The Tin Snail

by Cameron McAllister

  “How else are we going to deliver the post?” Bertrand replied. “Everyone ready?”

  I wiped my goggles and gave the thumbs-up, while Benoît took a large swig of wine for courage.

  Taking a deep breath, my father made the sign of the cross, then floored the pedal as hard as he could. As the car began its approach, Bertrand leaned across and shouted over the noise.

  “If you could try not to break any more of her eggs, I’m sure Marguerite would be grateful.”

  “It’s our necks I’m trying not to break,” Papa shouted back.

  In a matter of seconds the iron bridge rushed up and the front wheels connected. But as the car thundered onto the metal sheets, I heard the wooden structure start to groan, its timber supports complaining under the unexpected weight.

  Suddenly the groaning was joined by another noise; something far more sinister. Eyes bulging, I realized that it was the sound of the woodwork starting to splinter. A second later a huge crack echoed out, then another. One by one, the wooden stanchions holding up the bridge were beginning to shear clean through.

  A few seconds more, and we would have been across. My knuckles went white as my nails dug into the leather seat, willing the car forward.

  The bridge was imploding in front of us. The only thing still carrying us forward was the sheer momentum of its collapse.

  For a moment the car was teetering, suspended in midair, before its nose finally crunched into the snowy bank on the other side.

  My father’s foot pressed frantically against the metal of the footwell as he urged the car up the icy slope. But it was no use. The wheels spun hopelessly, churning up the mud.

  “Out, all of you! Quickly!” he cried, yanking on the handbrake.

  I leaped over the side of the car, clutching both chickens, while Bertrand and my father bundled the farmer and his wife out of the backseat. Abandoning the tray of broken eggs, we scrambled up the slope and turned, panting, to survey the car, marooned behind us.

  As we watched, powerless, it slid back into the stream, before finally coming to rest on the bottom, the freezing water lapping over the tops of its doors.

  “The post!” I spluttered. “We have to save it!”

  But it was too late. Armfuls of the stuff were already floating freely down the river, joined by a little flotilla of broken eggshells.

  “So, who’s for another sightseeing trip tomorrow?” Bertrand asked, trying to thaw the frosty atmosphere at dinner that evening.

  “In what, exactly?” Christian asked a little petulantly. “You sank my last car.”

  Another gloomy silence descended on the room. I slurped my soup as quietly as I could, watching my mother dart another scornful sideways glance at Papa.

  Bertrand, in her eyes, could do no wrong, but my father was an entirely different matter. Ever since we’d made it back after our disastrous attempt to deliver the post, Maman had been berating him for trying to drown me, as she claimed.

  She finished her dinner and folded her napkin neatly. “I for one will be going on only one trip tomorrow,” she announced crisply. “Straight back to Paris.”

  Bertrand reached for his pipe again. “Well, I’ll be sorry to see you go, my dear, but we’ll be sure to take good care of Angelo.”

  My mother threw a stern look at him. “Angelo will be coming home with me.”

  My spoon landed in my bowl with a loud clank, splashing soup down the napkin tucked into my collar. “P-please,” I stammered. “I—I can’t go back.” I turned pleadingly to Bertrand. “Can’t I stay?”

  My mother scowled at me. “To catch pneumonia or drown? It’s out of the question.”

  But Bertrand put a gentle hand on her arm. “Let him stay a few days longer. I’ll make sure he comes to no harm,” he promised, before adding sheepishly: “No more harm.”

  She bristled before finally relenting. “Very well. But only until Sunday. Not a day longer.” Then she marched out of the room and headed upstairs to pack her bags.

  The following morning, Friday, I watched the porter load my mother’s cases onto the train in Boutonne, twenty kilometers away. She and Christian were taking the first available service back to Paris. Victor had arranged for one of the town hall chauffeurs to ferry us to the station and back—no doubt to try and impress us, or at least Bertrand, whom he clearly revered.

  As my mother stiffly kissed my father goodbye, I thought she looked sad, mournful almost. Usually she looked plain irritated, but this was different. I couldn’t work out if it was because she knew there was no hope now for their marriage—or whether there was another reason.

