The Patron Saint of Lost Souls E-Book

Menna van Praag

• Herausgeber: Allison & Busby
• Kategorie: Fantasy und Science-Fiction
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2018

Seitenzahl: 385

Beschreibung

Jude is the owner of a unique antiques shop in Cambridge. She makes it her mission to match cusomers with the special something that they are missing, a talisman to bring them what their heart desires. Unfortunately, Jude's life is not overflowing with the love she wishes for. However, when she 'inherits' a niece that she never knew existed, doubling her meagre family overnight, Jude's life is soon set to get a lot less lonely and a lot more interesting. Viola is a single-minded perfectionist whose only heart's desire is the position of Head Chef at one of Cambridge's most prestigious restaurants. But when Viola keeps bumping into a widower, Mathieu, she begins to discover that there's more to life beyond the kitchen.

Leseprobe

The Patron Saint of Lost Souls

MENNA VAN PRAAG

For my dearest Virginie, who wrote

the best line in this book. Merci.

Contents

Title PageDedication  Chapter One Chapter Two Chapter Three Chapter Four Chapter Five Chapter Six Chapter Seven Chapter Eight Chapter Nine Chapter Ten Chapter Eleven Chapter Twelve Chapter Thirteen Chapter Fourteen Chapter Fifteen Chapter Sixteen Chapter Seventeen Chapter Eighteen Chapter Nineteen Chapter Twenty Chapter Twenty-One Chapter Twenty-Two Chapter Twenty-Three Chapter Twenty-Four Chapter Twenty-Five Chapter Twenty-Six Chapter Twenty-Seven Chapter Twenty-Eight Chapter Twenty-Nine Chapter Thirty Chapter Thirty-One Chapter Thirty-Two Chapter Thirty-Three Chapter Thirty-Four Chapter Thirty-Five Chapter Thirty-Six Chapter Thirty-Seven Chapter Thirty-Eight Chapter Thirty-Nine Chapter Forty Chapter Forty-One Chapter Forty-Two Chapter Forty-Three Chapter Forty-Four Chapter Forty-Five Chapter Forty-Six Chapter Forty-Seven Chapter Forty-Eight Chapter Forty-Nine Chapter Fifty Chapter Fifty-One Chapter Fifty-Two Chapter Fifty-Three Chapter Fifty-Four Chapter Fifty-Five Chapter Fifty-Six Chapter Fifty-Seven Chapter Fifty-Eight Chapter Fifty-Nine Chapter Sixty Chapter Sixty-One Chapter Sixty-Two Chapter Sixty-Three Chapter Sixty-Four Chapter Sixty-Five Chapter Sixty-Six Chapter Sixty-Seven Chapter Sixty-Eight Chapter Sixty-Nine Chapter Seventy Chapter Seventy-One Chapter Seventy-Two Chapter Seventy-Three  Acknowledgements About the Author By Menna van Praag Copyright

Chapter One

Three phone calls would change Jude’s life. But that would come later. Now, Jude stands in her favourite spot, gazing out at snowflakes drifting down to sprinkle the street below. As she watches the early Christmas shoppers scuttling from shop to shop, their hats and hair brushed with a dusting of white, a twist of longing wraps slowly around Jude’s heart and squeezes tight.

Jude’s life is full of people. She sees dozens in the shop every day and she’s lost count of just how many she’s helped. But, of all the hundreds of souls she has saved over the years, none have ever stuck around long enough to befriend, let alone love her. And sometimes Jude is so overcome with a sweep of loneliness that she must sit down and tell herself to breathe.

Now she touches her finger to the cool windowpane, feeling a snatch of pleasure at the chill on her skin, an odd little reminder that she’s still alive. It’s odd perhaps, but true, that because she has no witnesses to her life – no husband, no lover, no close friends – Jude often needs reminding that she’s alive, that she isn’t a ghost accidentally trapped along with all the other spirits in the labyrinthine antique shop.

Jude traces the tip of her finger across the misty glass, first sketching the shape of a small heart then letters: H E L P. Jude’s eyes widen with surprise. She hadn’t expected to write that; she hadn’t realised she felt that way, at least not so strongly. Quickly, in case anyone glances up from the street and sees her scribbling, Jude starts smudging the letters then, in a flash of inspiration, alters and adds to them so, instead of a dire proclamation, it’s now an advanced seasonal greeting: H A P P Y H O L I D A Y S!

Jude lets out a short sigh of relief, which serves to mist up the window again. Then, reluctantly, she turns to leave the quiet tranquillity of her upstairs room. At the doorway, she presses a hand to the wall, open palm splayed on the red brick, steadying herself to leave the tranquillity of her office before going downstairs to open the shop and greet the throng of holiday shoppers.

