Daughter of Catalonia

by Jane MacKenzie

  Philippe had come to see Madeleine at breakfast time, just as she was giving Bernard a carefully edited, official account of the night’s events. The hotel was empty save for them, and Philippe had closed the dining room door behind him when he came into the room. Martin, he told them, was doing fine. He had been seriously cold, and it would be some time before his embattled body recovered fully, but there was no lasting damage. As for his mind, it was harder to fathom. The boy remembered nothing about his fall. He had come to the rocks, as Madeleine had thought, looking for solitude and the wild spray of the sea, but he didn’t know what time it had been, and no one knew how long he had been there, except that he hadn’t been lying there when the searchers had followed the cliff path earlier in the afternoon. He hadn’t said much, Philippe told them, and no one wanted to ply him with questions when his mind was foggy and concussed.

  He didn’t know either that his ‘father’ Jean-Pierre Perrens was dead. Philippe had learnt as soon as he came back to Vermeilla this morning. Daniel hadn’t come with him, refusing to leave Martin, and so he didn’t know either. But Philippe had seen Colette.

  What she had told him Madeleine couldn’t fathom. Philippe’s questions seemed quite normal, but his eyes fixed her with what she thought was an overly searching gaze. But this, she realised, might just be her own guilty imagination playing tricks on her. In the late hours of last night she and Jordi had agreed that even Bernard and Philippe should not be told the truth, unless Colette chose to tell Philippe. It was her secret to tell, not theirs, and their whole concern was to set the idea of a tragic accident so firmly in everyone’s mind that no one asked Colette any questions she might struggle to answer. They weren’t out of the woods yet, they knew, since Colette’s state of mind was so disturbed, but she had the habit of silence, and it was silence they needed now.

  Philippe might well know already what had really happened on the café stairs last night, but in front of Bernard he wouldn’t, she knew, say anything. Colette, he told her when she asked him, was still groggy from the sedative, and clearly in a state of shock, but her main concern was to see her son, and he would be taking her to the hospital later in the morning, when Martin was more likely to be awake.

  ‘He looks good,’ he told them, ‘and it will do her good to see him.’

  ‘And us? Should we see him?’ Madeleine wanted to know.

  ‘When his mind is stronger, then yes, it will be very important for you to see him. Robert arrives today, yes? Well the café won’t be opening today, but you should bring him to visit me later at the apartment. I don’t suppose he remembers where he started out his life. Come round and I’ll have some Banyuls to offer you, and then tomorrow maybe we can go to see Martin.’

  So here they were, waiting for the train, and it seemed incredible that it was only just over a week since she had waved Robert goodbye at the Gard du Nord. Neither of them could have imagined that he would be back in France so soon, and under such circumstances. But this was his story too, and she longed to see him.

  As the train drew in she reminded herself that there was no guarantee he would be on it. This was the first possible train he could be on, assuming everything on his journey had gone completely smoothly. She scanned the small trickle of passengers as they left the train, and for a moment didn’t see Robert, until Bernard tapped her arm and pointed with a smile. It was a couple, the young man on the platform helping a lady from the train, taking her case and then holding out a hand to help her down. The lady was Solange, and Madeleine thought simply, Of course. It seemed so inevitable.

  ‘Well, Bernard,’ Solange commented, as she kissed him and Madeleine, ‘I hope you have been useful to this poor child.’

  ‘It has all been most instructive,’ was his rather cryptic reply, but he put his arm around Madeleine as he continued. ‘This “poor child”, as you call her, has been through more than you know, but she has proved herself a pretty strong force. And good,’ he added dryly, ‘at recruiting allies.’

  Robert just stood looking around him, and said ultimately to Madeleine, ‘I don’t remember anything, Lena. Will you show me?’

  They walked that afternoon all over Vermeilla, through the cobbled streets to watch the men playing boules, along the beach to where the usual trickling stream was still a swift flowing waterfall, then back to the harbour wall to gaze over the impossibly blue waters of the Mediterranean. Robert was quiet at times, and especially when Madeleine told him about the events of the previous night. She didn’t hide the truth from him about Jean-Pierre Perrens. He was the only person she would tell, but he needed to know everything she knew. And she told him about Jordi, since he had so much to share in the week’s stories, the lives stripped bare. It was Robert’s life too. He didn’t question her about Jordi, except once, when he simply asked, ‘Will I like him, Lena?’

