The House on the Edge of the Cliff

by Carol Drinkwater

  She was thin as a wheat stalk with muscular arms, her hands and elbows patched with paint. Her laugh was vibrant, horsy, neighing. She wore a broad-brimmed straw hat. Her flowered frock was buttoned up the front from the hem to its V neckline. She wore a chunky purple necklace of big fat beads with a matching bracelet. No rings. Her build was slight but her personality and her attire were vivacious and bold. I might have wrapped my hand around her waist and still had space to wiggle my fingers. Her hair was dark and pinned up beneath her sombrero with a few strays sticking to her face, which was clammy from the heat.

  It was very stuffy in the station. The black hands on the huge clock read ten to twelve. High noon. Poor Peter was wrestling with his case, work satchel and my backpack. We paused for him to catch up. Agnes had her arm wrapped firmly round my shoulders. She was bounding with energy. Her smile cracked open her face, exposing even teeth and crow’s feet about her shining eyes. Although she was no beauty, she was striking and charismatic. Age? I would have guessed early fifties. Older than her brother.

  A sweeping descent from the railway station to reach the car, so many steps, 104, to a well-polished, burgundy open-top into which Peter piled our belongings. He struggled to find space for himself on the back seat, legs squashed up tight to his chest, alongside everything else, including two straw bags stuffed with shopping. Celery sticks and baguettes packed tight against several gin and tonic-water bottles.

  ‘We’ll stop at a shop in one of the villages to pick up more provisions.’

  We didn’t. Agnes was nattering so much I think she forgot the groceries. ‘Peter, darling, did Roderick tell you I have an exhibition in Rome at the end of next month?’ She was yelling above the engine, and then turning to me, ‘And I’m not even halfway done. Do you paint?’ Before I could shake my head, she was on to the next subject. It reminded me of how when I’d first met Peter he had asked my name and hadn’t waited for a response, and we’d spent almost an entire day together before he learned it. A family trait, then. Peter also shared some of her looks, her lustrous jet black hair. Clear eyes, less violet in colour, more blue. She possessed a gift for extraordinary attention to detail, although her driving might have been the exception. At the wheel, she barely glanced at the roads. Other vehicles were hooting at her, drivers raising fists. It was dizzying and terrifying, given the sheer drop to the sea along the stretch of road before the climb towards the site where her house had been constructed on a lonely promontory of red rock. She waved an arm in the direction of the sea. ‘All this marvellous expanse of green and rocks and natural habitat is the national park and beyond it Les Calanques. Alas, no sea route or I would have taken you that way to show off my patch of Paradise. Perfect for walking, climbing, exploring and days at the beach. You’ll need sturdy shoes, and if you aren’t a strong swimmer, check with Peter that it’s safe before you venture in. We don’t want any accidents.’

  ‘Have you lived here long?’ I managed, while she paused for an intake of breath.

  ‘I fled England when I was little more than a girl, probably not much older than you are now. Seventeen. I dreamed of studying fine art at the Beaux Arts in Paris, living with the Bohemian set, shedding the British class system, its injustices and prejudices. And then I met someone. I fell head over heels, and once in love, so very much in love, there seemed little if any reason to return to the British Isles. Quite the reverse. Best to stay away. I was not their kind of person, you see, never had been. Everything I dreamed of, everything I required to sustain me, spiritually, emotionally, artistically, was in France and, later, here in the south. Since which time, this region, this house, Heron Heights, has been both home and inspiration.’

  Peter had not mentioned a husband so I was unsure whether the someone she had spoken of had remained as a constant in her life. I supposed, because she spoke in the singular, she must be divorced or a widow. I supposed I would soon find out.

  In fact, it was after Agnes had died, twenty-five years later, that I discovered her story and the identity of her lover.

  We were climbing the last kilometre. I glanced out at the widening view, the vast expanse of cliffs and scrubland yellowed with scented broom, the sea twinkling in the distance, and I felt the wind play with my hair. The knot in my stomach was magically melting away.

  The South of France.

  ‘Now I must pay some attention. The road is scarped and winding and one false move … Oh, but look, look there! Here, see. Here we are.’

  My arrival, as Agnes had promised, would be one of the high points of my trip. The ascent was clouded with dust from the unmade road beneath our wheels partially obscuring the natural beauty. It was at the crest as we drew to a halt that my jaw, literally, dropped open. There it was: the sweeping ageless panorama Peter had eulogized, nudging Cap Canaille.

  ‘Wow, this is Paradise indeed,’ I murmured, and the wind whispered its assent.

