She turned the tap off again and silence reigned once more in the cool room. There are some places that make us uneasy as soon as we set foot in them, and there are others that welcome us, that take us in, as if they have been expecting us.
She touched the walls. Some parts were unplastered and you could see the stone. The thick walls guaranteed coolness, and despite the overpowering heat outside, inside it was a pleasant temperature. It was a place where time stood still. Life went on as it had done in bygone centuries; people were self-sufficient, working on the land, looking after orchards, cattle or goodness knows what else. It was then that she made the connection with the two patterns carved in stone she had noticed on arrival. When she was trying to find the right key, she had spotted two motifs engraved in the wall on either side of the door. Although they had rubbed away you could make out the outline of vine leaves with two bunches of grapes on one side, and a barrel on the other side, suggesting that the house had originally had something to do with wine.
Franck was now climbing back up towards the house, bitter and worn out. Lise watched him from the shade inside, while he was in full sunlight. Two-thirds of the way up the slope he put his hands on his hips, still cluthcing the lifeless phone. The signal bars had completely disappeared. He had even got blood on it, blood that had already dried. But he had to be contactable. He couldn’t tell Lise everything. He was reluctant to open up about his recent disputes, but going into partnership with two colleagues twenty-five years his junior was no joke, particularly given that the pair had made their money not in film-making but in video games. Franck was wary of them, of their way of questioning everything, and especially of the meeting they had planned with Netflix in the next few days. Liem and Travis had been worrying him for three months, but he didn’t want to admit it, for fear of looking like an old fool. That was why he had to be contactable, to stop them from doing something stupid.
Lise saw him arrive in the doorway, out of breath as if he had been running for hours.
Completely distraught, he said with the little breath he had left: ‘Lise, it’s awful, there’s nothing … There’s nothing!’
‘What do you mean, there’s nothing?’
‘I don’t understand, there’s no signal anywhere; I can’t even get one bar. Can you believe it, not even one bar?’
‘Have you seen how out of breath you are?’
‘For goodness’ sake, Lise, it’s all uphill here. Or rather it’s up and down, and on the other side there are brambles and creatures everywhere. This really is the back of beyond.’
Seeing Franck in such a state, Lise was keen not to make things worse. He was still holding his phone in his hand like a poor bleeding animal.
‘Did you hurt yourself?’
‘It’s nothing. But, shit, it’s crazy; we’re up high and there’s no reception anywhere. It’s madness!’
Lise came closer and looked at his legs, which were covered in scratches.
‘We should think about buying some surgical spirit and dressings, just in case.’
‘We’re not in the darkest depths of the jungle.’
‘But, look, after an hour you’re already covered in blood!’
Lise led him to the tap. She could feel that he was hot and seeing the grazes on his legs reminded her of what she had read in the paper about the dangers of ticks and Lyme disease, but she kept quiet for fear that he would panic, city dweller that he was.
‘Lise, you don’t seem to realise, this is serious.’
‘But you can still do lots of things with your phone: take photos, check the time, and you can use it as a torch.’
‘Listen to me, Lise. I will not spend three weeks in this godforsaken place; I really can’t afford to, I can’t!’
Lise burst into hysterical laughter at that.
‘It’s not funny, for God’s sake! It’s not funny. I need my phone … Believe me, I cannot have a single day without being contactable.’
‘Even on holiday?’
‘Especially on holiday … You obviously don’t understand what I’m going through.’
‘Did you get the easel out of the car?’
‘You’re really going to start painting now?’
‘No, but it’s reassuring to know it’s there. A bit like you with your phone.’
‘The difference is that my phone is for work.’
Lise let him have the pleasure of this little dig. She left him to calm down, assuring him that he would be bound to find a signal by going towards the cliff, or the other way, towards the west. It crossed her mind to tell him to climb the enormous oak tree that stood a few metres from the house. She kept this to herself, but it put a smile on her face that he could not understand.
For now, the most important thing was that they settle in and take their time to unpack their bags. Once again, Franck noticed his wife’s composure; her natural way of doing things slowly, never letting things get to her. For as long as they had been together, she had always reassured him. In a long-term relationship, there are many opportunities to discover the other person’s true colours, to challenge them or draw inspiration from them. Franck deeply admired his wife, not least because she always kept her cool and never gave in to panic. And even though she had gone through lots of struggles and disappointments, in his eyes she was still the calmest and most serene person in the universe.
They started getting things out of the car. They had brought bed-linen and enough clothes to last them three weeks. In this heat they would not be wearing much. The problem of dinner soon arose. It was too late to go back down to wherever it was to go shopping; everything would be closed.
‘Tell me, are those really hazel trees down there?’ Lise asked playfully.
‘I don’t know, Lise. I don’t know anything. You think I’m looking at the trees?’
‘You should. Because if they are hazel trees, there might be hazelnuts, or blackberries, and mushrooms. Have you looked to see if there are any?’
‘Seriously, Lise, you really want to eat mushrooms with hazelnuts?’
Lise made no reply. Instead, she unpacked two big bags, containing crisps, three packets of warm salad, as well as a bottle of wine and an assortment of drinks she had bought at the service station just in case.
Franck felt lost. In these new surroundings, he was unsure what to do or where to put himself. He followed Lise’s instructions to get this or that bag out of the boot, to take this or that upstairs. She was on top of the situation. He watched her; she seemed cool and relaxed, while he had scratches all over his body and was soaked in sweat, with blood on his arms and legs. He listened to her obediently. In the bedroom he gave her a hand making the bed.
‘This mattress is brand new. That’s odd, don’t you think?’
‘The important thing is that there is a bed.’
Franck plugged in his charger near the bedside table, but that was not working either. He began to complain, until Lise told him to go and turn the electricity on to calm him down. Franck went downstairs and looked everywhere to find the meter. It was behind a curtain; he set it to ‘ON’ and the radio immediately started up in the bathroom, an old FM radio playing a Bob Marley song that sounded out of place, but at least he had got something from this house. Disturbed by the sudden burst of noise, he went to the bathroom to switch it off. It was an old black Telefunken with a knob and a big aerial, the same type of radio he had had as a teenager.