by John Dummer
Helen and I exchanged looks and tried to see how Lorenzo's mum would react. But she hadn't noticed and was leaning back on the garden chair in the sun. Now the girls were coming over holding on to Diddy's arms and she was beginning to show some interest. She peered at them, checking to see who had arrived.
'Uh-oh,' said Helen. 'That's done it.'
The old lady leant forward. She had recognised Diddy all right. Her expression was priceless... changing from mild interest to instant fury. She jumped up and headed for them, shaking her fist and screaming abuse. They saw her coming and Syd and Fabio tried to fend her off, but she grabbed one of the girls by the arm, pulling her away. The other girl tried to drag her back and they all began shouting insults at each other. The commotion brought Lorenzo out from the barn. He stood there amazed, as if he couldn't believe his eyes. He looked at us like we might know what was going on, but we shrugged, disowning it. His mum began shouting across to him, demanding he do something. Serge looked embarrassed.
Lorenzo picked up a heavy hammer and strode purposefully over to the big iron tank. He swung the hammer high and slammed it against the side again and again. The sound was deafening, reverberating like thunder. Everyone stopped in their tracks, swung round and looked in his direction. He stood with hammer in hand like some Old Testament patriarch and when he saw he had everyone's attention he spoke with authority in a low, controlled voice. He ordered his daughters indoors. They sloped off in silent acquiescence.
He turned firstly to Diddy. 'Out of respect to your father I'll say this once. Don't interfere with my girls!' When he turned to Serge his voice was like ice. 'We control our children... you control yours.'
Sheepishly, with heads bowed, we all got on with choosing our furniture.
19
HARES AND GINGERBREAD
It was still proving hard for me to cope with the thought of moving. I loved our old house and the land around it. It had a hold on me and didn't want to let me go, nor I it. So what if it was a bit primitive and I hadn't finished all the work and renovations I had planned? Whenever I stood outside the back door and looked out over the fields across to the village I got a warm feeling. I felt I belonged here.
'Maybe it won't be so bad,' I kept saying to Helen. 'If we grew a tall hedge along the edge, we probably wouldn't see all the new houses.'
'Yes, but how are you going to feel with the fields gone? We'll be remembering how beautiful it was. It will never be the same again.'
I'd eventually come round to Helen's way of thinking. It had gone against the grain, but when it came down to it, as usual, she was right. When I managed to think rationally about it I could see how I would hate it once it all changed. We had decided this time we would try to find a house that needed hardly any work or renovation. As a drummer and a writer I made a lousy builder. I had enjoyed my foray into roofing, plumbing and electrical wiring, but if we could find a place that was habitable and restored, that would be ideal. And a proper bathroom would be nice, not just a bath in the kitchen where you could soak and drink a cup of tea and chat to someone cooking the dinner. I thought it was a great laugh but it was a bit embarrassing when we had guests who weren't so keen on the lack of privacy. Also, I hated to think what would happen if something went wrong and the wiring shorted out. I didn't want to be around when a professional electrician investigated my bodged work and began cursing me as 'that idiot cowboy'.
Helen had taken some flattering photographs of our house, barns and fields and given the details to several estate agents. We realised that no one English would want to buy an old farm in the country with a housing estate about to be built right next door to it, but as we were near Dax it might suit a French couple who wanted to commute to the town for work. We'd had several visits from people looking to buy but so far no offers.
Meanwhile, Helen had been visiting houses on her own, with the two of us returning later to any that might have potential. Buying a restored house in the Chalosse was proving to be too expensive for us. Inspired by our time spent at the Ousse-Suzan fair she began looking in the Landes forest and discovered it was a cheaper area. None of our French friends wanted to move there. Maybe it was too remote. They much preferred the rolling farmlands of the Chalosse or the Atlantic coast. And it didn't seem to appeal to many English people either. Living in the middle of a pine forest possibly wasn't the typical dream of a new life in France. It was much wilder than where we were now.