Jude isn’t a fan of holiday shoppers. Especially not those who start their Christmas shopping in November. Those are the worst. She doesn’t despise them on principle – she doesn’t mind them at all when they confine themselves to other shops – she simply doesn’t like them when they come to Gatsby’s. It isn’t because of their giddy cheer, or their bustling, frantic desire to purchase something – anything – now, or their often dangerously overeager, grasping fingers among her delicate antiques. No, Jude hates holiday shoppers because they have no business being inside her special shop in the first place.

Over the past decade, Jude has observed that Christmas time, and the months preceding, sends ordinary people into a frenzy of consumerism that overrides all their subtler instincts. So they don’t realise that Gatsby’s isn’t an ordinary shop, that its wares aren’t supposed to be bought on hurried impulses for assorted family and friends. Christmas shoppers simply see the glittering front bay window and all the beauty displayed within – art deco lamps, ornate Victorian writing desks, polished silver photo frames, elaborately carved onyx and ivory chess sets, glass and gold scent spritzers, delicate Edwardian wooden chairs, plump embroidered footstools – and they pounce. During the rest of the year, they simply wander past the glittering window without being drawn inside – unless a rogue, last-minute birthday is suddenly snapping at their heels.

In the non-winter months, Jude doesn’t have to endure the heartache of selling special pieces to people to whom, strictly speaking, they don’t belong. For it gives Jude considerable pain to see shoppers snatch up her antiques, claiming that they’re ‘just darling’ or that ‘Cristobel/Lucinda/Sally will simply adore it!’, then plonking said piece onto the counter and chattering on as Jude sorrowfully wraps it, mumbling apologies under her breath. It gives her great joy, however, to see a purposeful shopper – one who knows they’re looking for something, even though they don’t know exactly what it is – shuffle or stride into Gatsby’s, losing themselves among the clusters of crowded gems spread across the two floors before finally alighting on it.

For Jude isn’t in the business of selling antiques as collectables, as pretty things that will adorn living rooms or desks or the like, objects that will extract exclamations of approval from various visitors. No, Jude doesn’t provide the gift-seeking public of Cambridge with trinkets; she bestows them – if they come looking for it – with a talisman.

The special shoppers who step inside Gatsby’s want something much more than a trinket, they want something far more precious; a boyfriend, a baby, a promotion, a new home, the healing of a health problem. And, among the thousands of extraordinary objects crammed between the tall, narrow walls, they will find the one they need. The one they will hold, the one they will gaze at, the one they will rub like a magic lamp while the whispers of their desires echo in their hearts. And Jude knows, though they rarely come back and tell her – after getting their heart’s desire they can’t believe it was anything else but fate or just plain good luck that brought it to them, certainly it wasn’t magic – that each person gets what they want, so long as the desire was pure and true.

It’s strange, Jude sometimes thinks, that as the custodian of so much power and good fortune, she isn’t the recipient of any of it. No talisman has found its way into her hands, nothing to help when her mother got sick, nothing to assist in alleviating her father’s alcoholism, nothing to aid Jude in finding love or having a family. Nothing. Which, Jude thinks, whenever she’s lying awake and alone at three o’clock in the morning, is both very strange and very sad.

Chapter Two

Viola has always been a perfectionist, ever since she was a little girl. No matter what she’s doing, from cleaning an oven to taking the Cambridge University entrance exam, she does it with great precision and absolute dedication. Viola’s earliest memory is of making chocolate Christmas cake with her father. It was his own special recipe, a closely guarded secret that died with him and something Viola has been trying, and failing, to recreate ever since.

She attempts it every Christmas Eve. A week in advance, Viola steeps the dried fruits in a brandy and amaretto mix. The day before, she finely chops the dark chocolate and prepares the spices: cinnamon, cloves and nutmeg. Then she simmers up a pan of mulled wine and, when the air in her kitchen is thoroughly soaked in the scent of Christmas, Viola pours herself a large glass. She sits for a long time then, eyes closed, remembering her father and each of the dishes he taught Viola to cook before he died.

Jack Styring wasn’t a chef but a barrister, working fifteen hours a day, six days a week, only taking Sundays off to be with his family: Viola and her mother, Daisy. Since Daisy was always less interested in making food than eating it, the creation of Sunday lunch meant, for Viola, two glorious hours of unadulterated daddy-time. Together they prepared pork belly, the most succulent part of the pig, sometimes stuffing it with nuts, sometimes with herbs. They dusted the potatoes in flour, letting them soak and roast in the fat. Viola learnt how to chop an onion without it making her eyes water, she perfected the chopping of green beans and broccoli, learnt how to sauté and steam. Most of all, Viola learnt how to love food with an undiluted, unsurpassed passion.

