Chapter twenty-six
“Thank you so much for minding the children,” Darcy looked across the wide kitchen table to Diane. The two were sitting around the big kitchen table after a tasty meal of Scallops a L’Orange entree, followed by a main course of Chicken Normandy, stuffed tomatoes, glazed carrots and fresh green beans. Laying a hand on the smooth tabletop, Darcy noted that it seemed that Gabriel’s mother had found a suitable replacement for the one she’d sent her son.
After clearing the debris from the first courses and setting out fresh strawberry and raspberry tarts along with a selection of cheeses displayed on a thick slab of marble Diane had declared a ‘time out’, sending all the children and their respective parents across the road to the nearby park, armed with Frisbees, a basketball and instructions to burn off some excess energy before dessert.
When Gabriel had looked as if he might hover, Diane had laughingly shooed her son away with the others, telling him to mind Connor and Rosie as a stand-in for their mother as they were going to have some ‘girl-time’. As the others departed, she had brought out a bottle of cider and poured a glass for herself and Darcy, proclaiming that much as she loved her children and grand-children, she also loved the sound of silence when they all left a room. Having now experienced the din created by five of Gabriel’s siblings –those currently living within ‘Sunday lunch’ radius of their mother’s house, and seven of their children for a little less than three hours, Darcy was inclined to agree.
“Let’s take this outside to the courtyard so I can enjoy some of that sun too before it disappears,” Diane said.
They exited the large family-style kitchen to a courtyard enclosed on all sides by three and four storied buildings. The space should have been claustrophobic but the rambling, organic nature of the architecture and the varying rooflines, windows and balconies made for a lively and interesting yard. A table had been placed in one corner, hidden from any neighbourhood prying eyes by a gnarly old wisteria vine growing twisted around stone columns supporting a sagging pergola. Diane plonked herself down and indicated that Darcy should take a seat as well. “It’s good when you are solo-parenting, to take time off when you get the opportunity. Take it from one who’s been there, done that,” she said, before adding, “you weren’t the only one that was peeking during prayers this morning,” she smiled when Darcy looked abashed. “ I was watching your face, -it was treat!” then she laughed out loud, “You don’t get to be a lawyer for as many years as I have been without learning to read people’s expressions –and yours quite plainly said ‘What the hell am I doing caged up inside this building on my day off?’”
“I never was much good at hiding my thoughts,” Darcy admitted, hoping she’d never find herself on the end of a cross-examination by this woman. “It’s been a busy week,” she added by way of explanation, hiding a yawn behind her hand.
“I imagine that every week is busy,” Diane said kindly. “I hope you don’t mind my questioning Gabriel a little about you, but he said you hadn’t been parenting alone for long so I would think you may be still finding your feet somewhat.”
“Not terribly long,” Darcy agreed, wondering what else Diane knew about her from Gabriel, “it’s only been a few months and then there’s been the move from London to Belagnac, but the children are settling in well and enjoying school so things are going along fine. For now.” She felt optimistic for the first time in months that they were going to come out the other side of their personal dark tunnel but didn’t want to tempt fate by appearing over-confident.
“Ah –there’s that expressive face again –you needn’t worry, you know. Getting information out of Gabriel was like getting blood out of a stone. He was very tight-lipped about the two of you, apart from one or two things he let slip.” Darcy sensed, from Diane’s body language that she’d love to know more. So, she thought, that’s what this ‘girl-time’ was about.
“I love your house,” Darcy knew she was changing the subject in a fairly blatant manner but didn’t want to continue a conversation about her personal life with someone she’d just met.
“It is quite wonderful isn’t it? –I moved here fifteen years ago; a few years after I’d sent Gabriel to live with my brother and when my youngest girls were still at Le Lycée. I know it’s far too big for me now but I never seemed to be able to make myself sell and move into anything smaller. I love the way it has weathered the years. We are both survivors this house and I.” Gabriel’s mother had taken the hint and ran with the new topic. It didn’t hurt that it was one she enjoyed. Her home was a four-storey half-timbered house in a street full of similar, but all quite individual old houses.
When she and Gabriel had turned into the road, Darcy had been enchanted with the little stream that flowed along one side of the narrow street, running directly in front of entrance doors. Low slab bridges at every house allowed residents access to their doors and to the shops and cafés along the cobbled street. As a landscape architect it was the kind of detail she’d often wished she could convince developers to include in their schemes –all too often any natural waterway in a building scheme disappeared underground, culverted and paved over, never to be seen again but this was a perfect example of what could be achieved.
