I woke up during the night with a throbbing head and parched throat. The light from the Easter full moon was streaming through the skylight directly above me, spilling an eerie glow onto the bed and casting lifelike shadows onto the walls. On the polished sideboard there was a tray holding a packet of aspirin, a small bottle of Perrier, a large bottle of rosé, a huge selection of goat’s cheeses and some home-made biscuits. What a way to start the Easter celebrations! I ran a bath and had a large midnight snack. It might have been the moonlight, the rosé or the unfamiliar surroundings, but I was sure I could feel Norman nearby.
In France, the Roman Catholic Easter tradition dictates that church bells are silenced from the night before Good Friday until Easter Sunday. During this time the bells go to Rome to be blessed by the Pope, returning on Easter Sunday so the resurrection of Christ can be proclaimed. In Rome, the bells are laden with chocolate eggs to be taken back and hidden in gardens for children to find. For days Saignon had become strangely quiet without all the bells. They were loud and annoying, but I had become accustomed to the sound.
Our Easter Sunday started with bells pealing from the twelfth-century Roman church next door, mingled with the sounds of uproarious laughter and delighted squeals. I knew two of the loudest voices coming from below; my children were tearing around the garden looking for Easter eggs.
I emerged from my room to find the kitchen table groaning with the Easter decorations that the household had been preparing for over a week. The papier-mâché chickens, the hand-decorated eggs, the biscuits, the cakes were all laid out on a lace tablecloth on the sideboard in the kitchen with a deftness that spoke of Kamila’s flawless Polish style. Only she was capable of giving an event like this an air of easy familiarity, when no doubt it had taken hours of work.
Mimi and Harry had disappeared into another part of the house to watch an American teenage film with the Polish chambermaid. I was off mothering duty for a while longer. I had ruled the roost without anyone’s help for several months now, so it was nice to hand the reins over to other people for a change. I knew they would spend the rest of the day beside the Saignon cemetery with the other village children, playing games that would involve a lot of running, hiding and climbing trees, and resting only for the occasional food and drink stop.
Easter lunch was to start with drinks in the garden, followed by a sit-down meal in the huge dining room. The garden was adjacent to the main building and linked to it by a bridge. It was very private and lush, with old linden trees, abundant cherry trees and grass that was obscenely thick and springy. I had to bend down to check it wasn’t artificial; anything was possible in this fairyland. Harry had already been caught out by a trompe l’oeil when he turned the handle of a door in the corridor expecting to enter his bedroom; instead, the door had remained fast against the wall and the rubber handle had twanged up and down. But that was nothing compared with the installation of modern art outside the children’s door that I mistook for some breakfast china one of them had broken. Kamila had burst into a wonderful trill, clicking her tongue and telling me that the shards of white cups and plates had been artistically arranged on the floor. Didn’t I understand installation art? Obviously not.
Only one glance at the glamorous guests milling around the beautiful garden was needed to imagine that I was in a scene from a sexy French film. The garden table was set with rows of glasses filled with liquorice-flavoured pastis, which, as I was learning, is the elixir of life in Provence. The obligatory three kisses of greeting on the cheeks were exchanged by all, then the pastis was handed around. Since childhood I had pulled all the black jellybeans out of the bag, as they make me feel queasy; liquorice is a taste I’ve never been able to acquire. That is, until it came in the form of pastis, the wonderful clear alcohol that becomes cloudy when mixed with ice cubes and water. Maybe the spring water from the fountain had swayed my taste buds, but I never looked back. It was the taste of Provence, strange and heady; it made me want to stuff myself with black olives marinated in thyme and rosemary oil and rush off to partake in a game of pétanque.
Instead I drifted around chatting to contemporary artists, doctors from Paris, a photographer from Barcelona and a travel writer from New York. These people were seriously interesting, with seriously beautiful clothes: pale linen suits, white cotton shirts, Italian sandals, discreet and expensive watches — and that was only the men. I couldn’t help but make comparisons with Easter lunches I had been to in the past, where the males congregated around a spitting barbecue, hauling up their badly fitting shorts with one hand whilst clutching an icy can of beer in the other. Rugby and cricket were usually the hot topics of conversation, spiced up with some pathetic attempts at lewdness when moving the sausages around the greasy grill.
Meanwhile, the women hovered or glided by in body-hugging garments that accentuated every curve and a distinct lack of fat rolls. I asked myself, how do these French women do it? They are obviously taught from birth that an inordinate amount of time, money and effort must go into presenting the correct look to the world every single day. Clothes must always be feminine, shoes must always be impractical, high-heeled and sombre; they are not like the Italians and Spanish, with their glitter and glitz. Underwear is perhaps the most important factor, as it should always be kept in mind that there is a high degree of probability that it will be seen and admired. The selection that was on show today was unbelievable. Every woman except me had some item of lingerie peeking through or out of a flimsy garment. Underwear is made for outerwear in France.
