by Tim Roux
I cannot imagine anyone teasing the Countess and keeping sufficient of their limbs intact to be able to crawl away again. God knows what the Earl is setting Chloe up to do, but John is evidently aware that some game is afoot by now and that it probably has something to do with Chloe and ritual humiliation. Malign gatecrashers will be tortured before they are ceremonially ejected from the premises as common trespassers. A poacher’s fate is awaiting Chloe, I would guess. Certainly Chloe is becoming less easy too – she is beginning to rustle.
She makes a bold move. “I met Alice the other day.”
“You did?” The Earl’s tone switches instantly to genuine interest. “You could actually see her?”
“Yes, Paul took me to see her. We chatted for about an hour together. She is really nice. She seemed very fond of you too, Sir.”
“I am delighted to hear that. I am sure that she must get very lonely. It really is no fun being a ghost – no fun at all. I hope that when my time comes I whiz straight down the shute, even if it only leads to hell. I cannot imagine that hell is a worse fate than hanging around as the living dead.”
“Yes, she was fervently hoping for liberation. She felt that her work has now been completed, thanks to you and your efforts.”
“We do what little we can,” concedes the Earl modestly. “Ah, here is the Countess now. I really must introduce you. Hello, my dear, this is Chloe. She is an interior designer. I was telling her about your expertise in the field. I hope you don’t mind. I am sure that you will find a great deal in common.”
If you have ever watched a helpless creature being trussed up and fed to a crocodile, you will understand this moment exactly. The Countess has just given Chloe a sharp flick of the eyelids and a brief gleam of the eye before declaring “Very nice to meet you, Chloe.” Having spoken to Alice definitely doesn’t count as sufficient redemption as far as the Earl is concerned. The Countess is almost licking her lips. “Let me show you around the house. How much do you know about classic French design? There are a few things here I have never understood. Perhaps you could explain them to me.”
As soon as Chloe is out of sight, the Earl pounces on us. “Whose bright idea was that, then?” he demands. Both Mike and I hesitate to respond, regressing instantly to our childhoods. “Paul? Michael? She really is your girlfriend is she, Michael?”
“Yes, she is.”
“To what purpose exactly?”
Chloe may be getting off lightly as compared with Mike. I courageously step to one side to let him have the full benefit of the onslaught.
“We will be civil to her, but we expect you to find a good excuse to leave within the next fifteen minutes and to take her with you. Is that understood?”
“Yes, My Lord.”
“Good. You can leave Paul here. I would like to consult him on something in private. John or Peter or somebody will drop him back over to your place.”
I am trying to calculate whether I should continue to feel uneasy too, but I sense that the quiet fury is not being aimed in my direction, although he cannot be very pleased with me either.
“Come on, Paul. I want to show you something. I think you will be intrigued by it.”
* * *
The Earl leads me not up the stairs, as I was expecting, but down the back stairs into the underworld of storage and boilers where M. Toucas goes and sleeps through his salaried days pretending to be clanking and shuffling about his duties.
“Here,” the Earl points. “I bet you you cannot walk clear through this wall.”
“No, I am not a ghost yet,” I reply, knowing full well that there is something the Earl is exceptionally pleased with himself about.
“Close your eyes and don’t open them until I say so.”
Isn’t he a bit old to be playing this game? Anyway, obviously I do.
There is a hefty scraping sound which tells me more or less what is going on as it is accompanied by the disjointed heavy breathing of elderly exertion, then its return scrape, and sure enough the Earl has disappeared. I can hear a very muffled, distant voice saying something, then the wall is torn open again. “Come and look in here, Paul,” the Earl encourages me exultantly.
It is not very beautiful. It is a cool, dank wine cellar of sorts, but it does have the virtue that the Earl only discovered it for the first time a few days ago, and nobody else was aware of its existence at all, not even that know-it-all M. Toucas.
