We were moving into the best time of the year — the soft sun of May. Field after field of wheat was electric yellow, stained with red poppies in irregular aureoles. Within six weeks, these same fields of waving golden wheat would have the colour stripped from their stalks, which would turn a sun-bleached white when the crops were harvested into large bales ready for use. The frilly petals of the irises, ranging from soft lilacs and mauves to deep magentas and aubergines, emerged in such casual beauty from the wild grasses along the banks of our country roads. The poppies and irises springing up everywhere contrasted sharply with the uniformity of the straight lines of the cherry trees in the surrounding orchards, already shining with red pendulous globes. How such beauty continues to flourish and triumph following winter after harsh winter is astounding.
However, among all of this beauty, I just wanted to lie down and die. Money, or rather the lack of it, was consuming my every thought and yet I couldn’t come to the decision that I should sell the house in Sydney. At the back of my mind, there had always been the possibility of returning to Sydney for the children’s final years of schooling — or back into the arms of Raymond. The children were more than happy to stay in France for their education and Raymond had thrown his arms around someone else. But selling the house was such a final action. Pots and pans flew around the kitchen as I took out my aggression and inability to make a decision. The children avoided me like the plague, as did Claire, who had enough sense to know that the storm would pass. Nothing was going the way I wanted. There was:
1. No love in my life.
2. No buyer for Place de la Fontaine.
3. No interest in the manuscript.
4. No decision about the family home in Sydney.
5. No money to pay for the mortgages.
Claire and I sat down one afternoon with paper and pen and worked out the urgency of the financial situation and what solutions could be found, if any. We were both horrified but not surprised when we calculated exactly how much money was required to keep the business turning per month. My father was unable to help, and even if he could, I just couldn’t bring myself to ask. Raymond was out of the question. Other members of the family were out of the question. Somewhere the solution was there; I just had to shake myself out of my lethargy and start thinking.
At three o’clock one night as my liver tried vainly to process another attack of alcohol, it came to me: the stock market. I had had the good fortune to make a nest egg in early 2000 and then sell everything just before a dramatic correction in the market. I knew that I would never have the gumption to go down that path again; once was more than enough. But I could sell anything that remained in my name. That would give me a little bit of breathing space. I rang a broker in Sydney and began the arrangements. The second call to Sydney was to the real estate office, to say that I had made up my mind that I wanted a spring sale for the family home. I was completely gutted, but the focus was coming back. There were two priorities:
1. Happy children.
2. A successful business.
The children were delightful and happy. Interim school report cards had come in and they were both glowing in all areas. Financially I could hold out until the beginning of 2005 if I sold all of the shares that I had put aside in an emergency fund, by which time the family home would be sold. On the emotional front, tears continued to spring up unexpectedly. I did not want to admit that Claire was perhaps correct in her assessment of the breakup that my pride was hurt more than anything. Proud, vain and lazy — I had the trifecta in life.
By the end of May, nothing had happened with the manuscript. Letters of refusal continued to arrive periodically but the deluge had ebbed. The manuscript itself began to gather dust at the bottom of the bookshelf. My birthday was coming up in the first week in June and little was going to help lift the cloud of doom and gloom. Destiny obviously was not going my way this year.
My forty-sixth birthday started off badly, with poor calculations of my exact age. Giggling at my inability to subtract 1958 from 2004, Mimi and Harry sat on my bed, which was covered with presents that they had chosen with Claire or had painstakingly made themselves with a needle and thread. I couldn’t even feel any joy when I realised I had miscalculated my age and I was younger than I thought. It was only when I went to the computer to check the incoming emails that my heart really soared and I screamed with delight: one of the biggest publishing companies in Sydney was interested in my manuscript. It defied belief. My birthday was starting to look better by the moment.
Waiting for me to grace the workroom with my presence, Claire had started work, trying to keep up with the colossal task of washing and ironing the sheets for the three properties. This day was no different and she was up to her elbows sorting out coloured towels from fluffy white dressing gowns with pockets full of used tissues left by the clients.
‘Come quick. You must look at something that has arrived in the computer. Come quick. Drop all of that.’ By this stage tears were streaming down everyone’s faces. I was screaming for joy.
‘They are going to publish it. I’ve done it. Do you know what this means?’
Claire too, was busy wiping away her tears. ‘This is so fantastique. You must go with the children to Sydney to sign the contract.’
We were in the middle of the season, all the houses were occupied nonstop, the washing and ironing was unrelenting as were the temperatures that were already pushing past thirty-seven degrees, building up to an early hot summer. It was the worst possible time to leave Claire to deal with everything by herself. Even with Claire’s immense capacity for hard work, this would take her to the limits. My fingers were crossed that I would be able to find someone to help. Maybe Fabienne would be able to find the time? Claire looked extremely doubtful. Fabienne, the young girl who often came to work as an extra pair of hands on Saturday, was working nonstop in the fields as the harvests were in full swing.
