Le Temps des Cerises (3 page)

The card game went on as the afternoon sun drifted down over the camp. Two idiots were trying to light a fire with green sticks and brambles, smoking out the whole provisions tent; and an officer stood polishing his boots and roaring at a corporal to put the pegs in straighter because a gale was forecast that night and he didn't fancy ending up over the ramparts. Laurie felt quite unnerved by the pointless activity, the squabbles between the men, the endless hustle and bustle of squads changing shifts, the dirt and mess of it all – and it was times like this he craved the solitude of his own little room where at the very least he could be bored to death in peace. Here there was nothing but mud and white, swathes and swathes of mud and white that enveloped you like a cloak as you walked through the night and into the early hours, clasping your dew-laden rifle in your hand and listening to the sound of hooting bats, grunting owls and, hardly knowing which was which, fleeting snores of men for company. If he'd been an artist he'd have sketched a sentryman as a wingless owl or a bodyless head, képi perched at a jaunty angle, bayonet in the air, eyes fixed expectantly on a middle distance as though awaiting some out-of-doors theatrical production. Sometimes when he stared into the darkness a vision of the city would appear before his eyes: the grand old towers of Notre Dame and the elegant spire of the Sainte Chapelle swaying in the breeze above the drear white acres, like the lofty rigging of some ancient
ship. And sometimes, in the solitude of his own little room, the view beyond the ramparts would rise above the bed sheets in ghostly immanence – all mud and white – an endless succession of days and nights…

Chapter three

Bernadine slipped through the convent gates – a shadowy figure in her black cloak and boots, black horsehair basket and inevitable black umbrella to fend off wind, rain and unwanted attention. She didn't have the time today to touch tubercular fingers, run her hands through lice-infested hair or give reassurance that the Lord was biding His time where the Prussians were concerned. How on earth did she know what the Lord had planned? He moved about in mysterious ways like a spy in the midst of them. Seemingly friendly at first, a good sort, the kind of man you could bare all for, lay your heart on your sleeve for and then, lo and behold, He was trotting off to the enemy camp with your secrets and your heart on His sleeve all bayoneted and blown to pieces. Leaving you bereft, appar­ently glad to be cleansed of all sin, all passion, all animated life. A chosen vessel. A vessel fit for the Holy Ghost to pour his goodly vapours into.

She stopped to blow her nose in the frosting air and scan the street. It was quite deserted and she smiled at all her unnecessary caution; few people would be travelling this path on such a grim winter's day – it was too far away from the bright lights and boulevards, too close to the lairs of waifs and strays, outlaws and strangely loitering men. ‘We are close to the lion's den,' the Mother Superior would sometimes whisper to the trembling novices, ‘and we must tread very carefully.' Strange how the convent had been built in such a sinister part of the city and yet, of course, not strange at all for its very motto was ‘To bring Light into Darkness'. The railway was overgrown and rusted with disuse, barely visible beneath the melting snow and thick brambles and she felt a pang of regret that she might never again hear the merry whistle from inside those convent walls and stop to imagine the people going off for a day in the country, to visit a sick relative or simply for the thrill of racing into blackness and out the other side again. Beyond the railway line lay open country carpeted in a gently greying snow and criss-crossed with hedges, ditches and the silhouettes of stunted trees. It was quite deserted – not an animal or even an animal's tracks to be seen; and she smiled at all her unnecessary caution.

All roads from here in led to Monsieur Lafayette's or back to the convent and she hesitated a moment, umbrella poised between heaven and earth to stave off wind, rain and unwanted attention; but then the thought of Aggie's ashen face and the tiny blue baby's cries pushed her on again. The Lord was a supreme idiot sometimes, the way He let things happen. If Aggie died she would not forgive Him. If the child died she would not forgive Him. It was best to rely on yourself, take the lead and let Him follow, meek and mild as a lamb. She stumbled on down the track to Monsieur Lafayette's, railing at her God because there was no one else to rail against; and to drown out the voice which shouted in her head that she was the supreme idiot, that she had neglected her friend, her vows, her vocation again and again, that life on this earth was not so easily redeemable and that if Aggie died or the child died it was she who would remain unforgiven.

