8

Autumn

When I arrive back at the moulin a week later (visa in hand), the village is wearing its autumn overcoat. Back in London my brother had remarked that he isn’t fond of this time of year — ‘It’s too untidy’ — but it looks good on our hamlet. It has a messy, tousled beauty now, leaves coating everything like a fiery mosaic. In the evenings the sky glows red and the river blazes beneath. But here’s the issue. Vienne is one of France’s least-populated areas (the younger Viennois tend to leave the villages and towns to seek work in the bigger centres of Bordeaux to the south or La Rochelle to the west). And while the warm weather had seduced locals onto the streets, to concerts, shows, festivals and outdoor restaurant tables, with autumn they have dissolved back through the walls of their homes like ghosts. Even Salsa the golden retriever’s appearances are fewer.

Alistair is doing everything to make me feel at home, comfortable and excited about being here. He’s created a cosy nook for me to work where it’s warm, in a top-floor bedroom with a window that looks down on my favourite walnut tree and a russet and golden carpet of leaves. If I’m lucky I catch a flash of our resident squirrel’s auburn coat as he scrambles over leaves to get home to Madame Squirrel and run through his nut inventory.

Alistair arranges outings with our new friends. We go foraging for glossy châtaignes(chestnuts) with Marianne and her husband Tony, plus the aforementioned Charlotte from Tours and her husband Serge. Serge is tall and slim with silver hair in a man-bun, an extremely kind face and a keen, youthful way about him. One of his hobbies is roller-blading so I am surprised to discover that he is 73. Charlotte has enviably thick, grey locks cut into a long bob, and flawless skin. Her fine features, coupled with her way of tipping her head back and placing her hand on her chest when she laughs (which is often) reminds me instantly of Meryl Streep. Serge and Charlotte have been together for 50 years, and are still giggly and playful around one another.

The air is crisp and twigs snap under our feet as we stoop to riffle through the leafy layer, popping our glossy bounty into plastic bags that are soon full. Marianne says she will roast her chestnuts; Charlotte suggests making chestnut jam, which sounds like a faff, but I guess it’s one way to while away the cold days. (We end up roasting ours in the oven then devouring them with Brussels sprouts, garlic and lardons. Magnificent.)

Afterwards we retreat to a nearby restaurant with a 15 euro set menu that is beautifully cooked and, inevitably, all meat or fish. A fabulous pork terrine to start (with a basket of fluffy white bread); a ceviche-style seafood salad; tender beef cheeks in rich red wine sauce with patates dauphinoises; a cheese platter; and then a chocolate pavé (which literally means paving stone) — a rectangular slab consisting of a firm mousse and a layer of biscuits. It’s dense but light, which is a blessing after the hefty four courses we’ve just stashed away.

It’s funny what you remember about conversations. From this two-hour lunch I recall only one remark. Charlotte, saying she has no passport and has no plans to get one. Because, ‘Why would I want to travel? Look at this place! France is just perfect.’ I can’t decide whether this is insular thinking, or the wisest thing I have ever heard.

On rainy afternoons Alistair unfurls great maps and talks me through planned jaunts around Spain because he’s not forgotten that European travel was part of his ‘Come live with me’ pitch. He takes me out to cute family-run bistros and, now that there’s a chill in the air, he hauls firewood up two flights of spiral stairs so that it’s always cheery of an evening. The hearth — while not quite of Citizen Kane proportions — is enormous. When the flames get going in the grate, it’s pretty much bonfire night at the moulin.

One grey day a pick-up truck arrives, its tray piled high with cordes de bois, fresh firewood which is tipped out onto the grass by the front door. Alistair and I begin to stack it by the moulin wall. Dark clouds glower over us as we work, a stern reminder not to slacken the pace. We’ve got a good little rhythm going — me picking the logs from the chaotic jumble and passing them to Alistair, who piles them on top of one another. We finish by covering the stack with sheets of corrugated iron to protect our winter insurance policy from the imminent rain.

It feels good to be doing this physical work. Doing it with Alistair. He teases me that I miss the city life — ‘your gyms, your clubs, your cocktail lunches’. Ha, who does he think I am — Carrie Bradshaw? In fact he’s wrong. Yes, I do love the buzz of the city, but I also enjoy this kind of simple, therapeutic activity. Out in the fresh air. Doing what people have been doing for centuries, stacking the odds in their favour as the bitterest weather approaches. Up to now I’ve been mostly existing on the fringes of moulin life, contributing the bare minimum. Not through laziness but due to both work and writing demands and a certain lack of confidence. I’m like a fish out of water. I’m not a gardener, a DIY-er or mechanic. In this rural setting I feel pretty much useless, to be frank. Having worked as a copy editor or writer for most of my career, my talents are not exactly transferable to rustic living. Knowing where to plant our courgettes would be of far more use than knowing where to place a semicolon. Still, I can learn.