  The previous night, as I dawdled on my way up to bed, I’d heard Bertrand and Papa out on the gravel.

  “Don’t worry about Christian,” Bertrand was saying. “I’ll see to it he’s given another sports car to make up for the one I lost him in the river. In the meantime I’ll need to head back to Paris myself in the next day or so. The board have summoned me to another emergency meeting.”

  “To decide my fate?” my father asked gloomily.

  “Actually, it’s to decide what to do about the factory.”

  I suddenly froze. Surely the factory wasn’t going to close as well? But as hard as I tried, I couldn’t make out what Bertrand said next. It seemed to be something about the Germans, but for once it wasn’t about Dr. Ferdinand Porsche. It was about Adolf Hitler, the German Chancellor. Before I could hear any more, Maman found me on the stairs and shooed me off to bed.

  Now, standing on the platform as she was about to leave, I couldn’t shake the feeling that what my father had been whispering about had something to do with my mother’s sad expression.

  I watched her hold out her hand delicately for Bertrand to kiss, but he brushed it aside and caught her up in his long arms, all but knocking her hat off. It struck me suddenly how young she looked again, almost vulnerable. Then she turned to me and I braced myself for a lecture on how to dress appropriately.

  To my surprise, it didn’t come. Instead she clasped me to her and kissed me wetly on the cheek in a way she hadn’t since I was a small boy. When she looked at me, her eyes were glistening with tears. In that moment I realized she was more than just sad to leave me. She was frightened.

  “Be careful. No more postal deliveries,” she said, before adding, “And enjoy yourself.”

  I was suddenly thrown. It was the first time she’d ever said anything like that. She was always on at me to work harder, to behave with more decorum.

  Christian was now gripping my father’s hand vigorously. “Next time I see you we may be designing tanks.”

  “Never,” my father retorted proudly. “Christian Silvestre and Luca Fabrizzi will only ever create works of engineering genius for beautiful people.”

  Christian jumped aboard and joined my mother at the window as the train pulled out.

  As I waved goodbye, I had the strange sensation that nothing would ever be quite the same again. Things had changed already—the very fact that Maman had allowed me to stay behind without her—but something else was nagging at me.

  I turned to Papa. “What did Christian mean about designing tanks? Has it got something to do with the factory?”

  For a moment he looked awkward.

  “Nothing.” He shrugged. “Just a joke.”

  A little later I sat with him and Bertrand in Victor’s bar, staring out at the half-melted snow. Dominique, Victor’s wife, emerged from the back with our drinks. Slim as a reed, with her long auburn hair tied securely, she was wearing a plain, muted dress with a baggy cardigan pulled round her, almost as if she wanted to cover up as much of herself as she could.

  As she brought our drinks to the table, I wondered if she’d picked up on our glum mood, because she slipped a small plate of almond macaroons onto the table.

  My father’s eyes lit up with delight. “I see the delivery van has been repaired.”

  “Oh, these aren’t from Boutonne,” Bertrand corrected as he cleaned his glasses for th
e umpteenth time that morning. “Dominique makes them herself. She’s quite the expert confectioner. You should try her praline truffles.”

  My father and I exchanged a look of astonishment before falling upon the macaroons greedily. As the almond crust crumbled in my mouth, I felt the gooey center melt like butter on my tongue.

  I could tell that Papa was thinking the same as me: was it possible they were even more delicious than the ones from the pâtisserie across the road from the factory?

  We’d hardly had time to savor our macaroons before Victor was making a beeline for our table.

  “I trust you are enjoying the little amuse-bouches I sent over,” he said, nodding to the crumbs on the plate.

  Bertrand smiled back. “It’s only a shame we won’t be staying long enough to enjoy more of Dominique’s creations.”

  “Ah,” Victor sighed, with a glint of amusement in his eye. “So you won’t be delivering the post on a regular basis?”

  I saw my father’s jaw tighten at what he took to be a sly dig, but Bertrand was quick to keep things amiable.