“It is where the Marquis and his family hid away from the villagers for several weeks before they were discovered. He showed it to me as a gesture of renewed entente cordiale. Imagine spending your last weeks down here. They were already in gaol. In the end, it was such a diminished, even shameful, life, and they all got so bad-tempered with each other that they came out again and gave themselves up to be guillotined. I feel that we should do something with it – make it into a shrine of something. What do you think?”
“I suppose you could set up an informal chapel down here – have it consecrated in memory of its aristocratic masters. What is the Mairie’s view on aristocrats?”
“M. le Maire is friendly enough towards me. They all have been, but perhaps English aristocracy is exempt. Mind you, if he kicked up any kind of fuss (and I don’t suppose that he would), I can send Romanov père in to bat for me. His lot were shot in a cellar, supposedly, if he really is some kind of relation to them, the Tsar, that is.”
“It might be a bit of a waste of money, though. Who would ever come down here?”
“It wouldn’t have to be that ornate. Ornate would be out of keeping, don’t you think? Anyway, there you are. I thought that you might be interested.”
“I am, and I am very sorry about bringing Chloe along with us.”
The Earl pats me on the shoulder. “Don’t worry about that, my boy. Those sorts of people always pray on the innocent.”
Innocent? What a fine insult.
“Did she really meet up with Alice?”
“Yes.”
“Well, that is something, then,” he comments, without indicating what kind of something he has in mind. “After our little excursion, come and have some tea.”
Back in the garden the last remnants of the Affligem entourage are assembled like a deck party on a cruiser.
“Has His Lordship shown you his little secret, then?” Peter inquires. “Very closet, don’t you think? Come and sit next to me.” He pats the seat of the chair next to him enticingly. “So what happens now with you?”
“We are going home soon. Back to Brussels.”
“Still, it has to be better than living in rural England. It bores me silly. The county set, peasants and serial killers. Actually, I think they are all the same people. Dead bodies lying all over the place, snubbed for some obscure, confectioned reason or another. Thank God for the flat in London and for gruelling dancing schedules. I don’t know how John copes. Fiona was born into it, so she has been inoculated, although she isn’t exactly wild about it either.”
“Where is Fiona?”
John looks up. “I don’t know. She went out somewhere earlier and hasn’t returned yet. She has been doing quite a lot of that recently. Sarah has gone with her.”
“I think they are having an affair,” Peter throws in, then in reaction to Mr. and Mrs. Harding’s faces adds “but not with each other, of course. They may be well-bred, but they are not sophisticated enough for that yet. No, I think they’ll be out cruising some local low-lifes, cavorting on the beach possibly.”
“Possibly,” John echoes diffidently.
“I must admit that I could do with a bit of action myself,” Peter continues. “If it gets any deader around here they will be burying us all.”
Lady Harding clinks her cup delicately. “I was only just thinking how wonderfully peaceful it is here, compared with London. Besides, Peter, if you want action, you only have to go as far as the gate. I am sure that you can get anything you like down there for the price of a piece of inside gossip.”
“Mmm, I might try
it. What do you think I can tell them? The idiotic thing is that there is no inside gossip – nothing at all. What can you say about any of us? We haven’t a single secret to hide between us.”
“How do you know, Peter?” Mr. Harding retaliates. “How can you possibly assert, logically speaking, that none of us has secrets? If they are secrets you wouldn’t, by definition, know anything about them.”
“Got me there, Alan. Come on, Paul, let’s go and hit a bistro and see if we can bump into Fiona and Sarah and discover what their secrets are. Are you ready, John?”
“Yeah, I’ll come.”
“Alan, are you coming?”
No, I’ll stay here, thank you, Peter?”
“Inspector John?”
“No, I’ll give it a miss today, thanks, Peter.”
“Right, let’s see if we can wing a journalist on the way out. I could do with the publicity. ‘Famous ballet dancer flattens hack’ – that’ll do it, although I think I prefer the description ‘notorious’ given the choice. It sounds more newsworthy. Everybody knows by now that only nonentities are referred to as famous nowadays.”
