Page 12 of Mrs. Endicott’s Splendid Adventure

It was about four o’clock when they approached Marseille. The road wound down from rocky hills, and they got their first glimpse of the city, crowned by the basilica of Our Lady of the Guard, its gold statue shining from a hilltop.

“How lovely,” Dora muttered as they first glimpsed it.

“Have you been here before?” Ellie asked.

“Never,” Dora said.

“Neither have I,” Ellie agreed. “We came to the Riviera from Italy the last time I was in France, years ago. A train from Genoa to Nice, and when we left we headed straight up to Paris.” She looked around them as they drove.

“I can’t say I’m too enamoured yet. It looks a little run-down, doesn’t it? ”

As they came into the city centre, they found themselves on a wide boulevard lined with shops, including a couple of department stores, and what looked like municipal buildings.

“Ah, this looks a little better,” Dora said. She consulted her map. “This main street is called La Canebière and leads directly to the port.”

Ellie stared ahead and kept driving. It seemed important to her to get that first glimpse of the Mediterranean and to know they had arrived. When she looked into the rearview mirror, she saw Yvette, now sitting up and alert, staring out of the window with an alarmed look on her face.

As the street approached the port, it became busier and more run-down, lined with bars and smaller shops.

They noticed sailors of various types, sizes and colours, strolling in bands, sitting at bars, talking, laughing.

Two men in white sailor uniforms were chatting to a girl who lounged at the doorway to a building.

As the Bentley passed, the girl nodded and they followed her inside.

“Oh my,” Dora said. “It doesn’t look too savoury around here. We certainly couldn’t leave Yvette in a place like this.”

Ellie agreed. “We don’t seem to be coming to anything like Nice. I thought there might be a promenade with good hotels. Perhaps we should just push on.” She turned back to Yvette. “We do not think this place would be suitable for you to stay here. Not with all these sailors.”

“I agree, madame,” Yvette said. “I have been feeling most apprehensive. I do not think I would feel safe here. If you don’t mind, I would like to remain with you until we come to somewhere less dangerous.”

Even as she said the words, there was a shout from the other side of the street.

A man emerged from an alleyway, pursued by other men.

He stumbled out into the street, almost colliding with their car.

Backed up against the car that had come to a halt in the traffic, he wheeled and pulled out a knife.

The men following him hesitated. A crowd gathered.

Attempts were made to grab him. There were more shouts; a whistle sounded.

Police arrived. Mavis gave a little cry of alarm.

The traffic moved, and Ellie drove on as quickly as she could, looking for a place to turn around, which she could not do until they reached the port itself, its quayside lined with ships of all sizes, from fishing boats to small freighters to a couple of liners, their white decks gleaming in the setting sun.

There were indeed hotels on the quayside but not the majestic ones Ellie remembered from Nice.

Ellie’s heart was still beating fast from the encounter with the knife-wielding man.

“I really don’t think we’d want to stay here, do you?” She turned to Dora.

“I most certainly don’t. Even if we’re safe, it’s too bustling and noisy for me. I’d like a place with peace and quiet. And beauty, too.”

“I agree,” Ellie said.

“I ain’t half glad we’re getting out of here,” Mavis said as they drove back up the main thoroughfare.

“I would have worried about getting murdered in me bed. I’ve never seen such unsavoury-looking types.

And that one with the knife. Blimey. Me heart nearly jumped out of me chest when he ran towards us. ”

“Don’t worry, Mavis,” Dora said. “The towns on the Riviera are most civilized. What’s more, there are plenty of English people there. Yvette should easily find a job as chambermaid at one of the big hotels in Nice or Antibes or Cannes.”

Yvette looked enquiringly at the sound of her name. “Nice? Antibes?” she said. “You go there?” she asked Ellie in French.

“I expect so,” Ellie said. “We haven’t made up our minds yet. But they would be good places for you to find work. What sort of job do you think you’ll want to do? What skills do you have?”

“I have no real skills, madame. I think I am not fit for anything other than being a maid,” Yvette said. “The only problem is ...”

She left the rest of the sentence hanging.

“Yes?” Ellie had come to a stop as a policeman held up traffic. Ellie turned back to look at Yvette, who had now blushed red.

“You are so good,” she said. “I was going to say that I wanted a better future than backbreaking work on a farm, but I cannot lie to you any longer. You must know the truth. My father threw me out when he discovered I am pregnant. He told me I am no longer his daughter, and he told me never to come back.”

The other two women didn’t understand when Ellie gasped.

“What did she say?” Dora asked. “Neither my French nor my hearing are as good as they were. Why did she leave?”

“She says she found out she is going to have a baby.”

“Pregnant?” Dora exclaimed. She switched to her painfully slow French. “But you’re a mere child yourself. Who is the father of this infant? Why does he not do the right thing?”

“He is far away, madame,” Yvette said. She swallowed back a sob.

“He is in the army, and he was suddenly sent to North Africa before I knew that I was with child. I don’t know where he’s gone.

He said he’d write to me as soon as he found out which country he’d be stationed in, but now I will never get the letter.

He would marry me if he knew, I’m sure of it. He was so sweet and loving to me.”

“You poor girl.” Ellie reached back and patted her hand. “Don’t worry. We’ll try to help you. Maybe we can contact your sweetheart through the French army headquarters?”

