The story continues from Tranche Nine…
Marcus is still feeling dizzy but the free-spirited behaviour of Lizzy and Marthe is just a part of it: like the bubbles in champagne they have added a tingle to his life, but it was his second visit to Armand Caldieri that handed him the opportunity to to take responsibility for himself…
Saturday, 27th August
He was still happy as the church clock chimed a half before two while he climbed the stairs to the garret. The last customer had gone out into the night and he had washed and cleaned and swept and locked the doors, leaving the café clean and ready for the morning.
He woke from a dream as the clock was striking again. The sky above the roofs beyond the window was paling. He sat up. Five o’clock. The lights would be on in the boulangerie and the smell of baking bread would be abroad in the narrow street. He was going to miss this! He got out of bed and washed and shaved in a basin of cold water. It was too early to open the café. He had woken from a vivid dream that, unusually, persisted in memory. He opened the notebook…
Last day in Nice – Saturday 27th August. A year ago, before expulsion, I had been working on a pea-vining site for Birds Eye. This morning I dreamed about it. It was like disconnected snippets or maybe pages torn out of a book. The first thing I remember is getting off the bus and walking home through the estate. It is early morning. It feels fresh. I look at my hands. They are wrapped in dirty bandages. I remember. I’m working half a shift on the grabs, feeding the insatiable vining machine with grabfuls from the green mountain dumped by the truck-load the moment bare concrete can be seen. It is relentless. Working under the lights, the machine churning and churning and churning. Feeding it with the tangled vines smelling of their green blood, sharp but sweet, as the machine somehow splits the pods and tender green peas pour into galavanised steel containers that are whipped away by a fork-lift the moment they are filled, being replaced immediately with an empty one. The peas will be frozen within half an hour. The stripped vines are bulldozed into mountains of green waste. I can taste the sileage smell of crushed greenery mixing with diesel fumes and machine oil and sweat and cigarettes, frying bacon and stewing tea. Robbo, the ex-Para, leader of our little team of labourers, says I’ve done as well as any of them. Another twelve hour shift completed at four shillings and sixpence per hour. I have proved my worth to the team and am by far the youngest to make it to grab-man. I plan to soak my hands in brine when I get home, they’ll harden up! Then - reaching the familiar bungalow with the beech hedge I helped plant and the rockery I helped build six summers before - I don’t recognise the car on the drive. I can smell breakfast. Sizzling succulent bacon. I opened the kitchen door. A woman I don’t recognise is putting laden plates on the formica-topped table in front of a man and two children, two girls, who I don’t recognise either. Who are you? The woman asks with her mouth twisted in disgust. Get out! orders the man. The children laugh. I back out the door - and wake up in a garret!
That was not the first dream he’d had in which he went somewhere only to discover he wasn’t recognised, but it was the most detailed and realistic. The fact that the family in the bungalow was most definitely not his own made him too… anxious? angry? confused? He couldn’t write more. Maybe he ought to get a copy of Freud’s book on dreams – except it wouldn’t tell him more than he already knew. Armand had opened that door. He would go to see the woman he recommended in London: if she was as good as him then maybe he’d find the courage to step through that door. The fearful emptiness left him. He had a plan!
And he had errands to run. This was his last day at the café. Antoine was recovering slowly. On Monday he would be back in London. His father had said on the phone that he would provisionally reinstate Marcus’ allowance while he ‘got himself back on his feet’. Armand had given him the address of a Mrs Bettevant in Fitzroy Square. She ran a lodging house and would have a room for him at least for a week or so. Armand’s friend in London had agreed to meet Marcus and would expect him to contact her once he was settled. That took care of the short-term future. The longer term was still in the clouds.
Almost everyone he met that morning wished Marcus ‘Bon voyage’. It was no surprise that the people closest to Mathilde, like Clareto or the women she sat with under the plane tree, should know. It was not surprising that Patrice would have heard, nor Madaleno who, loading him with baguettes and batons and croissants, shyly kissed his cheeks. He wondered, when all of the traders in the market appeared to know of his impending departure, first, how they’d come to know and, second, why they bothered. Nevertheless, Marcus told himself, Chez Antoine, and especially Mathilde, were well known in the old town and he, maybe, just maybe, was sufficient of an oddity to have attracted attention. ‘I didn’t get to go out on the dive boat with the Americans but I did go swimming with the girls at the sort of place you only ever see in films – and they were amazing. I think I need to take off more than my clothes in future. Maybe Armand’s friend will be able to help. Maybe talking to him didn’t solve problems, but it helped me see that I do have problems I can’t solve on my own.’
