A Very French Christmas Read online

  “It brings happiness, Mademoiselle!”

  After Claudine has given her some money and walked away, the woman watches her go and sighs: “Some people are lucky,” then begins shouting in the gathering fog: “Mistletoe for happiness! Come and get it! Plenty for everyone!”

  Her voice merges with the animated sound of the children gathered around the Christmas tree as it is being lit up. They are playing, singing, dancing. We hear only their voices, their laughter as the doors open very slowly, a fairy tale, mysterious atmosphere, to reveal the magnificent pine tree with hundreds of little lit candles.

  In the little adjoining room sit Édouard and Marie-Laure.

  Édouard: “Where is Claudine?”

  “She went out.”

  “She seemed so sad yesterday.”

  “She’s been depressed since her Ramon left. It serves her right; she shouldn’t have thrown herself at him.”

  Claudine is wandering in the street, anxiously looking for an address. Finally, she goes through a door, whispers a name to the concierge who replies with a snigger and a shrug of her shoulders.

  “Fifth floor, door on the left.”

  Claudine climbs the stairs; we see the look of despair on her face. The staircase is horrible, narrow, dark, with a very small gaslight on the landing, lighting up a shiny sign: MIDWIFE.

  Claudine has stopped on the landing. We see only her shadow. At that moment, a young woman comes down holding a baby in her arms. He’s a tiny little thing, ugly; he’s asleep. As the mother passes by Claudine, she covers, with infinite care, the infant’s face with a little gauze veil. Claudine looks at the child, then at the mother, who is an ordinary working-class woman dressed all in black; she then looks at the door. We see her shadow slowly go back down the stairs, and below, on the bright street, she joins a crowd of people rushing about; they all disappear.

  Meanwhile, the table is being set for the party.

  One of the maids (disgusted): “Those kids are making such a racket! I have a headache, what a celebration we had last night, didn’t we!”

  Angelic faces singing an old Christmas song around the piano. Two little boys in sailor suits, their mouths full of cake, are talking: “They’re still boring us to death with their music! Say, do you have the Auto magazine? Who won the Schneider Cup?”

  In the small living room, Édouard and Marie-Laure are having an argument.

  “You gullible fool, really, leave it to you to defend my holier-than-thou sister!”

  “Why are you saying that?”

  “Because ...” and she whispers something in his ear.

  At that moment, Claudine comes home. The children run across the room and hug her.

  “Claudine! It’s Claudine! Come and play with us.”

  She gently pushes them away, goes into her room and locks the door; they start to follow her, but the Christmas pudding has been lit and appears. We see all their little expressions over their cups of hot chocolate, the nanny scolding them. Claudine is in her room, crushed against the window. She murmurs in a toneless, despairing voice:

  “What am I going to do? What am I going to do?”

  At that moment, we see her father adjusting his tie in front of the mirror, at his mistress’s place. “So you’re sure you won’t be able to come back tonight?” she asks, sounding hopeful.

  “No, impossible.”

  “Oh, good,” she sighs, relieved.

  In the entrance hall to the bachelor pad where Claudine’s mother meets her lover, we see a hand slipping a small wallet into a man’s hand that quickly closes over it.

  The image fades into a different hand, Claudine’s; she is opening a small flask with the label: barbital.

  The children dance around the tree.

  Claudine carefully closes the doors and turns on the gas of the hot water tank above the bathtub, in the adjoining bathroom. Then she locks her door again. She walks over to the window, looks outside in despair as if she were hoping for something to come to help her, in vain.

  “My God,” she whispers, “Forgive me; I’m an unfortunate wretch ...”

  She takes the barbital. (All we see is a full glass of water, then empty and the trembling hand holding it.) She lays down on her bed.

  The children’s voices are heard singing in the living room; they soon fade away under the sound of church bells, then return stronger, shrill. (This should give the impression of a nightmare Claudine is having while asleep.) When the singing stops, we clearly hear the sound of gas, like a hissing snake.

  Édouard walks over to the children, who are now looking for some hidden object, accompanied by music, childish, obsessive music that is annoying.

