The instant I step out of the plane, I feel that whoosh of heat envelop me and the sun beat like a great fan against my tired features. What a welcome relief to be back. To be home. Michel, who flew down from Paris a couple of days ago, is there to greet me. He takes my bag and leads me to the car while I breathe deep the scent of eucalyptus wafting from the towering trees that dominate the airport parking. I take in the distant frantic honking of horns, gently listing palms, pure white buildings, clean blue skies and settle back into my seat to watch the Mediterranean world flash by. And then he breaks the news: the villa has been broken into. It’s as though he has just slapped me. “When?”
Michel has known of the burglary for several weeks but chose not to mention it to me because there was nothing I could do about it. Worrying about it at a distance, he argues, would have been both distressing and frustrating. “I would have preferred to know,” I state emphatically. I have been looking forward to this day for three months. I cannot deny that the news has clouded the pleasure of my return.
Once at the house, Michel unloads the car—my luggage and the fresh salads he bought before collecting me—while I roam from room to room, assessing the extent of the damage in our dusty foreign home. Little has been stolen, but then there there was precious little to steal. I am very relieved to find that our new bed has not been soiled, not even touched, but our cassettes and tape deck, modest as they were, are gone. Every tune had a place here, a memory. My fusty workspace is bare. My books, my precious books, have all been stolen, every one of them—dictionaries, guides, a history of the islands, manuals on local horticulture, even the dog-eared, beach-stained paperbacks—as has a brand-new espresso machine, a frivolous purchase I made the day before our New Year’s departure. I hid and locked it in a cupboard, and due to the brevity of our last stay, we never even found an opportunity to use it. Curiously, the bed linen and tablecloths from the market at Nice have not been snatched though they are surely more valuable and salable than my paltry writing gear. Angry as I feel, I am grateful we have not been denied at least a few souvenirs of our first days here.
Michel finds me standing alone in the salon. “How did they get in?” I ask. He points to splintered spaces, where our old peeling shutter slats have been hacked out and replaced, windowpanes that were smashed by the thief when he made his entry as well as to a newly fitted lock on the main door through which he made his escape. Who repaired them and when? Amar, he answers, regarding me. I think he is taken aback by how hurt I am. Though the damage has been made good and the loss is minimal, I want to cry. I take it personally. It is an intrusion, a despoilment and, more crucially, a warning.
Outside the kitchen window, I come across an empty, discarded Marlboro packet. Should I keep it, present it as evidence? I try to picture the character and face of that smoker, but its discovery is five weeks too late. I ditch it in the wastepaper basket. Best to let it go.
Still, the cropping of the land has exposed the property. We are vulnerable now. It forces us to address the need for security. The hill where we are situated may never have been fenced in before, but we cannot afford to remain romantic about these matters. In the beginning, there was nothing else, no other property for miles in any direction. As far as the naked eye could see, it was owned and inhabited by one family, our predecessors—the Spinotti clan. Life was probably less cutthroat then, but more importantly, in the dependencies, the mazets of Appassionata, the gardeners and permanent staff lived, a cluster of people who tended the place all year round. We are not as privileged, so another solution will have to be found.
After lunch on the terrace, Michel telephones Amar, who arrives before evening and quotes us for the laurel bushes we have decided to plant to border the grounds. For the time being, we do not have to face the enormous expense of fencing in the entire property, because flanking either side of our terrain is the same overgrown jungle we had here. We have no idea who owns these two plots, but unattractive as the weeds and climbers may be, they are a burglar deterrent.
My behavior toward Amar is antagonistic. This is partly due to my frame of mind, but mostly because he knows we are beginning to count on him and I feel him taking advantage. His estimation of the number of bushes required far exceeds mine, and I tell him so. Eventually, over a fruit juice, aided by Michel’s appeasing charm, we settle upon a more reasonable figure and a price. Even after hefty negotiating, he is expensive, added to which the cash we give him to settle for the land clearance, he now informs us, is insufficient.
“A rate has been agreed. Hands were shaken upon the deal!” I bark.
“Allow me to explain, chère Madame…” And he proceeds to explain in an irritatingly apologetic manner that he has underestimated the total number of man hours required for his two workers to climb up and down the hill and is obliged therefore to add this to the bill.
I am speechless with fury at his audacity and invention. Here, in the Midi, I am discovering, there are always reasons why the valuations change or why the work is not done in the manner or to the standard agreed. In this part of the world, quotations and budgets might as well be used as barbecue kindling.
Michel pays with good grace, and we order the laurel shrubs, for this is urgent and we cannot afford to delay while we look around for another gardener. Better the devil you know… Still, before plein summer is upon us, with all its distractions and harassments—the onslaught of tourists, lines, traffic congestions, when even the tiniest chore takes twice the time and every factory, société and office closes down for the entire month of August—we would do well to find ourselves some able-bodied help. We have a daunting list of tasks to accomplish. Most will be left to me to oversee, because Michel must return to Paris and will only be here on the weekends. I am tired from the run of the play and grateful to have an excuse to stay here and hang out. Besides, I have my writing project, inspired by our day trip to the islands, to complete.
And then there is the leaking roof… Yet again, after evening calculations over a bottle of wine, we realize that our funds are desperately insufficient. We will have to choose what we attack now and what gets left until some future date. But we are not downhearted. After my initial bad mood, I grow cheery again.
Last summer we managed and, better still, enjoyed magical months. There is no reason why this year should be any different. Now that the property belongs to us, certain pressures have been lifted. We can create our own pace. Installating a kitchen, rewiring throughout, building a bathroom between two guest bedrooms, replastering and painting upstairs and down, renovating an ancient scullery—une souillarde—as a summer kitchen while preserving its magnificent blond stone sink, replacing lengths of piping and cracked tiles, repairing and painting Matisse-blue all shutters and doors, planting palm trees, fruit trees, flowers, more flowers, creating vegetable and herb gardens, purchasing the second five acres, even my precious olive farming—such a never-ending list! But they can all be achieved in the fullness of time. If, during this summer, I can study the basics of olive farming and we can find ways to secure the house against the undesired entry of thieves and rain, we will have accomplished a great deal.