And so Marcus’ morning slipped into lunchtime and the café filled and he was kept busy. As the one o’clock crowd began to thin Marcus saw Lizzy crossing the square with Patrice. The artist had had his arm around her. Marcus tasted the acid of jealousy and looked away. They came into the café and went to a table at the back.
“Hi Marcus,” Lizzy greeted him, “I heard you’re going back to England tomorrow. Will you miss us?”
“I am and I shall.” Why was she teasing him? “What can I get you?”
“Deux plat du jour et une carafe – blanc,” Patrice replied pushing an uncleared plate away.
“Just one, Marcus,” Lizzy said with a sharp glance at Patrice. “I’ll have an omelette. Mathilde knows what I like.”
When he returned to bring the wine and lay the table, the artist and his muse were deep in intimate conversation – or was it? The man was looking intensely at the girl as if, Marcus thought wryly, trying to hypnotise her. She was leaning slightly away from him, looking down at the spectacles in her hands. Uh oh, drama! He withdrew to the kitchen and the washing-up. Clareto could deal with them.
By three the café was empty, the tables cleared, the kitchen cleaned, the floor swept. Mathilde sat with Antoine in his armchair under the plane tree. Two women and a man had taken chairs from outside the café and were sitting with them. In twenty four hours he would be going to the station and in forty-eight he would be starting a new chapter in London.
“Hi Marcus!” It was Lizzy, in the doorway as he’d first seen her, her blonde curls a fiery halo in the sunlight. “You’re leaving tomorrow – want to come for a walk?”
He looked around the spotless, empty café. He wanted to say ‘yes’ just as fiercely as he wanted to say ‘no’. “I... err… hmmm…”
“You’re really annoying Marcus!” She went over to the group under the tree, spoke to Mathilde and then returned to grin at him. “They’ll watch the shop. Come on… Where shall we go?”
Being told he was annoying stung him, but he was wise enough to understand that she was expecting him to be decisive. “Let’s go to the fort on Mont Boron. I went there the other day, it’s beautiful.”
“Okay. Let’s go.”
She took his hand and he had the good sense to squeeze hers gently, appreciatively. They walked through the narrow streets as far as the monument to Catherine Ségurane, who legend says was a washerwoman who led a popular revolt, opposite the church of Saints Martin and Augustin, where Garibaldi was christened. Next door was la Caserne Filley, still a barracks, which had been captured during the Nice insurrection, which was to be commemorated the next day. While all of this information fascinated Marcus his intuition told him that wittering was his way of evading reality – he held his tongue and they continued down the Rue Sincaire and turned right towards the port, which they had almost reached by the time he actually spoke, asking the question that had puzzled him the previous Sunday.
“Lizzy, in the church, Madame Orsova called you Elisabet…”
“She always gets it wrong,” the girl said with a laugh and a grateful glance at Marcus. “It’s Eliisabet. It’s Estonian.”
“But, you’re…”
“Complicated! Dad’s mother was Estonian who met his father, who was Russian, in London where they were refugees from the Okhrana. My other grandmother is English and she married a Frenchman she met when they were working in Vienna. Their children were Father Gerard, my mum and Aunt Dotti. What about you? Bet you’re complicated too…”
“Probably, but I don’t want to talk about it. The session with Armand made me realise just how little I actually know.”
“About what?”
“Everything, really. But Armand made me telephone home. Fortunately my father was in. So I told him the whole sorry tale, told him I don’t want to go home but asked him for help to sort myself out. He offered to get me a ticket back to England.”
“And he did?”
“Yes, I collected it from the agent this morning. I’m booked on the Blue Train on Sunday. It leaves in the afternoon - so I’ll come to Mass and thank your uncle.”
