The Lost Carousel of Provence

by Juliet Blackwell

“As I understand it,” said Jean-Paul, “the carousel didn’t come alone, but with a kind of decorative salon that housed it. It wasn’t strong enough to stand up against the elements, however—especially our Provençal winds—so it was brought in pieces and assembled within an outer building. Right, Fabrice?”

  Fabrice grunted and took a drink, then nodded.

  “And it’s still there?” Cady asked.

  “What remains of it,” said Fabrice.

  “As I told you, I have a carousel rabbit figure that might have been part of the set. A photo that was hidden within the figure bears the Château Clement stamp. Also,” Cady said, hardly able to contain her excitement as she flipped to a photograph of a woman working alongside the men, “I think I have a photograph of this woman. I’ll be right back.”

  Cady literally ran up the stairs, down the grand hall, through the book-lined room, up the steps to the red hallway, and into her room to grab the box that had been hidden in Gus’s belly, along with her photos of Gus, and the love note she had been using as a bookmark. Then she ran back.

  Fabrice looked amused and annoyed at the same time. “What’s got into you?”

  “Look at this,” Cady said, panting. She placed the box in front of Fabrice.

  “Go on, open it up.”

  Fabrice lifted the lid and peered inside. He picked up the photograph first, gazed at it a long time, and let out a “Huh.” Then he stroked the braid of hair and read the little love note. He put everything back in and shut the lid.

  “Where’d you find this?”

  “It was hidden in the belly of my rabbit.” As she spoke, she slid a couple of her eight-by-ten prints in front of him. “This is Gus.”

  Fabrice let out a breathless exclamation and sat up slightly. He gazed at the photos as though enthralled. She handed him more.

  He nodded. “You see these muguet flowers here? I remember those.”

  Cady had looked up the word muguet after Madame Martin used it in Paris. In English, it meant “lily of the valley.” Little white bell flowers along a slender stalk.

  “So it made its way to America,” Fabrice said, his voice filled with a kind of wonder.

  “You know it?”

  “This rabbit used to be here.”

  “With the carousel?”

  “It was inside the house, here, actually.”

  “Do you know who carved it?”

  “Whoever carved the carousel, I assume.”

  “And you saw it here, at the château?”

  He nodded. “After the war, my father and I came back to stay for a while. There was still some heavy furniture, that sort of thing, that hadn’t been looted. Some guy came in and bought a bunch of it, said he knew a market for European antiques. We needed the money.”

  “This is amazing,” Cady said. “I’ve had him for years. I’ve always loved him, and wondered where he came from. I’m sorry he’s not in good shape—I was going to restore him, but I wasn’t sure how that would affect the value.”

  “You know how to restore things like this?”

  “I’m no expert, but yes, I used to work in an antiques store, and I did a fair amount of restoration.”

  “Huh.”

  Fabrice gazed into the fire again, sliding back into his uncommunicative mode. Still, this was by far the most interest he had shown in anything since she’d met him.

  “Do you think I could see the carous—,” she began.

  “Enough already,” interrupted Fabrice. “Where’s that whiskey?”

  Cady went to get the bottle from the cupboard over the refrigerator.

  “Fabrice,” Jean-Paul said, “how would you feel if I moved in here for a while, just until you feel better?”

  “I’ve got more than enough help with the girl here.” He gestured in Cady’s direction.

  Jean-Paul glanced at Cady. “Cady has other things to do. She’s a photographer, on assignment. She’ll be on her way soon. I’m family.”

  “She can take all the pictures she wants around here. And anyway, she’s American. I like Americans more than family. What’s family ever done for me?”

  “It left you this château, for one thing,” answered Jean-Paul. “And we would have been a part of your life if you’d have let us.”

  “This château that you adore? You don’t fool me, Jean-Paul. You just want to dismantle it, sell it for parts, and run back to your precious Paris.”

  “I want to salvage it. If I can. There’s a difference. If you would just allow me to bring in some people to inspect it—”

  Fabrice waved him off angrily.