  He asks Christiane and Jeannot: “Has your sister come back yet?”

  The children barely reply. They are running around in all directions, shouting and talking all at once. The toys are given out; they pull them quite roughly from the branches of the tree and we see the tree shaking. A padded toy Santa Claus, badly attached, falls to the ground and all the little white shoes trample him, indifferent. The governesses blow out the candles. Jeannot, tears in his eyes, protests: “Oh, what a shame, it was so beautiful!”

  The nanny (dryly): “You’re nothing more than a little self-centered child. That’s what Christmas trees are for.”

  The children, shouting with joy, throw streamers, put on paper hats and blow into the cardboard trumpets. “A farandole! A farandole!” One of the governesses sits down at the piano and plays vigorously. The children spin around quickly, more and more quickly; they get wild from their game. They run around the tree, then through the whole apartment, rushing through empty rooms and ending up in front of Claudine’s door. It is locked and they begin banging on it: “Let us in, let us in!”

  Édouard, who has followed them, asks in surprise: “What are you doing here?”

  “Monsieur, Christiane and Jeannot’s sister won’t open the door. You see, it’s locked.”

  “Well, that’s because she wants to be left alone.”

  “Oh, no, of course not, she’s playing a trick on us ... Otherwise, she would have told us off by now,” replies a chubby-cheeked little boy wearing an Eton uniform.

  Suddenly, Édouard is filled with anxiety and asks: “Have you been calling her for a long time without her answering?”

  “Oh, yes, a very long time!”

  Édouard starts calling her, quietly at first, then much louder: “Claudine! Claudine!”

  No reply. The children, who have gradually become more and more worried, fall silent. Édouard kicks the door, bangs on it with his fists, but it remains firmly closed.

  The hissing of gas. Claudine’s head thrown back, her face white. The governess, in the empty living room, is being kissed by the butler but continues playing the piano, oblivious.

  Édouard, determined, shouts: “Be quiet, all of you! G... Damn it!”

  While he is rattling the door, two of the kids have found a ladder and climbed up to the little skylight cut out of the roof, above the chimney, in Claudine’s room. One of them calls out:

  “Monsieur, Monsieur! Come quickly!”

  Édouard rushes up, sees Claudine fainted on her bed, goes back down and forces the door open with his shoulder. A long silence. Everyone is huddled in front of the door, the servants and the terrified children. Then, great chaos, children shouting:

  “I’m scared! I’m scared! Is she dead?”

  We see the living room and the candles on the tree that flicker and go out.

  Claudine has opened her eyes. They are alone. He tries to laugh: “Are you feeling better? You gave me quite a fright, you know, my dear.”

  Claudine: “Oh, why did you wake me up? I was in such a deep sleep.”

  “Listen, I’m your friend, a true friend, Claudine ... Tell me the truth ... Is what Marie-Laure said true?”

  Claudine smiles sadly: “Ah, so Marie-Laure told you? Yes, it’s true.”

  Meanwhile, Christiane and Jeannot slip into the empty livin
g room. They are holding a box of matches and light all the candles on the tree again, one by one. They are very excited.

  “Wait ’til you see how pretty it will look ... We didn’t get to see it before with all the grown-ups pushing us around! Turn off the lights.”

  But once the lights are off, all we see is the bare Christmas tree, bits of streamers and old wrapping paper on the floor.

  “Oh!” the children say, sadly.

  At that moment, a great commotion. Claudine’s parents have been warned and rush into her room. Marie-Laure follows them.

  “You miserable child! You have no pity, you don’t care at all about your family,” etc.

  Édouard: “Monsieur, may I have the honor of asking for Claudine’s hand in marriage?”

  Her father (furious): “Claudine’s hand? I ... yes ... you can see I’m taken aback ... I mean, deeply moved ... (To Claudine, much more gently than before) So, no more foolishness, right? Ah, youth, fortunate youth ... you get married, you kill yourself, just like that ... Wait until you’re my age, then you’ll understand what it means to have real problems in life!”

  Marie-Laure to Édouard, frowning, but making an effort in spite of her bad luck: “Con ... congratulations ...”