“You don’t need to…”
“Maybe, but I want to. Without you I’d never have met your uncle and through him I met Armand. He says I have a little problem with self-esteem-“
“Only a little problem?”
“Ha Ha!” Her question touched a nerve. So, it was that obvious! Don’t reply too quickly, he told himself. If Armand tells me, he reasoned, it is because he’s a psychologist trained to recognise these things. If Lizzy recognises it, it is because she sees it. Yet, just assume she’s here because she actually likes me. Don’t be an idiot! Do you want to drive her away?
Finding their way through the villas on the haunches of Mont Boron meant he had time to reflect and build up the determination to ask the question that had needled him since…
“In the pool… I got excited but…”
“You didn’t really want to shag us, did you?”
“No…”
“Why not? You seemed ready for it…”
He stopped in the shade of the pines. “I wasn’t.”
“Why not. We would have, you know?”
He walked forward into the sunlight, towards a jutting bastion of the fort standing like the ram of a fossilised medieval galley planted on top of the hill. He turned. She was still standing in the shade, watching him.
“I didn’t want to…”
“But you knew we did?” she said, walking towards him.
“I didn’t know – but, yes, I sensed it.”
She walked past him, looking up at the walls towering above and then swivelling to face him. Her eyes held his. She stepped closer, as if to confront. He held his ground. She closed the gap. They were body to body. He could feel her warmth. He wanted to kiss her. She let him, snaking her arms around his neck and pressing herself to him.
“Do you think I’m wicked?” she asked, biting his lower lip.
That simple, teasing question liberated him. He let his hands slide over her body, aware that she was responding to his touch. They were enjoying the intimacy of shared arousal. He’d been here before, by the Iron Bridge, just before his birthday in the distant past just over a year ago. Then he had acted against instinct. Not this time. Now was not the time to give in to fear, pull away and pour out all the complicated thoughts that were crashing around in his mind. He took a long breath, held her closer, kissed slowly and let his fingertips trickle down her back.
“Golly,” she pressed herself against him, “your touch is heavenly…”
Suppressing the urge to babble, he took a long deep breath, holding her, feeling her relax into him. Instinct told him that this was the seventh veil; a realisation comforting in its simplicity. He wanted her. She wanted him. There was no hiding it; no denying it. He nuzzled into her hair: it smelled lemony, shampoo he assumed. Her body was moulded to his. It was glorious! Just enjoy the moment, he told himself. Just enjoy.
Time passed. She must have taken off her glasses, he thought, kissing her eyes, feeling her lashes fluttering against his lips. She pulled him close, closer, sliding her hand into the waistband of his jeans, burrowing, holding. How wonderful! He pulled her even closer, his hand on the small of her back, under the material of her top, marvelling at the soft warmth of her skin. Maybe just one more kiss? She bit his lip, the tip of her tongue meeting his.
More time passed. In that moment he was horny and gloriously happy but the clock was not stopped. He was going back tomorrow. During that afternoon by the pool she had told him she would be starting at university in a month to read French and either be a diplomat or work for the United Nations. That had reminded him that he had no plans, other than a vague intention to sort himself out. Putting failure behind him was the first priority. Dad was willing to help him get settled so he could resit the exams and he would ask Armand’s friend to continue what he had started. His personal life was a mess, and he would have to deal with that, but all in good time – what was important was not to add another relationship to the mess.
“Lizzy, I want to stay friends when you go to Bristol. I want to stop running away from situations, people, friends…”
She withdrew her hand, put it on his chest, leaning back in the circle of his arms. “I’d like that…”
He slowly separated from her, kissing her lightly, caressing a cheek, holding her hands. “Let’s walk...”
Sunday, 28th August
Liberation Day in Nice. Bells rang, red white and blue bunting fluttered in the sunlight. Flowers would be laid at memorials. There would be civic commemorations. The train would depart at five-thirty that evening. His last nine hours in Nice. In two hours he would meet Lizzy at the English church. Father Gerard had organised a farewell lunch. Then, perhaps, he would have a couple of hours with Lizzy and Marthe.
