The Road Between Us (29 page)

Mike seems distracted by something he has seen in his side mirror. ‘ “The Forgotten D-Day”.’

‘What’s “The Forgotten D-Day”?’

Mike seems to realize what he has said. ‘Nothing.’

‘You said, “The Forgotten D-Day”. Why did you say that?’

‘That’s what they called the liberation of southern France, when the Allies landed on the Riviera and pushed all the way up to Nancy.’

Edward sounds confused. ‘Nancy? That was where my father met my mother. She was French …’

The car swerves as a Porsche comes up from the slow lane and undercuts them. ‘Arsehole!’ Mike shouts, thumping the steering wheel with the flat of his hand. The Porsche has now crossed over into the fast lane. Mike follows it and, when it returns to the middle, overtakes it before pressing a switch which makes alternating blue lights flash in the top corners of the rear window. He signals with his hand for the Porsche to pull over. It obeys. Mike is clenching his jaw. As he parks ahead of the Porsche on the hard shoulder and unbuckles his seat belt he starts breathing quickly. ‘Won’t be a minute,’ he says.

Edward and Hannah watch Mike from the back window as he marches up to the man – designer stubble, aviator sunglasses – who has stepped out of his Porsche and is holding up his hands in an imitation of surrender. Without saying a word, Mike grabs his arm, twists it behind his back and frogmarches him to the passenger side of his car. There he makes him place his hands apart on the roof and splay his legs. He pats him down, then forces him to the ground, making him lie on his front with his hands on the back of his head. There he leaves him.

When he gets back in the car Mike says:‘He won’t do that again in a hurry.’

As they drive away, Hannah and Edward continue staring at the man lying down on the hard shoulder. They look first at each other, then at the back of Mike’s head.

‘Sorry about that,’ Mike says in a calmer voice.

This brings their three-way conversation to a close.

Once they join the motorway out of Calais, a blur of EU-subsidized crops – a pastel-blue mist of linseed, the dazzling yellow of oilseed rape – proves soporific. Hannah yawns as she studies the
music list. She knows she probably shouldn’t choose albums that will remind her father of her mother:
Blood on the Tracks
, say, or
Blue
, or
Tapestry
. Nor can she go for something too contemporary that will alienate him. She will have to introduce him to Amy Winehouse and Rumer at some point, and break the news to him that Take That have reformed and split up again, but for now she needs more neutral ground. ‘What do you fancy?’ she asks.

Edward thinks. ‘Know what I’d really like to listen to?
Test Match Special
. Would you mind?’

‘Sure. Let me see if I can find it.’

‘It’s on Long Wave. If they still have Long Wave. We should be able to pick it up here.’

Hannah taps the screen a few times and then the distinctive sound of Henry Blofeld’s voice can be heard painting a word picture of Stuart Broad running up and delivering an in-swinger that is clipped away for a single. ‘That’s Blowers,’ Edward says with a grin. ‘Can’t believe he’s still going. He calls everyone “my dear old thing”. Don’t know much about this Broad. He’s one of the new generation. Probably still at school last time I listened to
TMS
.’

They both recline their seats and fall asleep to the sound of the commentator trying to decide whether a bird that is walking around next to the square leg umpire is a pigeon or a dove.

It is 5.15pm by the time the Mercedes leaves a road that winds down through a spine of pink and blue mountains and comes to what looks like an amphitheatre of foothills. Their descent is less steep now and the road begins snaking as it levels out. They turn a corner and stop at an imposing wrought-iron gate on the outskirts of Natzwiller, a village in the fold of one of the hills. It opens electronically. Beyond it there is a gatehouse with a CCTV camera directed at the drive and, after this, an avenue of trees that continues for about a quarter of a mile. When Hannah sees the château, a white manor house with mullioned windows and a turret at one end, she catches her breath. It looks weightless, poised above a symmetrical parterre of flowerbeds, urns and statuary.

‘Wow,’ she says, leaning forward.

‘Wow,’ Edward echoes.

The air is warm and, when they open their doors, they can hear a lulling drone of insects. Noticing the granite statues either side of the entrance, Hannah grimaces and says:‘Check out the eagles.’ She is the first out of the car and, after a couple of elaborate stretches, she walks over to the nearest one and pats its head. It is cold to the touch. She crouches down and studies the angry curve of its beak, the angular shape of the wings, the hooded, unseeing eyes. ‘Brr,’ she says. ‘I just got chills. Who would have these outside their house?’

