‘Grandpa has nothing but old cars, vans and that old 2CV – ’
‘No! No! Really old. A 1929 Citroen. It’s in a barn behind the church. It’s been there ever since the war. He hid it from the Germans!’ Matthew was wide-eyed.
By now we were all interested. ‘Philippe says he’s going to ask him if we can get it out.’
Later that afternoon we went to look. Raymond and Grandpa led us to a barn that we had never even noticed before. Tucked behind the church, the huge doors creaked as we pushed them slowly open. Inside was a museum. Ancient farm machinery, wooden carts with great high wheels and oxen yokes attached, a pony trap and, hidden behind them all, covered with sacks, gleamed the dark green body of the old Citroen. It had Grandpa’s name on the back and the original tyres with DUNLOP clearly marked on the spare wheel. ‘Has it really been here since the war?’ we asked.
The old man nodded. ‘We hid her from the Germans,’ he shouted triumphantly. ‘We were supposed to give up all our vehicles but they never found mine.’
‘But why didn’t you get her out afterwards?’
He shrugged. ‘I don’t remember. I hadn’t the time. There was too much to do and anyway petrol was short.’
‘Can we get her out now, Grandpa?’ begged the boys. He looked at the car. ‘If you want to,’ he said and then without another word he turned abruptly and walked off. I watched his small figure trudging back to the house and wondered what memories he was recalling.
Eagerly the boys uncovered her to reveal her high stately shape. ‘She’s just like in “Bonnie and Clyde”,’ said Matthew. They jacked her up to remove the wooden blocks on which she had rested and pumped up the tyres which astonishingly stayed hard. She would not start, however, that had been too much to hope for.
‘I’m afraid the motor’s seized up,’ said Raymond sadly. However, Claudette’s cousin, who kept the garage in a neighbouring village arrived the following morning and a small crowd assembled to watch as, pulled by the tractor, she began slowly to emerge from obscurity after almost forty-five years.
The cousin towed her away to see if it were possible to revive her. Two hours later he telephoned to say that he had a problem. He needed a new cylinder head gasket and, if we could find it, a radiator cap. For a 1929 Citroen? Raymond scratched his head. He had heard that there was a specialist in old cars somewhere near Villeneuve and off we went, none too hopefully, to see whether he could help us.
In several acres of ground which stretched down to the river Lot we found a tall, dishevelled, gentle man who ran a nursing home for hundreds of old cars, the most precious wrapped in old eiderdowns. While he wiped his hands – he had been restoring the body work of an ancient racing car – we explained what we needed. He said nothing. We followed him into a long shed and from one of a line of various wardrobes he took a bundle of cylinder head gaskets tied with elastic, and from a biscuit tin he handed us the radiator cap. He took our money courteously and then squatted down again to continue with his work.
Claudette’s cousin grinned when he saw what we had brought and late that evening, the old car leading, we drove home in triumph and she’s been running ever since. Mike loves to drive her, enjoying the challenge of the crash gear box and, when he’s in a good mood, Grandpa will reminisce about autrefois when he first bought his car and he and Grandma were young. Now he prefers something better sprung and less draughty and leaves the Citroen to others.
Grandpa had told us that we were entitled to one free load of stones from the commune for our track up to Bel-Air every two years, and so far we had done nothing about it. However, thinking about the price we had paid for stones for the drive at Easter, we decided that now, while the track was dry, might be a good time to ask for them.
Unlike Raymond’s farm, we learned that Bel-Air was just inside the border of the next commune and it was to meet a new M. le Maire that we drove on a Tuesday morning – that being the only time he was in his bureau. Raymond had advised me to go with Mike and I soon saw why. Our Mayor was a lady’s man. Bronzed and handsome, he rose from his desk and in one swift stride enveloped my hand in both of his. His smile with a flash of gold fillings warmed me from head to foot.
‘Bien sûr,’ we could have the stones. He wrote the chit with a flourish. It was such a pleasure to meet us. He was absolutely delighted that the house was being restored.
