely no way we could have misread the signals the night before. No question—the two girls had enjoyed an amazing night and, like us, they were well on the way to falling in love. There had to be a reason why they weren’t there at the cathedral. They must have got held up in some way. There must have been some kind of incident.
Tim and I took a picnic lunch on the cathedral steps and continued to wait. We would not give up hope. We wandered the streets nearby. We peered into hotel receptions. Maybe the girls had overslept—after all, it had been getting light when we’d parted company the night before. But nothing. By 3pm there was no sign of them anywhere and there was nothing else for it but to give up, and so we plodded back to our car, distraught and heartbroken.
During the sombre car journey back to Madrid we discussed all the possibilities for what could have happened to Arantxa and Mercedes. In the end we decided that there was only one plausible explanation.
They must have been murdered.
Tim shuffled on his hard bed, turned towards me and frowned. I didn’t know whether this had been brought on by the room’s smell or the painful memory of Salamanca.
“Those poor girls,” said Tim, shifting onto his side ready to have a stab at sleeping. “Funny how a double killing like that never made the papers.”
“Yes, it was very odd.”
“Goodnight.”
“Goodnight.”
In the morning, after a surprisingly good night’s sleep, we made our way back to the van to continue our epic journey. As we walked past the credit-card machine with our bags, we waved cordially but we were ignored. No acknowledgement, not even a nod or a ‘Have a nice day’. We felt used. Frankly, once those machines have swallowed and then regurgitated your credit cards, they don’t give a toss. This was an example of twenty-first century ‘progress’.
No wonder finding a house in a French village was so appealing.
§
Tim’s house was in a picturesque rural setting with lovely hill views, but was much more of a ‘project’ than mine. It had been a ruin when he and Lucy had bought it, but extensive works were now only months away from completion. Tim had avoided all the drama and constant disappointment that usually accompanies such building projects by cleverly giving the job to one of his best mates, Matt, who had formerly been his partner in an amusing double act that had worked the London comedy circuit for a few years. Despite prospects for a promising career as an actor, Matt had thrown in the showbiz towel when his girlfriend Helen had become pregnant, and shortly afterwards they’d moved out to this region of France with barely a franc in their pockets, setting up home in a barn.↓
≡ Their first born son would be lucky enough to be able to go through life leaving doors wide open, and when challenged with the question, “Were you born in a barn?” would be able to reply, “Yes.”
Now, fifteen years later, Matt and Helen had fostered a successful building business, added two more children, and embraced convention by shunning ‘barn life’ and moving into a house.
They were working on Tims property when we arrived and they greeted us with enthusiastic hugs and kisses, which suggested that fifteen years of living in France had meant they’d more than embraced the concept of French salutations. And perhaps they were pleased to see us, too.
“How was the journey?” asked Helen.
“Ah,” said Tim.
“Perhaps we should tell you about it over a cup of tea,”
I said.
And a terrific cup it was, over which the story of the ‘journey thus far’ was related, much to Matt and Helen’s amusement. Then a new plan was formulated. It was decided that Matt would travel with us on the next part of the journey. This would give me and Tim another driver, and Matt the chance to catch up on a decade of news. It had been a satisfyingly spontaneous decision, and one to which Helen had acceded with great generosity of spirit.
“The chance for you to be three lads together in a Luton van?” she’d said. “How can I deny you that?”
‘Three lads in a van’ (and I use the word ‘lad’ more in reference to gender than age) turned out to be great fun. For us, the autoroute south now became ‘Memory Lane’ as we discussed stories from London’s comedy circuit during the late 1980s, successful and unsuccessful sexual liaisons and past girlfriends, all of which were peppered with the occasional mention of football. And we laughed. How we laughed.
And then, somewhere along the seemingly endless stretch of motorway, perhaps between Montauban and Toulouse, the banter suddenly matured and became surprisingly philosophical and analytical. Tales of past conquests and humiliations gave way to more reflective discussions about life and love, and where we all were. Of course, we were all in a Luton van working our way towards the Pyrenees, but where were we on our life journey? And being the only one who hadn’t followed the more conventional path of finding a partner and raising a family, my life invited the closest scrutiny. Matt and Tim fired question after question at me: what age had I been when my parents had divorced? What was my relationship like now with my parents? Why had I split up with my last girlfriend?
It was Matt who asked the hardest question.
“What about love, Tony? Have you ever been in love?”
A very tricky question indeed.
“Well,” I replied uncomfortably, “I know it sounds an incredible thing for a forty-four-year-old man to say—but I don’t think that I ever have. Of course, it depends how you define it.”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, there are lots of meanings for love, aren’t there? I mean, you can love your sister and you can love your dog.”
“Yes, but you’re not supposed to sleep with them,” said Tim.
“Maybe there were moments with Lianne,” I continued, ignoring Tim’s facetious remark. “And Clare. But the closest to really being in love was probably with Fi. Remember her?”
“Ah yes, Fiona!” said Tim with a smile, no doubt recalling the many fun nights the three of us had spent together over a decade before. “Nothing ever actually happened with that though, did it?”
“Things almost happened—but the trouble was that she was still in love with her ex-boyfriend. In the end she went back to him. He lived in Ibiza.”
“Well, I’m not sure if it counts as being in love if it remains unreciprocated,” said Matt, taking on the role of adjudicator. “So Fiona doesn’t count.”
“I even wrote a song for her,” I mused, surprising myself with the frankness of my confession.
“Really?” said Tim.
“In that case perhaps Fiona should count,” said the adjudicator.
“Yes, I think she should too,” said Tim.
