Mme Pomfort’s living room was dimly lit and felt like a mole’s hole to Katherine. The old widow was surrounded by framed photos on every surface, interspersed with small figurines of seventeenth-century noblemen and women in frilly costumes. Her furniture was upholstered and heavy, the drapes thick like those at the museum but not as rich, the lamp shades darkened by age from what was once probably cream to a dull tan. Today, the shutters on her living room windows were open, which helped, but Katherine couldn’t live without more light. She speculated, as Madame fussed over a tray of Marie biscuits and coffee, if the gloom might explain the stern demeanor of Reigny’s social lioness.
Mme Pomfort spent the first fifteen minutes of Katherine’s visit criticizing the newcomer to Reigny. “If you ask me, that Josephine Lacrois doesn’t care one bit for her poor old grandfather. You watch, she’ll sell his house to some foreigner an hour after he’s laid to rest.”
Like Michael and me? Katherine thought. But that had to be better than seeing the building continue its slow crumbling into the rocky earth. Instead, she said, “How is he?”
“Not good, not good. His lungs, you know. I remember when he was quite the man, running his tabac, knowing everything that went on in the town, quite the life of the party then.”
This cast not only M. Lacrois, whom she had only seen a few times, in a shabby sports coat and wooly scarf, slowly negotiating the badly paved road near his house, but Madame herself in a different light. The life of the party? Was this a party at which the stern Mme Pomfort was also a guest? Katherine tried to picture her as a young woman but got nowhere. “Did you know his wife?”
“Poor thing, she died of the pneumonia after the war. We had nothing then, you see, everyone so poor, the Germans having robbed us of our livestock, our crops, even our cars and trucks. When they left, we had to start all over again. Those were bad years, the children didn’t have milk, and so much sickness.” She shook herself. “But let us not dwell on what we cannot change, Mme Goff.”
“We may lose a resident when M. Lacrois dies, but we will be gaining one soon since Marie and Raoul are about to become parents.”
“Yes, that will be something to celebrate. She is a good girl and he, well, he may be a farmer one day. But they respect the ways of their elders.”
Katherine smiled. So there was a way to get into Madame’s good graces. Be French, have relatives from Reigny, fit in without making waves, and bring new life into this old town.
They chatted a while longer and Katherine asked if Madame was going to the memorial for the slain butcher’s wife. “No, she was not from here and I didn’t know her other than to say hello on my market days. She made the finest pâtés in the region, although they were too expensive, and I expect her reputation as a charcutier is one reason people will attend. That and to gossip about her killer.” She paused. “Nevertheless, her cooking talent should be recognized.” It came out, as most of the things Mme Pomfort said, as a statement of protocol, a dictum laid down by some ancient Reigny-sur-Canne social magistrate, whom it was Madame’s duty as a distant descendent of the Bonapartes to uphold.
The mention of talent did give Katherine the opening to brag a bit about Michael’s news, most of which seemed to go over the old woman’s head. Streaming songs? American concerts? Country rock music? She nodded her head in the appearance of interest but made only a few noncommittal sounds before signaling that the visit was over by standing abruptly.
Back on the street, Katherine wondered at her own meekness around the woman. It had started when she and Michael arrived in Reigny, all smiles and American casual manners, and had been instantly and completely snubbed by Madame and, as Katherine learned, therefore almost everyone else. Last summer, her offer to manage the entertainment portion of the town fête had helped, although it was the trauma of an unexplained death that had finally made them allies. The good news was, once you were on Madame’s good side, she explained to Michael, you were pretty much assured to be there forever unless you tried to claim the church garden.
The bookstore was dark and the “Fermé” sign Katherine had painted for Yves was hanging from the nail. Katherine realized that Pippa might be waiting for her, so she pulled out her cell phone and dialed the writer’s number. There was no answer. Pippa might be in the bath, or out for a walk, so she left a message saying she’d pick her friend up at one and trudged up the hill to Château de Bellegarde. The housekeeper who answered the door was no friendlier than on any other visit, but said Madame Adele was in the sitting room.
