Ten Trees and a Truffle Dog (2 page)

  To a man the dealers were short, scruffy and unshaven and together they smelled of the inside of a bar – a pungent combination of garlic, pastis and Gauloises. They sat at rickety tables covered in worn cloth. In front of them were cereal bowls containing a couple of earth-encased truffles about the size of golf balls. The overall impression was of terrible hardship. Clothes were worn through and patched up and the sole of one of the vendor's shoes hung loose like the tongue of a thirsty dog.

  At least I was experienced enough to see through the charade. Truffle hunters are notoriously secretive about their profession. For tax reasons most of them deny being involved in the trade. If challenged by
le fisc
(the tax authorities), they might shrug and admit to finding a single truffle at the bottom of the garden.

  'Look at my car,' they'd protest, as if a battered Renault was in itself proof of innocence.

  However, in reality dealers make thousands of euros a year, competing furiously with each other to discover the best hunting locations. Historically they would have followed flies through oak woods, watching carefully where the insects chose to land and digging the soil in their wake. These days dogs have replaced flies and a champion truffle dog is a valuable possession. Sadly two or three dogs a year are poisoned as rival hunters seek to wreck each other's prospects.

  Buying a truffle is complicated by a well-known sharp practice. Since finding truffles is so difficult, a few unscrupulous vendors sell Chinese truffles, which look similar to their Provençal cousins but have about 1/100th of the taste. Covered in mud and mixed in a bowl with the real thing it is incredibly difficult to tell the two apart. The odour of the Provençal truffles envelops their Chinese cousins, fooling all but the most experienced Gallic nose. Only once a truffle is cut open can you really discover its provenance. The white veins of a Chinese truffle are less tightly spaced and the skin pockmarked. To allay fears of fraud, each of the vendors in Rognes had a truffle sliced in half on the table in front of them. Other tricks of the trade include lacing the mud that always surrounds truffles with metal flakes and packing the natural indentations with mud. Both methods increase the weight of the truffle and hence the profit.

  I chose the scruffiest, dirtiest, smelliest vendor, on the basis that his appearance meant he had the most to hide from the
fisc
and was therefore the most professional of the bunch.

  
'C'est combien par kilo?'

  
'Neuf cents.'

  
'Huit cents?'

  
'Normalement, c'est neuf cent cinquante.'

  Comprehensively out-negotiated, I nodded and began examining the merchandise. In France it's almost rude not to touch and feel the food before purchasing. In the summer I've watched as shoppers in search of optimum ripeness have sniffed and re-sniffed up to twenty melons, and melons only cost a meagre five euros a kilo.

  Flaring my nostrils like a horse before a big race I attacked the pile of muddy black balls before me. The odour was so strong that after examining just five truffles a dull headache began to develop. A professional buyer could easily sniff over a hundred truffles in a morning and still discern minute differences in scent. I, however, was already lost. The first truffle had smelt the strongest, and had felt nice and heavy relative to its size.

  'I'll take this one,' I said, brushing the dirt away from the surface.

  'Remember, wrap it in paper, keep it in a box and change the paper morning and night,' the dealer said as he weighed the truffle and dropped it into a plastic bag.

  'Eighty-nine fifty.'

  Two crisp €50 notes changed hands. Turning to leave I bumped into a man with flowing white hair and a deep wind-ingrained tan. In his arms he carried three cases of wine, of which he was struggling to keep hold.

  'Can I help?' I offered, relieving him of one of the boxes.

  'Set it down over there.' He nodded gratefully.

  'Matured in the most expensive Bordeaux oak barrels for twelve months,' the vigneron told me, shrugging. 'And what do I get in return for twenty-four bottles? Three truffles –
c'est la folie
.' He grinned, clearly delighted with the exchange.

  I made my way back towards Tanya, passing stands full of truffle liqueur (undrinkable), truffle oils, truffle-infused eggs, and sachets of dried truffle risottos, all with inflated price tags.

  With the truffle purchased the fun could really start. Should we extravagantly grate it over the Christmas bird, or stuff great wedges in the cavities during the cooking process, allowing its aroma to permeate every mouthful? Better still, reserve it in a jar with eggs to make the ultimate morning-after omelette or slice it raw onto toast with a drizzling of the local olive oil? Tanya and I usually tried something different every year, plucking a new idea from a magazine article, but without fail we saved the last remaining slices to spike the festive brie. It's a divine combination and we'd been salivating at the thought since the first frost. This Christmas, though, things would be different.

  The menu outside the local cafe had been infected by truffle fever:
pâté de foie gras aux truffes
,
homard
(lobster)
gratiné aux truffes
,
fromage aux truffes
. Even the green salad was treated to a grating of black diamond. Catching the waiter's eye I ordered a
café crème
and sat down next to a drained-looking Tanya.

  'Well, I got it – nine hundred euros a kilo, but what can you do,' I chattered away excitedly. 'How about a
sauce
aux truffes
this year?'

  My coffee arrived and I took a deep injudicious gulp of the frothy mixture, burning the back of my throat.

  'Jamie, I think it's started.'

  'What's started?'

  'The baby.'

  I took another enormous gulp of coffee, still not quite registering what she had just said. The one job a father is totally responsible for is getting his wife to the hospital on time, practising the route, making sure the car is full of petrol, checking the oil level, the pressure in the tyres, making sure the bag is packed and generally that everything runs smoothly.

