Page 29 of Sisters Making Mischief
Like a couple of other customers, he looked straight at me, and even though my eyes were streaming, I could see a little smile crossed his face. Great, now I really did look like a clown.
Felix was on his way to the bar again and he stopped to do some vigorous hand shaking with the new arrival.
‘Ah, Luc.Ça va?’ How’s it going?
‘Ça va bien.’
They started to engage in a discussion wheretravaux de constructionwas mentioned more than once, which I think meant building work. Then there was some head shaking and a bit of French shrugging, while I mopped my eyes and took a drink of water. Then I realised I had spilt wine down my T-shirt. It was like a Rorschach Inkblot test. And it looked like either a bird or half a poodle. Flipping heck, what next? Perhaps I could tuck my napkin into the neck to hide it? Perhaps he would go away and I wouldn’t see him again. Ever. And yet there was something about him that made me feel different, acutely aware of his every movement. Aware of myself. I watched as he ran a hand over his hair, how his face creased into a smile. His broad shoulders moving under his sweater.
Then Felix was leading him over to our table and pulling out a spare chair and encouraging him to sit down. I shrank down in my seat.
‘How are you getting on? Are you over all the excitement of your arrival?’ he said. He had lovely brown eyes, and they were focused on me. Annoyingly I could feel my face getting rather warm. I hoped I wasn’t blushing.
‘Ça va bien,’ I said, not wanting to seem like a complete fool; I knew a lot of French once, perhaps it would all come back to me? Although O level French as taught by Miss Travis in the 1970s was probably not the same as the French actual French people speak. To them with my outdated vocabulary and precise grammar, I probably sounded like someone from a Jane Austen novel.
‘Excellent,’ he said.
At that point Louis came over holding four little glasses of something that looked like brandy.
‘Offertes à la maison. On the house,’ he said with a broad smile.
I didn’t actually think I needed any more alcohol, but behind the bar, Paulette was waving a tea towel at us and smiling so I took a cautious sip. I think it was rocket fuel and I could feel it burning a path down to my stomach where it sat like a hot little lump on top of my meal.
‘Eau-de-vie à la pomme,’ Isabel said with evident pleasure, ‘apple brandy.’
‘And I am told you are Isabel’s sister,’ Jean-Luc continued, ‘I can see the resemblance.’
‘She was always the good one,’ Isabel said annoyingly, ‘I was the naughty one.’
I sent her one of my best hard looks, but it didn’t seem to register.
‘Joy was the pretty one, I was the hippy,’ she continued.
‘How glad I am that you were,’ Felix said gallantly, ‘or we would never have met. Now then, Luc is having a problem with Gaston. He was supposed to have done the last bit of plastering last week, but he didn’t turn up. Luc has asked if I can have a word with him.’
‘Your brother,’ Isabel sighed, and turned to me to explain. ‘You met him once I think, he’s nothing like Felix. Gaston takes after his mother, short with a black beard. Not that Eugénie has a beard. I always think there is a touch of the Captain Pugwash about him. Gaston is always late, so unreliable. But he gets the job done eventually. He’s very clever, really. His wife Mathilde is such a lovely person. She studied jewellery making at college and now she makes things out of old bicycle parts and broken necklaces.’
Felix and Luc then carried on discussing where Gaston might be and the best way to encourage him to turn up, while Isabel and I finished our drinks.
Then after a brief discussion, I went to pay the bill. If they were having money troubles – as seemed likely from a few comments I had picked up on – I didn’t want to add to them.
‘Now I am going to take Joy to get some bread if there is any left, and have a look around the town,’ she said at last. ‘I’ll see you back here?’
‘Bien pour moi,’ Felix said, pleased. Fine by me.
I saw Isabel give her husband what I can only describe as a meaningful look, and I wondered what they were up to.
‘À bientôt,’ Luc said. See you soon.
I wondered if I would, and for some reason I was a little bit pleased at the thought. But that was daft, wasn’t it? I thought Isabel had said he wasn’t very sociable.
We walked through the town, the early evening light casting violet shadows across the roads. It was chilly now and I shivered in my sensible jacket and thin shoes. I don’t know why I had thought I needed to dress up to go to the Sports Bar. I would have been better off in my old duffle coat and furry boots.
There was a dear little church, a small, cobbled market square, two gift shops and Felix’s bookshop, all of which were closed. The baker was still selling the last loaves of the day from his quirky shop and Isabel bought some, wrapped up in rather cute paper with the baker’s name printed all over it.
There was an estate agent with pictures in the window ofmaisons à vendre– houses for sale in the area. Tumbledown barns, featureless modern houses, a couple of new developments and one enormous old place, which was something like the one onEscape to the Chateau. The price seemed very reasonable and the idea of buying somewhere as an investment was quiteappealing for a few minutes. I could almost imagine myself in a ballgown sweeping down the ballustraded staircase until Isabel pointed out the cost of renovating it, heating it and the additional problems of paperwork and visa requirements. Perhaps I wouldn’t do it, after all.
‘Do you still like living here?’ I said as we walked down an alleyway leading us back towards the main square.
