Monsieur Pamplemousse Afloat (6 page)

‘Take it from me,’ said Abeille, ‘it’s when you try and do it both ways at the same time the trouble starts. So will you give me a hand?’

‘It is possible.’ Monsieur Pamplemousse heard his voice answer from what seemed a long way away. The wine groupies exchanged disappointed glances.

‘Gee, thank you. That’s great. I’ve been lying awake thinking of it.’ She planted a kiss on his forehead, then lowered her voice. ‘Now I don’t have to worry any more. All I know about wine is what JayCee tells me. He says you French put that bump in the bottom of the bottles …’

‘Punt,’ corrected Monsieur Pamplemousse. ‘In English it is called punt. It is put there to collect the sediment.’

‘Is that so? Well JayCee reckons it’s a trick you French thought up to make it look like you’re getting more than you really are.’

The coach slowed down and Monsieur Pamplemousse glanced out of the window as they drew up alongside a tall cross set against a low stone wall. The gently rising piece of land beyond it was covered in vines and the name of the vineyard was carved on a piece of stone let into a corner pillar.

‘I think you should not say that too loudly,’ he murmured in hushed tones. ‘The owners would not take kindly to such a thought.’

Following on behind the others disembarking from the coach he glanced up. The air was crystal clear, but dark clouds were already gathering towards the west. It looked as though JayCee could be right about the weather. What was it Colonel Massingham had said? Hailstones as big as tennis balls. It would be bad news if Pommes Frites got caught out in a storm like that, especially if one landed on his head. Life wouldn’t be worth living for a while.

A helicopter flew low overhead – probably getting in some quick crop spraying before the rain arrived.

He watched as it turned and zoomed in over a tiny patch of vines, the boundaries of which were marked by blue plastic bags tied to lines of upright posts. It was a simple way of ensuring the pilot got it right. In a region where each vineyard could belong to a dozen different owners, mistakes could be costly.

He shot off a couple of frames of film as the helicopter turned and flew in again. Then, using the wall with the name of the vineyard as foreground interest, he took a couple more shots of the hill immediately in front of them. It was a picture postcard view that must have been reproduced a million times, but one more wouldn’t hurt.

Abeille rested her chin on his shoulder.

‘Wouldn’t it be a great place for having it away?’ she whispered. ‘Behind the wall.’

Monsieur Pamplemousse pulled himself free and stared at her aghast. ‘That is hallowed
terroir
…’ He made a rapid mental calculation, converting hectares into acres. ‘It is four and a half acres of some of the most valuable land in the world.’

‘You’re just trying to turn me on,’ said Abeille.

Mindful of JayCee’s words of warning, Monsieur Pamplemousse took the girl firmly by the arm and led her back to the coach. The Golden Gate Bridge during the hour of
affluence
was one thing; Domaine de la Romanée Conti when the grapes were beginning to ripen was something else again. The thought of being discovered made his blood run cold. He would never live it down.

‘I am supposed to be looking after you, remember?’

Abeille paused on the step and looked back at him. ‘You didn’t think I was being serious did you? With all these people around? Shame on you. What do you think I am?’

In truth Monsieur Pamplemousse didn’t know what to think, but he knew one who would have been only too happy to oblige. Boniface was having trouble finding the right gear. In his excitement he put the engine into reverse and they narrowly missed colliding with an approaching tractor.

‘Tell me about Beaune,’ said Abeille, as they drove on their way.

‘The place or the pageant?’ Monsieur Pamplemousse was happy to change the subject.

‘Whichever.’

‘Beaune itself is a city which is almost entirely given over to wine; it is honeycombed with cellars. Most of the big
négociants
have their offices there. Then, of course, there is the Hospice. Each year, on the third Sunday in November, there is a great wine auction. It is in aid of charity, but it also dictates the price of wine for that vintage. It is part of
Les Trois Glorieuses
– the Three Glorious Days. On the Saturday there is a dinner at Clos de Vougeot. On Sunday it is the turn of the Hôtel Dieu in Beaune, and on Monday everyone repairs to the village of Meursault for lunch. To take in all three you need a strong constitution.

