Page 27 of The Little Provence Book Shop
‘Oh, yes. She’s English. I think someone had told her I was here and she was curious,’ said Adeline with a shrug.
‘OK,’ Monique made to pick up her purchases and take them to the flat and then stopped. ‘But she seemed strange with me. She made a big circle to get around me, as if I was an elephant!’
Adeline laughed, then felt herself begin to go a little red. ‘She’s a bit… nervous, I think.’
‘Of me? But why?’
‘Perhaps…’ Adeline thought of Stacey’s stumbled attempt at French then felt Monique’s knowing eyes on her and realised that only the truth would do. ‘She heard some rumours about you. About you doing some magic and things like that.’
Monique shook her head. ‘Ah yes, because I am a witch.’ She rolled her eyes, then shook her head and laughed – such a joyful noise usually, but this time tinged with sadness. ‘Some people have no imagination,’ she said. ‘You are either a doctor with a medical diploma, or you are a witch. They cannot conceive of anything else. Anything in between. It is all black and white. And of course if you are a witch, then you must be dangerous, perhaps evil. They cannot imagine that some people use magic for good.’
‘People can be narrow-minded,’ Adeline said, feeling a little hypocritical.
‘Oui. When I first arrived, I was so young. And people were suspicious of me. But I thought…’ Monique shrugged. ‘Ah, it does not matter.’
‘I honestly think she’s an exception. I haven’t heard anyone else say anything, I think perhaps it’s an old rumour – and maybe if she doesn’t mix much with local people she hasn’t been corrected.’
Monique fiddled with the paper bag in her hands, worrying its edges. ‘It is just the word “witch”. It makes me feel like an old woman on a broom,’ she said, half amused. ‘But why is it thatpeople need to label everything?Non, I am not a doctor. I do not ride a broom like a witch. But I do use magic and I do heal people.’
Adeline felt a shiver, thinking about the strange charge she’d felt when Monique’s hand had rested on her shoulder the day before; the way in which the Dickinson poems seemed almost to have been written about her at times.
‘Ah, but not hocus-pocus, no cauldrons,’ Monique said, gathering the bag to her and smiling again. She looked, suddenly, more like her usual self. ‘Perhaps crystals. Maybe spells. A little intuition. Jars for luck and love and fortune. And stories of course. They are magic,non? Poems.’
‘Yes. I suppose.’
‘Pah! There is no “suppose”. I gave you a book from a woman who is dead many years, yet you hear her voice. You feel what she feels. You sense it. There is a connection. What is that if it is not magic?’
Adeline felt a shiver of recognition.
‘Stories, they are human souls trapped in words. One soul calling to another, across pages, miles, sometimes centuries. And they tell us the thing we need to know more than anything. That we are not alone. That we can connect. Maybe the writer and the reader will never meet. Maybe the writer has been dead many years. But there is a voice saying “We have the same mind, the same thoughts. Do not worry. You are heard. You are understood.” It is this.’ Monique said, tapping her chest. ‘This is what heals us.’
13
It was her first time in Avignon. It was only twenty kilometres from St Vianne, but with so much to do and find out about and settle into, she hadn’t had a chance to visit. But she’d received notification that her mobile had arrived at the local phone shop, so had to make the journey.
It had been more difficult than she might have imagined. Without a car, and with no local bus service, she hadn’t been quite sure what to do. A taxi to the town was a possibility, but she’d baulked when she’d enquired about the price. Thirty euros each way was far more than she was willing to fork out for such a short journey.
Adeline wished she’d thought it through more before she’d ordered the phone. Everything on the website had seemed so straightforward – until she’d got to creating a contract for herself. Then she’d needed ID and address details. As she was so new to her rental, she hadn’t yet received a bill addressed to her, so in the end she’d had to go to themairiewhere a local official had printed out a proof of residence with painstaking slowness, and stamped it with an official-looking stamp. Now shehad to take it to the shop to prove her existence and collect her phone.
Living in London, she’d been so used to stepping out of her house and getting on public transport; and although she’d been under no illusion that St Vianne was anything like London, she’d assumed there’d be some way of getting from A to B. A rickety bus or a local station she could walk to. But clearly not.
She’d just hung the phone up to the taxi service when she heard a cough behind her and jumped. ‘I’m sorry,’ Monique said. ‘I didn’t mean to scare you. But if you’re looking for a way to get to Avignon, I can arrange something.’
‘You can?’
The result had been a ride in a van with a ninety-year-old farmer in blue overalls called Grégoire who’d regaled her with graphic stories about birthing lambs that would have made James Herriot turn pale. But somehow, she’d managed to cope and – when he’d dispatched her in the town centre – she’d waved him off, grateful both for the lift and for the fact that it was over.
Then she was alone, standing on an unfamiliar street and somehow back in the heart of things. She’d only lived in sleepy St Vianne for a few weeks but it had lulled her into a different rhythm. It was a shock to see people walking briskly, cars driving past, the number of shops and boutiques that garnished the high street. After a moment, though, she realised she was enjoying being around a little more hustle and bustle – she drew energy from the other people passing and, as she searched for rue de Combles, began to enjoy peeping into artisan boutiques, chocolate shops and shoe stores and doing a little window-shopping.
She’d loved living in London. Loved the vibrancy of the city, the fact that whatever time it was, whatever season, there wouldbe something going on if you wanted to join in. More often than not, especially since Lili had been born, she’d opted to stay at home instead and indulge in her secret passion for reality shows, but had known that London was waiting, ready to welcome her back whenever she was ready.
Since arriving here, she’d come to appreciate the slower pace of St Vianne, the fact that the locals, even those who’d seemed a little suspicious of her at first, were friendly and always exchangedbonjours. The fact that Lili was now thriving in a class of just eight pupils rather than being lost in a class of thirty or more.
But that didn’t mean she had to hide from everything, she realised, looking at an enamelled bracelet in the window of a jewellery store and wondering whether to treat herself.
Deciding against it, she moved forward again and made her way to the shiny glass front of the Internet shop. Inside, a boy who looked sixteen at most explained the features of her new phone to her as if she was ancient and out of touch – she wasn’t sure whether it was because she seemed decrepit to him, or because she’d told him she didn’t currently have a phone at all – something that was apparently astonishing.
She had to admit it felt nice to slip the new mobile into her handbag and know that she was once more ‘back on the grid’. She’d pass her number to Kevin later, and reset her logins for social media. Get in touch. Share her journey, see what others were up to.