“And you are one of life’s survivors too I believe,” the slight sparkle in Diane’s glance told Darcy that she might have dropped the subject of Darcy for now, but it would be revisited sometime in the near future. Sighing gustily, she returned to talking about the house, “The problem is –the house only comes alive now when the children come to visit on weekends or when I babysit my grandchildren,” the sigh was barely gone before a quixotic light came into her eye, “if we can’t talk about you, can I let you into a little secret about me?” Diane deftly derailed the conversation onto another track. She looked around as if to check that the coast was clear of potential eavesdroppers.
Darcy nodded, intrigued as to what Gabriel’s mother might be about to share with her.
“I’ve met a man,” Diane’s eyes twinkled excitement while at the same time her voice was full of something close to trepidation. She set her drink on the circular garden table. “I haven’t told any of my children yet –you’re the first to know.” It seemed that Diane didn’t have any of Darcy’s difficulties when it came to sharing at a personal level. “I’ve only known him a short time but I can feel that ‘zing’ that tells me it’s something special –you know?”
Darcy knew about the ‘zing’ all too well, but once again, wasn’t about to share her feelings for Diane’s son, especially with his mother.
“I can see that you and Gabriel have it -the ‘zing’, I mean.”
Well, so much for not telling, Darcy thought. She started to shake her head in denial but Diane waved a hand to halt any protestations. “Nonsense, of course it’s there –I’m his mother. I know ‘all’ and besides, I could hear it in his voice the first time he talked about you on the phone. I just wanted to be sure that it was reciprocated by you,” she tapped her index finger alongside her nose, “that’s why I invited you today.”
Great –thought Darcy –checked over by the mother –next thing she’d be opening her mouth to inspect her teeth.
“Oh, you are so right about your face!” Diane exclaimed, clapping her hands, “it shows absolutely everything you are thinking. You would be such a dream for me to cross-examine on a witness stand. I would know the moment you weren’t telling the absolute truth.”
Darcy wasn’t thrilled that Diane was so adroit at discerning her thoughts, or that she had just said what Darcy herself had only been thinking minutes before. It wasn’t that she lied a lot –but like everyone, she’d told the odd porky in her life -stretched the truth-, she amended, and she liked to think she could get away with it. There had been several times she had found it necessary to be somewhat economical with the facts of late when it came to explaining the reasons behind the shift in their circumstances to the children – she wondered now if they’d seen right th
rough her as easily as Diane had. Perhaps years of being a mother to her brood of children and a lawyer to boot had honed Diane’s bullshit skills beyond the norm –at least she hoped this was so.
“You were telling me about this man you’ve met,” Darcy put the spotlight back onto Diane in hopes of deflecting it off her life. The ruse worked.
“Yes, I was. He’s quite lovely.” Diane’s face was alight with pleasure. “He is a lawyer who joined my practice a couple of months ago. We’ve been dating for a month now but I don’t really know how I’m going to go about introducing him to my children. Before this, I’ve never dated anyone in the twenty-one years since Frédéric –their father- died and I’m not sure how they will take the news.”
“Might I suggest that you start with just one or two? The entire family might be a little overwhelming to someone who isn’t used to, um,” Darcy searched her mind for a suitably descriptive word other than ‘hordes’.”
“You’re quite right. The shrieking hordes might scare him off.” Once again Diane had all but echoed her own thoughts. Darcy thought she’d better start working on her ‘game face’ if she ever wanted to have any private thoughts around this woman in the future. “Perhaps you and Gabriel would meet us for dinner one evening soon –that would be a small start.” She pondered a moment, “There is one additional thing about him that I want to share.”
Oh dear, thought Darcy, what this time?
“It’s not that awful,” Diane remonstrated, shaking a finger.
So much for the ‘game face’, Darcy thought wryly. “Sorry,” she apologised, “please carry on.” She took a sip of the sweet wine to cover her embarrassment before setting the glass back on the table.
“Well, Willem was a priest before he became a lawyer. He hasn’t been married and has no family of his own –he left the church because he felt betrayed by the way the Vatican was handling molestation cases against children by the priesthood. But that’s all ancient history, and I doubt that my children will have any issues with any of it -It’s just that Willem is fifteen years younger than me,” Diane made a moue shape with her lips.
