It wasn’t hard to triangulate those three places; good wine was the thing they all had in common.
“I mostly do business in the United States,” he said. “And what brings you, Madame, to this tiny spot in France?”
“It’s a long story, but I bought a house over the internet, and even though it’s very beautiful here, I can’t keep it. So I need a refund.”
“Ah, the one-euro program.”
“Yes. Have many people here done it?”
“Not yet. They give reports about it in Italy on CNN. We are later to it here in France.”
Marlow would have to look that up. She should have done some research before they came. She should have done a lot of things.
“It was the idea of ourfonctionnaire,” he said. “When she saw it in Italy, she created something similar here. She wants to help our abandoned villages problem. It’s quite brilliant.”
His English was spectacular.Hewas spectacular, to be honest. He wasn’t sporting a wedding ring—did French men do wedding rings? She left that tempting thought where it was.
An Audi zipped up the road, parked next to Guillaume’s Porsche, and spat out a fortyish woman in high heels, a tight skirt, and silk blouse. Marlow was now officially feeling underdressed. Her outfit would have worked at the festival office. In France, even in the middle of the countryside, not so much.
“Bonjour, Guillaume,”said the woman.
“Bonjour, Rémy. Comment allez-vous?”
“Très bien, et vous?”
“Eh bien, je suis trop occupé, mais ce n’est pas nouveau,”said Guillaume.
Marlow identified with feeling perpetually busy. At least he got to be way too busyhere, in this splendid place, suspended in time.
Guillaume spoke in French to Rémy. Marlow could follow the gist of it: he was telling this woman about her problem with the one-euro program. Rémy nodded. They were getting somewhere.
“This is Mademoiselle Rémy Rousseau,” he said to Marlow. “She can help.”
“Félicitations, Madame,”said Rémy. Marlow wasn’t exactly sure if congratulations were in order.“Avez-vous acheté votre maison à Mirabelle-les-Roches?”
Marlow nodded. Yes, she’d bought the house in Mirabelle-les-Roches.
“Alors je ne peux gérer vos affaires que dans la mairie de Mirabelle,”said Rémy.
“She can only help you in the Mirabelle town hall, up there,” translated Guillaume, pointing up the hill.
“Dans quinze minutes.”
With that, Rémy disappeared inside the Nenier city hall. And Marlow had fifteen minutes to figure out a way up that hill.
“I can show you the way,” said Guillaume.
“That’s not necessary,” Marlow said, knowing she absolutely needed the help.
“Allow me. I was only here to drop off an envelope. I will be back shortly.”
Sabine returned from her walk, and Marlow brought her up to speed. Then Guillaume re-emerged. Marlow introduced him to Sabine.
“Enchanté,”he said, reaching for the handle of the heaviest carry-on and leading them up mossy stone steps. “We can take the road, but this is quicker.”
The steps were divided by three landings, maybe a hundred in all—not for the faint of heart—and at the top was a little square. It was overtaken by weeds and encircled by a low stone wall in the grips of thick, woody vines. Sabine rested her bag on a broken bench, its wooden planks rotted through. Lining the square were a boarded-up fruit and vegetable store, its faded, torn awning taken over by roosting pigeons; a closed restaurant, paint peeling; a tiny medieval stone church, stained glass windows broken; a much smaller town hall than Nenier’s, stonework crumbling; an extinguished gas light outside a dark post office; and a closed bicycle rental store. One layer up was a sprinkling of very old, shuttered stone houses, thirty or forty max, presided over by a single-tower castle ruin. Mirabelle was dead.
“Bienvenue à Mirabelle-les-Roches,”said Rémy, who, it turned out, was right on their heels. She produced a ring of skeleton keys like a jailor, fit one into themairielock, turned it, and pushed on the tarnished doorknob. Guillaume motioned for Marlow and Sabine to go first. As Marlow passed him, she got a whiff of cologne that conjured at once the magical smell of an out-of-time gentleman and a take-charge-in-the-best-way-in-bed reprobate.
