The world is still there. It’s even brighter than usual.
After lunch Mother, still sitting at the table, pulls me into her lap. “Come for a cuddle, my pet,” she says. “You know, I’m leaving on Friday, are you going to miss me?”
“Yes,” I say. But I’m not so sure. She’s never asked before. Has she noticed how different I feel, this time?
“My precious lamb,” Mother says. “I won’t stay very long, only two weeks.”
As soon as she’s gone, I even feel a kind of relief. Grandmother is in charge, and it’s such a change of atmosphere. Grandmother never tries to please anybody, she just does what she thinks is right. She doesn’t take me in her lap, cuddle me, or even kiss me much except when she’s going away, or I am, or when I give her a bunch of wild flowers. She doesn’t need anything from me, doesn’t expect me to love her, wait for her, miss her. She just wants me to behave, and as a whole I do, so we get on well.
On Saturday, after school, Coralie and I don’t go home, but Loli takes us to the Vié house. Estelle has invited us to sleep over and spend Sunday with her family. She often does, when Mother is away; and I play with Philippe, her nine-year-old son who’s in boarding school during the week (the same school both our fathers went to, in the Montagne Noire), while Coralie romps with little Mireille.
“Can we go round to the garden gate?” I ask Loli.
“Why should we do that?”
I shrug. I can’t tell her about the ripe odour I want to avoid. So she rings the bell and Adèle, the Viés’ housekeeper, opens the door and kisses us in the entrance. I hurry into the hall, the reek from Bertrand’s office on the left is so overwhelming. Bertrand is a doctor, but he doesn’t need to work for a living. He just keeps these two rooms in the house, a waiting room and an examination room. When he’s around, anybody can come and be treated for free. A lot of gypsies do.
I wonder why I’m such a coward: if Bertrand can welcome them, examine them, talk to them, I should at least be able to bear the smell for a few seconds. It makes me woozy, like cheese does, but I have to try. Father explained that not everybody has the same idea of cleanliness, the same rules. He said that gypsies, if they follow their traditional laws, are only allowed to wash in running water. Not easy when you don’t live near a stream but in old houses around the church, where you don’t have running water!
Philippe is calling me from the top of the stairs. “Hey, Tita,” he says, “come and see my new cars. They have windows!”
In his bedroom, he’s already set up a chute for the car race. He has more than twenty toy cars, and his favorite game is to set them at the top of the chute, let them slide down and see how far each goes. You aren’t allowed to push. When I visit, we share the cars and the competition is between us.
I choose the Renault 4CV and he the Simca Aronde. Mine wins over and over, but today this doesn’t bother him. He’s trying to elucidate what is special and wonderful about these two new specimens. I can’t pay attention, but I like to listen to him, the passionate way he pronounces words like hub , steering , suspension .
Adèle calls us to dinner. The grown-ups have just finished their aperitif, and Bertrand excuses himself: he’s going to L’Etang, their country house in the Minervois. Three women from Béziers are staying with Estelle for a few days. This evening, they’ll all play bridge. Estelle has many friends. Local ones like everybody else, and bridge friends from all over. She’s also the head of the Dames de charité , and she organizes the kermesses , the church bazaars.
After dinner and baths, Philippe falls asleep almost immediately, and I look around his room for a book. There are lots of illustrés : Rodéo , Bugs Bunny , Pépito , Hopalong Cassidy . Finally, on the top shelf, I find Sans Famille and start reading.
Rémi is an
After lunch Mother, still sitting at the table, pulls me into her lap. “Come for a cuddle, my pet,” she says. “You know, I’m leaving on Friday, are you going to miss me?”
“Yes,” I say. But I’m not so sure. She’s never asked before. Has she noticed how different I feel, this time?
“My precious lamb,” Mother says. “I won’t stay very long, only two weeks.”
As soon as she’s gone, I even feel a kind of relief. Grandmother is in charge, and it’s such a change of atmosphere. Grandmother never tries to please anybody, she just does what she thinks is right. She doesn’t take me in her lap, cuddle me, or even kiss me much except when she’s going away, or I am, or when I give her a bunch of wild flowers. She doesn’t need anything from me, doesn’t expect me to love her, wait for her, miss her. She just wants me to behave, and as a whole I do, so we get on well.
On Saturday, after school, Coralie and I don’t go home, but Loli takes us to the Vié house. Estelle has invited us to sleep over and spend Sunday with her family. She often does, when Mother is away; and I play with Philippe, her nine-year-old son who’s in boarding school during the week (the same school both our fathers went to, in the Montagne Noire), while Coralie romps with little Mireille.
“Can we go round to the garden gate?” I ask Loli.
“Why should we do that?”
I shrug. I can’t tell her about the ripe odour I want to avoid. So she rings the bell and Adèle, the Viés’ housekeeper, opens the door and kisses us in the entrance. I hurry into the hall, the reek from Bertrand’s office on the left is so overwhelming. Bertrand is a doctor, but he doesn’t need to work for a living. He just keeps these two rooms in the house, a waiting room and an examination room. When he’s around, anybody can come and be treated for free. A lot of gypsies do.
I wonder why I’m such a coward: if Bertrand can welcome them, examine them, talk to them, I should at least be able to bear the smell for a few seconds. It makes me woozy, like cheese does, but I have to try. Father explained that not everybody has the same idea of cleanliness, the same rules. He said that gypsies, if they follow their traditional laws, are only allowed to wash in running water. Not easy when you don’t live near a stream but in old houses around the church, where you don’t have running water!
Philippe is calling me from the top of the stairs. “Hey, Tita,” he says, “come and see my new cars. They have windows!”
In his bedroom, he’s already set up a chute for the car race. He has more than twenty toy cars, and his favorite game is to set them at the top of the chute, let them slide down and see how far each goes. You aren’t allowed to push. When I visit, we share the cars and the competition is between us.
I choose the Renault 4CV and he the Simca Aronde. Mine wins over and over, but today this doesn’t bother him. He’s trying to elucidate what is special and wonderful about these two new specimens. I can’t pay attention, but I like to listen to him, the passionate way he pronounces words like hub , steering , suspension .
Adèle calls us to dinner. The grown-ups have just finished their aperitif, and Bertrand excuses himself: he’s going to L’Etang, their country house in the Minervois. Three women from Béziers are staying with Estelle for a few days. This evening, they’ll all play bridge. Estelle has many friends. Local ones like everybody else, and bridge friends from all over. She’s also the head of the Dames de charité , and she organizes the kermesses , the church bazaars.
After dinner and baths, Philippe falls asleep almost immediately, and I look around his room for a book. There are lots of illustrés : Rodéo , Bugs Bunny , Pépito , Hopalong Cassidy . Finally, on the top shelf, I find Sans Famille and start reading.
Rémi is an
Similar Books