  ‘I hope so, Bobo,’ was her answer. ‘It’s important.’

  At dusk they went to visit Philippe, all together, Bernard and Solange, Madeleine and Robert. For Solange it was a true case of memory lane. She held her breath as they climbed the stairs, and when Philippe opened the door to them she was unable to speak. Philippe didn’t notice, because he was completely transfixed by Robert. He stood at gaze for what seemed like minutes, and then took Robert’s hand and held it, tears swimming in his eyes.

  It was Bernard who broke the silence, introducing Solange and gently ushering Philippe backwards into the sitting room. They had bonded, these two men, Madeleine thought, in the last two days, and Bernard knew how to manage Philippe’s emotional enthusiasm. As Philippe recovered his poise, and searched through memory to recognise Solange from the young woman she had been, Madeleine took control of serving small glasses of chilled Banyuls, pulling Robert into the kitchen with her, pointing out the little stove in the corner with a grin of triumph.

  There was too much emotion in the room for it to be an easy little gathering at first, but they were saved by nostalgia, as Philippe and Solange revived the past with stories of Luis, Elise and the children, and their rich but frequently almost absurd lives in this little apartment and this little community. Robert bloomed as always, and Madeleine basked in his sunshine. She was more serious than he. She always would be, and she would never have his easy knack of winning over company at the first meeting. It was lucky, she thought, with a private little hug of pleasure, that there was one person for whom she had no rival, someone as serious as her, with a need she could answer just by being herself.

  When they returned to the hotel that evening there was a telephone message from Jordi saying he would come to Vermeilla next morning.

  ‘I told you she had made allies,’ Bernard winked at Robert.

  ‘We need to see Martin,’ Robert reminded her.

  ‘We will. But we can’t go until the afternoon, remember, until visiting hours, and anyway, I want you to meet Colette first.’

  Philippe had told them that Colette had spent half an hour alone with her two sons that day. He had left them alone and didn’t know what they had talked about, but he felt Martin needed to see Madeleine and Robert now. He didn’t say why, but they were all groping towards understanding, and for now perhaps it was best just to take those steps without questioning, and see where they led.

  And first thing Sunday morning those steps led Jordi to Vermeilla again, where Madeleine had been waiting for him (was she foolish, she wondered?) since early light. She and Robert were standing outside the hotel watching the desultory Sunday morning activity on the quayside. It was too early for the Sunday strollers, and the fishing boats lay at rest at the top of the beach. The bay was reasonably calm, with white flecks where the Tramontane still touched the blue waters, and above them all the clouds had been swept clear away by the wind. They could see for many miles, to a horizon halfway to Corsica, sea meeting sky in an indigo haze.

  As they stood silently contemplating, the peace was broken by the put-put of an ancient motor, and Jordi’s rickety motorbike chugged around the corner a
nd drew up next to them. Robert looked a question at Madeleine, and she nodded, blushing, before moving towards Jordi, and walking into his embrace. Mindful of Friday’s heavy waterproofs and bedraggled hair, she had taken time to dress this morning, choosing an elegant, creamy dress with a low neckline and nipped waist to show off her long, slender figure. She had always known she was pretty, but no one had ever whispered to her before that she was beautiful, or run their fingers through her mane of hair, or kissed her neck until it tingled. The memory set her nerves clamouring, and she wanted to touch his newly shaven cheek. He had even ironed a new shirt, she noticed. Was it for her or her family? Either way, he looked wonderful.

  Releasing her, he held a roughened hand out to Robert, who took it surprisingly shyly. He looked very young beside the lived-in Spaniard, but there was an innocence about both of them, thought Madeleine, that they were both quite unaware of.

  They walked together along the front, and took coffee by the beach, and then Jordi’s restless energy drove them along the cliff path, serene now, with just a vivid breeze, until below in the distance they could see Collioure, with the clock tower standing solo, guarded by the Chateau Royal, in a medley of golden stone.