I AM STANDING ON THE roof in the company of Monsieur Di Fazio, our chimney-sweeping plumber. He has agreed to coat this flat, leaking expanse with a layer of asphalt and gravel. Although it is a temporary solution and the work does not carry a damp-proof guarantee, he assures me that it should keep out the rain for up to a year, even two, until we can raise the hefty sum needed to execute the job in a more professional way. (The three quotes we have received have left us reeling.) While pacing to calculate meterage, he spins a kind of lumbering pirouette, a 360-degree turn, scans the length and breadth of our land, then screws up his face and peers south toward the bay. The view from this hauteur is breathtaking. In true Midi fashion, Di Fazio grimaces his approval. Coming from him, this is a rare compliment, for until this moment, he has recommended repeatedly that we raze the villa and construct a new one. But today, the earlysummer warmth mingled with an agreeable breeze coming off the hills seems to have put him in good humor. He concludes, “Pas mal, Madame,” with, as ever, the authority of God.
I nod, gratified.
He turns his regard toward our pine forest. “You have plenty of wood.”
“Yes,” I agree. Hardly a debatable point, for the felled trunks and branches are lying at angles all over the grounds like pick-up-stix.
“You know, a word of advice… if I may be so bold…”
I brace myself, expecting to be counseled to build ourselves a cabin and abandon all hope for this once-neglected farmhouse.
“There is enough wood here to pay my bill for the roof work.”
“Really?”
“Mais oui, Madame. Sell it for cash and then pay me in cash. It will be a très bonne affaire for you.” His eyes are ablaze with thoughts of a good business proposition, particularly if it is noir and therefore tax-free. We saunter toward the roof’s edge, preparing to descend the rear wall of the building by a ladder which I have placed there expressly for this purpose.
Di Fazio signals me to go ahead. I twist and lower myself onto the first rung, stepping cautiously because descending backward down ladders always makes me queasy. I leave him to follow. He is a hefty man and, I assume, will wait until I have reached solid ground before climbing aboard, but he doesn’t. I am only two rungs beneath him when I feel his weight and the ladder begins to shift. “I have discovered your secret, Madame,” he bellows from above. I wish he wouldn’t talk now. I try to hurry, concentrating on reaching terra firma.
“I told my wife. But no one else. I’ll keep it to myself. You don’t want the entire village gossiping.”
Whatever this secret of his is, it is amusing him greatly. I stare into the soles of his thick workman’s shoes while trying to avoid the not very pretty sight of his blue trousers flapping around extremely hairy legs. He is laughing so loudly that the ladder is now slapping back and forth against the wall. I picture us crashing to the ground, a damaged heap of limbs and metal.
“Tell me in a minute!” I yell, flinging myself to the ground, which seems the preferable alternative. From there, flushed and giddy, I await his revelation. “What secret, Mr. Di Fazio?”
His eyes are twinkling like those of a big kid who has uncovered the whereabouts of stashed sweets. “Pas un mot.” One finger is raised and pressed against his pouting mouth.
“But surely—”
“Ssssh. My lips are sealed.” How he loves to play-act, to revel in his moment of drama.
I shrug and lead the way to the front terraces. I have no idea what he is talking about. Surely not that le monsieur and myself are not yet married? He winks and shakes my hand ferociously, transmitting his soot to me in the process. “You are busy, Madame, I must leave you to your work. Don’t worry, your secret is safe with me.” And off he goes, clattering down the drive in his rickety bus filled to bursting with old sinks, bits of pipes and blackened chimney brushes.
Frankly, I am baffled. Still, his suggestion about selling the wood appeals to me. Unfortunately, I am not quite sure how to go about finding myself a purchaser, until one morning a few days later, returning by the back roads from a gym I have recently joined, at the wheel of an antiquated Renault 4 I have just purchased for five thousand francs, I pass a fenced field stocked meters high with lengths of tree trunks. I park the car to take a look. Beyond the gate, which is locked, is a small wooden hut. A notice is pinned to its door. I clamber onto the lower of the wrought-iron rails and peer over, searching for a telephone number or the hours of service, but its message is too faint to read. I glance at my watch. Twenty past twelve. No doubt the patron has closed up for a hearty two- to three-hour lunch break. It’s no problem; this little entreprise tucked away in the woods is barely five minutes’ drive along the circular lane that skirts the foot of our hill. I resolve to return later and, in the meantime, dash to the village to buy myself an olive and tomato fougasse before the baker closes for his lunch and another bout of baking.
Approaching the village square on foot, I spy Mr. Dolfo, our good-natured electrician. The poor fellow looks hot and flustered, locked in desperate combat with his van, the engine of which is screeching. It whines and starts to overheat, as does he, all in an attempt to reverse into what seems to me to be a perfectly generous parking space. When he claps eyes on me, he abandons all further shots at parking and simply switches off the engine. I am a little taken aback, because the vehicle is skewed at a rather dangerous angle, a fact which concerns him not a bit as he steps out and greets me heartily, shaking my hand as though I had just informed him that he has won le Loto. “Bonjour,” say I, still regarding his atrocious parking. I am ravenous and fearful of losing out on lunch. I make a move to leave, but he grips my hand fast and murmurs in a highly confidential manner: “We had no idea, Madame. Je suis désolé.”
“About what?”
“Et enchanté.”
This has to be Di Fazio’s doing.
On the far side of the place, I regard the automated shutters of the boulangerie creeping toward the ground. My breakfast consisted of two cups of black coffee, I have worked out for two hours and I have nothing edible in the house. “I have to go…”
“Mr. Di Fazio said pas un mot, so pas un mot.” He winks, releases my hand and wanders off aimlessly with a wave and complicitous nod.
Hurrying across the cobbles to purchase my loaf, I am all but flattened by a speeding Peugeot 5 which, after missing me, narrowly escapes swiping the entire hood off our electrician’s ill-parked van. In the smoke-filled tabac, alongside the bakers, a village resident I have noticed once or twice presses his thick speckled nose against the window and, beer and cigarette in hand, heeds me lasciviously as I hurry back to my car.
I cannot imagine what story our plumber is spreading around!
