by Anne Weale
Perhaps, despite his refreshed appearance, he still had a pounding headache, or perhaps he was giving her more time to come to terms with her conjugal obligations.
As before when they had shared a bathroom, he had left it immaculate. When Fran was small, the Turners had lived in a house with only one bathroom. There had always been stubble in the basin and splashes on the mirror after her father had shaved. Despite being outnumbered by women, he had always left the seat up. Reid, married for less than twenty-four hours and not at his best, had remembered to put it down. His thoughtfulness touched her.
He had left the bedroom when she returned to it. When she joined him in the sitting room, he was reading a French newspaper he must have ordered when he registered.
‘Let’s have breakfast downstairs, shall we?’
She wondered why he preferred to eat in public rather than up here à deux. ‘I have some paracetamol with me if you’d like some?’ she offered.
‘I never use them, thanks. Coffee will clear what’s left of my headache. Sorry if I snarled at you earlier.’
‘It was my fault you felt like snarling. I’m sorry about last night. You were right: some sleep has restored me. I guess even a quiet wedding is quite a stressful occasion.’ She smiled at him. ‘Can we make a fresh start?’
‘Of course.’ But his smile was guarded, as if it would take a good deal more than an apology to wipe out the memory of last night’s fiasco.
The hotel catered to an international clientele with breakfasts to suit all tastes. They both chose the French breakfast, although it was Fran who ate most of the freshly baked, hot croissants. Reid drank a lot of orange juice and coffee.
Until he started making suggestions as to how she might spend the morning, she had forgotten they weren’t going to be together. He didn’t even tell her where he was going or why, only where they would meet for lunch and at what time.
In any other circumstances, the prospect of spending a few hours in a historic foreign city would have had Fran flying to the main information centre to review the possibilities. But as Reid had already listed the main attractions, that wasn’t necessary. She had only to choose the most appealing of the options.
They parted in the ground-floor lobby. He didn’t kiss her goodbye. Not even a peck on the cheek.
She was left feeling snubbed and forlorn. His plan to go off on his own had been made before what happened last night. Even if they had made love and everything had been hunky-dory between them, he would still have deserted her.
Not really in the mood for either sightseeing or shopping, she spent some time exploring the old part of the city where a lot of the buildings dated back to the fifteenth century. She was early arriving at their rendezvous where there was a sunny terrace with tables shaded by sunbrellas.
She ordered a lemon drink and settled down to write cheerful postcards to Gran, her mother and Shelley. She was addressing the second when her ballpoint died on her. She gave an exasperated sigh.
‘May I lend you mine?’ someone said, in strongly accented English. It was the man at the next table. She had noticed when he sat down that he was young and good-looking but after the briefest glance she had looked away.
‘That’s very kind of you.’ She accepted his offer and finished what she was doing, aware that he was watching her and wondering if he intended to chat her up. If so, he was wasting his time... although, come to think of it, it might be no bad thing for Reid to realise that other men found her attractive.
She gave the pen back. ‘Thank you.’
‘My pleasure. Are you on holiday?’
‘Yes. Are you from Bordeaux?’
At first the conversation followed the usual lines. He introduced himself as Gilbert and told her he was an architectural draughtsman with aspirations to be a full-time painter.
‘Bordeaux has produced many artists...Odilon Redon...Rosa Bonheur. She was the first woman ever to receive the Legion of Honour. The government gave her official permission to dress as a man.’
‘Why did she want to do that?’ Fran asked.
‘She specialised in painting animals and crossdressing made it easier for her to sit about at fairs and markets, painting the cattle and horses. She lived in the nineteenth century when women had much less freedom. Not like now when they can go anywhere...do anything.’
He had been admiring Fran’s hair, and telling her how much he would enjoy painting her, when she saw Reid arriving but pretended not to.
Her husband didn’t look pleased at finding a stranger leaning towards her, his hand on the back of her chair. As he came within earshot, Gilbert was asking her if she would be willing to pose for him.
Reid answered for her. ‘Certainly not,’ he said coldly. ‘My wife’s time is fully occupied.’
Gilbert jumped to his feet, looking almost laughably embarrassed. Fran would have felt more contrite about keeping her left hand out of his line of sight since deciding to make use of him had she not suspected him of exaggerating his artistic talents. Surely a bona fide artist would have been sufficiently observant to notice her rings while she was writing the postcards? He might even not be a draughtsman. The whole story could be a line.
‘Excuse me...I didn’t realise...’ Pulverised by the laser-like glare fixed on him by the tall Englishman, Gilbert withdrew in confusion.
‘I should have thought by now you would have perfected the technique of fending off passes,’ Reid remarked curtly, as he sat down.
‘It hadn’t got to that stage, or anywhere near it.’ Fran explained about the ballpoint.
A waiter arrived with the drinks list and two menus. Reid ordered a litre bottle of water. Glancing at Fran’s tall glass, he said, freezingly polite, ‘Another soft drink for you?’
‘A glass of white wine for me, please.’ Because he was on the wagon, she didn’t see why she should be.
Judging by the angry tic in his cheek, she might need a little Dutch courage.
