English Correspondence (18 page)

‘I like it here,' the woman said, in English. She was English. Her clothes fitted her, as tight as a plum skin, but the rings on her fingers were loose. She was fiddling with them, rubbing her hands.

‘I wish we'd booked in for Christmas. It's cosy.'

‘Is it cold out?' Sylvie said, ‘I haven't been outside yet today.'

‘Haven't you?' the woman said. She stared at Sylvie. ‘I don't suppose you need to.'

Sylvie didn't know how to reply. There was one small part of her mind that functioned, and it seemed to be a part that she couldn't rely on. Everything was loud and bright. She went across to the desk and eased herself into her chair.

‘I love a fire to look at,' the woman said. ‘A fire, or a baby in the room. You can't keep your eyes off them.' She paused. ‘It's all on tap, isn't it? I had a friend who ran a place like this. It was all there, all laid on, you name it: food, booze, gym, Jacuzzi, pool, people running round after you, cooking and cleaning. She didn't even make her own bed. She left it though. The life.'

Neither Sylvie nor the man spoke.

‘She did. She was a friend of mine.'

‘Who?' the man said.

‘Francesca.'

‘I didn't know she was in the hotel business,' he said.

‘You're not saying she wasn't, are you, because she was.'

‘I wasn't saying anything.'

‘I know why you think that.' She paused. ‘I know because I'd have thought the same if she hadn't been a friend of mine. Her face doesn't fit, does it? You tell me why it doesn't and then I'll tell you if I agree.'

‘She's more your friend,' the man said.

‘Go on,' the woman said.

‘I don't know.'

‘Go on. I mean, would you say she's no good with people?'

‘Something like that. Disorganised.'

‘You're right. That's not why she left, though.' She turned to Sylvie. ‘Are you English?'

‘Partly,' said Sylvie.

‘I knew you were. I can always tell. It's a nice place you've got here. Peaceful. You get the key and take the things upstairs,' she said to the man. ‘It's all right if I sit here, isn't it?'

‘Fine,' said Sylvie.

‘Eleven's the number,' the man said. ‘Room eleven.'

Sylvie looked at the numbers on the board behind the desk and after a few seconds, handed him the key. He went up the stairs and the woman settled down in the armchair. She stretched her feet towards the fire.

‘It was man trouble.
He's
not interested in that sort of thing. Are you married to a Frenchman?'

‘Yes,' said Sylvie.

‘What's that like?'

‘All right,' said Sylvie.

The woman nodded. ‘Sometimes he's hard to talk to.' She looked up at the staircase. ‘But that's not unusual,' she said.

Paul came in through the door of the dining room. He stopped when he saw Sylvie. The woman looked at him casually and turned back to the fire.

‘Sylvie.' Paul went over and leant across her desk. Sylvie didn't move. ‘You shouldn't be here,' he said. He talked quietly, close to her face, conscious of the client in the armchair.

‘I'm fine,' said Sylvie.

‘Please,' he said.

‘Don't worry about me.'

‘You shouldn't have got up.'

‘I'm fine.'

‘Let me come back with you.'

‘No,' said Sylvie.

‘I can't cope with you in the restaurant.'

‘That's all right,' said Sylvie. ‘You won't need to.'

‘I can't stay with you.'

‘I know.'

‘Everything's organised. You don't need to be here.'

‘Where's Lucien?'

‘My mother came to collect him. I told you everything's sorted.'

‘I'll just sit at the desk.'

‘Please, Sylvie.'

‘I'll sit here. I'd rather.'

‘Don't move then. Unless you go back to bed. Don't try to do anything. Sylvie are you listening to me?'

‘Yes.'

‘What did I say?'

Sylvie said nothing. Paul put one hand on her shoulder and looked at her face, then he went out.

‘What was that all about?' the woman said.

‘I don't know,' said Sylvie. ‘Too many things. I've been in bed all day and he's saying I should go back there.'

‘He's your husband?'

‘Yes,' said Sylvie.

‘No one else would stick his nose in your face and talk to you like that.' She glanced up the stairs again. ‘
He's
not my husband.' She stroked her left sleeve. ‘Do you like my jacket?'

‘Yes,' said Sylvie. ‘It's a good colour.'

