Hotel Pastis

by Peter Mayle

  Acclaim for Peter Mayle’s

  HOTEL PASTIS

  “Mayle is a writer of grace and good humor, and he gives us here … a fine light novel.”

  —The New Yorker

  “A charming tale of love and labor in Provence.”

  —USA Today

  “Another winner … romantic and entertaining. Mayle’s gentle wit pokes through at every opportunity and keeps the reader wanting more.”

  —Topeka Capital-Journal

  “He writes with such wit and charm about his Provençal hideaway.”

  —Boston Globe

  “[A] wonderful, rollicking romp of a novel … a sure cure for malaise or depression. Hotel Pastis evokes more laughs than the slickest sitcom and ends just as it should.”

  —Roanoke Times & World News

  “The plot is pleasing … an appetizing first novel.”

  —Entertainment Weekly

  Peter Mayle

  HOTEL PASTIS

  Peter Mayle spent fifteen years in the advertising business, first as a copywriter and then as a reluctant executive, before escaping Madison Avenue in 1975 to write books. His work has been translated into seventeen languages, and he has contributed to the London Sunday Times, the Financial Times, and the Independent, as well as Gentlemen’s Quarterly and Esquire.

  A Year in Provence, published in 1990, won the British Book Awards’ Best Travel Book of the Year, and climbed steadily onto the bestseller lists there and in America. Toujours Provence, published a year later, has been just as enthusiastically embraced on both sides of the Atlantic. Mr. Mayle’s most recent book is Chasing Cézanne. He and his wife live in Provence.

  ALSO BY Peter Mayle

  Chasing Cézanne

  Anything Considered

  A Dogs Life

  Toujours Provence

  A Year in Provence

  FIRST VINTAGE BOOKS EDITION, NOVEMBER 1994

  Copyright © 1993 by Escargot Productions, Ltd.

  All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. Published in the United States by Vintage Books, a division of Random House, Inc., New York, and simultaneously published in Canada by Random House of Canada Limited, Toronto. Originally published in hardcover in Great Britain by Hamish Hamilton, Ltd., London, in 1993. First published in the United States by Alfred A. Knopf, Inc., New York, in 1993.

  Grateful acknowledgment is made to Jobete Music Co., Inc./Stone Agate Music for permission to reprint from “Let’s Get It On” by Marvin Gaye and Ed Townsend, copyright © 1973 by Jobete Music Co., Inc./Stone Agate Music.

  The characters in this book are fictitious, and any resemblance to actual persons is coincidental.

  The Library of Congress cataloged the Knopf edition as follows:

  Mayle, Peter.

  Hotel Pastis : a novel of Provence / by Peter Mayle. — 1st American

  ed.

  p. cm.

  eISBN: 978-0-307-79191-7

  1. Country life—France—Provence—Fiction.

  2. Hotelkeepers—France—Provence—Fiction. I. Title.

  PR6063.A8875H6 1993

  823′.914—DC20 93-14641

  Cover design by Carol Devine Carson

  Cover illustration by Ruth Marten

  v3.1

  For Frank

  Contents

  Cover

  About the Author

  Other Books by This Author

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  1

  “The trouble with all these divorces,” Ernest said as he put the tea tray on the packing case, “is the refurnishing. Look at that. We’re not going to find another one like that. Wasted on her, of course.”

  Simon Shaw looked up and watched one of the moving men packing the Hockney in bubble wrap. As the man bent over, he displayed the traditional emblem of the British labourer, the buttock cleavage revealed by the separation of T-shirt from grimy, low-slung jeans. Ernest sniffed and went back to the kitchen, picking his way through the piles of expensive relics that were destined for the ex-Mrs. Shaw’s bijou cottage in Eaton Mews South.

  Simon sipped his tea, the mixture of Lapsang souchong and Earl Grey that Ernest blended with such ceremony, and considered his surroundings.