A few days later he came to call. He was most affable, admiring all our renovations. It was he who explained the purpose of yet another curiosity which I had found and had hung on the porch. It was a metal ring about eight inches in diameter from which were suspended eight skewer-like objects with a hook at the end. But for hanging what? He laughed. He turned it horizontally, spreading out the skewers like tentacles. ‘C’est pour la lessive,’ he cried.
Another search in the ever-open dictionary and we understood. It was to prevent the washing from boiling up out of the pot. The eight hooks clipped round the rim. The Mayor laughed. ‘My mother had one,’ he said. ‘C’est quelque chose d’autrefois.’ We certainly didn’t need to look that up.
CHAPTER NINE
When we arrived the following Easter almost the first thing we did was unlock the chai to see how it looked with its newly cemented floor and high wall. This was our worst moment so far. For some reason, which will perhaps forever remain a mystery, M. René or his workmen had ignored the high end wall so clearly marked CREPIS CE MUR, which so badly needed attention and they had, instead, covered each of the other walls of beautiful stones with cement. I could not bear to look. I closed the door and wept in the garden.
There seemed no point in asking him why he had done it. He had become a friend and would have been upset and, more to the point, there was no way it could be undone. I tried not to think about it and, gradually, I have forgotten just how lovely the walls once were. It was our first and, so far, only major disaster and it taught us not to leave important work to be done when we are not there. At least, not by M. René!
Fortunately, the next day was the last of la vieille lune de Mars and time for le nettoyage. Our two hundred and forty litres of good red wine, maturing in the Cahors-flavoured oak barrel had to be scented, tasted and put into another barrel while the oak barrel was washed out, a happy distraction. Raymond rolled the substitute barrel outside onto the grass. He dusted it and, inviting us to stand close and watch, filled it with water. As he had anticipated it leaked on all sides, spraying us and amusing him. We patched the leaks with putty and topped it up. ‘We can leave it now to swell,’ he said.
In the veranda room he tipped the sleeping cats off the chairs. ‘Autrefois,’ he said, measuring out the pastis, ‘when we harvested the grapes, we would have to start washing out the barrels at least eight days before. We only put a little water in the barrel, we left it overnight then turned it to test the other side. A la vôtre! With twenty or thirty great barrels to do,’ he continued, ‘you couldn’t possibly fill them all. It would take too long and use too much water. People didn’t have water on tap then – you had to fetch it and so – ’ He turned his hand over, fingers limp and shook them in that unmistakably French gesture, ‘Figurez-vous le travail!’
The following afternoon we went down to help with le nettoyage. The barrel did not leak. It was emptied and positioned in the cave next to our special oak barrel. Now to fill it with the precious wine. Raymond put a large, wine-stained wooden tub beneath the bung of the full barrel and a funnel in the top of the empty one. ‘C’est le moment,’ he shouted, his eyes sparkling. With two swift blows he knocked out the bung and the wine gushed out. ‘Oh,’ he cried, pulling a mock face, ‘Ça sent mauvais.’
‘C’est pas vrai,’ we yelled.
He laughed. ‘Non, ça sent bon.’ He dipped a glass in the wine and we tasted. It was as good as it smelled and a wonderful, clear red.
Mike had to scoop the wine from the wooden tub with a small bucket and pour it into the funnel, working fast enough to prevent the tub overflowing. ‘Do you need another b
ucket?’ I called. ‘Non,’ Raymond replied. ‘C’est notre système. The wine is alive and must be disturbed as little as possible,’ he shouted over the cascade, as he inserted a piece of wood beneath the far end of the barrel, tipping it gradually to ensure that the flow of wine did not stop nor the barrel tip back. As the wine began to flow more slowly we watched anxiously for any sign of deposit. ‘Doucement, doucement,’ called Raymond. ‘Is it still clear? I can’t see properly from back here.’
‘Ça va,’ we shouted. ‘Et alors, ça va.’ He lowered the barrel which although empty was still heavy and he and Mike staggered outside to wash it out. There was almost no deposit and Raymond praised the filtration system at the Cave Coopérative. ‘Autrefois,’ he said, ‘C’était plein de peau et de tout.’ It was full of skin and all sorts.
