Daughter of Catalonia (4 page)

‘I had a letter from
Tante
Louise,’ she said, trying desperately to keep her tone light, ‘inviting me to Paris. She said she was writing to you as well. Have you had the letter?’

There was a long silence. Then Grandmama looked at Grandfather, who wiped his hands painstakingly on his napkin before replying in a deep rumble of impending thunder. ‘We had a letter. There is no question of sending you to them, though. What an impertinence even to suggest it. Typical of Louise!’

‘But I would like to go.’ Madeleine clenched her hands under the table and made her voice as natural as possible. ‘It’s been such a long, hard time recently, and I won’t get
back to normal life while I’m here in the same house where
Maman
died. I needn’t stay there long, but I would like to go to Paris.’

She encountered Grandfather’s severest frown. ‘I said it’s out of the question, Madeleine. I agree that you need a change, and we can maybe look at a trip away for you and Grandmama. Or you could take up a secretarial post locally. It would give you something to do. Both Grandmama and myself agree that you should have some occupation.’

Madeleine armed herself, and continued. Force came from somewhere, maybe from Paris, and her voice came stronger. ‘You know I don’t need your permission to go, don’t you? I just don’t have any money, that’s all. But if necessary I could sell
Maman
’s jewellery to pay for my ticket.’

There was an astonished silence. Then the storm really broke, lashing at her across the table. What on earth did she think she was going to get up to in Paris? She was nearly twenty-two years old. It was about time she thought about settling down, not gadding about. She was ungrateful. How could she even think of selling her mother’s jewellery? Such a terrible thing to think of doing.

Madeleine sat tight through the storm, finding it all surprisingly easy. She could hear Robert’s voice, very calm and positive, and it pushed her grandfather’s rantings into their proper place. Her own voice when it came was equally calm. ‘All right,’ she answered them. ‘Then I’ll go to London first and stay with Cicely or Uncle, and work to raise my fare. I’m very sorry, but you can’t stop me.’

And still the storm raged. That girl Cicely! Fast and cheap, that’s what she was. What kind of people did Madeleine think she would meet in her company?

‘I don’t know!’ Madeleine spat the words, no longer calm. ‘That’s the point! I don’t know any other company than the people I meet here. I’m twenty-one and have no experience of life at all. I wear tweeds and flat shoes, and the world is passing me by. You
lived
when you were young. You didn’t think
Tante
Louise was unsuitable then. You seemed to spend most of your lives in Paris.’ Madeleine shivered involuntarily, shaken by her own anger, and deliberately paused, calmed herself. ‘It’s my turn. I want some life, and I’m going to stay with
Tante
Louise – with my own family. What could be more normal?’

There was silence then, which was eventually broken by Grandmama. Her voice was surprisingly gentle.

‘So much heat, Madeleine! It’s been such a short time since your poor mother passed away. You are not yourself, and I can fully understand that you want a change of scene. You must miss her so much – we all do. Leave us now, and we’ll discuss it some more. There’s no need to be hasty.’

Madeleine looked across at Grandmama and tried to speak, but her throat constricted and no sound came. She brushed tears from her eyes and walked blindly out of the room, out of the house, onto the small patch of lawn in front of the house. There she stopped, the cold March wind whipping the tears from her eyes, chilling her wet cheeks. She took deep breaths, gulping the cold
air, feeling it cooling her throat, opening her lungs, expelling the dead, suffocated air of the dining room. She walked through the trees to the little stream which ran to the side of the house, and followed the path to the bridge, and to the road. The trees were bare of leaves, hard and angular, and their barrenness suited her mood. As she reached the bridge, the deep chill of the air by the stream was wonderful, crisp, unsullied. She walked down to the stream, and bent to wash her face. The icy water hit her cheeks and she laughed out loud, for the first time in months. She crossed the bridge and walked briskly down the road, heading for the open fields, every step a liberation, and skipped like a child as she looked up at the leaden sky, allowing the wind to tousle her hair and blow around her uncovered neck.

Whatever happened now, she knew she would go. They could rant and rave but she had breached the ramparts and Grandmama’s tone alone told her they knew it. For years she’d let
Maman
’s quiet submissiveness be her guide, watched as
Maman
saved her energy and held her ground only for her children, only for the biggest, most momentous things in their lives. She’d copied her, but it had never suited her character, and now she was a new creature. Her father’s daughter!
Tante
Louise’s niece! Cicely’s cousin! All of these people, yet more importantly, she was herself, and she was about to find out who that person really was.