The Landes forest is massive, one of the largest in Europe. The population has more or less stayed at the same level for the past 150 years. It stretches inland from the Atlantic coast with its miles of sandy beaches and reaches right up to Bordeaux. It was originally a vast boggy moor (la lande means moor in French), unhealthy and inhabited by shepherds who walked about the swampy terrain on stilts tending their flocks. They elevated this stilt-walking to an art and it's still kept alive now by entertaining troupes of performers who give colourful exhibitions of their skills with long stilts strapped to their legs. Unsurprisingly, mosquitoes used to flourish in this wet area and there was malaria here a couple of hundred years ago. The people were sickly and undernourished with a low life expectancy. It was sometimes known as the 'French Sahara' and crossing the moor was dreaded by the pilgrims on the Camino de Santiago de Compostela (Way of St James) in medieval times, who reported they could 'find no bread, no meat, no fresh water'. It was Napoleon III who passed a law in 1857 ordering all the communes of Landes Gascony to drain the Landes and plant pine trees, which had the effect of making the land usable and rich. And today it is a vast shady pine forest populated by deer, wild boar, hare, badgers, foxes, polecats and pine martens. There is even supposedly a species of European wildcat similar to the one in the Scottish Highlands.
One of the estate agents, a sad-faced little man with a grey goatee beard, showed us pictures of several 'desirable properties'. He seemed like a sober, sensitive chap and we agreed to accompany him in his Renault Espace to visit them. This was a mistake. It broke our self-imposed rule of not travelling in cars with French drivers. When we first came to France we had given a lift to a neighbour who complained about our sluggish speed. 'You English, you care too much about life,' he observed. It was a criticism we were willing to accept. From experience we had learnt some time ago not to be passengers with French drivers in their cars. Our nerves weren't up to it. They drove far too fast and recklessly for our Anglo-Saxon sensibilities. Drive along most roads in France and you come across pitiful little bunches of plastic flowers, memorials to the victims of fatal accidents. In some regions they have been running a scheme to illustrate the number of fatal accidents on especially dangerous roads. For every death they place a black cut-out of a human figure with a bright painted lightning flash on the head to indicate where the fatality occurred and smaller ones to denote children. It is chilling to see the senseless loss of life so vividly depicted when you pass one after another of these cut-out figures on a road that has witnessed many fatalities. I was told by a young French friend learning to drive that his instructor insisted he 'drive with punch'. I felt like asking him, what about Judy? But there would have been no point (they don't have Punch and Judy in France, but they do have Le Guignol, which is very similar). Any dawdling by drivers is considered bad form and it is important not to hold up other motorists as they might become irritated and start hooting and gesticulating madly.
No sooner had we fastened our seat belts than the estate agent floored the accelerator and we were pinned back in our seats like astronauts on a moon launch.
We tore out of town and up a road that ran straight through the forest with the trunks of pine trees flashing past and the dappled sunlight shining down through the high branches. A speck appeared in the distance. We found ourselves hazarding a guess as to what sort of vehicle it might be. The road we were on was straight but not very wide. As the speck grew larger we saw with horror that it was a lorry, and as it loomed larger still that it was loaded up with massive pine trees, probably
headed for the nearest wood yard or paper mill. Our driver appeared unperturbed, hugging the centre of the road, refusing to pull over. At the last possible moment, with a quick flick of the wheel, he dodged the oncoming juggernaut, skidding and bucking along the dirt verge, leaving us with our hearts in our mouths. We endured several close calls like this, visiting uninspiring houses tucked away in the deepest parts of the forest. And we began to long for it to stop. But our man pressed on, determined to find something to our taste. He couldn't bear to lose a possible buyer for his enormously inflated fee.
It was late afternoon and we had just about lost hope when he swung off the main road up a winding dirt drive and pulled up outside a pink-walled, half-timbered house with sea-blue shutters and a studded oak door. It was like an Arthur Rackham illustration of a gingerbread house from a Brothers Grimm fairytale, or maybe Snow White's cottage. I looked at Helen in disbelief. Were we dreaming? Was this a figment of our imagination? Would the Seven Dwarfs suddenly appear?
