A little bit of dribble never hurt anyone
‘Leckerbissen!’ cried Freja. ‘That’s it, isn’t it? That’s the name of the chocolate shop where Vivi will be working!’
Freja pointed along the quiet cobbled street. The building was five storeys high, its entire yellow façade covered with a painting of a vine. Starting at the ground beside the door, the tendrils stretched upward, weaving in and around each of the windows. Green leaves and golden pears sprouted along the way. Birds, rabbits, ibex, marmots and children nestled in the branches. At street level, the shop had two wide, arched windows, completely unadorned. People walking by could clearly see the delicacies that lay within, which would be sure to turn them from passers-by into customers. Above the windows, a sign dangled from the paws of a brass rabbit at one end and a brass squirrel at the other. In gold lettering, it announced: ‘Leckerbissen’.
The girl, the dog and the writer stared, smiling. At least, Freja and Tobias were smiling. Finnegan was licking his own nose, making sure to reach right up into his nostrils.
‘It’s the prettiest building I’ve ever seen!’ cried Freja.
‘It’s jolly, that’s for sure,’ agreed Tobias. ‘Shall we go in?’
‘Yes, please,’ said Freja.
‘You stay here, Finnegan,’ said Tobias, patting the dog on the head.
Finnegan wagged his tail, licked Tobias’ hand, then trotted down the street towards a butchery.
Stepping through the door, Freja was delighted to see that Leckerbissen was every bit as pretty inside as out. One of the walls was even painted with the same rambling vines, but here, bears, cuckoo clocks and a life-sized cow also nestled in its branches.
One half of the shop was dedicated to displaying as much chocolate as possible. A long wide table and an entire wall of shelves were filled with plates and trays and bowls of chocolates — small chocolates piled into pyramids, wide thin slabs of chocolate stacked like timber, chocolate eggs and buttons and balls filling bowls to overflowing. None of the chocolate was covered but open to the air and free to be poked or licked as the fancy might strike. A second table was covered in cake stands laden with chocolate biscuits, chocolate tarts, chocolate éclairs, chocolate cupcakes and large chocolate gâteaux that were decorated with all manner of curls and flowers and spikes and leaves, all made, of course, from chocolate!
The other side of the shop, the one with the vine-covered wall, was set up as a café. Round marble tables and black spindle-back chairs stood in two neat rows. A dozen customers sat, sipping mugs of hot chocolate, nibbling truffles, gobbling forkfuls of cake. Conversation was quiet and muffled and seemed to consist mainly of murmurs: ‘Mmmm-mmm!’ and ‘Ooooh!’ and ‘Aaaah!’ High above, four enormous chandeliers dripped with glass pears and porcelain bluebirds in place of the usual crystals.
At the back of the shop was a glass wall through which the kitchen and all of its chocolatey melting and moulding and baking and making could be viewed. Two men and a woman dashed about, their white aprons flapping, their chocolate-smeared fingers wriggling, their faces smiling.
Of course they’re smiling, thought Freja. Who wouldn’t be happy to work in such a place?
‘My word!’ gasped Tobias. ‘Look at the size of that block of chocolate back there in the kitchen! Why, it’s so big one could hide something truly ghastly inside.’ Taking a pencil and notebook from his trouser pocket, he began to write, muttering, ‘Chocolate . . . thick and heavy . . . concealing a gun . . . or a knife . . . or a hand grenade . . .’ He stopped writing, stared at the ceiling and scratched his head with the point of his pencil. His face broke into a grin and he wrote once more. ‘Body parts!’
‘What about the smell?’ asked Freja.
‘Oh, I don’t think the body parts would smell when concealed in chocolate! No, no, no. They would be nicely sealed in — every bit as snug as if they were popped into an airtight container.’
‘Not the body parts,’ sighed Freja. Tobias drifted off into the world of his crime writing at the strangest of moments. ‘I’m talking about the delicious smell of this shop, Leckerbissen!’
Tobias stared at her for a moment. He blinked, tucked his pencil behind his ear and stuffed the notebook back in his pocket. He nodded, shut his eyes and inhaled deeply through his nose. ‘Mmmm! A symphony of aromas!’
