Le Temps des Cerises (2 page)

Bernadine's eyes opened wide in surprise. ‘For goodness sake, what is it my child? What on earth's the matter?'

But before Aggie could open her mouth again to reveal her terrible secret her body was overtaken by a violent paroxysm and she suddenly toppled off the little sweet-woodruff bench and onto the ground with an almighty crash, sending the horsehair basket flying and the rolled-up bandages unrolling with gentle abandon past pyramid fruit trees, the greengage cage and the sunken vegetable patch.

Brother Michael was down in the cellar investigating what he privately termed the ‘miraculous' ingredient of the convent wines – an allusion to the water he'd accused the steward of adding to the bottles of La Tour Blanche – when he heard a muffled scream; but thinking it was simply some nun in the act of self-mortification, he shrugged his shoulders and got on with his job.

‘Oh, very Christian,' he muttered angrily, taking a drop of
'68. ‘Here's a little miracle for you!' Out of the fifteen bottles he'd investigated, sixteen of them at the very least, he'd noted down, contained the special ingredient and he was most aggrieved. Turning water into wine, he felt, was quite in keeping with a holy life but to turn wine into water was undoubtedly the action of an unsound mind, a mind not altogether in its rightful place. He corked up the bottle of '68 and moved a little unsteadily to a crate of '69, craving heaven as he did so for the remission of sins, the grace to live a holy life and to deserve some eternal rest.

‘BROTHER MICHAEL? ARE YOU DOWN THERE?'

He came to an abrupt halt. He knew that voice. It was Sister Bernadine – Shady Lady as he privately termed her. Woman Rumoured to have a Past. One of the handsomest nuns in the convent with a lonely faded beauty reminiscent, he had decided in a poetic moment, of a wild flower pressed between the pages of a book. Still capable of giving off glows and hints, he reminded himself. Still capable of leading even a man like him astray. He trembled slightly, wondering if he oughtn't to hide behind the crate of '69 and hold his breath until she went away but a shadow over the open cellar hatch persuaded him to own up to his existence.

‘Just checking the cellar for damp,' he called out in a surprisingly business-like tone. And wiping his fingers on his blue twill apron he started climbing the cellar stairs one step at a time, as St Bonaventure and Thomas Aquinas recommended.

‘Oh thank goodness,' Bernadine exclaimed, all red in the face and breathless, giving off glows and hints no doubt to poor Brother Michael. ‘Sister Agnes is in trouble. I believe she's suffered some kind of stroke. We must get her inside immediately.'

‘A… Agnes,' faltered Brother Michael, blinking rapidly. The Prettiest Perfectest Peach in Paradise as he privately termed her. But Aggie was literally bursting with health. There could never be anything the matter with Aggie…

‘Do you understand, Brother Michael: we must get her inside immediately!'

‘Yes.' He suddenly flew into action, tearing past Bernadine as if he had wings, out of the kitchen and up the garden path at an astonishing speed to where Aggie sat propped by the little sweet-woodruff bench, moaning loudly and sweating profusely. ‘There there,' he shouted, patting her on the head. ‘Brother Michael's here now!'

Events took on the quality of a dream after that. It seemed to him that he gauged the situation at a glance. No detail escaped him of the red strewn bandages, scattered uniforms and coloured thread, Bernadine's distress, Aggie's howls. Nothing was lost on him – not the bright sun, nor the blue sky, nor the nuns gathering one by one, pale and peering their long, thin faces at him like a bunch of silly sheep.

‘…bran poultice,' one of them bleated. He distinctly heard her bleat.

‘Smelling salts!'

‘Only yesterday…'

‘Enema by the look of her!'

‘Pale as a drink of water!'

He issued orders with remarkable fluency (though others might tell a different tale). He remained Calm amidst Chaos; took charge, took command, took off his girdle and tied it round Aggie's right leg, wrapped a bandage round her head; did all manner of useful and necessary tasks. He measured the distance by eye from where they sat to the convent wall, took pains to test the strength of his girdle by pulling on Aggie's left leg, calculated the position of the sun on her hair and the time it would take to reach her foot, meticulously planned each step of the route until in the end he came to the decisive conclusion (though with the feeling he'd spent a lifetime preparing for it) that Aggie must be got inside. And with that they half dragged, half pushed, half carried a shrieking Agnes through the greengage cage, past the pyramid fruit trees and over the sunken vegetable bed to the rooms where the Mother Superior sat, grim and foreboding, behind her desk.