  Cady did her best to pretend she wasn’t listening as she cleared the table and cleaned up the kitchen. Part of her thrilled to Fabrice’s words, to think she was preferred. Part of her clearly didn’t understand the family dynamics, and it felt awkward after Jean-Paul had gone out of his way to show her around Avignon. She felt torn about the fate of the château; like Fabrice, she wanted to see it stay in private hands, loved and taken care of. But she understood Jean-Paul’s point as well; a building like this was meant for a different time, a different way of life. Who had the resources for the renovation necessary to maintain such a residence?

  She remembered having a fantasy, a very, very long time ago. Of living in a huge old home and filling the rooms with unwanted children. It was a nice dream, but as an adult she’d realized it wasn’t much of a recipe for making a living.

  “You should leave, Jean-Paul,” said Fabrice, raising his voice. “Go tell your grandfather you’ll get this place, quite literally, over my dead body.”

  “Fabrice, please—”

  “Go!”

  “I apologize. I seem to have ruined what was otherwise a lovely evening.” Jean-Paul stood, the muscle in his jaw working. “Cady, thank you so much for a delicious dinner. You can keep those photos for now, if you like. Fabrice, I enjoyed speaking about your days in Paris. I look forward to hearing more soon.”

  He held out his hand. Fabrice looked at it, sighed, and shook hands with Jean-Paul as though it pained him.

  “Cady,” he said with a nod to her. No kisses this time.

  She followed him out the door to the hall.

  “Jean-Paul,” she called.

  He hesitated for a moment before turning around.

  “I’m sorry about this. You know how cranky he is.”

  “I do. I’ve known him my whole life, Cady, as has my mother, and her father before her.”

  “I didn’t mean . . . I don’t mean to barge in where I’m not wanted.”

  “He wants you more than me, or anyone else in the family, apparently.”

  “Well . . . thank you for today,” Cady said, coming to stand near him. “I really enjoyed the tour of Avignon.”

  “Thank you for dinner. And for opening my eyes to the wonders of garlic bread.”

  They remained for a moment in the narrow corridor, standing by the chalky-blue wooden door, enveloped by the scent of old stone and the damp, musty air. It could have been another time, another place, two servants lingering by the help’s entrance, trying to unravel the whims of the irascible master.

  Jean-Paul’s tongue played with the inside of his cheek for a moment as he studied her face. He lifted one hand, very slowly, and grasped a lock of her hair, caressing it between thumb and forefinger.

  “Silk,” he said, almost to himself. “I wondered what it felt like.”

  “It’s the French shampoo,” Cady said, wincing at the inanity of her words. “Probably.”

  Jean-Paul let out a soft chuckle and dropped his hand. “Anyway, good luck with him. You have my number if either of you needs anything. I’ll be in touch.”

  He turned up his collar and ducked out the door into a fierce, frigid wind.

  Cady shut the door behind him and returned to the kitchen
, where Fabrice remained by the hearth, brooding, gazing at the dying flames.

  She sat in the chair Jean-Paul had vacated.

  Ten minutes of silence passed, interrupted only by Lucy’s muffled snoring and the hiss of the fire, the wind and rain hitting the windowpanes, every second counted down by the ticking of the clock with no hands.

  Finally, Cady said, “I would give anything for a family. Even one that annoyed me.”

  Fabrice’s seafoam green eyes, foggy with age, fixed on her. Despite their senescence, they seemed able to see beyond the surface. Once again Cady was reminded of the way Maxine had looked at her: as though she knew.

  “You are alone?” Fabrice asked.

  Cady didn’t usually think of her situation in such blunt terms. But yes, she walked through this world alone.

  She nodded and stared at the fire, opening her eyes wide to fight the tears that gathered. She felt as vulnerable as the little girl who had ridden round and round on the Tilden Park carousel, yearning for parents, dreaming of belonging.

  “Well, Cady, I’ll tell you a secret,” said Fabrice in a voice as sad as the moaning winds rattling the windowpanes. “In the end we are all alone. Each one of us.”

