A Chateau of One's Own Read online

  Indeed, the smell of cows was like a musty presence in the kitchen. I looked through a rough doorway and saw troughs and livestock. I suppose having the cows so close lessened the farmer’s commute. And the methane gas could warm the house in the winter.

  ‘I think I know cows and this smell is much stronger. The smell is stronger nearer to town, between here and Châteauneuf.’

  ‘Oh, that’s the tannery,’ the big guy with the peg leg said.

  My heart sank like a ton of bricks tossed from a third-floor chateau window. I was in shock, numb. Besides the dreadful putrescence of a pig farm, a tannery ranks as the source of one of the most rotten smells known to man, in my opinion. The farmers explained that occasionally the wind shifts and blows down into the gully where we were situated. I felt hoodwinked. Not only had I bitten off more than I could chew, but now we had to contend with the chemical and biological refuse of a venture that treats dead skins on a commercial level. And to think I hesitated to put down ten per cent on this lovely house.

  As I drank more moonshine, the problem grew less important. Madame then brought out a large steaming plate of what looked like liver. The farmer told me it was their very own foie gras. Finally, my revenge on those pesky geese. And it was good. I drank and ate foie gras like I was going to prison, slipping into a near coma from the richness and pungency of this makeshift feast.

  As I edged my way to the car, the patriarch pulled me aside and whispered,

  ‘Just remember. We have right of access to the pond to water our cows. Never forget that.’

  By midnight, I had swerved my hire car back to the chateau and once again entered the galerie. I had made no plans concerning where and exactly how I would sleep. I was drawn quite strongly to the library. This, the best room in the house, with its tall doors and intricate wood carvings and miles of old, musty books, seemed like the logical place to set up camp. I dragged two mattresses, somewhat soiled and damp, onto the parquet floors. I had one bulb to light my way. I scrounged a couple of blankets and felt content with my little nest. I opened a window. The air was cool but I needed a remedy for my creeping headache. Too much wine, too little sleep.

  Feeling the urge to pee like a racehorse, I climbed a flight of stairs to the toilet in the dark. I did my business and turned on the tap only to be met by a thick reddish sludge from the bowels of an ancient plumbing system. I decided against a shower.

  I crawled back into bed and pulled the sheets up. I looked around at the carved oak panelling, or boiserie, and contemplated the ancient books that lined the delicately crafted shelves with their handmade glass doors. The ceiling consisted of substantial oak beams, painted with fleurs-de-lis and gold designs. My head filled with pleasant last thoughts, I turned off the light and drifted off to sleep.

  I have no idea how much time passed. At some point in the depths of the night, I awoke to the sound of scraping. The sound grew more insistent, followed by the faintest hint of footsteps and a small coo. Disorientated, I eased my way to the wall and switched on the light. I turned around and saw an astoundingly large bird flying directly toward me. I leaped up and ran madly in circles, then into the adjoining sitting room where I ran smack into the iron base of an old bed.

  The pain shot up my leg making me forget the pain in my arm from the goose attack of the early evening. Peering warily back into the library, I saw a beautiful white barn owl standing boldly on my bed. I picked up a broom and hobbled toward him. Something warm ran down my leg. I looked down and saw a good-sized gash on my shin, blood streaming onto the wood floor. So, this was it, I would bleed to death in the middle of the French countryside, in an abandoned house, brought to my untimely end by an owl.

  After some pause, I shooed and coerced and lightly tapped the stubborn bird with my weapon of choice. He hopped. And stopped. He flew upward in an arc and landed on an old trunk. He stared at me with those wide, unmoving eyes that are sometimes mistaken for wisdom. Unnerving. Finally, I inched my way to the window and circled back around my guest like a caveman, hunched and frightened. One last time, I poked him gently on the bum. He obviously concluded I was insane and flew off into the night. I closed the window, kept the light on and drifted off into an uneasy sleep again. The broom stood guard.