BEFORE DI FAZIO BEGINS work or guests arrive, I have a few days to organize my summer. I have scripts to write. Gardens I want to create. Books to buy, a restock after the robbery. I browse in air-conditioned bibliothèques, hunting the ABCs of olive farming. In my quest for knowledge of the olive, its history and farming, I buy everything I can lay my hands on. I learn that there are certain esteemed connoisseurs who hold that the olive oil produced around Nice has only one rival, the Italian variety from Lucca. Others pronounce that the fruit produced here on this French Riviera coast is second to none. It yields the finest virgin pressed oil in the world, as well as the most expensive. Legend has it that Adam’s grave was planted with an olive tree. I cannot think how this could be substantiated, but given the Middle Eastern locales of the Old Testament, it is not implausible. As tales go, I rather prefer the one about the battle between Poseidon, god of the seas, and Athena, goddess of wisdom, for the title of the city of Athens. The gods named the city after her rather than him because she planted the first olive tree within the Acropolis as a symbol of peace and prosperity, and the gods judged her legacy to mankind more fruitful than any of Poseidon’s trident-bashing, art-of-war chicaneries. (Women had the ruling vote on this: there were more goddesses than gods.)
Getting back to facts: olive trees thrive best in Mediterranean climes. They will grow and produce in stony as well as well-drained soils and will survive happily at lofty altitudes, where other fruit trees would perish. Once established, they need little attention, minimal water and can withstand all but the severest of droughts and even frost, if the temperature does not drop beneath 45°F for any length of time. These gnarled and characterful plants survive for centuries but commence production at a tortoiselike pace. They do not produce their first fruits until they are seven or eight years old and will not deliver the full extent of their bounteous crops until fifteen, even twenty, years old. For any farmer who is beginning from scratch, it is a long-term investment. Fortunately, that is not the case at our place, but it might explain why it is illegal in southern France to chop down an olive tree. Any road or building must be constructed around existing trees.
I stroll our dusty tracks flanked with the silvery trees, the sky above me Gauloise blue, digesting the knowledge I am amassing, seeing the cleared land anew. Now that we are rid of the stranglehold of weeds, I spend delicious time alone examining trunks and roots, the hang of the branches, the fattening drupes. The ancients deemed the olive tree a healer, and I feel its soothing power at work on me, chilling me out, slowing me down.
On my return to the house, to my work, I observe two magpies warning off a russet fox, a battle for territory which the fox loses. The magpies send the rather sleek creature scuttling off into the undergrowth.
I HAVE BEEN AT MY trestle table scribbling notes, lost in the history of the olive, and have left my return visit to the wood store till late in the afternoon, but upon arrival, I find the place still padlocked behind its iron gate. I hang around for a bit, kicking my heels, wondering if I should leave a note and, if so, where best to post it. The early-summer warmth embraces me. Several retired horses are grazing in a neighboring field, and I stroll over to stroke them. I have driven by these creatures on numerous occasions but have never had reason to stop.
It is a pretty uninhabited country lane, and I decide to while away some time examining the hedgerows, in the hope that a woodman might appear. Scraggly clematis vine is climbing everywhere. A flattened milk carton lies in the road. It attracts my attention because its lettering is Arabic. I pass a bay tree as tall as a fully grown cypress. There is a peppery perfume in the air which I cannot identify. Is it wild sage? Yellow broom in full blossom brings a sweet, bright coloring to the roadside brush. Shards of green-tinted glass from bottles thrown carelessly on the tarmac threaten my feet, shod only in rope-soled espadrilles. Around the next corner is a tiny vineyard which I have noticed frequently on my trajets to and from the inland village of Mougins. The vines are years old, short and stubby and gnarled. The green fruit hangs like breasts heavy with milk. There are several cherry trees growing among the neat vine rows. Should I seek out this vine tender and ask his advice on preparation of soils, planting seasons, fruit flies, harvests, oh, a million questions? A jeep rattles past, and I am suddenly aware of how perfectly silent it is here, a meditative silence. There is no breeze. The day is still, intense.
I pause by a narrow shady lane, speckled with shoals of pebbles and the crumbling remains of last winter’s forgotten leaves. Michel has pointed out this little pathway on several occasions. It leads to the rear side of our hill, he says. I notice, because I am on foot and not beetling by in my battered old car, that a few yards down the lane the route has been barred but is not impassable. There is no red and white Défense d’entrer sign; the land probably belongs to the local commune, which has installed the gatepost in an attempt to discourage the infuriating habit some have acquired of jettisoning old sinks, fridges and rusty electrical junk anywhere and everywhere, be it country lanes, gutters or roadsides. The Arabs are normally blamed for it, but I have no idea how sound these accusations are.
I hear a mewling, or is it a bird? It is so unexpected within the silence that, at first, I take it to be one of the horses whinnying, back near the wood store. I hear it again and trace its source to farther along the lane. I had been intending to turn back but decide to take a quick peek. As I walk, slipping beneath the horizontal post, the sound grows more audible. On either side of me, the brush is thick with dozens of misshapen Portuguese oaks. They have repeatedly seeded and now struggle for light and space. In amongst them are many fluffy-fronded mimosas. There is a small clearing ahead, and at the farthest point, half the carcass of a rotting car. The sound is coming from there. As I approach, I see a gorgeous golden-bay animal lying on its side, panting heavily. It is a dog, a large shaggy one, shockingly thin. I bend and kneel, too timorous to reach out in case it snaps at me. One of its rear legs is bleeding badly. It must have ripped its flesh on the jagged, jutting metal. Gingerly, I put out a hand, and the creature bears its teeth in a ferocious grin. For a moment I wonder if I am mistaken. Might it be a wolf? It could very well be. Whichever, it is a magnificent animal, and in distress. I rise, considering what to do for the beast. I am close to home, but I couldn’t possibly carry it even if it allowed me to. And because of the barred entry, I cannot bring my old car to the rescue. I decide to hurry home, find the name of a local vet and meet him here. I start to run, and the dog lifts its head and whines miserably. I halt, look back, heart torn, then scoot fast back down the lane.
When I reach my Renault, I discover another, a shooting-brake, parked by the gate of the wood firm. A short silver-haired man is unloading two chainsaws from his trunk. I call to him, and he spins around. His face is flushed and friendly and kind. I tell him about the animal and ask for his help. He reloads the chainsaws and beckons to me. I jump in beside him, and we motor along the lane as far as the post. Together we return for the dog, who is yelping helplessly but grows defensive as we draw near. Eventually, after several fruitless attempts, the wounded animal allows us to approach and carry her—I now see that it is a her—to the trunk of the car, where she is settled on her side, hemmed in by the chainsaws, baskets, a profusion of wicker and dozens of empty wine bottles.