  Heron Heights, pale pink, two storeys, with a funny peaked turret to the right side – it boasted an upper floor (now our bedroom) – was set on a bluff beneath a soaring precipice shaped like an upside-down ice-cream cone. ‘The highest maritime cliff in Europe, with not another property in sight.’

  Beyond my wildest dreams.

  The house, in its unique position, was planted upon jagged rose-red rock. It overlooked miles of sandy or shingle beaches, each divided by giant boulders into coves and creeks. To the right, some distance from where Agnes had stopped the car, towered a series of stone palisades, carved by history and time into what looked like the flue pipes of a giant organ. Beyond, though out of sight now, Agnes pointed to dozens of small secluded bays and inlets. ‘They are Les Calanques, the creeks.’

  The area had a wilderness quality, reminding me of Cornwall rather than my preconceived images of the South of France.

  I stepped out of the car. The soft wind billowed my blouse. I stood with my hands on my head, the breeze as my fan, gazing about me in wonder. Dumbstruck. It was one of the most beautiful landscapes, seascapes, I had ever set eyes on.

  Agnes was alongside me, hanging on to her hat, eyes dancing excitedly. ‘Pretty damn special, eh?’

  ‘Unbelievable. Mind-blowing.’

  ‘Peter has always loved it here, haven’t you, darling boy? All his childhood summers were spent here.’ My hostess spun for confirmation from her nephew, who was unloading the car. From somewhere – there was nowhere but the house – a dog was barking.

  ‘It does get windy here sometimes, I’ll grant you that. Otherwise, calm, peace, isolation, nature, wild creatures, easels, oils and wine. Oh, and I have a dog. That’s him letting us know who’s boss. A robust hound, a buster of a boy, who’ll chew your shoes, hats and fingers. Be warned. His name is Bruce. I hope you like dogs?’

  Back at home – home was a faint memory to me now, so removed was it from all that I was seeing and experiencing – we had never owned a dog, but I had always longed for one.

  ‘Bruce,’ trilled Agnes. ‘The only man in my life,’ she jested, with a wink in my direction as a black mastiff, the size of a pony, came bounding towards us.

  I was in the company of two new people, two new friends – even Peter, who just a few weeks ago was also a stranger – on a strip of rock facing south, gazing out upon possibly the most stupendous sight with which life had thus far presented me. How fabulous it was.

  I took a deep breath. On that day, that sublime afternoon, I believed that my life had been blessed, not cursed. That meeting Peter, his bringing me there, was a gift. How could I have foreseen that I was to be the instrument of calamity, that tragedy lay in waiting just a few short weeks away?

  Settling in

  The house was full of warm sun. Heat seeped out of every corner, like juice flowing from an orange. Art deco in style, clean lines, angles and curves. White walls, white muslin curtains that billowed in the breeze. The front of the house, the façade that faced the sea, was a patchwork of ravishing reds and purples: bougainvillaea embowered. Its music was the s
ea, the waves that curled and receded over distant pebbles and sand.

  I was in my element. I had landed on my feet yet again.

  I slung my crumpled travelling clothes onto the bed, peeled off the underwear that was almost glued to my skin, and slipped into the shower. Savon de Marseille, a square khaki block of olive-oil soap, clumsy and slippery in my hands, lathering my grimy, claggy body. The water was tepid but it was all I needed to refresh myself. I changed into shorts in that room of my own. Slabs of sunlight on the ceiling and tomette floor tiles. Bed bathed in sunlight, warming the white linen, giving it a burnished glow. The writing table was decorated with tall sunflowers and several sprigs of lavender, upright in a floral vase. Beneath it, a note on a sheet of pale blue stationery. A watercolour of a sailing ship out on the open sea. Bienvenue, welcome, chère amie de Peter, written in bold purple lettering. Agnes.

  My own compact room with a view, and what a view.

  I could hear the sea clearly even from that elevation and distance. Its rhythmic roll, back and forth, licking the beach, slapping the rocks. If I could fly like a bird, I could take off from this window-ledge and dive into it. Seamlessly, Olympic fashion.

  I unpacked my bag at a somnolent pace, make-believing that this was my very own private hideaway and I was there to stay. For ever and a day.

  I paused, stopped, started, threw myself onto the bed against the plumped-up pillows, inhaled the scents, leaned again on the window-ledge, kicked up one bare leg behind me, watched the dog, big Bruce, gambolling in the sand dunes, rooting and ferreting at the Marram grass. There was a path and steps. Rope and wood, rustic style, with bamboo canes made into hanging oil lights, snaking all the way down to the cove.