Freja smiled and shut her own eyes. She lifted her nose a little and sniffed. Once. Twice. Three times. ‘Everything good is here,’ she said. ‘Warm sweet milk, bittersweet cocoa, caramel vanilla, coffee toffee, creamy truffle, truffley cream, dusty hazelnuts, walnutty butter, almonds and joy.’
‘Herzlich Willkommen!’
Freja’s eyes flew open. A pleasantly plump woman stepped through the glass door from the kitchen into the shop. She had silver-blonde hair tucked up into a white scarf and wore a large white apron. She held a bowl of melted chocolate in the crook of her arm and was stirring it with a wooden spoon. Her smile was broad with a trace of chocolate in the corners.
Freja smiled back. ‘Hello. I mean, guten Tag.’
‘Ah. You are English,’ said the woman, and she continued to speak with a wonderful German accent that rumbled and rolled and turned w’s into v’s and many other sounds into z’s. ‘You are warmly welcomed to Leckerbissen. That means titbit. Yummy stuff. You sound like a true lover of the chocolate, ja? You have a nose for the aromas! A heart for the joy!’
Freja blushed. ‘I do like chocolate,’ she whispered.
The woman smiled. ‘I, too, like the chocolate. Nein! That is a big fat lie. I lo-o-o-ove the chocolate! I live for the chocolate! Which is why I am a chocolatier and the owner of Leckerbissen. My name is Frau —’
‘Niederhauser,’ finished Tobias. ‘We know of you already because our friend Vivi is arriving tomorrow to work with you.’ Tobias blushed and his mouth twitched into a silly grin.
‘Ah, Vivi!’ cried the chocolatier. ‘The Italian chef who is coming from France to Switzerland. Delightful! And you are . . . ?’
Tobias stepped forward. ‘I am Tobias Appleby.’ He offered his hand for a shake, then realised that the woman’s hands were already full. They both laughed.
Frau Niederhauser held out her wooden spoon and said, ‘In Switzerland, a slurp of melted chocolate is every bit as good as a handshake. Here! Taste this.’
So Tobias did! He leaned forward and slurped straight from the spoon. He licked his lips and grinned. ‘Sensational!’ he cried. Chocolate smeared outward from the corners of his mouth making his smile wider — and browner — than usual.
Frau Niederhauser nodded her approval and held the spoon towards Freja.
Freja stepped forward, ran her finger through the melted chocolate and licked it. ‘Mmmm! Delicious!’ She sighed. ‘I’m Freja Peachtree. And I’m extremely pleased to meet you and your chocolate.’
Frau Niederhauser laughed and plopped the spoon back into the bowl.
‘But our germs!’ cried Freja.
‘It is not a problem,’ said the woman. ‘We have no germs that matter. This chocolate is the highest quality in the world. Good chocolate is powerful. It can overcome the most sinister of germs. It has the capacity to heal the body, to improve the memory, to soothe the soul and to mend the broken heart! Ask anyone in Switzerland and they will tell you the same. We are great believers in the chocolate!’
Waving her hand to indicate the tables of chocolates and cakes, she cried, ‘We do not cover any of our chocolate here in Leckerbissen. The fragrance must be allowed to float and roam and tickle the noses of our customers. Precisely as it has yours. And if someone should poke or squeeze, dribble or lick, we do not become hysterical. Nobody has ever complained that my chocolate has made them ill. The only comments I am given are of how delicious, how soothing, how transforming are my chocolate delights!’ She popped her large stirring spoon into her mouth and pulled it out with a slurp. She smiled widely, her lips now thickly coated in dark chocolate.
Freja beamed back at her.
‘Mami! We are ready!’ A tall, thin man poked his head from the kitchen door. His apron and chef’s cap were spotlessly clean, shining in their whiteness, but his smiling face was smeared with chocolate.
‘Ah, François-Louis!’ cried Frau Niederhauser. ‘Come! Come! You must meet our customers. They are friends of the chef, Vivi, who arrives tomorrow — Tobias Chocolatey and Freja Sweet-tea.’