The green-painted shop sat squat in the road like a very determined and overgrown cabbage, and Bernadine almost held her nose at the sight of it. The faded lettering of ‘LAFAYETTE: HERBALIST' and in lower case: ‘Confectioner' could still be seen if you squeezed your eyes hard enough; and the windows that had once been gilded to protect the delicate essences of the interior now let in the full spectrum of elements. Snails hung frozen to the outside walls, sticking tight to their dream that this was indeed a live green cabbage and toadstools seamed the edge of the yard which was overrun in the main by nettles cultivated, the way the Romans did it, for teas, potions and the unaccountable delight of dashing one's hands against the malevolent leaves. Occasionally a daring daffodil or crocus tried to eke out a living in the four square feet of weediness but it was soon throttled to death for its presumption. Bernadine braced herself and entered the shop, blinking in the rapidly deteriorating light.

‘Better to lose her to me than to the truth,' Monsieur Lafayette was saying to Mistigris, the stonecutter and notorious drunkard. (Bernadine was a little distressed to see the stonecutter there for she didn't want the subject of the statue coming up, not now. Mistigris had once made a statue for the convent and had never been paid for it because the Mother Superior had dubbed it appallingly inferior handiwork.) Both men were dressed in token gesture of the National Guard uniform with a red stripe down the side of their trousers and both were smoking cigars, their heads almost lost in a halo of smoke. Upon seeing Bernadine, Monsieur Lafayette coughed and changed the subject with a flourish: ‘We await the Prussians as the Romans awaited the Carthaginians in their curule chairs. Do we not, sir?'

‘Quite,' tottered old Mistigris, swaying a little at the hips. ‘In our curules, sir.'

The shop looked quite different – emptier, of course, with a sad, neglected air. The cabinets still displayed their monstrous instruments, enemas, lozenges and syrups, tinctures of mallow, comfrey and myrrh; valerian root for the toothache, false unicorn powder for the gout; a variety of miscellaneous dried herbs; but the sweet boxes and jars that had contained pounds and pounds of shrimp sugar, jujubes, almond paste and peppermints were practically empty and all that remained on the counter was an old wig box and almanac. Bernadine tried to appear unfazed in the presence of the two men by pulling down the hood of her cloak, placing her basket on the ground and smoothing her hair straight, though her right hand clutched at the rosary beads sewn into the lining of her pocket.

‘And you, my dear,' Monsieur Lafayette leered, his bald head and red lips shining through the cloud of smoke. ‘We don't often have the pleasure. How long has it been? Sixteen or seventeen years, surely?'

‘Not quite. I came in a couple of years ago if you remember rightly for the Reverend Mother's toothache.'

‘Ah yes. And how is that… dear soul?'

‘Very well.'

‘Then it must be some commission from the Cannibal's Delight, I suppose. Tell her we are quite out of caramel cigars. She finished off the last box two days ago.'

Bernadine ignored the reference to Agnes – too aware of the terrible irony of the situation – and replied that she hadn't come in for sweets.

‘Grease a few onions that one would,' he went on in a jocular fashion. ‘Put her in a stew and she'd do the business of the butter and the goose fat put together!'

Mistigris laughed delightedly at that, though with no idea presumably who Monsieur Lafayette was alluding to, then staggered off into the back of the shop. Bernadine watched uncomfortably as he sat himself down beside the blue and white curtain that sectioned off the deeper recesses of the room. It was rumoured that behind the blue and white curtain lay a dirty mattress and stool, the purpose of which nobody knew but many speculated…

‘You, on the other hand, my dear,' he chuckled, ‘are a touch narrow around the shoulders for my liking. The Lord's been wearing you a little thin, methinks.'

‘Not the Lord,' she murmured. ‘Rest assured, monsieur, I should not have come if the business wasn't quite urgent.'

‘How very mysterious and exciting. But what can poor old Modeste give you that your little garden cannot? I was under the impression it provided you with everything: love, succour, consolation, green beans…'

‘Not this year, I'm afraid. In truth, Agg… one of the nuns is very sick and I need some healing herbs.'

