Chapter 4
Sabrina went back to the realtor’s office the next day and inquired about the photograph in the window.
An older man sitting at a desk rolled his eyes when she asked about it.
He spoke English and was used to foreign tourists.
He told her the chateau had been on and off the market several times in the last few years, and he didn’t know its current status.
The last he’d heard the owners were living there during the pandemic, but that was two years ago and he didn’t know if they still were.
The chateau in the photograph was the Chateau de Bonport.
“It’s newer than some of the others we have listed, early eighteenth-century, and it’s smaller than several others, if you’re looking for something grander.
We have two very large ones too. They’re not expensive but they need a great deal of work.
The Chateau de Bonport is in good condition.
All it needs is a bit of paint and minor repairs.
Maybe they’ve done that by now. It’s between Arcangues and Biarritz.
It’s lovely in the summer, very pretty gardens if you’re looking for a summer home.
” She had no idea what she was looking for, nothing really.
This was not the Paris apartment Malcolm had promised her, but it looked charming and beautiful in the pictures.
“Would you like to see it?” he offered. “I can call and find out if it’s still listed, or currently occupied by the owners or renters.
Things change and people forget to tell us, particularly after all the upheavals of the pandemic. ”
She thought it might be fun to see, and she had nothing else to do.
He called the number he had, and someone told him it was not officially on the market at the moment, but it might be a possibility.
They were open to offers. The realtor volunteered to drive Sabrina to see it.
The owners were apparently in Paris, but the caretaker was authorized to show it, and the realtor said he could discuss the price with the owners later, if she was interested.
The caretaker didn’t know if they would sell or rent it.
The realtor drove Sabrina there himself, so she left her car at his office.
The sun came out while they were on the way from Biarritz to Arcangues.
They passed a monastery with nuns and children outside playing soccer, and Sabrina smiled as she watched them, as one of the children tripped one of the nuns, who was laughing.
“What’s that?” Sabrina asked the realtor about the building where the children and nuns were.
“It’s a convent. It’s been an unofficial orphanage since the pandemic.
There are church services there on Sunday, and many other churches in the area, if you’re Catholic.
The nuns have quite a nice choir with the children, if you like that sort of thing.
The nuns take in as many children as they can.
Some of them lost their entire families, or they’re left with one parent who can’t care for them.
” It sounded sad to Sabrina, and they drove past it quickly toward the Chateau de Bonport.
Three miles outside Biarritz, just before Arcangues, they went down a long driveway with orchards on either side.
There was fruit on the ground, and the orchards didn’t look well tended.
Sabrina wondered if the house had gone to rack and ruin since the photographs.
It was possible. It had been a hard time in France, and everywhere else recently, and maybe the owners were selling because they were out of money.
They followed a bend in the road, and the house came into view.
It was just as lovely as the photograph, and the gardens were only slightly less well tended, but still very handsome.
There were big trees all around the property, and Sabrina could see a long lawn behind the house with more gardens, surrounded by tall trees.
There were several smaller houses on the property, one larger than the others, not too near the main building.
The realtor explained that this was the dower house, where the current owner’s widowed mother usually stayed once her son inherited the chateau after his father’s death, which automatically relegated his mother to the smaller home.
Sabrina was familiar with dower houses from trips to England, where they had the same tradition.
The chateau itself was beautiful, and larger in person than it appeared in the photograph, but it wasn’t enormous or daunting.
It still had the same fairy-tale quality which had attracted her attention and appealed to her.
It was very much of the period and well-preserved despite the sea air.
And it looked just as magical and whimsical as it had in the photograph she had seen the night before in the window.
An old man came toward them when they stopped the car and identified himself to the realtor as the caretaker.
His name was Maxime. He was carrying a huge antique ring of keys, and led the way up the steps to the front door, which had an enormous brass knocker that Sabrina noticed needed polishing.
And when the door opened, she saw ancestral portraits, a long hall, some hunting trophies, and tapestries, some in better shape than others.
The realtor explained, “The French call this in ‘its own juice.’ Everything is original, just the way they inherited it for generations.” The furniture was all antique, the rooms were sunny, and the curtains elegant and a little frayed.
Everything looked well used, a little shabby, but the overall feeling was cozy and inviting.
It looked as though one could be at home there, and obviously people were.
There was a skateboard in the front hall, some tennis rackets, and a set of golf clubs.
The realtor said there was a golf course which encircled the town, if she played golf.
It looked like someone’s home, not a relic of the ancient past or a museum.
Sabrina felt at ease and welcome as soon as she walked in, almost as though the small, pretty chateau put its arms around her and embraced her.
There was evidence that the residents had been using the fireplaces, but the caretaker assured them that there was modern heating and plumbing throughout the house, the pipes were good and the roof was sound, and there were new appliances in the kitchen.
So it had the charm of an old chateau but the convenience of a modern home, one that looked well lived in and a little beaten up.
But something about it touched Sabrina, far more than the fancy apartments she’d been shown in Paris that had no soul.
They were devoid of life and traces of the people who lived there. The chateau looked homey and loved.
They walked through the house to the huge lawn behind it, and Sabrina wandered to the edge of the gardens and took a deep breath of the fresh air.
The sea was only a few miles away and you could smell it.
She could imagine her own children lounging in the chairs on the patio behind the main house, or running on the lawn, chasing each other in some game.
They went back inside and upstairs. There were half a dozen very handsome bedrooms, most of which were unoccupied, and a dozen smaller rooms on the floor above, for servants in the past, many of them used as storerooms now for sports equipment, luggage, a giant telescope, and antique furniture no longer used but original to the house.
It took an hour to take the full tour, and Sabrina felt a little intrusive going from room to room.
The owners clearly had children, she wasn’t sure how many, and there was a very pretty young girl’s room at the opposite end from the master suite.
There was also a second master suite near it, with a closet full of women’s clothes.
There were only men’s clothes in the main master suite at the opposite end, with a man’s riding boots, tennis shoes, tweed jackets, some blazers, a leather bomber jacket that looked vintage, and stacks of books everywhere.
They had seen it all by the time they left. The realtor had inquired again if it was still for sale.
“The missus told me to show it if anyone ever called. The master doesn’t want to sell it, it’s his family’s home.
They’ve been living here since the pandemic, but they go to Paris too.
She’s there most of the time. She’s a doctor.
He stays here whenever he can.” The master suite looked well occupied, with many stacks of books.
There were still two horses in the stable, and the caretaker said he took care of them.
Even though it was a chateau, it was clearly a family home.
Sabrina had the sudden feeling that Malcolm would have loved it, and would have wanted to clean it all up and bring it back to its full glory.
She didn’t mind it looking a little worn.
It felt more inviting to her that way, and less lonely than if everything had been perfect.
They thanked Maxime for his time, and went back to the realtor’s office for her car.
“It needs a little tidying up, and some paint here and there. Many of the chateaux we see aren’t in as good shape as this one, and haven’t been inhabited in years, and would take a lot of work to restore,” the realtor commented.
“I’ll give it some thought,” she promised when she left.
“I’ll speak to them about a price,” he said, but it didn’t make sense to her.
It was a crazy idea, and just because it had charm wasn’t a reason to buy it.
She didn’t need it and it was a long way from home.
She had no real use for a chateau in Biarritz, seven hours from Paris, no matter how charming it was.
It might be fun to rent for a summer, but her children loved the polished glamour and sophistication of the south of France, not a country chateau.