Antoine sat under the plane tree with his cronies. Marcus was packed, his room tidied and surrendered. On a whim he followed Mathilde and the women into little baroque church on the piazza. He sat at the back and let the service envelope him. It was exactly a year since he and Dad had taken the dinghy for a last sail, the interview at the bank and his leaving home. A lot had happened in that year and yet, here he was, about to return to London. Barely a week in this place and yet he felt a sense of belonging absent from large swathes of memory. Something – a lot - to reflect on. He accepted a blessing after the service and shared drinks under the plane tree with Antoine, Mathilde, Clareto and the others. He had been a washer-upper and occasional waiter for a week and yet they made him feel as if he had become part of a family.
He walked to the English church carrying his back-pack and rolled sleeping bag, wearing the same clothes he been wearing when he arrived, albeit cleaner. In the square where he had smoked his last cigarette he had to fight the irrational and almost overwhelming urge to walk away, sit on a bench at the station, wait for the train, depart simply. He watched people arriving and filing into the church. This was the test! No Marthe or Lizzy to fudge the question – did he want to go in or did he want to walk away? Mass and the lunch given by Father Gerard was a different dimension of that same feeling. He tried to explain this to Armand and Madame Orsova at the lunch table.
“Even in the short time I have known you Marcus, I see you are changing. Trust your feelings and don’t be afraid to ask for help.”
Madame Orsova leaned towards him. “I only meet you last week but I know Armand is right. If people in the old town like you it is because they respect you and that has to be earned. You are young. Trust your heart; it is never wrong.”
He thanked them both. They had each told him the same thing. Indeed, it was what the Jiminy Cricket voice in his head had always been saying: he had chosen to disbelieve it. If this running away to France had achieved anything, it was lead him to people whose voices he could now choose not to disbelieve.
He spent his last few hours in Nice with Marthe and Lizzy promenading under the palms, eating ice-cream, being a child again. It was simply wonderful to be adult enough to take tea at the Negresco and yet still giggle like school-children on an exeat. But the fun had to end and he had to board the train.
He found his berth, took pen and notebook to the lounge car and ordered a kir. Time to capture thoughts and reflect on them. It would be a long journey. He wrote:
Sunday, 28th August.. Le Train Bleu, en route Gare de Nice to Calais, then ferry to Dover and train to London. Lizzy and Marthe came to see me off. It was a wrench to leave them – they both hugged and kissed me and told me to keep in touch and that they’d come to see me in London. I like them both and Lizzy excites me - but it’s more than just sexual excitement with her. Let’s be calm. I have a lot of things to sort out.
Marcus looked out of the window. The train was already slowing as it approached Cannes. He looked at what he had written and then leafed through the notebook. He agreed with himself that he did indeed have much to sort out. He ordered another kir and continued.
First thing is, Dad bought me a sleeping berth, a single one. I hadn’t expected that. I would have been happy with a couchette and I expected all I’d actually get would be a seat. But there is something ridiculously glamorous about going back to England on the Blue Train after the journey I had to get here. Maybe he didn’t intend it this way, but I shall think of this as his way of trying to get me to aspire to being proud of myself.
Second thing: I have to find somewhere to live. Armand’s friend has got me a temporary place in Fitzroy Square. Then I’ll have to look for a place. Sharing another flat may be a possibility but who with? Better I think to go for a single bedsit. Location will be important. Must be near a college and wherever I can find work.
That brings me to three – fucking up the exam revision was the stupidest thing I ever did. I know that if I’d just got study guides, done a proper analysis of the syllabus and past papers and made lots of model answers I’d have got the Ds I needed. So, the aim has to be… pass the fucking exams!!!
And four – work. I’m going to need to earn money. I must support myself. I’ve got enough for maybe a month and Dad has been a help but I have to be self-sufficient. And that has to fit in with revision classes. Not going to be easy I guess, but I can’t go home. This work is just to live.
Lastly, five Why? That reason is simple – it’s been drilled into me since forever that I must go to university. It’s just that I am a stupid romantic and have no clear idea of what I want to do – other than I like making things, exploring, finding out. BUT unless I pass (see three!) university is a pipe dream. However, if I want to go to university in a year’s time then I’ll need to apply by Christmas.
