Jay was not expected to attend Mass. En tout cas, tous les Anglais sont païens. The term was used with affection. Not so with La Païenne across the river. Even the old men on the café’s terrasse viewed her with suspicion. Perhaps because she was a woman alone. When Jay asked outright, he found he was politely stonewalled. Mireille looked at the roses for a long time. Lifting them to her face, she breathed the scent. Her arthritic hands, oddly delicate in comparison with her bulky body, touched the petals gently.
‘Thank you.’ She gave a formal little nod. ‘My lovely roses. I’ll put them into water. Come in, and I’ll make some tea.’
Her house was clean and airy, with the whitewashed walls and stone floors of the region, but its simplicity was deceptive. An Aubusson rug hung on one wall, and there was a grandfather clock in the corner of the living room which Kerry would have sold her soul for. Mireille saw him looking. ‘That belonged to my grandmother,’ she said. ‘It used to be in my nursery when I was a child. I remember listening to the chimes when I lay awake in bed. It plays a different carillon for the hour, the half and the quarter. Tony loved it.’ Her mouth tightened, and she turned away to arrange the roses in a bowl. ‘Tony’s daughter would have loved it.’
The tea was weak, like flower water. She served it in what must have been her best Limoges, with silver tongs for the sugar and lemon.
‘I’m sure she would. If only her mother were a little less reclusive.’
Mireille looked at him. Derisively. ‘Reclusive? Héh! She’s antisocial, Monsieur Jay. Hates everyone. Her family more than anyone else.’ She sipped her tea. ‘I would have helped her if she’d let me. I wanted to bring them both to live with me. Give the child what she needs most. A proper home. A family. But she-’ She put down the cup. Jay noticed that she never called Marise by name. ‘She insists on maintaining the terms of the lease. She insists she will stay until next July, when it expires. Refuses to come to the village. Refuses to talk to me or to my nephew, who offers to help her. And afterwards, héh? She plans to buy the land from Pierre-Emile. Why? She wants to be independent, she says. She doesn’t want to owe us anything.’ Mireille’s face was a clenched fist. ‘Owe us! She owes me everything. I gave her a home. I gave her my son! There’s nothing left of him now but the child. And even there she’s managed to take her from us. Only she can talk to her, with that sign language she uses. She’ll never know about her father and how he died. She’s even fixed that. Even if I could-’
The old woman broke off abruptly. ‘Never mind, héh!’ she said with an effort. ‘She’ll come round eventually. She’ll have to come round. She can’t hold out for ever. Not when I-’ Again she broke off, her teeth snapping together with a small brittle sound.
‘I don’t see why she should be so hostile,’ said Jay at last. ‘The village is such a friendly place. Look how friendly everyone’s been to me. If she gave people a chance I’m sure they’d welcome her. It can’t be easy, living on her own. You’d think she’d be pleased to know people were concerned-’
‘You don’t understand.’ Mireille’s voice was contemptuous. ‘She knows what sort of welcome she’d get if she ever showed her face here. That’s why she stays away. Ever since he brought her here from Paris it’s been the same. She never fitted in. Never even tried. Everyone knows what she did, héh. I’ve made sure of that.’ Her black eyes narrowed in triumph.
‘Everybody knows how she murdered my son.’
43
‘WELL, SHE EXAGGERATES, YOU KNOW,’ SAID CLAIRMONT peaceably. They were in the Café des Marauds, which was filling up rapidly with its after-work crowd, he in his oil-stained overalls and blue beret, a group of his workers, Roux amongst them, gathered around a table behind him. The comfortable reek of Gauloises and coffee filled the air. Someone behind them was discussing a recent football match. Joséphine was busy microwaving pizza slices.
‘Héh, José, un croque, tu veux bien?’
On the counter stood a bowl of boiled eggs and a dish of salt. Clairmont took one and began to peel it carefully. ‘I mean, everyone knows she didn’t actually kill him. But there are plenty of other ways than pulling the trigger, héh?’
‘Driven him to it, you mean?’
Clairmont nodded. ‘He was an easy-going lad. Thought she was perfect. Did everything for her, even after they were married. Wouldn’t hear a word spoken against her. Said she was highly strung and delicate. Well, maybe she was, héh?’ He helped himself to salt from the dish. ‘The way he was with her, you’d have thought she was glass. She’d just come out of one of those hospitals, he said. Something wrong with her nerves.’ Clairmont laughed. ‘Nerves, héh! Wasn’t anything wrong with her nerves. But anyone dared say anything about her-’ He shrugged. ‘Killed himself trying to please her, poor Tony. Worked himself half to death for her, then shot himself when she tried to leave him.’ He bit into his egg with melancholy gusto.
‘Oh yes, she was going to leave,’ he added, seeing Jay’s surprise. ‘Had her bags all packed and ready. Mireille saw them. There’d been some row,’ he explained, finishing the egg and gesturing to Joséphine for a second blonde. ‘There was always some kind of a row going on in that place. But this time it really looked as if she was going to go through with it. Mireille-’
‘What is it?’ Joséphine was carrying a tray of microwaved pizzas, and looked flushed and tired.
‘Two Stellas, José.’
Joséphine handed him the bottles, which he opened using the bottle-opener fixed into the bar. She gave him a narrow look before moving on with the pizzas.
‘Well anyway, that was that,’ finished Clairmont, pouring the beers. ‘They made out it was an accident, héh, as you would. But everyone knows that crazy wife of his was behind it.’ He grinned. ‘The funny thing was that she didn’t get a penny from his will. She’s at the mercy of the family. It was a seven-year lease – they can’t do anything about that – but when it runs out, héh!’ He shrugged expressively. ‘Then she’ll be gone, and good riddance to her.’
‘Unless she buys the farm herself,’ said Jay. ‘Mireille said she might try.’
Clairmont’s face darkened for a moment. ‘I’d bid against her myself if I could afford it,’ he declared, draining his glass. ‘That’s good building land. I could build a dozen holiday chalets on that old vineyard. Pierre-Emile’s an idiot if he lets it go to her.’ He shook his head. ‘All we need is a bit of luck and land prices in Lansquenet could rocket. Look at Le Pinot. That land could make a fortune if you developed it properly. But you’d never see her doing that. Wouldn’t even give up the marshland by the river when they were thinking about widening the road. Blocked the plan out of sheer meanness.’ He shook his head.
‘But things are on the up now, héh?’ His good humour was already restored, his grin oddly at variance with his mournful moustache. ‘In a year, maybe two, we could make Le Pinot look like a Marseilles bidonville. Now that things are beginning to change.’ Once again he gave his humble, eager grin. ‘All it takes is one person to make a difference, Monsieur Jay. Isn’t that right?’