“Maybe.” Yvette did not sound too hopeful.

“How do you plan to support yourself with a child?” Dora asked. “Or even during the latter stages of pregnancy? You will not be able to work.”

Yvette shook her head. Tears were now trickling down her cheeks. “I do not know, madame. All I know is that I have no home. No one I can turn to.”

“You have no relatives who can help?” Dora asked.

“My mother died when I was an infant. My father has raised me alone. I had grandparents, but they have now passed away, too. There is my father’s brother, but he is as bad as my father. I would not be welcome there.”

Ellie cleared her throat. “Well, Yvette, ma petite, you are in safe hands now. We will take you with us, and when we reach our destination, we will decide what is best for you.”

Yvette lifted a tear-stained face. “Really? Oh madame, I cannot thank you enough. You don’t know what it’s been like, not knowing what to do.

I seriously thought of taking my life, drinking rat poison, even though I know that it would be a terrible sin, and I’d never go to heaven .

..” She wiped a tear from her cheek again.

The policeman blew his whistle again and motioned the traffic forward. As they drove off, Dora moved closer to Ellie. “I hope you know what you’re doing,” she muttered. “First you saddle us with a housemaid and now with a pregnant girl. Are we to be a Noah’s ark for the lost souls of the world?”

Ellie looked at her, then she smiled. “If that’s what it takes, then yes.”

They drove out of the city and took the road signposted to Toulon.

“We won’t be able to get as far as the Riviera proper tonight,” Ellie said.

“We should make it to Hyères or Toulon.” Dora was back in her role as navigator. “I hear that Hyères is most agreeable. Didn’t Queen Victoria stay there in her later years?”

“In that case, it must be good enough for us.” Ellie laughed. “How far would you say it was?”

Dora studied her map. “Fifty miles maybe. But the road looks awfully winding.”

“We should be able to do fifty miles before it gets dark,” Ellie said.

Dora traced the road on the map with her finger. “There are small villages along the coast but nothing inland until we get to Toulon. And that’s another naval town, isn’t it? I’m sure I read that the French navy are headquartered there.”

“Then definitely not Toulon. I don’t think we could handle more knife fights.

” Ellie steered the car around a bend. The road was entering a wild and mountainous area, the hillsides covered in bushy scrub.

It cut through a steep-sided valley, wound its way up to a crest, then down again.

Ellie found herself gripping the wheel as she stared ahead.

The valleys themselves were already bathed in gloom, and the sun only highlighted the cream-coloured rocky summits above them. It grew gradually darker.

“I hope it’s not too far now,” Ellie said. “We haven’t passed a village in ages, and we’ll need petrol soon.”

“I thought of mentioning that before we left Marseille,” Dora said, a note of smugness in her voice. Ellie swallowed back her annoyance.

As they climbed to the top of another ridge, she stared in alarm. “Is that smoke? Do you smell burning?”

A white mist was rising from the bonnet of the Bentley.

“I do see smoke, or is it steam?” Dora peered out of the windscreen.

“Is the engine on fire?” Mavis sat up in alarm, clutching Dora’s seat. “Shouldn’t we get out before it blows up?”

“I think it’s steam,” Ellie said. “It must be the radiator. I should have checked before we left. Oh damn and blast. How far to the nearest village, do you think, Dora?”

Dora peered down at the map. It was now quite dark and hard to see.

“I don’t see anything on this road for a while. There are villages along the coast. Maybe we should head for the closest one. Take the next turnoff.”

They proceeded slowly, the Bentley still showing its displeasure, hissing steam escaping. At the foot of the slope, a tiny road went off to their right. A small hand-painted sign read “Saint-Benet.”

“It might just be a church or a monastery,” Dora said. “I don’t see it on the map.”

“At least there would be someone who can help us.” Ellie turned the car on to the road, little more than a track. It took them down another steep-sided valley, lined with thick pine forest. Olive trees grew beside the road. Vineyards climbed in terraces up the hillsides.

“At least there is cultivation,” Dora said. “We’re not in the middle of nowhere.”

“I don’t see any houses.” Ellie peered hopefully through the windscreen.

The road snaked downward, seemingly forever, the tall hillsides blotting out the last of the setting sun. Ellie found she was holding her breath, waiting for the inevitable moment when the Bentley ground to a halt and they were stuck far from any help.

Then, at the moment the valley was about to be plunged into darkness, it widened out.

There were small farms with stone farmhouses in the middle of cultivated fields, their shutters already closed for the night.

Buildings appeared on either side of the road—a church with a square tower, a row of narrow houses.

The street ended in a small harbour lined with pastel-coloured buildings.

On either side of the village steep cliffs rose, the sandstone glowing blood-red in the last of the setting sun.

Brightly painted fishing boats bobbed at the quay, and beyond stretched the Mediterranean, as wine-dark as Homer had described it.

Lights already shone in some of the buildings and sparkled on the water.

From somewhere came the sounds of an accordion playing, a baby crying, voices, laughter.

“Oh my.” Ellie slowed the car, her mouth open, staring in wonder. She had never seen anywhere more perfect. The thought came to her that she didn’t want to leave. As if confirming this, the Bentley gave a hiss and died.