Prologue
The December sky is inky, starless. My fist throbs from hammering on the locked door. I wait. Silence…
The torch in my phone flickers like a guttering candle as I tramp across the uneven ground to the rear of the building. A sliver of light seeps through a gap between two shutters but dissipates without illuminating the ground.
Sliding one foot in front of the other, I inch across the pitch-black yard, churning up loose grit with each step, until I reach grass and mud. My eyes adjust. A shadowy bulk takes shape, black against the patina of the sky – the hired digger, its metal bucket suspended at a rakish angle. Close beside it, mounds of soil, banks of sand and gravel, and three freshly dug rectangular pits.
I tread warily, remembering one is deeper than a grown man’s height. My phone emits a feeble beep as the battery signals its death throes. Heart pounding, I snatch a breath and train my flickering beam down into the trench…
Chapter One
Emma
Summer 2015
From a distance, it reminds me of a Neolithic burial site with collapsed walls, overgrown and reclaimed by nature. As we draw closer, there’s evidence of a long, low building with one gable end in the crumbling stone and smashed clay tiles.
We stamp along a track, trampling knee-high grass under our flimsy sandals. Monsieur Renaud, the estate agent, leads the way, gripping his tablet computer in one hand and brushing seed heads from his cream slacks with the other.
My husband, Paul, strolls alongside him, oblivious to the vegetation scratching his legs. At six-foot-two, he towers above the dapper estate agent and fires off rounds of questions about the property.
“How long has it been derelict? How much land is there? Where’s the boundary?”
The agent responds in fluent English and seems to take this inquisition in his stride.
The path is fringed with nettles, so I scoop my four-year-old daughter, Mollie, up into my arms. Her blonde curls are plastered to her forehead in the heavy, humid air.
“Here you go.” I hand her a bottle of water and glance around for my son, who is trailing behind as usual.
At ten years old, Owen sometimes acts as if he’s semi-detached from our family. He’s tall for his age and people often assume he’s older – twelve, or even thirteen. I tell myself he’s striving for independence, but secretly worry we embarrass him because Paul, Mollie, and I are fair skinned, while Owen is the son of my ex-husband, Zak, and rightly proud of the Nigerian side of his heritage.
The property is called Les Quatre Vents and is on the market at a rock bottom price. When Paul picked up the estate agent’s particulars in Limoges, he tried to convince me it would be simple to convert it into a holiday home. I’ve agreed to this viewing to cheer him up, because he’s been having a tough time at work.
Now we’re closer I see walls coated with ivy, a sagging roof that’s open to the elements, and a limp vine clinging to one end. The rotting front door has been lifted off its hinges and propped up against the wall, giving us a glimpse of an earth floor inside.
“Surely this was never a cottage,” I say as we come to a halt. It looks more like a cowshed. “You said someone used to live here?”
“Ah, oui. Until ten years.” Monsieur Renaud consults the property details on his tablet. “Madame Durand, aunt of the family.”
Mollie wriggles in my arms.
“Let me take her,” offers Paul.
Glancing to my left, I figure out where the photographer must have stood to take a soft focus shot through the cherry blossoms.
“When was this picture taken?” I ask.
Monsieur Renaud looks sorrowful. “It was taken in spring.” He consults his screen. “Spring of 2009.”
“Well, we’re here now. Let’s look inside,” says Paul, bending his head to duck under the low lintel.
The height of the doorway isn’t a problem for me; I step inside, inhaling damp air. Paul sets Mollie down and she clings to my leg.
“It’s creepy, Mummy.”
“We won’t stay long. Daddy just wants to look around.”
In one corner is an old stove, the wall above stained black from decades of smoke. Close by, a stone sink bristles with dried-up corpses of flies and beetles. It’s hard to imagine an elderly lady living alone in this place with no modern facilities or comforts. I try to turn on the brass tap, but it won’t budge.
“Let me.” Paul clamps his hand on the tap and twists. A few specks of rust drop into the sink, but no water. “Bathroom?” he asks the agent.
“Outside.”
We step back from the dank gloom into the August heat and Monsieur Renaud guides us to the rear of the building where he pushes an outhouse door to reveal a soil closet with two footplates, poised either side of a hole in the ground.
“Mummy – what’s that?” Mollie asks.
