Page 33 of Vianne

Over the past few days I have been silently saying goodbye to Marseille.

Goodbye to the markets, the Vieux Quartier, the harbour, where the pleasure boats have mostly been put away for the winter.

Goodbye to my customers; to Marinette, with her elegant air and love of my hot chocolate; to Tonton and his dog, Galipette; to Emile and his combination of gluttony and resentment.

Goodbye to the garden, and the roses that I shall never see bloom; goodbye to Margot’s cookery book, and everything she has given me.

Only Louis is left, and the gift that I had made for him, a gift I can’t bear to part with now, because that would mean saying goodbye.

You should be gone already, ’Viane , says my mother’s voice from the top of the Butte.

And I know that she is right: I can see the changes unfolding.

The guest room – no, the baby’s room – is completely finished, though Louis tells me the smell of paint will linger for a few days.

I chase it away with the good scents of my cooking; apricot tartlets; pan-fried squid with chilli oil; pieds paquets, with saffron rice.

Louis has not mentioned our conversation of the weekend, but I feel it always at my side, like the ghost of a promise unfulfilled.

I should be gone. I know it, and yet the temptation to stay – just another day, a week – is almost unbearable.

But today is my last day. I have already said my goodbyes, silent as they must be.

There is only one place left on my list: the very first place I visited.

Over the past months, Bonne Mère has become a part of my life; leaving her now is almost as hard as leaving Louis and the bistrot.

And today the weather is threatening; the climb to the summit cheerless; the warm air charged with the rain to come.

Halfway to the top of the Butte, I turn to look over the harbour: the wall of purple cloud that stands on the far horizon has acquired a skirt of lightning.

There is no audible thunder as yet, but the dark air feels the change.

I hurry towards the summit. A woman by the side of the road is selling Marseille soap from out of a basket. It smells of summer and the sea, and the olive oil used in the process. The woman is middle-aged, nondescript; dressed in the kind of overall so many women here prefer.

I ask, ‘How much?’

‘Five francs.’

There are so many different scents, so many different colours.

Lavender, and vetiver, and patchouli, and seaweed, and rose, all roughly cut and stamped with the words Savon de Marseille , 72% Extra Pur .

I buy a block of mimosa soap that smells of summer sunshine.

She hands it to me in a paper bag. The voice in my head whispers slyly: One more thing to leave behind.

It sounds like my mother, but it is not. Perhaps it is the voice of the wind that blows now from the quayside – the Tramontane , the Sirocco , or in the case of Marseille, the Mistral – tugging at my shirttails.

‘Vianne, whoever you are. It’s time.’

And the mist that blurs the horizon is like the vapour from the bouillabaisse, and the vapour from my dreams, and it shows me that room at La Bonne Mère, in blue and mimosa-yellow, with a bowl of flowers by the bed, and the crib by the open window.

And there are toys in that little room: rabbits and teddies and building-blocks, and hand-knitted clothes in the cupboard, and a rocking-horse by the door, hand-carved like the wooden crib.

But the child in the crib is not Anouk. The vapour shows me a little boy, a boy who will not follow the wind, however much it calls him.

That boy was wanted. That boy was loved.

That boy would have been happy here. That boy would have been at home in Marseille, would have picked the plums from the tree that grew behind La Bonne Mère; would have played by the Old Port and chased stray dogs and dreamed of the ships that went sailing by.

But Margot’s son did not survive. And the space he has left is hungry .

Why, Margot? What do you want? I’ve learnt your recipes. Read your book. Seen Edmond’s footprint on the page. Wherever I go, your memory and his will carry on. But I can’t you give you this. Can’t change who I am. Can’t change who my daughter is going to be.

My mother’s voice again: ’Viane. I thought I taught you better than this. A mother is a shark, chérie: if she falls asleep, she dies. You have been asleep for too long. Now you need to wake up, and—

‘Run, before the storm breaks.’

I realize I have closed my eyes. Opening them once again, I see the seller of Marseille soaps fastening the straps on the side of her heavy wicker basket. The purple clouds are now very close; thickly spindled with lightning.

‘I’m sorry?’

‘I said I’m going to have to run. Before the storm breaks.’ The woman hoisted her basket onto her back. ‘If rain gets into this lot, there’ll be nothing left of me but suds.’

I watched her as she shouldered her wares, and felt a sudden sense of unease.

When I was choosing the soap I’d assumed that she was a younger woman, but now I realized she was older than that, and that the braid of hair down her back was not grey, but almost white.

It was the woman from Rue du Panier, watching me from eyes the shade of those lightning-spindled clouds.

‘Khamaseen. You look different,’ I said.

‘Sometimes it’s useful to blend in.’ She smiled. ‘So, you decided to leave,’ she said. ‘You’re leaving Marseille, and moving on.’

‘How did you know?’

‘I see things.’ A fat drop of rain fell between us, smacking onto the road like a curse.

‘Still, if you’re going in search of yourself, be sure not to leave yourself behind.

You don’t want that for your child, Vianne.

Changing direction with the wind, flinching at every turn of the cards.

A little boy could be good for you. A good little boy with sea-blue eyes, who loves his mother, and never leaves.

A little boy who sleeps at night, and never hears the call of the wind. ’

It sounded almost like a threat. And yet, the woman’s voice was kind.

I said: ‘I have a daughter.’

‘Then run,’ said the woman. ‘Here it comes.’