And inside the house, there’s the Mayor of Hamelin, the one who wouldn’t pay the Piper, looking out of a bedroom window. He’s a peg-doll too, of course, with a nightgown made from a handkerchief and a paper nightcap on his head, and his face drawn on in felt-tip pen, with his mouth wide open in surprise.
And I don’t know why, but somehow the Pied Piper reminds me of Roux, with his red hair and shabby clothes, and the greedy old Mayor makes me think of Thierry, and I couldn’t help thinking that, like the Nativity in Place du Tertre, it wasn’t just a window display, that it had to mean something more—
‘I love it,’ I said.
‘I hoped you would.’
On the beanbag, Rosette made a sleepy little snuffling noise and reached for her blanket, which had fallen on the floor. Zozie found it and put it over her. She stopped for a moment to touch Rosette’s hair.
And then I had a weird thought. More than that – an inspiration. I guess it was the Advent house, but I was thinking about the Nativity, and the way everyone comes to the stable at once – the animals and the Magi and the shepherds and angels and the star – without anyone having to invite them or anything, as if they’d been summoned there by magic—
I almost told Zozie right then. But I needed time to sort myself out; to make sure I wasn’t about to do anything stupid. You see, I’d remembered something, too. Something that happened a long time ago, back in the days when we were still different. Something to do with Rosette, perhaps. Poor Rosette, who cried like a cat and who never seemed to feed at all, and sometimes stopped breathing without any reason, for seconds, even minutes at a time . . .
The baby. The crib. The animals—
The angels and the Magi—
What is a Magus, anyway? And why do I think I’ve met one before?
6
Tuesday, 4th December
MEANWHILE, I STILL had to deal with Roux. My plans for him do not involve contact with Vianne, but I do need him to stay close, and so, as planned, at half past five, I went down to Rue de la Croix and waited for him to come out.
It was closer to six when he left the house. Thierry’s taxi had already arrived – he’s staying in a nice hotel while work on the flat is under way – but Thierry had not yet left the flat, and I was able to watch from a discreet little vantage point on the corner as Roux waited with his hands in his pockets and his collar turned up against the rain.
Now Thierry has always rather prided himself on being a man of no pretensions; a real man who isn’t afraid to get his hands dirty, and who would never make another man feel inferior for lack of money or social status. This is quite untrue, of course. Thierry’s a snob of the worst kind – he just doesn’t know it, that’s all. But it’s in his manner all the same: in the way he always calls Laurent mon pote; and I could see it now in the careless way he took his time locking up the flat, checking, setting the security alarm, then turning to Roux with a look of surprise – as if to say, ah yes, I forgot—
‘How much did we call it? A hundred?’ he asked.
A hundred euros a day, I thought. Not an especially generous sum. But Roux just gave that shrug of his – the shrug that so infuriates Thierry and makes him want to force a reaction. Roux, in contrast, is very cool, a gas-jet turned to its lowest flame. But I noticed that he kept his eyes slightly lowered throughout, as if afraid of what he might reveal.
‘Cheque all right?’ Thierry said.
Nice touch, I thought. Of course he must know that Roux has no bank account, that Roux pays no taxes, that Roux may not even be his name.
‘Or would you rather have cash?’ he said.
Roux shrugged again. ‘Whatever,’ he said. Willing to forfeit a whole day’s wages rather than concede a point.
Thierry gave his broadest smile. ‘All right, I’ll give you a cheque,’ he said. ‘I’m a bit tight on cash today. Sure you don’t mind?’
Roux’s colours flared, but he kept stubbornly silent.
‘Who shall I make it to?’
‘Leave it blank.’
Still smiling, Thierry took his time writing the cheque, then gave it to Roux with a cheery wink. ‘See you same time tomorrow, then. Unless you’ve had enough, that is.’
Roux shook his head.
‘All right, then. Eight-thirty. Don’t be late.’
And then he was off in his taxicab, leaving Roux with his useless cheque, apparently too lost in his thoughts to notice me as I approached.
‘Roux,’ I said.
