Blackstone's pursuits

In which we arrive on a movie set and thwart a daring escape bid

I like motoring in France. I don’t know my left from my right at the best of times, so driving on the ‘wrong’ side of the road is no big deal for me.

There is this theory that to get to anywhere in France from the Channel ports you have to go through Paris. It’s rubbish, of course. We hung about in St Malo for a while, just to get the feel of it, then headed south to Rennes. Using a map which we’d bought at the terminal we plotted a route more or less alongside the Loire, until we picked up the Autoroute which led to Lyon.

We made a couple of stops along the way, and Prim gave me yet another surprise. I may like France, but when it comes to speaking the language, I’m about as useful as Harpo Marx. Prim turned out to be fluent. ‘It was Africa,’ she explained. ‘French was the main language where I was, so I had to pick it up.’

The day grew hotter as we went further south, until the information signs along the road were showing an outside temperature of 28 degrees. To make it tolerable we drove with the windows down and the sunroof open, but even at that, touching the steering wheel felt a bit like handling hot bread straight from the oven.

‘Where does your sister live?’ Prim asked as we pulled into a service area, to make another pit stop, and to buy food to take to Ellen’s. Arriving empty-handed is not the done thing in the Blackstone family.

‘A place called Perrouges. I’ve never been there, but she says it’s nice. Sort of old, she says.’

We found it without too much trouble, but when we got there we could barely believe our eyes. It turned out that my sister’s home is in a piece of living history, a walled townlet with cobbled streets narrow enough to offer shade nearly all day, and hardly a building that’s less than two hundred and fifty years old.

‘Jesus,’ said Prim. ‘It’s a movie set!’

Naturally, I’d forgotten to bring a note of Ellen’s address, but my tour guide solved the problem by going into the town’s tiny hotel and asking the receptionist where the Scots family lived. It wasn’t far — nowhere in Perrouges is far — just round the comer and down a twisty alley.

We knew the house before we got there. When they handed out the lungs, our Ellen was right up at the front of the queue.

‘Jonathan!’ The shout seemed to fill the narrow alleyway, bouncing back and forth off the stone walls. I jumped. It was pure reflex. When I was a kid, Ellen’s bellow could freeze my blood from two hundred yards away. Close up it could emasculate an elephant. The sound was still echoing, on its way, no doubt, to frighten distant wildlife, when my older nephew came diving head first out of a low window, about thirty feet away. He did a perfect rolling landing, winding up on his feet, and kick-started a sprint. His trainers threw up puffs of dust as he raced up the sloping pathway towards us. He made to shimmy round us, head down, but I grabbed his shoulder. At first he tried to wriggle out of my grasp, and only when he found it was too strong for him, did he look up.

‘Hello there, Wee Man. What have you been up to then?’

His mouth dropped open, answering my question in the process. It, and half of his face, was stained by the juice of berries.

‘Uncle Oz! Uncle Oz!’ He was so surprised that he forgot all about his escape bid, and his predicament. ‘Mum, Mum!’ he shouted, back down the alley. ‘See who’s here! See who’s here!’ Jonathan is only just turned seven, but he’s showing signs already that he’s inherited his mother’s lung-power. I let him go and he ran back to the house, crashing through the door this time, rather than the window. A second or two later there was the sharp, unmistakable ‘Splat!’ of palm on bare leg, and a second after that the sound of a howl being stifled as Jonathan gasped out his news through the string of retribution.

‘If you’re making up stories again …’ said Ellen as she stepped outside.

It had been over a year since I’d seen her. The first thing I realised was that there was more of her to see. Ellen’s always been a square-built sort of girl, but France had straightened out what curves she had. I wouldn’t say she’d got fat … no, to be honest, I would. She’d got fat.

She stared at me. ‘Oz, you bugger! You might have let me know!’ Jonathan appeared again by her side, sniffling and smiling at the same time, pulling his wee brother Colin along behind him.

I gave her a bear-sized hug. It’s only when I see Ellen after a break that I realise how much she means to me. She hugged me back and looked up at me. If it had been anyone but Ellen, I’d have said there was a tear in the corner of her eye.

‘Hi, Sis. I know we should have called, but it was a spur of the moment thing. Ellie, this is Prim Phillips, my girlfriend.’

You know right away how my sister feels about someone. If she has doubts, it shows in a narrowing of her eyes that she doesn’t even know is there. She looked at Primavera, wide-eyed, and grinned. I have to say that even after a day’s drive through France, Prim looked fantastic. The sun had given her skin an extra glow, and had picked out shiny highlights in her hair.

‘You poor lassie,’ said Ellen, ‘come on in.’

The house was fantastic. Not huge, but big enough for a young family. It had a stone floor and walls, which made it wonderfully cool, and beamed ceilings, yet the important parts were modem. The kitchen, to which we followed Ellen, was lined with hand-built cupboards, and fitted out with every available appliance. A Pyrex bowl sat on the work-surface, half full of strawberries. Around it there lay piles of green husks.

Ellen pointed at it, still outraged. ‘See that wee so-and-so. They were for tonight.’ She glowered at her older son. ‘So help me God!’ Jonathan, reckoning he was on safer ground with me around, chanced his arm by smiling.

‘It’s all right, Ellie,’ I said. ‘We’ve got some more in the car.’ I cuffed Jonathan, very lightly, around the ear. ‘None for you though, pal.’

‘Allan still at work?’ I asked, innocently, and was concerned to see a shadow cross her face.

‘Of course,’ she said. ‘Allan works every hour God sends. Allan volunteers for extra work. Last week he was away so early and home so late that he didn’t see his kids at all.’ She tried to sound casual, but she didn’t fool me. My sister was not a happy lady.

I didn’t want to get into the domestics, so I changed the subject. ‘How are you getting on with the language?’

‘Bloody awful,’ she said. ‘Stuff that, though. How’s Dad?’

‘He’s great. I might as well tell you straight off; he’s got a new interest in life. Auntie Mary.’

Ellen’s face lit up again. ‘That’s great. I’ve been hoping that would happen. And how about Jan? Is she still with the German?’ Ellen did not approve of Jan’s relationship.

‘Slovakian, Sis. She’s Slovakian. Aye, they’re still going strong.’

‘And you two. How long have you been …’

We were still talking in the kitchen when Allan came in a couple of hours later, just after nine, but by that time the kids were in bed, our kit was in the spare room, and a meal had been prepared. ‘Coq au Vin’ Ellen called it, muttering something about ‘shaggin’ in a Transit’, but it looked like chicken in red wine sauce to me.

I try to make excuses for my brother-in-law, especially to my Dad, but I always wind up admitting that he’s a selfish, boring get. Allan is not the sort of guy you’d invite out to the pub. He was surprised to see us, of course, but not the sort of surprise that gives way to a big smile, like Ellen’s did. He barely hid his irritation at our disruption of his routine.

We ate outside in their small courtyard. Ellie asked Prim about Africa, and to be polite, I asked Allan about his job. He gave me a lecture on the state of the oil industry; I told him that I always judged the state of the oil industry by the number of rigs tied up idle in the Firth of Forth. Finally, as soon as half-decent manners allowed, my brother-in-law offered the ‘early start’ excuse and went upstairs.

Later, as Prim and I undressed in the tiny guest room, we thought we heard the sound of my sister’s raised voice. ‘See if I ever get like him, sweetheart,’ I said. ‘Make sure you shoot me before you leave, will you.’