Bella...A French Life

by Marilyn Z. Tomlins

  “Like underclothes.”

  “Like panties? Or a bra and panty set?”

  “A set. Sound’s good.”

  I choose half a dozen bra and panty sets and Louise pulls the curtain of the fitting cubicle aside for me to step in.

  “Do keep your own panty on when you try these panties on,” she says.

  She is in white skin-tight trousers, her buttocks jutting out, and I am sure she is not wearing a panty herself.

  I buy two sets. One is black. The other is red. Jean-Louis loved red underwear.

  I had told Marion this once.

  “Kinky,” she said. “I like a man who likes kinky.”

  -0-

  Chapter Thirty-One

  It is going on for four o’clock and the Vaybee is almost deserted: lunch is over and the hour of the aperitif has not yet begun.

  Alice sits on a high stool at the till of which she is in charge these days. She lifts a hand, which seems all red nails and shiny rings, in greeting.

  “Doctor!”

  She always addresses me as ‘doctor’ which makes me wonder what Frascot has told her about me.

  He steps from the kitchen.

  “What can I serve you, Miss? It’s on the house.”

  “Just a small black coffee, please.”

  Rare it is that something is ‘on the house’ at the Vaybee. Father Pierre’s meals and drinks are though.

  “We’re dancing tonight,” Alice calls out. “We want to chase the Monday night blues.”

  “Great.”

  “Ah, you will be staying, Miss. Colin joining you?” asks Frascot.

  Colin.

  “I’ve just popped in for a coffee, Frascot.”

  “Colin was around earlier,” he says.

  “And what a dish!” comes from Alice. “Hey, hey, hey!”

  “Just you shut up, woman!” snorts Frascot.

  Two youths walk in and want orange juice and peanuts. Frascot says he does not sell peanuts.

  “So, good, we will each have two packets. And pass the salt too,” replies one of the youths.

  “I’ll tell you what he will give you,” says Alice. “A slap.”

  “I don’t keep peanuts in the place and you know it, so do not come here to provoke,” says Frascot to the two.

  “Keep your old stinking pants on, Gran’pa,” says the other youth.

  He is not a bad-looking young man: dark curls fall over his face and his eyes are as black as the curls.

  I am sitting at a window table. Le Square is deserted. Lights have already gone on in some of the houses behind it. It is getting darker earlier every day: soon it will be dark here already at this time of the day. Winter! I think I will go to Paris as soon as Colin leaves. Leaves?

  Yes. Colin will leave, Bella girl.

  Speak of the devil, or rather, think of the devil. I hear a motorcycle approaching. It is Colin. He turns his head this way and must therefore see my car: I parked it in front of the Vaybee and between two yellow lines marking a space for deliveries, but I know the space will not be needed: Frascot’s deliveries are always made first thing in the morning. I also know Mayor Pares will not allow his traffic cop to give me a ticket: Le Presbytère is too big a contributor to the town hall’s coffers.

  Colin pulls up behind the Merc and begins to walk to the Vaybee. He is taking off his crash helmet.

  “I saw your car,” he greets me. “May I?”

  He points to the free chair at my table.

  “I went shopping in Avranches so I thought I will have a coffee before I go home.”

  “Glad I saw your car.”

  He waves to Frascot and Alice. The latter’s cheeks turn a little redder than they already are with blusher.

  “Who’s the lady?” he asks me.

  “Frascot’s latest.”

  “Oh yes. She was at Fred’s wife’s party. Alice - is it? What was his wife like?”

  “I never met her - they divorced when he was in his twenties - but I understand she was a very plain woman. Rather fat too.”

  “Any children?”

  “Yes. But just one.”

  “That’s a blessing.”

  “Quite.”

  “I’ve never wanted … do not want … children, but my brother has four. They’re grown-up now of course.”

  “My brother also has four.”

  “And you, Bella?”

  “I’ve never been married.”

  “You do not have a love child?”

