Chapter Eleven
‘I gather you asked Madame whether I could stay at the chateau,’ Mathilde said. ‘You might have run the idea past me first.’
‘You weren’t in a fit state for conversation last night,’ the Patron replied – Yves, as she thought of him now – and she felt her cheeks grow hot. ‘But don’t you want to hole up here? I’d have thought it would suit you perfectly.’
‘Yes, it would,’ Mathilde admitted. ‘Thank you. I have a month to make myself indispensable.’
‘I’m sure that won’t be a problem.’ Yves smiled at her, holding out a cigarette case. ‘Smoke?’
She accepted, glad of something to do with her hands.
He’d found her sitting on a bench outside the kitchen door, having finished clearing up after the midday meal.
It had been a busy morning: she’d been taken to meet Georges the gardener for a conversation about her previous experience and willingness for hard work (boundless, she assured him), and when he gave the idea his approval, she was handed over to Odile, who supplied breakfast (a slice of bread and a cup of roasted barley masquerading as coffee) and sorted out a pile of clothes for her: tailored blouses and skirts that were far too good for working outdoors.
She asked Odile if there were any spare trousers and work shirts to be had, and was eventually given what looked like a teenage boy’s school uniform.
Odile’s agreement about her staying at the chateau didn’t seem to have been sought and Mathilde wasn’t sure whether it would have been forthcoming; the housekeeper didn’t seem overjoyed at the thought of her joining the staff.
‘And now I know where to find you,’ Yves went on, striking a match, ‘so the arrangement suits me too.’
Mathilde bent her head to the flame, blew out a plume of smoke and gazed up at the mountains.
The sight was calming; they were so silent and permanent, unchanging despite the turmoil below.
She had no desire for male attention and the thought of ever being intimate with a man again was inconceivable, yet Yves’ presence unsettled her.
‘What do you want from me?’ she asked.
‘I should like you to be another pair of eyes and ears,’ he replied. ‘Get to know the area and the people who live here, find out who’s sympathetic to our cause and where the safe houses might be. Out-of-the-way places, not in the middle of a village.’ He glanced around. ‘Come, let’s walk.’
‘Our cause.’ Mathilde’s spirits rose at the sound of those words.
They took the steps leading down from the terrace and crossed the lawn beneath it towards the rose garden.
‘The countess doesn’t want me causing trouble,’ she said, when they were a safe distance from the house. ‘She believes the war is over.’
‘Well, she doesn’t have to know,’ Yves replied.
‘And besides, I’m sure she’ll change her mind.
’ They strolled along a gravel path through the formal gardens, its borders now a romantic tangle.
He went on in a low voice, ‘France will be liberated one day; you must believe that. Britain is holding firm, and you won’t have heard yet, but Hitler’s invaded the Soviet Union. ’
‘Is that good news?’
‘I think so. He’s gone too far – Germany doesn’t have enough men to attack on so many fronts. The tide is turning, and surely one day soon, America will join the fight alongside us. We must prepare for the battles to come.’
‘The countess said you spend time in London. Have you met de Gaulle?’ Yves nodded. ‘What’s he like?’ Mathilde went on. ‘He sounds so inspiring on the wireless but is he as impressive in person?’
Yves chuckled. ‘He’s strong meat; that’s for sure. Churchill seems to admire him, though, and no one else can rally people like he does. The Free French army wouldn’t exist without him. Cometh the hour, cometh the man, as they say.’
They walked on, keeping a safe distance apart.
The sun beat down and a lizard darted across the path, disappearing into the undergrowth with a flick of its tail.
At the end of the path, a statue of Diana with a quiver of arrows on her back gazed over her stone shoulder at the mountains. Hunter or hunted? It was hard to tell.
‘Madame de Courcy said you’re friends with her son,’ Mathilde said. ‘Is he in London too?’
‘Fabrice is in a prisoner-of-war camp in Germany,’ Yves replied.
He picked a leaf and twirled it between his fingers before letting it fall.
