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Authors: Ruth Brandon
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course, was absurd: at a time like this, Juliette would naturally be surrounded by her family. Perhaps she had told him I was coming – not that he’d be surprised, it was his doing, after all.
The figure turned. It was not, after all, Manu. This man’s hair was grey, and cut en brosse . It was the Minister, the man I’d seen on television. He was slightly thicker-set than his son, but they had the same attenuated build, the same way of standing and moving. Had he seen me? He seemed to be looking directly at me, but no – the trees were too thick, and he was too preoccupied with something else. He and the old woman were having some sort of argument – he was gesticulating, turned towards her now, while she sat back in her chair, apparently unmoved, certainly unmoving. Finally he flung up his hands in a gesture of supreme impatience, turned on his heel and made for the BMW. Its door slammed and it drove off at speed, leaving her alone with the dog.
There was a flurry of barks: the car’s departure had woken the dog, who sensed the presence of a stranger. The old woman shouted at it to be quiet and sit down, but although it subsided somewhat, it soon began barking again, and looked longingly in my direction. I shrank back into the screening woodland and, as noiselessly as I knew how, edged back the way I had come until, with deep relief, I found myself once again on the public path.
6
La Jaubertie, July
When I awoke next morning the weather had changed. Rain had fallen in the night: the magnolia leaves outside my window were covered with drops of moisture. I let the curtain fall and checked my watch. Half past seven. Before time began. Why on earth was I up so early?
The answer came next minute in the form of high-pitched voices raised in argument. Delphine’s children had evidently finished their breakfast and were now having an early-morning quarrel in the court. Their voices cut the still morning like scalpels. I cursed them and fell back on to the pillows.
My appointment was not until ten, and it wouldn’t take more than a few minutes to drive to La Jaubertie. On the other hand, I knew I’d never fall asleep again. I reached for my book – a biography of Emmanuel Rigaut, brought to remind myself of essential background – propped myself up on the pillows, and thought about what Delphine had told me.
Tondue. Surely it couldn’t be true? Not just because it was horrifying – horrifying things happen. But this was incomprehensible. Tondue was about collaboration, and Emmanuel Rigaut had been not just a Communist, but a Resistance hero. The book’s frontispiece was a photo of him taken at that time – the same tall, thin figure as his son and grandson, no mistaking the line of paternity there. He stared expressionlessly out at the photographer from beneath a flat cap; a cigarette dangling from the corner of his mouth. Under his code name of Bizouleur he had led a network that sabotaged railways and bridges, provided safe houses for those who needed them, and helped with the underground railroad that smuggled Jews and grounded fighter and bomber crews out of occupied France and across the border into Spain. How could such a man possibly remain married to a woman who slept with the occupiers? Although the marriage had ended in the 1950s, Antoine had been born in 1942, and Jean-Jacques in 1947: living proof that while the war was on, and for some time after that, it must have existed in more than name.
At ten precisely, I parked my car on the gravel sweep outside La Jaubertie’s front door. Today the garden was empty of both cars and people, and the great studded door was closed. This was the first time I’d seen the château as it should officially be approached, from the front. It loomed greyly over me, its vast roof (which was, I now saw, in a state of some disrepair) rising steeply between the towers like an enormous upturned ark. The original house, with its turrets, arrow-slits and high-level
The figure turned. It was not, after all, Manu. This man’s hair was grey, and cut en brosse . It was the Minister, the man I’d seen on television. He was slightly thicker-set than his son, but they had the same attenuated build, the same way of standing and moving. Had he seen me? He seemed to be looking directly at me, but no – the trees were too thick, and he was too preoccupied with something else. He and the old woman were having some sort of argument – he was gesticulating, turned towards her now, while she sat back in her chair, apparently unmoved, certainly unmoving. Finally he flung up his hands in a gesture of supreme impatience, turned on his heel and made for the BMW. Its door slammed and it drove off at speed, leaving her alone with the dog.
There was a flurry of barks: the car’s departure had woken the dog, who sensed the presence of a stranger. The old woman shouted at it to be quiet and sit down, but although it subsided somewhat, it soon began barking again, and looked longingly in my direction. I shrank back into the screening woodland and, as noiselessly as I knew how, edged back the way I had come until, with deep relief, I found myself once again on the public path.
6
La Jaubertie, July
When I awoke next morning the weather had changed. Rain had fallen in the night: the magnolia leaves outside my window were covered with drops of moisture. I let the curtain fall and checked my watch. Half past seven. Before time began. Why on earth was I up so early?
The answer came next minute in the form of high-pitched voices raised in argument. Delphine’s children had evidently finished their breakfast and were now having an early-morning quarrel in the court. Their voices cut the still morning like scalpels. I cursed them and fell back on to the pillows.
My appointment was not until ten, and it wouldn’t take more than a few minutes to drive to La Jaubertie. On the other hand, I knew I’d never fall asleep again. I reached for my book – a biography of Emmanuel Rigaut, brought to remind myself of essential background – propped myself up on the pillows, and thought about what Delphine had told me.
Tondue. Surely it couldn’t be true? Not just because it was horrifying – horrifying things happen. But this was incomprehensible. Tondue was about collaboration, and Emmanuel Rigaut had been not just a Communist, but a Resistance hero. The book’s frontispiece was a photo of him taken at that time – the same tall, thin figure as his son and grandson, no mistaking the line of paternity there. He stared expressionlessly out at the photographer from beneath a flat cap; a cigarette dangling from the corner of his mouth. Under his code name of Bizouleur he had led a network that sabotaged railways and bridges, provided safe houses for those who needed them, and helped with the underground railroad that smuggled Jews and grounded fighter and bomber crews out of occupied France and across the border into Spain. How could such a man possibly remain married to a woman who slept with the occupiers? Although the marriage had ended in the 1950s, Antoine had been born in 1942, and Jean-Jacques in 1947: living proof that while the war was on, and for some time after that, it must have existed in more than name.
At ten precisely, I parked my car on the gravel sweep outside La Jaubertie’s front door. Today the garden was empty of both cars and people, and the great studded door was closed. This was the first time I’d seen the château as it should officially be approached, from the front. It loomed greyly over me, its vast roof (which was, I now saw, in a state of some disrepair) rising steeply between the towers like an enormous upturned ark. The original house, with its turrets, arrow-slits and high-level
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