Page 11 of Mrs. Endicott's Splendid Adventure

Soon after, they came to another small settlement, but Ellie was loath to stop, even though she was now aware that she had not visited the lavatory like the other women. She’d just have to hold it.

“What if the man spots our car and comes to check on us again? Maybe somebody saw me helping Yvette.” She stared straight ahead. “We must drive on until we come to a big enough place where we cannot be traced.”

That proved to be the town of Valence, on the bank of the river. From what they could see in the darkness, it was a city of parks and elegant buildings.

“Ah, this looks more like it,” Dora said, sitting up in her seat. “There’s bound to be a decent hotel here. And a decent meal, too, one hopes.”

Ellie left the riverbank, and they followed a wide boulevard towards the city centre.

“There.” Dora pointed. “Hotel Bristol. That should do.”

“It looks as if it’s quite expensive.” Ellie examined the grand edifice, brightly lit, with a courtyard and flags flying. “There are four of us.”

“I’m sure they must have maids’ rooms for Mavis and the girl,” Dora said dismissively.

“Thanks a lot,” Mavis muttered.

“Oh no, madame,” Yvette exclaimed from the back seat. “I cannot stay here with you. I have no money for such luxury. I will sleep in your motor car and guard it for you until the morning.”

“Certainly not,” Ellie said. A small warning voice whispered that they should not be too trusting, however grateful the girl seemed.

It would be too easy to rob them of their belongings or even drive away in their car.

“You can stay in a small room beside mine for the night, unless you would prefer to leave us now. But tomorrow we will be on the Riviera if you have patience.”

“Madame is an angel once again,” Yvette said. “I will kiss your hand, madame.”

“Not while I’m driving.” Ellie had to laugh.

She suddenly felt overcome with exhaustion, not wanting to seek further, and the hotel did look inviting. They left the motor car outside and went into the foyer.

“But of course,” the receptionist said, noting the Bentley parked outside. “I can arrange a room for mesdames with a small chamber off to the side for the maids.”

“Thank you. Most satisfactory,” Dora said before Ellie could reply.

She turned to Mavis. “I hope you don’t mind for one night. It will take a while before she stops thinking of you as a servant, but she’ll come around when we reach the South.”

Mavis gave a shrug. “I don’t mind kipping in her maid’s room, but I ain’t shining her shoes. Not the way she talks to me.”

And so it was arranged. Ellie would sleep with Yvette in her maid’s quarters, and Dora would take a grand room overlooking the garden with Mavis.

The car was driven into the garage. A bellboy carried up their overnight bags.

The servant’s room was quite adequate with a bed and washbasin.

Ellie’s room had a bathroom with an enormous clawfoot tub.

“Quite delightful,” Dora said as they met downstairs. “French doors opening on to a balcony, and I can hear a fountain playing down below. I shall sleep well tonight.”

“Mine ain’t no worse than where I’ve lived most of me life,” Mavis said. She moved closer to Ellie. “As long as she don’t snore.” She gave Dora a frown.

They did not feel like facing the grand dining room at the hotel, where guests were in evening attire.

Instead they asked the clerk for a recommendation and ventured into the town.

On a narrow backstreet they found the bistro and were warmly greeted.

The set-price menu was consommé followed by duck breast and crème br?lée.

A carafe of red wine was brought to the table, and they all ate heartily.

“What would my doctor say if he could see this?” Dora chuckled as she poured herself a second glass of wine.

“I’m supposed to be on a bland diet of milk puddings and fish.

Stupid man. I told him it’s not my stomach that’s going to give out, it’s my heart, and my heart needs good, solid nourishment. ”

Ellie examined her. She had forgotten for a moment that the reason Dora was coming to France was that she did not have long to live.

Ellie noticed now that her skin was quite transparent, the veins standing up blue on the backs of her hands, and that she had a frail look about her.

She had always been so formidable that this realization came as a shock.

Yvette had sat silent through the meal, not daring to make eye contact with the others. Now she looked up and thanked Ellie again.

“You have saved my honour if not my life, madame,” she said. “Who knows where I would be now—maybe floating lifeless in the Rh?ne. He was clearly a violent man.”

“Yes, you had a lucky escape,” Ellie said. “So tell us, why did you have to leave your home so suddenly?”

Yvette studied her coffee cup, toying with the spoon.

“It’s my father,” she said. “He is a horrible man. Unkind, critical. My mother died when I was young, and my father treats me as a servant. He expects me to do all the housework and take care of the animals ... and then ...” She broke off, blinked, and took a deep breath.

“He wanted me to marry the son of the man who owned the next farm over, so that our lands could be joined. Gaston was horrible—fat, ugly, rude. I refused. My father said he would force me. So I had to leave.”

Ellie covered Yvette’s hand with her own. “My dear girl, I’m so sorry. You are safe now. You travel with us to the South, and then you can find yourself a job and a place to live, and all will be well.”

Yvette gave a weak smile. “Thank you, madame. You are too good.”

Dora insisted on paying half the bill, and they walked back together to the hotel.

Ellie slept well that night, partly because of the wine, but also because she was exhausted.

She awoke to narrow stripes of sunlight coming in through the closed blinds.

When she opened them, the breeze that greeted her already had a hint of the South to it, perfumed and caressing.

She felt her spirits rising. With any luck today, they’d be seeing the blue Mediterranean Sea, finding the perfect place to stay . ..

Mavis appeared, dressed and ready, now wearing a cotton frock. Like all her clothes, it hung off her bony frame, and Ellie realized it was the first time she had seen Mavis not wearing her apron.