  I promised myself I’d investigate it all later. I’d need a hat, not my beret. A bolder statement, extravagant, and as smart as Agnes’s. Saint-Tropez savvy. If I could paint, I would never leave here either.

  She was on her own. There was no companion. The love she had spoken of was not in her present, then. I wondered what had happened to him. Not sad for her, I hoped. Alone, here. It could be perfect, this solitude. Or intimidating.

  The door opened after the briefest of tap-taps. I swung from the window and my ruminations. Peter’s floppy-haired head peered round the frame. ‘Lunch is ready. Agnes says we’ll have a ripping dinner tonight. Now we’ll snack. Bread, cheese and wine, will that do?’

  ‘It will all do. Thank you so much.’ I smiled broadly. Peter nodded. He looked a little more relaxed. I threw my unfolded undies onto the bed, leaving drawers and wardrobe doors wide open. I could complete the unpacking later, whenever. I didn’t want to miss a single second of this magical day.

  After lunch, a long, languid swim. Feet flipping, turning onto my back, belly exposed to the sun. I was a seal in slow motion. My hair hanging loose, dripping like lengths of seaweed. Salt on my skin. Afterwards, spreadeagled on the beach, not even a towel beneath me. The vast blue sky embraced me. I yielded myself up to the day, to the present, to the perfection of this opportunity. These chance encounters. Peter was still in the water. He was a powerful swimmer, ploughing a crawl through the mild azure waves. I had not expected him, an intellectual, to be such an accomplished athlete. I lifted my head from my golden pillow to look for him, a dot on the horizon, and saw him rising out of the spray, sprinting towards me. He flopped at my side. Droplets of water, crystal grains of sand settled on my face.

  ‘Watch it!’ I whooped.

  He leaned over me, olive-skinned and shiny, and brushed his lips against the rounded blade of my salt-encrusted shoulder and smiled, licking me, tongue into the indent of my collar bone. ‘Happy to be here?’

  ‘Mmm. And you?’

  I caught the briefest trace of a shadow, a heaviness behind his eyes. It had been gathering weight for days now. I missed the mischievous glint in his violet eyes. I knew, though, that he was disappointed with the results in Paris and blamed himself for quitting the fight. Absent when the students had occupied the Sorbonne. Absent for the triumphs and disappointments that had followed. He had left to protect me, putting my safety before his vision. Others in the fight had got out of the city at the same time, I reminded him. ‘Cohn-Bendit, for one.’

  ‘He was exiled.’

  Peter’s disillusion sat between us, even though he did his best to conceal his feelings. I didn’t want him to hold it against me. I didn’t want it to spoil our friendship. I wanted us to be friends for ever.

  Agnes and I assembled for ‘sundowners’ on the veranda. Chilled alcoholic drinks with buckets of chunky ice cubes. ‘Campari and tonic, Bellini, or gin and tonic with lemon? We have a lemon tree in the garden. Actually, it’s little more than a yard out the back on this bed of limestone but no shortage of citrus fruits. Cut yourself a slice. Two, if you like your cocktails sharp. Which will you have?’

  ‘Campari, please.’ I had never tasted Campari before. It was bitter, yet sticky-sweet. Insanely good. I drank it down almost in one go.

  Steady.

  We shook up another.

  Swing jazz on the gramophone. ‘I Got Rhythm’. Love it. ‘Django Reinhardt. Have you heard of him?’

  I admitted I hadn’t.

  ‘Chez Florence atop Montmartre was my canteen, our regular hangout. I could have listened to Django and Stéphane Grappelli play together all night. Well, I did! The club had moved to rue Blanche by the time we settled in that quartier in 1930 and we frequently danced there till dawn. In ’thirty-four, they formed a band, the Quintette du Hot Club de France. Ah, my Lord, such memories. I was twenty-four. Poor man died far too young.’

  ‘Your lover?’ I was appalled for her.

  Agnes stayed her chopping and stared at me with a wry smile. ‘My lover? No. That’s … another story, for later in the summer when we’ve become the best of friends. I was talking about Reinhardt. Django. I knew him quite well back in those euphoric days before the war.’

  I felt my jaw drop and gulped the last sip of my second sexy scarlet drink. So deliciously yummy and scrumptious, and just a bit alcoholic. The melting ice cubes clunked against my upper lip and front teeth and numbed my mouth. I pictured Agnes bopping and jiving to swing jazz at dawn with her lover out on the sloping streets of Montmartre. Too cool for words.