Six – what then? The issue is to do what at university? I MUST have a career goal, and I don’t. Therefore, back to three
A man two tables along was smoking. The smell made Marcus think of cigarettes. He hadn’t smoked for almost exactly eight days. Beyond the window the sea became intermittently visible as the train snaked along the coast. He read again the list of five tasks, the last of which was still troubling him. The train plunged into another tunnel. He continued to write.
Lightbulb moment!? I’ve managed ten days without glasses and eight without cigarettes and yet the moment I think about university applications I become aware of my fuzzy sight and this constriction in my chest that I want to dull with nicotine. What if all my problems are not about misplaced sex-urges? What if this is not all about me being as intelligent or academic as mum and dad want? What if the problem is ME looking for EXCUSES? Isn’t that what Armand’s questions were leading to? But this isn’t about me having to find the answer to some unexplained existential problem. Life’s not an exam. If I’ve learned anything in the last week it’s life has to be lived. So… let’s put future career aspirations aside. I have a primary goal – do the best I possibly can in resitting the A-Levels next summer. Get the grades to make university possible. But to study what? And why? Yes; why is important. Am I clearer about what I DON’T want because that is easier than facing the fear that I am not good enough for anything?
He felt uncomfortable and stared out of the window. In the sharp Mediterranean light everything seemed clear. He was returning to the darkness, rain and gloom of the North. He had lost his glasses just after the truck driver had dropped him when he had gone for a wash and shave in a village wash-place. It had been early and the light seemed to have sharpened his vision. He remembered seeing a building in a field painted with an advert for Nicolas, fresh and blue in a sun-bleached field -
“May I join you?”
“Please…” he said, unsure why an older lady dressed exotically should want to sit with him – until he saw that the car had filled. “Yes… please…”
“I didn’t mean to interrupt you…” Her English was faintly accented, more German than French, he thought, but when the attendant came over and she addressed him as ‘Daniel’ and ordered a ‘Kir’ in crisply enunciated French he decided she must be German.
“You didn’t interrupt. I was just dreaming.”
“But you were writing…” she said, indicating the notebook and then looking up at the attendant as he placed a glass in front of her. “Ah, merci, Daniel”
“A journal…” He was tempted to explain but remembered Lizzy telling him he should be more direct as they walked around Mont Boron the day before – was it only a day? Be direct. Find out about her: “You know the attendant –so you must travel frequently?”
“Not infrequently… but they all wear small badges… but you don’t. I’m Marie-Christine…”
“I’m Marcus…” he replied. “I’m short-sighted. Didn’t see a badge.”
“Pleased to meet you, Marcus. Are you going to England?”
“Yes…” Like Madame Orsova, Marie-Christine made Marcus feel very aware that not only was she a woman but also a still beautiful one. “Are you going to Paris?”
“Den Haag,” she said, paused and then asked: “were they your girlfriends – the two who saw you off?”
“Just friends.” He was wondering how old she was. Her clothes were theatrically bright and her make-up, especially the eyes, dramatic. Her hair was thick, copped short and grey with darker streaks. She wore a man’s watch and no rings or jewellery, other than two pearl keepers in her ears. Fine lines emphasised her beauty. He sensed a robust confidence.
“My dear boy,” she laughed, putting a hand on his. “You have so much to learn about women.”
He was unable to meet her eyes. He felt himself blushing furiously. “Why do you say that?”
“I was on the platform. I saw you. Call me an old fool if you will but I wanted to shake you. They had come to see you off. Maybe never see you again. Even I, a complete stranger, could see how much those girls liked you. And yet you were acting like they were elderly aunts seeing you off to school. Did you not like them?”
The train plunged into another tunnel. Since meeting Marthe in the cemetery on the Colline du Chateau his life had been changed by women. Marthe had found him somewhere to live and work. Mathilde had trusted and employed him. Lizzy had helped him find Armand who was responsible for his being on this train and having somewhere to stay when he arrived in London.
”I’d never dare call you any sort of fool,” he said just as the train burst out into sunshine again. Her eyes, warm brown, gentle, encouraged him. “I know Lizzy and Marthe liked me. I like them both too. It’s just… oh! I always make a mess of friendships like that...”
