Promises to Keep

by Patricia Sands

  “As they should,” Philippe said when Kat remarked on the contrast. “Ancient plumbing is not romantic, in spite of how you see it.”

  Rocky outcroppings came into view occasionally, and forested hills appeared as they neared Toulon and moved well into the Var region. Philippe pointed to some good hiking areas they might try one day.

  He explained that their timing for this trip to Lyon was perfect, as they would be there during the renowned Fête des Lumières, when much of the city and many of its most beautiful buildings were lit with spectacular displays of colorful lights, many of them animated and set to music. “It’s going to be crowded. People come from all around the world to see the lights. Millions of them. The fête lasts four days and there’s a massive party throughout the city. You have to make restaurant reservations months in advance—unless you know my cousin Armand.

  “The legend is that the Virgin Mary saved the city from the plague and, to thank her, a statue was built in 1852. On the day it was erected, the whole city was lit by candles that its citizens had put in their windows.”

  After leaving Marseille, the train turned north, its engine kicked into high gear, and Le Train à Grande Vitesse lived up to its name.

  Philippe dug into his backpack and pulled out a gift-wrapped package. “You’ll like this.”

  “Forgive me if I don’t talk much for the rest of the trip,” Kat said after she had unwrapped a guidebook to Lyon, and she spent much of the rest of the journey reading about the history of the city.

  The first time she looked up was when the train stopped in Aix-en-Provence. Katherine was surprised by how soon they had reached the town.

  “Only ten minutes! But I didn’t see Sainte-Victoire,” she said. “We always see it on the drive.”

  The barren, imposing Montagne Sainte-Victoire near Aix—painted more than two hundred times by Cézanne—commanded their attention whenever they went there by car but was nowhere to be seen from the train.

  “Instead I’m looking at a nuclear reactor. It’s not the same,” she said, and she buried herself back in the book. From time to time, Philippe nudged her to enjoy the scenery.

  Fields of dried sunflowers reminded Kat of the golden vistas of Provence in June. Most of the fields were brown or yellow and looked dry, including vast vineyards at rest for the winter.

  “Fields of solar panels aren’t on my wish list of things to see,” she muttered as they passed a huge installation.

  “But they are part of modern life,” Philippe said. “Just like those windmills over there, providing electricity with today’s technology.”

  “No-o-o-o,” Katherine cried. “I only want to see the Don Quixote type of windmills, merci beaucoup.”

  Philippe shook his head. “Une vraie romantique.”

  The hills of the Luberon, still green in spite of winter’s approach, appeared in the distance as the train approached Valence. Soon they were traveling through a vast patchwork of fields that were mute testimony to the agricultural importance of the area. Tractors and other heavy machinery were at work, turning the fields and preparing furrows for spring planting. Katherine set her book aside and, undeterred by the windows, took several photos.

  “The shutter in my eye never stops when I’m in a landscape like this,” she said. “Let’s come back in the spring by car so we can stop at these old farms and explore the roads.”

  “Avec plaisir.”

  When the view again became unremarkable, Kat continued reading.

  Some minutes later, she rested the open book in her lap. “I just read that Lyon was the heart of the Resistance during the Second World War. That movement fascinates me. One of the first places I want to visit is the Resistance Museum.”

  “I’m putting it on the list.”

  Suddenly the countryside vanished, and the train slowed down as it passed through the industrial areas on the outskirts of Lyon. Finally, the train stopped, and they stepped into one of the biggest and most crowded stations she had ever seen.

  Philippe hailed a taxi outside the vast station for the final leg of their journey to Denise and Armand’s apartment on the edge of the old town. Soon they were climbing the four flights of stairs to their front door.

  “This is another good reason to pack lightly when traveling in France.” Kat said, stopping to catch her breath even though Philippe was carrying her bag. “And I thought I was in good shape!”

  “Stair climbing requires a special breathing technique,” Philippe teased.

  The apartment door was ajar and, when she heard them arrive, Denise dashed out to greet them, while Armand held the door open wide.

  “Pas juste!” Denise exclaimed when Philippe told her they would only be staying for two days. “We want more time to get to know cette charmante femme who has captured your heart. You must promise to come again, and soon.”

  “We will,” Philippe said. “We can’t possibly see everything in this short a time.”

  Denise was as exuberant as her pixie-like appearance suggested. She was petite, with closely cropped dark hair that was streaked with pink and plum. Her violet eyes sparkled as she spoke, while her hands motioned nonstop.

  Armand was short and sturdily built, with a quiet expression that belied a sense of humor as robust as his appetite. His closely shaven head and wire-rimmed glasses enhanced his academic appearance. He had studied in California, and his English was excellent.

  After Philippe and Kat put their bags in the office-cum-guest-room and freshened up, the foursome headed out.

  “Katherine, next year you and Philippe must come in November for le Beaujol’ympiades. It’s when we celebrate the arrival of the year’s Beaujolais Nouveau. The parties are très amusantes,” Denise said. They were walking through the old town and had stopped to look at one of the many posters announcing the previous month’s festivities.