It was her father who taught Viola to be a perfectionist. For him, nothing was worth doing unless it was done with absolute excellence. At first, little Viola found this difficult, since she didn’t know how to cook at all, let alone with any sort of skill. So, in the beginning she simply watched, eyes fixed on her father’s fingers as they flashed across a chopping board or dove in and out of herb and spice pots, picking out the perfect blend to season whatever lay in the ceramic dish. Viola listened while he explained which flavours supported and which sabotaged each other. She smelt the delicacies he held under her nose until she could identify every ingredient with her eyes closed. She tasted all their creations with great care, savouring every bite. Until, one day, Viola had the ability to name each single, separate element in every dish they made.

‘Whatever you do, ordinary or extraordinary, significant or insignificant, should always be done with passion and to perfection,’ her father would say, as he darted about the kitchen, boiling water and heating pans. ‘It’s all an expression of who you are. Live with passion and you deserve every breath of life you get, live without it and you may as well go straight to your grave! Am I right?’

Viola would nod earnestly, even though she didn’t understand what her father was saying, not until later. Still, she adored him and was completely certain that whatever he said was quite flawless and absolutely true.

‘Parsnips! Where the hell are the baby parsnips? I needed them, in greens, fried in garlic butter, five bloody minutes ago – Viola!’

‘Yes, Chef!’ Viola snatched up a pan, cursing herself for getting behind. As she slides the butter into the pan and chops the greens she thinks about the topic she’s been thinking about every second, minute, hour of the day for the past month. The competition.

A month ago, Viola’s boss, the owner of the La Feuille de Laurier, had thrown down the culinary gauntlet to his chefs: a cooking competition on Christmas Eve, the winner of which, he said, would be awarded the much coveted title of head chef. Viola has wanted to head up the kitchen of the prestigious restaurant ever since getting a job as a kitchen porter when she was twenty-one. Having never intended to enter the hospitality industry in the first place, having been set to study English Literature at Cambridge University, Viola found herself in the lowly position of washing dishes and scrubbing floors after a devastating event that left her unable to do anything more mentally or physically challenging than that. However, once she’d set foot in the kitchen, Viola had vowed that she would strive until she’d achieved the highest position possible and then, after a few years working at the top of her game, she’d open her own restaurant and name it after her father. She’s been waiting nearly fifteen years and here, at last, is her chance.

Chapter Three

‘Hurry up or we’ll be late!’ Mathieu taps his foot on the doorstep, checking his watch for what feels like the thousandth time. The school run is a military operation, one for which he’s ill-equipped and always failing. ‘Allons-y!’ It doesn’t help that Hugo, the eleven-year-old soldier under his charge, couldn’t care less whether or not they make it to school on time or, indeed, at all. Hugo drifts dreamily from breakfast – singed toast dripping in jam – to languidly pulling on his school uniform to brushing his teeth, while Mathieu barks orders every few minutes to draw Hugo’s attention away from his comic books and back to the matter at hand. Mathieu usually ends up assisting in the feeding, clothing and brushing, simply because it’s easier that way and means that he’s less likely to scream at his son as if he really is an army general.

‘Allons-y – Hugo! We’ll be late! Depêche-toi!’

Why Mathieu even bothers wielding this as a threat, he has no idea. A more effective motivational call would be the one issuing a ban on all reading for twenty-four hours unless they’re out of the door in three seconds flat. But even that would be no use. Mathieu’s a softie and Hugo knows it. Anytime he issues any sort of ultimatum he quickly recants once Hugo starts fussing, and bans rarely last more than a few minutes. Mathieu knows he should be stricter but he simply doesn’t have it in him. Not any more.

‘Hugo! Now!’ Mathieu shouts into the flat, before marching inside to retrieve his errant son. He finds Hugo sitting on at the kitchen table, jumper only half-on, one shoe dangling off his toe, toast crumbs scattered like confetti, with his nose scanning the exploits of The Amazing Spiderman.

‘Oh, Hugo.’ Mathieu sighs, bending down to sort out the forgotten shoe, before pulling his son’s arm through the forgotten sleeve. ‘What am I going to do with you?’

Either sensing the rhetorical nature of the question, or simply ignoring it altogether, Hugo doesn’t respond, though he allows his father to gently manhandle him.

‘Have you brushed your teeth?’

Silence.

‘Hugo!’

Hugo glances up, blinking.

‘Have you brushed your teeth?’

Hugo shakes his head.

‘Of course not.’ Mathieu sighs. ‘Unless I do it for you, it doesn’t get done.’ He looks to his watch again. ‘D’accord, well we don’t have time now.’ He pulls Hugo up to stand, tugging him towards the door. ‘These ones will all fall out anyway, so I don’t suppose it matters too much.’

Fortunately, the school is only a ten-minute walk, or seven-minute hustle, from their flat and they usually make it, Mathieu half-carrying, half-dragging Hugo through the school gates. He wishes that, just once in the past three weeks, he’d managed to be early, so he wouldn’t have to brace himself for the sidelong glances of the other parents at the school gates, their innocuous comments barely concealing judgements of parental inadequacy. He wishes that, just once, he could be early, to stand with those superior models of parenthood, the early birds, while casting a few sidelong glances himself, seemingly sympathetic nods to the stragglers. If only.

