by Olga Wojtas
I looked round. “It’s strange,” I said, “how it seems so much smaller on the inside than the outside.” There was no point making Tardis analogies, although I do feel a certain kinship with the Time Lord.
“There’s nothing strange about this building,” he said in an agitated sort of way.
I realised he thought I was criticising it. “It’s really sensible to have cavity-wall insulation at this altitude,” I said. “You must get pretty cold winters. And it looks great. Is that the shield up there? Yes, it is – that’s exciting to see the original, very striking design. And I love what you’ve done with the interior. All those mirrors, the Versailles look, so clever. Are you going to put mirrors on the wall behind the stage as well, and beside the door?”
“How can I?” he burst out. “Of course, that was my plan, to have a town hall so grand that people would come to our village from far and wide to see it. But now it just looks … ridiculous. Even the villagers laugh at it.”
“What’s gone wrong?” I asked. “Funding problems?”
He nodded.
“You know,” I said, “early last century, we decided to build the National Monument of Scotland in Edinburgh to commemorate the soldiers and sailors who died in the Napoleonic Wars. No offence, by the way.”
He looked confused rather than offended, so I continued, “It was supposed to look like the Parthenon, but we ran out of money before it was finished. So now it gets called things like Scotland’s Disgrace and Edinburgh’s Folly.”
This didn’t seem to be cheering him up. “The point is,” I said, “it was a great idea. Just like yours. It’s important to be aspirational. You should be very proud of yourself for having had the vision in the first place, and for achieving so much of it. Pat yourself on the back.”
But instead of patting himself on the back, he slumped, his head in his hands. “It’s all over. Everything was going so well. There was money, more than enough. And now…”
Despite his financial difficulties, he had personally bribed the policeman to get me out of jail. It was a kind and generous thing to do. I felt for my purse. It opened easily – Miss Blaine seemed happy enough to reimburse my rescuer.
I held the purse out to him. “You mustn’t be out of pocket on my behalf. I insist you take what you’re owed.”
“You’re very kind.” He removed a couple of banknotes and was reaching for a third when the purse snapped shut. Miss Blaine also seemed to know down to the last centime how much he was owed.
“Money,” he groaned. “That’s the heart of the problem. I built this town hall at my own expense with my own hands.”
I didn’t like to say it might have been better if he’d brought in an architect who would have included office space and sanitary facilities.
“I knew it would be costly, the mirrors, the gilding – that’s why I built it the way I did.”
“Makes sense,” I said, while thinking the exact opposite.
“And now, what can I do?”
“If you need more money, you could put the taxes up,” I suggested.
“The people have no money, so how can I ask them for more?”
This was the most cheering policy statement I had ever heard. But although it must have been very popular among the villagers, the mayor gave a heartbreaking sigh.
“When I was first elected, I said I hoped I would have this job for life, to dedicate myself to advancing Sans-Soleil’s interests. And that’s what I shall do, however long – or short – my life may be.”
It seemed a very morbid thing to say, but perhaps it wasn’t surprising, if he kept a coffin in the town hall reminding him that he was going to die. The coffin was nowhere to be seen now. I was going to ask him where he had put it, if there were no other rooms in the building, when I remembered this was supposed to be the first time I’d been in the town hall.
I eyed him critically. Louche, but definitely attractive. “You look in pretty good shape,” I said. “Just be sensible. For example, no more than fourteen units of alcohol a week, which is six pints of beer or ten small glasses of low-strength wine.”
I caught his look of disbelief. “OK, try to cut down gradually,” I said. “And don’t go overboard on dairy products, not too much cheese.”
He gave a strangled groan. “The cheese! The cheese is essential!”
“All right,” I said. “One thing at a time. Start by watching your booze intake for the sake of your liver, and we’ll worry about cholesterol later.”
He sank back down to the ground, mumbling, “The cheese … the cheese…”
I patted him consolingly on the shoulder. “You’re in a state of negative energy,” I said. “What you need is to be a bit more zen. Let’s sit on the floor. I’m going to go into the lotus position, but since you’re a beginner, just lean against the stage with your legs crossed.”
I took him through observing the breath for a while, and then we moved on to observing the mind, just letting the thoughts come in and go away. A random thought came in that made me chuckle.
“I’m terribly sorry,” I said. “I didn’t mean to disturb you. I was just thinking of the rue Morgue, and then of Edgar Allan Poe’s short story, and I wondered if you’d had a lot of murders there.”
The mayor gasped. Then in a voice so soft that I could barely hear him, he said, “The undertaker is not the undertaker.”
I was impressed. For a beginner, it was a pretty good attempt at a zen sentence. I decided to give him a better example.
“The guardian of the law is not the guardian of the law,” I said.
He stared hard at me. I could see he was concentrating. “The judge is not the judge.”
A second later, it just came to me, a sentence so zen that we could meditate on it for hours. “The teacher is not the teacher.”
The mayor’s gaze was now one of total awe. “You know everything.”
“Not everything,” I said modestly. “But I know most things. I had the finest education in the world, thanks to the Marcia Blaine School for Girls in Edinburgh, Scotland.” I placed heavy emphasis on the last word, in the hope that it would eventually get through.
