Max found himself taking a perverse pleasure in disagreeing with her, defending France and the French, occasionally fanning the flames of argument with mild criticisms of America. These were never well received. Although Christie was too intelligent to swallow the doctrine of “either for us or against us,” she was puzzled and sometimes angered by what she thought of as the Europeans’ tendency to bite the hand that had fed them so generously after World War Two. And she was angered still further when Max, talking about the shelf life of gratitude, reminded her of Lafayette, and America ’s debt to the French. And so the atmosphere in the house became increasingly strained. Madame Passepartout sensed the tension, and even she was uncharacteristically subdued. It was inevitable that the constant bickering would have to come to a head.
It started in public. Driven by hunger, Christie and Max had declared a hostile truce and were having dinner in the village. Fanny, it has to be said, behaved in a way that did nothing to improve a delicate situation, fussing over Max while ignoring Christie, who watched with an ever more baleful eye. The final straw came with the arrival of dessert.
Christie speared her poached pear with a murderous jab of her fork. “Does she have to give you a massage every time she comes to the table?”
“Just being friendly.”
“Yeah, right.”
“Listen, that’s the way she is. You don’t have to watch.”
“Fine.” Christie pushed back her chair and stood up. “Then I won’t.” And she marched off into the night, her back stiff with anger.
Max caught up with her a few minutes later on the road outside the village. Slowing the car down to walking speed, he leaned over and opened the passenger door. Christie ignored him, looking straight ahead as she quickened her pace. After a hundred yards of crawling along beside her, Max gave up, slammed the door shut, and accelerated.
Back at the house, he tossed the car keys onto the kitchen table and searched for something to take the edge off his temper. Roussel’s evil-tasting marc matched his mood, and he was on his second glass by the time Christie came through the door.
He looked up at her set face, hesitated, and should have thought better of it. But in his irritation he said it anyway. “Nice walk?”
Those two words opened a floodgate. Christie’s complaints, after a passing swipe at Fanny, moved on to the real focus of her dissatisfaction: Max, or rather, his attitude-unsympathetic, self-centered, smug, a twisted sense of humor. Typically English. She paced back and forth in front of the stove, glaring at him while she waited for him to erupt, or at least react. But he had already wrapped himself inside that cocoon of chilly condescension which the Englishman will often assume in the face of emotional outbursts, particularly those coming from women and foreigners. Nothing could have been more infuriating to a girl spoiling for a fight.
“You’re entitled to your opinion,” Max said, “however offensively you express it.” He pointed to the bottle on the table. “Care for a drink?”
No, she wouldn’t care for a goddamn drink. But she would care for the basic consideration that should be given to someone in her position-someone far away from home, not speaking the language, surrounded by strangers, living with a stranger.
Max swirled the last mouthful of oily liquid around in his glass before tossing it back with a shudder and getting to his feet. “I’m off to bed,” he said. “Why don’t you grow up? I didn’t ask you to come.”
He never made it to the kitchen door. Christie snapped, seized the nearest weapon to hand, and let fly. It was unfortunate that the weapon was a six-inch cast-iron skillet, even more unfortunate that her aim was true. The skillet caught Max full on the temple. There was an explosion in his head, a burst of pain, then blackness. His legs buckled and he collapsed, unconscious, on the floor.
Christie stood in shock, looking down at the prone figure. Blood was beginning to seep from Max’s head, leaving a thin red line as it dribbled down the side of his face. He made no sound, and lay still; ominously still.
Remorse and panic took over. Christie got down on the floor and cradled Max’s head in her lap while she tried to stop the flow of blood with a wad of paper towel torn from a kitchen roll. She felt his neck and thought she detected his pulse, a moment of relief quickly canceled out by thoughts of possible consequences: trauma, brain damage, multimillion-dollar lawsuits, arrest for causing grievous bodily harm, years spent rotting in a French prison cell.
A doctor. She must call a doctor. But she didn’t know how to call a doctor in France. The police? The fire department? Oh my God. What had she done?
The head on her lap moved, no more than a cautious inch. There was a groan, and then one of Max’s eyes opened slowly, looking up past the curve of her bloodstained bosom at her frowning, anxious face.
“Where did you learn to throw like that?”
Christie exhaled, a great gust of relief. “Are you OK? Listen, I am so sorry. I don’t know what happened. I guess I must have-God, the blood. Tell me you’re OK.”
Max moved his head gingerly. “I think I’ll live,” he said, “but I can’t be moved.” He let his head fall back on her lap, folded his arms across his chest, closed his eyes, and groaned again. “Although there is something that might help.”
“What? Anything, anything at all. A doctor? Aspirin? A drink? Tell me.”
“You wouldn’t happen to have a nurse’s uniform, would you?”
Christie looked down at her victim’s face. Max opened both eyes, and winked. “I’ve always had a thing about nurses.”
They were both laughing as Christie helped him up and sat him down at the table, where she went to work on his wound with a bowl of water and more paper towels. “It’s not as bad as I thought,” she said when she had cleaned the gash above his eyebrow. “I don’t think you’re going to need stitches. But what a dumb thing to do. I’m sorry. I really am.”
“I probably deserved it,” said Max.
She squeezed his shoulder, took the bowl of bloody water, and emptied it down the sink. “OK. Now what I need is some antiseptic. What do they use here? Do you have any iodine?”
“Never touch it,” said Max. He reached across the table for the bottle of marc. “Try this. It kills all known germs. Unblocks drains, too.”
She dabbed the alcohol on his head, then made a makeshift bandage with strips cut from a clean dish towel. “There,” she said. “Are you sure we shouldn’t call the doctor?”
Max started to shake his head, then winced. “Why spoil a nice evening?”
Twelve
The following morning, Max confronted his battered reflection in the shaving mirror, lifting the strip of dishcloth to inspect the livid welt above his left eye. Apart from some tenderness, and a throb of discomfort if he moved his head abruptly, the damage didn’t seem too bad. Doctor Clerc in the village could clean the wound up and dress it in no time. He crept down the stairs, hoping to avoid Madame Passepartout, who, given her love of drama, would undoubtedly want to call Médecins Sans Frontières and a helicopter full of paramedics.
He crept in vain. She was lying in wait for him outside the kitchen door, with an apprehensive Christie hovering at her side.
“I couldn’t sleep,” said Christie. “I was so worried. I thought you might have, you know, complications-shock, post-accident trauma. I brought you a couple of Advil, but you were asleep. How do you feel?”
Before he could answer, Madame Passepartout clapped both hands to her cheeks in horror. “Oh la la la, le pauvre! What has happened to your head?”