Peter has lost the attention of his audience. Oscar Wilde he isn’t – not yet, anyway, but he’ll certainly keep practising.
So we storm through the gates in the Mahari and take off towards Gignac. Nobody even bothers to pursue us. One glance tells them that we are merely the supporting cast and that any information we could give them would be worthless.
We spend a few hours bistro-crawling in a leisurely way before grabbing a table at the Restaurant de Lauzun five minutes before Fiona and Sarah walk in.
“Well, well,” Peter calls out. “What are the chances, eh?”
Fiona frowns “I said we were coming here.”
“Did you?”
“You know full well I did. Hello, Paul. Are you escaping la cave du marquis that my father has indefatigably been showing off to everyone?”
“Yes, I did get a tour,” I reply.
“Poor things. Can you imagine?”
“So are you joining us, or are you going to do your girly thing over there?” Peter asks, pre-empted by John who is already re-arranging the tables to accommodate two more. “Well, what have you been doing, girls?”
“We have been down to the beach, eaten mussels, done all the last minute touristy things and generally been chatting.”
“Come and rest your weary jaws, then.”
“Thank you, Peter.”
And indeed they do. It is one of the most silent meals I have ever had. My thoughts are all over the place about how I miss Fiona, and how I would rather not be here at all, and how I should be looking for Alice and, failing Alice, Natalie. Fiona and my eyes meet occasionally only to shy away from each other again. Peter indulges himself in a few florid forays to try to jolly things along, but the wine is getting the most company. Afterwards I say goodbye to Fiona, Sarah and John for the last time and Peter drives me back to Valflaunès in the Mahari.
Fiona kisses me once on the cheek and surreptitiously squeezes my hip fondly with her right hand. A tear nearly appears in my eye, and in Fiona’s too, I think.
* * *
“I would like to be buried properly,” says Alice. “Could you arrange that for me? Do you have time? Stop fiddling with your false tooth.”
“This temporary implant always feels as if it is wobbling,” I reply.
“Does it matter?” Alice demands.
“Not really.”
“It is becoming an obsession.”
“I am sorry. Let’s discuss your re-burial.”
“I wonder if I could be buried in the grounds of the Château de Freyrargues. Do you think that the Earl would allow that?”
“I don’t see why not. There is a Reynaud family mausoleum there.”
Alice shudders. “I don’t want to be anywhere near them.”
“Do you have a spot in mind?”
“I shall go and have a look.”
“Presumably there will be a post-mortem first.”
“No thanks. I don’t want to stand there watching myself being poked around and scraped and chiselled, or whatever they do. You will have to re-bury me yourself.”
“Perhaps the Earl and I can have a little ceremony together. I am sure that he will be willing to do that. It will just be a question of how we sneak your body past the press. Mind you, that would be quite funny – sneaking a real story past them under their noses.”
“Do you think that when I am buried respectfully I will be allowed to die properly?”
“I think that there is a good chance.”
“Would you mind if I finally left you forever, Paul?”
“I would certainly miss you, Alice. I miss you now because you are not really here.”
“You can always come to visit my grave and pray for my soul.”
“I will.”
“You promise?”
“As often as I can.”
“Thank you. I’ll put in a good word for you in heaven. I don’t mind sharing you, Paul, but I don’t want to be forgotten by you entirely.”
“You shan’t be, Alice. Nobody is going to forget you now after you have brought all those lost bodies to light.”
“I don’t want you to remember me for that. I want you to remember me for me.”
“I was joking.”
“It is hard to tell when the English are joking. You always seem to be but you seldom are. Shall I take you on a tour of my favourite places?”
“Certainly.”
“Let’s go then.”