  The best house, everybody had said, in central London—large, elegant, almost secluded at the end of a quiet Kensington square. Caroline had spent three years and God knows how much money decorating it until it had reached that state of mannered perfection which made the disorder of normal daily life unthinkable. Rag-rolled paint in artfully faded colours on ceilings and walls, antique silk curtains that overflowed across the floor, eighteenth-century fireplaces brought over from France, hand-embroidered cushions, tablescapes of meticulously arranged artefacts. A magazine house.

  Caroline’s friends—those thin, smart friends who lived on salads and the occasional wicked glass of dry white wine—had cooed over the house. Caroline and her team of decorators adored it. Simon had always felt like an untidy intruder, smoking furtively in his panelled study because she didn’t like the smell of cigar smoke in the sitting room, or because some vulpine woman was “styling” the main rooms for a photographic essay on gracious urban living.

  Towards the end, Simon had been living in the house like a visitor, spending his days in the office and his evenings with clients while Caroline entertained, joking with a slight sting in her voice that she had become an advertising widow. If he came home before her guests had left, Caroline would introduce him as poor darling, who’s been working so hard. But when they were alone, there would be tight-lipped verbal jabs about his absence, his tiredness, his preoccupation with business, his neglect—there was no other word for it, neglect—of her. From there, it was only a short step to the Other Woman in the office, Simon’s secretary, who always seemed to be there no matter how late Caroline called. Caroline knew all about secretaries. She’d been one, and she’d been there, all sympathy and short skirts, when Simon had divorced his first wife. There had been no complaints then about working late.

  In fact, Caroline must have known that there was no other woman. Simon didn’t have the privacy for adultery. His life was run by other people, even down to his bath, which was run by Ernest. The battle of the bath had been one of the few that Caroline had lost, and she had been at war with Ernest ever since. There was something not quite right about the relationship between the two men, she used to say in those late-night recriminations. Something unhealthy.

  Ernest had been with Simon for nearly ten years, starting as his chauffeur in the early days when the only company car was an elderly Ford, and gradually becoming indispensable as the manager of Simon’s existence: part valet, part personal assistant, part confidant, part friend, the master of detail, tireless in his efficiency. He was a qualified Rolls-Royce mechanic, an inspired flower arranger, and a better cook than Caroline ever wanted to be. He disapproved of her extravagance, her social pretensions, and her total lack of domestic skills. She detested him because she couldn’t dislodge him. Simon had spent years in the crossfire. At least that was finished. What was it Car
oline had said as they were leaving the lawyers’ offices after the settlement? Something about him having custody of Ernest.

  “Excuse me, squire.” Two movers were standing over Simon, their arms piled with dust covers. “We’ll have the couch now, if you don’t mind. For Eaton Mews, innit, like the rest of the stuff?”

  “You want the cup and saucer too?”

  “Just doing our job, squire. Just doing our job.”

  “I’m not a bloody squire.”

  “Please yourself, cock.”

  Simon surrendered the couch and went through the double doors into the naked dining room. Ernest was clattering next door in the kitchen, whistling a few bars of music that Simon recognised as part of a Rossini overture. Caroline had loathed any kind of classical music, enduring Glyndebourne for social reasons and the excuse for a new dress.

  The kitchen was Simon’s favourite room in the house, partly, he admitted now, because it had been so rarely visited by Caroline. He and Ernest had designed it between them, equipping it to professional standards with a Le Cornu range the size of a small tank, pans of the heaviest cast iron and copper, knives and cleavers and end-grain chopping blocks, a chilled marble slab for pastry, two mammoth brushed-steel refrigerators, a separate pantry at the end of the long room. In the middle, on the oiled teak table, Ernest had collected bottles and decanters from the bar in the sitting room.

  He stopped whistling as Simon came in. “Liz called,” he said. “There’s an executive committee meeting at six, and that security analyst at Goodman’s wants you to call him about the last quarter’s projections.” Ernest looked at the message pad by the phone. “And the agents want to know if they can show someone the house tomorrow. A musician, they said—Whatever that means nowadays.”