  CHAPTER FORTY

  1900

  CHTEAU CLEMENT

  Maëlle

  Maëlle slips in through a side door, heading to her room. Though it has been many days since they arrived, Maëlle still feels like an intruder in the halls of the great château. She hurries down the corridors as quietly as she can, hoping not to be noticed.

  “Maëlle,” comes Madame Clement’s voice.

  “Oui, madame?” she says, turning toward her. “May I do something for you?”

  “Guess what I have? Chouchenn!” she says, holding aloft a bottle of Breton-style mead.

  “Pardon?”

  “Come, have a drink with me?”

  “Madame, I—”

  “Please, call me Josephine,” she says with a laugh. “I think I can’t be more than a year or two older than you. And we are all Bretons here, are we not?”

  Maëlle feels at a loss for words. Her father always used to preach to her, as Léon does, that no person was better than another, no matter how wealthy or influential. We are all created equal, he declared, reciting slogans from the French Revolution. Maëlle had turned the argument to her favor, using the same logic on him when insisting that she be allowed to carve: If no one person is better than another, then why can’t a woman have ambitions just like a man?

  But now, facing Madame Clement’s—Josephine’s—fashionable, lace-covered dress, her pearl earrings and finely coiffed hair, Maëlle feels unsure. Lesser. Naive in the ways of the world.

  Josephine’s manner is easygoing, friendly. But Maëlle still finds it hard to meet her eyes, to chat as though she were with a friend. Is it typical for the lady of the manor to ask an artisan to join her for a drink?

  “Y-your husband is not here?” Maëlle stammers.

  “He goes to bed very early and gets up before dawn. We have opposite schedules; I’m afraid I’m a night owl. When we were first married I tried to wake at the same time as he, but I found myself sleeping away the afternoons! So now I appreciate having the evenings to my thoughts, while he awakens early to work in his darkroom.”

  “I’m sorry, I feel very ignorant. But what is a ‘darkroom’?”

  “You’re not ignorant at all. It has to do with the art of photography. The film must be developed in the dark, and then special chemical baths are used to make the pictures appear. It’s quite an intricate process.”

  “Oh,” says Maëlle. She can’t think of anything else to say.

  They are still standing, awkwardly, in the wide paneled hallway that leads to the room of books, and on to the stairway to Maëlle’s room. She yearns for the white linen softness of that bed after a very long day of labor.

  On the other hand, her days are spent exclusively in the company of men, and the idea of feminine conversation appeals. And in any case, Monsieur Bayol’s words come back to her: She must keep the clients happy. Who is Maëlle Tanguy to refuse a drink with a lady like Josephine Clement?

  “So, won’t you join me?” Josephine repeats. “I’m sure it seems . . . forward, perhaps, or strange. But I am surrounded every day by men—as are you! In Quimper I had many friends, but not here. And I would love to hear more about your work, and how you learned to carve. You fascinate me: a woman artist!”

  “Thank you,” Maëlle says, blushing. “Yes, of course, I would be honored to join you for a drink.”

  “Wonderful! Follow me.” Josephine leads the way down the corridor to a small sitting room, its heavy wooden furniture brightened by a cheery fire. They take seats at a small table near the hearth, and Josephine pours a bit of the mead into two aperitif glasses from a set perched atop a nearby shelf.

  “Yec-hed mat!” she says, holding up her glass and uttering a traditional Breton toast.

  An hour, then two, pass as they sip the chouchenn and reminisce about their homeland: They speak of the stiff white lace caps traditionally worn by women in Breton, called coiffes, and the striped shirts, called marinières, of the navy and fishermen—the stripes make them easier to see in the waves in case they fall overboard. They speak of the fishing boats going out to sea in the mornings, the ruggedness of their rocky coastline. The blush-colored stone and sands of the pink granite coast.

  “You miss it, then?” asks Maëlle. “Even living here, in such a grand home?”