  The next day, I set about tending my wounds with a cold compress made muddy by water from rusty pipes. I decided to call Bud with the latest news. I drove my two-door Fiat Punto to Juvardeil and parked outside the church. The Sunday calm of the town comforted my aching head and bruised ego. I made my way back to the tabac, Monsieur le Rouge’s old hang-out, taking in the genteel, rustic appointments of our new town, the streets covered with pavés, or thick cobblestones. In the bar, I ordered a small glass of red wine, a hair of the dog to steel myself for the impending exchange with Bud over the existence of the tannery.

  Outside again, I found the lone phone booth in the town, just outside the tabac. As I dialled, Monsieur le Rouge stumbled up the main street and disappeared into the bar.

  ‘Hey, Bud. How’s it going?’

  ‘Good, good. Hold on, I’m feeding Blue… OK, so what’s going on?’

  ‘A good visit, some promising things, some not so.’

  ‘What do you mean?’ ‘Well, first of all, remember that horrible smell? It appears there’s a tannery near the house, just outside Châteauneuf.’

  ‘You’re kidding me! No way. Oh, Sam, we can’t buy it. That’s terrible. We can’t have people so close producing smells from the skins of dead animals. How are we going to get our money back?’ Bud is a vegetarian. I had dreaded her response knowing her deep empathy with everything living.

  ‘I don’t think it’s that serious. Maybe it will go away. Maybe they’ll fix it.’

  ‘Uh-huh. Just like Dangerfield’s went out of business? We’ve been waiting for the end of that thing ever since we moved here.’ She had a point. The comedy club had been a constant source of annoyance and strain in our extended sojourn in New York. We had hoped and fought for the end of this annoyance for six years, all to no avail. We now suffered quietly on the weekends as bad jokes played up through our wooden floors. Duped then, duped again. We had thought the cheapness of both properties meant a good deal. Sometimes you get what you pay for.

  ‘You’re right. Well, if we lose the money, it’s only $45,000. It’s not our whole savings.’

  ‘Sam, that’s a lot of money. We can’t lose that. But I can’t get over that we’ll be living so close to a place with rotting animal skins. What are we going to do?’

  ‘Honestly, I think we have to push forward. And hope the wind doesn’t blow this way too often.’

  ‘I can’t believe this. I told you the chateau was too big and now this. And last night, I was having such good thoughts. Thinking of the children playing, the cats lounging around the woods. I can’t believe this.’

  ‘Bud, I don’t know what to do. I think we push ahead and hope for the best. I talked to the farmers, the Pasteurs, and they said it’s not so bad.’

  ‘They live with cows. Farms smell, how could they know the difference?’

  ‘I know, I know. Can we talk about it when I come home?’

  ‘Of course. But, I must say, that’s about the worst news you could tell me. But come home. We’ll see.’

  Good. An opening. I wouldn’t call myself obstinate, but I am stubborn. I wanted the house. We could figure out a plan, a way to sit comfortable with this new-found obstacle. Plus, I didn’t want to lose the 35 grand.

  ‘OK, Bud, I’ll see you soon. I love you. Give my love to Blue.’

  ‘I love you too. See you tonight. Be safe.’

  I slipped back into the car feeling a little emotional. The more we learned, the worse it seemed. But stashed deep inside, somewhere hidden beneath the layers of doubt, the same romantic urge that drove us this far poked its little head up and calmed me for the time being. I still dreamed of roaming our property, stick in hand, with happy peasants working the fields. Too much Tolstoy, I suppose. Yes, that w
as it, we would be Levin and Kitty with loads of children, happy workers, grain-covered fields, strapping horses and roaring fires. Now, if only we could derail the current course of the story and veer away from what looked like an inevitable remake of Anna Karenina’s tragic ending.

  I passed by the tannery glumly and stopped at the pharmacy. There I loaded up on vitamin C, water and aspirin. I began the journey back to Belgium. My hangover from the night’s revelry subsided ever so slightly. Cheap wine and rich food are one thing. If only I could find a remedy for my chateau-buyer’s remorse.