The front door is arched and the black-painted, brass-studded wood from which it is made looks old and grainy. Mike tests the doorknob and, finding it open, lifts Edward’s case from the boot and drags it on wheels that tick against the marble of the entrance hall. ‘You have my card. I’ll come and collect you whenever you are ready, although hopefully we should have the Learjet back in action by then.’

‘You’re going to drive all the way back to London tonight?’ Edward asks.

‘Think I might go back via Paris. There’s a friend I thought I might call in on.’

Something about the way he said ‘friend’ makes Hannah think he might have meant enemy. ‘Please thank your boss for us,’ she says.

‘I’ll write to him properly when we get back,’ Edward adds.

‘I’ll just wait for François to show up, then I’ll show you to your rooms. The fridge and the wine cellar are stocked and if there’s anything you need just make a list for the housekeeper. If you would like her to come in and have a clean, write a note, otherwise she will leave you in peace. We want you to relax and have a good time. You must treat this place as your home for as long as you want it, that’s what Mr Walser asked me to tell you.’

‘How about exploring the area?’ Hannah asks. ‘Is it best to hire a car?’

‘You could. Though I think the nearest car hire place would be Strasbourg. If you’re feeling energetic, there are a couple of bikes in the stable.’

‘
Bonjour
.’ The voice is frail, barely audible, coming from behind them. ‘Welcome to Le Jardin des Papillons.’

Edward and Hannah turn to see a bow-legged old man standing in the doorway. Already short, his height is further reduced by his stoop. It is as if an invisible hand is pushing down on his neck and he has to strain to look up. In his arthritically crooked hands he is carrying a rattling tray upon which three flutes and a bottle of champagne are cold-sweating in an ice bucket. He has a tanned and freckled scalp, a white moustache and pale, rheumy eyes distorted by thick glasses. The skin around his elbows is hanging in pleats. ‘I am François,’ the old man says in a voice that is more a croak, one that begins at the back of the throat and barely has the energy to leave his mouth. ‘I live in the gatehouse.’ He kisses Hannah’s extended hand, says: ‘
Trop belle pour moi
,’ then turns to Edward and says, ‘You had a good journey, yes?’

‘
Très bon, merci. Je suis Edward. Et c’est Hannah
.’

‘Your French is good,’ François says, ‘but I need to practise my English.’ He then shakes Edward’s hand and pats Mike’s back. He only comes as high as the driver’s chest. ‘You are staying with us tonight, Mike?’

‘No thank you, sir, got to get back.’

Edward and Hannah exchange a glance, surprised by Mike’s deference to the old man.

‘Shame,’ François says. ‘Never mind. We shall talk next time.’ With gentle, fussy movements he wipes condensation from the neck of the bottle, pops the cork and fills the glasses.

Hannah takes a sip from hers. She clinks glasses with Edward. ‘
Santé
.’

‘
Santé
,’ he echoes.

‘You are to help yourselves to wine from the cellar,’ François says. ‘The Alsace region is an odd mixture of French and German. White wine mostly. Riesling and Muscat. But we have some good Burgundy down there. I recommend the Pinot Noir. There’s some Italian, too. We want you to enjoy yourselves.’

Edward is intrigued by the way the old man refers to the house
as if it is his own, as Mike had done.
We
want you to enjoy yourselves. ‘We’ll pay for anything we drink,’ he says.

‘That won’t be necessary,
monsieur
. Herr Walser would be upset if you did. Now, let me show you to your rooms and then I will leave you in peace.’

Mike steps forward to take the bags. ‘Let me do that, sir.’

‘No, Mike, you have a long drive. I shall do it myself. These are very special guests.’ François regards Edward for a moment, his head on a tilt. He then nods slowly to himself and smiles.

Mike strides to the car and, running a hand over its still-warm bonnet, says: ‘One part Mercedes, two parts Panzer.’

As she watches the car glide back down the drive, Hannah says in a whisper to her father: ‘Well, he wasn’t weird at all.’

Edward nods. ‘Wouldn’t like to cross him.’

When François attempts to lift the suitcase, Edward prises it from his grip. François does not protest – honour has been served – and they follow him along a corridor lined with free-standing, glass-topped display cabinets full of pinned butterflies. Hannah stops to read out loud some of the labels, translating as best she can from the French – ‘Green-veined White, Common Blue, Brimstone, Painted Lady, Small Tortoiseshell’ – a roll call that sounds like an abstract poem. Realizing François hasn’t waited for them, Edward tugs gently on her shirt.