‘Don’t you want to make a good impression?’ he asks, as they hurry along Trinity Street. Unsurprisingly, Hugo doesn’t respond. No doubt he’s fighting Octoman, defending the citizens of Gotham – or is that Batman? Mathieu can boast a prodigious knowledge of fictional worlds, though he does tend to confuse them, eliciting much eye rolling from his son. ‘Other kids probably won’t want to be friends with someone who’s always late.’

He’s grabbing at low parental straws now, he knows, but sometimes he’ll be reduced to saying anything just to get a response from Hugo. No doubt his fellow pre-teens care as much for punctuality as does Hugo himself but, short of bribery, Mathieu has little else to resort to. Not that he’s above bribery, but it’s an expense he can’t quite afford now; not with Cambridge rents and a lecturer’s salary. Since, sadly, the kudos of a position in the Faculty of Modern History at Cambridge University isn’t matched by the monetary reparation, Mathieu is earning a third of what he earnt at the Sorbonne but, at least for now, it doesn’t matter. He had to leave Paris and to leave for Cambridge didn’t seem like such a terrible move.

He bends down to kiss Hugo goodbye at the gates. He’s noticed that none of the other parents seem to do this too but he doesn’t care. They can add overly sentimental parenting to their list of judgements against him. They’ll probably just put it down to the fact that he’s French.

‘I’ll see you at three-thirty,’ he says. ‘Be good, OK. Listen to your teachers, pay attention in—’

‘Bring Spiderman with you,’ Hugo says, pulling away. ‘And the Green Goblin.’

‘Yes,’ Mathieu says. ‘But, remember—’

‘Promise?’

‘Of course, when have I ever forgotten?’

This elicits one of Hugo’s patented eye rolls before he breaks free to scuffle across the playground towards his classroom.

‘Hurry up!’ Mathieu calls out. ‘Be good!’ He stays at the gate, waiting until Hugo is through the main doors, hoping his son might turn back and wave. Sadly, Mathieu’s expectations in this regard are disappointed, just as they are every day. ‘Be safe,’ he says under his breath, before turning to go.

Chapter Four

Stranger, perhaps, than Jude’s inability to find her own talisman, is the nature of how she inherited the shop in the first place. Two decades ago, Jude was hurrying along Green Street, dashing home, after collecting prescriptions and groceries for her mum, to cook dinner. Then a flash of gold caught her eye and Jude had stopped. She’d turned to look into the window of Gatsby’s, a shop she’d never noticed before, and her mouth fell open just a little.

Jude didn’t decide to walk inside, she didn’t choose to do so, she simply found herself standing outside on the pavement one minute and inside the next. Then she stood among a thousand treasures that sparkled and shone and dazzled, so all Jude could do was blink. She stood among the rare and magnificent objects, no longer feeling the plastic straps of the heavy bags cutting into the palms of her hands, no longer thinking about her dying mother, no longer worrying about the million and one things she always worried about. Instead, Jude soaked up the beauty all around her and sighed, tears coming to her eyes. She wanted to touch every piece, she wanted to take it all home, she wanted to leave home and move into this glorious place and live among the antiques like a house elf.

It was a while before she noticed the man standing behind the counter. When Jude at last tore her gaze away from the oasis of splendour she’d stumbled upon, she saw him staring at her. He was very old, stooped over his glass cabinet of curiosities, hands clasped together under a wisp of a white beard – the only hair left on his head.

Jude glanced at the floor, a little unnerved. She wasn’t used to being looked at, people mostly ignored her, and she’d certainly never been looked at that way before; as if someone had a question and she was the answer.

‘Welcome to Gatsby’s,’ he said. ‘What is it you’re looking for?’

Jude let her eyes flick up to his face. ‘No – nothing … I just saw, I just came, I’m only looking.’ She turned her head towards the door. ‘But, I, I should go …’

‘So soon?’ the old man seemed crestfallen. ‘Is there not something you want?’

Jude nearly laughed at this. There were so many things she wanted, so much missing from her drab, disappointing little life that she barely had enough words or the vocabulary to express all her desires.

‘I’m sure I couldn’t afford anything in this shop,’ Jude said instead. ‘But thank you.’ She took a backwards step towards the front door.

The old man held up an ancient hand. ‘No, wait. I have something for you.’

Jude frowned and, without thinking, placed her bags on the floor at her feet. Her shoulders relaxed with relief. She stepped forward, though, if she had thought about it, she’d have been suspicious.

‘You do?’

Nodding, the old man bent down behind the glass cabinet and reached inside. Jude watched, though she couldn’t see what he’d grasped between his bony fingers. She stepped closer, abandoning her bags behind her. Then they were standing a few feet from each other, separated only by the counter.

