Chapter 17
SEVENTEEN
LUCY
Beatrice unlocked the street door, which opened into a corridor that ran the length of the shop.
Lucy buzzed with anticipation as they followed it down to the staircase at the back.
She had dreaded going alone to her grandparents’ flat above the bookshop.
She thought it’d feel like a void, a cold, empty place without their loving presence.
But with Beatrice, the oppressive grey image had faded and the old warmth that Lucy remembered started to come back.
The little hall at the foot of the stairs could’ve been a dismal space, with the entrance to the cellar that had rusted shut, and the heavy door that opened into the back garden, but Mémé would never have allowed that.
Instead, there was brightly coloured carpet, which continued up the stairs along with Mémé’s collection of family photographs.
‘I’ve seen these photos so many times,’ Lucy said to Beatrice, tapping the glass. ‘I thought I knew my family history so well. I had no idea that my great-grandma ran a resistance book club during the war!’
‘Every year we have services and memorials for the liberation, for D-Day, for VE Day,’ Beatrice explained as they paused on the stairs.
‘But Arielle wanted to tell our story. When she was given her diagnosis, the doctor told her she’d be lucky to have six months and she swore me to secrecy.
Nobody was to know how near the end she was.
That was when she and I started working, getting everything ready to pass to you.
It was going to be a wedding present, but time caught up with us.
’ She briefly squeezed Lucy’s hand. ‘It was important to her that you read it, because it started with reading and with books. So she started to write it all down for you.’ Beatrice smiled gently.
‘And we gathered up everything we could find and put it all safely away. Not Esther’s book though.
Esther’s book has always been kept in the shop; I can’t even tell you why, it just wouldn’t have seemed right to pack it up into a box.
She was never able to pick it up, but keeping it near, it felt as though she was near too. ’
Lucy was so astonished that at first she wasn’t sure what to say.
‘We knew Mémé was ill, but she never told us it was so advanced. We all thought she’d get treatment and live to be at least a hundred.
’ She swallowed the tears that were threatening to well up.
‘She never liked making a fuss, or have people fret over her. I… I do understand why she didn’t say anything.
And she passed away at home, like Papi did.
She always said she didn’t want to be put into a home.
To think that you two were collecting things together for me while she…
Beatrice, it’s the most wonderful gift. Thank you.
I know that’s barely adequate for what you and Mémé have given me, but I mean it.
Thank you for trusting me with your story – with Cordeval’s story. ’
‘It’ll keep you busy.’ Beatrice chuckled. ‘I go away tomorrow; a few days with my eldest granddaughter and her family in Marseille. But when I come home, we can talk about it all. I want you to learn the story yourself, in Arielle’s words.’
Lucy smiled, although she wasn’t sure she’d still be in Cordeval by the time Beatrice came back. Perhaps she could write to her from London?
They carried on up the stairs. Despite her age, Beatrice didn’t need a hand.
They passed photographs of Mémé and Papi as a young couple, and later pictures of Lucy’s father and her uncle as children.
Mémé’s brother Etienne and his wife appeared in the collection, too, and Lucy peeped out of photographs taken with her cousins.
On the first-floor landing was a recent snapshot of Mémé with Beatrice down by the harbour, the wind whipping their white hair.
Round Mémé’s neck, the sun had caught the gold chain she always wore, which carried her parents’ wedding rings.
‘There you are!’ Lucy pointed to the photo. ‘The terrible two!’
‘There we are.’ Beatrice chuckled. ‘Wait until I follow her up to heaven and start the party again; St Peter won’t know what’s hit the place!’
Lucy took a deep breath before unlocking the door to the flat.
It opened into the first-floor living area.
It was a vast, open space, and Lucy’s memories populated it with the laughter and chatter she remembered from all the family get-togethers she’d been to here.
She could even conjure up the scent of Mémé’s cooking, the enormous meals she’d made – the coqs au vin, the seafood stews, the apple tartes and wafer-thin pancakes.
In her mind, she could hear Papi’s bad jokes and the affectionate groans that had always followed their telling.
Sunlight streamed through the front windows into the long room, shining against the pans that hung on their hooks above the stove.
The dining table was polished as ever, and the sofa cushions were plumped, as if Mémé had just been through with a duster.
The large oak dresser was busy with framed photos; Lucy was among them, along with Papi, Beatrice, and her father and uncle, and black-and-white photos going further back.
Some books had been left on an armchair. The room was as cosy as Lucy remembered it, with its atmosphere of ordered chaos, and it carried the echoes of everyone who had called it home.
‘It’s so strange being back here without Mémé,’ she admitted to Beatrice. ‘But it’s as if a bit of her is still here, because you are.’
‘The last night I saw her, we had such a lovely time,’ Beatrice said with a smile, looking around the room.
‘Sébastien cooked us the most glorious supper and we drank the cellar dry. The bar was packed, everybody singing and laughing, then we came back here and looked through our box of treasures. She went to bed that night and…’ Beatrice smiled again, but there was sadness in it now.
‘I was the one who found her the next morning, when I came to call for our morning coffee. I hope I go so peacefully, smiling a naughty smile just like Arielle.’
Lucy placed her hand on Beatrice’s arm. She couldn’t imagine how hard it was to be the one who found a lifelong friend dead. But Beatrice seemed to take comfort in Mémé’s smile, and Lucy wondered if she had been smiling because she’d seen Papi again.
‘I knew she’d passed away in her sleep, but I hadn’t known she’d had such a wonderful time the night before,’ Lucy said. ‘Thanks for… well, for being such a brilliant friend to her.’
Even so, guilt was gnawing at her. If only she could’ve spent more time with Mémé and Papi.
She glanced around the room again, and then her gaze settled on a colourful hexagonal box that was sitting on the coffee table.
It looked like a hatbox, and each panel had different colours and patterns.
Stripes on one, polka dots on another, and zigzags and checks as well.
‘Is that the box?’ Lucy asked, her voice hushed with curiosity and awe.
Beatrice nodded. ‘There it is,’ she said. ‘Our story. Your story.’