She walked for hours, not thinking too much, just content to know that she herself had made this move. It was enough for the moment. Later they could tell
her what they had decided in these further discussions of theirs. Either they would pay her fare and send her, in which case she would have to put up with tiresome weeks of interference before she finally boarded any train, or they would remain immovable, in which case she would simply go around them and sell the jewellery her mother would never have grudged her. The latter would be simpler really. She could then just leave, maybe stay with Cicely while she arranged tickets, a passport, then go independently to Paris. The mere thought was as exhilarating as the wind.

Night fell early in March, and by the time she made her way back along the too familiar country roads to the house a half-moon was trying to show itself through the clouds. She’d left the house without a coat or gloves, and only by tucking them into her jumper could she keep any feeling in her hands. Her feet were also as cold as ice, and she knew that the rest of her would feel the chill as soon as she went indoors. But the cold was like a triumph, vital, rejuvenating. It quickened the breath and strangely fired up the heart.

She entered the house by the side door, looking for the first time at her watch. They would already be at dinner. Life was marked at the moment by a series of mealtime encounters, it seemed, by the monotony of the round of breakfasts, lunches and dinners all served in that same green dining room with its oppressive mahogany sideboards and the huge table of which the three diners occupied one tiny end. Casserole for lunch, what would it be for dinner? Fish, probably. Grandmama liked to
eat light foods in the evening. They never ate badly at Forsham, Madeleine acknowledged. Grandmama was French, after all. It was the predictability of each meal, and the repetitive conversations, and the long silences, and the criticisms hovering in waiting for any misplaced word which had annihilated Madeleine for years. Now she went in head high and smiling. Who cared, after all?

The Gare du Nord was teeming with people at the rush hour as Madeleine and Robert hauled their cases off the train from Boulogne and looked around for a porter. At first sight the station looked just the same as any busy London station: dark, grimy, metallic, smelling of oil and dirt. Even the passengers looked the same with the harried look of passengers everywhere. Madeleine felt a pang of disappointment, but as the porter reached them, muttering in French, pulling on a chewed cigarette, a whiff of French tobacco came towards her and she felt a surge of excitement. Further along the platform café tables spilt into the alleyway, and as she followed the trolley towards them she was hit by the smell of intense, freshly ground coffee. Men in work clothes leant on the café bar’s counter drinking what she thought must be pastis, cloudy and yellow in thin, straight, painted glasses. Workers in
overalls stood alongside raincoated office workers with an eye on their watches, not a word passing between them. Madeleine slowed to pass the tables, stepping around a child playing on the grubby floor, his mother in furs, gazing intently at her companion over something long and mint-coloured in a tall glass. Her husband? Her lover? Madeleine felt as though she was moving in slow motion through a long-lost world.

Robert strode along before her alongside the porter. She’d made it to France more easily than she could have imagined after all, but the elders had insisted she mustn’t travel alone, and had sent Robert with her on the outward journey. Not that she was complaining. It was wonderful to have Robert with her, and he too had a past and a present to discover in France.

At the end of the platform, behind the barrier, she could already see Cousin Solange, standing out in an elegant cream suit in front of all the rest of the waiting crowd. Beside her, with a hand lightly holding her elbow, stood a rather round, pepper-haired man with a small moustache, whom Madeleine supposed must be Solange’s husband Bernard. She waved, and Solange surged forward until she was nearly touching the barrier.

As Madeleine came through, Solange wafted her into an embrace. ‘Madeleine. I would hardly have known you. How wonderful to see you. And this must be … oh!’

Solange’s eyes gaped, and as Madeleine looked from her to Robert she suddenly realised why. Solange had never met Robert, who was so much the image of the young Luis whom Solange and her family had known. They could
expect this level of astonishment from everyone who had known their father. She hastened to explain, with an extraordinary flush of pleasure.

‘This is Robert, Solange. He is very like our father, I know. Is that what surprised you?’

‘Surprised me? It’s astonishing!’ said Solange. She reached out to Robert and smiled rather shakily. ‘Robert you are very welcome. My mother will be incredulous when she sees you. Your father was such a distinctive-looking man, so … so
broad
, and dark and handsome. Oh, I sound stupid, but you are Luis. You are simply Luis.’

Robert smiled, and allowed himself to be enfolded in a perfumed embrace. Solange kissed him on both cheeks and then turned to her husband.

‘Bernard, these are my cousins Madeleine and Robert. You know their history, but you just
can’t
know what it means to see this young man, so much the image of that astonishing father of his.’

Bernard came forward, gracefully manoeuvring past Robert, and first kissed Madeleine on both cheeks. ‘No doubt, Solange, but my first welcome must be for this beautiful young woman. How do you do, my dear Madeleine? I have heard so much about you ever since Solange visited London and met you. She has always talked about how much of your father she saw in you also, as well as the beauty of your mother. I only met your mother once, but I will never forget how lovely she was.’