“Admitting anything is always the first step to recovery.” She raised an eyebrow, smiled, squeezing his hand. “We have a long journey ahead of us. You are an attractive young man and I’m an older woman with lots of experience. What say you we have dinner together and talk?”
His obvious surprise made her laugh. She was right, he knew nothing about women. That was deliberately coquettish. She had the feminine directness of Anaïs Nin, or Colette or de Beauvoir – something that was both challenging and exciting.
“I would absolutely love that!” he exclaimed with an honesty that quite surprised him – and her too, he guessed, from her eyes.
Monday, 29th August
Marie-Christine left the train in Paris. She had changed out of her colourful Riviera clothes into a sharply cut grey suit, silk stockings and black patent low-heeled court shoes carrying a black leather portmanteau and crocodile handbag. Even her makeup matched this altogether more restrained personality. She looked the lawyer he now knew her to be. Nevertheless, when she hugged him he felt the exuberant girl who had revealed herself in their long conversation over dinner and drinks as they headed North up the Rhone valley. She departed with the porter and her suitcases and he ordered coffee and opened the notebook.
Monday, 29th August. Paris, next stop Calais, then ferry and train to London. Armand said I can probably stay with Mrs Bettevant for a week or two. Main things I’ll have to do are find a job, then get somewhere to live and find out how to do my A-Levels again. It’s Bank Holiday in England. I also need to get my trunk from Mrs Lambleigh in West Ken. And what am I going to do about Sophie? Marie-Christine cross examined me about our relationship. Indeed, ALL my relationships. What she didn’t do is tell me what I must do. She was very much like Armand in that – asking questions that open up self-enquiry but also steering me away from self-judgement. The only time either of them came anywhere near telling me what to do was in blocking that tendency. I do see that I find it easier to blame myself than confront someone else. If this escapade in France is to be of any use I have to change my behaviours. I know that means being more positive, more constructive, more confrontative – and it’s not just about knowing what I want but stating it and risking refusal. What I have learned is that I really am my own worst enemy. I hope that Armand’s friend can help me move forward.
Northern France, in the sunshine after overnight rain, glistened. The villages and towns they passed seemed unchanging. The harvest was in and in some fields ploughing had begun. Other than tractors and cars and trucks rather than horses and wagons, Marcus felt these views had probably changed little in all the years the Blue Train had been passing. Yet he knew that the passengers of sixty or seventy or eighty years previously had experienced a world that he only knew from Hope’s Dolly Dialogues or Prisoner of Zenda, Wilde’s plays, Buchan’s 39 Steps or Greenmantle and old bound volumes of Punch in the House library. He felt he was returning to a place he had been trying to retreat to, or hide in. Marie-Christine, like Armand, and like Lizzy too, had only challenged him when he spoke about past events as ‘failures’. Each of them, in their own different ways, had said that ‘if you never try, you will never fail’. That was the unavoidable truth!
What have I learned from running away to the Riviera? Trust people! I was so desperate that I had no option but to trust Marthe. I am here now because of her. She must have trusted me, why else would she have spoken to me in the cemetery? Mathilde must have trusted me or she wouldn’t have given me a bed and employed me. Both Lizzy and Marthe trusted me – they wouldn’t have taken me swimming otherwise. I only trusted Father Gerard because of Lizzy and Armand because of them both. I learned to trust Marie-Christine – but at first I didn’t, I was just too scared of being rude to her. Thanks to them I have a lot to be grateful for. Now I must learn to trust myself!
Easy to write, he thought, reading over his words, but it isn’t really about trusting so much as believing in oneself. If he had got anything from running away it would only result from genuinely learning to put his trust in other people. He closed the notebook.
The train was slowing. The landscape was industrial and urban. They would soon be at the ferry. He went back to his cabin and checked he had left nothing. Time to stop running away, he told himself as the train came to a stop alongside the ferry. He followed the other passengers across the dockside. In an hour or so he would be in Dover and then onward to London.
A great many people have given Marcus their time and attention. It is to be hoped that, as he crosses the Channel, he is committing to act on the support and advice and encouragement he has received…
The story continues with Tranche Eleven
Evocative, your masterful portrayal of Marcus’s inner world, particularly the persisten and vivid nature of memory amidst impending change, offers a profoundly important perspective on human experience.