Free A Short Walk from Harrods by Dirk Bogarde Page A

were down here. And now; after all that, the Germans, the Italians, the Resistance … after all
that,
our own begin to destroy us! I know what it is, of course …’ She got up and went to get an ice-cream for herself, from the freezer. ‘It’s the fault of television. The kids see all this terrible American stuff. They copy, we have not enough police,
et voilà!
It is the end of familiarity, of friendliness, of trust. You’ll see!’
    Of course I did. Madame Pasquini down at the post office was equally sad, but, at the same time, resigned. Jack could bark but Jack didn’t bite. No longer was it possible to loungeagainst the counter and chat away about the vines, the snow, the heat or the cold, or just about the cost of seed potatoes. Ordinary politeness remained, of course, but village trust faded. No one was ever encouraged to linger by Madame Pasquini, but she had become very much a friend since Jack and was vastly curious about the letters and packets that kept on coming to my address, even though I had made a valiant effort never to reveal my exact location to anyone apart from family and important business links. I suppose it is fair to say that I was her best client. I was in her
bureau
almost daily and spent a modest fortune. Naturally that was appreciated also.
    Across the road, facing the post office, set in an immaculate vegetable garden, stood a hideous little modern villa, Les Sylphides, shaded by a great fig tree. Its owner was a retired postmaster. I never spoke to him. He was always, summer and winter, occupied in his garden. Every year the walls of the villa were a smother of morning glories, his roses were bigger than cabbages, his onions ranged in rows as precise and elegant as the dancers whose ballet had given his house its name. His wife, a tiny creature, with neat little feet, cropped white hair, huge round wire-glasses, wrapped about in a spotless floral pinny, was known to me at least, as Madame Moineau. For a sparrow, plucked, was exactly what she resembled. And she twittered and cheeped, tucked into a corner of the counter at the
bureau de poste.
She and Madame Pasquini were inseparable friends. They both, I was to learn, had a burning passion for the tarot cards. Madame Moineau was the absolute queen of the pack, and people from all about came to consult her, even from as far away as Cannes, Nice or even Avignon. She was famous for her readings.
    However, she had not foreseen the disaster about to befallher way of life in the post office. Now she was on the outside of a great iron grille and poor Madame Pasquini (plus Jack) was locked away behind. Lounging on the counter, idly talking away about the harvest, the price of knitting wool at Monoprix, the dark rumour that a Dutchman had been asking about the empty farm up at Le Foux, all this comforting chitter chatter was now somehow inhibited. If you had a packet to mail it had to go on a revolving plate which took it into the secure part of the office. No longer could you weigh your own goods on the brass scales, stamp the thing, and hand it over to the expert hands of the postmistress. The intimacy had vanished. Madame Moineau still hunched herself into her corner, she was still constantly a presence, but somehow it was not quite the same any longer.
    To speak to Madame Pasquini she felt forced now to raise her voice, and this grievously embarrassed her. So she sighed, nodded about at whoever was present, and curtailed her conversations. Her tarot cards had not revealed, either, the enormity of the
real
disaster which lay ahead in her gentle, fragile path.
    One day she was not in her corner … the next day … and the next. I asked if she was perhaps indisposed? On holiday? Madame Pasquini, certain that no one could overhear us (there was only one noisy English tourist in the telephone cabin trying to get a call through to Flaxman. I heard him spelling it out alphabetically in desperation: ‘F for