  “No. ”

  “You give me the impression of someone who would make a wonderful mother …”

  “I am not maternal.”

  “I am not paternal.”

  “What are the names of your brother’s children?”

  “George, Jane, Emma … can’t remember the name of the youngest ... oh yes, it is Alfred.”

  “Very English.”

  He shrugs.

  “And … there are the garden gnomes.”

  “Which he sells?”

  “Manufactures and sells. He names them. His newest is, if you will believe it, named Fred. The Fred range.”

  “I must tell Fred.”

  “What’s this about my brother?” asks Frascot who has come to ask what Colin is drinking.

  “What are you having, Bella?” asks Colin.

  “Small black coffee.”

  “Same for me, Frascot,” says Colin.

  “So what were you saying about my brother?” Frascot asks again.

  “Not your brother, Frascot, but mine. We were talking about my brother.”

  “You have a brother?”

  “Brother, sister-in-law, nieces, nephews. Misfortune in its entirety.”

  Frascot shrugs and walks off to fetch Colin’s coffee. I think he did not catch Colin’s irony.

  “You are not close to your brother, Colin?” I ask.

  “We’re living different lives, but no, I love my brother, especially now that our parents are deceased and it’s just the two of us in the family, but as for him, he’s as cold as ice.”

  “But he has fathered four children.”

  “So he has and this is the mystery of all mysteries.”

  He winks.

  Alice brings two small cups of black coffee to our table. She never serves patrons, so it must be for Colin’s benefit she does so today. We thank her; she smiles in Colin’s direction and wiggles her generously-flabby bottom walking back to the till.

  “You get on well with your brother, Bella?” asks Colin returning to what we were talking about before Alice’s interruption.

  “Very well, yes.”

  “Was your mother a doctor, or a nurse perhaps before retirement when she came to help your father at the guest house? I ask this because both you and your brother are doctors and when this happens usually one of the parents was and I know, from what you’ve already told me, it was not your father.”

  “My mother was a waitress. German soldiers used to go into the bistro where she worked for a drink and so my parents got talking, got talking despite the silence which fell over the place when a German walked in.”

  “And they fell in love?”

  “Yes, and it was not to have been, and she had become a horizontal collaborator, and when the war was over the villagers shaved my mother’s head and dragged her through the streets. Some spat on her. Shouted at her that she was a whore.”

  He nods.

  “They already did that in the Great War - shave the heads of the women who had slept with German soldiers and …”

  “It was not a case of ‘slept with’. My mother fell in love with my father and he fell in love with her.”

  “Of course,” he said, “do forgive me for using such an expression.”

  “Not to worry. There is ‘falling in love with’ and there is ‘slept with’.”

  “Of course,” he says again.

  The coffee is hot as it always is here at the Vaybee. More patrons have walked in, some of them standing at the bar. The
latter are drinking small glasses of Frascot’s table wine. I hope Miss Jambenoire will not also come in for a pre-dinner drink or an aperitif. I am not usually in the Vaybee at this time on a Monday evening, so I do not know if it is her habit to do so. Father Pierre, I know, will not be walking in. He practises bination and will be saying the second mass of the day to the faithful.

  “Where do your parents lie buried?” asks Colin.

  We had been drinking our coffee in silence, each watching the patrons, some young, some not so young, walk in.

  “Here in the local cemetery. They lie together, side by side,” I tell Colin.

  “It’s family tradition here for all in a family to lie together, is it not?”

  I nod.

  “I will lie somewhere alone. But not that I want to think about that already now.”

  “Of course you would not, Bella.”

  “What about your parents, Colin?”

  “My father lies in the cemetery closest to where he had lived in the last years of his life. He lived in a hotel in London’s Bayswater Road. As for my mother, she lies in their cemetery in London.”

  “Their cemetery?”

  “A Jewish cemetery.”

  “I see.”