‘And that’s why I believe the countess won’t think the way she does for ever.
’ He turned towards the house. ‘But now I must be getting back. We leave in a couple of hours and there’s plenty to be done. I’ll be here again soon, though.’
‘I shall be fine,’ Mathilde said stiffly.
‘I’m sure you will.’ A smile lifted the corners of his mouth as he looked at her. ‘There’s another reason I suggested you might stay here. Madame de Courcy could do with a friend. Her son’s in Germany and she has no contact with her daughter.’
‘I doubt she’d choose me,’ Mathilde told him. ‘A fugitive, half-starved and filthy?’
‘She could do worse.’ He was still smiling.
‘I like to think of you both here together. You remind me very much of her daughter, Amélie, and she must see the resemblance too. The pair of you could be perfect for each other.’ He sounded very pleased with himself, but what gave him the right to make such a sweeping assertion? He hardly knew her.
They walked back to the house in silence. Yves was a distraction, Mathilde told herself; she would be relieved once he had gone. And yet she felt a stab of loss that surprised her with its intensity.
‘Goodbye, then,’ she said. ‘Thanks for everything you’ve done for me.’
He ignored the hand she had extended for him to shake, took her by the shoulders and kissed her lightly on each cheek. ‘This is au revoir and not adieu. Look after yourself, Lionne, my lioness, until we meet again. And wear a sun hat.’
Mathilde watched him walk away, her cheeks burning where his lips had touched them. Yes, her life would be so much easier without Yves in it.
After a couple of weeks at the chateau, Mathilde felt as though she’d been there for years.
She split her time between the house and gardens, rising early to work outside before the sun became too fierce.
Under Georges’ supervision, she thinned the vine canes and arranged their remaining leaves into an airy canopy.
Monsieur Piquemal would have been jealous of this hillside vineyard, basking in the sun all day with such perfect drainage and ventilation, kept warm at night by a thick blanket of stones.
Some of the vines were eighty years old, Georges told her; they thrived in this spot.
She also weeded the vegetable garden, pruned the roses and did her best with the overgrown hedges and flower beds.
At midday, she washed her hands and face, changed out of her work clothes and ate an early lunch with Odile and the baby, Irène, who had to be the most placid little thing in the world.
She spent a lot of time asleep in her pram or crib, and was perfectly happy plonked on the floor with a crust of bread or a rusk.
She adored the countess’s Alsatian, Brioche, who was always so gentle with her; the dog didn’t like men but she was fiercely protective of women and children.
After they’d eaten, Mathilde would help Odile prepare a meal for the countess and any guests she might have invited to dine, plus Georges and the other staff.
A girl from the nearby village came twice a week to deal with the laundry, a lad took care of the dirtier jobs in the house – cleaning chimneys and windows, polishing boots, et cetera – while two others were responsible for the stables and heavy digging outside, although they seemed to spend most of their time hiding from Georges in the tool shed.
Despite the chateau’s grandeur, everyone ate simply but well.
Odile had a store of dried beans in the larder and there were potatoes, carrots and onions from the kitchen garden, bulked out with the turnips Mathilde had grown heartily sick of in Paris.
The bees gave them honey, Georges caught rabbits and the chickens provided eggs, and one of Mathilde’s duties was to take whatever scraps were left over to fatten the pig that rooted about in the orchard.
The existence of this pig had to be kept strictly secret or it would have been confiscated by the authorities.
‘And why should we raise a creature to make the fat cats in Vichy fatter still?’ Georges complained.
He grumbled from morning till night, Mathilde soon found out: about the terrible harvest last year and this one not looking much better; about meat rations being reduced yet again; about the fact you couldn’t get hold of copper sulphate for love nor money so the vines were covered in mildew.
Still, at least he wasn’t as hostile towards her as Emile Rambert had been, and he seemed happy enough with her work, although she was sure he complained to Odile about her in private.
Sometimes she would catch him watching her from across the field and wonder what terrible resentments he might be harbouring.