‘If you buy any two, I'll throw in a bottle of iron water.' He indicated the nails steeping in a carafe on the windowsill, the water already a clouded yellow; and Bernadine nodded.

‘That would be very kind,' she smiled, mentally ticking off the herbs she needed as he brought out the silver spoon and little brass scales for the weighing. ‘Yarrow, shepherd's purse, lady's mantle if you have it, raspberry leaf, camomile, nettle of course, and certainly a bottle of iron water. Please.' The cat was out of the bag now – she knew that – for the herbs she'd named were those commonly used by women after childbirth: to stem the flow of blood, lessen a fever, encourage milk production, strengthen the spirit and replenish iron reserves. She waited for Monsieur Lafayette to start poking fun; but for a while he did not. He simply set to work with an air of great diligence, weighing out the herbs on the little brass scales and into three-gram brown paper packets, fishing out the bad bits with his blunt, stained fingers, tutting when a golden camomile head fell to the floor and straining the iron water from the carafe into an old quart glass jar. Each time a gentle snore arose from the moth-eaten chair by the curtain he would raise a conspiratorial eyebrow as if the two of them were colluding in something while the poor old stonecutter slumbered; but it was only when the packets were lined up on the counter that he allowed himself to speak.

‘Another one of you been viewing the moon then?' he said in his syrupy voice. ‘No wonder St Joseph's receives such handsome donations.'

Bernadine caught sight of herself in the fly-spotted mirror behind the counter – a thin, ashen-grey face with two flaming points of colour on either cheekbone.

‘Who can it be, I wonder. Surely not the Cannibal's Delight? It would account for her being the size of a balloon! Maybe we should have sent Gambetta off in her instead of the Armand-Barbès
³
!'

Bernadine lowered her eyes in case they betrayed her and busily crammed the packets into her basket, her mind racing. Well, one thing was for certain at least, a thing that had bothered her a little: Monsieur Lafayette could not be the father, he had seemed quite genuinely surprised in his own strange way and, loathsome as the man might be, she did not believe he would have taken Aggie by force.

Mistigris, by this time, had woken up with all the commotion and was veering towards the counter like the archetypal avenging angel. ‘I've got a bone to pick with you lot,' he cried, pointing at Bernadine. ‘You're a scurvy bunch and no mistake!'

Bernadine, almost reeling from the smoke and alcoholic fumes, valiantly stood her ground. ‘Monsieur Renan,' she began sincerely, looking him square in the face, ‘I'm truly sorry that you were never paid for the statue. It was quite wrong – you should have been – and I have always felt badly about it. Perhaps when everything returns to normal the Reverend Mother will see fit to do the right thing by you.'

Mistigris looked quite taken aback and he stuck his thumbs in his waistcoat pockets and gazed at her appraisingly. ‘That's alright,' he mumbled at last. ‘It was the stone's destiny to be a Virgin, in any case. I don't need paying for it.'

It was Bernadine's turn to look surprised and she gazed back at the white hair and creased face, wondering what sort of man he had been before the drink had claimed him. ‘That's very generous of you, monsieur. Nevertheless the materials alone must have cost you a pretty penny. I shall try to put in a good word for you when any new commissions are required. Only the other day, the Reverend Mother was talking about having a calvary made.'

Bernadine pulled up her hood, hooked her umbrella to the horsehair basket and made ready to leave but before she could reach the door, Monsieur Lafayette had crept up and positioned himself in front of it.

‘If anyone should require the services of old Lafayette,' he wheedled, ‘they only have to ask.' He pressed her arm. ‘Nicely. He can be very delicate when he wants to, old Modeste, and discreet. Delicate and discreet, isn't that so, Sister Bernadine?'

She looked at the pin black eyes and fat red lips with a feeling close to hatred. ‘Goodnight monsieur,' she said with as much dignity as she could muster and, motioning him aside, stepped into the yard, her right hand still clutching the rosary beads in the lining of her pocket.