‘Vianne?’ He turned and shot me that Christmas-tree smile. ‘Oh, it’s you.’ His face fell.
‘The name’s Zozie.’ I gave him a look. ‘And you could work on your charm a bit.’
‘Sorry?’
‘I mean you could at least pretend to be pleased to see me.’
‘Oh. Sorry.’ He looked abashed.
‘So how’s the job?’
‘Not bad,’ he said.
I smiled at that. ‘Come on,’ I said. ‘Let’s find somewhere dry to talk. Where are you staying?’
He named a backstreet dive off Rue de Clichy – just the kind of place I’d expect.
‘Let’s go there. I don’t have long.’
I knew the place – it was cheap and grubby-looking, but it did take cash, which matters a lot to someone like Roux. There was no key to the front door, but an electronic keypad with a code. I watched him enter it – 825436 – his profile lit sharply in the crude orange of the street-light. File that away for later use. Codes of all kinds are useful, I thought.
We went inside. I saw his room. A dark interior; a carpet that felt slightly sticky beneath my feet; a square cell the colour of old chewing gum with a single bed and not much else; no window; no chair; just a sink, a radiator and a bad print on the wall.
‘Well?’ said Roux.
‘Try these,’ I said. I took out a small gift-wrapped box from my coat and handed it to him. ‘I made them myself. On the house.’
‘Thanks,’ he said sourly, and dropped the box on to the bed without giving it a second glance.
Once more I felt a sting of annoyance.
One truffle, I thought, is that too much to ask? The symbols on the box were powerful (I’d used the red circle of Lady Blood Moon, the seductress, the Eater of Hearts), but just one taste of what was inside would make him so much easier to persuade—
‘So when can I call?’ said Roux impatiently.
I sat down on the end of the bed. ‘It’s complicated,’ I began. ‘You took her by surprise, you know. Turning up the way you did – out of the blue, especially when she’s with someone else.’
He laughed at that, a bitter sound. ‘Ah, yes. Le Tresset. Mr Big.’
‘Don’t worry. I’ll cash the cheque for you.’
He looked at me. ‘You know about that?’
‘I know Thierry. He’s the kind of man who can’t even shake another man’s hand without seeing how many bones he can break. And he’s jealous of you.’
‘Jealous?’
‘Of course.’
He grinned, looking genuinely amused for a second. ‘Because I’ve got everything, haven’t I? The money, the looks, the place in the country—’
‘You’ve got more than that,’ I told him.
‘What?’
‘She loves you, Roux.’
For a second he didn’t say anything. He didn’t even look at me, but I could see the tension in his body and the accompanying flare of his colours – from gas-jet-blue to neon-red –and I knew that I had shaken him.
‘She told you that?’ he said at last.
‘No, not quite. But I know it’s true.’
There was a Pyrex glass beside the sink. He filled it with water and drank it in one, then took a deep breath and filled it again. ‘So if that’s the way she feels,’ he said, ‘then why’s she marrying Le Tresset?’
I smiled and held out the little box, from which the red circle of Lady Blood Moon lit his face with a carnival glow.
‘Sure you won’t have a
chocolate?’
Impatiently, he shook his head.
‘All right,’ I said. ‘Just tell me this. When you first saw me, you called me Vianne. Why was that?’
‘I told you before. You looked like her. Well, at least – the way she used to be.’
‘Used to be?’
‘She’s different now,’ he said. ‘Her hair, her clothes . . .’
‘That’s right,’ I said. ‘That’s Thierry’s influence. He’s a total control freak; insanely jealous; always wanting things his way. At first he was great. He helped with the kids. He gave her presents, expensive ones. Then he began to pressure her. Now he tells her what to wear, how to behave, even how to raise her children. Of course it doesn’t help that he’s her landlord, and could throw her out at any time.’
Roux frowned, and I could tell that I was finally getting to him. I could see doubt in his colours, and, more promisingly, the first flowering of anger.
‘So why didn’t she tell me? Why didn’t she write?’
‘Maybe she was afraid,’ I said.
‘Afraid? Of him?’
