The Lollipop Shoes (34 page)

Thierry called round at five today to report on the progress of the flat. He seemed slightly bewildered at the unusual level of activity in the shop, and, I would say, not entirely pleased.

‘It’s like a factory in there,’ he remarked, with a nod at the kitchen door, where Vianne was making
mendiants du roi
– thick slices of candied orange dipped in dark chocolate and scattered with edible gold leaf – so pretty it’s almost a shame to eat them, and perfect for the season, of course. ‘Doesn’t she ever take any time off?’

I smiled. ‘You know. The Christmas rush.’

He grunted. ‘I’ll be glad when it’s all over with. I’ve never been so pushed with a job. Still, it’s going to be worth it – assuming I get it done on time . . .’

I saw Anouk shoot him a look as she sat at the table with Rosette.

‘Don’t worry,’ he said. ‘A promise is a promise. It’s going to be the best Christmas ever. Just the four of us, at Rue de la Croix. We can go to midnight Mass at the Sacré-Coeur. Wouldn’t that be great, eh?’

‘Maybe.’ Her voice was expressionless.

I saw him suppress an impatient sigh. Anouk can be very hard work, and her resistance to him is palpable. Perhaps this is because of Roux, still absent, but always in her thoughts. I’ve seen him regularly, of course, a couple of times on the Butte itself, once crossing Place du Tertre, once going down the stairs by the funicular – moving fast and with a knitted cap to cover his hair, as if he’s afraid to be recognized.

I’ve also met up with him at the hostel in which he is staying, to check on his progress, to feed him lies, to cash his cheques and to ensure that he stays docile and obedient. He’s getting understandably impatient by now, and a little hurt that Vianne has not yet asked for him. Plus he’s working all hours for Thierry, of course, beginning at eight in the morning and often finishing late at night, and when he leaves Rue de la Croix he’s sometimes too tired even to eat, but goes back to his hostel and sleeps like the dead.

As for Vianne, I sense her concern – and her disappointment, too. She has not been to Rue de la Croix. Anouk, too, is under strict instructions to stay away. If Roux wants to see them, he’ll come, Vianne says. If not – well. It’s his choice.

Thierry was looking more impatient than ever. He stepped into the kitchen, where Vianne was carefully laying out the finished
mendiants
on to a sheet of baking paper. I thought there was something furtive in the way he pulled the door half-closed, and I noticed his colours were brighter than usual, edged with jittery reds and purples.

‘I’ve hardly seen you all this week.’ His voice carries; I could hear it quite clearly from the front of the shop.
Vianne’s is less easy to hear; a murmur of something like protest, perhaps. The sound of a scuffle. His giant laughter. ‘Come on. One kiss. I’ve missed you, Yanne.’

That murmur again, her voice rising. ‘Thierry, be careful. The chocolates—’

I hid a smile. The old goat. Getting frisky, is he? Well, that doesn’t surprise me at all. That chivalrous façade may have fooled Vianne, but men, like dogs, are predictable, Thierry le Tresset more than most. Beneath his apparent self-confidence, Thierry is deeply insecure, and the arrival of Roux has made him more so. He has become territorial, both at Rue de la Croix, where his hold on Roux gives him a strange, unacknowledged thrill, and here at Le Rocher de Montmartre.

I heard Vianne’s voice faintly through the door. ‘Thierry, please. This isn’t the time.’

Meanwhile Anouk was listening. Her face showed no expression at all, but her colours gleamed. I smiled at her. She didn’t smile back. Instead she glanced at the door and made a little beckoning movement with her fingers. Anyone else would have missed it. She might not even have known she was making it. But at the same moment, a draught seemed to catch at the kitchen door and it swung open sharply, slamming against the painted wall.

A small interruption, but it was enough. I caught a flash of annoyance from Thierry’s colours, a kind of relief from Vianne herself. Of course this impatience is new to her; she is so used to thinking of him as an avuncular figure: dependable; safe, if a little dull. His new possessiveness is slightly overwhelming, and for the first time she is dimly aware of a feeling, not just of alarm, but of distaste.

It’s all because of Roux, she thinks. All her doubts will
leave with him. But for now the uncertainty makes her nervous, unreasonable. She kisses Thierry on the mouth – guilt is sea-green, in the language of colours – and gives him a smile that is over-bright.

‘I’ll make it up to you,’ she says.

With two fingers of her right hand, Anouk makes a tiny gesture of dismissal.

Opposite, on her little chair, Rosette is watching her, bright-eyed. She copies the sign –
tsk-tsk, begone!
– and Thierry slaps a hand to the back of his neck, as if an insect has stung him there. The wind-chimes ring—

‘I have to go.’

Indeed he does; clumsy in his big overcoat, he almost trips as he opens the door. Anouk’s hand is in her pocket now, where she keeps his peg-doll safe. She pulls it out and goes to the display window, where she places it carefully outside the house.

‘Bye, Thierry,’ says Anouk.

Rosette signs with her fingers.
Bye-bye
.

The door slams shut. The children smile.

It’s really very draughty today.

11

Saturday, 8th December

WELL, IT’S A
start. The balance is shifting. Nanou may not see it, but I do. Little things, benign at first, that will make her mine in no time at all.

She stayed in the shop for most of today, playing with Rosette, helping out – and waiting for another chance to use those new peg-dolls of hers. She found one in Madame Luzeron, who came in mid-morning – though it wasn’t her day – with her fluffy little dog in tow.

‘Back so soon?’ I smiled at her. ‘We must be doing something right.’

I saw that her face looked rather drawn; and she was wearing her cemetery coat, which meant that she must have called there again. Perhaps a special day, I thought – a birthday or an anniversary – in any case, she looked tired and vaguely brittle, and her gloved hands were shaking with cold.

