Sabine eyed a canvas that was all pinks, swirling and fading into one another.
“It doesn’t know what it wants to be yet,” said Delphine. “I am waiting for it to tell me.”
Sabine nodded, feeling the same—not about a piece of art, but about herself.
Out back, they sat by a fountain. Chef Louis brought out blue cheese and sliced pears.
“So what do you think?” asked Delphine.
“It’s the most amazing place I’ve ever seen,” said Sabine.
“You don’t have to show me what you make, but can you at least tell me?”
“I make these,” said Sabine, pulling out two half-finished tiny books. She’d seen so much art today, most of it still inprocess, so she felt it was safe to share. “I don’t usually know I’m going to make one until I pull the paper out of my notebook.”
Delphine lit up as she flipped through them. “Merveilleux!You have a beginner’s mind. This is an intangible, magical bit that all great artists have and only so-so artists dream of.”
Sabine had never thought about her little books as an art form.
“Aubin asked you what made you happy,” said Yves, “and you said these books. Maybe what you need to do is just play with them. Put university on hold for a year. Come here.”
“How much does it cost?” Sabine asked.
“A thousand euros a week for French artists,” said Delphine, “two for internationals. We are booked into next year, but there is always a spot for someone special.”
Sabine’s heart broke. It was nice to be thought of as special, but this to-die-for place was out of reach, whether she was special or not.
Luc found Marlow pacing outside Maison Perdue, close to losing her mind about the Rémy-induced state of affairs, and about Ruth from Cincinnati visiting the next day to settle the house. He grabbed a box ofpalmiercookies from his kitchen and pulled her down to the Nenier lot where his little Renault was parked.
“I have an errand to run, and you could use a break.”
She wept most of the way. Just when she thought she was done crying, she’d start again. She ate the entire box ofpalmiersherself. Then she cried about that, too.
“It’s OK, I have had them before,” he said.
They arrived at a run-down stone cottage on the edge of a hilly forest. “Sylvain is the mushroom expert in Haute-Marne. My friend Camille needs mushrooms.”
“But I’m blotchy,” said Marlow.
“The blotches are fading, and while I don’t want to make your twenty-thousand-euro day any worse by forcing you into public, it’s just Sylvain. He doesn’t care about such things.”
They found Sylvain in his study, wearing two pairs of readers and poring over legal documents. He was in his eighties, had a full head of grey hair, mutton chops, his T-shirt pulled over the circumference of his pot belly, and he was apparently a big fan of the seventies Adidas shorts, socks, and sandals look. He greeted Luc warmly, kissing him on both cheeks.
“Je vous présente mon amie, Marlow,”said Luc.“Elle vient du Canada.”
“Bonjour la Canadienne,”said Sylvain.“Il fait froid chez vous, même en juillet?”
Marlow laughed and explained that it could be cold in Canada, but not usually in July. Sylvain listened as he slipped into old mud-caked running shoes (he called them his“baskets”) without undoing the laces. He grabbed a big walking stick from a collection in the corner. Luc took one and offered another to Marlow, but she didn’t think she needed it. Sylvain lifted a weathered Airways travel bag off a hook.
“Où est ton sac?”he asked Luc.
Luc pulled out a grocery store plastic bag which he’d stuffed into his pocket.
“Les champignons vont détester ce sac!”said Sylvain with disdain.“Ils seront écrasés dans ton sac!”He despaired that the mushrooms would hate Luc’s bag and be crushed in it.“On y va!”
And off they went, following Sylvain into the forest behind his house. He was fitter than he looked. Almost immediately, the ground got steep; he traversed it with no difficulty at all, using his stick for balance. Marlow regretted refusing one and found a substitute on the ground.From here on in, I’m taking people’s advice.No more of this “no thank you” nonsense.
They walked up for a while, then down into ravines and up the other side, looking for two kinds of mushrooms:chanterelles, which were yellow and little, and boletes, harder to identify.
