Page 62 of Vianne
All Hallows’ Eve, and the wind has changed.
Winter is waiting in the wings. The soft wind from the sea has become a harrying, urgent tug from the east, all charged with the cold from the mountains.
At Xocolatl, all of us feel that sudden sense of urgency: even Stéphane seems less mellow, somehow; his round face pocked with shadow, like the last moon of the season.
In the back of the shop Guy is hard at work, making bars of couverture and singing tunelessly to himself.
Mahmed tends to the machines, and frets.
I sense the tension between the two, as well as the affection.
Guy believes implicitly in his product, and in his own genius.
Mahmed believes in good accounts, and investing in the future.
I pack the chocolates into boxes and sachets as well as making my own new creations: mendiants, painted with gold leaf and jewelled with Malaga raisins and Seville orange peel; strawberry violet fondant, caramel, with pink peppercorns; green tea truffles, with sea salt.
Mahmed isn’t sure about any of them. The combinations are too strange; even the names are unusual.
‘ Nipples of Venus . What kind of a name is that? Are you trying to get us shut down before we even open?’
‘Names are important,’ I tell him. ‘Half the taste is in the name. And nipples of Venus were a famous treat in seventeenth-century Italy. I read about them in one of Guy’s books. Try one.’
Mahmed shrugs. ‘These fancy names. Why can’t we just sell chocolates?’
‘Because it’s never just chocolate,’ says Guy. ‘It’s dreams. It’s magic. It’s a story that started a thousand years before Christ, and which is still unfolding. We’re not just selling chocolate. We’re selling Theobroma cacao , the elixir of the gods.’
Mahmed gave a reluctant grin. ‘Whatever it is, Guy, you’re full of it.’
Guy laughed again. ‘I hope so.’
We celebrated Hallowe’en with a version of Margot’s chocolate cake, and cheap red wine in plastic cups, and one of Guy’s chickpea curries.
It feels good to do this with someone else; to feel this sense of family.
I belong here, I tell myself. Anouk and I could belong here.
But for that to happen, Guy must make his chocolaterie a success.
He needs his independence from his wealthy, controlling family; we need him to bring us together, to keep us all from drifting away.
And I already owe the man so much; I want to help him if I can.
Such are the good intentions that lead us into the path of the wind.
Such are the songs of the Man in Black, and of those who summon him.
Back in my room, I pushed back the bed and cast a circle in salt and sand.
First the circle, then the star; drawn in thick, unwavering lines.
A candle at each point of the star; one for each of the elements, and red silk sachets at intervals all around the circle.
It’s a ritual I’ve watched my mother perform for us so many times, in cheap hotel rooms and in deserted lay-bys, in the scent of incense and diesel fumes, with the scuttling clouds across the moon.
And always when we had no choice, because, as she said, there’s always a price.
The world must stay in balance. It gives, but only to take away.
I never really believed in that. But she did: believed that whatever she did to ease our path would tear away at something else: her health, her child, her safety. That’s why we can only help ourselves , she would tell me afterwards. Helping other people is a risk we cannot afford.
Except that you were wrong, Maman. We can bring good into the world. Bal and Abani taught me that, with their orange-flowered van. We are like trees, which, branching out, nourish each other in time of need. Crown-shy, we keep our counsel. Rooted, we keep each other safe.
I sit inside the circle, cross-legged on the tiles, my mother’s box beside me.
I have some dried eucalyptus leaves, picked from a garden on Rue du Panier.
Their scent is still fresh and powerful; a potent, natural incense.
I light one of the leaves; it smells fragrant and faintly medicinal, like cold winter nights under blankets and warm summer evenings in the park.
The smoke is light and moonlight-pale, painting frost-flowers in the air.
Orange flowers; a fleeting smile behind the battered counter.
The lentil van, with its message of hope. I open the box and take out the cards.
Come to me.
The wind gives a sigh.
Come to me. Bring me the future.
I draw the Two of Wands. A good card; a card of plans and projects.