He turned to Robert, and shook his hand. ‘Robert, it is good to meet you at last. You are very welcome. You are both very welcome.’

Madeleine drank in the moment, not wanting to move. These people welcomed them because of their parents, not in spite of them. There were memories here which they could explore, and goodwill which radiated and warmed them. She looked across at Robert again, looking for the mirror of her excitement, and caught a reflected smile.

‘Let’s go,’ said Solange. ‘My mother is waiting anxiously to see you.’

A short taxi ride took them through some of the most famous streets of Paris. They swept down the rue Lafayette, and on into the Boulevard Haussmann. The evening was drawing in, and behind the avenue of trees the department stores were all lit up, revealing a quick glimpse of chic luxury as the taxi followed the slow-moving evening traffic. The Arc de Triomphe loomed ahead.

‘Look!’ Madeleine breathed at Robert, as they drove past the arch, and on into the Avenue Victor Hugo.

‘I know,’ he replied, with suppressed excitement.

On down the Victor Hugo and into the sixteenth arrondissement, where
Tante
Louise had her apartment. Madeleine had known that the family lived in the heart of fashionable Paris, but was awed now that she was here.

‘Don’t be too impressed,’ said Solange, as they drew up outside the beautiful old stone apartment block, with its elaborate wrought iron balconies framing every window. ‘This apartment has belonged to the family for a very long time, and those who had the money to buy it are long dead. Even the furniture, which is quite beautiful, was mainly bought by my grandfather.’

Access to the second-floor apartment was by an
ancient lift with a grill which had to be pulled across and clicked shut before the lift would move. In previous times, Madeleine guessed, there would have been a man operating the lift for residents, just as the desk in the entrance hall would have had a permanent concierge. The hallways were still perfectly maintained, with immaculate black and white tiling on the floors and lovely green glass tiling on the bottom half of the walls.

As the lift doors opened onto the second floor, Bernard stepped out ahead of Madeleine, and held out a hand to guide her quite unnecessarily over the lip of the grill door. She took the hand with a rush of feminine pleasure. He led her to a panelled wooden door and rang the bell. A maid quickly answered, dressed in a black dress and white apron, and ushered them into a high-ceilinged entrance hall. Madeleine took in the marble flooring, a side table from the early nineteenth century, possibly Bourbon, she thought, and a Sèvres vase painted in gold. There was an old landscape as well, a hunting scene with graceful, long-limbed hounds. The whole scene was so elegant, so impossibly French, that it reminded Madeleine of idealised Hollywood visions of Paris, except that here was
Tante
Louise, emerging from a door facing them, busy and tiny and mobile as ever, her face a mass of tiny lines which framed her thin lips and nose, and almost seemed to be holding her bird-like little face together.

‘My children!’ she cried, both hands outstretched as she took Madeleine then Robert into her arms. ‘My Robert, oh my goodness, Robert! Why, I haven’t seen you since you were just a baby. I knew then that we didn’t need to
worry about Luis’s heritage. You were his image then as you are now.’

She smiled triumphantly at Solange, who was murmuring agreement. ‘You didn’t ever see Robert as a baby, did you? You must have had a surprise when you saw him today. I remember Elise had a photo of Luis kneeling on the floor in the apartment in Vermeilla looking down into Robert’s eyes. Robert was just a baby and lying on a rug, looking up at Luis – the two of them in profile. The likeness was stunning. I don’t suppose you remember your father, do you Robert? No? Well then, we have much to talk about. But first, come in all of you. It is the aperitif hour, and we have much to celebrate.’

She led them into the drawing room, ushered Madeleine to a cream-coloured
chapeau de gendarme
armchair, and drew Robert down next to her on an embroidered sofa on ebony legs, which looked as though it would never carry his weight.

‘We’ll have a glass of champagne shall we, my dears, to celebrate? Or would you prefer a whisky, Robert?’

She talked effortlessly and without pauses, about their journey, about the weather, about what Paris could offer them as entertainment at this season.

‘Maria Callas is here, at the Opera House. You must go. She’s so much at her best just now. Rossini’s
Tosca
, that’s what you must see. And, of course, you must go to the cinema. There’s that amusing little film by Jacques Tati that everyone’s so delighted about. Solange must find you some young people to go to that with. Such a lovable character, Monsieur Hulot. I saw the last film, a few years
ago. The style’s really rather modern for me, but terribly clever and such fun.’