  Peter’s aunt was putting water on to boil, trickling pinches of salt into the liquid and furiously chopping herbs. She was swinging her hips to the music as she worked. I watched her from the rear and longed to know more about her life, about the man she had loved. Her feet, in brightly striped espadrilles laced up beyond her ankles towards her calves, like climbing ivy, were tapping to the jive.

  ‘Any sign of Peter?’

  ‘He’ll join us for dinner. He’s working, writing a paper, he says.’

  ‘He never stops. Such a clever, ambitious boy.’

  I hunted for plates, and found stacks in the lower cupboard of a restored wooden dresser. I chose chunky enamel ones decorated with fruits in luscious bold colours, all hand-painted. Big purple figs, scarlet cherries, oranges.

  ‘What fab designs. Did you paint these?’ I called to Agnes.

  ‘No, dear, a friend of mine.’

  ‘Local ceramics?’

  ‘Well, yes, but she’s gone now.’

  Knives and forks from a drawer, I laid the table for three outside on a terracotta-tiled terrace abutting the side of the main body of the house. It was an enchanted arbour, shaded by vines and overlooking our expanse of sea, settling to navy now and glinting still beneath the first stars of the evening. The table was already dressed with a cloth printed with bees and cicadas. Candles spluttered in the almost imperceptible breeze. What a gay and jolly welcome the table offered, with its display of fruits and insects.

  I sat a moment on one of the rush-seated chairs, happy to drink in the panorama before me. The sun had set but the sea was inviting. A bat overhead swooped by my cheek. I jumped from my seat, emitting a shriek. The creature swung about, nose-diving into our evening, then disappeared.<
br />
  ‘Our miniature Draculas, Mediterranean horseshoe bats – they’re perfectly harmless. They sleep all day wrapped in their cloak-like wings behind the shutters of the house and venture out at dusk in search of dinner. Their delight is moths, not you, dear, and the blasted mosquitoes. They show no fear and I think they’ve got used to my company – they accept me now and my guests.’ Agnes was approaching with a steaming plate of pasta. Big Bruce padded at her side. I rose to help her.

  ‘Looks scrummy.’

  ‘Nothing fancy. Simple dishes because I have little time. No one has complained yet. How did you meet Peter?’

  ‘He picked me up in a bar.’

  My hostess let out a loud roar of delight. ‘Good for Peter. He has a fine eye for beauty, just like his aunt.’

  I reconsidered my answer, thinking I might have given the wrong impression. ‘Well, it was more a café than a bar. Lunchtime. My first day in Paris.’

  ‘Love at first sight, or so Roderick described it.’ She grinned, plonking the spaghetti in the centre of the table. Aromas of garlic, unfamiliar spices and freshly snipped green herbs wafted my way.

  ‘Smells delicious.’

  ‘Sit yourself down and pour a glass of wine. There’s no ceremony here. Tomorrow evening you can make the cocktails. How about that? You’re family now.’

  I glanced her way to see whether her face expressed this sentiment, or whether she was just being flippant, and I believed it did. The candlelight chiselling her features gave her appearance a greater beauty than she owned in reality. She was handsome rather than beautiful, and probably older than I had originally estimated.

  ‘I’m not sure I’m up to making cocktails just yet, but thank you for your kindness and your hospitality. This place is beyond wonderful. Cheers.’

  ‘It’s splendid that my nephew has brought you here. I’ve never seen him in the company of a girlfriend before and he’s clearly smitten with you. Dear boy. First big love. As I said, his father remarked on it too. Peter has never spoken to me of any girl in the past but, then, he hasn’t visited me for several summers now. He was just a teenager the last time he came. I’ve missed his friendship and company. In the olden days, when he was a boy, he confided in me about everything and I adored it. He’s the closest I have to a child of my own. Then university came along and the attention of his comrades took first place. To be honest, it did cross my mind that perhaps he was homosexual and keeping it to himself, though why he should feel it necessary to conceal it from me I have no idea. His father, I suppose. Roderick would hit the roof, old bigot that he is, so Peter would have felt obliged to hide his preferences. Of course, it’s clear now that he hadn’t met the right girl. It’ll be a challenge for you, though. Peter is dedicated to his work, of course, and’ – she lifted her long-fingered hands, still smudged with paint stains, to make inverted commas in the air – ‘“the cause”. He’ll make a better ambassador than his father. Kinder nature. Considerate. More of a diplomat.’