A good sign for the chocolate shop; for all the plans we are making.
The smoke grows slightly more opaque. Now it smells of Sicily, and the hedges of eucalyptus that grow on the sides of the mountain.
The brush fires that ravage the island have the same gentle fragrance; their smoke is almost invisible, like a heat-haze from the hills.
Another card. The Lovers, reversed. I think once more of Guy and Mahmed.
More hangs on the success of this shop than financial independence.
Another card. The Hermit. Louis. I see him in winter sunlight; his face is almost gentle in repose.
And he is holding a dish of cacao beans – no, not beans, but the santons that Margot kept beside her bed.
As I watch, he puts one in his mouth. I banish the card with a gesture.
His card – the Hermit – keeps coming up like an unpaid debt.
I draw another card. The Fool. A young man on a hill, smiling into the summer sky.
Outside, the wind rises and falls in tune with the sound of the ocean.
The next card is the Tower. It stands on the corner of Allée du Pieu, all flashing red neon and gleaming glass.
Hard to tell, through the thickening smoke, if the neon sign reads Xocolatl or Happy Noodles ; the design seems to hold a little of both; a cacao pod that might also be a noodle bowl; a filament of rising steam which could also be a column of smoke.
The Three of Cups: a generous card, which reminds me once more of the lentil van, with the big orange flowers on the side, and the colourful plastic bowls of dal .
And finally, the last card, Death. Death, which is an ending, but also the chance to start anew.
Outside, the wind is rising. Its voice sounds like a lullaby.
And as the last of the scented smoke drifts across the circle, I see reflections of a town; a bridge across a stretch of river; some boats, one with a filament of smoke rising from the chimney; another with a line of washing drying from the bows.
And there are trees by the waterside, and the spire of a church in the distance, and the scent of woodsmoke on the air, and the sweetness of fried dough and candyfloss.
And I hear music from the smoke; the jangle of a carousel warring with the church bells, and I think: This must be Vianne.
The eucalyptus smoke has dispersed, leaving a pallid, sickroom smell. My movements in the chalk circle have blurred and broken the outline. Two of the candles have blown out; a draught comes from the open door.
I looked up, feeling suddenly cold. Stéphane was in the doorway. His face was Hallowe’en-pumpkin yellow in the candlelight. ‘I’m sorry to disturb you,’ he said. ‘I was looking for Pomponette.’
I put the cards back in their box and climbed to my feet.
It’s getting harder to do that now; my pregnancy is starting to show.
I was suddenly conscious that I was barefoot, dressed only in my nightgown.
I pulled one of the blankets from the bed and drew it around my shoulders.
Pomponette was not on the rug, nor in her usual place under the bed.
‘She must have slipped out,’ I told him.
‘I’m sure she’ll be back in the morning. ’
Stéphane looked uncertain. ‘You mind if I stay here for a while? I don’t sleep too well nowadays.’
‘Of course.’ I handed him my other blanket. ‘You want me to make you some chocolate? It often helps when I can’t sleep.’
He gave a painful, toothless smile. ‘You know, chocolate doesn’t solve everything .’
‘No, but it’s warm on a cold night.’
‘Okay. You twisted my arm.’
I put on my slippers and went into the kitchen to make the chocolate.
Seventy per cent couverture, with whole milk, sugar, grated nutmeg, vanilla seeds, and a whole bird’s-eye chilli, scored to release its warmth into the milk.
Let it steep for a minute or two. Drink it in a flowered cup, with the steam rising in the candlelight.
Watch Stéphane’s face lose its anxious look, the fine lines around his mouth start to fade.
Hear the wind at the window, like the voice of my mother.
’Viane. Think what you’re doing, ’Viane.
But the new voice inside me is stronger. It feels like the voice of a Vianne that has been waiting forever in the wings, a Vianne who chooses her own path, who takes control of her destiny. And the voice of this Vianne calls: Come to me.
Come to me. Bring me power.