‘I am to blame,' Bernadine babbled as everyone shuffled in. ‘All the talk of food brought on some sort of malady. She has the most terrible stomach cramps.'

‘Gumdrops!' whispered the Mother Superior with a shake of her head.

‘Oh no, it's not a mere case of indigestion,' Bernadine insisted, ‘I am sure of it. She's in the most frightful pain. We must fetch a doctor at once.'

‘War! More needy!' whispered the Mother Superior with another shake of the head. ‘No doctors for gumdrops.'

Brother Michael stared at the Gentle Terror as he privately termed the Mother Superior. ‘This is not the work of gumdrops,' he said in a tone of utter seriousness, pointing at Aggie who was writhing in agony on the floor. ‘I could never believe this to be the work of gumdrops, Reverend Mother.'

And indeed it was not. A few minutes later, beneath the shelves of confiscated novels, facepaint, jujubes and lace knickers; the benevolent eye of a plaster Mary and infant Jesus and signs which read:
Here Silence is Always Kept
and
Insubordination is Everywhere
, Sister Agnes' confession was delivered of its own accord in the shape of a tiny blue baby girl, amidst much shouting and hysteria on the part of everyone concerned except for the Mother Superior who whispered for all she was worth and Brother Michael who stood open mouthed and tugging at his blue twill apron as if he were tolling the angelus.

Chapter two

21
st
December 1870

Dearest Maman,

Here I am in the thick of it still, as you see – though thank God I sleep on my own bed tonight instead of this wretched straw pallet. The mud is almost up to our knees after the sudden thaw but it is still bitterly cold. Those socks you sent to me via Monsieur K. are a godsend, Maman. A real godsend. It is the coldest winter ever they say. Of course it would be!

I have still not a scratch upon me, having seen no real action. Alphonse has his chest wound from Le Bourget which aches a little more, he says, when a pretty girl goes past! I envy him sometimes: his spontaneity, his ready engagement with life, the ability to slough off an identity yet still be the same, to wake up bright and breezy day after day. Constancy above all in all things. I am weak willed as a woman. I wish that something would happen – anything – if only to see if I could bear it. All this waiting around will be the death of me. We while away the time somehow with cards and dominoes – wine is plentiful! We have a few tables and chairs dotted about – a little sitting room at the ramparts! All I need to feel at home is a roaring fire, some toasted muffins, you knitting quietly in your armchair and Molly thumping away on the piano! Tell her I expect a perfect rendition of the Moonlight Sonata when I next see her!

You would not recognise the city if you came to visit. It is quite simply a fortress: the Louvre an armament shop, the Bon Marché a hospital (all your favourite calicoes and linens being used to mop up the wounded!), the squares nothing more than parade grounds. Not a single stump is left in the Bois de Boulogne and the lime trees you loved so on the Boulevard Haussmann have all gone for firewood. We have no lighting after dark (Paris, city of light, extinguished!), the Prussians having cut off our coal supply from Belgium; and few carriages are to be seen because (don't read this bit out to Molly) the horses have all been eaten (Paris, city of the gourmet, famished!). Nobody knows how to make it palatable. Copies of
The Practical Cuisine
are selling like hotcakes apparently as uppercrust housekeepers search for tips on ‘how to dress exotic meats'! The rest of Paris searches for tips on how to dress thin air. I dream of a cheese green as an emerald and...