Freja giggled.
‘This,’ said Frau Niederhauser, inflating with pride, ‘is my oldest son, François-Louis. He is named after the great François-Louis Cailler, the Swiss gentleman who invented the first ever chocolate bar in 1819.’
François-Louis’ smile stretched even wider. He clicked his heels and gave a bow of his head.
A second tall, thin man, dressed also in a white chef’s hat and apron, poked his head over François-Louis’ shoulder.
‘And this,’ cried Frau Niederhauser, ‘is my second son, Daniel. He is named after the great Daniel Peter, son-in-law of François-Louis Cailler and the Swiss gentleman who invented milk chocolate.’
Daniel stepped to the side of his brother, clicked his heels and bowed. Then he reached out, grabbed a large round chocolate from the top of a pile, popped it into his mouth and smiled, lips closed, cheek bulging.
Freja smiled back, deciding that she liked Daniel and François-Louis already.
‘Spiffing!’ cried Tobias. ‘It must be a delight to have both your sons working with you as chocolatiers.’
Frau Niederhauser frowned. ‘But of course! What else would they want to do with their lives? François-Louis is a sculptor of chocolate and Daniel is the master of fillings. They are the best in their fields — the best in all of Switzerland.’
‘François-Louis is the best chocolate sculptor in the world!’ cried Daniel. ‘Wait until you see what he has created this week!’
The two young men ducked back into the kitchen, disappearing behind a tall stand filled with bowls and chocolate moulds and piping bags.
François-Louis poked his head back into sight and yelled, ‘Close the eyes, Freja Sweet-tea and Tobias Chocolatey!’
Frau Niederhauser raised her eyebrows and nodded at the girl and the writer. So they closed their eyes.
When, finally, they were instructed, ‘Now open the eyes,’ they were not disappointed. In the middle of the shop, right in front of them, stood a life-sized cow, sculpted completely from chocolate. The cow’s head was crowned with a wreath of chocolate flowers, a chocolate bell hung from her neck and she stood in a chocolate meadow dotted with white chocolate edelweiss.
The customers in the café all rose from their seats and gathered around. They oohed and aahed, then broke into a round of applause. Freja and Tobias joined in.
François-Louis beamed. He held out the corners of his apron, curtseyed and said, ‘Danke! Danke!’ over and over again.
Daniel held up his hand and cried, ‘But wait! There is more!’ Ducking back into the kitchen, he returned with a tottering stack of golden boxes which he placed on the edge of the table. Removing the topmost box, he opened its lid to reveal a miniature chocolate cow, no bigger than a kitten but an exact replica of François-Louis’ life-sized cow.
‘And the filling, Daniel?’ asked Frau Niederhauser, her cheeks glowing with pride.
‘Cream of caramel cow!’ Daniel announced. ‘A new caramel made with Swiss butter, pure cream from Herr Keller’s dairy, brown sugar from the Caribbean that is so dark it is almost black, and . . .’ He stopped and gave a cheeky grin. ‘Well, if I told you about the final ingredients, I would have to kill you all because it is a secret.’
The customers chuckled, then began to push and shove and rush to the table to grab a golden box with one of the cows.
Freja smiled up at Tobias. ‘Clementine loves cows,’ she whispered.
‘And chocolate,’ said Tobias.
‘And caramel,’ added Freja.
‘Gift sorted!’ cried Tobias.
Ten minutes later, they left the store with a chocolate cow in a gold box, a cellophane bag of chocolate buttons tied at the top with a pink satin bow and a large square box of chocolate truffles tied up with a turquoise ribbon the colour of the River Reuss.
Finnegan was waiting for them outside the door, sauerkraut, melted cheese and shreds of newspaper tangled in his fur. He had, it seemed, found some rubbish bins to raid while waiting for them. He grinned and dribbled on Freja’s boot. Freja pulled a string of melted cheese from behind his ear.
Tobias looked at his watch. ‘It’s time,’ he said.
Freja’s heart skipped a beat. But whether it was from joy or fear she could not quite tell.