‘Perhaps,’ I said.
Now I could see him thinking hard, head lowered, eyes creased in concentration. For some strange reason, he doesn’t trust me; and yet I know he’ll take the bait. For her sake, for Vianne Rocher.
‘I’ll go and see her. Talk to her—’
‘That would be a big mistake.’
‘Why?’
‘She doesn’t want to see you yet. You have to give her time. You can’t just turn up out of the blue and expect her to make a choice.’
His eyes told me that was precisely what he’d expected.
I put a hand on his arm. ‘Listen,’ I said. ‘I’ll talk to her. I’ll try and make her see things your way. But no more visits, no letters, no calls. Trust me on this.’
‘Why should I?’ he said.
Well, I knew he wouldn’t be easy, but this was getting ridiculous. I allowed an edge to enter my voice. ‘Why? Because I’m her friend, and I care what happens to her and the kids. And if you’d just stop thinking about your wounded feelings for a minute, you’d see why she needs some time to think. I mean, where have you been for the past four years? And how does she know you won’t take off again? Thierry isn’t perfect, of course, but he’s here, and he’s dependable, which is more than can be said of you.’
Some folk respond better to abrasiveness than charm. Roux is obviously one of these, because he sounded more civil then than at any other time he’d spoken to me.
‘I see,’ he said. ‘I’m sorry, Zozie.’
‘So you’ll do as I say? Otherwise, there’s no point in me even trying to help you.’
He nodded.
‘You mean it?’
‘Yeah.’
I gave a sigh. The hard part was done.
A pity, in a way, I thought. In spite of everything, I find him rather attractive. But for every favour the gods bestow, there has to be a sacrifice. And of course, by the end of the month I’ll be asking for a significant favour . . .
7
Wednesday, 5th December
SUZE WAS BACK again today. Wearing a beanie hat instead of that scarf and trying to make up for lost time. Heads together with Chantal at lunch, and after that it was all out with the lame comments and the where’s your boyfriend and the stupid Annie’s It games.
Not that there’s anything remotely fun about that any more. Now it’s not just halfway mean: it’s mean all the way, with Sandrine and Chantal telling everybody about last week’s visit to the shop, making it sound like a cross between a hippie den and a junk yard, and laughing like crazy at everything.
To make it worse, Jean-Loup was ill, and I was back to being It on my own. Not that I care about that, of course. But it isn’t fair; we’ve worked so hard, Maman and Zozie and Rosette and me – and now there’s Chantal and Co. making us sound like a bunch of losers.
Normally I wouldn’t have cared. But things are getting so much better for us, with Zozie moving in with us, and business so good, and the shop full of customers every day, and Roux coming back like that, out of the blue—
But it’s been four days, and he hasn’t made an appearance yet. I couldn’t stop thinking about him at school, and wondering where he’s keeping his boat, or whether he lied to us about that and he’s just sleeping under a bridge somewhere, or in some old deserted house, the way he did in Lansquenet after Monsieur Muscat burnt his boat.
And in lessons I couldn’t concentrate; and Monsieur Gestin shouted at me for daydreaming, and Chantal and Co. giggled at that, and I didn’t even have Jean-Loup to talk to.
And it got a lot worse; because after school as I stood in the queue next to Claude Meunier and Mathilde Chagrin, Danielle came up to me with that fake-concerned expression she puts on so often, and said: ‘Is it true your little sister’s retarded?’
Chantal and Suze were standing nearby, looking nicely poker-faced. I could see it in their colours, though, the way they were trying to set me up; and I could see they were so close to laughing that they were nearly bursting with it—
‘I don’t know what you’re talking about.’ I made my voice expressionless. No one knows about Rosette – or so I thought until today. And then I remembered one day with Suze, playing with Rosette in the shop . . .
‘That’s what I’ve heard,’ said Danielle. ‘Your sister’s a retard. Everyone knows.’
Well, so much for Best Friends, I thought. And the pink enamelled pendant, and the promise she’d made never to tell, cross your heart and hope to—
I glared at Suze in her hot-pink beanie (redheads should never wear hot pink).
