We were a quiet trio on the few more miles. I think even Lisette understood that something had gone wrong for she was very quiet and sat clutching my hand in her small one and didn’t speak until we stopped on the side of the river Vienne to gaze at the beautiful mediaeval town across the water.
“Chinon,” said Étienne and at that moment a shaft of sunlight broke through the clouds and lit up the creamy stone walls of the rambling chateau and the higgledy roofs of the town below it. The scene could have been taken from Lisette’s book of fairy tales.
“Oh, it’s lovely,” I breathed and my heart lifted and stayed that way for the rest of the day.
I bought a little guide book in a paper shop and used it to take us to the various historic sites and we walked and walked. We went up and down the narrow crooked streets, where the balconies of stone and wooden houses flourished with bright geranium and tomato plants, through open squares with their statues and fountains until I found the place where Jeanne d’Arc had drunk from a well.
“It must have been here,” I said, really to myself, for Étienne and Lisette were no longer interested. I was studying my little guide book.
“I think it was, my child. On this very spot.”
When I looked up I found I was standing next to an elderly nun dressed in full robes with a broad starched white headdress.
“Good afternoon, ma soeur.” Étienne removed his cap and Lisette bobbed a little curtsey. I stood awkwardly, like the Protestant English school girl that I was.
“Monsieur,” she nodded to Étienne. “These are your daughters?”
“No.” He touched my arm. “This young lady is a visitor from England.”
She turned her head to look at me. “Saint Joan would not be a welcome addition to your history, perhaps.”
I was a bit taken aback and wondered how to answer her. The English had, of course, burnt Joan at the stake but I thought of Miss Baxter and our lessons and said, “It was a long time ago. Perhaps we weren’t as…compassionate as we are now.”
“Nicely answered,” she smiled. “How old are you, my child?”
“I’m sixteen.” I wondered why she’d asked because this was exactly the same question M. Hubert had posed.
“Ah,” the nun said, “exactly the same age as the Maid when she came here, to Chinon, to speak to the king. So young and yet…” She crossed herself then moved closer to me so that her broad headdress almost filled the space between us and while Étienne and Lisette watched she brought up her hand and made a cross on my forehead with her thumb.“God bless you.”
“Oh!” Lisette, who was holding my hand, jumped up and down with excitement. She loved displays of religiosity.
The nun looked down at her. “Pretty child,” she said and turned to Étienne. “Another visitor?”
There was a pause and I felt my stomach tighten.
“No,” he said at last, putting a protective hand on Lisette’s head. “This little one is my daughter.”
I wasn’t able to take in the import of that statement properly because as the nun made her blessings and farewells Lisette pulled on my hand. “Can we stop walking now, please Eleanor,” she begged.
“Yes, of course,” I said. “Are you tired?”
“Mm,” she nodded, “and thirsty.”
“Well,” Étienne indicated a café with a board outside offering snacks, “let’s go there.”
It was while we were sitting at the café eating smoked ham baguettes that I spotted a shop selling ladies clothes. I’d torn my Aertex shirt while I was working in the vineyard and although Grandmère had mended it, the repaired shoulder seam and the tear across the sleeve seemed to stand out every time I put it on. I needed something else to wear.
Leaving Étienne drinking cold beer in the café, Lisette and I walked across the road to the shop. I saw the dress I wanted in the window before we went in and to my delight it fitted me perfectly when I tried it on. It was cotton, with cap sleeves, a square neck and a gathered waistline above a pretty full skirt. But it was the pattern that I fell in love with. Small flowers, pinks, blues and lilacs, the colours of sweet peas, were scattered across a cream background. I’d never seen anything like it and certainly never imagined that I would be able to buy it. I knew Suzy would think it unsophisticated and Mother would hate it. Far too colourful for her and terribly rough cotton. “Uh,” she would sniff. “It looks like it’s made from old kitchen curtains.” But how would she know? We didn’t have any kitchen curtains. In our house only the bedrooms had curtains.