Once the barrel was completely clean they struggled to replace it securely in the cave. Ancient floors of beaten earth are not the most even and each old piece of wood he selected to correct the slope seemed more warped than the previous one but at last Raymond was satisfied. ‘Là!’ he gasped. He replaced the lower bung and lit a sulphur candle which he suspended into the top of the barrel. The pale whisps of sulphur smoke which curled from between the slats made us sneeze and we reeled out into the fresh air until it had burned out. ‘Philippe won’t be very pleased when he comes home,’ chuckled Raymond. ‘His room is directly above and it seeps through the floorboards.’
‘He’ll have to sleep with his window open,’ I teased.
‘Jamais,’ cried Raymond. They are as astonished that we sleep with our windows and shutters open as we are that they sleep with everything closed. Perhaps the proximity of their animals has something to do with it.
The barrel disinfected with sulphur, the whole process began again in reverse. This time there was no problem about disturbing any deposit. The wine frothed as it was poured back.
‘In another three years this will be formidable,’ promised Raymond. ‘It already has a little goût de Cahors, don’t you agree!’ We all had another taste just to make sure.
That summer we were inundated by toads. During the day they hid motionless in corners, crouched behind the refrigerator, under the broom or in the wheelbarrow. As dusk fell they emerged in search of food. Their promenade was always in the direction of the pond where, I assume, there were more insects. We watched them pass, dark plodding lumps, totally unperturbed by anything in their path. If you kept still they would walk, cold and heavy, right over your foot.
Adam, our elder son returned. Bel-Air, we were pleased to see, had become a part of his life too. He spent several days in the attic wiring the rest of the house. It was a great pleasure to be able to read in bed. As a present he had brought a spotlight which he sited discretely on the porch, angling it to illuminate our bottle collection. There were those bottles marked CAIFFA and I still did not know what they had contained. Larousse simply stated that Caiffa was the ancient spelling of Haifa. Once again it was Grandma who gave us the answer. Caiffa was a company, a little like Kleeneeze, with travelling salesmen. It was based in Paris and sold almost everything, and gave stamps with each purchase. Another search in Anaïs’s hat box produced a catalogue. Les Etablissements de Caïffa for 1927. Grandma turned the pages nostalgically. ‘I remember when the Caiffa man came on horseback,’ she said, ‘with all his wares in two great pannier baskets. We used to run to meet him. How we looked forward to his coming.’
Many of the bottles had contained Seidlitz powders and Anaïs had also kept a small brochure written in 1933 by Doctor Berchon, whose precept for a healthy life was as follows: Il suffit d’avoir la tête fraîche, les pieds chauds, et le ventre libre. All you need is a cool head, warm feet and an uncluttered stomach.
After giving a lurid description of the dangers of self-poisoning by constipation, the learned doctor continues by extolling the virtues of Le Seidlitz Charles Chantaud which should be taken by anyone wishing to achieve an advanced age. It certainly seems to have done Anaïs no harm as she lived to ninety-two. A combination of magnesium sulphate, tartaric acid and bicarbonate of soda, it was said to purify the blood. M. Chantaud’s success lay in his having found a way of transforming the remedy into granules which, packed in glass bottles would, unlike mineral water, keep indefinitely. ‘For thirty years,’ continues the enthusiastic Dr Berchon, ‘Le Seidlitz Chantaud has helped to cure migraine, gout, rheumatism and piles. From the salon to the theatre. At the ball. In the shop or studio it is now pronounced the King of Laxatives!’
That summer I began to work in earnest on my south-facing terrace outside the main bedroom door. The last strand of chicken wire removed and the ground fairly level, the problem had been the waist-high weeds which seemed to take me all the Easter holiday to clear, only to be back even more thickly when we returned in July. At last I did what I should have done to begin with, and weed killer and black plastic had resulted in a beautifully bare patch of ground. My terrace could now begin to take shape.
M. René tried to convince me to pave it with des pierres d’Allemagne, a machine-cut paving which is quite pleasing and has the advantage of being level. I, forever stubborn and in any case unimpressed by his aesthetic judgement, wanted to create a terrace which would look more integral with both the house and the garden. I had seen old terraces made of the local pierres du Lot and that was what I wanted.