“An olden days’ toilet.”
“Ugh!”
She pinches her nose between thumb and forefinger. But any unpleasant stench has long ago been swallowed by the earth and now it smells of damp and leaf mould.
“Fosse septique is over here.”
The agent points out a bank of soil, edged with red clay roof tiles – a flower bed in a former life – now carpeted with weeds. He grasps a clump of dried grass, coils it around his hand and tugs it out by the roots. With his tan loafers, he pushes earth aside to expose buried concrete.
Paul peers into the hole. “Septic tank,” he translates, though I’m the one who studied French at university, until I got pregnant with Owen and had to drop out because I couldn’t spend a year abroad.
“It will need pumping out.” Monsieur Renaud scrapes his shoe on a tile to remove the earth. “Perhaps it need replacing. We ’ave new regulations now in force.”
This is a waste of everyone’s time. I turn to Paul to suggest we should be on our way, but he’s stomping across the field, towards the boundary, where the summer foliage of three majestic oaks coalesces: a green cloud against sapphire sky, so beautiful it takes my breath away.
Owen is poking his finger into crevices in a low wall. “Look, Mum. A lizard.”
The gecko sneaks out of its lair and scuttles across the yard.
“Where?” Mollie turns, but she’s too late.
Paul strolls back up the field, holding his mobile phone out in front of him and talking to himself.
I hear him say, “Two hectares of land. Mature plum and walnut trees, oaks to boundary,” and realise he’s filming and recording a voiceover.
“Do you know it would be easy to renovate this place and make us a family holiday home?” Paul says as he holds out his phone, inviting me to view the video clip on his minuscule screen.
I squint at the phone, as a cloud drifts in front of the sun and I rub my bare arms to ward off a shiver.
“All this land!” Paul makes a sweeping gesture with his arm. “If we could get planning permission to turn the outbuildings into gîtes to rent out, we might even make some money.”
“You’re joking, right?”
He pretends not to hear me. Looking at properties for sale and dreaming of a different life is a game we play when we’re on holiday but, until today, we’ve restricted our viewings to photos in estate agents’ windows.
“Paul, it may be cheap, but it’s a wreck. And what about the renovation costs?”
“A ruin, Emma – that’s the French term for a project like this.”
Monsieur Renaud is standing a discreet distance away, but he’s been listening to our conversation and his estate agent antennae must register a call to action because he sidles closer, clearing his throat.
“Why’s it so cheap?” Paul asks.
“The family of Madame Durand are waiting already ten years for their money.”
Uneasily, I chip in, “But I don’t understand. There must be local families needing homes?”
“They prefer new. And nearer to Limoges for work.”
“How easy would it be to get planning permission for, say, a fifty per cent increase over the original footprint?” asks Paul.
The agent straightens his spine. “Footprint?”
Paul glances at me but decides my translating skills won’t run to building terms. “Size, dimensions…”
“Oui. No problem. There is a local plan that allows construction in this area, but you will need to apply for a permis de construire.”
“Come on, Paul.” I move into the space between him and the agent. “Let’s go. We’ve wasted enough of Monsieur Renaud’s time.”
A flock of gulls wheels overhead, forming a diamond pattern with frayed edges. The leading bird swoops down, as if to land on the sagging roof of Les Quatre Vents, but thinks again and scrambles skywards, borne aloft on the wind, and disappears from view.
Chapter Two
Emma
Summer 2015
As I chop red peppers for our lunchtime salad, I wonder, do other families spend their summer holidays trekking around tumbledown ruins they’ve no intention of buying?
It’s two days since we visited Les Quatre Vents and Paul’s mood flits between excited and morose, as repercussions of a fatal accident at the company, where he’s a director, clamour for his attention.
I chose this rural location in the Limousin so we could relax but, since we arrived at the chilly, echoing gîte, we’ve been trapped in a land that time forgot.
The bedroom walls are mottled with black mildew, and the swimming pool is closed for maintenance. The village of Sainte Violette, half an hour’s walk away, has one hotel, a bar that opens according to the owner’s whim, and a boulangerie.
Every morning, a bread van tours the outlying hamlets; it arrives at the end of our drive at seven-thirty, emits three blasts on its horn, and drives off as I stick my feet into Crocs and chase after it.