The old man smiled, his skin cracking along a hundred lines, his milky blue eyes misting. ‘You’re a collector, aren’t you?’

‘Sorry, what?’ Jude asked, suddenly a little scared.

‘You’re a collector of lost souls.’

Jude shook her head. ‘No, no, I don’t know what you mean, but I …’ She glanced back at the door.

‘You find the broken people – at least, the ones who believe they are – you seek them out and bring them comfort. Do you not?’

Jude swallowed. How was it possible that this total stranger saw this? How was it that he saw her more clearly than anyone else, even her own mother? Slowly, she nodded.

The old man’s smile deepened. ‘Well, if you stay here, then you won’t have to find them any more, they will come to you.’

Jude frowned. ‘I don’t understand.’

The old man opened his clenched fist to reveal a small, ornate brass key in the centre of his open palm. ‘Oh, but I think you do.’

Jude reached out and picked up the key. They stood in silence for a while.

‘I’ve been waiting for my successor for a long time,’ he said. ‘I’m glad it’s you. I know you will take good care of our treasure trove.’

‘But, I … I don’t know how to …’

The old man wrapped his own hands around Jude’s, closing her hand around the key.

‘This job isn’t about knowing, now, is it?’ he asked. ‘It’s the right heart you need, and you have that. The rest of it, the little things you need to know, I can teach you all that.’

Jude just looked at him, realising she liked the feeling of his cool papery skin on hers and realising that she hadn’t touched anyone other than her mother in longer than she could remember.

‘So, what do you say? Will you let an old man rest? Will you take this little place under your wing?’

And, although she still had a hundred questions, Jude found herself nodding again and saying ‘yes’.

Chapter Five

To win the title, to be head chef before she’s thirty-six – it’s all Viola can think about. She’s obsessed. Totally and utterly obsessed. She’ll get it. She is going to win, to triumph, to create the most splendid meal Jacques Moreau has ever tasted in all his years of international fine dining. She’ll put the Michelin-starred chefs of Paris to shame. Well, to shame is perhaps shooting a little too high, just a bit, Viola considers, but still, she’ll aim to get pretty damn close. And, unless her employer declares that her food is – at the very least – one of the most splendid dishes he’s ever eaten, she will consider herself as having failed.

Every day, hour, minute Viola isn’t at work she’s in her own kitchen, cooking. Well, not simply cooking but creating. She makes sauces from twenty different ingredients, including contrasting spices that should (and usually do) clash dreadfully but might just work. She cooks cauliflower twelve different ways, she roasts, sautés, fries, boils, bakes. She turns everything into a jus. She scours recipe books then meditates on how she can put her own spin, her unique twist, on the old favourites. She orders books from all over the world, hoping to find something – an ingredient or a dish – that no one else will have found, something delicious, delectable and, most important of all: new. Unknown. Surprising. For a man like Jacques Moreau, who has no doubt experienced almost everything under the sun, this element of surprise is what will make her stand out from the rest. Every one of the competitors will offer something that tastes incredible, but only she will create something that is also unique. She will be the Shakespeare of chefs. That is what Viola is aiming for.

Needless to say, with the bar set so high, every single dish Viola has cooked thus far has proven a crushing disappointment. She has such high hopes, as the kitchen fills with the aromas of fried garlic, roast aubergine, sautéed nettle leaves and baked quail. But, when she puts it all together, closes her eyes and takes her first bite … the tastes on her tongue are always met with a heavy sigh. Sometimes, Viola’s so disappointed with herself that she spits out the result, even before swallowing, and tips the rest in the bin.

Tonight, Viola is experimenting with flowers to flavour sorbet. She wants to pair her pudding, whatever it ends up being – current contenders include peach and passionfruit soufflé, chocolate-damson friands, pear and primrose tarte Tatin – with a uniquely divine chill to the lips, to cool the warm comfort of the sweet, so one cannot help but devour both in a bid for culinary ecstasy.

She is grinding primrose petals with salt to extract the oils, her wrist starting to ache as she twists the marble pestle against the sides of the mortar, when Viola hears voices. For a moment she thinks it’s the radio, but then remembers that she never listens to the radio while cooking since it distracts her attention from the flavours and impedes the potential for sudden flashes of inspiration. The mind must roam free, listening for those hidden moments of genius that sometimes spring forth from silence, unbidden, unexpected and unsort.

Viola stops grinding.

‘Albert, could you put down that bloody comic book long enough to eat something.’

Silence.

‘Come on, three scallops, then you’re done. OK?’

