Chapter Thirteen #2
Before Juliette could introduce herself, Jean stepped forward with his hand outstretched to greet the younger builder: a guy in his forties with muscular arms covered in tattoos. The atmosphere lightened a little as they clapped each other on the back and exchanged a few words.
‘Lucas has done some work for us,’ Véronique whispered to Juliette. ‘He’s great – one of the best.’
Juliette looked around. The room was luxurious, its tall windows framing a spectacular view of the nearby mountains, but somehow it felt a little unwelcoming.
She wrinkled her nose. What was that smell?
Taking a closer look, she noticed that the flower-strewn wallpaper had bubbled in places, and a large flap by the ceiling was hanging down.
But now the two Frenchmen were talking in earnest and she had to concentrate. Lucas gesticulated for emphasis as he spoke while Jean shrugged and nodded, with the occasional ‘Mais non,’ or ‘Bien s?r.’ Matt gave the odd impatient sigh and Alison stared out of the window, chewing on a fingernail.
At last Lucas ran out of words and everyone looked at Juliette.
‘As I understand it,’ she began, addressing Matt and Alison, ‘the damp problem is not the result of Lucas’ plumbing.
You have a leak in the roof and the ridge beam is rotten and needs replacing, as he’s already mentioned.
Apparently he also told you it was too soon to start decorating – the basics need to be fixed first.’ She turned to Sophie. ‘That’s the gist of it, I think?’
Sophie nodded.
‘So it’s my fault,’ Alison burst out. ‘I should have known – it usually is. And now we’ll be even further behind schedule.’
Matt sighed more heavily than ever. ‘What a nightmare,’ he muttered under his breath.
Lucas went on to explain what needed to be done to the roof and when he would be able to fit in the work, which Juliette relayed to the English couple, who received the news in stony silence.
She began edging towards the door. ‘Well, we’ll leave you to agree the next steps. But Lucas is an excellent builder, according to my friends. I’m sure you can trust him.’
‘I’ll show you out,’ Alison said, rousing herself. ‘And thanks for your help. It was very good of you.’
‘My pleasure,’ Juliette said, though of course it had been nothing like. She shot the Lafleurs an apologetic glance for having dragged them into such an awkward situation, but Véronique only smiled and shook her head.
‘I’ll have a look at your message,’ Alison promised as they went downstairs. ‘But tell me why you wanted to visit the chateau?’
So Juliette explained again, searching for her mother’s photographs on her cell phone.
Alison paused on the staircase to study them. ‘Would you mind forwarding these to me? I’ll give you my number. When we’ve finished the house – and please God, one day we will – we’ll be making a start on the outside space, and it will be so useful to have something to show our gardener.’
‘Do you know much about the history of the place?’ Juliette asked. ‘I’d love to find out what happened here during the war.’
‘Not really,’ Alison replied. ‘We found a box of papers in the attic but I haven’t had a chance to go through them, and they’re in French anyway so they won’t mean much to me.’ She gave a rueful smile. ‘Language lessons haven’t been my top priority. How come you’re so fluent?’
‘My grandmother was French,’ Juliette reminded her, ‘and my partner is too. We live in Paris so I speak the language every day.’
‘Oh, so you’re not from around here?’ Alison said. ‘Shame, I was going to invite you back another day. How long are you staying? Can you drop by next week? I’d love to chat properly.’
‘I’m going back to Paris on Monday,’ Juliette said, alarmed by the desperation in Alison’s eyes, the needy tone of her voice. ‘Never mind, maybe I’ll be down again sometime.’
‘What are you doing tomorrow?’ Alison laid her hand on Juliette’s arm. ‘Come for coffee and I’ll show you around the house.’
‘I’m not sure what our plans are,’ Juliette began, but Véronique’s eyes had lit up. She broke in to say in a mixture of French and English that they were completely free the next day and she for one would love to see the chateau gardens, having visited them several years before.
‘Great. Let’s make it around eleven,’ Alison said promptly. ‘We’ll be back on form by then, I promise.’