Our gîte has satellite TV and Owen has brought his Xbox but he and Mollie argue all day; she wants to watch the Disney Channel; he wants to play games.
Paul spends his days indoors fending off a deluge of work emails. He can’t sleep at night and his face is pale with exhaustion and, ironically, a lack of sun. His dark hair needs cutting and his ten-day growth of beard scratches my face when I kiss him.
To give him some breathing space, I drag the children out on trips or shopping at the local market, giving them each five euros to spend on tatty souvenirs.
The rest of the time I stretch out on a lounger, scowling at the scummy surface of the out-of-order swimming pool and immerse myself in a novel. The sun beats down and I ram a floppy-brimmed hat over my auburn hair, applying the highest factor of sun cream but my pale skin is pink and freckled. I’ve abandoned contact lenses for brown-tinted glasses that block the sun’s rays.
“Lunch!” I call.
Paul and Mollie take their places at the table, but there’s no sign of Owen. Paul notices Owen’s absence and half-rises from his chair.
“Leave him,” I say, passing round the salad bowl.
Mollie pushes aside the morsel of ham I’ve sneaked onto her plate and nibbles a piece of cheese.
“This is ridiculous!” Paul puts down his knife, strides out into the hall, and bellows, “Owen!”
We all hear Owen’s reply, “Don’t tell me what to do. You’re not my dad.”
The verbal assault comes out of nowhere. A sliver of argument inflated into words that can’t now be unsaid.
Mollie glances at me, bursts into tears, and runs upstairs to join her brother. I dig my fingernails into my palms as Paul returns to the table and stares at the sunflower pattern on the cloth.
“I’m sorry. I don’t know what got into him.”
Paul shrugs. “He’s right, though, Emma. I’m not his dad.”
He pushes his plate away and I’m furious with my son for causing more stress.
I remember how Owen used to worship Paul, but at that time, he rarely saw his dad. Zak was working on contracts abroad.
Owen had just started school when I applied for a part-time job at the company where Paul worked, and he was on the interview panel. I didn’t get the job – who would employ someone like me with no degree and a stunted CV? When Paul rang to break the bad news, he talked me into meeting him for a drink and I abandoned my usual caution and accepted.
Gradually, Paul slotted into our lives. He and Owen spent hours in rough and tumble play, giggling at superhero movies or kicking a ball around the park. Soon, the treats became more extravagant. Paul organised visits to theme parks and zoos; aquariums and museums – sometimes two in a single weekend. When Paul suggested a skiing holiday, I called a halt.
“Owen doesn’t have a passport,” I told him.
I could have added that we were happy with our lives and didn’t need more treats, but I had something more pressing to tell him. “I’m pregnant.”
Paul and Owen were thrilled and, before Mollie arrived, we left our old life and the unheated flat, which triggered Owen’s asthma every winter, and moved into Paul’s house in Wimbledon.
Paul reaches round to a shelf and hauls his laptop onto the table, sweeping crumbs away with his hand. As it powers up, I hear emails pinging into his inbox.
“Any news?” I ask.
Paul sighs. “Where d’ you want me to start?”
When the accident first happened, the story was splashed across the news and played on a continuous loop.
A workman called Dorek had fallen from the thirteenth floor of an office block Paul’s company was redeveloping. As operations director of Manifold Developments, Paul was called to the scene and thrust into the spotlight with microphones shoved in his face.
The media was on a mission, searching for a scandal. Some newspapers reported that the worker wasn’t wearing a proper harness and that health and safety at Manifold was lax. A rumour circulated that Dorek had personal problems and his death was deliberate – suicide. Having stoked the fire, the media lost interest and withdrew, leaving Paul badly burned.
The list of emails waiting in his inbox are all marked with ‘Confidential’ and ‘Urgent’ in the subject line. His face is grim.
“Questions and more questions. They’re looking for a scapegoat.”
“But how can it be your fault if he decided to jump?”
I feel my face burning where I caught the sun yesterday.
“He didn’t jump, Emma. That story was just press sensationalism.”
“So that means…?”
He nods. “I’m ops director. It’s my responsibility.”
I take a sip of my coffee; lukewarm, bitter.