At this, Viola listens more closely. A person who eats scallops for dinner on a Wednesday evening being worthy of her attention. She wonders how he prepared them. She wonders who Albert is. Probably, given the reading material referenced, the speaker’s son. Viola enjoys the French accent. She thinks of the Eiffel Tower, the Champs-Elysées, the tiny bistro on the Left Bank when, aged ten, she tasted snails for the first time; sautéed in garlic butter and thyme, with a dash of lime, with crème brûlée and wild figs drizzled in lavender honey for desert. Viola’s father had taken her for the weekend, to celebrate her birthday, and they’d passed the most glorious few days of Viola’s young life in a blur of bright lights and brilliant food. She’d never wanted to leave, and had spent the rest of her childhood wanting to return every year, every birthday, begging her father to take her again. Every year he’d promised he would, though, somehow, something would always crop up at the last minute that made it impossible.

‘Next year, my love,’ he’d say. ‘Next year, I promise.’

And she’d believed him. Every time. Every year Viola packed her bag weeks in advance, told all her friends, pledged to bring presents and take photos, eliciting gratitude and envy from those who’d either never been or never been anywhere alone with their fathers. Three full days of undivided attention, no phone calls, no computers, no emergency work meetings – what bliss!

What disappointed Viola most of all, at least after the first few years, was that she believed him, every single time. Even after all the let-downs, all the last-minute cancellations, all the excellent excuses, the next year she hoped, she knew, that this time would be different. Because this time they had something to celebrate. Viola had been accepted to Cambridge University. Her father couldn’t have been prouder. This time he promised a trip in a private boat along the Seine, followed by dinner chez Alain Ducasse au Plaza Athénée. It would be the trip of a lifetime. And then, three days before her eighteenth birthday – when she’d saved up all her babysitting money and bought the train tickets herself – Jack Styring, always so healthy, so hearty, went into the hospital for tests. Three months later, he died.

Chapter Six

Mathieu worries about Hugo every day. He worries about whether or not he’s an adequate father – he should probably be stricter, or perhaps he should be less strict, or maybe there’s some fantastic newfangled way of parenting he needs to know about. He should be reading books, doing research, interviewing other parents. But the thought of such things just makes him sad, and scared. His wife used to read such books, she researched all sorts of things: how to get your baby to sleep through the night (mixed results), how to ween (messy), how to potty train (likewise), how to instil confidence and self-esteem in your child (again, mixed results). So, Mathieu’s heart just gets heavy and starts to sink when he’s faced with such a prospect. Whenever he shuffles into Waterstones or Heffers – such books are not to be found in the Faculty of Modern History – he just can’t make himself pick up the books. And when faced with fellow parents at the school gate, he baulks at the idea of asking their advice on anything, most of all parenting. He can’t face the censor, the criticism and, if things got too far, the pity.

Mathieu sighs. What he really should be doing right now is working, but he can’t concentrate. He’s been reading and rereading the same page on the types of tea favoured by Marie Antoinette for the past hour. It’s funny, really, that his chosen field of research, his expertise, should be in an area so seemingly frivolous as food. His work is so light and airy in comparison with the rest of his life. Is that because nature abhors a vacuum, likes a balance, or whatever that is? If he’d studied the history of war instead, if he’d specialised in the rise of the Third Reich, or some such, would his personal life have been correspondingly free from pain? Of course not. But still, these are the flights of fancy Mathieu likes to ponder while he should be considering something else entirely. Tomorrow he’s giving a lecture on the wedding banquet of Marie Antoinette and Louis XVI and he’s not finished his notes yet. He really must crack on. And yet, all he can think of is Hugo.

He needs to get out, leave the library. Go for a walk. Clear his head. Get to know his new city better. Mathieu is already a little in love with Cambridge, even though he still considers it’s not on a par with Paris. His hometown still trumps his adopted town in terms of sheer ethereal beauty and enchantment. And food, perhaps that above all. They try, the English, with their croissants and eclairs, their macarons and millefeuilles, but they fail. Mathieu has never tasted a croissant outside France that tasted anything like one inside. And Cambridge patisseries certainly don’t buck the trend in that regard but continue substandard as ever.

The colleges are beautiful, certainly, and Mathieu very much enjoys his walk to work through the cobbled backstreets to Clare College, past an ancient sundial, the glorious white pillars of the Senate House, the long windows of the accompanying library through which antiquated books and manuscripts beckon to passers-by. But the River Cam cannot compare to the Seine, though he wouldn’t mind introducing the rather lovely, and sometimes comical, practice of punting along this river. Mathieu had never seen a punt before coming to Cambridge. They recall to him the gondolas that populate the rivers of Venice, though – happily – the punters don’t sing opera while gliding through the water among the swans. Swans. He likes those too. Paris could afford a few swans. He read somewhere that the Queen officially owns every swan in England, so perhaps she’d be happy to part with several dozen in exchange for the secret recipe for perfect croissants.