They walked back to the car in silence. Jean let out his breath in a whistle as they drove away, raising his eyebrows, and Juliette knew how he felt; it had been a stressful encounter that had taken some of the shine off the day.
‘Do you remember when we first moved into the farmhouse?’ Véronique asked him as they turned on to the road. ‘All our beams were rotten and the whole place had to be rewired and replumbed.’ She turned to Juliette. ‘We spent our first winter in an unheated caravan.’
‘I’ll never forget,’ he replied. ‘But our house has four bedrooms – there are probably twenty at least in the chateau, and their roof must be ten times the size of ours. Maybe it didn’t cost them much to buy the place but that’s a lot of work to pay for.
And they don’t even speak the language! Goodness knows why they came here. ’
‘Chasing the dream,’ Sophie said, leaning her head against the car window. ‘You can’t blame them for trying.’
‘I don’t,’ Jean replied. ‘I wouldn’t want to be in their shoes, though.’
Juliette had a lot to tell Nico that evening, though he sounded distracted and she got the impression he wasn’t listening with his full attention.
He was pleased to hear she’d found her chateau but frankly not as excited as he might have been.
Yet he said he missed her and couldn’t wait to see her, and that he hoped she was having fun.
‘And what have you been up to?’ she asked.
‘This and that,’ he replied. ‘I’ll tell you when I see you.’
‘Sounds ominous.’ Juliette tried to sound light-hearted but his tone of voice alarmed her. ‘Is everything OK?’
‘Fine,’ he assured her, and now she thought he was irritated. ‘Don’t worry – just enjoy yourself and come home safely. Je t’aime, chérie.’
Juliette didn’t sleep well that night but her spirits rose when she opened her bedroom shutters the next morning to see the valley bathed in sunshine.
Sophie was wading into the pond, carving a path between the waterlilies, so Juliette put on her swimsuit, grabbed a towel and ran outside to join her.
The ooze of mud between her toes and the shock of cold water chased her worries away, and she felt fully alive and present as she lay on her back, staring up into the vivid blue sky.
There was no point wasting a second fretting about Nico, hundreds of miles away in Paris; she’d be seeing him again soon enough.
‘How could you bear to leave this place?’ she asked Sophie, as they were towelling themselves dry on the bank.
‘I do miss it,’ Sophie admitted, ‘but I wanted to make my own way, see the world and find something interesting to do. Provence is beautiful, but it’s too easy to lie in the sun and drink rosé all day.’
‘Sounds good to me,’ Juliette said, though she knew what Sophie meant.
Paris had an energy that invigorated her, kept her looking ahead for the next mountain to climb.
In the meantime, though, a weekend here was exactly what she needed.
The smell of coffee drifted towards them from the terrace, where Jean was laying out breakfast: yoghurt, muesli, fresh peaches and croissants.
Véronique came home from church with news that she’d spoken to the local dressmaker, who was going to drop by later that morning and see how the wedding gown could be altered.
‘She’ll have to be a miracle worker,’ Sophie said, standing up to brush crumbs off her skirt. ‘Wearing your dress was a nice idea in theory but I’ve started looking for alternatives online. It’s far too late, of course, and everything’s sold out. Happy days.’ She stomped into the house.
Véronique and Juliette exchanged sympathetic glances. ‘She has a lot on her plate,’ Véronique said.
‘That’s for sure,’ Juliette replied. ‘Listen, you don’t have to come to the chateau with me this morning; I can easily take a cab. I’m sorry for dragging you into such an awkward situation.’
‘Are you joking?’ Véronique said. ‘I can’t wait to see the gardens – the most wonderful Albertine roses used to grow all over the back walls. I’m hoping Alison might let me take some cuttings.’
‘And maybe you can give the poor woman some moral support,’ Jean commented, pouring them all some more coffee.
At that very moment, Juliette’s phone pinged with a text from Alison herself, as though her ears had been burning.
Had a proper look at your photographs and OMG, I have news. Will explain later.
So maybe it wouldn’t be a wasted journey after all.
‘There are hundreds of these rundown chateaux in France,’ Véronique said as they set off in the car an hour later.
