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his fingers through his hair. ‘It’ll be a Rosy-Faced lovebird, probably. He said they were easy for a beginner and make “quite delightful” pets. You
know
how he talks. The lovebirds talk too.’
    â€˜How very interesting.’
    â€˜He said I should have a pair, really.’
    â€˜If you’re ready, let’s go down to the bar. Come on.’
    Madame Mazine called out as we crossed the lobby. ‘I have been speaking to Maurice, the driver, about your car. The mayor is back from the clinic, but he’s not strong enough to drive yet … So … ?’ She left a question in the air for me to catch up.
    â€˜So perhaps I continue to rent his Simca? Is that it? I’d be very grateful, until I can make other arrangements.’
    â€˜Maurice is in the bar, he went to get some cigarettes. Perhaps you could have a word with him? Clotilde will start cleaning the Pavilion tomorrow.’
    â€˜But I still have a week in my room. Until the twenty-sixth?’
    â€˜Indeed. But it will be better for a little paint, and the paper is quite … poor.’
    What she meant was that the paper was peeling off in grubby strips like old bandage here and there and would be replaced. Which was good news.
    So I nodded, politely, and we went down to the bar, noisier now, with the volume up on the television and a group of truck drivers arguing good-naturedly about tyre pressures. Maurice was among them. He was affable, drew me aside to a corner by the pin-table. Monsieur le Maire was home but weak. He would be relieved if I wished to continue renting the Simca. He had it in mind, anyway, to change to another model when he was better. And was there a question of a telephone? Madame Mazine and Eugène suggested that there might be. Or had he misheard? You could never be certain with Eugène. He was always so busy rushing here and there …
    News does indeed travel fast in small communities. But in this case it was saving me a good deal of trouble; after all, his brother-in-law was the mayor and I was paying handsomely for the use of his Simca. I obviously, from what I had been told, was helping out with medical bills, so perhaps someone knew someone who knew someone else who would be sympathetic to my desire for a telephone? Madame Mazine had suggested, quietly, that ‘if you have the money, Monsieur Colcott, you will very shortly have a telephone’. So.
    â€˜No indeed! You heard quite correctly from Eugène. I am about to go into Sainte-Brigitte tomorrow to get the forms and so on.’
    To my immense delight, Maurice brushed the remark aside as if it had been a mildly irritating gnat. ‘Boff! Forms! Bureaucrats. Des gens
terribles.’
    I agreed warmly and offered him a refill. He had drained his glass after his line about bureaucrats, quite deliberately. We were to discuss telephones.
    Sitting at the corner table, which was far enough away from the bar counter to hear oneself talk, he pointed out, with his newly charged glass of Ricard, that my brother, ‘Jimmie’, had once applied for a telephone, but had not been able to afford it after all. Times were hard for a painter, wasn’t that so? I knew, of course, that the poteaux had already been erected along the road from Saint-Basile, past the house, to Saint-Basile-les-Pins? All that had to be done was take a line from the road up to the house … And so it went on. Reasonable, simple, absolutely ‘pas de problème’. He took a swig of his drink and I picked up my cue. But what, I said worriedly, about the forms and papers and most important of all, how would I go about paying for this bounty? Simple! said Maurice, setting down his glass and wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. Simple, my dear Monsieur. As I probably knew, Monsieur le Maire had had a very bad time with his prostate; it was a delicate subject to bring up in public, and he apologized, but health was all. Health –