“Katherine, my dear,” Adele Bellegarde said, rising from her chintz sofa and coming over to kiss her guest. “How lovely, and perfect timing. Will you have a glass of sherry with me to take off the chill of the day?” Pulling Katherine over to sit with her, she asked for all the news. “I don’t get out much, you know, and no one comes to see me.”
Katherine noticed immediately the new lines on Adele’s face, and the thinness of her hand as the older woman patted hers. “Is Sophie here?”
“Only for a short visit. She will go back to Paris on the morning train and take Yves with her. Thankfully, I have my books and my house projects to work on, but a widow’s life is a lonely one. Ah, there you are, chérie.”
Sophie, trailed slowly by Yves, had come into the room, rubbing her hands together briskly. “Katherine, it is so good to see you. I hear Michael has returned. Has he finished his music making?” She kissed Katherine and sat next to her.
“Just the recording. The concert tour hasn’t started and I confess I’m not looking forward to it. He’ll be gone so long.”
“Ah, but you will go with him, will you not?” Sophie looked surprised, probably imagining, Katherine thought, something far more glamorous than red-eye bus trips and fast-food meals. She thought Michael wanted her to come, but guessed he’d feel differently if it didn’t go well. And there was the matter of Eric, who would be the big star at the concerts. She and Eric had minor history, only one foolish night before she and Michael got married, but given what Eric did to Michael by pushing him out of the band and stealing the hit song Michael wrote, it was sticky. How would she behave if—when, really—she saw Eric?
For now, she only said, “Too early to know. And then, there are the animals. They must be fed and walked and that means we can’t close up the house. I really need to think it through.”
Yves poured his fiancée and himself generous glasses of sherry, and slumped into a deep chair, yawning and scratching his head. “But you must go, dear Katherine, so you will have stories to tell us when you return.” He lifted his glass in a careless toast, then drained it.
Sophie glanced at him. “Maybe we should come to a concert? Oh yes,” she added as Katherine made a questioning noise. “After all, our company has a major investment in the recording studio and it might be a way to combine a meeting with the pleasure of seeing Michael onstage in America. What do you think, Yves?”
He brushed a strand of dark hair from his forehead and frowned. “Will Michael be in Hollywood? I would very much like to see that. But it is a long trip and I do not like the idea of flying so much, you know?” He looked at Sophie.
She smiled and Katherine saw the iron underneath the turned-up lips. “Yves has been telling me we need to visit Playa Blanca, a nice idea if I can get away from the office for a week.”
Yves jumped up and went to a window, staring out at the woods beyond the driveway. “It is a good thing to keep your father’s business going, but surely there are others who could do that as well as you.”
A small silence settled in the room. Sophie looked thoughtfully at a large painting over the fireplace mantel and sipped from her glass. Adele’s eyes jumped back and forth between the couple, and she clasped her hands in her lap. “Well, we shall think about it,” Sophie finally said. “But what has happened about poor Mme Sabine? I do not spend much time here and Maman has no visitors to tell her the latest news.”
Katherine said as little as possible and quickly steered away from a discussion of Mme Sabine’s death. Adele had experienced too much of death this last year. Instead, she talked about the coming baby in Reigny, Mme Pomfort’s delicate friendship with her former garden rival, and Michael’s work in the Bellegarde-funded studio, without mentioning his producer or Betty Lou by name.
From his spot at the window, Yves spoke. “I’m sure there are lovely places in America, but once you have lived in France, it is hard to consider leaving.”
Katherine hid her smile. No use describing sunsets in Malibu or walks on the rugged trails in Big Sur.
Adele said, “New York is such an exciting place.”
“You’ve been to Manhattan?” Katherine said.
“Once, with my parents, after the war. So much abundance, hard to take it all in, given our condition here. But the Americans we met were friendly and generous. Indeed, it was rather uncomfortable to be treated as though we were poor, as so many people did, not realizing how prominent our family is.”