  “It’s probably the assistant drummer from a rock group.”

  “I know, dear. Most unsuitable, but what can you do? They’re the ones with the money.”

  Simon pulled a chair away from the table and sat down heavily. His back ached, and his shirt felt uncomfortably tight against his stomach. He was carrying too much weight. Too many lunches, too many meetings, not enough exercise. He looked at Ernest, who admitted to forty-eight but could have been ten years younger—slim, with a narrow, unlined face, close-cropped blond hair, immaculate in his dark blue suit and white shirt, no paunch, no jowls. That’s what years of self-discipline did for you, Simon thought. There was a rumour in the agency that Ernest had slipped away for a face-lift during one of his exotic holidays, but Simon knew it was the skin cream from the dermatologist in Harley Street—fifty pounds a tube, and put through on expenses as office supplies. It was one of Ernest’s perks.

  “Shall I get Liz for you?” Ernest picked up the phone, one eyebrow cocked, his mouth slightly pursed.

  “Ern, I don’t think I can face all that crap this evening. Ask Liz if she can fit it in tomorrow.”

  Ernest nodded, and Simon reached among the bottles on the table for the Laphroaig. The glasses had all been packed. He poured the whisky into a teacup and half listened to Ernest.

  “… Well, if Mr. Jordan gets upset he’ll just have to go into the garden and eat worms. Mr. Shaw has had to postpone the meeting. We have had a ghastly day. Our home is being dismantled around our ears, and we are not feeling like a captain of industry.”

  Ernest looked at Simon and rolled his eyes upwards as he listened to Liz’s reply. He cut her short.

  “I know, I know. We’ll deal with the little man from Goodman’s tomorrow, when we’re feeling more like our old self. Do something diplomatic, dear. A tiny white lie. I know you can do it when you want to. I’ve heard you talking to that boyfriend of yours.”

  Ernest winced at her reply and held the phone away from his ear.

  “And to you, dear. See you in the morning.”

  He put down the phone, glanced at the teacup in front of Simon, and frowned. He opened a packing carton, took out a cut-glass tumbler, polished it with the silk handkerchief from his top pocket, and poured a large measure of whisky. “There.” He removed the teacup and put it in the sink. “I know these are trying times, but we mustn’t let standards slip. A little water?”

  “What did she say?”

  “Oh, the usual wailing and gnashing of teeth.” Ernest shrugged. “Apparently the executive committee meeting has already been put off twice, and they’ll all be in a snit. Especially Mr. Jordan—but then it doesn’t take much to put our Mr. Jordan in a snit, as we know.”

  He was right. Jordan, whose talent for handling dull clients was equalled only by his acute sense of self-importance, would feel slighted. Simon made a mental note to massage him in the morning, and took a mouthful of whisky. He felt the shudder go down to his stomach, and remembered that he hadn’t eaten all day.

  For once, the evening was free. He could take a book and go to a corner table in the Connaught, but he didn’t feel like eating alone. He could call some friends, but dinner with friends would mean edging around the subject of Caroline and the divorce. Dinner with someone from the agency would be all the usual tired gossip about clients and new business prospects and office politics. He looked down the table, narrowing his eyes against the sun as it reflected needles of light from the bottles. He would miss this room.

  “Ern, what are you doing tonight?”

  Ernest backed out of a cupboard with a pile of plates. He put them down and stood with one hand on his cheek, the other cradling his elbow, graceful and slightly theatrical.

  “Well, now. I can’t quite decide between a masked ball in Wimbledon or a gala curry at the Star of India.”

  “How about dinner here, in the kitchen? We’ve never done it, and the house might be sold by next week.”

  “As it happens,” Ernest said, “I might be able to make myself available.” He smiled. “Yes, I’d like that. The last supper. What would you like to eat?”

  “I took a bottle of the ’73 Petrus out of the cellar before they moved the rest of the wine. Something to go with that.”