‘You dress French, don't you? I couldn't manage that. The underwear and everything. I haven't got the concentration. It suits you. But I'm not sure it
is
you.' She went on, ‘Your jumper's the wrong way round.'

Sylvie felt for the label, just under where her necklace should have been. ‘I put it on in a hurry. No. No, I didn't, I put it on slowly.' She started to get her arms out of the sleeves.

The telephone rang.

‘You don't mind my telling you, do you?'

‘No,' said Sylvie. She pulled her jersey right off, turned it round and put it back on again.

‘You've got nice skin,' the woman said in a matter of fact way. ‘You'd better answer the phone.'

Sylvie picked it up. It was Yvette.

‘That's not you, is it, darling?'

‘Yes, it is me,' Sylvie said.

‘Where are you?'

‘In the usual place. I'm in the entrance hall, sitting at my desk.'

‘Paul's not about, by any chance, is he, darling. I'd just like a little word with him.'

‘He's in the kitchen. He seemed rather pressed. I can give him a message.'

‘Just ask him to give me a moment, would you, darling?'

‘Is it something urgent then?'

Yvette hummed into the telephone and wouldn't commit herself.

‘But you can't tell me about it, is that it?'

Sylvie listened to Yvette's circumlocutions. She wasn't speaking straight into the mouthpiece. Gilles was chipping in and she was giving him instructions. Suddenly Sylvie heard commotion and crying. Yvette said, ‘Don't worry, darling. I'll call you back,' and put the phone down.

‘You weren't here yesterday when we arrived. It was another woman,' her companion said.

Sylvie sat there. Her patience felt a burden, more like stoicism. The woman by the fire was looking at her. The telephone rang again. It was sooner than Sylvie had hoped for. But it was Maude.

‘Oh, Sylvie, you're up.'

‘Yes, I'm up. Why is that surprising? I wasn't back late yesterday.'

‘Paul said you were rather fed up and had had a lie in.'

‘Did he? Well, I'm fine thank you.' Sylvie's heard her own replies as abrupt. Maude, at the other end was sounding euphonic, as if she were trying to warm up a difficult language class. She said something had cropped up which meant she couldn't come in and she hoped she could touch base with Paul.

‘He's in the kitchen. I'll put you through if you like, but he seemed pretty busy. Is something the matter? Nothing serious, I hope.'

Someone at the other end was listening. Alain.

‘No, it's some stupid muddle with dates. I feel really bad about it. You've both got so much on, now we're into December and the Christmas parties are starting,' she said.

‘Don't worry, Maude. It can't be helped.'

‘You will tell Paul, won't you?' she said.

‘Yes, of course I'll tell him.'

Paul came through the dining room door.

‘He's just walked in. I'll tell him now. Bye.' She put the telephone down. ‘That was Maude. She can't come this evening.'

‘But she's got to. She said she was going to.'

‘There's no need to sound so annoyed.'

‘What explanation did she give?'

Sylvie shrugged her shoulders.

‘Why didn't you let me speak to her?'

His annoyance had found its right object.

‘I was right here,' he said. ‘You were talking to her as I walked in. It would have been the simplest thing to put her on. Why didn't you do that?'

‘It wouldn't have made any difference.'

‘That's got nothing to do with it. You're stupid. Wilful; like a child.'

Sylvie thought, this wilfulness that they don't like is the strong part. I just haven't got it quite right yet. It's when I manage, and put on a brave face, that I'm weak.

‘What's the matter with her anyway?' Paul said.

‘Something minor and domestic. It didn't sound too terrible.'

‘She can come in then. I'll call her back.'

‘Alain will answer,' Sylvie said.

‘Sorry?'

‘I wouldn't bother. Alain will answer.'

‘Why should that be a problem?'

The telephone rang again.

‘I imagine he stopped her from coming,' said Sylvie.

Paul picked the receiver up with a flourish from the other side of the desk.

‘Hullo.' He sounded combative.

‘Oh, it's you Mummy. No, I'm not cross.'

‘No, just a bit concerned. The usual sort of thing.'

‘Yes, she is up. Up but . . .'

‘I've no idea. I wouldn't say so. No.'

‘Sorry?'

‘Is he? That's not like him.'

‘No, I'm not suggesting it's your fault. You're always so good with him.'

‘He'll calm down soon. Have you given him something to eat?'

‘No, of course I know you wouldn't neglect him.'