A few kilometres outside the village M. René stores his building materials. Yes, he did have some of the great stones, if that was what we wanted. He explained to me how to cut them with a hammer and cold chisel and how to bed them in sand. ‘C’est du travail!’ he said. I couldn’t wait to start. Back and forth we went with the van, disturbing the basking lizards as we loaded sand and stones. You could tell at once which stones would split and where to place the chisel, and many of them contained fossils. Apart from helping me collect the materials Mike left me to it, thinking I would never finish it. My terrace took me three holidays to complete and I enjoyed every moment. I filled all the rough joins with a pale cement containing plenty of lime and smoothed it to leave the stones standing proud. I curved the edge into the grass and now it looks as though it has always been there. Of course it will never be as level as if I had used prefabricated slabs and each year I must repair a few joins or remove the odd weed, but my pierres du Lot are beautiful and change colour to a soft rose-beige when it rains.
My worst enemy in the garden is la taupe, the mole. Watering our grass simply provides him with damp earth in which to frolic. My lawn reduced to an uneven sponge, he finds himself beneath the terrace where he carelessly hurls up a stone or two before careering on under the flowerbed. Grandpa, muttering, sets his traps to no avail and I console myself by letting the mole do the digging and using the earth he provides to fill my flowerpots.
This summer our campsis radicans or American Trumpet Creeper, which two years previously we had planted as a straggly small shrub against the south-facing wall, finally climbed to the roof and we counted thirty-five scarlet blooms. I wonder why this spectacular climber is not more common in England as it can survive extremely cold winters.
On warm evenings in high summer, after eating outdoors on whichever side of the house takes our fancy, we sometimes stroll down the track and turn into the lane which winds to the village. The heat still rises from the tarmac and in the shrilling of crickets we eventually arrive opposite the church where the old ladies sit. All grandmothers, except poor Thérèse who lives in the Presbytery and must wear a wig for she is bald, they talk of gardens and grandchildren. Thérèse suffers from an incurable disease rather like leprosy and her deformed hands must be dressed each day by the nurse. Gaunt, mutilated, but uncomplaining she sits between the others as they discuss le kiwi which Mme Laval has planted this year. It will be three years before it fruits and we know whether or not it was a good idea. ‘On verra,’ Mme Laval shrugs and smiles, ‘et comment ça va les fils?’ They always want to know how Adam and Matthew are. Usually someone is knitting for a new
baby. ‘Bonne nuit,’ they chorus sweetly as we at last continue up the street to visit M. René.
His door is open and Simone, his wife, is shelling white beans for bottling. They are called locally les cocos and her washing-up bowl is almost full with these gleaming pearls, every shade from palest green to a subtly mottled silvery white. Delicious, especially in a tomato and onion sauce, the aftereffects are sadly the same as with all beans, what Grandpa calls la musique des pauvres!
In a chair by the open door sits M. Benoît waving both arms in a flurry of greeting. He is seventy-four but looks much older, with baby soft, silvery hair which fluffs from under his beret, and a toothless smile. The watery blue eyes widen when he sees that we have brought sweets and he takes one eagerly in his long, pale fingers, flat and so soft with beautifully shaped nails. Making breathy high-pitched sounds he sucks the fruit jellies noisily. He smiles. He wants to thank us but cannot and suddenly his eyes fill with tears. M. Benoît is dumb but not deaf. Born into a time and place where speech therapy was unheard of, he gave up trying to talk when his early efforts were ridiculed. Unmarried, he lived alone in a small house just outside the village where he cultivated a patch of land and was independent until his health and strength at last failed.
It was then that M. René and his wife took him in under an agreement called rente viagère. It is, in effect, a life annuity contract still quite common in rural France. An old person without relatives to care for them may make a contract with a friend or neighbour to be looked after and supported financially until they die, in exchange for their property. When I first heard of it I wondered whether it might be open to abuse, but as Mme Rene said, ‘if anything were to happen to old Benoît I would be the first suspect.’
A House in the Sunflowers Page 10