  ‘This must be the most beautiful place in the world,’ said Robert.

  Jordi shrugged in a very Hispanic gesture of magniloquence. ‘It isn’t Spain, and it isn’t the Vallespir, but it is pretty enough. When the sun shines it shines too,’ he conceded.

  Madeleine laughed. ‘And amateur artists paint toy pictures of it to sell to tourists, eh Jordi? The Vallespir is magnificent, but Matisse came here before he went to Céret, and it was here he found his colours. You have to admit that!’

  ‘I admit nothing!’ Jordi said, with his arm around her. ‘Robert, your sister has arrived here from what sounds like a rather tame England, and I’m afraid it has all rather gone to her head.’

  Robert grinned, but came back to Jordi’s earlier words. ‘Tell me about the Vallespir, and the camps,’ he asked.

  They talked and walked until Madeleine remembered with a guilty start that they were due to meet Bernard and Solange for lunch.

  ‘And then we have to visit Colette.’

  ‘And Martin? Did you say you were going to see him this afternoon?’ Jordi wanted to know. ‘I’m glad, but I’ll leave you when we get back. I don’t think Colette even realised who I was on Friday night, and you don’t want to bombard her with more people and memories than you need to.’

  ‘You’ll eat with us?’ Madeleine urged.

  ‘Yes, ma belle, I’ll join you for lunch. You can introduce me to your aunt.’

  Solange greeted Jordi with her usual calm pleasure, and quelled Bernard’s mischievous tongue as she turned her elegant smile to the young man, and talked to him about his work. His prickles had raised slightly in front of Madeleine’s sleek Parisian family, but Solange was so natural he had no resistance. Madeleine said little, but watched them all with a glimmering smile. They took time over lunch, but then Jordi insisted on leaving. Solange didn’t want to come to the café with them either, but Madeleine begged her to.

  ‘I can’t see what my presence can add to the situation, Madeleine. The poor woman will have enough to do handling seeing Robert. It’ll bring Luis right back before her eyes. The last she needs is a crowd.’

  But Jordi came surprisingly to Madeleine’s support.

  ‘I think they need you, Solange,’ he said. ‘You knew Colette all those years ago, and you’re the link to the past. I think your presence will reassure her.’

  ‘She’ll hardly remember me,’ argued Solange, but her protests lacked conviction. She kissed Jordi on both cheeks, and ushered the others away, leaving Madeleine standing with Jordi by his motorbike.

  ‘Come back soon, young man,’ they heard her say, over her shoulder. as she entered the hotel.

  ‘Your aunt is a lovely woman.’

  ‘I know. Jordi?’

  ‘Yes, ma belle?’

  ‘If you insist on calling me ma belle, I shall have to call you mon beau!’

  ‘With pleasure, carinyo.’

  ‘Papa used to call me carinyo.’

  ‘Because you were his darling.’

  ‘And yours?’

  ‘And mine.’ Jordi smiled, and reached out to pull her towards him. ‘What were you going to ask me?’

  His arms were around Madeleine, stroking down her back, and she had to think for a moment to remember. What had she wanted to say to him?

  She shook her head and said, ‘Robert can only stay a couple of days, and he thinks I should go back with him.’

  Jordi’s hands froze, and he pulled her tighter.

  ‘Why? You only came here a week ago. And you only left England a couple of weeks ago.’

  ‘Three weeks,’ she corrected him, and then, ‘But you’re right, and I know, and I don’t want to go, but it would only be for a while. You see, there’s something wrong about me being here right now. I’m a visitor, in transit, in a hotel, and I was a visitor too in Paris. I left my grandparents’ house deliberately deceiving them.’

  ‘They wouldn’t have let you go otherwise!’

  ‘I know, but it makes it feel as though I’ve just done something temporary. Jordi, I need to go, but I’ll come back, if you want me to.’

  Jordi’s hands tightened around her, and he pulled her into a long kiss. Sunday passers-by looked at them, very shocked, and Madeleine wanted to laugh, but for pure happiness. She eased back from his embrace and continued. It was so important to make him understand.