You go girl! Nothing to apologise for there, thought Darcy. She jumped in before Diane could tell her what she was thinking, saying, “And why would that be any kind of problem? If you were a man, it would hardly be worthy of a comment.”
“You’re quite right,” Diane agreed. “It’s just that deep down in the core of me, sometimes I’m not as French as I might seem. The girl from Missouri is still burrowed in the depths somewhere and I know that my folks ‘back home’ would have something to say about it. And whilst I know that I’m not some cougar out hunting for a younger man –I was completely blown away when he asked me out the first time -but they’ll never see it that way.”
“Well, then,” Darcy spoke in a practical tone, reminded of her own mother’s negative and unsupportive responses to her life choices, “it’s a good thing they’re not here then, isn’t it?”
“Oh, I do like you!” Diane spluttered with laughter, “such honesty!” She reached across to lightly pat Darcy’s outstretched hand. “You are going to make a delightful addition to the family!”
Darcy sat back, stunned. Dropping her arms lifelessly at her sides she was unable to form any words to respond to Diane’s comment in either endorsement or rebuttal. She opened and closed her mouth to say something several times but nothing would come out.
Diane sat with her head cocked to one side; studying Darcy with a bemused expression, “You poor dear –you look like a trout flailing on the riverbank. Take a breath,” she instructed gently, now looking more amused than concerned. “I never meant to shock you into an early grave, -heaven forbid! – Gabriel would never forgive me, but I thought you were well aware of how he felt about you.” She watched Darcy closely for a moment to make sure she had started breathing again and when she was certain no permanent physical harm had been done, continued, “I may be a little more outspoken than you’re accustomed to but I feel I have to tell you that I’ve never seen my son look at a woman the way he looks at you –half as if he’d like to carry you off to his bed and half as if he’d kill rampaging bulls to protect you.” Her smile turned nostalgic, “it’s a lucky woman that finds a man like that way once in a lifetime; – and I know what I’m talking about - he takes after his father in that regard. It is one of the reasons why it’s taken me so many years to even consider another man.”
Darcy’s brain had resumed functioning. She made a decision to go with a swift denial but before she could voice her thoughts the sounds of doors opening and slamming and the thumping feet of the returning ‘hordes’ put paid to any continued private conversation. Diane rose from the courtyard table to proceed inside and serve dessert and there was no further opportunity to resolve the subject they’d started before it was time to leave.
Frustrated that she’d not been able to repudiate the notion that she had plans of joining the Dubois clan at any time in the future, immediate or otherwise, Darcy chewed over over Diane’s words along with a generous portion of deliciously tart raspberries surrounded by smooth crème pâtissière in a perfectly baked short crust pastry; again on the drive back to Belagnac; and still afterwards once she was home in the cottage supervising teeth cleaning and bedtime for her children. Despite her prolonged deliberations she could come to no reasonable conclusion as to why Diane had made the assumption that she would be joining the Dubois clan.
Yes, she admitted, she liked Gabriel, a lot, but it was too much of a stretch of her imagination, fertile as it could be, to picture them together as a permanent fixture. After her disastrous marriage to Patrick, she did not want to go there again.
Mindful of Diane’s divulging of Gabriel’s intent, Darcy found excuses not to visit the chateau more than was absolutely necessary over the next days. Granted, Gabriel was her employer, which meant a certain amount of to’ing and fro’ing between the cottage and chateau to finalise design plans and discuss revisions, budgeting and alterations was inevitable but for the most part she cited a heavy work load as her reason to turn down all invitations he made to bring the children over for meals or spend time with him. During the days she made sure that she was busy outside overseeing the early stages of excavation and ground work in the walled garden, surrounded by the construction crew and not available for private consultations and when not outdoors she used the need to stay ahead of the construction team as a valid reason to remain in the cottage, glued to her computer screen and working long into the night to finish the final detailed design drawings for the works. By Gabriel’s tight lips and general demeanour when she did see him, she knew her ruse was not going to work much longer.
Fortune smiled upon her, she decided, when, towards the end of the week Gabriel was called away to urgent business meetings in Moscow, where he said he’d be for the next fortnight while involved in face-to-face discussions with potential partners regarding future business opportunities. When Darcy heard the news, she didn’t know if she was relieved or disappointed.
Knowing in her heart that she needed to sort out her feelings for the man but glad of a reprieve that meant she didn’t have to keep hiding out like the coward she was starting to feel she was becoming, she turned to her work once more and pushed all other considerations to the recesses of her mind