Back at the farm, I run in search of a couple of torn sheets and a pillow, and the dog is installed on our obsolete mattress in one of the stables—where we found the wild cats at Christmas. The man introduces himself as René and offers to take me back for my car. During this short journey, I explain to him that I had been waiting for him, with the intention of selling him recently cut wood. Pine, olive, oak. “Would you be interested?”
“Pourquoi pas?” His eyes are blue and creased, and I know instantly that I like him.
While I slip off to telephone the vet René has recommended, he examines the wood and offers me one thousand francs above the sum Di Fazio is charging for the temporary sealing of the roof. More than that, he pulls from a leather pouch in his car a very healthy bankroll of notes and pays me, on the spot, the entire sum in cash.
“Don’t you want to wait until—”
“No, no. I’ll be back with my son tomorrow. We’ll saw it into logs here, if that’s all right with you. It will be easier to transport.” I agree happily, we arrange a mutually convenient time for his return and off he goes, leaving me staring at a satisfyingly thick wad of five-hundred-franc bills.
The dog has no collar, no name and no tattoo. In France, a tattoo is obligatory. If a dog is found without one, it can be destroyed. Worse, it can be sold and used for experimentation. I am horrified and promptly arrange to spend more than half the cash René has given me on a whole host of treatments for this magnificent hound. Her paw needs a minor operation and stitching. Two teeth have been broken, almost certainly while being thrashed, on top of which, she has a stomach complaint and bleeding lacerations on a mauled hind leg. This animal doctor is hugely tall and equally rotund. He is a good-natured, bearded German from Bavaria, a really delightful fellow whose love of animals exudes from his every pore.
“Leave her with me,” he says. “I will call you in a couple of days. You can collect her when she is a little healthier. Do you know her name, by any chance?” We are talking in English because the doctor enjoys the opportunity to test out his skills.
I shake my head. “I don’t know her name,” I say.
He looks surprised, then chortles and writes something on her card while wishing me a bonne soirée and assuring me that I am not to worry.
I return home to my work, thinking about what to do with the dog when she is well again. I have not forgotten Henri and the promise I made to return for him as soon as our circumstances allow. These concerns prompt me to telephone the animal rescue center, le refuge.
When I inquire after Henri, I learn that a home was found for him shortly after we returned with him. My heart sinks, and yet I cannot begrudge dear wild Henri a decent bed. “Il est très, très content,” the administratrice informs me. I thank her, wish her well and replace the receiver, saying a silent au revoir to the big black hound who turned our lives into a spin for a few short weeks.
René does not return the next day for his prepurchased wood, nor the following. I have no telephone number for him. I did not even catch his last name. I am puzzled. Am I in possession of stolen or homemade notes which I am about to pass on to the vet and to Mr. Di Fazio who clunks up the drive, ready and eager to begin the repair on the roof?
I watch as he unloads the most gruesome collection of tools and asphalt-heating equipment, something not unlike a giant Bunsen burner. All the while, he sings and whistles and grins, nodding and bowing every time I am anywhere near him. On one occasion, as I pass by, he slaps his thigh as though he were the principal boy in a pantomime and grins, shining white teeth exposed like an open zipper within his soot-smeared face. “Pas de bottes, eh!”
Which means, No boots! It is now July. I am running about everywhere in shorts, a tube top and flat espadrilles. I have no idea what he is talking about, and I don’t want to ask, but I am beginning to fear that he might be completely balmy.
UNTIL THE END OF the twentieth century, when dieticians the world over pronounced the Mediterranean diet the healthiest in the world, the olive and its by-products were used almost exclusively in southern cuisines. The hue of the oil is as golden and luxuriant as a summer afternoon spent dozing in a hammock in the Midi. It is as familiar and vital to the kitchens of this region as, say, garlic or bouillebaisse. Quintesssentially Mediterranean, it evokes the climate, terrain and character as instantaneously as any wrinkle-faced Niçois playing boules in his dusty village square.
It was the Greeks, some twenty-five hundred years ago, who planted the first olive trees on this southern coast of France, but they spent precious little time cultivating or reaping here, they were not an agricultural people. They were navigators, explorers, seafaring traders. Moving westward, they founded such seaports as Antibes, Nice and, of course, Marseille in 600B.C.—its original Greek name was Massilia—and then they moved on. For the Greeks, the bustling port of Massilia was a watering place and a spa as they headed inland, hell-bent on securing their tin and amber routes. The citizens of Massilia spoke perfect Greek. They dressed and comported themselves like Athenians and kept well away from what they perceived as the contamination of the barbarians living all around them, the tribal Celts.
I GIVE UP ON MY writing and olive studies because Di Fazio is marching to and fro on the roof. His every step is acoustically exaggerated and shudders the house as though a giant were striding the heavens. And how he whistles and sings!
I close up my laptop and go outside for a swim, but almost as I plunge into the pool, he calls down to me, asking for a beer. He is très soif. Fair enough. The day is hot, and he is up there with a flame as high as a laurel bush. I ascend the ladder, dripping wet, to take him his beer. The heat and activity have broken him out in a sweat. Perspiration is running down his face and has washed away the soot in stripes. His face looks like a zebra’s. I hear the telephone ringing, so I hurry across the semi-surfaced roof—it is as hot as hell up there with the gas flame roaring and spitting—and begin my descent. As I turn, he holds up his bottle: “À la vôtre!”
I nod. “Good health to you, too, Monsier Di Fazio.” I smile and disappear. His cheeriness is quite extraordinary. I am about to enter the house, hurrying to the phone, when he leans out over the roof again and calls, “Et votre mari, il porte un melon aussi?” And he roars with laughter. I am thinking about it. The question he has asked is: And your husband, does he carry a melon as well?
“‘ello?”
It is the vet’s young receptionist. “No Name is ready to be collected.” No Name! I smile and tell her that I will be by in a short while. I have decided to keep the dog until she is fit, and then… I haven’t thought that far ahead yet. Michel is arriving later this evening. I intend to discuss the dog with him.
Although the vet’s bill is somewhere in the region of five thousand francs, about five hundred pounds, he refuses to accept one centime. “Why?”
