Chapter Fifteen
‘Then they should have left some copper sulphate and fertiliser for us,’ Georges muttered, ‘instead of stealing it all for themselves.’
Besides spending hours in the vegetable garden, Mathilde looked further afield for food: searching out early girolle mushrooms, picking nettles, sorrel and watercress from the banks of a nearby river.
Seeing an old man fishing there, she watched him for a while, then returned the next Sunday with a rod and net borrowed from Georges to try her luck.
Her first attempts at casting were hopeless but there were several anglers that day and one of them took pity on her, showing her where to stand and how to flick the line upstream so that her lure drifted naturally across the water.
That first day, she caught a small barbel; by the end of the month, she was bringing back trout and pike.
Odile had to admit she was pleased. Nothing was wasted in the chateau: the shortest piece of string was untangled and reused, every scrap of food that wasn’t eaten by humans went to the pig, clothes no longer fit to be worn were torn up and used as cleaning rags.
Mathilde’s expeditions around the countryside now had a definite purpose.
She spent her first month’s wages on a second-hand bicycle and a Michelin map of the area, which she copied in an enlarged form on a piece of white cotton that had once been part of a pillowcase.
Every farm or cottage she visited was marked on her cloth map and annotated with a code that told her whether the inhabitants could be relied upon – as far as she could tell – or should be avoided.
Having been blessed with a virtually photographic memory, she could take a mental picture of each place and store it away for future reference.
She used a variety of methods to introduce herself: asking for directions or a glass of water, pretending to look for a stray dog, finding out whether anyone would be available for work in the vineyard come harvest. Sometimes she took Brioche with her, the big dog loping along at her side for added security.
People in these isolated places were often eager for conversation, as she’d found with Paulette, and it was easy to draw them out.
Those who were grumpy and suspicious, or whose homes contained obvious warning signs (such as a portrait of Marshal Pétain on the mantelpiece) were thanked and left alone.
She encouraged the others to express their opinions by gradually revealing some of her own.
An order had recently come from Vichy, for example, that all rifles and shotguns should be handed in at the nearest town hall.
And yet how would a person deal with a fox stalking the chicken coop?
Mathilde wondered; she’d heard of several farmers who had no intention of giving up their weapons.
Slowly, subtly, the seeds of resistance were planted or nurtured.
Sometimes they’d grown into flourishing plants already, and she had a special code to mark those houses.
Mathilde also visited Paulette regularly, mining her local knowledge. ‘And why are you so interested in the Lecontes?’ Paulette asked eventually. ‘Look, I know what you’re doing; you don’t have to lie.’
‘And what would that be?’
‘Preparing the ground,’ Paulette replied, dabbing some bleach along Mathilde’s hairline.
‘Getting up to some of that funny business that landed you in jail, no doubt. Well, that’s fine by me, if you’re brave or stupid enough to take the risk.
And don’t worry, I can keep my mouth shut when necessary.
’ She smiled at Mathilde’s reflection in the mirror.
Could she, though? Mathilde had no option but to hope so.
Yet she thought Yves would be pleased with her progress, and she was impatient to see him again.
She had to have something to look forward to as the long, hard days rolled by: a dream of freedom to keep her hopes alive.
Her wedding anniversary on 3 September, the anniversary of the day war had been declared two years before, was particularly poignant.
She and Jacques had promised to meet on that day each year, if at all possible, outside the Sacré-C?ur cathedral in Paris.
And now there was no point making the dangerous journey.
Maybe one day, when the war was over, she would go there by herself and sit on the steps to remember him.
Around the middle of the month, Monsieur Rousseau inspected the vines, tasted a few grapes, looked up at the sky and declared that harvest should begin in a week or so; storms were forecast later in the month.
Georges and Mathilde sprang into action, cleaning out barrels and washing equipment in readiness, besides contacting anyone willing to pick the grapes.
In years gone by, Georges told Mathilde, a gang of Spanish Roma had magically appeared in the area at harvest time, but most of the Roma had been interned since war broke out so the chateau was having to rely on less experienced casual workers instead.
Paulette and her son Thierry were among them, and several of the farmers’ wives Mathilde had met on her expeditions.
They would be picking through the night, so both grapes and workers stayed cool.