I decided that I definitely needed to rethink my wardrobe, not to mention my body shape. The fine figure I had wanted to cut wasn’t quite living up to expectations, but since I’d spent most of the previous night engaged in deep discussion with a bottle of rosé, dancing moonbeams and my departed husband, I thought that on the whole I hadn’t scrubbed up too badly. At least the blotches and swellings had subsided a little from around my eyes. I vowed that lunch at Kamila’s would introduce the New Me. I would take small portions and feign satiation and alcohol abstinence, hopefully bypassing the cheese platter that always marked my downfall into gluttony.
The assembled guests were directed back into the house as threatening black clouds began to gather overhead. I was learning about these Luberon cloud formations. They could build up in an instant — bubbling and boiling on the horizon and accompanied by thunder and lightning — then just as quickly disappear, to rain in another part of the valley. There appeared to be no rhyme or reason to where the rain would fall. One fact was certain: it was never where it was needed the most. Only a few days earlier I had overheard women in the bakery chatting about a cold front that was on its way, due to bring an unwanted frost. Little had they realised that the cold would bring with it a major hailstorm, wreaking disaster on the crops.
Ignorant of the impending tempest, we continued with our celebrations, wandering down the polished stairs into the dining room, where delicious fragrances wafted up from the table to greet us. What was cooking? Pierre showed us to our places at the long, grey wooden table, which had been immaculately polished. Antique linen serviettes had been folded and placed on oversized white plates. Every setting included a small spray of flowers and Belgian chocolate Easter eggs. Along the centre of the table was a massive, over-the-top display of flowers bought from the Saturday Apt markets, intermingled with grasses that Pierre had picked from the fields that morning. I immediately moved the vase to the far end of the table, away from me and my nose. Suspended above the table was an old wooden wheel about a metre in diameter, with small circus figurines and animals caught in mid-flight, performing tricks along the rim. Along the pale grey marble mantelpiece were several art pieces constructed from champagne foils (only the best) that looked as though they were escapees from my son’s toy chest: toy soldiers on horses with cloaks stiff in the breeze.
The gathering storm was changing the light and the temperature started to plummet. The fire was lit in the large open fireplace and
immediately the blaze became an intense golden incandescence, sending shadows dancing across the eau-de-nil ochred walls. A tremendous shudder made everyone leap up as the long windows were flung wide open by the wind and the torrential rain began. From my seat at the table I could see the main street of Saignon turn into a raging, dirty river. No doubt Mimi and Harry would soon be scurrying back inside, dripping wet. I hoped the farmers’ wives I met in the bakery would be grateful for this rain, but I doubted this downpour was the soft spring shower they’d been hoping for.
Kamila arrived silently to see whether the rain had touched her voluminous aubergine and gold taffeta curtains. She rearranged the antique tasselled tiebacks and nodded with approval. Everything was under control.
‘Everybody, are you ready? Shall I start serving?’
With that she scooped up the hem of her black skirt and pulled on a cord that immediately transformed it from ankle length to a miniskirt so she could dart back and forth with greater ease. There was a collective sigh of admiration as the secret she had shared only with Pierre was revealed to all: the red lacy tops of her stockings. How could everything not be okay? We were all in paradise. Nobody really cared if we ate or not. The atmosphere was more than perfect, and everyone settled down for a long, pleasurable afternoon with our convivial hosts.
As I observed them, I could see Kamila and Pierre were like Yin and Yang, epitomising the old saying ‘Opposites attract.’ I had to admit I was jealous of their closeness, and of the fact that they had started with nothing and built themselves an enviable lifestyle. I often wondered if I had it in me to construct anything 100 per cent by myself. My relationship with Norman had taught me that it was important to be with someone, but at this stage of my grieving process it was still more important that I learn to deal with things on my own.
But this wasn’t the most important discovery I would make that day.
By the time coffee appeared, conversation had turned to the euro, the new currency that the majority of the French were ready to embrace with stoic acquiescence. The supermarkets were beginning to price everything in two different currencies, to start preparing the French for the big conversion on 1 January 2002. Nobody could really get their minds to divide prices by 6.5; adapting to the new currency was going to be an uphill struggle for many people. Most Europeans had very strong ideas about the effect the euro would have on the economy, and Pierre held court, giving us his views on what we should all be doing. The papers had been filled with stories of old people with hoards of cash hidden under the floorboards, or under the proverbial bed. Across Europe, the problem was the same. In order to change from the old currencies to the new euro, how did one declare this ‘newfound’ wealth to the tax department? The answer was simple: convert it into assets that could be sold once the currency changed over to euros. If Pierre’s predictions were correct, this would result in huge profits after the new currency gained strength.
I kept a very low profile throughout this discussion to avoid sounding gauche and ill informed. The implications of the new euro had not received much press back in Australia before I left, and I still felt completely ignorant about this major change that would soon hit millions of Europeans. I sat at the table in silence and listened intently.
