The Winter Ghosts (17 page)

When I woke again, it was morning. Madame Galy had gone. The chair was back against the wall as if it had never been moved. Physically, I was done in, but I felt all right - in fact, better than I had for some time. And I was ravenously hungry.

I sat up, debating whether to get up or wait a while longer. I wasn’t certain of the time. Just as I had decided that I would wash and dress, there was a light tap on the door.

‘Come in.’

Madame Galy came into the room, my laundered shirt over her arm, and carrying a breakfast tray.

‘I have brought you something to eat,’ she said.

I smiled and smoothed down the covers.

‘That’s kind of you. I seem to have quite an appetite this morning.’

I was touched by the way she found things to busy herself with in the room, while surreptitiously checking that I ate every scrap. Toasted bread, salted ham and an egg sliced perfectly in two. When I tried to thank her for her long night’s vigil, she brushed my gratitude aside. But a pink glow suffused her homely features and I could see she was pleased.

‘Your letter was delivered to your friends in Ax yesterday afternoon, monsieur. The boy can go again tomorrow once you know how things stand with your motor car.’

‘Thank you.’ I wiped my hands on the serviette. ‘You said there was someone who could help?’

She nodded. ‘Michel Breillac and his sons will be here at ten o’clock.’

‘What time is it now?’

‘It is nearly nine.’

‘Splendid. I can easily be ready within an hour.’

Concern flashed across Madame Galy’s face when she realised I intended to accompany them.

‘I do not think it would be wise, monsieur, after what you went through last evening. It is barely above freezing. Better to give Monsieur Breillac directions and leave it to him. He is a capable man.’

It seems extraordinary now that I would have contemplated an expedition after so serious a fever. But in truth, I believed the delirium had left me somehow stronger, restored. I felt invigorated, more complete in body and mind than I had been for some time.

‘I’m quite recovered,’ I said with a smile. ‘On top form, in fact.’

She shook her head. ‘It would be better to rest for one more day. You should not overtire yourself.’

‘It will be fine,’ I said firmly.

Supervising the salvage of my poor little saloon stranded up in the hills was not, of course, my primary concern. Madame Galy said she did not know Fabrissa, so I had to find someone who did. That could not be achieved by kicking my heels in the boarding house.

‘Very well, monsieur,’ she said, though I could see she thought me foolish. ‘Ten o’clock.’

After she had left, I flung back the covers and got out of bed. The floorboards were chill beneath my bare feet, but the ground held steady. I splashed cold water on my face and did my best to smooth down my errant hair. I ran my hand over my raspy chin and regretted the lack of a razor, but did not want to seek out Madame Galy once more, for fear she would renew her efforts to dissuade me from accompanying the Breillacs.

I finished dressing and pulled on my Fitwells. The leather of the sturdy old boots had contracted in the heat from the fire, but they were comfortable enough. I rummaged in my trouser pocket and retrieved my cigarette case and matches, then threw open the windows and looked out at the white place de l’Église.

I plunged my hand back into my pocket. Nothing. I balanced my cigarette on the sill. I frowned. After I had offered the yellow fabric cross to Fabrissa and she had refused it, I could have sworn I’d tucked it away. I tried the other pocket, but it was also empty. Just balls of fluff and a spent match.

Had I mislaid it on the way home? Since I had no recollection at all of how I had made it back to my room, it seemed the likeliest explanation, though I was disappointed.

‘No matter,’ I said to myself, shutting the window.

I was certain, you see, that I would find her.

As the last chime of the clock struck ten, I came downstairs to the reception area.

Monsieur Breillac and his two sons were already there, and introductions were quickly made. Guillaume and Pierre Breillac were twins, of eighteen or nineteen or so, their faces all but hidden by fur hats tied beneath the chin. In any event, they looked so similar I found it hard to tell them apart, until it became evident that Guillaume spoke passable English, whereas Pierre did not. Monsieur Breillac said nothing, just nodded a greeting, and I detected the same sadness in his eyes that clouded Monsieur Galy’s, Madame Galy’s too when she thought no one was watching.

She was still adamant I should not go, but when she saw I would not be deflected, found me a fur hat and muffler to wear as well as a pair of heavy men’s gloves.

‘Please thank Monsieur Galy for the loan,’ I said. ‘They’re a perfect fit.’

‘They are not my husband’s,’ she said quietly. I saw a look pass between the Breillac boys and their father, but nobody said anything, so I threaded my fingers into the soft fur lining without further comment and thought no more about it.

Guillaume acted as interpreter, because although my French was adequate, it did not stretch to such technicalities as torque tube or running board. With a mixture of hand gestures and his blunt translation, we established where the car might be and what I considered the extent of the damage.

We set off shortly after ten-fifteen under a blue sky, unbroken by clouds. As we crossed the place de l’Église, I felt my heart expand with the beauty of it; the same old world, but seen through new eyes. A white winter sun hung low in the sky and it was bright but cold.