“Because No Name was not your responsibility and because you have given us many hours of pleasure. In Germany, the program is called The Doctor and His Dear Friends. I will accept a signed photograph of you, and that will be my payment.” I am bowled over by his kindness and delighted to set eyes on the dog, who is now answering to No Name. She is bandaged from snout to neck, ears exposed and erect, and has another dressing protecting the wounded hind leg. It does not inhibit her ability to walk, albeit with a limp. She wags her tail at the sight of me, so I cannot have been entirely forgotten. Armed with a dozen boxes of antibiotics, I lead her gingerly to the car, and she follows without a whimper.
“Hard to believe,” says the vet who accompanies us, “that anyone would abandon this creature. She’s a purebred Belgian shepherd and a particularly splendid example of the race. If you can’t keep her, let me know. I’ll have no difficulty finding a home for her.”
When I return, our chirpy plumber has packed up for the weekend, but the wood has still not been removed. I settle No Name in a makeshift basket and head for the airport.
Michel is tired. Actually, he looks exhausted and speaks only in monosyllables about his production affairs, but I can read in his expression how pleased he is to be here. On the journey home, I am recounting the adventures of my week while he listens, silently stroking my shoulder and hair.
My pride at selling the wood, the vet’s kindness… oh, yes, there’s a dog, and I have understood correctly, haven’t I? The word melon means melon, doesn’t it? As in English. Michel considers, pondering Di Fazio’s comment.”That was all he said: does your husband carry a melon?”
“I think so.”
“Ah, porter to wear!”
“Do you wear a melon?” I am giggling. We are now kneeling beside No Name, who is uncertain about the arrival of this unknown male, but she does not bare her teeth.
I take Michel on a swift tour of the garden to show him various shrubs and flowers I have potted and inform him blithely of my purchase from one of the village stallholders of a hundred roses, paid for in advance, to be collected when the market next passes this way. Without a hint of criticism, he tries to point out that I lack symmetry and that I am not necessarily choosing the plants that will withstand the heat. “Where will you plant a hundred roses?” he asks. “If the fellow ever comes back, that is.”
“You are cynical. Of course he’ll come back.” I wave my arm vaguely to the right. “Up there.”
“But, chérie, the earth is full of stones, and there’s no shelter or water source. It will be blazingly hot, which is not ideal for roses.”
“Sometimes you are so full of logic!”
“Überblick,” he replies warmly, which I think is his favorite word. Translated, it means overview. “Are you sure Di Fazio didn’t ask you whether your husband is a melon?”
I burst out laughing. “Why would he ask such a thing?”
“A melon is a fool, a simpleton.”
“Are you?”
“I hope not.” All this is lighthearted banter as Michel prepares the barbecue and I make a salad. We are eating on the upper terrace, looking out over the moonlit sea. The crescent of lights along the promontory of Fréjus string out and camber, winking in the darkness. Standing in the center of our clothed, temporary garden table is my oil lamp. We watch it glow, a warm ball of honeyed light. It is already past nightfall, and the evening, because we have not yet reached full summer, has turned coolish. Clad in slacks and long-sleeved shirts, we pour ourselves glasses of dark red wine. Michel brings the sizzling lamb cutlets spiced with herbs from a small vegetable patch I have been creating as I return from the house carrying the cash paid to me by René. I pour it onto the table for Michel to examine. It has spent the past few days stowed in the bottom drawer of an antique Irish pine chest we found in a junk shop in Paris, buried among our lavender-scented linen. He looks at it, then at me, queryingly.
“Why didn’t you bank it?”
I have to think a moment, because I am not exactly clear why I have left the equilavent of a thousand pounds sitting in the chest. “In case it’s counterfeit or stolen,” I confess.
Michel roars with laughter. “Chérie, you are so dramatic. It is black money, no doubt, but surely tu as déjà compris that a considerable percentage of all money that changes hands down here is earned on the black market. It is the modus vivendi. I am sure this René fellow didn’t physically make it!”
“Then why hasn’t he returned for his wood?”
“He will. This is the Midi. Everything happens in its own time.”
Yet again I have forgotten to remember that time has a different interpretation here. Tomorrow does not necessarily mean tomorrow. It means at some point in the future beyond now. And the only way to know when that might be is to cheerfully wait and see. For a woman as impatient as I am, this has to be a learning curve! I accept his wisdom, and we pass a blissful weekend without sight nor sound of workmen.
AS EVER HERE, WE rise at the first call of the sun. Now that the land has been cut back, we like to walk. This morning, we pick our way up the winding narrow track, ascending through the steep pine forest, hiking to the very pinnacle of the hill. Puffing, we drop to the needle-strewn earth, inhale the heaven-sent perfumes, sharp with a twist of early morning dew, and watch the sun rise. Its rays stream through the squiggle of treetops and blank out the crescent moon.
Daybreak. I have watched the sun rise, the breaking of the day, in myriad locations all over the world with companions or past lovers, but nowhere has it felt this blessed. Here it belongs to us and our intimacy. I close my eyes and breathe deep. Sometimes, for a moment, it feels scary to love this much.
Wending our way back down the hill to the house, we take an early-morning dip in the still, cool pool, followed by a warm bath. Together, through the window of the cavernous blue-tiled room, we watch families of rabbits steal out from beneath the stacks of wood. They poke cautious snouts and whiskers into the new day and then scamper freely, hopping about, taking stock of their newly undressed playground.
These early mornings are a treasured time of day. We have snatched them for our own. They are a part of who we are and what we share. Most of our waking hours are given over to work, weekends too, because if we don’t create, we won’t have a gnat’s chance of restoring or even holding on to this ruin of a farm.
“BREAKFAST!” CALLS MICHEL. His curly hair, which he has let grow, is damp from his bath and clings to the nape of his neck. He is tanned from the sun.
The days are growing too hot to breakfast on our hidden terrace, so we shift our wooden table and chairs to the front of the house, where the sun will not hit until after ten. Over eggs and coffee I begin to fill Michel in on some of the olive material I have been reading. “It was like a journeying caravan, like good news or a creed spreading, the way the olive tree and the production of its fruit traveled. The Greeks brought it here to southern France, but it was also exported across northern Africa to Tunisia, Algeria, Morocco. There, right across the northern littoral of that continent, the Arabs began to cultivate it. Oil was produced. Fruits marinated, recipes and methods passed on, adapted to their cooking. It found its way quite naturally into the local cuisines. Later, the olive tree sailed across the waters north to Portugal and Spain, along with Arab traders, perhaps. The two migrations in that direction from Africa were the Arabs and the Sephardic Jews.”