  “So you heard about our little adventure with the bridge?”

  “I’m afraid the whole village is talking about it.” Victor smirked. “I believe some of the mail even washed up in Bordeaux. Perhaps we should float it down there more often,” he quipped, before heading back to the bar.

  “Ignore him,” Bertrand urged my father, seeing him bristle. “I told you, he means no real harm.”

  “But what about tomorrow’s post?” I asked. “How will it be delivered if the postman’s bike is broken and the donkey refuses to budge?”

  “They could always use the lawn mower,” Papa replied.

  “Of course!” I cried, seizing on the idea. “We could fix some kind of trailer behind it. Then we could give the farmer and his wife a lift as well.”

  “What they really need’s a tank,” my father grunted unhelpfully. “Mind you, there should be a few of those before long.”

  This time I wasn’t going to be fobbed off so easily. “Why do you keep talking about tanks?” I demanded.

  My father and Bertrand exchanged an awkward glance before Bertrand cleared his throat uneasily.

  “What your father isn’t telling you is that there may be a war.”

  I went cold.

  “It may never happen,” Bertrand reassured me, but I could see that Papa wasn’t so sure.

  “Will you have to fight?” I asked him warily. “If it comes to it?”

  “It depends whether the French want me to. If the Italians side with Hitler, I could be the enemy,” he answered darkly.

  Before I could ask any more questions, a young lad of about sixteen entered the café carrying a large school satchel. He was broad and physically strong, his muscular arms squeezed into school clothes that he’d long outgrown. Victor greeted him warmly, slapping him on the shoulder, then brought him over to meet us.

  “Monsieur Hipaux, you’ll remember my son, Philippe?” he said proudly.

  “Of course.” Bertrand smiled and shook the boy’s hand. “Though it’s been a few years. You’ve grown.”

  “Philippe is studying to be an engineer. Perhaps you’ll want to employ him in your factory one of these days?”

  “You should all come up to the house for dinner, and Philippe can tell me all about his studies,” Bertrand suggested, out of politeness.

  But Victor’s eyes lit up immediately. “We’d be delighted,” he said, turning to Philippe. “Wouldn’t we?”

  Philippe nodded curtly without smiling. Clearly the idea didn’t excite him. I couldn’t pretend I was looking forward to it much either.

  Dinner that evening never seemed to end. Victor droned on interminably about all his ambitions for Philippe. If war broke out, his son’s career would be best served in the engineering corps or logistics, he insisted: somewhere that would further his prospects once any possible conflict was over.

  Philippe, however, had other ideas.

  “I don’t want to further my career,” he said with a scowl in a rare moment of defiance. “I want to serve my country by joining the air corps.”

  “Nonsense,” Dominique reprimanded him gently. “You’re far too young for talk about signing up.”

  Now that the conversation had come round to flying machines, I began to wake up.

  “Didn’t you fly for the air corps during the war?” I asked Bertrand.

  “Monsieur Hipaux won no less than the Military Cross,” Victor announced loftily—a fact I was already aware of since Bertrand had let me look after his medal in my top drawer at home. “But I’m sure you’d agree,” he went on, “that your career would have been far better served had there never been a war.” He looked to Bertrand for support, but he wasn’t about to get it.

  “Actually, I think it was essential. It taught me to take risks. Which is something no formal training can teach you.”

  “I suppose Monsieur Fabrizzi here had no formal training either?” Victor asked with a hint of sarcasm, glancing across at my father. “Sorry, Signor Fabrizzi,” he corrected. I wondered if he was making some sly dig about my father being Italian.

  Papa smiled coolly. “I prefer Monsieur,” he replied evenly. “And for the record, no, I have almost no formal qualifications whatsoever.”

  Victor gave a loud snort. “You expect us to believe Monsieur Hipaux hired you to design luxury cars with no experience?”

  “That’s exactly what I did!” Bertrand exclaimed. “When I first came across Luca’s work I thought it showed such flair—such a rare gift—that I employed him on the spot.” He smiled at my father. “I’ve never once regretted my decision.”