  I'd heard stories of twenty-minute labours and births in the backs of cars, and was determined that it would never happen to us. Yet we were registered at a hospital near home over an hour away, through the sinuous Combe de Lourmarin, one of the last places you would want to negotiate with a wife in heavy labour: nothing but sheer cliffs and goat farms for miles.

  'But it's not due for another month,' I protested, trying to hide the panic creeping into my belly.

  'I know.'

  'And we haven't got anything ready.'

  'I know.' Tanya winced in pain.

  'I'll get the car.'

  I started at a fast walk, which somehow quickly became a jog and finally a run. I hadn't even asked how close together the contractions were.

  
'Attention!'
, 'Watch where you're going', 'What's the rush?' people called as I shoved through the crowds, fighting the flow of arrivals.

  The engine started first time and I crawled down the hill in the slow-moving traffic. I could see Tanya waiting at the roadside, hands on knees, panting. Despite the cold she'd taken off her coat, which she'd handed to one of the many onlookers. Nothing attracts a crowd like a sick person in France. A grazed arm is enough to have yourself escorted to the nearest bar for a restorative brandy. Blame is apportioned, remedies shared, the doctor called out to stem the bleeding.

  Perhaps twenty people had gathered around to offer their advice to Tanya. No doubt the majority of them were berating her imbecile of a husband. How had he allowed this to happen? Where was he now?

  Please let one of them be a midwife, I prayed, burying my head in my arms as I waited for the traffic to move. Shoppers zigzagged between the cars, and the municipal policemen tried to bring order to the chaos. What would our baby wear when it was born? The hospital had stipulated about thirty essential items – but we had nothing with us. Would it be a boy or a girl? I really didn't care, as long as we got to the hospital. The pregnancy bible,
What to
Expect When You're Expecting
, sat on the dashboard in front of me. The author certainly hadn't told us to expect this.

  'Let's go.' Tanya slammed the door and a gap briefly opened in the traffic. A couple of bends later and the soft folds of the Luberon hills came into view. The panic was gradually replaced by an unexpected sense of calm. Finally it was going to happen, after months of waiting – a Christmas present to beat all Christmas presents. I'd heard good things about Pertuis hospital, which was much closer than Apt. We'd make for there.

  'OK?'

  Tanya nodded weakly. There was silence for a minute or so.

  'There's just one thing,' she said tentatively. 'I left the truffle on the table.'

P
ertuis hospital smelt of strong detergent and overcooked food. The walls of the maternity ward were painted a crumbling pink and lined with arty black-and-white photos of semi-naked women with their babies. Strangely some of the mothers had chosen to wear their finest lingerie, giving the images an overtone of sexuality.

  'Might as well look your best,' I joked to Tanya, but she didn't reply. Instead, she scanned the empty corridor for signs of a midwife. According to the local paper the service on offer was one of the best in France. People travelled up to two hours to have their baby in Pertuis, lured by its holistic approach – acupuncture, massages, aqua births, aromatherapy and, most importantly for Tanya, epidurals. Whatever the mother-to-be wanted, was provided.

  Part of the reason for the hospital's notoriety was the French state's continual attempts to shut it down. The government wanted to concentrate resources on large birthing centres, cramming them with machinery and processing women like goods in a factory. Protest marches and fundraising failed to save the hospital but when the main local farmer threatened to stop supplying his famed asparagus to Paris, politicians finally took notice. Sitting together waiting for a midwife, we could not have been more grateful.

  Nearby a tall man with three-day stubble and a shaggy mop of hair paced up and down, looking anxiously towards a distant door. He clutched a packet of cigarettes in his hands and judging from the plastic wraps over his shoes he'd come from one of the birthing rooms. Despite the heat in the hospital he wore a scarf wrapped tightly around his neck and a heavy woollen jumper. For some reason he looked vaguely familiar, but I couldn't place his face.

  
'Ça va?'
I asked.

  '
Oui, ça va
, you have to wait outside for the epidural,' he explained. 'The needle's big and sometimes the fathers faint.' With that thought he succumbed, placing a cigarette in his mouth and heading for the stairs.

  
'Madame Ivey, venez avec moi.'
A slim elegant lady dressed in midwife green beckoned to us. She was perhaps our age, with warm nut-brown eyes, but her voice was stern and the hospital orderlies seemed to shrink away from her. Introductions were clearly not part of the service and I squinted to read the name stencilled on a badge on her chest – 'Lea'.

  Tanya struggled to her feet and like the losing couple in a sports day three-legged race we hobbled into Lea's office. Inside the small room a large window looked north towards the Luberon hills. The evergreen pine and olive trees and the sumptuous blue sky combined to give the appearance of a summer's day.

  'We've phoned for your records. Any trips or falls? Anything out of the ordinary?'

  Tanya shook her head and the examination continued, with Lea writing notes slowly into a book. Outside in the corridor we could hear the wails of newborn babies and the odd piercing scream of a mother in labour, but Lea was oblivious.

  'Do you smoke?' Lea's tone was that of an interrogator.

  Once again Tanya shook her head.

  'Drink?'

  'Eat uncooked meat?'

  'Unpasteurised cheese?'

  All that was missing was a spotlight in Tanya's eyes. I could see her breaking soon and, to stop the incessant questioning, confessing to an invented orgy of wine, goat's cheese and Gauloises. Lea meanwhile sat unperturbed, reeling off an extensive list of prohibited activities, her single raised eyebrow suggesting all the time that she didn't believe a word of our responses. Something had to explain why our baby was premature and she would have her answer.

  Inexplicably her attention then turned to me.

  'Do you smoke?'

  I shook my head.

  'Drink?'