Last night at the bistro, Reid had spent a long time studying the menu before making up his mind. Now he gave it only a cursory inspection before deciding on an entrecôte with a salad.
‘I’d like a little more time, please.’ Fran smiled sweetly at the waiter.
‘Certainly, madame.’
Knowing Reid was irritated, perhaps because he was impatient to say some more cutting things to her, Fran took her time before deciding on fillets of sea bass with artichokes.
‘And to begin, madame?’ the waiter enquired.
‘Nothing, thank you...but perhaps a pudding later.’
‘Some wine with the entrecôte, monsieur?’
‘No, thank you.’ Even with the waiter, Reid’s tone was markedly lacking in his usual affability.
As soon as they were alone, he said in a low cold voice, ‘Let me make something clear. Our marriage may be unusual in some respects. It isn’t and never will be an “open” relationship. You belong to me now. If anyone else sends out signals, I expect you to make it clear you’re already spoken for.’
‘In that case it would make sense not to leave me hanging about while you’re busy with more important things,’ she said angrily. ‘A wife isn’t a possession...at least not in our part of the world. She’s supposed to be an equal partner. If you’re going to be jealous if I even speak to other men, we might as well separate now. I couldn’t stand it.’
This statement was followed by an interval of fraught silence because the waiter had come back with a basket of bread and was making adjustments to the table settings.
‘If you didn’t want to be left on your own, why didn’t you say so?’ Reid asked, a few minutes later.
‘Because it was obvious that, whatever it was you had to do, you preferred to do it alone.’
‘Rubbish! I was going to the outskirts...to one of the commercial zones. It’s not an interesting area. I thought you’d prefer the centre.’
‘What were you doing there?’
‘Buying some equipment the French are particul
arly good at.’
He didn’t elaborate. She could tell he was still in a rage and not without justification. She had encouraged poor Gilbert to believe she was here on her own. But if Reid couldn’t see that it was outrageously selfish to leave a bride by herself on the first day of a honeymoon, he deserved to be taught a lesson.
Their food came. In any other circumstances Fran would have savoured every mouthful. Today she ate it mechanically, torn between outrage at Reid’s macho outlook and regret that they were at loggerheads.
Trying to consider the situation dispassionately, she felt it boiled down to the fact that Bordeaux wasn’t a suitable place for a honeymoon. Maybe, when a couple were in love, anywhere would be heaven. But even then a romantic and peaceful setting had to be better than a huge crowded city.
When the time came, she decided against a pudding, knowing she wouldn’t enjoy it in an atmosphere of repressed disharmony. They were giving a good imitation of the kind of couple who had long since exhausted their conversational resources and had nothing left to say to each other.
They had coffee and Reid paid the bill. Outside the restaurant, he flagged a taxi.
As it sped them back to the hotel, she had the feeling that, as soon as they reached the suite, he intended to make punitive love to her... with or without her compliance.
She cast a surreptitious glance at his averted face. He was staring out of the window. All she could see were the angular lines of his cheekbone and jaw. He had said she belonged to him. Was he capable of taking her, regardless of her wishes? What was he really like at the core of his being? Was there savagery there, even cruelty, under the civilised surface? Last night he had been kind. But perhaps he was losing patience with her.
In the lift going up to their floor, Fran’s insides were full of butterflies. But this wasn’t the same kind of panic she had felt when they came back last night. Now there was an element of excitement mixed in with the apprehensiveness.
Reid unlocked their door. Even though he was annoyed, he didn’t stride in ahead of her but stood back for her to precede him.
“Thank you,’ she said, matching his politeness.
‘How long will it take you to pack?’
Taken aback, she swung round and gaped at him. ‘We’re going back to London?’
‘Don’t be silly. We’re moving on. You didn’t imagine we’d be spending the whole trip in Bordeaux, did you?’
‘What else was I supposed to think?’
He made for the bedroom, saying over his shoulder, ‘You wanted a magical mystery tour. We’re on our way to one of the most beautiful parts of Europe...the mountain valleys of the Basses Pyrénées. Bordeaux was merely a stopover to avoid driving on last night.’
‘How are we getting there?’
‘I’ve rented a car. You can share the driving if you like. Have you done any driving on the right?’
‘A little bit, in the States.’
As Fran began to pack, she felt relieved that the rift between them had been bridged. But also, if she were honest, she was a little disappointed that their quarrel hadn’t been resolved in the manner she had half expected.
Until they had been to bed together, until she was over that hurdle, there was bound to be tension between them. Sex was, after all, what honeymoons were about, even though, for most of her contemporaries, the sexual side of their honeymoons was a continuation rather than a beginning as it would be for her.
An hour after leaving the hotel, they had left Bordeaux behind and were heading south towards the western end of the mountains which ran from the Mediterranean to the Atlantic, forming a natural frontier between France to the north of them and Spain to the south of them.
Using a well-known computer program, Reid had charted their route from Bordeaux to the small French country town which was to be their next night stop. He had passed this to Fran as an aid to her job as navigator. But as the journey progressed, it seemed to her that he knew the way by heart.
‘Do you know the Pyrenees well?’ she asked.