  There was an awkward silence, during which Camille came in to clear the dishes. Bertrand complimented her on the soup, but Victor showed no such grace, belching through his ferrety whiskers.

  As Camille took the last of the plates, I became aware of Philippe’s eyes following her every movement. A few moments after she left the room, he excused himself and slipped out too.

  “So,” Victor continued, a little sulkily now, “have you come to Regnac to work on a new design?”

  “Actually, I came here to get away from designing cars,” my father replied.

  “After your experience down by the river, maybe you should try your hand at building a boat.”

  Seeing Papa’s volcanic temper about to erupt, I blurted out the first thing that came into my head.

  “I’ve got a much better idea.”

  “Let me guess,” Victor said with a sniff. “A new postal van.”

  “Yes,” I replied, which seemed to take him by surprise. “But not just a postal van. A car that ordinary people can drive.”

  As the words left my mouth, I realized that the idea had secretly been going around inside my head ever since the accident on the bridge. Now, suddenly, it seemed blindingly obvious.

  My father, however, was looking unimpressed. “You think they want one after today?” he scoffed. “I suspect they’ll be too busy laughing at the last one we parked in their river.”

  “But it was the wrong design,” I persisted. “It was too heavy, and the wheels were too hard. If the suspension was softer, like your last design—”

  “My last design is the reason we’re sitting here now,” Papa snapped, pushing his chair back as if to leave the table.

  But Bertrand put a gentle hand on his arm to stop him. “At least hear Angelo out. He may have a point.”

  My father sighed and sank back into his seat as Bertrand nodded at me to continue.

  “In the field—I mean, the test track,” I stuttered. “You said you wanted a car that France had never seen before. Something entirely new.”

  “I did,” he replied uncertainly.

  “Well, can’t you see?” I asked, turning to my father urgently. “This could be it.”

  “And who exactly would buy this car?” he asked. “People like that old farmer, Benoît?”

  “Yes,” I cried, warming
to my theme now. “If it was cheap enough.”

  At that Victor guffawed. “Better make it simple enough for his wife to drive, then. Because he spends most of his time in my bar.”

  “Perhaps Marguerite would like to drive it,” Dominique suddenly chimed in. “I know I would.” She’d been so quiet all evening, I’d almost forgotten she was there (probably because Victor hadn’t stopped gassing on). But now that I looked at her, she seemed different. Her soft hazel eyes, which she normally kept averted, were suddenly gleaming in the candlelight.

  Victor clearly didn’t share her newfound enthusiasm and harrumphed grumpily.

  I turned urgently to Papa. “Please,” I pleaded. “At least think about it. All people have ever done before is build cars for rich people in the cities. But what about everyone else? Why do they have to ride around on donkeys like something out of the Middle Ages?”

  “Because most of them are too poor to afford a car,” Victor told me. “Besides, have you seen the state of our roads?”

  “Then we have to design a car with better suspension,” I insisted. “One that can drive over a plowed field without breaking eggs or spilling wine.”

  Victor nearly choked on his drink. “If you manage that, they’ll call you a miracle worker. We’ll have flocks of pilgrims coming to pay homage to you!”

  A wry smile played on Bertrand’s lips. “You think it can’t be done?” he asked.

  “I think your little adventure on the bridge proved it,” Victor replied.

  “Well, there you are, Angelo,” Bertrand said, winking at me. “You will have to prove the mayor wrong.”

  I suddenly realized that I’d got so carried away with my new idea, I’d completely forgotten about Philippe and Camille. Something about the way he’d pursued her out of the room had made me uneasy. I quickly excused myself, saying I needed an early night if I was going to start work on my design. Then I hurried out.

  To my surprise, there was no sign of either of them in the kitchen. Confused, I headed back into the hallway, only to hear whispering coming from the cellar.

  I made my way cautiously down the steps, my eyes slowly growing used to the gloom. When I finally stepped through the doorway, my skin burned like I’d been scalded.