“Did you know,” Michel chips in, “that the Koran speaks of it as a blessed tree of neither the East nor the West?”
“No, I didn’t. I have been wondering, though, if priests, seers, ancient gurus, the family cook, a tribal grandmother, whoever, understood its mythical powers, its curative properties. Facts were handed down until somewhere in the melting pot of a more modern world, the second-millennium migrations, wars, et cetera, this knowledge was lost, and only now are we beginning to rediscover it.”
As we natter, we watch a band of bushy-tailed auburn squirrels leap from the cypresses to the lower almond tree. They are stealing the nuts we have not harvested. Their expeditions are surprisingly orderly. Two at a time, they descend upon the tree, where the branches bounce like trampolines as they gracefully land, collect their share of the hoard and then give way for the next pair. The only argument develops when a greedy magpie swoops down and begins to screech and rattle the branches. He is furious that the squirrels have beaten him to it. Several landowners I know shoot magpies; watching the birds on this estate, I am beginning to understand why.
AFTER BREAKFAST, WORK. Buried in my space, my atelier, I hear the distant clip-clipping of Michel’s busy fingers at his laptop. I open my book on the history of the olive and read that, after the Greeks, the Romans came to the south of France. Unlike the parched topography of Greece, the landscape of Italy was richer, lusher. It was more verdant and rolling. Because of this, the Romans moved more comfortably by land than sea. During their trek north and their taking of Provence—it was Caesar who christened the region Il Provincia—they quickly grasped the potential of the dusky groves growing everywhere on these hills, their recently conquered territory, and they wasted no time in cultivating the fruit.
Both the Greek and Roman cultures have left profound impressions on Provence. Both are Mediterranean peoples and both stamped their systems, philosophies and architecture on this more northerly region of what we now know as Europe. The differences in their natures has had a deep-rooted effect on Provence. The Greeks introduced the olive to the Romans, and the Romans, in their own country, husbanded and created a thriving industry from it, perfecting its storage, and then they began to do the same here.
IN THE AFTERNOONS, we make love, screened from the relentless heat by the spill of shadows from closed slatted shutters. The century-old house creaks and shifts, waking like Rip van Winkle after decades of sleeping. Then it relaxes into peaceful stillness, as do we. Our sole companion is No Name, who heals by the hour. After, I read or scribble while Michel dozes. Beyond the walls of the cool room, our magnolia has flowered. Its blossoms resemble teacups sculpted out of clotted cream.
During an evening stroll on the upper reaches of the land, we find that many of the drystone walls have sunk into rubbled piles and are slowly spilling across the terraces. They will need to be rebuilt. The removal of such a surfeit of vegetation could be the cause. The root systems may well have been holding the stones in place or, Michel suggests, it could well be sangliers in search of food. Although no wild boar have been near the house since my first encounter, it is unlikely that they have deserted our farmland entirely. We take a little tour and find their footprints everywhere and untidy holes where they have been snouting for grub. I better take heed! During our stroll back, Michel asks me how my story is getting on. “Slowly,” I reply.
“Might you have it finished by the end of summer?”
I smile and nod, knowing he is inching me toward our agreed-upon deadline. The acceptance and production of these scripts would make a monumental difference to our chances of acquiring the second five acres of land and to holding on to the farm. It would also mean a great deal to me personally, to the fashioning of this new life, the redefining of myself.
Dusk falls, shadows lengthen and we bathe in the pool basked in moonshine, then cook supper on the barbecue. I have taken to preparing the simplest of meals with lashings of olive oil, garlic and herbs. Bliss.
MONDAY ARRIVES AND we are up at the crack of deepest morn, crawling out of bed before the lark sings. Michel needs to be on the earliest flight to Paris, which means we must leave the villa at five-thirty. At the terminal, huddled in my rather temperamental fossil of a Renault, we kiss good-bye. There is heaven in this relationship, and I try not to allow a sense of abandonment or sadness at the prospect of yet another week apart. In three more weeks we will be together for the rest of the summer.
When I return to the house, having stopped off for a much-needed croissant and several cafés au lait in Antibes, Di Fazio turns into the lane. He grinds up the drive behind me.
Before we have barely uttered good morning, he announces, “You’re an actress, aren’t you?”
I nod, feeling at this particular moment more like a bag lady. He roars triumphantly. I am puzzled as to how he has acquired this tidbit but know that it must please him, for he has been regaling me regularly with stories of a highly renowned French pianist and chanteur who, according to Di Fazio, lives not too far from us and whose pipes this plumber has replaced. “Plumber to the stars!” he cries exuberantly, and I picture his vision of it, written in bold paint across the beam of that clonking banger.
One of the characteristics I most love about the French is their appreciation of the arts. We are all, even the humblest of entertainers, les artistes in the eyes of the French. The very mention of the word actress, or even better, writer, fills them with apoplexisms of delight and awed respect. Di Fazio is no exception.
“I saw you on television, didn’t I?”
I shrug. It is possible, but I cannot think what he might have seen. Little if anything I have ever acted in has been bought by the French networks. I understand that All Creatures Great and Small has been shown all over the world except France. Even in Poland, before the fall of communism, when all American and English programs were banned, All Creatures slipped through the system and continued to be screened.
“You are very famous. I had no idea.”
I head on toward the house because he has overestimated my notoriety, because I fear that our plumbing bills are about to escalate and because I am feeling lonesome. But not for long! Amar arrives with an army of ouvriers or jardiniers who unload what looks like an entire forestry commission project’s worth of shrubs and laurel bushes. Definitely way beyond the number we ordered. And then he departs, leaving his équipe to go to work. I steam down the drive. Shovels, rakes, garden utensils of every shape and size are digging, hacking at pine branches, throwing sods of earth every which way, transforming the face of our border land.
“Stop!” I screech.
There is no leader here to take heed. I am the madwoman from atop the hill. Sun-baked faces stare, eyes glare, but they return to the job in hand, the contract they are being paid for, no doubt at a menial rate. I dread to think what Amar will charge for all of this, and I hurtle back to my papers in search of his telephone number. This has to be stopped before I find we have purchased an entire garden center!