‘They’re relics of another age. It’s good to see them being restored, of course, but so many are being bought by people without much interest in our history and traditions.
Still, what can you do? Nothing stays the same.
’ She gestured at the countryside. ‘And why wouldn’t anyone want a taste of paradise?
We can’t be selfish and keep it to ourselves. ’
‘You have to admire their guts,’ Juliette said. ‘And I guess if no one local wants to take on renovating these places . . .’
‘You’re right,’ Véronique replied. ‘And our builders and craftsmen are happy to have the work. But vines aren’t the only things that need roots to flourish.
’ She clicked her tongue. ‘Oh, ignore me! There’s no point expecting a chateau to be the heart of the community nowadays – if it ever was.
Time for these old houses to be appreciated in other ways. ’
Alison must have been looking out for them, because she was standing in the open doorway as soon as they climbed out of the car. She was wearing a long floaty dress and her make-up looked freshly applied.
‘There you are!’ she cried gaily. ‘Come in! No more dramas today, cross fingers.’
‘It’s very kind of you to have us.’ Juliette glanced around, trying to get a sense of the place without knowing what she expected to find. This was a wild-goose chase, really, but she had so little to go on that any connection to Mémé was worth pursuing.
‘I love showing off the chateau to visitors,’ Alison said, in a way that made Juliette think she didn’t often get the chance. ‘Would you like a tour of the house or shall we have coffee on the terrace first?’
‘I know Véronique is longing to see your gardens,’ Juliette told her. ‘I should explain our connection: Véronique’s lovely daughter Sophie and my son Ben are getting married down here in September.’
‘A Provencal wedding! How wonderful.’ A muscle twitched at the corner of Alison’s eye. ‘You’ll have to tell me all your plans. We were hoping our business would be up and running by now but I’m afraid we shall have to wait till next year.’
They walked through French doors in the magnificent salon to a wide terrace overlooking a lawn, bordered by a tangle of greenery.
‘The grounds,’ Alison said. ‘A little overgrown, as you can see.’ She waved towards a single-storey white building on the left.
‘We think that must have been the old servants’ accommodation.
It would make the most perfect spa, but that will probably have to wait till the swimming pool’s finished. ’
‘Wonderful,’ Juliette murmured politely.
Véronique was looking in the other direction, towards the back of the house and the thick branches and glossy leaves of a salmon-pink rose which climbed up it, almost to the roof.
‘This is the Albertine rose,’ she told Alison, adding to Juliette in French, ‘I didn’t know if it would still be alive but it seems to be thriving on neglect.’
‘Is it really?’ Alison replied. ‘Fancy that.’
‘Chère Alison,’ Veronique began, ‘may I walk? With my little . . .?’ And she brought a pair of secateurs out of her bag and snipped the air with them.
‘By all means,’ Alison said. ‘Help yourself to whatever you’d like. I never get round to pruning. Now, take a seat, Juliette, and I’ll fetch the coffee.’
‘Actually, I’ve had three cups already this morning,’ Juliette told her. ‘Why don’t we just sit and chat? You mentioned that you had some news for me. About the photographs?’
‘Indeed I do,’ Alison replied. ‘Are you sure you don’t want coffee, though? Maybe a glass of water? Or even wine? There’s an open bottle in the fridge and it’s not long till midday.’
‘I’m fine, thank you,’ Juliette said firmly. She patted the chair next to her. ‘Now fire away.’
At last, Alison sat down. ‘So, I had a proper look at those photos you sent me. Remember those two Frenchwomen, the ones standing on our front steps? I’d been assuming they’re French; they certainly look it, though of course they might not have been.’
Juliette nodded, holding her breath.
‘Well, you’ll never believe this but I know who they are,’ Alison said. ‘At least, I’m pretty sure I do. And the best thing is, one of them is still alive. It’s a long story, though I think you’ll be interested to hear it.’
‘I have time,’ Juliette said. ‘Tell me absolutely everything.’
Her nerves were tingling. Something significant must have happened in this huge, half-derelict house to make Mémé want to return so many years after the war, and she was one step closer to finding out what that was.