The House with Blue Shutters by Lisa Hilton Page A

overall for a scrap of paper. She dialled carefully,
     pressing her fingers precisely on the digits, hunched over.
    Jonathan appeared in a maroon towelling dressing-gown. The sweat of his sleep came thickly to Claudia’s nose in the cooler
     air from the passage. ‘What’s up?’ he asked in English.
    ‘They haven’t got a phone, you see,’ said Aisling, as though that explained everything.
    ‘Who hasn’t got a phone, for God’s sake?’
    ‘Ginette and Mademoiselle Oriane, from Aucordier’s up the hill. There must have been an accident. Claudia found her.’
    Ginette turned back to them. She was thin, feet snub in green felt slippers. Claudia saw that Aisling had on a patient encouraging
     smile, as for a child. ‘Mademoiselle Oriane had one of her nightmares. I heard her scream, then she fell out of bed on to
     the floor. I think she’s broken her arm. I best go back up.’ Her speech was rapid, in the thick nasal accent of the region.
     There was a moment of hesitancy on Aisling’s face.
    ‘The other lady is hurt,’ Claudia offered.
    ‘My God!’ said Aisling dramatically, then quickly in English, ‘I’ll go up in the car. Jonathan, will you put the lights on
     and watch out for the doctor, he mayn’t know the way up? Just a moment,’ she added imperiously to Ginette.
    Claudia followed Aisling up the stairs. ‘Shall I come, too?’ she asked, feeling that Aisling minded about something.
    ‘You might as well, since you were up anyway.’
    Alex was still sleeping. Claudia pulled his light sweater over her pyjamas and shoved at her espadrilles with her feet. On
     the way back down, she picked up a bottle of cognac fromthe table in the drawing room, Aisling reappeared in jeans. ‘Right then, Ginette.’ Jonathan was making tea. The three women
     loaded the bicycle into the boot of the car and Aisling manoeuvred carefully up the narrow Murblanc lane to the road, only
     slightly wider, steel coloured in the moonlight. The road climbed to the left until they stopped at the large square house
     that Claudia had seen over the brim of the hill. The door was open, a harsh neon strip frosted the yard from indoors. ‘It’s
     only me,’ called Ginette loudly, ‘and Madame Harvey.’
    Mademoiselle Oriane was propped on the floor against a high wooden bed. Ginette had clearly been too afraid or too weak to
     move her. Aisling stepped forward purposefully, her voice matronly. ‘Now, Mademoiselle, what’s going on? You remember me don’t
     you, Madame Harvey? From Murblanc? I bought your lovely table for my kitchen.’
    The old woman’s eyes were so pale that it was hard to discern where her floury, crinkled face began. Her hair was absolutely
     white, tucked into a blue web of hairnet. As Aisling approached, she spat at her, viciously. She called her, in a high, strong
     voice, the son of a whore.
    Ginette rushed forward. ‘I’m so sorry, Madame Harvey, she’s confused, she gets like this. It’s one of her spells, oh dear,
     when she fell, she was screaming so.’ Ginette stopped short and began to cry, her sobs mounting into wails, she hiccuped breathlessly,
     uncontained, and began to gulp like a frog, her shoulders convulsing, saliva running down her chin.
    ‘Oh Christ!’ said Aisling.
    Claudia cautiously put an arm around Ginette’s shoulders, but the gasping continued, the frail muscles bouncing beneathher housecoat. Claudia shook her a little, then raised her arm and cut a short slap across her face.
    ‘Now,’ Claudia said firmly, feigning confidence, ‘come and sit down, Ginette. I’m going to give you a little drink, and we’re
     going to put Mademoiselle right. Come on.’ She led Ginette to a dingy brown sofa, looked to the cupboard next to the huge
     old fireplace, occupied by an oil stove, and retrieved a glass. She was still holding the bottle of cognac. ‘Now you drink
     that,’ pouring a measure, ‘and we’ll get on. The doctor will be here soon.’
    ‘She’s not right, you