  Armand nodded, “No one welcomes le Beaujolais Nouveau better than the Lyonnais.”

  Katherine smiled at this display of the love the French have for their wines, and the warmth of the cousins’ welcome allayed the slight anxiety she’d been feeling at the prospect of meeting Philippe’s wife’s family.

  First on their hosts’ agenda as tour guides was a bus tour, to give them a sense of the city’s layout and an opportunity to see some of its enormous trompe l’oeil wall murals.

  “We have a history of wall painting here, dating back to the Romans,” Armand said. “There are over two hundred outdoor murals, and some of our modern fresco painters are known throughout the world. Did you know we are a UNESCO World Heritage Site?”

  He was obviously proud of his city. And he had good reason to be, Kat thought. It was a lovely place, and the nineteenth-century architecture at its heart reminded her a little of Paris. “The main difference that I can see,” she said, “is all the avant-garde installations.”

  “There’s some cutting-edge art here, bien sûr,” Denise said. “A good example is what’s happening in the new area of Confluence in the Presqu’île district, where the Rhône and the Saône rivers join together. There used to be only slaughterhouses and prisons there, but it’s being redeveloped and promises to be a showcase of modern architecture. There’s an eclectic mix of style in Lyon.”

  Armand pointed out the imposing Basilica of Notre Dame de Fourvière, which overlooked the city from atop a hill in the old quarter.

  “It makes me think of Sacré Coeur, except it is all towers instead of domes,” Kat said.

  “We lovingly refer to it as l’éléphant renversé, the upside-down elephant!”

  “Some of us do,” corrected Denise, poking him in the ribs. “Personally, I love its look.”

  The bus drove on through narrow streets lined with five-story buildings to La Place des Terreaux. The openness of the square tempted them off the bus for an espresso break in a café near the impressive fountain of a woman
driving four charging horses.

  “Here’s what you should know about this square,” Armand said once they were settled inside the café. “It was originally the site of the pig market—because, you know, Lyon is famous for its pork—and also of public executions. The two weren’t held on the same day, I don’t think. We don’t hold either of them any more, for which the pigs thank us, I’m sure.”

  He grinned, and Denise snorted. “Ask me how many times I’ve heard these stories.”

  “So, to continue, the intricate sculpture in the fountain is the work of Bartholdi, creator of the Statue of Liberty, and it represents the Garonne River and its four tributaries rushing to the sea. But you must see it lit up at night.”

  “He’s right,” Denise agreed. “C’est incroyable.”

  “Merci à mon assistante,” Armand said, raising his cup in a toast. Denise stood and curtsied.

  Armand cleared his voice and went on. “The Hôtel de Ville, that exquisite edifice you see at the end of the square, which is our city hall, was first constructed in the mid 1600s. Twenty-five years later, a fire destroyed most of it, but it was rebuilt shortly afterward. In 1792, during the sitting of the Revolutionary Court, our national anthem, the Marseillaise, was sung in public here for the first time. Lots of towns—and Paris, of course—like to claim to be the first . . . and so do we!”

  He proceeded to sing a few bars, and Philippe joined in to give Kat a rousing rendition while Denise buried her face in her hands. Their laughter prompted people at several other tables to join in.

  Fully re-caffeinated, they waited at the bus stop to continue the tour.

  As they left the square, Denise said, “He didn’t mention that the carillon in l’hôtel is one of the largest in Europe, with sixty-five bells. It plays on Sunday evenings in the summer and once a week the rest of the year. It will play during the fête, so you will hear it.”

  They left the bus tour again to explore the Renaissance district on foot. One of the oldest areas in Lyon, it was lucky enough to have survived for five hundred years almost intact. Armand explained that some of the buildings were erected in the Middle Ages and many more in the Renaissance era, when silk weaving and printing were the city’s main industries.

  “I love how they have made so many streets here only for pedestrians. Everything seems so accessible,” Kat said. Then she remembered what she’d read—that hidden from view were hundreds of secret covered passageways, called traboules, running through private homes and down to the river, some of them dating back to the fourth century.

  She had been unaware of Lyon’s silk-weaving past until Véronique had talked about it in Entrevaux. The guidebook Philippe had given her on the train had several pages about that history, and she was particularly interested in seeing the traboules. She’d read that they had been used by the Resistance during the German occupation. She mentioned her interest to Armand, who told her that many of them were in the Croix-Rousse area, where they were headed next.

  Walking through to Place Bellecour, the largest square, they went down into the subway and caught the next train. The district, built on a hill, was once the center of the silk-weaving industry. There was no time left to explore any of the traboules that were open to the public, so Denise suggested that Philippe take Kat on a tour of them the next day. “They are architecturally unique as well as historically important. You can’t imagine what they are like until you see them for yourself.”

  While the men stopped into a bar, the women went on a guided tour of the Maison des Canuts, the Silk Weavers’ House, where they looked at the many antique looms on display and watched a demonstration of how an old, treadle-operated dobby loom worked. “It’s like watching an intricate ballet,” Kat whispered to Denise. “The movements required are so precise and demanding. It’s quite the workout for the weaver. The Jacquard looms are fascinating too, with those punch cards.”