  Édouard (quietly): “My dear, I prefer ... someone who is blossoming rather than someone who is withering.”

  Marie-Laure (annoyed): “I don’t understand.”

  Claudine and Édouard are alone. “Thank you, my dear friend,” she says softly. “I will be ridiculously faithful to you, I swear it.”

  We see their two faces. He looks at her, nods his head, brings her hand to his lips. She says quietly, over and over again, her eyes full of tears: “Thank you for my child.”

  Fade out.

  That evening. Guests at the dinner table. Her father raises his glass: “I have the pleasure of announcing the engagement of my daughter Claudine to Monsieur Saulnier.”

  A discreet murmur of congratulations.

  One lady to her mother: “You must be very happy!”

  “Oh, naturally, but it’s so sad to lose one’s children, and mine are still such babes ... So when we send them out into the world all alone for the first time, we do worry so, don’t we?”

  Everyone leaves the table. Everything is discreet, proper. The servants walk by in silence, serving the coffee. On the sad Christmas tree, the candles have nearly burned out on its broken branches.

  Jeannot and Christiane’s room; they are in bed. We hear the nanny snoring. Little Jeannot is asleep, clutching his toys to his heart. Christiane, sitting on her bed, is crying softly; she wipes away her tears. Jeannot wakes up and whispers: “Why are you crying?”

  Christiane (pitifully): “I don’t know ...”

  Jeannot: “Oh, but didn’t you have a good time today? The Christmas tree, and now Claudine is going to get married ... I’ll be the ring bearer and you’ll be the flower girl ... didn’t you have a good time?”

  Christiane shakes her head.

  “Why?”

  Christiane buries her face in her pillow.

  “Because ... I don’t know ...”

  Silence.

  Faint melancholic music gradually fades away:

  Childhood, Innocence, Dawn of the world ...

  Dawn of love

  The most wonderful days ...

  PAUL ARÈNE (1843-1896) was a poet, playwright and author of fiction from Provence in southern France who contributed articles and stories to Paris newspapers.

  JEAN-PHILIPPE BLONDEL was born in 1964 in Troyes, France, where he lives as an author and English teacher. He has published nearly a dozen novels, including The 6:41 to Paris, published in English translation by New Vessel Press. It has been a bestseller in both France and Germany.

  FRANÇOIS COPPÉE (1842-1908) was a poet, playwright and short story writer. He was also an anti-Semitic activist involved in the campaign for legal persecution of French army officer Alfred Dreyfus on baseless allegations of treason.

  ALPHONSE DAUDET (1840-1897) was a native of Provence who wrote comic novels and other works of fiction that depict Parisian social and professional life. Daudet was notoriously anti-Semitic, and counted among his friends Édouard Drumont, founder of the National Anti-Semitic League of France, and publisher of an inflammatory tract, La France juive. Daudet also wrote extensively about his experience living with syphilis.

  ANTOINE GUSTAVE DROZ (1832-1895), born in Paris and son of a sculptor, trained as a visual artist and later wrote stories about family life and psychological novels.

  DOMINIQUE FABRE, born in 1960, writes about people living on society’s margins. He is a lifelong resident of Paris. Two of his novels have been translated into English, including Guys Like Me, which was published in 2015 by New Vessel Press.

  ANATOLE FRANCE (1844-1924), was a bestselling author, poet and journalist. He was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1921 after writing novels of social and political satire. France’s story “The Juggler of Notre Dame,” is based upon a medieval legend. This religious miracle tale is similar to the later Christmas carol, “The Little Drummer Boy.”

  ANATOLE LE BRAZ (1859-1926) was known for his poetry, novels and collections of folklore legends from his native Brittany. He recorded the songs of Breton peasants and fisherman in a volume awarded a prize by the Académie Française.

  GUY DE MAUPASSANT (1850-1893) is considered a master of the short story. He studied law and worked as a civil servant before coming under the tutelage of Gustave Flaubert. As Flaubert’s protégé, he was introduced into an authors’ circle including Émile Zola and Ivan Turgenev. Maupassant wrote over three hundred stories, travel books, and six novels, including Bel-Ami and Pierre et Jean.