So this is how we sidle into autumn and winter. On vivid, sun-filled mornings it’s easy enough to maintain morale. It’s when the clouds roll in and refuse to budge for days, surly visitors who fill your life with negative energy, that I have to be on my guard. If not, homesickness will insinuate itself into my thoughts, like a sneaky autumnal draft through a cracked pane.

Looking back, I can see how my homesickness must have frustrated Alistair. ‘This is your home now,’ he kept saying, adding, ‘yes I own it but I want it to be yours too.’ He encourages me to put up my own photos and pictures but there are few walls that can be hammered into. He urges me to ‘add your stamp’ to the living area, but there’s little room for manoeuvre because there’s nowhere to put the heavy furniture that came with the mill.

He says I should pick a project of my own — the old barn with a collapsed roof, for example. He wants to turn it into a gîte that we can live in when we are too old and creaky to climb the steep and windy wooden staircase. But it needs expensive and extensive repairs first and foremost, and I have no money of my own to fund the restoration. There’s the garden, but it’s huge and it’s hard to know where to begin for a novice gardener. I do, however, pledge to start sowing veges in the spring.

I know this all makes me sound resistant to settling in, ungrateful even. This is certainly how Alistair comes to see it. But it’s hard to convey just how lost I still feel at this point. I am in that desolate no man’s land — away from those I cherish so dearly, but not yet close enough to anyone here to be able to fill that emotional vacuum.

I am aware I must keep my wits about me, otherwise homesickness will soon be joined by its evil twin: nostalgia. Whispering maliciously into my ear: ‘You were happier then.’ ‘You had so many friends then.’ ‘You were safe then.’

It’s ridiculous. I came here for adventure, to get out of my comfort zone. I can’t be defeated by a few falling leaves and a drop in temperature. So I resolve to try a bit harder, to immerse myself deeper.

Of course the locals haven’t really vanished. They’re just living differently. ‘You have to go and knock on people’s doors, or invite them over for a cuppa,’ says our Norwegian friend, Inger, over a bowl of her creamy pumpkin soup (with amaretto swirled through it — divine) and Swedish meatballs. ‘It’s how people here get through the colder months.’ Inger has made her home here and seems happy enough. But she is only in her forties, and married to a Frenchman with whom she has a three-year-old daughter. Your children are your roots, that’s the way I see it.

As pursuits go, turning up on your neighbour’s doorstep with croissants isn’t exactly daredevil. But to me it’s as scary as free-diving. Something in me rebels at the idea of foisting my company and conversation on people uninvited. So instead I ask a few friends and neighbours over, for Alistair’s birthday. It will also be a small way of showing my gratitude, to thank him for all the ways he is trying to help me settle in.

Nervous about preparing dinner for people who are no doubt used to excellent home-cooking, I decide on a ‘tapas’ evening. It’s nice neutral territory. Screw up a coq au vin or a blanquette de veau and I’ll be mortified. But with the Spanish option, I can just say, ‘Ah, well this is how they serve it in Galicia.’ Many of our guests also know I’m of Latin American descent. While that doesn’t qualify me as a tapas expert, it does cut me a bit of slack.

The day of the soirée I spend hours making Spanish omelettes, pork albóndigas (meatballs) in thick tomato sauce, croquetas filled with creamy bechamel and serrano ham, and later rubbing garlic onto slices of bread and topping them with tomato and anchovies. I’ve also bought quality chorizo, olives and some Manchego cheese. I make a jug of strong red-wine sangria, and am altogether satisfied with my efforts.

Alistair, however, is strangely nervous about the gathering. ‘I don’t know,’ he says. ‘I always worry, “Will people have a good time?”’ This is uncharacteristic of him. He’s usually the life and soul, especially after a few pichets of wine. I tell him not to worry. ‘No, but the French — they do things differently to us,’ he says. ‘I’m never sure what the protocol is with these things.’ He’s overthinking it. There will be plenty of food, rivers of sangria, music, and besides, they all know one another. What could go wrong?

Antoine and Brigitte are the first to arrive. They’ve been to the moulin plenty of times, but when they come in they seem a little uneasy. I pour them a drink and offer some of the anchovy crostini for them to snack on. Antoine is taken aback. ‘What, we eat now?’ No, I tell him. Just something to grignoter (nibble) while we wait for the others to arrive. He waves his hand. ‘No thank you. I wait.’ More people clank up the stairs, bearing expensive wine, chocolates and small cakes. They stand around on the edges of the living room, looking a little lost. It feels like a gallery opening where the crowd is waiting for someone to make a speech rather than an informal birthday party.

The long wooden table is set with crockery, and plates of tapas. The guests chat quietly and occasionally glance over at the food. I urge them to grab a plate, try some of the dishes. It’s past 8 p.m. and they must be getting peckish. Nobody does. Finally, seeing that someone needs to do something, Brigitte takes control of the situation: ‘Et bon … à table, non?’, she says, announcing that they should all come and sit down. There is a collective sigh of relief as people sink down gratefully on the dining-room chairs, as if finally given permission to relax.