  We hadn’t even bought the place and already we were filled with the type of existential dread that paralyses the most optimistic souls. But hope sprang eternal.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  ‘We’re all mad here’

  The Cheshire Cat in Through the Looking-Glass, Lewis Carroll

  Bud loves cats. Her affliction, I mean calling, can be summed up in the words of French artist Jean Cocteau: ‘I love cats because I enjoy my home; and little by little, they become its visible soul.’

  For the record, I myself am not particularly fond of cats. I don’t dislike them really, but I would choose other companions first. Like wild boar or hyenas. I’m not allergic to them, as so many cat-haters feign. They are just tolerable to me. But I care for Bud and she cares for them. As Bud makes me greater than I would have been alone, we live peaceably together with her cats. All 15 of them.

  Certainly, that is a lot of cats. At all times, there were seven litter trays in our tiny flat, demanding a good scooping at least twice a day. The joys of marriage.

  In our time in New York, Bud often fostered cats from local rescue centres and shelters. Inevitably, the ‘fostering’ turned into adoption. Bud didn’t exactly hang out with the city’s band of cat rescuers but she knew them all. To say they are a committed bunch is mild. Wild-eyed, apocalyptic and overzealous are words that come to mind.

  It’s important to note that all the cats are strays, inbreds, ‘mutts’ in dog jargon, not pedigree. Sure, by chance, there are a few presentable ones: Grainne the Tonkinese, Angus the Maine Coon. But the majority of the gang are domestic short-hairs. One, Boru, was found on the highway in the Bronx. He is a dark cat with stripes. At the time of his deliverance, he was the tiniest thing you’ve ever seen. He was stuck on a four-lane highway, shivering and badly scratched. The rescuers stopped 70-mile-an-hour traffic to snatch Boru from certain death. Many of Bud’s cats have similarly dramatic stories. Enough already. I don’t even like them.

  We arranged with the owner of the chateau to move in before the actual exchange or closing, the acte authentique. Since we did not have many belongings in our cramped cave in Manhattan, getting all we owned to France would not be much of a problem. I contracted a shipper to bring a container and load our meagre, un-precious worldly goods. One problem solved.

  There remained the final dilemma: how on God’s green earth would we get the cats to the chateau? Obviously, this would take some planning. There was no question of leaving the cats. Honestly, the idea was never considered.

  We called the French consulate in New York to begin the process of sifting through the requirements of cat-shipping. It took no fewer than four transfers to find someone who knew what to do. Bud presented our little problem.

  ‘You want to bring cats to France, yes?’ queried the woman on the other end of the line.

  ‘Yes,’ Bud said.

  ‘Well, of course, you can put the cat in a bag and bring her on the plane. There is no quarantine.’ This is very good news. In Ireland, there is a six-month quarantine.

  ‘OK, but we have fifteen cats – we have to ship them by freight,’ Bud pointed out.

  ‘You say how many cats? Five?’

  ‘No, fifteen, quinze.’

  ‘What do you want to do, breed these cats?’ the woman asked.

  ‘No, they are pets.’

  ‘But why do you have fifteen cats? This is too many, no?’

  ‘Yes, it is a lot of cats. But I have rescued them and want to take them with me.’

  ‘But there are many cats in France.’ Ah, yes. Again.

  ‘I’m sure there are and I will adopt some of those too. But for now I want to bring these cats with me.’ Bud pushed ahead.

  ‘You will have to come in. I must meet you and give you a dossier.’ The woman was helpful and mighty curious.

  That afternoon we made our way from our flat on First Avenue and 60th Street to the French consulate on Fifth Avenue. We walked, Blue tucked snugly in the baby sling, passports and cat trivia stuffed in pockets. The French consulate was a beautiful several-storeyed building on one of the most exceptional streets in the world, just down the way from the Metropolitan Museum of Art. The facade was classical, Italianate, like something you might find in Florence. Cut stones formed neat symmetrical blocks and refined pilasters with elegant cornices. As we entered, I told Bud they had recently discovered a sculpture by Michelangelo here. It was simply sitting in one of the reception areas. How exciting, we were moving to a place where Michelangelo was overlooked, taken for granted amongst the infinite splendours that make up la France.