‘Parts of them, yes. They’re addictive. The weather’s not too reliable, but it never is in the mountains, unless you go much further south.’
Although much of their route was on fast roads through flat country, by the afternoon’s end they were in the foothills of the mountains whose distant peaks were still gleamed with snow.
The roads became narrower, the terrain more alpine. When Reid drove into the car park of a small hotel called La Terrasse, it could be seen at a glance that it was a very different establishment from the one in Bordeaux. Several old countrymen and a younger one in the distinctive blue overalls of the French working man broke off a gossip in the bar when Fran walked in ahead of Reid who immediately greeted them and received a polite chorus of ‘M’sieur...dame’ in response.
They were given a key and found their own way upstairs to a room on the first floor which was in darkness until she switched on the light. It was about the size of their bathroom in Bordeaux. A low divan bed occupied most of the space. The television, high up on the wall, looked like a oversize security camera beamed on the bed.
‘Not too pokey for you, I hope?’ said Reid, putting down the cases.
She didn’t mind it for herself, but was a little surprised that he found it acceptable. Like the suite in Bordeaux, this room also had French windows but on a smaller scale and inward-opening because there were louvred doors outside them. She pushed these open and stepped out onto a timber-built balcony roofed by the projecting eaves typical of buildings in regions where, in winter, heavy snow fell.
‘Oh...what a fabulous view!’
Beyond the head of the valley they had been following rose majestic peaks, their snowfields glistening in the soft evening sunlight. In the middle distance high pastures sloped down to tracts of dense woodland.
‘Nice, isn’t it?’ said Reid.
She glanced at him, seeing on his face an expression new to her. She was trying to think of a word to describe it when there was a tap on the door and he went to open it.
The large middle-aged woman who had given them the key came in with a tray bearing a wine cooler and two glasses.
‘Did you order this in advance?’ Fran asked, when they were alone again and he was opening the champagne.
He nodded. ‘I’m told by the women in my family that, at the end of a long drive, a hot bath and a glass of champagne are the best possible pick-me-up. I’ll have a quick shower first and then you can laze in the bath for as long as you like. The dining room opens at eight.’
‘You’ve stayed here before?’
‘Yes...but not in this room and I was on my own, taking a few days’ break.’ Having filled the glasses, he said, ‘Let’s take them outside, shall we? But first...’ He reached out to take her hand and draw her towards him. ‘Shall we kiss and make up?’
Fran put her hands on his chest. Instinct told her that here in this unpretentious hostelry in its lovely setting, things were going to go better.
‘I’m sorry about today, Reid. I did flirt a bit with that Frenchman, but only to pay you out for—as I thought—neglecting me. I believed we were in Bordeaux for you to do banking things.’
‘You must think I’m extraordinarily passionate about banking to give it priority even on my honeymoon.’
By almost perceptible degrees his arms were tightening round her, pressing her closer against him.
‘Most people with interesting careers are passionate about them. I understand that. It was just that I felt, in the circumstances, you should be concentrating on me.’
‘I intend to concentrate on you. From now on you’ll have my undivided attention.’ He bent his head and kissed her, but only lightly.
Even so it was enough to make her pulses start to race. She was disappointed when he let her go and handed her one of the glasses.
The balcony had two director’s chairs propped against the inside wall. Reid set his glass on the rail of the balustrade while he unfolded them.
/>
‘Tomorrow I’ll take you up there,’ he said, his eyes on the pastures, after they had sat down. ‘It’s great walking country. At this time of year we shall have it almost to ourselves.’
‘Are there still bears in these mountains?’
‘A few, in the more remote areas. Also a lot of wild boar. I’ve occasionally smelt them and heard them, but they keep out of sight. There’s plenty of interesting bird life and it’s a botanist’s paradise.’
He drank his champagne rather quickly and went in to have his shower. Listening to the water running, Fran wondered if, while she was in the tub, he would lie on the bed, wrapped in a towel, waiting for her to join him, intending to make love to her before they went down to dinner.
The sound of bleating made her stand up and lean over the balcony. Coming along a side street below was a large flock of sheep, a man leading them and a dog bringing up the rear. As he passed the hotel, the shepherd looked up, acknowledging her with a nod. She wondered if he had ever been away from this valley or had spent his whole life here.
She thought back to how Reid had looked on first seeing the view. He had stood with his hands on the rail and his eyes on the mountains. It had seemed to her that he had undergone some subtle transformation, becoming more relaxed and approachable. Or had she only imagined it?
As he had that morning, he came out of the bathroom with a towel wrapped round him.
‘I’m afraid it’s rather steamy in there. There’s no window, only an extractor fan. Let me refill your glass.’
He had already run a bath for her, she discovered. Lying in the warm water to which she had added some of her own bath oil, she sipped her second glass of champagne and wondered if he had drawn the glass curtains to make the room more private and folded back the bedclothes.
Although he said, ‘Take your time. There’s no hurry,’ she felt she ought not to keep him waiting too long. After all they had been married for almost thirty-six hours and so far, for various reasons, it hadn’t been much of a honeymoon for a man who, by any standards, had been extremely patient.
Fran was just about to stand up and start drying herself when there was a tap on the door.