The best thing about Cambridge, of course, is that it doesn’t hold any memories for Mathieu. He doesn’t turn a corner to stumble upon the cafe where he took Virginie for their first official date. He doesn’t see her favourite flowers – peach peonies – springing out of green buckets in the market. He doesn’t pass Virginie’s favourite bookshop; the one in which she’d pass entire afternoons reading novels in the old red leather armchair in the window, because the owner had a crush on her and didn’t mind her reading his entire literary selection, so long as she didn’t crease the spines. Mathieu always maintained that the bookshop owner probably spent his own afternoons watching his wife reading, though she denied it. But then she couldn’t imagine that he had a crush on her at all. Mathieu, though, knew that any man who liked women would have a crush on Virginie. Just setting eyes on her would have ignited those feelings, speaking with her would have sealed the deal. It certainly had for him. And since Virginie is hiding around the corner of every Parisian street, Mathieu can no longer cherish every cobblestone as he once did. For that reason alone, all the glorious delights of Paris cannot trump the precious calm of Cambridge.

Chapter Seven

Nowadays, Jude can only vaguely remember the time when she still wanted things, when she believed that a perfect life might be possible, that it might be just out of reach, that it could be grasped if only she tried hard enough. Those days are long past. At the height of her twenties, such things stood in the centre of her thoughts, during her thirties they gradually drifted to the edge and, by the time Jude turned forty, they’d slipped over the horizon and fallen out of view. Today, as she stares forty-six in the face, Jude only occasionally muses on the shadows, the echoes of such whims, but their imprint is so faded now, and their call so faint, they barely feel like hers any more.

Jude watches every customer who comes into Gatsby’s, her eyes flicking up from the counter – where she sits scouring antiques magazines for information about markets and sales – and she knows immediately what type they are: the ones who know exactly what they want, but just don’t yet know how to get it, and the ones who have an inkling but so far aren’t certain. Jude always feels a sweet surge of empathy for the latter and a stab of jealousy towards the former.

She scrutinises the determined ones as they dart into the shop, their eyes flitting this way and that as they look for the thing they somehow know they must own before they can grasp their greater desire. She looks on until, at last, they pounce upon the object and, clutching it to their chests, scurry to the counter. Jude always wraps their purchases with a small sprinkling of bitterness, even as she hates herself for feeling that way, and still wishes she could charge them double when it comes time to pay.

But towards the uncertain customers, Jude is kind in thought and deed. She observes as they push tentatively at the front door before taking a careful step inside, as they glance around nervously, clearly wondering what on earth they’re doing in an antiques shop, yet understanding at the same time that they can’t leave empty-handed. Jude watches as they flutter from one beautiful item to the next, fingertips brushing shiny surfaces and hovering above precious gems, until they finally alight on The One. She sees their eyes light up then, with a flash of knowing that is both incomprehensible but unmistakable. And, when they find the courage to pick it up, to hold it as if it’s already their own (before summoning the extra courage to check out the price tag), Jude allows herself a small smile, a vicarious shot of delight. When she wraps these purchases, she does so with a sprinkling of gratitude and, when it comes time to pay, wishes that she could give it to them for free.

In one concession to the possible, potential magic of Christmas, every year on 24th December, after the shop closes its doors, Jude stands among her treasures, her trinkets and talismans, opens her eyes wide, reaches out her hands and waits.

Every year, for the past twenty years, Jude’s hoped that she’ll be drawn to her very own talisman, the very special thing that will bring her happiness, that will give her direction, that will save her life. Of course, it never happens. Every year she’s left standing, looking around forlornly, empty-handed. So, every year, Jude’s hope dwindles and, for the last few years, as she’s started seeing her fiftieth birthday looming on the advancing horizon, Jude has only enacted the little ritual as part of a punitive regime – for unspecified sins – a reminder that, for some utterly unfair reason, she’ll never have the life she longs for. Not that she even really knows what that life would be.

Now the next Christmas Eve looms, but Jude can still postpone the inevitable disappointment for another six weeks. For now, she can content herself with cleaning dust off her antiques, polishing the wood and shining up the brass, silver, gold and glass before the eager early Christmas shoppers descend upon Gatsby’s. For now, she’ll enjoy the fresh morning hours, the oasis of calm before the gathering storm clouds of consumerism burst open and blow through her little shop.

Jude is on her hands and knees, rubbing beeswax into the legs of a particularly beautiful ornate Edwardian writing desk, when she hears someone push at the door and step inside. Annoyed – Gatsby’s isn’t usually the first port of call for the Christmas shoppers, they usually descend in their desperate rush after exhausting the traditional shops – Jude glances up. Upon catching sight of the customer, she nearly drops her cloth, but just manages to keep her grip on it and scramble to her feet.