  We announced ourselves at the front desk and waited patiently as we watched French people and Americans come and go (speaking of Michelangelo). We were escorted through an old brass and wood revolving door to our contact, a Madame Borderon. Of course, she was smartly dressed, outfit complete with a perfectly arranged and colourful scarf. She showed us to her surprisingly messy desk and asked us to sit.

  Bud and Madame Borderon repeated the exact same conversation as relayed over the phone. Almost word for word. We came to learn that cats are not held in the same esteem in France as, say, dogs. Cats are more akin to rodents. Madame chuckled as her eyes lit up, no doubt reflecting on the absurdity of the request. But, like a decent bureaucrat, she had all of the forms one might need. Very thorough, these French.

  There were roughly 728 things to do. The dossier was about fifty pages. I told Madame Borderon that we were shipping cats, not the famed Michelangelo sculpture. Madame Borderon made sure we all knew this was not very funny.

  ‘Also, you must write a formal registered letter to the Minister of Agriculture. It is a request for the importation of animals. If you have more than three, as it appears you do, you must write directly for permission.’

  ‘Are you serious?’ I asked, flabbergasted. My first encounter with the infamous bureaucracy of France. I wondered, silently, if in fact President of the Republic of France Jacques Chirac would look at our dossier and sign it personally.

  ‘Yes, you must.’

  As we strolled back to the flat, I shared my thoughts.

  ‘What do you think? It sure seems like a lot of trouble.’

  ‘We can work through it. Would you consider leaving Blue?’

  That was that.

  At home, we pored over the dossier. It seemed we must make up information sheets on each and every cat: name, date of birth, vaccinations, description, colouring, breed, major surgeries, relationships with other cats, etc. They would all need a check-up and proof of rabies vaccination. And we needed to tattoo or place a microchip with encoded number behind the ear of every feline traveller. Our loan application had been much simpler. For that matter, the compromis de vente, or pre-sale contract to buy the chateau, was like a child’s colouring book compared to this.

  Over the next two weeks we transported two cats at a time to the vet. The complete check-up, microchip and necessary vaccines ran to about $100 (about £55) per cat. After six cats, the vet agreed to come to our cramped apartment to finish up. He made three visits in total; each time we chased, hunted and finally snared a cat or two or three. The vet was a good sport. He got clawed repeatedly and bitten a number of times. Although our cats were apparently domesticated, some still harboured an intense feral quality that made them a bit difficult. Sort of like Bud. The mean streets of Gotham had trained some of these lovelies to fight and defend as if their lives depended on it
. Bud has found kindred souls who persevere in adverse circumstances. This is evidently the source of her ability to live with me.

  The big day arrived. Our plan of attack had been prepared with Rommel-like precision and intensity. It was the end of May, four months after we had made the deposit on our new life. Bud, Blue and I would fly to France, to the chateau. Bud would stay for the summer and I would return to the States after ten days. Regrettably, I was still gainfully employed. I had to do a shoot on monster trucks in Las Vegas. In the history of Western civilisation, are there two more disparate subjects than monster trucks in Las Vegas and the beauty of a seventeenth-century French chateau? I would return and we would sign the acte authentique in late July.

  We had our 15 impeccably crafted dossiers on the cats. The French were ready for us and we for them. We’d negotiated with two airlines but Air France gave us the best deal: $1,200 (about £650) for 15 cats each in their own carrier, direct from JFK to Charles de Gaulle. Bud had read all the literature: to drug or not to drug the cats for safe travel (not – because they often have respiratory problems in transit); one cat per carrier or two (one – to avoid fights); water and food in the carriers or not (yes to water, no to food).

  We searched the Yellow Pages for a means to get the cats from our apartment to the airport. From her many cat travels and feline interactions, Bud remembered an outfit called ‘Pet Taxi’. Only in New York is there a pet limousine service. Bud called Pet Taxi.

  ‘Hi, I need to transport my fifteen cats to the airport,’ she began.

  ‘No problem, darling. We got three minivans. What time?’ The operator, obviously a long-time denizen of New York, had seen it all. No hesitation, no problem.