  ‘Robert tells me that he has seen my grandparents and they seem to have aged. They are lonely, I know, and I can’t help that. I’m not going to sacrifice my life to stay in their world and marry their choice of “gentleman”. But I want to tell them properly, and not run away like my mother did. I think it was her betrayal which made things even worse for them, and all those years they made her pay not just for marrying my father but for abandoning them so publicly. Even if they only care about appearances, I can help them by going back briefly and showing myself locally, making my plans public.’

  ‘They’ll never accept you marrying a Spanish potter.’

  The words seemed to be ripped from Jordi’s throat, and Madeleine looked startled into his face.

  ‘Marry?’

  ‘Yes, Madeleine, marry! Why, where did you think we were going?’ There was a challenge in his voice.

  Madeleine took a deep breath. He was direct, her man, but to throw a proposal of marriage at her after less than a week, in the street? Only Jordi could do that. She felt an involuntary urge to laugh, in sheer abandonment.

  ‘Jordi, this is a mad road we’re going down! You have opened something in life for me that I didn’t think could possibly exist. But I’ve only just discovered that I am an individual and have rights. And whatever I want to do, my grandparents can’t stop me. I have some valuable pearls which my mother left me, and I plan to sell them. It’s an amazing feeling, to have so much freedom and choice.’

  She saw the troubled look in his face, and reached for him.

  ‘I will come back, I promise. I want to see where this crazy road of yours is going to lead us! Like I said, I just need to make things right in England. I don’t even need to stay with my grandparents while I’m there. I have cousins in London who have offered me a bed any time, and it would complete things for me somehow to spend some time with them before I come back here. But I must go, and I need some freedom now, after a lifetime when I didn’t know the word existed. Then I’ll come back, and we can explore this crazy future you’re offering me.’

  She reached up to stroke his cheek, his hair, the nape of his neck, and pulled his head down towards hers.

  A few moments later, Jordi said, ‘The cherry festival. Could you come back in time for the cherry festival in three weeks’ time? Come here first, Madeleine, and then we’ll go to Paris together. I want to get married to you in Paris, in front of all of your fancy relatives, so they
don’t think we’re running away. You can help me build the gallery – I’ve never been any good at promoting it, and dealing with people. You’ll know how, and you know how to talk to people.’

  ‘Perhaps, Jordi. More than perhaps! But just give me a little time, and in the meantime, let’s meet for the cherry festival. You can teach me how to dance the Sardane.’

  ‘You promise to be here?’ His voice was anxious.

  ‘I promise,’ replied Madeleine, and kissed him again. She’d be back, she knew, and with Jordi, but she just needed to be sure she had fully discovered the real Madeleine first.

  ‘Bring your brother to Céret before you leave, won’t you? We’ll give him a sight of the Vallespir – maybe we can compete with the coast in his eyes!’

  ‘And if he wants to see where the camp was?’

  ‘Then we’ll take him there as well. Have courage for this afternoon, Madeleine. You’ll be fine now with your new brother.’ It was a statement of fact.

  ‘Yes, mon beau, we’ll all be all right now.’

  It was wonderful to have Solange with them that afternoon with Colette. Colette recoiled, as they knew she would, on seeing Robert, and shrank into herself, though it seemed almost impossible for her to shrink any more. The Colette whom Madeleine had met a week ago had been tired but competent, in charge. Now she seemed merely bewildered in the face of events which were too much to handle. Madeleine had the impression that she was just letting life do what it would to her, an injured sea creature at the mercy of the ocean, unsure where she would wash ashore and what the world would look like when she did.

  A sister had appeared from somewhere and was running this house of bereavement, planning a funeral, and fielding village visitors. She had the same resigned, patient face as Colette, but she was older, and lacked Colette’s essential femininity. She moved between kitchen and sitting room in the traditional long black skirt and scarf of older Catalan women. Colette too was in full black mourning today, with the scarf over her hair, ageing her overnight. Tradition, Madeleine knew, stated she would wear black for seven years. Most women never got out of blacks, once they reached a certain age – there was always another death before the seven years was over.