“If I don’t do what they say, they’ve threatened to get rid of me,” the mayor said. “Every day I ask myself when it will come to an end.”
It was, of course, the electorate’s democratic right to vote him out, and I could see that if he did decide to put up taxes, he might not get re-elected. But at least he was safe until the end of his current term of office.
“How long have you got?” I asked.
He ran his fingers through his hair. His thick, lustrous hair. With an effort, I stopped myself imagining running my own fingers through his hair. I was on a work trip, besides which, he was rather on the young side.
“I don’t know. They’re getting impatient,” he said bleakly.
“Impatient about this?” I asked, waving at the far wall, blank except for the shield. It was ridiculous, the villagers giving him a hard time about the lack of mirrors if the funding wasn’t there. “But that’s not fair. It’s not their business.”
“You’re right,” he said with sudden force. “It’s not. It’s my business.”
“That’s the spirit,” I said. “Be proud of what you’ve achieved. Refuse to be pressurised. Stand up to them.”
He stood up. “I will. I will.” He strode across the hall, a myriad of dim reflections. And then, “I don’t know whether I can.”
“Now remember, we’re being zen,” I said. “We must try not to overreact to perceived difficulties. Let’s focus on the positive. You’ve got the festivities coming up, and everybody’s going to have a wonderful time.”
My pep talk worked. “Yes, the festivities!” he said. “The day will be a triumph. It has to be. All of the preparations; these will be the greatest celebrations we have ever had.”
“There you go,” I said. The villagers would love it, and there would be no problem about his re-election. “You said you’ve booke
d a singer from Paris?”
“Indeed I have. And a man to play the piano.”
“That’s great,” I said. “What’s the singer going to sing?”
“Songs,” he said vaguely. “But good ones.”
“That sounds very sophisticated,” I said. “I’m sure everyone will be really impressed. And absolutely any help I can give you, you only have to ask.”
He considered this. “Can you do art?”
“I can indeed.” My ceramic model of a black poodle was displayed in the headmistress’s room for half a term, even though when it was fired it came out green instead of black.
“Could you make a poster for the concert?”
Miss Blaine knew full well that I had been making posters for concerts, plays and sporting events throughout my schooldays. That must be why she included a set of watercolour paints in my mission kit, for just this sort of eventuality.
“Give me the details and some paper, and I’ll make several,” I said.
He rummaged around the side of the stage and produced a few sizeable sheets that would be ideal.
“The concert’s here, seven thirty on the fourteenth,” he said. His brow furrowed. “I can’t remember the singer’s name. Marie something, I think. Yes, that’s it, Marie Jardin, but she spells it all wrong.”
“Showbiz types,” I said. “No respect for conventional spelling. And then ordinary parents use the daft names for their children, and before you know where you are it’s literal anarchy.”
“Yes, it’s really peculiar, the way she writes it,” he said. “It’s not Marie, it ends in a Y.”
Not Marie, but Mary. Was it possible? I did a quick calculation. She had moved from Chicago to Paris in 1896. “Is her name Mary Garden?” I asked.
“That might have been it,” he said. “You’ve heard of her?”
“Mr Mayor, I have. The whole world will hear of her. She’ll be one of the most celebrated divas of the age, composers will write operas especially for her.”
The mayor was looking at me quizzically.
“I imagine,” I added hastily. “She’s very good. And her performance here will ensure that Sans-Soleil’s name is known across the land. Thanks to you.”
The mayor beamed in delight.
“And what’s more,” I said, “she’s Scottish.”
His face fell. “Oh. Not French?”
I could see he was considering cancelling the whole thing. I thought fast. “What better proof could there be that Sans-Soleil is a cosmopolitan centre for the arts than its ability to attract international celebrities?”
“There is that,” he conceded.
“A great finale to a great day,” I said. “I’d better get on with the posters. I’ll bring them to you later on – how long will you be here?”
He turned away from me. “You’ll find me at Chez Maman,” he said in a low voice.
I wasn’t surprised he was embarrassed. This really wasn’t good from the point of view of reducing his alcohol consumption.
“Tell you what,” I said. “Instead of me coming to you, you can come to me, chez Madeleine.”
“Ah, Madeleine!”
I gave him a sharp look. He was attractive. And louche. “Is there anything going on between you and Madeleine?” I demanded.
He looked horrified. “Don’t say that – Sylvain would kill me!” And then he let out a long sigh of relief. “But thank God, Sylvain’s dead.”
“So, there is something going on between you and Madeleine?”
“Not yet,” he said. “But where there’s life, there’s hope.”
I suddenly caught that faint radio play noise again, which I’d heard in this building on my arrival in Sans-Soleil.
The mayor grasped my arm and began leading me towards the door, saying, “I’d be very grateful if you could make the posters as soon as possible, so that I can put them up in good time.”
“Wait, can you hear that?” I asked.
“No, I can’t hear anything,” he said, although he didn’t stop to listen.
“That noise…” I said.
“Mice,” he said. “We have a lot of trouble with mice.”
