Chateau of Echoes

“So do I. When I write. But I always surface afterward. You need to reconnect with the world.”

“I go to Italy every January.”

“And visit whom?”

“I go to the Forum. I go to the Coliseum. I go to Capri.”

“To visit whom? You visit ancient sites when you travel; you live in a forest populated by ancient, mythical characters. You even try to push away God, the giver of life, the healer of broken hearts. Your whole life is one long communion with the dead. It’s time to move on, Freddie. Let Peter go.”

“That’s ridiculous. Peter died four years ago.”

“And now it’s time to move on.”

Just what I needed: an amateur psychologist. Refusing to listen, I turned my back on Cranwell and my attention to cleaning our coffee cups. After a while, he left.

I felt like swearing, but even that overwhelming urge couldn’t override a childhood of sermons and Sunday school.

The only times I’d thought of Peter all autumn were the times Cranwell had brought him to mind.

When I started on a tart crust for dessert, I’m afraid I was a little more vicious with the pastry than I needed to be. I ended up throwing it away and starting all over. It would have been too tough.

I thought about what Cranwell said the next morning as I worked in the kitchen. Although most of it was garbage, he did have a point about moving on. And I had moved on.

In my head.

But I still wore my wedding ring. I looked at it in the clear morning light which filtered through the windows. It was a simple solitaire set into a platinum band. Peter had picked it himself, and I had always loved it. But maybe it was time.

As an experiment, I took it off.

Kneading and shaping baguettes and brioches, my finger felt naked. When I went up to deliver Cranwell’s breakfast that morning, I felt exposed. The ring had protected me for so long that I had taken it for granted.

Cranwell was seated at the table, with his butterscotch-colored robe flung over his caramel and burgundy paisley silk pajamas. He looked up from his computer, glancing at me over the top of his glasses.

I handed him the tray, and then I spooned a cube of sugar from the bowl with my left hand. It rolled into the coffee with a plop.

It was just a test, to see if he’d notice.

He took the cup from my hand, looking at it, but not really seeing it.

But when I turned to leave, he caught my hand, stopping me.

“I can help you later.” He was trying to tell me something with his eyes, and I could not look away from them.

“Help me what?” I swallowed.

“Look for your ring.”

My hand trembled; my cheeks flamed. I couldn’t help it. “It’s not lost.” I tugged my hand loose and left the room.

On my return to the kitchen, I pulled the ring from my pocket and screwed it back onto my finger. It seemed safer.

That afternoon, as I made crepes for dinner, I tried to decide what it was about Cranwell that was so attractive. I’d always thought that self-delusion was reserved for cowards, and so I could not deny that he was attractive and that I was attracted to him. That is not to say that I trusted him. I absolutely did not.

Would not.

As I slid pats of butter across the crepe pan, poured pools of batter on the metal surface, and spun a rake across the mix to spread it out, I had to be honest with myself. Cranwell was attractive.

His eyes were hypnotic.

But my feelings for him were not all based on the way he looked. They had something to do with his laugh. It started in his chest as a ‘humph’ and then ricocheted inside him until it burst out into a chuckle.

I enjoyed making him laugh.

It was also enjoyable to see him smile. Smiles started in his lips, and sometimes, if I were lucky, they would crimp lines beneath his eyes and cause them to glint. They were quiet smiles.

In myriad ways Cranwell seduced the senses. His eyes, his laugh, his smile. The way he carried himself. The clothes he wore. The textures and layers that made the man.

Sliding a spatula under the last crepe, I flipped it onto the top of the pile.

At least I had identified him. At least I knew who my nemesis was.

The problem was that, in spite of everything, I liked Cranwell. And maybe he really had changed. Maybe he wasn’t the playboy he had been. I decided that the challenge would be to avoid falling in love with him. And that was going to cause some difficulties. I could tell already, because on top of everything else, Cranwell liked to listen. And heaven help the woman who finds a man who will listen to her.

I comforted myself with the thought that the first step in waging war is taking measure of the enemy.

16

The next evening, when Severine came for her dinner tray, I remembered to ask her a question that had been on my mind. “Is this the year of your Catherinette?”

“Oui.” It was the first time I’d seen her blush. In fact, she blushed so badly, her cheeks matched the color of the scarf she’d wound around her neck.

“What’s a Catherinette?” Cranwell was looking at Severine with interest.

“Oh, Robert, it is nothing.” Severine waved a graceful hand at Cranwell as if to swat his question away.

“What is it, Freddie?” He fingered the collar of his moss green v-neck sweater the way he always did when he was curious about something.

“It’s the year of Severine’s twenty-fifth birthday. And because she’s single, we celebrate. And she pleads with Sainte-Catherine to send her a husband.”

Severine shushed Cranwell’s laughter. “It is not done so much any more.”

“Of course it is!” I’d had friends in Paris who’d celebrated. “Especially the twenty-five kisses.”

“The what?” Cranwell was getting into the idea. I could tell.

“It is an old custom. Very vieux jeu.” Severine had jammed her hands into the back pockets of her tight-fitting indigo jeans.

“Let us celebrate with you. It’ll be fun.” Cranwell’s eyes held a dangerous twinkle.

Severine looked from Cranwell to me; I could tell she didn’t quite trust us.

“Seriously. It will be fun.” I handed her a dinner tray. “Tell me what your favorite meal is and I’ll fix it.”

“Foie gras, homards, et croque-em-bouche.”

I lifted an eyebrow. Liver pate, lobster, and a pyramid of tiny puff pastries filled with cream and wrapped in spun caramel. Since I’d insisted on celebrating, she was going to make me work.

But she deserved a celebration. Especially since she had no one else to celebrate with.

Cranwell waylaid her on her route to the stairs. “I wanted to ask you about the grail.”

She stopped so suddenly that she lost her grip on the tray. It clattered to the floor. “Frederique! I am so sorry.”

“It’s fine. Don’t worry about it.” Nothing had broken and most of the food had stayed on the tray. I got out a new plate and began to reconstruct her dinner.

“You had asked me about the grail, Robert? What does this have to do with Alix?”

He shrugged. “I don’t know. Probably nothing. Just following a thought.”

“I am only an expert on Alix.”

“But surely you’ve studied the legends if you’ve studied medieval history.”