‘Étienne-Jules Marey, who studied movement on film and effectively invented the movie camera, was born in Beaune. So was Gaspard Monge, who invented descriptive geometry …’ Monsieur Pamplemousse broke off. If he wasn’t careful it would sound as though he was echoing Boniface’s cassette. ‘It is also full of tourists. As for tonight’s pageant, that is all about a character called “Vert-Vert”.’

‘Vert-Vert? Is that a he or a she?’

‘Neither,’ said Monsieur Pamplemousse. ‘Vert-Vert was a parrot who lived in the fifteenth century. He belonged to some Visitandine nuns in a town called Nevers, and he became so famous that two centuries
after he died a teacher in a Jesuit college wrote a long poem about him. Generations of school children have had to learn it off by heart ever since. I had to when I was at school.

‘How did he get to be so famous?’ said Abeille. ‘Did he have a good agent or something?’

‘On the contrary,’ said Monsieur Pamplemousse. ‘Vert-Vert lived a very pampered, sybaritic life. The nuns spoilt him, and instead of being adept at the usual phrases parrots learn he gradually became extremely fluent in ecclesiastical matters.

‘News of his prowess spread far beyond the boundaries of Burgundy and one day some sister nuns at a convent in Nantes asked if he could go and stay with them for a while.

‘At first the nuns at Nevers refused to let him go, but in the end they relented and he was sent off by boat.

‘Unfortunately, during the journey down the Loire he met up with some Dragoons and that is when the trouble began.

‘By the time the boat reached Nantes the damage was done. Far from being enthralled by Vert-Vert’s quotations from the Bible, the nuns were
so scandalised by his foul language he was packed straight off home again in disgrace.

‘Punishment was swift. For the indiscriminate use of oaths and for the embarrassment he had caused, the Nevers Council of Order condemned him to a period of fasting and solitude.’

‘Oaths? You mean like swearing?’

‘
Oui
.’

‘Tell me some.’

‘
Merde
,’ said Monsieur Pamplemousse.

‘And he had to go on solitary just because he said shit? Jesus – if that happened in America half the population would be shut away!’

‘This was in 1493,’ said Monsieur Pamplemousse. ‘Besides, there were a lot of variations. There were other words.’

‘Like what for example?’

Monsieur Pamplemousse racked his mind for some suitable examples. ‘
Con
and
lune
and
praline
,
par exemple
.’ He immediately regretted his action.

‘
Con
and
lune
… and what was the last one again –
praline
? I thought that was some kind of nut.’

Heads turned once again as Monsieur Pamplemousse tried desperately to think of a suitable translation … ‘I am afraid my knowledge of English does not allow me,’ he said at last. ‘But it is something all ladies have.’

Disappointment manifested itself in certain areas of the coach.

‘So what happened in the end?’

‘Vert-Vert served his sentence and gradually the nuns relented.

In short, he died of over-eating.’

‘And we have to watch a pageant about it?’

‘That is what it says in the itinerary.’

Abeille sat digesting the news for a moment or two. ‘I was in a pageant once,’ she said at last. ‘When I was in sixth grade. Miss Screwpull of 1993. I was the one the judges most wanted to pluck at harvest time.’

‘Times change,’ said Monsieur Pamplemousse.

Signs saying
Visitez!
or
Dégustation gratuite
heralded the approach to Beaune.

The offices of L. Ambert et Frère –
Négociants-Éléveurs
occupied a large building standing a little way back from the perimeter road running round the outer wall of the city. There was little possibility of missing it; every half kilometre or so there were freshly painted signs advertising its presence. Other posters and hoardings drew attention to the pageant that evening.

They drove in through the open gates and crunched to a halt in a gravelled parking area alongside a row of cars and station wagons. Monsieur Pamplemousse gazed up at the signs. It wasn’t quite what he had
expected. During the briefing, the Director had mentioned nothing about there being a brother in the business. Perhaps he wasn’t aware of it. The words ‘et Frère’ looked as though they were a recent addition; a hasty one at that, for the paint was of a different shade of white and they threw the original arrangement out of balance with the rest.