Within the space of an hour, after a restorative cup of tea beside the pond, I worked out exactly what I should do. Fly to Sydney to sign the contract, taking with me Mimi, Harry and also Raphaël, as both boys would still be under twelve and for the last time they would qualify for a child’s fare — in fact, we would be home two days before Raphaël turned twelve. It was an opportunity of a lifetime for him although it would be extremely hard for him to be away from his family. We would be heading into winter, not necessarily the time to show off the best of Sydney to our young tourist. Claire, Patrick and Fabienne pulled the short straw and would be left to carry the heavy load of cleaning, washing and ironing and dealing with all of the ongoing problems associated with the three properties, keeping the two poorly behaved dogs in line, and also the two cats, and a small rodent problem in the garage that wasn’t worth thinking about.
Harry was more concerned about how the oft-mentioned truckload of cash would find its way to our house or how the very fat cheque would squeeze through the letterbox.
Frantic calls to airlines to try to secure seats for the day that school finished turned out to be fruitless, as there was a general exodus from Paris on the first day of the long summer holidays. As always, it was the Saturday changeover day that was presenting me with problems: I needed a Sunday flight returning by Friday a week later, which was proving to be impossible. I decided to take the children out of school early. Letters were written to the school explaining the situation and asking for five days’ leave of absence, which was unwillingly granted. We were not sure how I would be replaced for the one or two Saturdays for bed making and cleaning duties; on at least one occasion, Patrick would be donning my apron and joining Claire and Fabienne.
One of the airlines came through with the seats — and better still, there was a chance that the thousands of frequent flyer points that I had recently accumulated could be used as an upgrade to business class for a portion of the trip. We would be away seventeen days. The ink on the departure stamp was barely dry from my quick trip in May but it was a dream come true for everyo
ne. Raphaël had never been in a large plane, let alone one that would take him to the other side of the world where he would have to speak English with everyone except us. His first experience of travel had been our trip to Florence earlier in the year and now he was off to Sydney. He was spinning with excitement.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
The Fat Lady Sings
Paris was warm and balmy, heralding the beginning of yet another hot summer’s day while we stood in the queue for two hours waiting to have our luggage registered. We found out later this was a fairly pointless exercise as it remained on the tarmac in Paris when our plane departed for Sydney.
Descending through the white fluffy clouds, a mirage of colours and exotic visions assaulted the senses of those lucky enough to have window seats. A patchwork of colours and shapes defined the landscape: the iridescent blue ocean, the endless urban sprawl of Monopoly houses with their red roofs cut into the drought-stricken vegetation along with the grey arteries of interminable roads, clogged to a standstill with too many cars. As the plane made its final descent, circling and swooping down to the runway, the distinctive shapes of the white sails of the Sydney Opera House and the Coathanger — the Sydney Harbour Bridge — were clearly visible and my heart skipped a beat. There was a general intake of breath from everyone in the plane.
Exhausted, cranky and cold, we exited from the customs area of Sydney International Airport with no luggage and no warm clothing. For the next twenty-four hours we wore an assemblage of clothing found in my father’s drawers and cupboards, a new uniform of flannelette pyjamas, a cashmere sweater and an assortment of woolly socks. By the time the luggage turned up we were more than ready to attack Sydney: the shops, the restaurants, the ferries, the beaches in winter — and this of course was before we met all the family and friends who were queued up to see Mimi and Harry and their French friend.
Raphaël’s eyes were permanently on swivel sticks. It was cultural overload. Living in a small village in the heartland of Provence, it was difficult for him to begin to comprehend life in a large metropolis like Paris, a place that was well known to him through movies, documentaries and the news. Sydney was an alien planet: a completely different way of life, food, language and culture.
When Harry was little the first word that he read aloud unassisted had been with me while shopping in the supermarket: ‘Tim Tam’ he cried for joy, throwing several packets into the trolley. So it was no surprise when Raphaël uttered the same word with sheer delight, rubbing his stomach and giving me the universal thumbs-up sign of approval, when eating a Tim Tam for the first time. Ah yes, Australian cuisine is so good, he sighed over and over. Vast quantities of taste sensations were offered to the trio of bottomless pits; the stars were lamingtons and pavlovas. Sugar and chocolate — an international language to any young person. Asian food was becoming our staple diet and I wondered how I would be able to reproduce anything like it back in Provence, where we ate mainly tomatoes, zucchini and eggplants.