While this performance is at play, René arrives, followed by a bevy of cars, all of which have open trailers attached. Our drive is now completely blocked by vehicles. Even if I wanted to escape, I couldn’t.
René, who is a little over five feet five tall, leads his party up the hill. Fit and stocky with a wine-tinted face and a shock of gray hair which grows so thick and lustrous it almost doubles his height, he begins organizing his gang, all of whom are wielding chainsaws. No Name begins to bark. Then there is Di Fazio above me on the roof, melting and pouring asphalt, unloading and raking gallons of gravel, singing his socks off, five chainsaws zirring at full whack in the pine forest above while, lower down the terraces, shovels slap against stones, branches crack and hit the earth, voices yell… I cannot hear myself think or speak, and I am screaming like a lunatic into the telephone, insisting to Amar that he come over here right now and put a stop to all this planting.
“But the plumbago will be magnificent. Blue creeping up through all those cedar trees. It will be splendid.”
“But we didn’t order plumbago, and we can’t afford it! We don’t even have a fence yet.”
He sighs and agrees to be there as soon as he can. The prospect of not receiving his money seems to have clarified his sense of reason. I put down the phone and run my fingers through hair that hasn’t been combed since I got out of bed, when I barely had time to brush my teeth. I catch a glimpse of myself in the mirror and see how utterly disheveled I look. Somewhere distant, in the village of Le Cannet, where Bonnard painted some of his finest works and Rita Hayworth lived out many of her later years, the midday siren sounds, and as though a switch has been flicked, all work activity stops. Ah, silence. From a dozen quarters, men tramp to the parking area and pull from their various cars, vans, trucks—or, in the case of Amar’s Arabs, their satchels—lunch. Each seeks out the shade or a step to perch on. I watch from a window, fascinated. The Arabs each have small plastic lunchboxes similar to those given to school-children. Within, I see sandwiches and a piece of fruit, an apple or a banana. They also have bottles of still water; the Crystal, which is for sale at one franc a liter. They sit on the ground alongside or close by one another, always in the deepest shade.
Elsewhere are the French.
René and his chainsaw gang are unfolding and setting up a portable table. Onto it are placed unlabeled bottles of rosé and red wine, water, paté, salad, plates, saucepans of hot food (how, I ask myself?), while knives and forks are passed out like leaflets. These are followed by glasses which, when filled, are raised while each drinks the health of the rest. Di Fazio, who is alone but French—more precisely Riviera-Mediterranean, because his family hailed from Italy a couple of generations back—hovers close by his fellow citizens, wishing them bon appétit.
The Arabs munch in businesslike silence.
The French still have preparations afoot. Di Fazio walks over to his prehistoric bus and pulls out a cooler, from which he extracts chilled water and two bottles of beer. He paces the parking area, slugging back the beers, one directly after the other, in thirsty need. The water is then poured over his head, which now renders him the complexion of an albino. He saunters over to René and his troupe and begins to make conversation. His voice is loud, but his accent is so thick I have no idea what he is talking about; whatever the subject matter is, it calls for a great deal of gesticulating. The others are entranced. So am I, but for different reasons. I find this social spectacle fascinating. Even the Arabs, whom Di Fazio swings to face one or twice to include them in his storytelling, seem hooked. Di Fazio is now acting out with great pizzazz what looks like a bank robbery. Two fingers go up in the style of a child’s gunplay. Then he slinks his portly body about, as though imitating a woman, slaps his calves, makes a kick in the air as though booting someone off the face of the earth, before his gaze is reverentially raised in the direction of the house.
It is only then that it dawns on me, as all eyes turn toward the villa and I jump guiltly out of sight, that the female impersonation was meant to be of me!
Monsieur le plombier then makes a gesture that I have noticed is very common here in the Midi. It is a shaking of the hand, thumb turned upward, that denotes wealth or power or serious money. Even his French audience has stopped eating, so spellbound are they by his gossip. Is he telling them that we robbed a bank? But he hasn’t even been paid yet, and if the cash noir, stashed in the linen drawer and burning an illicit hole in our sheets, is stolen, it is René’s!
Fortunately, the arrival of Amar breaks up the party. He heads over to his workforce and wishes them bon appétit, repeating the same to the French contigent. I exit the house and make my way to him, feeling just a mite self-conscious. As Amar and I approach each other, René calls to me: “C’est vous qui jouez dans chapeau melon et bottes de cuir?”
Everyone awaits my response to “Is it you who is playing in a melon hat and leather boots?” Having no idea what this means or what to reply, I take the Midi approach and shrug. This they translate as an exceedingly modest affirmative. René rises to shake my hand, as does one of his companions who already looks the worse for wine and keeps repeating: “Enchanté, madame. Vous êtes charmante, charmante.”
Panic drives me to grab Amar by the arm and drag him down the hill. Nothing I say now will convince him we purchased this olive farm and are attempting to renovate it on an already fraying shoestring. Di Fazio has scuppered everything. Still, after persistant nagging, Amar agrees to dig up those shrubs not agreed upon. But he says that because he cannot take back the bags of fertilizer and horse dung that have been laid and shoveled everywhere, they must all be paid for. When I query the astronomical figure charged for horse manure, he tells me that it is a particularly potent mix since these sacks have been collected from a stud farm! The finest stallions. He smiles wickedly.
I can barely credit the sheer ingenuity of his invention. Yet again he has managed to augment his contract fee by a substantial sum. I thank him for his cooperation and resolve that this will be his last, very last, job for us. Thank goodness I ordered the roses elsewhere.
Later, when Michel and I talk on the phone, he agrees that the time has come to look around for someone else. We say good night, sending love through the airwaves, and I almost forget that I haven’t told him about Di Fazio’s latest pantomime. I narrate it hastily, and Michel is highly amused. “A bowler hat and leather boots,” he explains. “Yes, I didn’t think of that.”
“A bowler hat and leather boots?” I repeat like the simpleton described in French as a melon.
“Melon also means bowler hat. Because of its shape. In this instance, it is the French name for a British television program.”
“Which is?”
“I can’t remember the title in English. I’ll think of it and tell you tomorrow.”
“Have I acted in it?”