‘Sit down,’ I suggested. ‘I’ll bring you some chocolate.’

Madame hesitated.

‘I shouldn’t,’ she said.

Anouk gave me a furtive glance, and I saw her pull out Madame’s peg-doll, marked with the seductive sign of Lady Blood Moon. A plug of modelling clay serves as a base, and in a second Madame Luzeron – or at least, her double – stands inside the Advent house, looking out on to the lake with its skaters and its chocolate ducks.

For a moment she seemed not to notice; and then her eye was strangely drawn – perhaps to the child with her bright, rosy face; perhaps to the object in the window, now glowing with a curious light.

Her disapproving mouth softened a little.

‘You know, I had a dolls’ house when I was a girl,’ she said, peering into the display window.

‘Really?’ I said, smiling at Anouk. It’s rare that Madame volunteers information.

Madame Luzeron sipped her chocolate. ‘Yes. It was my grandmother’s, and although it was supposed to come to me when she died, I was never allowed to play with it.’

‘Why not?’ said Anouk, fixing the little cotton-wool dog more firmly to the peg-doll’s dress.

‘Oh, it was too valuable – an antiquarian once offered me a hundred thousand francs for it – and besides, it was an heirloom. Not a toy.’

‘So you never got to play with it. That’s not fair,’ said Anouk, now carefully placing a green sugar mouse under a tissue-paper tree.

‘Well, I was young,’ said Madame Luzeron. ‘I might have damaged it or—’

She stopped. I looked up, and saw her frozen.

‘What a funny thing,’ she said. ‘I haven’t thought of it in years. And when Robert wanted to play with it—’

She put down her cup with a sudden brisk mechanical movement.

‘It
wasn’t
fair, was it?’ she said.

‘Are you all right, Madame?’ I said. Her thin face was the colour of icing-sugar, sculpted into sharp little wrinkles like the frosting on a cake.

‘I’m fine, thank you.’ Her voice was cool.

‘Would you like a piece of chocolate cake?’ That was Anouk, looking concerned; always wanting to give things away. Madame gave her a hungry look.

‘Thank you, my dear. I’d love one,’ she said.

Anouk cut a generous slice. ‘Robert – was that your son?’ she said.

Madame pecked out a silent
yes
.

‘How old was he when he died?’

‘Thirteen,’ said Madame. ‘A little older than you, perhaps. They never found out what was wrong with him. Such a healthy boy – I never let him eat sweets, even – then, suddenly, dead. You wouldn’t think it was possible, would you?’

Anouk shook her head, wide-eyed.

‘Today’s his anniversary,’ she went on. ‘Eighth of December, 1979. Long before you were born. In those days you could still get a plot in the big cemetery – if you were prepared to pay enough. I’ve lived here for ever. My family has money. I could have let him play with the dolls’ house if I’d wanted to. Have
you
ever had a dolls’ house?’

Once more, Anouk shook her head.

‘I have it still, somewhere in the attic. I even have the dolls it came with, and the little furniture. All hand-made in original materials. Venetian mirrors on the walls.
Crafted before the Revolution. I wonder if any child
ever
got to play with the damn thing.’

She was looking slightly flushed now, as if her use of a forbidden word had infused her bloodless face with something approaching animation.

‘Perhaps
you
might like to play with it.’

Anouk’s eyes lit up at once. ‘Wow!’

‘You’re very welcome, little girl.’ She frowned. ‘You know, I don’t think I actually know your names. I’m Isabelle – and my little dog is Salammbô. You can stroke her if you like. She doesn’t bite.’

Anouk bent to touch the little dog, which frisked and licked enthusiastically at her hands. ‘She’s so sweet. I love dogs.’

‘I can’t believe I’ve been coming here for years and I never even asked your names.’

Anouk grinned. ‘I’m Anouk,’ she said. ‘And this is my good friend Zozie.’ And she went on fussing the little dog, and such was her absorption that she never even noticed that she’d given Madame the wrong name, or that the sign of Lady Blood Moon was shining out from the Advent house, shining with a radiance that filled the room.

12

Sunday, 9th December

THE WEATHERMAN LIED.
He said there’d be snow. He said there’d be a cold snap, but all we’ve had so far is mist and rain. It’s better in the Advent house – it’s proper Christmas
there
, at least, and outside it’s all frost and ice, like something in a story, with icing-sugar icicles hanging down from the roof and a fresh scatter of sugar snow over the lake. Some of the peg-dolls are skating there, all muffled up in hats and coats, and some children (they’re supposed to be Rosette, Jean-Loup and me) are building an igloo out of sugar cubes, while someone else (Nico, in fact) is dragging the Christmas tree up to the house on a matchbox sledge.

I’ve been making a lot of peg-dolls this week. I’m putting them round the Advent house, where everyone can see them without really noticing what they’re for. They’re really cool to make, you know; you can draw on the faces with felt-tip pen, and Zozie brought me a box of scraps of ribbon and cloth for making the clothes and the other
stuff. So far I’ve got Nico, Alice, Madame Luzeron, Rosette, Roux, Thierry, Jean-Loup, Maman and me.

Some of them aren’t finished, though. You have to finish them with something that belongs to the person: a strand of hair; a fingernail; or something they’ve touched or worn. It isn’t always easy getting those things; and then you have to give them a name and a sign and whisper a secret into their ear.

With some people, that’s easy to do. Some secrets are easy to guess: like Madame Luzeron, who feels so sad about her son, even though he died so long ago; or Nico, who wants to lose weight, but can’t, or Alice, who can, but really shouldn’t.