‘Some people ought to mind their own business,’ I said, loud enough for them all to hear.
Danielle smirked. ‘It’s true, then,’ she said, and her colours brightened greedily, like hot coals in a sudden draught.
Something in me flared as well. Don’t you dare, I told her fiercely. Anyone says another word—
‘Sure it’s true,’ said Suze. ‘I mean, she’s like, what is she, four, or something, and she can’t even talk yet, or eat properly. My mum says she’s a mong. She looks like a mong, anyway.’
‘No she doesn’t,’ I said quietly.
‘Yes she does. She’s an ugly retard, just like you.’
Suze just laughed. Chantal joined in. Soon they were chanting – retard, retard – and I could see Mathilde Chagrin staring at me with those pale, anxious eyes and suddenly—
BAM!
I don’t quite know what happened then. It was so fast, like a cat that suddenly goes from purring asleep to hissing and scratching in the space of a second. I know that I forked my fingers at her, as Zozie did in the English tea-shop. I don’t quite know what I meant to do; but I felt it fly from my hand, somehow, as if I’d actually thrown something, a little stone, or a spinning disc of something that burnt.
In any case, it acted fast: I heard Suzanne give a scream, then suddenly she was grabbing at her hot-pink beanie, pulling it off her head.
‘Ow! Ow!’
‘What’s wrong?’ said Chantal.
‘It itches!’ wailed Suze. She was scratching her head furiously; I could see pink patches of skin beneath what was left of her hair. ‘God, it itches!’
I felt sick all of a sudden, weak and sick, the way I felt the other night with Zozie. But the worst of it was, I wasn’t sorry; instead I felt a kind of thrill, the kind you get when something bad happens, and it’s your fault, but no one knows.
‘What is it?’ Chantal was saying.
‘I don’t know!’ said Suzanne.
Danielle was looking all concerned, but fake, the way she’d looked at me before asking if Rosette was retarded, and Sandrine was making little squeaking noises – of sympathy or excitement, I couldn’t tell.
Then Chantal began to scratch her head.
‘G-got n-nits, Chantal?’ said Claude Meunier.
The back of the queue laughed at that.
Th
en Danielle began to do the same.
It was as if a cloud of itching powder had suddenly descended upon the three of them. Itching powder, or something worse. Chantal looked angry, then alarmed. Suzanne was almost in hysterics. And for a moment it felt so good—
A memory came back to me then, of a time I was very small. A day by the sea; paddling in my swimsuit; Maman sitting with a book on the sand. A boy who splashed me with sea water and made my eyes sting. As he passed by, I threw a stone – a small one; a pebble – expecting to miss.
It was just an accident—
The little boy crying, holding his head. Maman running towards me, dismay in her face. That sick sense of shock – an accident—
Images of broken glass; a scraped knee; a stray dog yelping under a bus.
Those are accidents, Nanou.
Slowly, I started to back away. I didn’t know whether to laugh or to cry. It was funny – funny in the way a horrible thing can still be funny. And it still felt good, in that horrible way—
‘What the hell is it?’ yelled Chantal.
Whatever it was, it was potent, I thought. Even itching powder wouldn’t have worked as dramatically. But I couldn’t quite see what was happening. There were too many people in the way, and the queue had dissolved into a kind of mass, everyone wanting to see what was going on.
I didn’t even try. I knew.
Suddenly I needed to see Zozie. She’d know what to do, I thought, and she wouldn’t give me the third degree. I didn’t want to wait for the bus so I took the Métro back instead, and ran all the way from Place de Clichy. I was completely out of breath when I got in; Maman was in the kitchen fixing Rosette’s snack and I swear Zozie knew before I even said a word.
‘What’s wrong, Nanou?’
I looked at her. She was wearing jeans and her lollipop shoes, looking redder and higher and shinier than ever with their sparkly stack heels. Seeing them made me feel better somehow, and I collapsed into one of the pink leopard chairs with an enormous sigh of relief.
The Lollipop Shoes Page 22