But by the close of Easter Sunday, I had made a decision that would end up changing my life. Within the week I would sell the entire portfolio I had acquired over the past three months. The euro promised to be a much stronger currency than the Australian dollar and I wanted to get in on the action. I had no idea how to go about doing this, but I’d just have to take it one step at a time. Up a ladder. No snakes on the horizon. Full steam ahead.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
‘Veuve Taylor’
I WILL NEVER BE sure of what instinct made me decide to opt out of the market at precisely that time, especially as it seemed I was pushing further and further into very positive territory. All I know is that the lunch at Easter was a turning point. Until then I’d had very few thoughts about what to do with the money I’d made; I wasn’t even sure how much of it there was. When I considered it at all, I’d assumed that it would sit in my bank account in Sydney until Liz Karbowiak advised me to proceed in a particular direction, such as putting it into a fixed investment fund, or perhaps buying a small investment flat in Mosman.
But the lunch at Kamila’s got me thinking seriously about how advantageous it would be to have property not back in Australia, but here in France. Then the day I came to sell I would walk away with the powerful euro rather than the Australian dollar, which was currently languishing around the shirt-tails of the struggling American greenback.
The state of the US economy was something that hadn’t been discussed at the lunch; everyone in France was too caught up with thinking about the euro. But the reports on Bloomberg were all about how the market was wildly overheated and in a state of constant fluctuation. The dot.com phenomenon had had its day and it looked as though the bubble would soon burst. And as the newspapers said, America sneezes and the world catches a cold; the Australian market would follow the same way. It was just a question of time. It wasn’t lost on me that I was playing Russian roulette with the stock market and had little real knowledge of what I was doing. I was an amateur speculator who’d had wonderfully good fortune so far — and I knew this lucky streak could end at any time.
But there were more important reasons for getting out than just financial ones. It was finally dawning on me that I couldn’t continue with my current bizarre lifestyle — speaking to my Sydney broker Liz Karbowiak and surfing the Internet throughout the night like a woman possessed. In the weeks leading up to Easter the children had been pushed rudely out the door first thing in the morning so I could settle bleary-eyed in front of the television, where I would watch the US market in almost vertical ascent all day.
The children and I had come here to be together, and instead I was becoming fanatical about making vast quantities of money. To my distorted outlook, it proved that I was worth something. I was still saturated with the Sydney idea that wealth not only equals status, but also shows what an upright citizen you are. But our lives in busy Sydney had been staid and predictable. Here, in the middle of a quiet medieval village, we were riding a roller coaster and I was standing upright in my seat.
It was definitely time to get onto some safer ground. My mother had always been a firm believer in the old adage that bricks and mortar were better than stocks and shares. I had begun to make a lot of paper money, but it meant very little to me. I preferred things that were more tangible. Buying the house in Mosman had whetted my appetite for wheeling and dealing on the property market; it was something I already knew and enjoyed.
So in the end, the decision to sell the whole of my recently acquired portfolio was simple. I knew it was the right thing. I didn’t want to continue with this folly.
It was very early on the morning of 26 April 2000, three days after Easter Sunday. I rang Liz Karbowiak from the public telephone beside the Saignon cemetery. (Kamila’s house only had one phone line, and guests were encouraged to go elsewhere.) How ironic that here I was dealing with a major life decision, while some German tourist used the public toilets barely two metres away.
The previous day had been Anzac Day: a public holiday in Australia. This meant that the stock market had been closed since before Easter, and very little would happen until the beginning of the following week. Liz had told me time and time again that if I wanted to sell any of my shares I would need to speak to her personally over the phone, and then confirm this via email or a fax and finally in a letter. The bottom line was that the bank required something from me in writing. She advised me to send a letter immediately, and said that on the following Monday she would begin to sell. But she wouldn’t initiate any action until she had heard from me again.
We returned to Place de la Fontaine on the Saturday after Easter. We had been away only a week, but so much had happened it felt like a lifetime. Our weekend was spent unpac
king all the children’s toys and preparing for the return to school on Monday.
Finally, I switched on my laptop and got ready to sell all my recently acquired holdings — and eventually find out just how much money I had made. It was late Sunday night, but already Monday morning in Sydney. I knew that I needed to work with a clear head; a cup of tea was required.
Place de la Fontaine only had one telephone line, but luckily there were two jacks: one downstairs at the foot of the stairs and one beside my bed. During the night, I would turn my bedroom into my work station, with laptop and papers strewn across the bed. The only downside of my ‘office’ was having to go down the steep stairs whenever I needed something from the kitchen. Preparing to make the journey, I slid my slippers on and crunched over to the stairs.
Crunch? What the fuck was that crunch?
I looked under my slipper to see what piece of Lego or plastic miniature weapon had been left lying around near my bed. But it was nothing as mundane as that. I had just trodden on the hard plastic plug that slid into my laptop and made Internet connection possible. Without this tiny piece of plastic there would be no messages going out tonight. Even worse, the fax was in the computer, so I couldn’t receive or send faxes either. Everything would have to wait until the next day.
I tried really hard not to panic, but I could feel my tension mounting. Having made the decision, I felt it was imperative to sell as soon as possible. Something was in the air and I really didn’t like it. The journalists reporting on the US market had been full of doom and woe for weeks. Even to my limited understanding, things were starting to sound dire. I had no idea what a ‘major correction’ meant, but it certainly wasn’t a positive thing.
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