  “Jacquard really was responsible for the whole idea of programming machines, and his concepts were critical in the development of computing hardware,” Denise said as the tour finished, her enthusiasm matching Kat’s. “I never tire of visiting this area. There’s always something to learn.”

  The weather difference from the coast was a bit of a shock and reminded Kat of Toronto in December. She was glad Philippe had encouraged her to put a heavy sweater on under her jacket.

  “My feet are ready for a rest,” Denise exclaimed after they rejoined Philippe and Armand. “We’ve covered a lot of territory today.”

  They hailed a taxi and went back to the apartment to shower, change, warm up, and enjoy an apéro. “I’m sure you know the drill by now,” Armand teased Kat as he served them all a celebratory kir royale.

  “Bien sûr,” she replied. “Santé!”

  This part of the day was another French tradition to which Kat had adapted, one that was a complete change from the rush from work to dinner that was the rule in her marriage. James had not been a fan of cocktail hour.

  Of course, that would have meant he had to converse with me, she thought ruefully.

  Joy had explained the philosophy of l’apéritif in France when Katherine was first in Provence on her exchange.

  “L’heure de l’apéro is not just a time for cocktails,” Joy had said. “It is the moment when the French deliberately create some space between the workday and the dinner hour, demonstrating their talent for slowing down and, somehow, miraculously expanding time. The idea is to whet the appetite for the meal that is to come. Le plaisir . . . remember?”

  Denise and Armand expanded on the tradition.

  They all raised their glasses without actually making contact.

  “Did you know that it is bad luck to cross arms with others when we reach across to toast?” Denise said.

  “Yes, I heard that,” Kat said. “I also know we must always make eye contact with the person. It’s one of the many lessons I’ve learned from Philippe.”

  “Ah, she is learning quickly to become française, Philippe.”

  “D’accord,” he replied, his eyes shining.

  The conversation turned to where to eat dinner that night, and Armand spoke persuasively in favor of their local bouchon, a kind of restaurant that served traditional Lyonnais food.

  Denise held up a hand to get a word in. “Katherine, you should know that Armand is a bit like royalty here in Lyon, as he is descended from one of the original mères Lyonnaises, the local women employed as cooks by aristocratic families.”

  “I just read about them on the train.”

  “So you know that, after the Revolution, they were encouraged to write down their recipes—”

  Armand broke in excitedly. “And my great-great-grandmother was one of those mères. Her recipes were handed down through my family but, of more pride to us, some of the greatest chefs in this city were trained following her strict rules.”

  “Armand’s family is well known here and is always welcome at the finest restaurants, sans réservations.” Philippe added.

  “So now you know why he is the way he is.”

  “You mean trop gros?” asked Armand, feigning hurt.

  “Non, not overweight,” Denise laughed, giving him a light poke in his well-padded stomach, “I mean why you are so fixated on cuisine.”

  Armand played along and doubled over before continuing. “Bien! So tonight, Katherine my dear, you will eat the food of the fine mères de Lyon. You will love it!”

  “Tomorrow we will take you for a meal at the other end of the spectrum here. We will cover it all,” Philippe promised as his cousins nodded in agreement.

  “C’est une visite éclair!” laughed Denise.

  “A lightning visit,” translated Armand.

  “Right—a whirlwind visit,” Kat offered.

  They left for dinner at eight and strolled a few blocks to a small corner restaurant, where Armand pointed o
ut the sticker on the window showing it was an authentic bouchon. They entered a packed wood-paneled room with tables covered in red-and-white checked cloths.

  While they waited for the food to arrive, Philippe and Denise chatted while Armand told Kat the history of some of the more famous bouchons, many of which originally were small post houses or inns. A straw bottle stopper, or bouchon, would be hung in the window to indicate that meals were served.

  “In the early days, these places served diners from every walk of life, some of them very unsavory. The secret was the food, prepared by a mère while the husband poured wine and collected the money. It’s like sitting down for a family meal, but you have to pay for it.

  “Each bouchon has its own ambiance, flavor and history,” he added. “But there are two things they have in common—delicious traditional dishes and noise.”

  After a meal that included duck paté, sausages, roast pork and quenelles, they strolled along narrow laneways that were lit up for the fête. Philippe deliberately dropped behind his cousins and whispered to Kat that she was doing a fine job of distracting Armand.

  “We’ve exchanged some nice memories about the family, but I’m not saying a word to Denise about Idelle until later tomorrow. I have always liked her and feel a bit of a heel to be doing this. But whatever will help, we must do. Thanks, Minou. You are making this all so much easier.”

  “Tonight we’ll wander a few streets and tomorrow we will visit Notre-Dame, which is why we didn’t get off the bus there earlier,” Armand called back to them, pointing high above the rooftops at the basilica glowing against the night sky. “There’s been a shrine there since the eleventh century. Originally it was the site of the Roman forum; the basilica was built on top of an older structure to give thanks to the Holy Mary for the city being spared during the Franco-Prussian war of 1870, give or take a few years.”