Our man got out of the car and was checking through a bunch of heavy iron keys, searching for the one to open the door. We looked around, enchanted. There was an old mossy stone well with a wooden bucket for drawing the water. The house itself had a higgledy-piggledy tiled roof above the colombage (half-timbering), which was set into the pink stucco walls and curved into strange, compelling shapes like the sides of a galleon. It was captivating. We didn't need to think about it. We were smitten!
'Come on in and have a look inside.' The agent had opened the front door and was beckoning to us. He began throwing back the shutters to let the light in. It was as if we had entered a bygone age. We were standing in a quaintly decorated kitchen with a tiled floor and pink painted beams from which cast-iron pots were suspended in even rows. Against the walls stood a pair of mellow walnut-wood buffets stacked with Samadet-inspired faience plates (glazed earthenware decorated with opaque colours) and under the window there was a long rustic table ideal for preparing or eating meals at. Everything appeared to have been carefully and tastefully chosen to enhance the character of the house. The living room had more oak beams, limed walls and an open cheminée (fireplace) with worn-smooth old elm seats pushed up close to sit near the fire and toast your toes.
'It was originally living quarters for resiniers,' he said. 'They collected resin by making cuts in the trunks of pine trees and bleeding the resin into earthenware pots.'
Whoever had restored this old cottage knew what they were doing. It even had a proper finished bathroom with a bath, basin, bidet and shower. Oh joy of joys! This was real luxury!
But could we afford it? It seemed almost too good to be true, as if it had been waiting empty for us deep in the forest. There must be a catch. Was it owned by a wicked witch or a goblin with an unpronounceable name? Did we have to guess his name to have a stab at buying the place?
'It's owned by a very nice German couple,' said the agent. 'They use it as a summer residence.'
So that was why it was so well restored. The Germans are good at retaining original features and have a knack with country cottages and wood. It turned out that although the price they were asking was a bit of a stretch for us, if we managed to sell our old place we might be able to manage it. On the way back to his office the agent discussed the technicalities and said the German couple were due to visit the following weekend. He could arrange for us all to meet up. That's if we liked the property and wanted to make an offer. We did, we said, and we would. We were trying not to get too excited.
The next day we came back on our own with Buster sitting in the back and drove around, checking out the area. We have moved a few times and had a procedure we tried to follow when we were looking to buy a place. On the first visit if you fall for a house, you tend to miss things, especially if you are charmed by it. It's best to come back at different times of the day without an agent if possible, to get the real feel of the place. You never know, you might turn up a minus you had overlooked, such as a noisy road, a polluting factory or a homicidal neighbour who keeps pigs.
We parked at the top of the drive, clipped Buster's lead on his leather harness and walked down to the house, looking around, drinking in the atmosphere. The tall forest pines ran down to the edge of the grounds, giving way to stately oaks and various exotic trees that had been planted in the clearing. The agent had said the German couple were keen gardeners who spent their holidays working here. They seemed to have transformed this little corner into a walk in the Black Forest.
There was a movement near some rhododendron bushes under the big oak trees. We watched as a large hare hopped out into the open. He was big, much larger than a rabbit, with long ears and a head that had an almost skull-like quality. Hares are embedded in folk myths from cultures all over the world. We had never seen one so close as this before. He stopped, stood up on his hind paws and turned to look straight at us. Buster stiffened, straining at his lead, but the hare wasn't frightened. He watched for a moment, then dropped back on all fours and loped back through the bushes. It was thrilling. His appearance added to the absolutely magical feeling the house gave us. We loved it!
We rang the estate agent and told him we wanted to make an offer. He said he would pass it on to the German couple. Later he got back to us. They had accepted our offer and we arranged to meet them that Sunday.
The studded oak door was opened by a giant of a man in khaki shorts wearing a pink T-shirt that bore the legend 'Onwards Go in a Frostily Direction' on the front in green letters. His hair was cropped short, shaved up the sides and he had a small, square moustache.