So we spend several hours touring the countryside and visiting parts of Béziers, Montpellier and Narbonne. Alice tells me the story of her short life, of the friends she used to play with, where she smoked her first cigarette, the walks she used to go on with her parents and with her friends, of the rivalries and the jealousies, of the clumsy way her father treated her mother, of her uncles and her aunts and her cousins, and in the whole story there was not one remarkable thing – nothing that couldn’t have happened to anyone. She never had time to create space for herself beyond the standard pattern, and it made me wonder whether my friends would describe my life in the same way – I went to school, I played endlessly with Michael as good friends as well as brothers, I grew up, I went to university in Leuven, then I died, except that I haven’t died yet, except that I shall die soon, I know it. I have seen it. I have seen how it happens. We will all die, and many of us will never have lived. The thought makes me realise the urgency of the situation, how I must at least live for something. Two years, three years, what time do I have left to me, do we all have left to us, to the moment when all the ghosts get cleared out of this place, a planetary spring clean at least – maybe the end of everything forever?
I wonder if I will really miss Alice. We haven’t really had a relationship either. We have had a friendship. We have had a glimpse of promising impossibilities. We have pledged ourselves to each other, but there is nothing you could hang a coat on. A living human being and a ghost are simply incapable of fusing entirely. Even Fiona and I still have more chance, and that is not intended by either of us.
What is a life? I am sorry if I am turning philosophical here but the moment and the atmosphere here demand it. Alice is begging these questions. What sort of life could anyone live when they can truly say that they have had a life? From the outside, in ignorance, it is easy. You just real off a list of zany adventures, tragedies, eccentricities, cataclysms, achievements. But from the inside does it feel like that, or is it just a life?
Who do I know who has had a life? I cannot think of anyone. So perhaps I just have to tough it out until I die, doing whatever it occurs to me to do and I am capable of doing. That’s it.
The end.
* * *
The Earl instantly agreed to re-bury Alice on his estate. In fact, he was immediately enthusiastic about the idea because there is an escarpment that faces out towards the Mediterranean and he would rather like to be buried there
himself although he knows that in practice he will end up in the family vault in the Cotswolds alongside three hundred years of ancestors.
“I have a trepidation that I will arrive at the gates of the mausoleum and my entire family will line up to tear me off a strip for all my misdeeds and mistakes. Father always said I was lazy, so I’ll get that. Mother thought I was careless and irresponsible, so that will be her dig. I never met my grandparents so they are unknown quantities, but being late Victorian I am sure that they will be duly censorious of my neglect of the cause of science and my indifference to my religion. They will all have been watching me like hawks my entire life and taking notes. I can only hope that St. Peter marches in and imposes a judicial moratorium pending the publication of his own report. It really does give me the willies to think of myself entombed in a vault of cold, damp Cotswold stone in the midst of so many dead bodies. Worse than the Marquis’ hiding place down here in the cellar – and for eternity. So, in short, I would much prefer to be buried on a nice warm gentle slope, facing out towards the sea in my own happy isolation. I have informed the Countess of my wishes but she only says ‘Don’t be silly, Dear. You must do your duty. We all must.’ So that’s it, I suppose. Still, if young Alice can enjoy my spot instead, that will be some consolation. Where is she now, by the way?”
“I’m not quite sure.”
“And how do we get at her?”
“I don’t know that either. The issue was irrelevant until you agreed to accommodate her.”
“Well, yes, she can definitely have board and lodgings here. We will have to find a way to get her past the gate, but that shouldn’t be too difficult, and I’ll ask M. Toucas to prepare the grave. I’ll think up some excuse. Obviously I shall not call it a grave. A hide. I’ll think I’ll pretend I am building a hide to watch the nocturnal animals from. He’ll buy that story. He knows that I love watching wildlife in the quiet of the early morning. Never stops referring to it in fact. Thinks I am completely barmy. There you are, all settled from my end. I am sure that the Countess will not object. In fact she will be quite pleased. She will take it that I have finally given up on being interred here myself. It would be quite indecent for me to choose to be buried alongside the grave of an attractive young French girl rather than in the welcoming bosom of my family. Personally I think I would prefer the welcoming bosom of an attractive young French girl, but don’t mention that to the Countess, now.”