  Four pimply youths walk in. One is pushing a shiny electric keyboard over to a corner. Another is carrying a drum. He starts to set it up beside the keyboard. The third starts to tune a shiny electric guitar. The fourth member, a girl, sets up a microphone. One of the patrons standing at the bar carries chairs over to them.

  Colin looks at me and frowns.

  “There’s going to be music here tonight. Alice and Fred told me.”

  “Oh lordie!” sighs Colin just as he did at Paula’s birthday party.

  “We can go if you wish. I was not going to stay anyway for the music.”

  Darkness has fallen over the square and behind every window there is a light. Blue-grey smoke pours from some of the chimneys we can see.

  A glance at my watch tells me it is half past six.

  “Time passes quickly,” says Colin, having seen I had checked to see the time.

  “Our lives are passing, yes.”

  “Let us make it pass just a little slower this night. Let us stay and have a bite to eat and I may even invite you for a waltz.”

  He wants to know what I think of his suggestion.

  “I will say that those four there,” I point to the musicians, “they won’t be playing any waltzes tonight.”

  “Not! In that case we will just listen, but what do you say about dinner?”

  I tell him it will be lovely.

  Why did I say that?

  He calls Alice over and she’s at our table within a second. No. Half a second.

  “What can I do for you, Milord?” she asks.

  “For us actually,” replies Colin.

  He tells her we would like something to eat and whether we could move to another table.

  “Sure, sure, Milord,” she says. “Something … something intimate?”

  “Sure, sure, Milady, something intimate,” he replies.

  He winks at me.

  She shows us to the table beside the tall lamp with the shade of white and pink seashells where Jean-Louis and I had sat the day of our mussels lunch.

  “May I allow you to choose for me?” asks Colin.

  How different this man is from Jean-Louis.

  “If you trust me, Colin.”

  “Totally.”

  He holds up his hand, palms to me. His lifeline is long.

  Frascot makes a good porc marengo. I suggest it to Colin.

  “Describe it to me, please?” he asks.

  “It consists of cubes of pork which have been cooked in white wine for something like an hour. Added to the pork are carrots, tomatoes, onions and various herbs. It’s rich and filling, so one usually has boiled potatoes with it.”

  “Sounds excellent.”

  Alice comes to get our order.

  “Wine?” she asks, addressing Colin.

  “Wine?” he asks me.

  “A glass will do. Thanks. I’m driving.”

  “And I’m on my bike, so only a glass it will have to be for me, too,” Colin tells Alice.

  “Alice, nothing fancy, please. Just your white table variety please,” I quickly tell her.

  She leans over Colin to take the menu from him, but only holds a hand out to take the one I am holding from me.

  “I’ll bring a carafe over if you should decide to have more than just a glass. There will be four glasses in the carafe but if you do not want to drink that much, not to worry about it, Frascot will work it into something tomorrow. I mean when you leave here you will be falling straight into bed, not so, so being a little light in the head will not be a problem, not so?”

  Neither Colin nor I reply.

  Frascot brings the food, and Alice, the wine, and Colin fills our glasses.

  “What shall we drink to?” he asks.

  He has picked up his glass.

  “Let us be horrible and drink to ourselves, Colin,” I say. “I will drink to your dreams coming true and you can drink to …” I stop.

  “… your dreams coming true, Bella.”

  I smile.

  “Colin, I stopped dreaming some time ago.”

  “I too, Bella, I too have stopped dreaming some time ago,” he replies.

  From outside comes the patter of rain on the square.

  “Winter,” says Colin.

  “Yes, winter. Not my favourite season. Winter in Paris is quite pleasant actually, but here it can be …”

  “Lonely?” he breaks in.

  “Yep.”

  “I understand. It’s beautiful here in the village - what’s its name - and up at your place, but one can’t talk to a view, no matter how beautiful it is, the way one can talk to a human being, can one?”

  “No. Or rather yes, the mad do.”

  “But you are not mad, Bella.”

  “I am not mad, Colin, and for this reason I agreed a moment ago that it can be lonely at Le Presbytère in winter.”