‘Hello,’ Jude says. ‘Are you looking for anything specific? Can I help you? I’m here if you need anything. Just ask, I’m at your …’

Jude isn’t a talker. She rarely speaks with her customers – even her favourites – bar a few carefully chosen words. Now she can’t seem to shut up. Why on earth can’t she control herself? It’s him. She’s never seen him before. But, at the same time, it feels as if she knows him more intimately than anyone else, which, Jude has to admit, wouldn’t actually be very difficult, given the total absence of intimates in her life.

‘I’m not sure,’ he says. He’s tall, quite thin, with dark red hair. A week’s worth of russet stubble covers his cheeks, his brown eyes are bloodshot with sleeplessness. ‘I don’t really know, I just found myself …’

Jude conceals her smile. She’d known immediately that he wasn’t a Christmas shopper, but not only that, he is her very favourite kind of shopper: the uncertain sort.

She hides the cloth behind her back and smooths down her skirt – not that there is much point. She looks dowdy and drab anyway. Why does she never bother dressing well or wearing make-up? She might as well have a dishcloth tied round her head. And yet, even then, Jude still feels – looking into his dark eyes – that there is possibility, there is hope. She doesn’t know why she feels this way – she’s certainly never felt this way before – but she does. There is something in the air between them, a sense of connection, a spark. Is she simply imagining it? No, surely she can’t be.

‘Well, why don’t you have a look around,’ Jude suggests, taking a step back towards the counter. She smiles, patting down her hair. ‘We’ve got so much here, it might take you a while. And I’m always … if you need anything.’

Her customer nods, still looking a little disorientated and bemused. Jude slips behind the counter, both to give him space and to hide behind a helpful antiques magazine so she can better watch him while he finds his own talisman.

What is it he’s looking for? Jude wonders. She hopes it’s love and she hopes he hasn’t found it yet. Perhaps it’s something else altogether but, whatever it is, Jude longs to be by his side while he finds it. He’s a lost soul, that much is clear, and she can help him. And, for once, for the very first time, she can be given something in return. Would that be too much to ask? A little love as the small amount of interest paid on a lifetime of selfless acts. Couldn’t she have that as her Christmas wish? Please. Please, pleeease … But to whom is she praying? God? Father Christmas? And what’s the point of that, since she doesn’t believe in either.

Jude watches the stranger as he gazes around the shop, taking in the chaotic, eclectic collection of charms that surround him. She can see the sense of overwhelm flood his face, waves of fear and desire collide and crash together on his cheeks until, finally, he finds the courage to step forward and begin investigating the objects closest to his fingertips.

As he carefully picks up a solid-silver hand mirror, slowly turning it over and over, tracing the swirls of roses engraved across the handle, Jude imagines him holding her in the same way: gently unwrapping the drab clothes from her body, caressing the lumps and bumps of her blurry body as if it’s the most beautiful object he’s ever touched. When he presses a palm to the back of a Victorian chauffeuse, Jude feels him putting his hand just beneath her shoulder blades, a gesture of comfort, reassurance. And then he turns and stops. Jude leans forward, trying to get a glimpse of what he’s seen. But, as he bends over and clasps his fingers around the object, Jude can’t see, not until he places it on the glass counter.

It’s a small china doll with a painted smile and a shock of frizzy blonde hair. Love. He must be looking for love. And Jude has blonde hair. It’s dead straight, not remotely frizzy, but still. She reaches out so he can place the doll carefully in the centre of her open hand. Slowly, showing the same reverence he did when choosing his talisman, Jude begins to wrap the doll in dark-blue tissue paper. He withdraws his wallet from the back pocket of his trousers. Jude takes her time folding the paper.

And then – because she can’t bear him to walk out, to leave, to possibly never return, without her knowing anything about him at all, without at least trying to put herself in the picture – Jude does what she never does: she asks him the question.

‘So, um, what is …’ Jude nods towards the little doll, just as she tucks the tissue paper over the little china face. ‘What is it you want?’

She glances up and catches his eye. His face breaks open into a smile and Jude feels the hope rise up again in her chest. She smiles back, tentative, shy, suggestive.

‘It’s for my … wife,’ he says. ‘We’re … we’re trying for a baby.’

‘Oh. Right. I see.’

Jude tries to nod, tries to feign a smile, but finds that she can’t.

Chapter Eight

Viola misses her father every day. But lately she misses him more than usual. She wishes he was here for the competition. Holding herself up to his exacting standards would ensure that she stood a good chance of winning. Viola does her very best to set the bar high for herself, but she knows that, at least sometimes, her stamina fails her. She’d always done terrifically well at school, but then she’d had her father’s expectations to sustain her, to buoy and lift her efforts. If Viola achieved eighty-four per cent in an exam, Jack Styring would ask what happened to the other sixteen per cent. He would praise her effort but remind her that she could always do better. Together, they’d go over the exam paper, analysing the questions, assessing Viola’s answers, to see where she’d slipped.

As a child and teenager, it was her greatest wish to one day, just once, achieve one hundred per cent in an exam. She would often