We began the treadmill of visiting family and friends: Sue and Rob from Clontarf, followed by Sue and Rob from Davidson. The children were keen to see Raymond even though I wanted him dead, injured or maimed. It was arranged that we would meet at Manly. After a curt nod and a desultory wave of the hand, Raymond took the trio off on a speedboat ride around Sydney Harbour, a walk around the Opera House, lunch at McDonald’s followed by yet another walk but this time across the Harbour Bridge to Luna Park, an amusement park where they spent the best part of five hours on the rides. The call I had in the early evening was not the one I wanted. They were seated at a restaurant, just minutes from Jack’s house. I was to bring clean clothes for one of the boys who had been violently ill. Of course I was invited to stay for dinner — if I really wanted.
The contract for the book had been signed, which after all had been the object of our journey. By the end of our excursion in Sydney Raphaël had fallen in love with Sydney and I knew for the first time in decades that I was no longer in love with Raymond. It is difficult for love to flourish if there is no respect, and both had disappeared off the horizon. The same feeling applied when I went to pay a scheduled visit to the family home. My love for the house had died. It was evident that housekeeping was not high on the tenants’ priorities, as the agent said with a wry smile — even he was shocked at the state of the house. Under no circumstances could this property be sold with them as sitting tenants; it would scare potential buyers away.
The market was scorching, with prices shooting up month by month — but only for quality properties. Buyers were desperate for houses but they were informed and discerning in their quest; a property like mine as it stood would not interest them in the slightest. It was time to cut the ties that bound us to Sydney forever. The house had to be repaired and sold as soon as possible. It was time to go home. Back to a very hot Provençal summer.
It was difficult to reacclimatise to the heat of July after the windy, cold days in the southern hemisphere. The crowds and the traffic in Sydney had astounded me. I couldn’t believe that I used to love battling across the sprawling city of Sydney, driving in circles to find a car space for shopping and spending hours in queues at the supermarket. I was ecstatic to be back in Apt, my sleepy French country town with its 13,000 inhabitants. During July and August, though, it is quite believable that the population must double if not sometimes triple with the foreign invasion, everyone shopping at the same time in the same supermarket. The roads were clogged with cars, trucks and bikes all heading in different directions; tempers were frayed as the mercury climbed higher and higher. It was easier to make early morning visits to the supermarket while the tourists were still in their beds and spend the rest of the time waiting out the summer, taking long afternoon naps that stretched into the evening and washing and ironing in the cool of the night. Summertime meant ferrying the children around to visit friends or paying visits to the public pool in the village.
But this summer, for the first time no one was invited to the house for lunches or dinners. The atmosphere was like a morgue. I tried not to think about Raymond, but turning the page, ruling a line under a huge chapter in my life, was exceedingly hard. The reality was that I did not want to accept change. Few people knew of my success with a publishing house accepting the manuscript because few knew that I spent my days writing. I had gone out of my way to disassociate myself from the English-speaking community, but now I was beginning to think that I had made a huge mistake.
Lizzie had taken her children for an extended trip to Australia. Deirdre had also gone to Australia to visit her family and to initiate the necessary steps for a rapid return to Queensland; personal belongings and books were packed, furniture was sold, and the rest would go into a garage sale. Kit was busy with work, and although he had managed to cut back on his punishing schedule, he was never available for dinner. Everyone else seemed to be taking refuge from the crippling heat by fleeing back to England for quick visits.
During summer, Harry continued with a couple of hours of tuition from Anne George each week to bring him up to the required standard for his first year in high school. Maybe because I had nothing to do with the activity, or maybe due to a growth spurt, Harry suddenly progressed in leaps and bounds. I could see that if I could convince Anne George, she should remain part of Harry’s educational program for the next couple of years — if not until he was at least twenty-five. Declensions of verbs and exercises in French grammar had very limited appeal, whereas swimming at the local pool did, so her ability to keep Harry at his task was admirable. As with everything that Harry attacked, he took on the fundamentals of the French language with grace and charm, never complaining about the futility of the exercise.
The greatest difference between Australia and Provence is the delineation of the seasons. In general, Australian weather shifts rapidly between extremes: very hot, very wet, very dry or very windy. In Provence the weather changes every twelve weeks almost to the day. Spring and autumn were delightful, summer was unbea
rably hot and winter bitterly cold. Mother Nature was always on the move. With school starting back in the first week of September, autumn was already in preparation — it is one of the most vibrant times in the Luberon, with the rich colours and the light on the distant hills, the soft luminosity and warmth of the twilight. The fields lay fallow, ready for the first of the autumn rains, and the tractors stood in readiness to tear the earth up in large clods in preparation for the next crop. Green vine leaves were in abundance, the large purple grapes ripening on the vines before the harvest. With the sound of the municipal pool being emptied and the grating of the chairs being stacked in tidy piles to go into winter hibernation, everyone breathed easier as the summer drew to a close.
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