  IRÈNE NÉMIROVSKY (1903-1942) was born in Kiev into a Jewish banking family. Following the Bolshevik Revolution, she moved to France and wrote in French. Némirovsky was baptized as a Catholic in 1939, three years before her arrest and deportation to Auschwitz where she died. Her best-known novel, Suite Française, was published posthumously and translated into English by Sandra Smith.

  “Christmas in Algiers”

  translated by Warren Barton Blake

  “The Juggler of Notre Dame”

  translated by Anna C. Brackett

  “St. Anthony and His Pig”

  translated by J. M. Lancaster

  “The Lost Child”

  translated by J. Matthewman

  “The Louis d’Or”

  “A Christmas Supper in the Marais”

  “Salvette and Bernadou”

  “I Take Supper with My Wife”

  translated by Antoinette Ogden

  “Noël”

  translated by Sandra Smith

  “Christmas Eve”

  translated by Frederick Caesar de Sumichrast

  “The Wooden Shoes of Little Wolff”

  “A Miracle”

  translator unknown

  “The Gift”

  “Christmas at the Boarding School”

  translated by Michael Z. Wise

  A VERY RUSSIAN CHRISTMAS

  This is Russian Christmas celebrated in supreme pleasure and pain by the greatest of writers, from Dostoevsky and Tolstoy to Chekhov and Teffi. The dozen stories in this collection will satisfy every reader, and with their wit, humor, and tenderness, packed full of sentimental songs, footmen, whirling winds, solitary nights, snow drifts, and hopeful children, the collection proves that Nobody Does Christmas Like the Russians.

  http://newvesselpress.com/books/a-very-russian-christmas/

  IF VENICE DIES BY SALVATORE SETTIS

  Internationally renowned art historian Salvatore Settis ignites a new debate about the Pearl of the Adriatic and cultural patrimony at large. In this fiery blend of history and cultural analysis, Settis argues that “hit-and-run” visitors are turning Venice and other landmark urban settings into shopping malls and theme parks. This is a passionate plea to secure the soul of Venice, written with consummate authority, wide-rangin
g erudition and élan.

  http://newvesselpress.com/books/if-venice-dies/

  THE MADONNA OF NOTRE DAME BY ALEXIS RAGOUGNEAU

  Fifty thousand believers and photo-hungry tourists jam into Notre Dame Cathedral to celebrate the Feast of the Assumption. The next morning, a stunningly beautiful young woman kneels at prayer in a cathedral side chapel. But when an American tourist accidentally bumps against her, her body collapses. This thrilling murder mystery illuminates shadowy corners of the world’s most famous cathedral, shedding light on good and evil with suspense, compassion and wry humor.

  http://newvesselpress.com/books/madonna-notre-dame/

  YEAR OF THE COMET BY SERGEI LEBEDEV

  From the critically acclaimed author of Oblivion comes Year of the Comet, a story of a Russian boyhood and coming of age as the Soviet Union is on the brink of collapse. Sergei Lebedev depicts a vast empire coming apart at the seams, transforming a very public moment into something tender and personal, and writes with shattering beauty and insight about childhood and the growing consciousness of a boy in the world.

  http://newvesselpress.com/books/year-of-the-comet/

  MOVING THE PALACE BY CHARIF MAJDALANI

  A young Lebanese adventurer explores the wilds of Africa, encountering an eccentric English colonel in Sudan and enlisting in his service. In this lush chronicle of far-flung adventure, the military recruit crosses paths with a compatriot who has dismantled a sumptuous palace and is transporting it across the continent on a camel caravan. This is a captivating modern-day Odyssey in the tradition of Bruce Chatwin and Paul Theroux.

  http://newvesselpress.com/books/moving-the-palace/

  ADUA BY IGIABA SCEGO

  Adua, an immigrant from Somalia to Italy, has lived in Rome for nearly forty years. She came seeking freedom from a strict father and an oppressive regime, but her dreams of film stardom ended in shame. Now that the civil war in Somalia is over, her homeland calls her. She must decide whether to return and reclaim her inheritance, but also how to take charge of her own story and build a future.