“How much?” I asked the shop girl nervously, convinced I wouldn’t have enough money but egged on by Lisette who pronounced it delicious, I’d bravely enquired.
To my astonishment it was cheap, so cheap that I had enough left from my holiday money to buy it and have some left over. Oh, I loved that dress, loved the brightness of it, loved the fact that it had been bought in such a beautiful place and most of all, loved that it made me feel French. I kept it for years after.
“Eleanor’s bought a dress,” said Lisette, importantly when we rejoined Étienne. “I helped to chose it.”
“Now, let’s buy something for you,” I said to Lisette. “What would you like?”
“Er…not right now,” said Étienne. “I’ve seen something I need to get. Do you mind waiting for me?”
While we waited Lisette had an ice cream and I another citron pressé until Étienne appeared carrying a large box. He looked hot and sweat stood out on his forehead and trickled down his bare arms.
“Christ, it’s heavy,” he said.
“What is it?” I was hopping up and down almost as badly as Lisette.
“Wait and see.”
We were quiet on the drive home, Étienne and I both silent, looking ahead at the road while Lisette leant against me, fast asleep. I thought about Chinon and the pretty streets and squares and about the nun and her blessing but mostly about the dress I’d bought. I preferred not to contemplate Fontevraud too deeply.
“I’ve been thinking about Robert Brissac.” Étienne said, as we passed Saumur.
“What about him?” I asked reluctantly. Was he going to grumble at me for making him go to Fontevraud?
“I need to see him again. I need to ask him something.”
“What?”
He shrugged. “This and that.”
We arrived home as the sky darkened for night, turning into the yard quietly happy and exhausted. Lisette still asleep, had to be gently woken.
“Oh, I’ve had such a nice day,” she murmured sleepily but when Grandmère came out to welcome us home she woke up properly and chattered about everything and nothing like a little starling.
“Did you see everything you wanted?” Grandmère asked while we were in the kitchen. She had prepared a simple platter of shrimps and salad which with bread and wine and made an appetizing meal. We were to eat it in the kitchen too as she thought we’d be too tired to wash and tidy up before supper.
“Yes, oh, yes,” I said. “Chinon is wonderful and I bought a dress. I’ll show you later.” I went to the pantry for the bowl of mayonnaise and put it on the table. “The only thing was, Étienne took us to Fontevraud. It upset him.”
We were alone, Étienne had gone to check on the cattle and Lisette had done one of her usual disappearing acts. “Oh dear,” said Grandmère. “That place has unhappy memories for him. I shall never forget the day that Robert Brissac was released. Étienne went to get him and had to take him immediately to the hospital in Saumur. He’d been tortured and starved and was only just clinging to life. And it was Étienne who had to tell him that his wife had been taken away and shot.”
No wonder he’d been so upset, I thought, then I remembered what he’d said after. About facing one’s terrors and how it might have been a good thing. I didn’t have a chance to say that to Grandmère because Étienne came in then and Lisette appeared from the hallway and we sat down to eat.
“I’ve got something for you,” Étienne said to Lisette l
ater while we were clearing away the supper plates.
“Me, Papa?” Lisette’s face was shining. “Oh, oh!”
“Wait here.”
It was the large box he’d carried through Chinon that he put on the kitchen table and while Lisette wriggled in excitement and Grandmère and I looked at each other in amazement, he pulled away the string holding it shut and like a magician getting a rabbit out of a hat, he produced a wooden doll’s house.
Lisette’s mouth was open but no words came out and maybe mine was hanging open too. Perhaps unnerved by our silence, Étienne delved further into the big box and while we watched pulled out further small boxes which contained the doll’s house furniture and the inhabitant dolls themselves.
We were all stunned. It was a wonderful present but nobody could speak, we just sat there staring at it until Étienne, throwing himself back onto his chair, muttered uneasily, “well say something. Is it alright?”