Monsieur Breillac put his hand on Guillaume’s arm and spoke rapidly in patois. I waited until he translated. His father suggested we should climb up through the woods rather than risk the
charreton.
A two-person cart pulled by a donkey, he explained in response to my raised eyebrows. His father said the road would be iced over and it would be slow and treacherous going. Whereas the woodland paths, protected by the trees, would be more secure underfoot. If I had the stamina for it, that was.

Having been so wretchedly ill, you might wonder at my arrogance. Or stupidity, I suppose. Indeed, I wonder at it myself, even now. Looking back, though, I can only say that I knew I had the strength I needed. The fever had passed through me, leaving in its place a kind of nervous energy and a sense of purpose I’d been lacking for some time.

I readily agreed to Breillac’s proposal. And I was excited, too. Sitting beside the dewpond, Fabrissa had invited me to come and find her. And it was in these mountains that I had first heard her voice.

There had been no fresh snow overnight so, despite a hard frost, the going was not too bad. We walked at a fair pace and soon arrived at the bridge which I had crossed two days previously. As we tramped over it, the Billy Goats Gruff and I, the frozen water below glinted in the December morning like the surface of a looking-glass. Reeds and brown rushes stuck up through the ice like a line of tin soldiers, as if caught at the precise moment the winter took hold.

We walked across the drab fields, the brown furrows crusted with snow, and were soon on the outskirts of the woods where the trees sparkled with frost.

I pointed out the path by which I had descended and, in single file, we began to climb. It was steep, yet it seemed less taxing than previously. Breillac and his sons were easy company, and the sun and the lack of wind lifted my spirits. I kept my ears peeled for Fabrissa’s voice, but today there was no suggestion of figures in the mist or watchers in the hills.

I held off asking the Breillacs if they knew of Fabrissa because I did not want my hopes dashed. The longer I delayed the question, the longer I kept the possibility alive that they could tell me where to find her.

So on we went. I remember a bird singing high up in the barren branches of a tree. A hen blackbird, maybe a robin, oddly English sounds to hear in a French country wood, prompting the absurd thought that Fabrissa and I might, some day, walk hand in hand on the Sussex Downs. My plans were castles in the air, of course, dreams, imaginings of silver days we might spend in one another’s company. The countless dusks watching the sun sinking down into the earth. The nights in one another’s arms. And I smiled as I remembered her clever grey eyes and the pale turn of her chin and the drape of her hair across her shoulders. My heart ached to see her again.

‘I wonder, Guillaume, if you might know a girl by the name of Fabrissa?’

He thought for a moment, then shook his head.

‘What about Pierre? Perhaps your father. Could you ask?’ He turned around and I, keeping my tone light, carried on chattering, shoring up my defences against disappointment. ‘We were introduced at the
fête
, a couple of nights ago. Like an idiot, I didn’t catch her last name. Be interested to know where she lives.’

I heard Breillac repeat her name, but he was shaking his head, and so was Pierre. Guillaume turned back to face me. ‘No,’ he reported, ‘they don’t know of such a girl.’ Then he added, ‘My father says he didn’t see you, monsieur, at the Ostal.’

My stomach gave an unpleasant lurch.

‘He didn’t?’ I paused. ‘Well, it was crowded. Hard to see anyone much. I didn’t even catch a glimpse of Madame Galy all night and it was she who’d invited me. The way of these things, I suppose.’ I paused. ‘Your father didn’t get caught up in the brawl?’ I gave a brittle laugh. ‘Do you know, I thought it was real to start with. Those swords and helmets, very convincing.’

Guillaume’s eyes cut into me. ‘Brawl, monsieur?’

‘The fight, then,’ I said. ‘The punch-up.’ I stopped and looked at him. ‘You were there, Guillaume? The
fête de Saint-Etienne
?’

‘I was. We all were.’

Guillaume was genuinely baffled and I, feeling I had somehow blotted the day for us all, said nothing more. But it preyed on my mind. Even admitting I was rather preoccupied at the time, it was queer that my recollection of the evening was so at odds with theirs.

We walked on, barely talking as the path grew steeper yet. At last, I made out the junction where the two paths became a single track leading back up to the road.

We stopped to catch our breath. It was then that I felt the familiar prickling at the nape of my neck, the same thickening of the air. I glanced up into the dense undergrowth to my left and, in the gloom, made out the gnarled roots of some ancient trees, vanishing into the mountain.

‘Like stairs,’ I murmured, hearing Fabrissa’s voice in my head.

‘Monsieur, it is this way, yes?’

‘What?’

I realised my three companions had stopped and were waiting on me for further directions.

‘That’s right, yes. Straight on.’

It was close to eleven-thirty when we emerged from the path by the wooden sign.