It definitely wasn’t mice, but I had more pressing things to worry about, namely the mayor’s fingers pressing on my arm. From the moment he took hold of me, I had begun tingling again. Surely I had suppressed all romantic feeling for him?
We stepped out into the putative daylight, and I was relieved to find that the tingling stopped. It had been the same sort of low-level tingle I had felt from Madeleine. These weren’t the people I was supposed to help, and yet there was some sort of signal coming from them. Perhaps they needed to be recharged in some way. Or I did. I really felt Miss Blaine should have ensured everything was working correctly.
There was a sudden sharp pain in my big toe, as though someone had trodden on it very heavily. I couldn’t work out what might have caused it – I hadn’t stubbed it on anything. I had been thinking about Miss Blaine, and now here I was, hopping about, squawking a bit.
“Gout?” said the mayor. “It’s all that roast beef you English eat.”
“I’m not English,” I protested. “I eat porridge, haggis, shortbread, tablet, fish suppers. Haddock, not cod. With salt and sauce.”
“Ah yes. Short bread. The small baguette you and the English milord both like.”
I took a deep breath and changed the subject, returning to what I had been saying inside the town hall: “Did you hear the radio? The crystal set?”
He looked at me blankly, and I realised that broadcasting wasn’t yet a thing.
“Back in there,” I persisted. “Did you hear voices?”
He shook his head. “No, I told you, I didn’t hear anything.”
I was sure I had heard something, but on my previous mission I had suffered some visual disturbance. Perhaps this time it was my ears that were affected.
We headed back down into the village and into the main square, dominated by the statue of the monk with his hands upraised.
“Is that the village’s patron?” I asked.
“We don’t know who it is,” said the mayor. “It’s a memorial to the Unknown Abbot.”
“Why are you commemorating him if he’s unknown?” I asked.
“We don’t know who he was, but we know what he did,” said the mayor, sounding suddenly pious. I was surprised: I didn’t have him down as a religious man. But I suppose there’s no reason why someone can’t be both louche and a person of faith.
“What did he do?” I asked. “Heal the sick, cleanse the lepers, raise the dead, cast out devils?”
“He discovered how to make cheese.”
“Ah,” I said, “blessed are the cheesemakers.”
I expected the mayor to laugh, but he simply nodded. Of course, the first cinema in France opened in 1899, but it would be a while before it screened The Life of Brian.
The mayor gazed reverently at the statue. “The Unknown Abbot was in charge of the nearby Abbey of Sans-Foi. He capitalised on the unique characteristics of the area to create a local cheese, to tempt both the eye and the palate.”
“Really? I didn’t think abbots would approve of temptation. And do the monks still make the cheese?”
The mayor shook his head. “Shortly after taking up cheese-making, they also took up distilling eau de vie and died of alcohol poisoning. But according to legend, they went cheerfully.”
“Alcohol can be more curse than blessing,” I said, cringing at the memory of having missed That Book because of my hangover. “I suppose the recipes died with them.”
“No,” said the mayor, “thankfully – I mean, yes. Yes, gone. That is, the cheese-making survives because the monks taught the local farmers. But the brandy recipe, that’s disappeared for ever.”
“Probably for the best,” I said. “It reminds me of a poem by Robert Louis Stevenson, called ‘Heather Ale’. It’s all about the Picts, who lived in Scotland before the Scots.”
“When it was
Pictland?” said the mayor.
“Let’s not confuse things,” I said. “Just focus on the fact that the Picts brewed ale from heather. Anyway, eventually there were just two Picts left.”
“What happened to the rest of them?” asked the mayor.
According to the poem, the Scots had massacred them, but that’s factually incorrect, so I wasn’t going to mention it.
“They’d gone away,” I said.
“Where to?” asked the mayor.
“Just – somewhere else. So, there were two Picts left–”
“What were their names?” asked the mayor.
I normally like people asking questions, but he was asking the wrong kind.
“We don’t know,” I said, a little sharply. “All we know is that they were a father and son, and they were very small. They were found under a stone.”
“Like snails? They were as small as snails?”
“No, they weren’t as small as snails. They were small, but they were still people. Just small people.”
The mayor’s brow creased. “Then it must have been a very big stone. Wouldn’t it be better to call it a rock? So, they were found squashed under a rock–”
“Did you hear me say they were squashed?” I demanded. “They were hiding under the rock – the stone.”
“Why were they hiding?”
I was going to tell him that he’d find out sooner if he didn’t keep interrupting me, and then I thought this was probably useful preparation for teaching the pupils the next day.
“They were hiding from the new king. The king was upset, because he ruled over a land covered in heather, but he didn’t know how to make ale out of it.”
“This was the Scottish king?” asked the mayor.
It was just like the thing, that he’d finally cottoned on to national sensitivities at the time when it was least appropriate.
“The poem doesn’t say,” I hedged.
“But you said—”
“Never mind what I said, let’s just stick to the poem. All we know is that the king was quite bad-tempered. His troops found the very small father and son under a stone.”
“How?” asked the mayor.
“They just did,” I said. “Look, do you know much about poetry?”