Lisette broke the silence. She jumped up and rushing over to Étienne, wrapped her arms around his neck and hugged him. Then she pressed little kisses his cheek. “Thank you, Papa,” she said breathlessly. “Oh, thank you, thank you. It’s the best present I’ve ever had.”
Later, when the doll’s house had been carried up to Lisette’s room and she’d fallen asleep with the tiny girl occupant doll in her hand, I went back down to Grandmère’s parlour. I wasn’t ready for bed although I’d walked for what felt like miles and seen both wonderful and disturbing sights. She was sitting at her table with the cards laid out on the plush cloth. I went to sit opposite her and rested my head in my hand.
“What can you see tonight? I asked
“I’m not sure.” She turned over another card and frowned. “It’s confusing, contradictory. I’ll try another pattern.”
The cards were shuffled and as I watched she started to lay them out again in a wider pattern. She was absorbed in her task, carefully placing each card after another, her belief in the prophecy of the cards seemingly never wavering. I wondered for a moment if she really believed in what she was doing but only for a moment. She never doubted the cards.
“Will they tell you about Mathilde?” The words came out of my mouth in a rush and I had no idea why I’d said them. There’d been no mention of her or M. Hubert all day and it was as if that terrible event had happened long ago to someone we barely knew. It seemed that Mathilde and Jean Paul were being wiped from the consciousness of Riverain and life was going on in a hugely improved way. We were happy, all of us and strangely unconcerned about the police investigation; we were as content as those regal figures on the tombs, having somehow atoned for our sins and facing an eternity of peace.
But I must have been thinking about her somewhere deep inside me or I would never have said what I did. “I’m sorry,” I muttered. “I don’t know why I said that.”
Grandmère’s hand hovered over the complicated arrangement of cards she was making. “What d’you think the cards will tell us about Mathilde?” Her voice had the tiniest edge of steel, perhaps a warning.
“Nothing. I don’t know,” I said hurriedly. Then, “sorry,” again.
She wouldn’t look at me and I squirmed in my seat feeling like a stupid child. Eventually she raised her eyes and gave me a little smile. “I think we’ll concentrate on the living,” she said and gathering up the scattered cards, shuffled them briefly then handed the pack to me. “You deal them out, nine cards, three by three. Let’s see what will happen to you.”
On that hot night in her airless little room I watched as Grandmère turned the cards over one by one and muttered out my fate. I didn’t understand her vaguely worded predictions then, but later, much later, sitting in the cheerless kitchen of my home on the hill while the February snow lapped against the window, I remembered what she’d said and gripped my book tighter, trying not to cry.
Chapter 21
I went to bed then, saying goodnight to Grandmère as she put the cards away in her cabinet, my head a whirl of confusion as I tried to understand the meaning of her words. She must have realised I was uncomfortable for she smiled and came over to kiss me on both cheeks. “Don’t worry, child. It will all work out with a bit of help.”
My room was so hot, even though the shutters had been closed all day and the windows behind them thrown wide open. I undressed and tried on again the dress I’d bought in Chinon. I still loved it and carefully taking it off, hung it in the cedar wardrobe. My nightdress was hanging on a hook behind the bathroom door and I stared at it, reluctant to put it on. The tear had been mended and it had been washed several times since that night when Jean Paul had tried to… but it was a reminder and I didn’t like it.
I got into bed naked, stretching my arms and legs out to the corners, exulting in the feel of the cool sheet against my body. I pushed away the duvet and let what little air there was in the room touch my flesh. It was the coolest I’d felt all day and I waited tiredly for sleep to cloud over me.
Images of the day in Chinon flitted across my mind. The pretty streets and squares and the nun talking to us. Then I thought of Étienne buying a present for Lisette, the child of his wife’s German lover. Why had he done that? No wonder Grandmère and I had been astonished.
Fontevraud then came into my mind and I shifted uncomfortably on the bed. How could I have known, I muttered to myself. It’s not as if anyone had told me. And I felt quite cross with Étienne and Grandmère for not explaining the real reason for us not going there.