‘And then, of course, you have to see Paris. Do you like art? Oh, I am glad. So sad to come to Paris and not love its art. We are just coming into the season of major exhibitions. Such a good time for you to visit. And the weather is improving daily. It felt almost like summer yesterday. Robert, how long can you stay with us?’

‘No more than ten days, unfortunately,
Tante
Louise. I’m on holiday just now from Oxford, but the new term begins at the end of April.’

Tante
Louise nodded approvingly. ‘Of course, you are at Oxford University! Clever young man. Well, we’ll just have to make the most of your short time to do all the essential things, then later we can do fashions and the like with Madeleine. Not so, Solange? We’ve been looking forward to having a young lady around again to shop with. Oh, we’ll keep you busy, never you fear.’

Over a delicate dinner of fish rich in wine and butter, conversation became more serious. Solange wanted to know about their mother’s illness. Had there been warning? How come the news of her illness had only reached them in Paris a few weeks before her death? They would have travelled to see her. There was so much still to be said between them. It filled Madeleine with anger, because she knew that although her mother’s illness had been diagnosed very late, the elders had taken even longer to communicate the news to Paris, leaving no time for any new rapprochement. But there would be no purpose served now by telling them this, so she explained simply how no
one had known until very near the end, how Elise had kept her symptoms hidden from them all.

‘I don’t think she really wanted to know what was wrong with her, or to be treated,’ she said. ‘
Maman
was such a private person. She said so little and imposed so little that I don’t think anyone thought to question why she was fading away before our eyes. She just didn’t want to fight, you see.’

Louise was astonished. ‘But Elise was a fighter! She was an Amazon. She may have looked soft and pink and feminine, but she could take on the world!’

Robert put down his coffee cup with a start. He gaped at Louise, and she looked back at him with equal surprise. Robert flushed rather self-consciously, and straightened his little cup, which had landed at an awkward angle. He paused deliberately and then smiled at
Tante
Louise.

‘Forgive me,
Tante
Louise. We didn’t know this Elise,’ he explained. ‘My mother in later life was not the same person we think you knew. She seemed to be a beaten person after my father died. But we know there was more to her than we knew. We have so much we want to learn about her. We don’t know anything, you see. Nothing about her youth, or about her and Papa, or her life in France. She didn’t talk about it, ever.’

‘She used to talk, though,’ Madeleine interposed. ‘When we first arrived back in England from Vermeilla we talked all the time about Papa, and France, and all of you, and all the people we’d left behind in the village. We talked about when we would go home, and I used to make up stories about what we would do, and she would
laugh at me a little. Robert doesn’t remember.’

‘And then it stopped?’ Louise wanted to know.

‘Yes, when we got the letter telling us Papa had died. It’s all a bit hazy to me, because for a few weeks I didn’t really see
Maman
. She was too ill to see anyone, I think. Nobody told me anything, but I wasn’t allowed near her room, and I spent all my time with Robert and his nanny. I didn’t know then that Papa had been killed.
Maman
told me that later, and she told me he had been very brave and we should be proud of him, and she let me cry, and held me, but that was all. After that, all our little chats about Papa and the friends stopped, and if I asked any questions she would just smile – you know that soft smile of hers – and change the subject. And I soon learnt not to ask any more.’

‘And her character changed as well?’

Madeleine nodded, and Louise nodded in her turn.

‘It doesn’t surprise me so much. I wondered, that day in London, to see Elise so quiet at first, and sort of faded, almost. But then she became more animated, and more like her old self, so I stopped asking myself questions.’

Madeleine sighed. ‘It was wonderful that day. It’s the only time I can remember since I was tiny that
Maman
came to life again. But it was only with you, and it was over as soon as we left you. You even managed to make Grandmama human that day.’

Solange looked towards Robert.

‘And you weren’t even with us that day in London. You don’t even have any memory of your mother as the happy woman we knew. For you that’s very sad.’

Robert took time to answer. ‘She was good to us, don’t get us wrong.
Maman
always loved us and looked after us. And we loved her. She was still a wonderful woman. But sometimes I feel she deprived us of our roots, and she even died without leaving us anything. No letters, no token even, no link to our past. She left us nothing but questions.’

Tante
Louise and Solange exchanged glances. It was Louise who spoke.

‘And you would like us to give you some answers?’

Robert nodded. ‘It’s what we’ve been hoping for.’

‘And what we were expecting,
n’est-ce pas
, Solange? We knew you would want to hear about Elise and Luis, and we’ve been talking about them a lot ourselves, knowing you were on your way here. It’s such a pleasure to talk about them and bring back their memory. But we don’t know anything about what happened to them in the war, you know.’