‘Hasn't he?'

‘Shall I talk to him?'

‘Won't he?'

‘If there's no alternative. You'll have to.'

‘No, I'm sure you've tried everything.'

‘We'll just have to, won't we?'

‘I'm not sounding like anything.'

‘Well, I didn't mean to.'

‘All right. I'll see you shortly.'

Paul put the telephone down.

‘That was my mother.'

‘What's happened?' said Sylvie.

‘She's bringing Lucien back.'

‘He's ill?'

‘No. He wants to see you.'

‘Well, I want to see him.'

‘Apparently he's been crying.' Paul stared at Sylvie without emotion. ‘I haven't liked today,' he said. ‘Or yesterday evening.'

He went out.

The woman got up from the armchair.

‘I'm sorry I was here for all that,' she said. ‘I was going to go, but then I thought it would be better to sit tight. I'll go up now. He's probably fallen asleep. He does that when I'm out of the way. Cat naps. I think I must tire him out.'

‘Don't go,' said Sylvie. ‘If you don't mind staying a bit longer, I'd like you to.'

‘All right,' said the woman.

‘Talk to me,' said Sylvie. ‘Tell me about Francesca.'

‘You're interested in her, are you? What do you want to know?'

‘Anything,' said Sylvie.

‘We were teenage together. Not school. She went to hers on a bus. We used to see each other at dance classes and hanging about the Marina. She was lovely. All over the place, though. I never thought she'd settle, not easily.' She stopped. ‘Are you sure you want to hear about someone you don't know?'

‘Yes,' said Sylvie.

‘This entrepreneur hippy type fell for her. Well, that bit wasn't surprising, but the next I heard was that he'd set her up in business with him in a leisure complex in Cornwall. That did surprise me. She stuck it for five years. Then, one evening, she left a note in the hotel swimming pool, one word a sheet, all floating on the water. They had a hundred karmic astrologers staying there. She wasn't good with the New Agers. Not on their wavelength. She ran away to a man she'd met on the beach; hitched a lift to Cardiff. She didn't need to. She had her own car. That's what she's like. Jeff, her partner, caught the bits of paper in the net they used for getting wasps and leaves out. He threw them away without going to the bother of working out the message. She found that out later.'

‘She didn't tell you what she wrote?' said Sylvie.

‘No,' said the woman. ‘That was her all over. She said it had gone. That was the end of it.'

Sylvie didn't feel any need to ask what had happened to her. This moment of escape didn't have the status of a turning point. It wasn't something with consequences, something to live up to. She could see Francesca, as if she were standing in front of her. She had very particular looks, the sort that get a woman in and out of trouble without her knowing why. She could also see the message, the feeling of it anyway; brave and flawed. Francesca might even have missed out a cruçial word.

‘Is anything else wrong with me besides my jersey?' she asked.

She felt she needed to exert herself and this was all she could think of.

‘Let's look at you,' said the woman. ‘I'd say your hair isn't sitting right. It's tidy but sort of going in the wrong direction. Hair's a spiral, isn't it? You can't argue with the way it's meant to go. And you're not wearing any make-up. Do you want me to fix it for you?'

‘I haven't got anything with me,' said Sylvie.

‘Borrow mine,' said the woman. ‘I always travel with a full kit of slap. There's a ladies down here, isn't there? I'll come with you.'

Sylvie was about to say she could manage on her own, but, when she got up, she said, ‘Thank you.' She felt unsteady and she needed the woman's company. They walked across the hall and along the passage. The woman held the door open for her and then propped it open with one of her high-heeled shoes. There was only just room for the two of them and hot air came out in gusts from a vent. Sylvie noticed that Natalie had kept it gleaming; no hair in the plug hole, or wound round the soap, to put the clients off their dinners. She thought her companion might insist on helping, but she didn't. She offered the cosmetic bag as if it were a packet of sweets. Sylvie dipped into it tentatively and applied the other woman's colours. She used her hairbrush. It wasn't as uncomfortable as it might have been. More like borrowing clothes in an emergency than getting in a stranger's bath water. She concentrated and because the woman was looking at her impartially, with interest, not searchingly, she made her face in the mirror relax into someone she recognised. There I am, she thought. She put the towel she'd used in the basket and realigned the laundered ones into a pile of white folds.