  Ernest looked at his watch. “I’ll be back in an hour. Why don’t you call the little man at Goodman’s? Get it over with.”

  Simon heard the front door close and the sound of the big Mercedes pulling away as he walked through to his study, which the moving men had taken over as their temporary canteen. The handsome room was empty except for a phone on the floor and Simon’s briefcase in the corner where the desk used to be, and an upturned packing case cluttered with the remains of numerous tea breaks: stained mugs, an old electric kettle, used teabags, an open bottle of milk, a copy of the Sun, and a crystal ashtray, one of a pair that Simon had bought from Asprey’s, piled high with cigarette ends. The air was sickly with the smell of spilt milk and smoke and sweat. Simon opened a window and lit a cigar in self-defence, sat on the floor and picked up the phone.

  “Goodman Brothers, Levine, Russell and Fine.” The telephonist sounded bored and irritated, as though she had been interrupted while at work doing her nails and reading Cosmopolitan.

  “Mr. Wilkinson, please. It’s Simon Shaw.”

  “I’m sorry.” She sounded pleased. “Mr. Wilkinson’s in conference. Who did you say it was?”

  “Shaw, Simon Shaw. Of the Shaw Group. That makes four times I’ve told you. I’m returning Mr. Wilkinson’s call. He said it was important. The name is Shaw. Do you want me to spell it?”

  Simon heard her sigh, as he was meant to. “I’ll see if Mr. Wilkinson can be disturbed.”

  Jesus. An airhead answering the phone, and now he was forced to listen to Ravel’s Bolero while Wilkinson made up his mind whether or not he could be disturbed. Not for the first time, Simon wondered if it had been such a good idea to go public.

  Ravel was cut off in mid-swoop, and Wilkinson’s faintly patronising voice came on the line. “Mr. Shaw?”

  Who else was he expecting? “Good afternoon,” said Simon. “You wanted to speak to me?”

  “Indeed I do, Mr. Shaw. We’re in conference at the moment, looking
at your fourth quarter.” From the tone of his voice, he might have been a doctor discussing a bad case of piles. Simon could hear the rustle of papers. “These projections of yours—correct me if I’m wrong—represent over forty percent of your annual billings.”

  “That’s right.”

  “I see. Don’t you think this might be a little optimistic, given the current state of the retail market? You’ll forgive my saying so, but the City is a little nervous about the advertising sector these days. The institutions are not happy. Returns haven’t been up to expectations. It might be advisable to be a little more considered in your estimates, wouldn’t you say?”

  Here we go, Simon thought. Lesson number one all over again. “Mr. Wilkinson, the advertising business makes most of its profits in the fourth quarter. Every year, strangely enough, Christmas comes in December. Companies advertise. Consumers buy. Everybody spends money. We are now at the end of September, and all the budgets have been committed. Air time and press space have been booked.”

  “Booked doesn’t necessarily mean paid for, Mr. Shaw. We all know that. Are you confident that your clients are soundly based? No imminent mergers or takeovers? No cash flow problems?”

  “Not to my knowledge, no.”

  “Not to your knowledge.” There was a pause while Wilkinson allowed his scepticism to be felt. He was a man who used silence like a bucket of cold water.

  Simon tried again. “Mr. Wilkinson, short of nuclear war or an outbreak of bubonic plague, we will achieve the figures shown in our projections. In the event of war or bubonic plague, we will go down the tubes, along with the rest of British industry and possibly even Goodman Brothers.”

  “ ‘Down the tubes,’ Mr. Shaw?”

  “Out of business, Mr. Wilkinson.”

  “I see. There’s nothing more you care to add to that rather unhelpful comment?”

  “Each year for the past nine years, Mr. Wilkinson, as you very well know, the agency has shown increased billings and increased profits. This is our best year ever. It has just over ninety days to run, and there is no reason to assume any shortfall from our projected figures. Do you want a press release? If you people had a proper understanding of the advertising business, we wouldn’t have to go through this absurd cross-examination every month.”