When they come to an oak-panelled room with a vaulted ceiling they nod at one another, impressed. A carved marble fireplace dominates one end, a faded tapestry depicting medieval hunting scenes the other. Mounted along the wall opposite the windows are dozens of antlers, and the heads of a stuffed bear and a wild boar. On the wooden floor there is a faded black stain that could once have been ink, or ancient blood.

They are now at a wide spiral staircase made from white-painted stone. Following the old man up it is a slow process, as he has to pause every third step. On the landing he stares out of an armorial window for almost a minute then, at the top, his pace quickens as he shows them to their adjoining rooms. They are at the end of a
long hallway which has four identical white bedroom doors either side.

François opens one of them and steps back. Hannah goes in first. ‘I bagsy this one,’ she says putting her rucksack on the bed. She moves to the window and opens it with a clatter. Below is a courtyard and, beyond that, the garden. ‘Wow,’ she says again. ‘What is that smell? Sweet alyssum?’ She inhales deeply. ‘And lavender?’

‘No good asking me,’ Edward says, touching his nose.

Hannah is now studying a series of six small erotic pastels hanging on the wall. She doesn’t need to check the signature to know they are by Gustav Klimt. One shows a semi-nude woman in a chair examining her foot. The drawing seems to throb steadily with life and she feels an urge to step inside it, inhabit its space, lose herself in its planes of shimmering, shifting colour.

‘
Monsieur
,’ François says, opening the door to the adjoining room and stepping to one side to allow Edward past. When Hannah comes through she sees he is staring at a dark mahogany four-poster bed; its tapering spiral posts are swagged with faded red velvet tied back with gold tassels. The canopy has an embroidered serpent winding across it and on the headboard there is a carved crest.

‘Want this one instead!’ Hannah says.

‘Too late,’ Edward says.

‘This is the bed in which Lord Byron slept,’ François says, pointing to a hand-painted plaque which reads: ‘
Lord Byron a dormi ici 1817
’. Then he gives an amused shrug as if to say ‘it takes all kinds’.

‘This place is breathtaking,’ Edward says. ‘How long has Mr Walser lived here?’

‘He bought it in, let me think, 1998 … The year France won the World Cup.’

Once they have done a little unpacking, father and daughter head back downstairs together and find François sipping champagne on the terrace.

‘Before I leave you there is something I would like you to see,’
he says, getting to his feet with the aid of a stick. The old man leads the way along an avenue of cypress, flowering cherry and magnolia, to a small stone bridge. ‘This was built by the Romans,’ he says. ‘Because it feeds down from the Vosges mountains, the river water is very pure. I recommend a swim in it, but not now perhaps. In the heat of the day.’

Beneath the sunbeams glancing off the surface of the river they can see fat trout poised motionless against the current. And on the far bank, near an elegantly rotting Doric temple, there is what looks like the darting shadow of a water vole. Scrambling for footholds in a ruined archway on the other side of the bridge are wild roses and bougainvillea tangled with ivy. Beyond these is a grove of petrified oak timbers, stripped and faded to the colour of old bone.

‘Beautiful,’ Hannah says in a wistful voice, momentarily forgetting her reason for coming here.

‘Beautiful,’ Edward echoes.

François looks pleased. He is staring at Edward again.

After a light supper of aubergine rolls with spinach and ricotta left for them by the housekeeper, Edward blows out the candles, leaving a smell of snuffed-out wax in the air. ‘Think I might get an early night,’ he says with a yawn. ‘We can explore properly tomorrow.’

‘I might watch a DVD. I saw a machine in there.’

‘Or you could try the cinema.’

‘Another night. I want to watch this.’ She holds up a DVD of
The Railway Children
. ‘It came free with a Sunday paper.’

‘You brought it with you?’

‘Yep. Do you remember when we watched it together before you went away?’

Edward nods. ‘Put it on.’

After opening a bottle of red, pouring two glasses and slotting the DVD in the machine, Hannah presses play on the remote. When nothing happens she unclips its back, rolls the batteries from side to side and tries again. This time it works and, when she sits next to her father on the sofa, he places his arm around her
shoulders. An hour and three quarters later, as it comes to the final scene in which the elder daughter looks down the platform as the steam clears, then runs into her father’s arms crying, ‘Daddy, my daddy!’ they look at one another, see they are both wet-eyed and splutter with laughter.