Invitation to Provence(42)
“Why are you whispering?” Clare whispered back, then she giggled.
“Well, I guess there’s only one way to find out.” Franny put her finger on the bell and pressed hard.
32
THUNDER CRACKLED AS FRANNY leaned on the bell again. No one came, so she banged on the door, thinking, What if no one is there? What would they do? Even the village looked deserted. It was all too spooky.
Behind her, the others huddled under the portico. Even the silence seemed dark, with only the beat of the rain and the cypresses creaking in the wind.
The door was thrown open so suddenly she took a quick step back, staring at the cadaverous-looking man, holding an enormous candelabra.
“Oh my god,” Clare whispered, “it’s the house of Frankenstein.”
“Ah, maintenant,” Haigh deliberately spoke French to put them on their mettle. “La Petite Bleu, Mademoiselle Franny, et Madame Clare, je présume? Mais vous êtes très en retard,” he added disapprovingly. Then, peering behind them into the night, he said in perfectly normal English, “What happened to the car?”
Nervously Franny explained that there was no car, that the rental had broken down and Monsieur Allier from the greengrocery had given them a lift in his pickup.
“I thought I smelled melons,” Haigh said, sniffing as he waved them inside. “Welcome to the Chateau des Roses Sauvages. I am the butler and my name is Haigh.” He closed the door behind them and the draft blew out all the candles. A slow wheezing creaked through the darkness, followed by a terrible grinding. Clare shrieked and clung to Franny just as a clock tolled the hours in a flat, dead tone.
“It’s only a clock,” Haigh told them, “an antique eighteenth-century clock to be exact.”
“I knew we should never have come,” Franny whispered, dripping rainwater, as the butler relit the candles and turned to look at them, tut-tutting when he saw the puddles on his newly polished parquet.
Holding his silver candelabra high, he said, “I’ll show you to your rooms,” and walked to the stairs. He stopped and looked back. Shao Lan had not moved. “Follow me, child,” he said sternly, but she stood her ground. She wasn’t going anywhere. Head lowered, shoulders hunched, she only glared at him, a deep blue Marten glare. “Fuck off,” she said clearly.
Clare stifled a giggle. “Baby’s first words,” she whispered.
The butler stared down his long, thin nose at Shao Lan, one hand on his hip, head tilted to one side. “Well now, aren’t we being the Little Madam,” he said, then he turned and swished his way up the stairs. “Follow me please, and bring that child with you,” he said, hiding a grin.
They followed him up the beautiful curved staircase, peeking at the large gilt-framed paintings and the marble statues in the dim niches, feeling the sumptuous softness of the carpet under their bare feet, still nervously aware that the big house was completely silent.
Haigh stepped in front of a pair of tall double doors. With a flourish he threw them open. “Shao Lan,” he said, stepping back to let them see the beautiful candlelit room with its red damask–draped four-poster and heavy red silk curtains, “your grandmother wanted you to have the Red Room because she knew red was the special Chinese color for happiness and good fortune.”
Shao Lan understood what he’d said but she didn’t understand why he spoke of her grandmother. She wondered, Was Bao Chu here? Would she see her soon? Hope flickered.
Franny took her hand and led her into the room. She showed her how comfy the bed was, then knelt so she could feel the fluffy white rug, but Shao Lan’s face showed no reaction. Then Haigh and his candelabra moved on to the room next door.
“This was Madame Rafaella’s own room,” he said proudly as they looked, awed, at the delicious green-and-white boudoir. “Madame wanted Miss Franny to have it. She said to tell you she hopes you will be as happy here as she once was.”
Walking into the room, Franny thought she caught a sweet hint of mimosa in the air. The striped silk taffeta curtains rustled in a sudden draft. A strange thrill rippled up her spine, a tiny, soft stroking. She could swear she knew this room.
They followed Haigh’s candelabra again and went next to a fantastical white-on-white art deco bedroom that seemed to have been preserved intact from the twenties. “This is to be Miss Clare’s room,” Haigh said. “It was Madame’s mother’s room, and she was hoping Miss Clare would help dispel its ghosts.”
They stared at him at the word ghosts and he smirked knowingly. “Only in a manner of speaking, you understand. I knew Madame’s mother well, and I doubt she would want to haunt this place. She’s more likely to be found in the casino in the H?tel de Paris in Monte Carlo.”
“Satin,” Clare said, walking to the bed and running her hand lovingly over the embroidered spread, “and all these mirrors. Just look at the silver and the chrome. Oh my god, it might have been made for me!”
“Dinner will be served at nine o’clock,” Haigh informed them from the doorway. “Madame Rafaella always dresses for dinner. Please be on time.” Then, his duty apparently done, he took his candelabra and left them to sort themselves out.
33
SHAO LAN REFUSED to go into the Red Room. She sat on the edge of Franny’s bed, her feet dangling. Clare had already gone to her own fantasy room to get ready for dinner. Outside, the wind still roared through the trees and thunder rumbled close by.