As they climbed out of the coach and formed a group near the main entrance to the building, an elderly woman he took to be Chantal’s aunt, Madame Ambert, came forward to greet them and extend a brief welcome. Monsieur Pamplemousse had a feeling she was scanning the faces as though she might be looking for him, but before he had a chance to catch her attention she handed over to an underling and disappeared. Perhaps she had been frightened off by the presence of Abeille, who had slipped her arm proprietorially into his? Or else she had been forewarned to look for a dog. Rather to his relief, Pommes Frites had elected to stay in the coach for the time being. Guided tours were not his strong suit.

Boniface was already in deep conversation with a girl – a courier from a tour company.

Madame Ambert was clearly too well bred to let it show to all and sundry, but he got the feeling she was having to force herself into doing something which was total anathema to her; she looked distracted and unhappy as she left them to it.

They were each handed a tasting glass with the name of the company prominently engraved on the outside – he noted in passing that the words ‘et Frère’ were missing – and after a complimentary glass of an unidentified white wine they set off on an escorted tour of the eighteenth-century mansion house.

Ahead of them. Monsieur Pamplemousse could hear Colonel Massingham’s voice droning on. The subject on this occasion was tasting glasses.

‘… the shape is very important. The stem prevents the hand from warming the wine. The tulip shape is so that when the aromas are released they will concentrate at the narrow top. That is why, when tasting, you should never fill the glasses beyond the widest point …’

He wondered how Mrs Massingham stood it. Life with the colonel must be one long lecture. Perhaps, as mothers do with children, she had developed mental shutters, replying only when absolutely necessary.

On the pretext of studying the brochure they had been given on the way in, Monsieur Pamplemousse hung back a little until the voice was barely audible.

Originally the residence of a prominent member of the old Burgundian Parliament, the house had been many things in its time – including a hotel – before it had been acquired by the Ambert family, who had restored it to its former glory, furnishing it in the style of Louis XV.

Parts of it looked as though they were still lived in; the library, for example. Some of the bedrooms were also roped off to visitors and there were signs of occupation.

The vaulted rooms of the old kitchen and pantry area were festooned with artefacts of the wine trade. Ancient well-worn double shoulder baskets – made of willow and yoked in the middle – were now filled with bottles of wine for sale, the prices prominently displayed. Replicas of old cannons, once used for scaring birds, miniature dioramas of barrel-makers at work, glasses, corkscrews, grafting knives; everything had its price tag. Someone, somewhere, was making the most of things. The only item that remained unpriced was a gigantic wooden wine press housed in the former stables. It would need a crane to move it.

There was no denying times were hard. After a long run of good weather, two poor seasons coupled with the world-wide recession had caused prices to fall and many
vignerons
had been forced to add other strings to their bow. Who could blame the Director’s aunt for joining their ranks? And yet, somehow, he couldn’t rid himself of a feeling of disappointment.

A striking woman, genteelly handsome rather than beautiful, with a face which radiated toughness. Toughness, along with a stubborn streak. She would have had need of both qualities over the years. To be a successful woman
négociante
in an international
trading area which until recent years had been almost entirely male dominated, couldn’t have been easy.

Idly picking up a pair of pruning shears, Monsieur Pamplemousse turned them over. It was stamped
MADE IN CHINA
. At a guess the manufacturer’s price must have been upped at least tenfold.

Displaying the tools of the trade with pride and charging admission was one thing; over-pricing cheap replicas was something else again.

Dinner was a pedestrian affair; a sad reflection of the festivities of
Les Trois Glorieuses
. It was taken at a candlelit table set in what must once have been the main room of the mansion. Ornamental mirrors lined the oak panelled walls. They were interspersed with unsigned monochrome paintings of unknown sitters, presumably past members of the family. The side tables were festooned with hand-painted china and porcelain ornaments. At least they didn’t have price tags on them.