“I don’t think so. I’ll remember it, don’t worry.”
The village gossip is spreading with the relentless persistence of the bush telegraph. As a consequence, the entire community now has me identified, I learn, as the actress who played the role of Emma Peel in the hit television series The Avengers. It is cult viewing here in France. The French title is The Bowler Hat (as worn by Steed) and Leather Boots (as worn by Ms. Peel). No amount of negatives will shift their opinion. In fact, it serves only to confirm their conviction. They smile patiently, reading my effusive denials as modesty and a plea for the rights of les artistes to live their lives in peace. In the eyes of the locals, I am a glamorous actress. But what most amuses me about this whole affair is my crazy response to it.
I was wild here, scruffy and at ease. Now that I have been found out and labeled, albeit mistakenly, I switch like a programmed puppet into actress mode whenever curious eyes are upon me. Instead of leaping into my battered car and racing down the hill to catch the postman or pick up a forgotten baguette, I now take the trouble to run a brush through my pool-bleached curls. I don lipstick and mascara and trade in my stitch-worn, faded cotton espadrilles for polished toenails and leather sandals with tiny heels which show off my legs. Such vanity! The public perception which so easily ends up defining the boundaries of character. It was part of what I have been running from.
NOT LONG AFTER THE Romans began to press the oil here in France, rather than using the method of the more popular Italian family-run businesses, the cooperative system was established. Small community mills were constructed, and the olives were taken there by the locals to press or cure. Although there were, and still are, many single estates and farms cultivating their own olive groves, very few, if any, own a private mill. It has long been the norm here in France to take the harvest to one of the nearby cooperatives where the fruit is pressed—as a single-estate extra-virgin oil—and sold or used locally. Since Appassionata is modest, Michel and I agree to use this system. The finest olive oil is extremely costly because it is a very labor-intensive process. The trees do not demand heavy watering but they need to be fumigated, pruned regularly—usually biannually on a rota system—and treated once every twenty-one days from around mid-July to early or late October, depending on the weather. Although I am learning all this, it is not until I finally encounter “our man” and we begin to work with him that I understand the challenge we are taking on.
CALM RETURNS. Di Fazio’s reparations are complete, and I hand over the agreed sum in cash. René’s cash. Di Fazio counts it carefully and requests one last beer for the road, which he drinks in two gulps before trundling off down the hill, a contented man.
The laurel bushes are planted. Begrudgingly, I settle Amar’s account with him, the agreed sum plus many hundreds of francs for the manure. I must water the shrubs on a daily basis, he advises. Then, as he takes off, he calls back a parting shot: he cannot be held responsible for their life expectancy, because, due to the escalating heat, nothing should be planted this time of year. “It’s too risky!” I want to throw my gardening tools at him.
Fearful that the precious new bushes will begin to wilt before my eyes, I abandon my writing and rush directly to buy several lengths of hose which René very kindly offers to help me knit together. I am grateful for his generosity because the whole business is unnecessarily time-consuming and complicated, with plastic sockets which in my hands simply will not marry. After much frustrated fiddling, we eventually lay the hose, which winds like a yellow serpent, nudged up against the Italian stone staircase, all the way to the bushes at the foot of the land.
While I was at the hardware store, René sawed the last of the trees. The logs have since been carted away in remorques by various members of his family. All activity is at an end. Evening is approaching, so as thanks for his much-needed assistance, I invite him to stay for un petit apéritif, which he accepts.
Pastis? No, he prefers to join me in a glass of red wine. With the bottle, a Côte-du-Rhône Villages, I serve a humble dish of local olives and another of pistachio nuts because I haven’t had time to shop. We sit in contemplative silence, listening to the frogs and inhaling the perfumes of dusk.
“Are these from your trees?” He has an olive pinched between his workman’s fingers.
I shake my head.
“You know, since I retired, I live my rêve,” he tells me. “The wood business is not mine. I am helping a friend who cannot afford an assistant.”
He asks me to guess his age. It is a game I always try to avoid, but in this case I decide to not subtract five years and speak my mind. “Early sixties” is my pronouncement.
He sits up straight in his chair and shakes his head, thrilled by my mistake. Seventy-four, he announces with pride. And indeed he has every reason to be proud, for I am genuinely amazed.
His two great pleasures in life, he tells me, now that he has passed seventy and has settled into retirement, la retraite, are his boat, which he takes out most fine days to the islands—ah, the islands!—and he spends lazy hours fishing, and the husbanding of olive farms. He oversees and runs four, the largest of which boasts over two hundred trees. That particular estate is owned by a long-standing chum of his. They were boys together. Both were educated here in the village. His school pal, René continues without the slightest hint of jealousy, is a multimillionaire and the proprietor of the largest and most famous chain of hardware stores in southern France. René speaks of his septuagenarian companion with fondness but of himself with pride. “He works too hard, has too many responsibilities. Mais moi, I do what I love in life. I have over six hundred and fifty olive trees in my care.” And he sweeps up his glass, proposing a toast to doing what one loves in life. I drink to that! Then with a twinkle, and not without a soupçon of Provençal wiliness, he adds, “You have the perfect position here. The fruit from your trees must be excellent. Tragic to let it go to waste. Why not allow me to care for them for you?”
I am silenced by his proposition. This is so much more than I had hoped for at this stage. My sole regret is that Michel is not here to share this fortuitous moment.
The bottle has grown lighter as evening has fallen. I pour what remains into our glasses, and he gives me the deal. He will prune and treat the trees, gather the olives and deliver them for pressing at the moulin. For this service he demands two thirds of everything farmed and pressed. We will receive the remaining third.
I had thought we might share the harvest on a fifty-fifty basis, but he shakes his head firmly. He is adamant. Ce boulot requires a great deal of labor, skill and expertise. I nod, knowing this to be true from my books and study, and accept René’s proposition without debate. We raise our glasses to the partnership.
The sun is sinking into underbelly tones, gold seeping into tender flesh-pink. I have lived my life through my senses, looked at, experienced it through prisms of light and emotions. Touching, feeling. Now I am attempting to be not less romantic but more practical, particularly about the renovating of this villa and the reestablishing of its olive farm. Michel describes it as honing new muscles. Still, I hope when he meets René he will agree that fate has dropped a nugget of good fortune into our laps; instinct tells me we have chanced upon our man.