Paul turns back to his laptop. A fly is buzzing against the windowpane. I open the window and set it free. Suddenly, I can’t face another afternoon imprisoned in this dreary house.
“Come on, we’re going out.”
“Fine. There’s a document I need to sign and send back to Manifold by express mail. Let’s head into Limoges.”
I stride into the hall and shout, “Owen, Mollie, come down now!”
Sheepishly, they pad down the stairs and hover just outside the kitchen door.
“Owen, get in here and apologise to Paul.”
My son makes a face and turns sullen eyes on me. “But I only said—”
“I know what you said. Now say sorry.”
He shuffles a few paces into the kitchen, stops a metre away from Paul and keeps his eyes fixed on the ground.
“Sorry.”
“Okay, let’s forget it,” says Paul. “Your mother wants us to go out.”
I nod. “We’re going into Limoges. Get your stuff, then wait in the car. Ten minutes.”
I gather up bottled water and the guidebook. We all clamber into the car and drive to the city in silence.
We dawdle along narrow streets and stroll up Rue Raspail where the frontages of some ancient buildings are barely wider than the span of a man’s arms. Close to the cathedral, green and white bunting zigzags between half-timbered buildings across narrow cobbled streets.
“Why don’t you take the kids into the cathedral while I go to the post office?” Paul suggests. “I’ll meet you back here.” He points out a café with broad sun parasols.
Owen, Mollie, and I enter the cool darkness of St Etienne cathedral, where Owen breaks away to settle himself on a seat close to the main door and stretches his long legs out in front of him. I leave him to sulk while Mollie and I meander along a side aisle.
Stained glass windows filter light to cool blue and a vast urn of white lilies scents the air. In the silence, I hear a tapping sound: a guide is escorting three partially sighted visitors with long white canes. I move closer, testing my French as I eavesdrop on her description of the flamboyant Gothic style. She’s explaining to her group that, in the Middle Ages, only bishops and clerics could view the full celebration of mass, but in the eighteenth century the sanctuary was rearranged, and the altar moved, so the congregation could finally see what was going on. The blind group moves away, their canes echoing on the flagstones.
Mollie wants to light a candle for her grandma and grandpa, so I give her a one-euro coin to put in the box, and we murmur a quick prayer for Paul’s parents, who both died before I met him. I hold her hand steady while she lights a new candle from an old one, then take it from her and add it to the bonsai candle forest of flickering flames and melting wax.
“Can we blow it out now?” she asks excitedly.
“No, darling. It burns down on its own.”
The simple candle ritual, the majestic ancient building, a flicker of spirituality – but it doesn’t lure me – I don’t really get religion. Still, something about the place slows my pulse and by the time we complete our circuit up the centre aisle, I’m calm.
Owen joins us, and we emerge, squinting, into the sunshine. We stroll to the café, settle at an outside table, and order drinks. Mollie and I sit in the shade and Owen moves his chair from under the parasol into the sun.
Our drinks arrive and Owen blows bubbles in his glass through a straw to entertain Mollie, who tries to copy him. Orangina trickles down her chin and sets her giggling. She gets up and runs around the traffic-free square, flapping her arms to scare off pigeons.
A nearby clock strikes four.
“Do you think Dad’s lost?” asks Mollie.
“Can we just go?”
Owen kicks his feet against the metal struts of the table and the repetitive clanging sparks a dull pain in my head.
“No, Owen. Besides, Dad’s got the car keys.”
“I’m bored.”
“Here he is.”
Although she’s the smallest, Mollie is first to spot him. Shielding her eyes from the sun, she runs over, and he swings her up into his arms.
“I thought you were sending that to Manifold?” I remark, as Paul drops a bulging envelope onto the metal table. “Didn’t you find the post office?”
“I did. This is something else. Far more exciting.”
He draws out a sheaf of papers and hands them to me.
There are pages of legal-looking documents in small print and more property bumph, but the photograph on the top sheet is familiar: a long, low stone building in a grassy field, set back behind a cherry blossom tree.
“Isn’t that…?”
He nods. “Les Quatre Vents. And now it’s ours.”
A shaft of sunlight sneaks under the parasol and illuminates his slow smile.
“What?” I shout, scrambling to my feet.
“I’ve just been into the estate agent’s and put down a deposit.”