Alistair had been right; he’d told me, ‘The French are funny about just standing around eating,’ but I wanted it to be casual. A sit-down affair would unfairly elevate their expectations of the menu. But no. Now they’re happily passing plates, laughing loudly, sharing their news, asking what’s in the croquetas and urging me to text them the recipe. It’s like the rather sad, awkward crowd of before was simply the early shift who have been replaced by a different set of people altogether — thoroughly effervescent party animals for whom a plate of albóndigas served up in an ancient water mill is their idea of the ultimate night out.

French eating protocol is just one of several puzzling phenomena. Another is something Alistair and I call ‘The Dark Art of Knowing When Things are Happening and Where’.

There is no local website or What’s On magazine, no central oracle for social gatherings and public events. There are various Facebook pages for English speakers or inhabitants of certain villages, but it’s easy to miss new posts and often these contain scant information. You might be lucky to see a poster on a lamp post or fence, but invariably these shed little light either. Often the venue or date will be missing, or in such small print you can’t possibly find it or see it when you drive past. We pick up a flyer in a grocery store that has a picture, in silhouette, of children and cows walking on a hillside, a date, and a price. We show it to the lady at the checkout, who nods, points to the paper and says, ‘Yes, look. It’s a buffet dinner!’ Of course.

Calendar highlights exist in the ether, in the collective consciousness, or are promoted by word of mouth. Many is the time when neighbours will say, ‘Oh, you weren’t at such-and-such last Saturday.’ When we explain that’s because we didn’t know it was on and ask where they heard about it, the Gallic shrugging starts in earnest. ‘Um, bah, je sais pas … On a entendu quelque part.’ They just happened to hear somewhere.

There are some permanent fixtures, like the weekly markets and the Wednesday-night campground meals (which we only found out about through a neighbour). Other than that, advertising seems to be written in some kind of code.

The Jolie Rosette, where the circus and other live performances take place, is known by that name to everyone — but on posters it’s referred to as La Prade à Moutou (sheep meadow). We have friends who live three minutes from it, have been here for decades, and didn’t know it existed. Even Antoine, who is plugged into everything and has lived in the locality all his life, had never been because he thought it was an agricultural event.

Then there’s the semi-mythical bread woman. For weeks we have been trying to find out more about a lady who is said to drive through our area delivering fresh bread, but no one appears to be able to tell us which days she comes, or what time. She doesn’t beep her horn or announce her presence in any way whatsoever. How on earth she does any trade is anyone’s guess, but somehow the locals seem to get their necessary carbs from her when they can’t make it to the boulangerie.

Maybe that’s when I will know that I have made it. That I belong. When I sense that it’s time to wander out onto the road and, sure enough, a lady in a van stops and hands me a baguette.

One afternoon in November, Alistair calls me to come downstairs. He needs my help with the old carriage.

The old carriage is a decrepit wooden affair that has been sitting under a blue tarpaulin in the barn. It’s a uniform beige, cobwebby and dust-covered. It has huge wheels, rudimentary spring suspension, and a wooden seat for two. It must at one time have been hitched to a mule, and used to transport flour from the mill. Like everything here, it is a gentle whisper from the past — a thing not dead but merely sleeping, as if placed under a spell.

I have a dream of cleaning this contraption, painting it and buying a donkey of our own. I will ride into the village, la petite anglaise excentrique, climb down and rub the donkey’s ears. He will be called Frances.

I recently saw the film Antoinette dans les Cévennes, where an infatuated young teacher treks through the beautiful Cévennes national park with a donkey, in pursuit of her married lover who’s on holiday with his family. The film had me enraptured. Donkey transport seems to me the most romantic thing on earth.

For now, Alistair wants to move the carriage to the big old barn up the road, which he bought from a neighbour to store his two race cars. We tie bits of wire to the two shafts, and then connect these securely to the ride-on lawn mower, which Alistair will drive. I sit up in the carriage, in a sunhat, and imagine myself holding the donkey’s reins, its ears twitching happily in the sun.

Everything starts off fine as we rumble up the incline towards the road. When we get to the steepest part, Alistair wisely tells me to hop down. About ten seconds later, the wire comes loose — first on one side and then the other — and suddenly the carriage starts to roll away from us. ‘Grab it!!!’ yells Alistair, still sitting on the mower. I don’t even have time to stop and (justifiably) say, ‘How am I going to intercept a moving carriage twenty times my size and weight?’ I just need to do something because it is gathering speed towards the river. I sprint after it down the slope and — by some miracle — manage to grab one of the shafts and push it sufficiently hard sideways that it judders to a stop. Alistair is amazed. He didn’t really expect me to halt its trajectory. He comes over, wipes his sweaty hand on his shorts, and gives me a big high-five. I feel like that hopeless seven-year-old kid who’s finally won her dad’s approval. We secure the wires more tightly then I clamber back on as we head up the gentler section of slope near the road.

It’s not exactly the most elegant form of transport. The carriage creaks and lurches from side to side as we wobble over the stony, pot-holed thoroughfare. But sitting up high in my straw hat, with Alistair’s smack of approval fresh on my hand, I feel like the Queen of the Vienne.