“How did the Bellegardes fare in the war?” To Katherine, it was a simple question, but somehow it misfired. Adele drew herself up to her full height, became busy with the soft throw she had put over her legs, and asked how Jeannette was getting along in school. In a few moments, she rose and explained she had some correspondence to deal with and thanked her neighbor for dropping in. Sophie rose too, and said she had phone calls to make to Paris. Only Yves remained, offering her a refill of the sherry. The sherry, Katherine thought, was excellent, but the message was clear. For the second time that morning, Katherine was dismissed.
Finding herself deposited outside the massive wooden doors of the château, she wondered about the history of the Bellegardes. There had been some gossip about Adele’s late husband, a naturalized French citizen of German origin, last summer but she thought it had been unfair, triggered by the always present memories of the Nazi occupation of the region.
She checked her phone but there was no message from Pippa. It was time to get home and change. She would wear the slightly witchy, black bouffant skirt that someone had decided to part with at a summer flea market with black tights and the ruffled black coat. That is, if it wasn’t covered in dog hair from the time she left it on the chaise and Gracey turned it into a nest of sorts.
The sound of a guitar being strummed and Michael singing softly welcomed her as she came in the kitchen door, pulling off her boots. It was a sound she had been so used to hearing every day for three years. Today, it sounded fresh and his voice more polished. The house smelled like coffee and wood smoke. It was warm and cozy, such a treat after so many days alone. She kissed the top of his head as she slipped past his chair to warm her fingers and toes by the fire.
“Heaven,” she said, speaking to the whole house and everything in it. The dogs briefly opened their eyes to stare up at her, but were too content lying along the hearth to do more. “What are you up to?”
“I’m trying to figure out how to do this song for the Christmas show at the church if it’s going to be a duet with Emile. There must be some key he can sing in.”
“Good luck with that. You played and sang last year so you know it’s likely to be a handful of the oldest, deafest residents, everyone freezing in that unheated building, impatient to get to the mairie and the potluck dinner.”
“I don’t perform without rehearsing even if it is for people who have no clue about the lyrics or the importance of chord changes. They will want to sing a couple French songs and Emile will lead that.”
“You’re a darling to take it seriously.”
“You fixing up that Madonna painting?”
“Unfortunately, yes. Tomorrow I’ll touch up that hideous thing, as promised. I might take a stab at the old stations of the cross if I have time. They’re frescos, painted directly on the walls, and so faded that I can hardly pick out the images. But one of the old ladies told me she gets distracted because the paintings annoy her so much, so maybe that will be my present to her, even if she’s the only one who cares.”
Michael turned in his chair. “You’re a good woman, you know that?” He turned back and Katherine, warm in body and heart, went to the kitchen to find something to snack on. He called from his chair, “You’re driving today, right? Because I thought I might go buy some firewood from that funny old farmer who lives near the truffle town in the next day or two.”
“The truffle town” was Noyers-sur-Serein, a tiny town that came alive on a specific day in late fall when the truffles were gathered and sold from the courtyard of an old school in a frenzied atmosphere. Katherine could never afford to buy, but she had gone this year to see what the fuss was about, and found it extraordinary. Michael had driven and while she was squeezed in the crowd, he had walked around, and found a man working a field who cared as little as he did for the earthy-smelling fungus. The man had instead done a good job of convincing Michael of the superior quality of his firewood, and the two had struck not only a bargain but the kind of man-to-man friendship Michael seemed to thrive on, one with very little talking, lots of posturing, and many hand signals.
“Can it wait ’til tomorrow? Pippa needs a ride so she can pick up her car, and I intend to stay in Reigny all day tomorrow.”
“Sure. By the way, the phone rang a couple of times. I didn’t answer it. Too confusing.”
“Probably Pippa wondering where I am. I’ll change and get going. But maybe this will be the winter you learn to say hello and goodbye.”
“Problem is everything that comes between hello and goodbye,” Michael said to her back as she headed up the stairs.