Oh dear, I thought... unfortunate moustache!
'Hello, pleased to meet you.' He shook my hand and almost broke my knuckles with a macho squeeze. I hate it when men do that. It seems to be the antithesis of a friendly greeting. He said his name was Berthold and introduced his wife, Frieda. She stepped forward and gave us both kisses on our cheeks. She was blonde, ample-bosomed and wore a tasteful floral print dress. They took us on a guided tour of the house, which they proudly announced was being featured in the next edition of the French interiors magazine Maison et Jardin. They were ecstatic about this. So why were they selling then, we asked.
'It is too much for us now, we are getting old,' Berthold confided. 'We don't have time to keep the garden nice.' He explained to me that they had had a lot of trouble with 'the Seven Sleepers'.
'They build their liddle nests in the loft and make a horrible smell.' He took me out to his workshop and opened a cupboard filled with strange looking intricate wire traps. 'We catch them and take them deep into the forest and let them go,' he explained. 'It is verboten to kill them.'
I wanted to know more about these 'Seven Sleepers'. I had never heard of them.
'Ya, you call them Seven Sleepers in English,' he said. 'They are liddle rodents that sleep seven months of the year. The Romans used to eat them. You must know this word.'
Ah! He meant dormice.
'We don't call them Seven Sleepers,' I said.
'Ah no, you do,' he insisted.
I decided it was a waste of time to argue about it. I'll dump those traps, I thought, as soon as we move in. Although we had been 'townies' just like them, living in the French countryside had altered our view. We found the idea of cuddly, furry little rodents living in the loft quite appealing. We had had swarms of rats at harvest time in Portugal so dormice held no fears for us.
I was amazed at how tidy his workshop was, thinking about the mess mine was in. I'm always impressed by people who keep their things neat and promise myself I'll follow their example and be like that in future, but somehow I never manage it. Berthold took me up into the loft to see where the Seven Sleepers had been making their nests. He said he had removed all the loft insulation because it smelt bad. I was thinking we would have to put a load more in for us and the dormice. We would be living here all year round and the Landes can get very chilly during the short winter.
Berthold and Frieda were pleased we were buying their hou
se but mistakenly believed we were keen gardeners like them. They had passed so many happy hours working in the garden, they said, and spent a good two hours telling us what we had to do and in what season.
'Everyone has been so kind and welcoming to us here,' Frieda said, her eyes filling with tears. I was surprised. This was the total opposite from my perception of how Germans are generally received here in France. Mr Leglise, our neighbour, often made disparaging remarks to me about the Germans. 'Les Bosch occupied us during the war and now we're in the EU they're just coming in and buying us out and acting like aristos,' he moaned. I felt he was qualified to make this complaint. He lost his only son in the army during World War Two. Considering this, his reaction was mild.
The so-called Franco-German alliance doesn't really give the true picture. I hadn't realised just how the Germans were viewed by the ordinary country folk in France until we borrowed a friend's German-registered VW camper for a couple of weeks. The reception we received from our local supermarket petrol station was cold to say the least, and the looks from passers-by were decidedly frosty. In my teens I toured Germany with my band, Lester Square and the GTs, which subsequently broke up over there and I ended up, at one stage, working in the cloakroom of a club in Münster. I had made friends with the young drummer who worked in the club and spent many a happy hour hanging out with the resident group. The drummer's name was Udo Lindenberg and he went on to become one of the most celebrated rock stars in Germany. When I was handing over coats at the end of an evening, half-cut middle-aged German clubbers would embrace me when they discovered I was British, insisting, 'We didn't want to fight you English, you are like us... we never meant to go to war with you.' And I had to admit they had a point. Germans are like us. We understand the German Anglo-Saxon mindset more than the Gallic one. It is much closer to ours. The Saxons were Germanic peoples who invaded England and merged with the Angles and Jutes to become the Anglo-Saxons, so it's hardly surprising we get on.