“I reckon it’s going to get ruddy hot, don’t you, missus?” she asked. “If it’s this warm already ...”

“So how are you enjoying your adventure so far?” Ellie asked, smiling as Mavis began packing her things into the suitcase without being asked.

“Blimey, I never thought, in a million years, that I’d be seeing things like this,” Mavis said. “You’ve opened my eyes, that’s what you’ve done, and I’m grateful. I expect I’ll miss home eventually, but right now I just want to take it all in.”

“That’s the spirit,” Ellie said. “You need time to become a person in your own right, just like I do. We need to find out who we are.”

“What about that French girl?” Mavis said. “She hasn’t scarpered with your jewellery, has she?”

“She’s in the bathroom,” Ellie said. “Poor little thing.”

“Well, I don’t trust her,” Mavis said.

“It’s because she’s foreign and doesn’t speak English, Mavis. But don’t worry. We’ll get her settled in Marseille before we go on to find the perfect spot for ourselves. It’s only another day you have to put up with her.”

Mavis didn’t reply but gave a little sniff.

After breakfast they stood as the hotel employee loaded their suitcases back into the Bentley. Dora drew Ellie aside, glancing at Yvette, who stood clutching a pathetically small cardboard suitcase, looking young and vulnerable.

“I really must insist that you stop rounding up strays, Mrs Endicott,” Dora said. “For one thing, there is no more room in the motor car.”

Ellie smiled. “But we’re all strays, don’t you see? I’m a stray. You’re a stray. We’ve nowhere to go, and everywhere to go.”

“I suppose you’re right.” Dora frowned. “Why are you so darned optimistic? Fate has dealt you a dirty hand, the same as it has for all of us. I’m being cheated out of time, Mavis out of a loving husband and enough money and Yvette out of a loving family.

You’ve been cheated out of your nice, comfortable life and your lovely home and all the work you’ve put into it . ..”

“I am on my way to the South of France where who knows what adventures we’ll have.

What could I want more?” Ellie said. “And I have the whole world before me to do exactly what I want for the first time in my life. Do you realize, Dora, that I’ve spent my entire life trying to please other people: my parents, who never thought I was good enough, clever enough, pretty enough, holy enough, and then my husband, who took everything I did for granted, gave me no credit for any of his success and then tossed me aside without a second thought? ”

She spread her hands wide. “It’s all possible, Dora.

I can’t tell you how wonderfully free I feel.

If my husband had had his way, I’d have been moved to a tiny flat in Knightsbridge, the flat where he had once kept his mistress, I suspect.

I’d have mooched around Harrods once a week, looking at clothes and foodstuffs I could no longer afford, and then spent my evenings sitting alone, listening to the radio.

Or I’d be living in a grim little cottage—he suggested the one by the railway line, you know—doing good deeds with you at church and getting whispers and looks of pity whenever I went out. ”

She exchanged a glance with Dora. “Instead we’re going to find a lovely place overlooking the sea and eat octopus and drink lots of wine.”

“Good gracious me.” Dora shook her head.

They set off, the Bentley’s nose pointed due south with the Rh?ne River flowing beside them.

Boats going south moved swiftly with the current.

Those going north struggled under full power.

There were no bridges for a long while, meaning the people on both banks led quite different lives, Ellie surmised.

Vineyards still covered the hillsides, their leaves starting to turn golden, and buildings were now solid stone rather than gracefully carved wood.

They came to the medieval city of Avignon.

“There is a way around the city which would save us some time,” Dora said, looking up from her map.

Ellie hesitated. “Have you ever seen Avignon?”

“I can’t say that I have. All I know is the song, ‘Sur le Pont.’”

“I think we should spare a few moments to see it,” Ellie said. “The bridge and the Palace of the Popes. A lot of history.”

“Ah, sur le pont d’Avignon,” Yvette chimed in from the back seat, having understood these words. And she broke into the song with a high, sweet voice.

That settled it. Avignon had to be visited.

“Even if we have to spend the night in Marseille and go further along the coast tomorrow,” Ellie said. “After all, the one thing we have is time.”

They drove into the city centre through narrow streets, many of them cobbled. Ahead of them rose the formidable Palace of the Popes, looking more like a great fortress with its crenelated buttresses and fortified tower.

They went down to the riverbank to see the bridge.

“But it’s only half there,” Mavis exclaimed as they stared at the yellow stone span reaching out into the turbulent water, abruptly ending halfway across.

“Yes, I believe the power of the river kept knocking down the arches,” Ellie said. “It was abandoned long ago.”

“Don’t they have nothing modern in France, then?” Mavis asked, eyeing it critically.

“I’m sure they do in Paris and in all the cities,” Ellie said, “but it’s the history that makes it so charming, isn’t it?”

Mavis just grunted. After Avignon the landscape changed again.

They were now coming into the landscape of the South—dry and dusty with the occasional hilltop village.

The road had moved away from the river. They passed vineyards or fields of maize, the cobs already harvested, the stubble now dead and dying.

There were olive trees surrounding solid stone farmhouses, donkeys carrying loads from the fields.

On the hillsides grew umbrella pines, Italian cypress and herby shrubs whose scent filled the car—sage and rosemary and other smells that Ellie could not identify.

She breathed in deeply, letting the scents remind her that she had escaped, that she was now far away and starting a new and different life.

I may never go back, she thought, toying with the idea.

What if she found a place she liked and stayed here forever?