Finally I thought of Grandmère and the cards and tried to work out what she’d meant as she told me my fate. ‘A change is coming to us all, very soon. And sadness and heartbreak. You, Eleanor, will never be the same again.’
I supposed she meant that I was going to leave this beautiful place, go home to all the trouble that awaited me, with Mother recovering from her illness, scornful of my attempts to look after her and Dada, poor Dada, totally disorientated. However would I manage? I groaned silently. The prospect was depressing.
Then another thought consumed me. Maybe her prediction had to do with Mathilde? Sadness and heartbreak? Oh, God! Somebody in the household will be arrested and charged with her murder. Others would be accessories to that murder…even me. I thought of M. Hubert threatening the guillotine, his obvious pleasure at the idea and his reptilian eyes glittering as he stared at me. My stomach curdled and all thoughts of sleep were gone.
I sat up, my body now damply warm and took a deep breath. The room was stifling or perhaps I felt that I was being stifled by the myriad of thoughts that were invading my head. It was no good, despite my tiredness, I would never sleep and I got out of bed and pulled the hated nightdress off the hook. If I was going downstairs I would have to wear something and this was the coolest article of clothing I possessed.
The back stairs creaked as I walked down and I paused in the kitchen, listening for sounds of somebody waking up but there were none and I opened the door and walked out into the yard.
In the distance, towards the south, I could hear the faint rumble of thunder and when I looked in that direction I saw the brief flashes of lightning. That was Étienne’s predicted storm, not here yet but on its way and hopefully bringing relief from the hot breathless days we’d endured over the last weeks.
I walked onto the bridge and stood, leaning against the mended rail, listening to the faint slap of the river as it splashed against the posts beneath me and the occasional plop of a fish jumping out of the water. Another faint rumble of thunder; the leaves on the willow trees rustled as the beginnings of a breeze moved through them and I felt the cooler air on my face. It was bliss.
“You can’t sleep, ma chérie?” Étienne had walked onto the bridge. He was barefoot and bare-chested and I held my breath and waited. He had called me ‘his darling’ so that when he strode forward and took me in his arms, I was ready.
Now when I think of that night, oh, so many years ago, I smile. What we did was natural, no shame to be attached, just two people who wanted and m
ore importantly, needed, each other. Besides, I was in an enchanted place and nothing I did there could ever be wrong.
“Come,” he said after a while and led me back across the bridge to the river bank where the grass was cool on my back when he lay me down. My lips felt bruised from his kisses and my whole body throbbed with anticipation. I knew what he was going to do and eager as he, pulled him down on top of me.
“Oh, mon Dieu,” he said afterwards, his breath ragged, “you are my heart.”
I loved that. His heart. And he was mine.
He sat up on one elbow. “Did I hurt you?” he murmured, his voice choking with emotion. “I didn’t think, before…”
“No,” I said. He had, of course, but it didn’t matter and the next time it didn’t. “I wanted you to do it.”
His arms were around me again and I curled my body into his. The hated nightdress had been torn off in our passion and he too was naked. I could feel his body throughout the length of mine, the muscles rippling beneath his glistening skin, his strength, his power. He was everything a man should be, the personification of all the romantic heroes of the novels I’d read alone in my cold bedroom. Experiences crashed around me, first love, the feel of a man’s body and, perhaps the least regarded, loss of virginity. I was almost overwhelmed.
The thunder was closer and with every louder rumble the lightning grew more intense. I felt a drop of rain and then another and soon we were being pelted with heavy drops which soaked our hair and our glowing bodies and made us laugh out loud.
Étienne took my hand, pulling me upright and we ran along the river bank and across the yard to the kitchen door. “Shush,” he whispered as we crept up the back stairs but I wanted to laugh again and when he threw me on the iron bed and made love to me once more I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry.
When I Was Young Page 23