In the Moon by Alan Holmes

Author:Alan Holmes [Holmes, Alan]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Xlibris
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 8

The Great Rabbit Race and a Horse Named Lili

In the Spring of 1937, Father bought a summer house called “les Buissons” (“The Bushes”) in Condette, a sleepy farming hamlet about six kilometers inland from Hardelot. Because he considered “les Buissons” too mundane, the first thing he did was to give the house a more original name. Raimond was asked to paint a new sign proclaiming it to be “Villa Champs de Mai” (“Villa Fields of May”). Mother’s birthday was in May, and Father had bought the house that month, announcing that it was a birthday present.

Years later, Mother confided to me that she would have much preferred to continue renting a villa in Hardelot, a lively, bustling seaside resort, a place she loved as much as I did. Condette was quiet and peaceful, but too quiet and too peaceful for everyone in the family except Father. He abhorred the Sunday crowds on the beach, and since he was only there on weekends when the crowding reached a crescendo, Hardelot was far from ideal for him. Father longed to spend his leisure hours in a more serene and rustic setting. His goal was achieved in spades when he bought the villa in Condette.

I hadn’t been in Condette more than a day before it sank in that Villa Sombra was to be the last villa we would rent in Hardelot, and I was thrown into a deep gloom over my new surroundings. I could see Mother was not her usual cheerful self either, but she was a good sport and not inclined to protest or resist Father, so she promptly threw her considerable energies into making the new house a success.

Father immediately started transforming Villa Champs de Mai into his dream house. This involved remodeling four bedrooms downstairs and adding four new bedrooms upstairs in what had been a huge attic. In each of the eight new bedrooms, he installed electric lighting and wash basins with hot and cold running water. The original house had been a hunting lodge entirely devoid of these amenities. A single hand pump in the kitchen had taken care of all the household’s water needs.

Father imported from England a special brand of stove, the famous Aga cooker, probably the best in the world at the time. In France, it’s hard to imagine a household item that plays a more important role in daily life than the stove, yet the French had nothing that compared with this magnificent British invention. The Aga was far too elaborate for Françoise, whose short temper was further shortened by the fact that she couldn’t read the English instruction manual. However, with Mother’s assistance in translating, and with technical help from Raimond, she gradually mastered this Rolls Royce of stoves and, by the end of the summer, she liked it so much that she wanted one for the kitchen in Ville-d’Avray.

Though lacking other amenities, one thing the house did have was a spacious and well-built larder. Three huge meat hooks attached to its rafters hinted at whole carcasses of wild boar or stags that may have hung there in times past.

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