In the midst of this flurry of activity, Mathilde was washing up her plate in the kitchen late one evening when she heard someone rattle the shutters outside.
Opening the back door, she found two men, supporting a third between them: Yves and the swarthy Sanglier, half-carrying a tall, fair-haired man with his head hanging and his knees buckling.
Quickly, she ushered them inside. Odile had already left for the gate lodge she shared with Georges so the kitchen was empty – apart from Brioche in her basket by the stove, who growled low in her throat until Mathilde told her to shush.
They laid the invalid gently on a horsehair couch under the window and watched him groan, throwing an arm over his face.
His clothes were filthy and splashed with dried bloodstains.
‘Thank you,’ Yves said, as she poured them glasses of water and helped the injured man to drink.
He gulped the water greedily, his fingers clasping hers on the glass and his skin burning to the touch.
‘We had to move him in a hurry and couldn’t think of anywhere else to go. Is Madame de Courcy still up?’
‘I think so.’ The countess seldom went to bed before midnight, Mathilde had discovered; she would be working in her study or reading in the salon.
‘I’ll go to see her.’ Yves drained his glass and straightened his clothes. He looked tired and worried, but he was actually here at last; her heart had leapt at the sight of him.
‘Well, good luck with that. And this isn’t the best time,’ she said. ‘We’ll be starting the harvest soon.’
‘Thanks for the warning.’ He flashed her a brief smile. ‘I like your hair. Now you’re truly a lioness.’
Feeling herself blush, Mathilde glanced at the man on the sofa. ‘I’ll start cleaning him up. Good luck with Madame. And by the way, my name is Fleur now – Fleur Morisot.’
‘Goodbye then, Fleur Morisot,’ Yves said. ‘We’ll talk later.’
She felt a little self-conscious, left alone with Sanglier, but he nodded at her. ‘I’m glad to see you again,’ he said. ‘I knew your cousin – he was a brave man.’
‘He was,’ she replied. ‘I think of him often, and his wife, too. I don’t suppose you’ve heard any news of Renée Bouchon?’ But Sanglier only shook his head.
She fetched a bowl of water, a vial of lavender oil and some rags. ‘We might as well clean him up a little,’ she told Sanglier, ‘whatever happens next. Who is he?’
‘He’s British, a pilot,’ Sanglier replied. ‘Shot down a few days ago and was meant to be heading over the mountains to Spain, but he’s in no fit state to walk. The wound on his leg’s become infected.’
The man groaned, tossing his head from side to side, but he seemed to find the cool, lavender-scented water soothing.
Madame de Courcy soon appeared, with Yves at her side. She stared down at the new arrival, then turned to Yves. ‘Really, this is too much! Don’t you realise the danger you’re putting us in? How could you have brought him here? Especially now, with the harvest about to begin.’
‘We had nowhere else to go,’ Yves replied, ‘and I thought you would want to help. Because of Fabrice, I mean. Here’s another young man who’s risked his life fighting for us, and now he’s alone and helpless in a foreign country.’
The countess frowned. ‘Fleur, what do you think?’ she asked Mathilde. ‘Would you be willing to care for this fellow alongside your other duties?’
‘Of course,’ Mathilde replied. ‘I’m not much of a nurse but I’ll do what I can.’
‘All right, then,’ Madame de Courcy said with a sigh.
‘I’ll telephone Doctor Pailleau.’ She had recently had a telephone installed in her study and was often to be heard speaking into it, much to the suspicion of everyone else in the household.
‘You’ve put me in an impossible situation, though, Yves,’ she went on, ‘and I don’t appreciate it. ’
‘I’m sorry, Madame,’ he said. ‘It won’t happen again.’
‘I hope not,’ the countess snapped. ‘We’ll need to keep him somewhere out of the way. Upstairs would be best, I think, so Fleur can check on him at night. Obviously I can’t have you two sleeping up there, though. That would be risky for any number of reasons.’
‘I understand,’ Yves said. ‘Sanglier and I will camp in the woods until our man’s well enough to move on, or . . . the story has another ending.’
‘You must keep well out of the way,’ Madame de Courcy told him. ‘The place will be full of people once harvest starts and you’re as much of a liability as our friend here.’