Laurie broke off from his letter to blow on his numbed fingers, stamp his feet and take a sip of the watery coffee commonly referred to as mouth warmer – because the only thing it was good for was warming one's mouth. He rolled it around his tongue like a wine then spat it out again. What didn't he dream of here in this ruined landscape, acres of dreary white before him, the city like a crouching beast behind him. What didn't they all dream of but to win the war, get out of this stupid futile mess and go back home for good instead of this endless to-ing and fro-ing; though in fairness, he had to admit, some wanted it, to some it was an adventure, like Alphonse maybe, or the little gunner who rubbed his cannon down as if it were a horse or a woman and made snowmen on sentry duty just for the hell of it. Laurie crunched on the stale biscuit he'd been saving in his mess tin and reread the page he'd just written, wondering if its tone was sufficiently buoyant. He spent a long time over his letters, believing them to be a filial and fraternal duty, digging up curious and unusual anecdotes to entertain his mother and sister who sat in Toulouse in blissful ignorance. At least he hoped they sat in blissful ignorance. Sometimes he underplayed or over dramatised the situation a little, depending on his mood or what he thought might best amuse, generally writing behind a persona and keeping the full colour of emotion, whole complexity of truth for his poems and dreams. And if he ever did write straight from the heart, more often than not he crumpled up the page and left it unsent. Today he felt he'd been a little too honest and he finished up the sentence with a mildly facetious ‘
one of your baked eggs, Maman
' then sat back to rack his brains a little more and listen half-heartedly to the rest of the men who were drinking gin and playing pontoon.

‘I've never seen so much make-up on a man,' Old Joubet was saying, picking his teeth and staring at his hand in disbelief. He always stared at his cards in disbelief – whether to bluff his opponents or because he really couldn't comprehend the blows Fate kept dealing him was hard to tell. ‘He was wearing so much make-up at the Battle of Sedan he looked like a fucking
cocodette
²
. What the hell's wrong with him anyway?'

‘Kidney stones!'

‘Syphilis!'

‘His days are numbered in that area. The only thing that pops out nowadays is his tongue. His servant takes sugar tongs along when they go to the opera to stick the Emperor's tongue back in if he's been drooling too long at the ladies!' Little Coupeau, a dyer from Montmartre, was known for his salacious take on the world and everyone laughed including Laurie.

‘No wonder his missus went round like a thunderclap.'

‘That's why she kept sending him back to the front, hoping desperately he'd get himself killed!'

‘He bloody nearly did,' Old Joubet resumed, still staring. ‘God knows how the enemy missed him – you could see his fucking cheeks a mile off! Twenty-one,' he added, putting down an ace and king in spectacular fashion and collecting up his chips, still with a look of disbelief.

Everybody sighed and the gin bottle was passed round; somebody muttered something about foul play and was immediately shouted down by Bidulph, a good friend of Joubet's. Then the talk turned to the evening's entertainment – they were looking forward to the few nights off – some were going to the meeting at St Nicolas, others to Mabille's for the women. The name of a particular dancer cropped up in conversation and two young men at the end of the table almost came to blows over it; would have done so, in Laurie's opinion, if Tessier hadn't stepped in.

‘Oh Tessier,' one of them drawled angrily, ‘keep your club foot out of it, will you.'

There was a strained silence at that – all eyes on Tessier as he limped back painfully to his seat; and then someone shouted out ‘on with the game' and he smiled good-naturedly because they all loved to watch him shuffle, his hands flew so gracefully over the cards. He put on an extra show this time with feints, slidebacks and sleight of hand stunts; and Old Joubet told him he should take a stall at the Gingerbread Fair while Coupeau said that the Queen of Diamonds coming out of his ear was the biggest thrill he'd had in years! Tessier got quite carried away and the whole thing might have got a little tedious if someone hadn't shouted out ‘on with the game, on with the game'; but at least he was back to his old self again and sufficiently put to rights to call out to Laurie a moment later in a blustering tone: ‘Hey Laurel leaves – how's it going? Tell your ma if she wants to know what her boy gets up to, to look up Léon Tessier, bookkeeper,12 Rue du Faubourg… he'll put her in the picture!'

Laurie smiled. ‘Thanks very much, Léon! I'll be sure to do just that!' He was fond of Léon – beneath the blustering was a good heart and a kind soul and he reckoned that out of all the members of 7
th
Company (apart from Alphonse of course) Tessier was the one he'd trust his life to despite the bad feet and poor eyes which to his utmost shame had kept him out of the regular army.