“Right,” I said. “Whatever you boys think.”
“The main thing,” said Tim, “is that you’re ready to get stuck in again.”
“Agreed,” said Matt. “What type of girl would be right for you?”
I shrugged. This was all getting to feel like I was on the psychiatrist’s couch—but for the fact that I was sitting bolt upright and driving a big white van on a French motorway. The questions went on and, despite feeling a little under the diagnostic cosh, I answered each one as honestly as I could, and by the time we’d successfully negotiated Toulouse’s peripherique, a conclusion had been drawn by my two amateur psychologists. Basically, I was a man who expected a great deal of a partner in a relationship and perhaps I needed to find a way to be more understanding and tolerant of weaknesses and faults. Secondly, it was agreed that often in the past I had been attracted to personalities who were ambitious and who needed to prove themselves in some way.
“What you need, Tone,” said Tim, elbow out of window, map of France open on his lap, “is someone independent, who likes what she does but doesn’t need to measure her success in terms of achievements.”
“Right,” I said, almost subordinately, as if there was a new hierarchy in the cab and I was now student to Matt and Tim’s university tutor.
“Maybe,” continued Tim, “you need someone simpler—more at peace with themselves, who can support and encourage you, but still with enough enthusiasm for their projects so as to maintain your interest in them.”
“Right,” I said with a nod.
“And with nice tits,” added Matt.
At least one of us had remembered that we were three blokes in the cab of a white Luton van.
“Perhaps you’ll find someone in France,” said Tim.
“Yeah—a nice French girl,” Matt chirped boisterously. “With nice tits.”
“Yes, thanks, Matt,” I interjected. “Well, let’s see what happens, shall we?”
And the van sped on.
§
Half an hour after Toulouse, the Pyrenees rose defiantly and majestically to our left. These snow-capped peaks have formed the natural boundary between France and Spain, the buffer between two cultures, and frequently the escape route for dissidents, freedom fighters and escaped prisoners of war. We were now in the French departement of Hautes-Pyrenees, which before the French Revolution had been known as Bigorre. This was where my new home was situated. A home that was looking in fine form by the time we reached it. Tim and Matt approved of the location.
“Wow!” said Matt, whilst Tim offered a whistling sound of admiration.
I swelled with pride and went to knock on the door, an act that reminded me that I wasn’t yet the legal owner. Soon Jean-Claude and family were helping us unload the van with a surprising and most welcome gusto and enthusiasm.
“Ah, Tony—tu joues du piano!” Jean-Claude observed on noting the instrument that slowly revealed itself from beneath tables, chairs and an assortment of bedding.
“Owi,” I replied, offering a few playful notes of blues as my accomplices began to shuffle it down the van.
“Très bon ,” he said with a nod, whilst his wife and son looked on in amazement as if I’d just performed a magic trick.
The addition of French brawn (Jean-Claude’s rugby-playing past now even more acutely evident) meant that the piano was offloaded without further incident, and it was left to relax in its new home—the garage beneath a French house in the foothills of the Pyrenees. Here, I hoped, it would have time to acclimatise itself to its new surroundings so that when I returned it would be ready to ease my fingers across its keys, perhaps towards some inspirational melodies.
We spent a frustratingly short amount of time in what I’d now taken to calling ‘nearly my house’, partly because we’d arrived on a day when the family were anxious to leave for an outing. There was only time to give my two English psychotherapists a short tour, which involved a lot of nodding and smiling at Jean-Claude, who followed us at every turn. All too quickly we were climbing back into the van whilst the family waved us off, completely oblivious to the disasters that had befallen its predecessor and ignorant of the gargantuan effort we had made to get there.
“You’ve done well there,” said Tim, looking back at the house as we pulled away.
“Yeah,” said Matt. “For someone who gave it about half an hour’s thought, this is a bit of a result.”
I hoped they were right.
After drinks with Malcolm and Anne and a meal in town, we were back on the road again. It wasn’t until shortly after we’d rejoined the motorway that I noticed my leather jacket was missing, complete with the diary nestling in its pocket. A quick search of the van confirmed that it was not on board—and I felt pretty confident that on d
eparture I had stashed it in the cab by my feet near the offside door. Irritatingly, I could only conclude that it had fallen out of the cab when I’d opened the door to collect the ticket for entry to the peage.
“That makes it your fault, Tim,” I said, trying to remain jovial. “Because if you’d parked nearer to the ticket machine I wouldn’t have had to open the door.”
“All right, Hawks, you win,” said Tim. “We’ll go back for your poxy jacket.”
A fruitless journey though, because on arriving for the second time at the entrance to the peage, there was no sign of my jacket.
“Bugger,” I said. “Someone must have made off with it.”
“You’ve had that jacket too long anyway,” said Matt. “You were wearing it fifteen years ago.”
“It’s the diary I’m bothered about. There’s some after-dinner speaking engagements in it that I haven’t got round to copying into my other diary.”
“Never mind,” said Tim. “Let’s just hope whoever finds it turns up and does them for you.”
“It’ll probably be funnier,”joked Matt.
“Maybe it fell out of the van on Jean-Claude’s drive before we left,” said Tim. “Why don’t you give him a quick call and check?”
Tim had correctly identified another possibility and the call had to be made, however much I hated making phone calls in French. I was at a level in the language where I needed to see who was speaking to me so that I could follow the contours of their mouths as they framed the words, and where I could have the option if necessary of drawing pictures on a piece of paper when things went horribly wrong. Phone calls were scary things.
“Can you do it for me?” I said to Matt. “You’re better at French than me.”
“I know, but I want to see you squirm,” he replied.