Cafe Babanussa by Karen Hill Page A

Willie supplied a few bottles of red wine and brandy. Willie loosened up enough to tell Ruby that his father was an indigenous Peruvian and that his mother was French. Ruby told him about her own mixed background, but she still felt strangely awkward.
    Things worsened as the night wore on. Emma and Jean-Claude were all over each other, while Willie cast longing looks at Ruby. She felt sorry for him, but not enough to invite him into her tent. He was only eighteen and looked sixteen—too young for her. Willie eventually retreated to sleep in the red car, where he was less likely to hear the grunts and squeals emanating from the tent where the redheads were busy.
    The next day, Jean-Claude and Willie left for town, promising to look for work for the four of them. Ruby wasn’t too sure about letting these guys—one loud and obnoxious, the other quiet and unassuming—take charge of their working future in France. But Emma was game, reasoning that being French, they knew the ropes. Hours later, they were back: they had secured a job on a pear farm about thirty kilometres down the road.
    The next morning, hung over, Ruby was still feeling uncomfortable about riding in the car. Jean-Claude sped through Mâcon, running red lights and almost running down several pedestrians. Ruby yelled at him to slow down. But he just laughed. “If you’re anarchist, this is the only way to drive.”
    Ruby could have told him that her lover was also an anarchist but would never drive so recklessly, but she knew it would fall on deaf ears. The car careened through the streets of the town and eventually onto country roads, the high speed reducing Ruby to a huddled ball in the back seat. She hated the smile on Emma’s face.
    Willie only talked when Jean-Claude addressed him directly. Then he would babble about how his father had led his people into rebellion in Peru many years ago and how he too possessed the ability to rouse people to revolt. Jean-Claude talked about his experiences in the 1968 student uprisings in Paris and how he hoped to repeat a similar situation, this time enlisting workers from across the country.
    How different they sounded from Werner. He was an intellectual who lived through his books, his days of fighting in the streets a thing of the past. He had wanted to change the world; however, he had told her that he gave it up when he realized that it had become more about the excitement than about the cause. Now he was only involved in his books, studying German language and history. She tried to picture Werner dressed in black, from balaclava to boots, setting barricades on fire. What a different person that would have been!
    Arriving at the farm, Ruby gazed over a vast expanse ofwoods and fields; at the top of a ridge, she could see row after row of pear trees. They were immediately approached by a man who introduced himself as Monsieur Ranier. Short, pudgy and balding, he perched his sunglasses atop his shiny head as he looked over the group.
    â€œI hope you all know that this is hard work. You’ll get a break for lunch at one and then work until dinner at six. Pitch your tents and then come back ready to work.”
    They found a beautiful little lake surrounded by trees and rocks and a little sandy tract of beach. Just above the beach was flat ground where they pitched their tents.
    â€œThis is heaven,” said Ruby. “I can swim!”
    Heading back up the hill, they found Ranier waiting for them with the others. Ranier hooted when he found out that Ruby was Canadian.
    â€œYou are a cousin of ours, after all.”
    Ranier teased her about her slightly Québécois accent. From then on, everybody referred to her as “ La Canadienne .”
    Ranier sent Emma, Jean-Claude and Willie off to the pear trees to start picking. Then he said to Ruby, “Eh, la Canadienne! Venez ici.” And, you, the Canadian! Come over here .
    Ruby was told to drive a tractor that held dozens