  “Oh Bella!”

  It was a cry from deep inside of him.

  Embarrassed at having revealed too much of my life to him, perhaps, I give a little laugh.

  “I’ve just had a mouthful of wine and it has already gone to my head, so do not take notice of me please, Colin.”

  He leans over the table and reaches for my hands.

  “Bella, Anton Chekhov wrote: Just as I shall lie alone in the grave, so, in essence, do I live alone. It is true for every one of us.”

  Slowly, he lifts my hands to his face.

  “Bella, Bella, Bella,” he murmures.

  He presses the palm of my right hand against his lips.

  Outside, the rain has started to pelt the square.

  I keep my eyes on his; I discern tenderness in them.

  He eases his hold on my right hand but tightens that on my left. I watch him raise the hand to his lips as he had raised my right hand a moment earlier. He is looking at me, the tenderness still in his eyes. Quickly, he turns my hand over and presses his lips very hard against the top of my hand.

  “Hey, you two!” says Alice.

  She is standing beside our table; we did not - I certainly did not - see or hear her approach. She is holding a urinal pistol. A very pretty one. It is of porcelain with yellow pansies painted around it.

  “For you,” she says. “On the house. The trou normand.”

  Colin looks at me.

  “Bella, is this what it looks like?”

  I nod.

  “Certainly is.”

  “Wait, let me get this correct. Help me out with this. Am I supposed to … you know what … in it? Good Lord, is this the custom in France?”

  He has turned red in the face.

  “Yes. I mean no, you are not expected to do anything into it. We are supposed to drink from it.”

  “Drink what? Not what someone else has put into it?”

&n
bsp; “Calvados. Drink Calvados from it.”

  “You’re joking,” he says. “You must be joking.”

  He is no longer red in the face, but has become a little grey around his mouth.

  Alice is biting on her lips, trying not to laugh. Again, she leans over Colin, her low-cut black top slipping down to reveal her full breasts right to her very red nipples. The sight would have turned Jean-Louis on. Colin is not even aware of what she is showing him, offering him. He is staring at the urinal pistol.

  “Doctor, you will have to explain to Colin about the pistolet urinoir tradition. He is … how to say it … a little worried, non,” says Alice, straightening up.

  “We call it the Norman Hole,” I tell Colin. “It is offered to cleanse the palette before going on from the main course to the cheese and dessert.”

  “I never! A urinal pistol?”

  “To be different, yes.”

  “Sure is that! I thought drinking an infusion after a meal was odd, but this! I wonder if the Queen comes to Normandy, will they offer it to her too?”

  I laugh.

  “Maybe this is why you Brits have not again tried to conquer Normandy.”

  He laughs.

  Alice, who has returned to her chair behind the till, motions for us to drink the offered Calvados.

  “You go first,” says Colin.

  He has picked up the urinal pistol and is holding it around its fat belly and swivelling its contents. Quickly, I lift the round mouth of the urinal to my lips and I tip my head back. I swallow once, and again and I begin to choke, the fiery apple brandy shooting down my throat as if a real bullet has been fired into my mouth from a real pistol.

  “I … oh hell,” I stutter, getting my breath back.

  “My turn,” says Colin, interest in his eyes.

  I watch him tilt his head back and bring the urinal up to his mouth, his mouth wide open as if in a dentist’s chair.

  “Colin …,” I begin.

  I have to warn him of the potency of what he is about to drink, but the brandy is already running from the mouth of the urinal into his open mouth. He swallows, coughs, swallows again and coughs again, his eyes bulging and the brandy running down the sides of his mouth and over his leather jacket.

  “Bella, what is in this thing?” he asks, getting his breath back.

  I look towards Alice and she is no longer sitting down behind the till, but she is on her feet beside it and beside her is Frascot. The two are doing their best not to laugh at Colin. She is holding a hand over her mouth, and Frascot is pinching his legs together as if he needs the urinal pistol, but not to drink from, but for the real thing.