  Josephine looks around the room at the rich paneling and the long brocade drapes, the fine wood furniture. “I’m very lucky, I know. And Yves is very good to me. Although . . . it is true that things are harder these days than before. The lands aren’t producing as they once did. . . .”

  Maëlle thinks about what Léon said, about the signs of things slipping.

  Josephine waves it off. “But never mind that. We are still lucky, are we not? And Provence is beautiful; the vegetation is stark, but I’ve grown used to it. And the winds carry the most amazing scents, have you noticed?”

  “I do! I notice it every morning when I open my window. Herbs, and lavender.”

  Josephine nods. “And I don’t miss wearing the coiffe Bretagne! My mother was very traditional, and she insisted that I wear it. I hear fewer people are donning it these days.”

  Maëlle smiles. Her mother used to make a fuss as well, but Maëlle didn’t listen. She preferred to wear a Parisian-style hat or nothing at all. Not that she had many choices.

  “But I do miss my family, and my friends,” says Josephine. “I spend hours every evening writing letters, and I await their return missives with eager anticipation. Still, it is not the same as sitting and talking with friends.”

  “No, of course not.”

  “There is a . . .” Again she glances around her fine parlor, as though taking it all in. “There is a ‘loneliness of kind’ here. I miss having a woman to talk to, a friend who understands.”

  Maëlle nods, pleased to think she might be considered a kindred spirit to someone as fine as Josephine Clement.

  “Also,” Josephine goes on, “I miss our wild Breton coast. The Mediterranean is calm and warm, very peaceful, like a very large bathtub! But it is not the same. I always liked the crashing of the waves upon the rocks. My mother told me it was not decent to react so strongly to such passion.”

  “Mine said the same!” says Maëlle, amazed and pleased to have so much in common with a woman who owns a château.

  “So, tell me about how you came to carve with Monsieur Bayol,” Josephine says. “Ever since he told us about you in his missive, I have been so intrigued. A woman carver!”

  Maëlle finds herself opening up to Josephine, describing how she learned to carve from her father, and how she and Erwann shared long talks back in their humble home in Concarneau. She te
lls her how Erwann had encouraged her to go, and how sad and alone—yet excited—she felt while watching him recede as the train jolted away from the station. Maëlle tells of getting lost in the streets of Angers on her way to find Bayol’s factory, and how everyone had laughed at her when she made known her intentions of becoming an apprentice. Of her warm little room off Madame Bayol’s kitchen—and how much nicer her accommodations were here in Château Clement.

  “That bedroom makes me feel like . . . Marie-Antoinette!” Maëlle declares, giggling. For the first time since Léon cut her out, Maëlle does not think of him, but only of her art, and her new friend.

  Josephine lets out a peal of laughter that sounds like church bells, and pours more mead into their tiny glasses. The room is warmed by the fire, and their spirits buoyed by the company, their talk, and the chouchenn.

  Two women. New friends banishing the loneliness of kind.

  CHAPTER FORTY-ONE

  PRESENT DAY

  CHTEAU CLEMENT

  Cady

  The next morning Cady walked into the kitchen to find a tall stack of books sitting on the counter.

  “What’s all this?” Cady asked, picking one up. The pages were yellow and foxed with age; the cover was green linen. Inside was an inscription: To my friend and colleague, Fabrice Clement. Simone de Beauvoir.

  “Simone de Beauvoir?” Cady asked. “The Simone de Beauvoir?”

  “You said you wanted to read more,” said Fabrice. “These are by some of the people we were talking about last night.”

  “They’re incredible. But . . . they’re in French.”

  “You speak French.”

  “Not perfectly.”

  He waved a hand. “Well enough. Make a little effort. You should always read books in their native language, if you possibly can.”

  Again she wondered whether the English version of Le Château might be missing—or had mistranslated—some critical points. The first time she had tried to discuss the book with Fabrice, he’d threatened to throw her out; the second time he avoided the subject. She wondered if he’d be more amenable now. Maybe tonight, after he enjoyed his aperitif.