“Merde,” said Fanny.

“Afraid so.”

Christie watched as Fanny left and made her way through the crowd. “It’s pretty obvious from seeing the two of you together,” she said. “You should do something about it. You know? A date?”

Max clapped his hand to his heart and put on a rueful expression. “All I can do is admire her from afar,” he said. “It’s those impossible restaurant hours. Bloody unsociable. I suppose I could offer to help with the dishes.” He left some change on the table and stood up, looking at his watch. “Come on. I thought we could buy some stuff in the market and have lunch at the house, in case the wine man turns up early.”

They joined the crush moving slowly through the square, and stopped first at a stall festooned with sausages, its counter covered with confits and pâtés that Christie peered at over her sunglasses. “Could I make a menu request?” she said. “Nothing with a beak, OK?”

They picked out a rough country pâté, watching the deft hands of the stall holder cut two thick slices and wrap them in waxed paper. He counted out their change with fingers as rosy pink as a well-boiled ham while he advised them on a suitable wine, and the necessity-the absolute necessity-of buying a few cornichons to go with the pâté. Then to the cheese stall, and a discussion about the ripeness of the goat cheeses from Banon; each plump disk was wrapped in chestnut leaves that, so they were assured, had been soaked in eau-de-vie. They went on to buy salad and fruit, bread and oil, and a flask of balsamic vinegar, finishing off at the flower stall to pick up a bunch of vivid parrot tulips for the table.

Christie was fascinated by the novelty of it all-the talkative stall keepers, the small courtesies that accompanied each transaction, the general air of easygoing good humor, the lack of haste.

“It beats pushing a shopping cart through the local supermarket,” she said. “That’s for sure. But something like this couldn’t happen back home. I mean, there are dogs everywhere, people are smoking, and the guys behind the stalls aren’t even wearing plastic gloves. The hygiene police in California would have a field day. They’d shut everything down.”

“And arrest the dogs for loitering with intent, I’m sure,” said Max. “Amazing that we’re not all dropping like flies, really. Yet people seem to live as long here as they do in the States, or longer. You must have read some of those statistics.”

“Sure. We send them out as press releases. You know-the French Paradox: a bottle a day keeps the doctor away. Every time the figures are published, sales of red wine go through the roof. Americans love the quick fix.”

Laden with plastic bags, they were on their way to the car when they came to the village church, and Max stopped to read a notice pinned to the door. He smiled and shook his head. “Provençal logic. It’s wonderful.” He translated the contents of the message. Please note: The meeting scheduled for today has been changed. It took place yesterday.

Arriving back at the house, they found a note from Madame Passepartout informing them that a Monsieur Fitzgerald from Bordeaux had called to say that he would be with them in the early afternoon; that Max was under no circumstances to get his head wet, or too hot; and that she was unable to return to work after lunch due to a crise de chat.

“A cat crisis,” Max said in explanation. “She has this old moggy who sometimes gets fur balls and has to have her paw held. Actually, it’s better that she won’t be here. She’d be telling the oenologue what to do.”

They unpacked the food and Max went to the sink to wash the salad, while Christie perched on the edge of the kitchen table with a glass of wine and a cigarette. “It doesn’t seem like real life down here,” she said. “Is it always like this? What’s it like in the winter?”

Max laid the washed salad out to dry on a strip of paper towel. “I’ve never been here in the winter. Uncle Henry always used to say it was a great time of the year for writers and alcoholics-cold, quiet, empty, nothing much to do. I’m rather looking forward to it.” If I’m still here, he couldn’t help thinking, as he reached up to the shelf for a battered olive wood salad bowl. He pushed the thought away. “Now then. This is one of the few things I can manage in the kitchen without chopping bits off my fingers or breaking something: la sauce vinaigrette à ma façon. Watch closely.”

He put black pepper and two generous pinches of sea salt into the bowl, grinding them together with the back of a fork until he’d made a coarse black and white dust. A few drops of balsamic vinegar-a deep, deep brown-went in next, and then a long stream of olive oil, greenish yellow in the sunlight. Finally, a cherry-sized blob of full-strength Maille mustard from Dijon. Max picked up the bowl and held it against his stomach while he whisked the mixture with his fork, checking its consistency two or three times before he was satisfied. Putting the bowl down, he tore off a piece of baguette, mopped it in the brown puddle he had prepared with such care, and offered the dripping bread to Christie. “Some people add lemon juice,” he said, “but I prefer it like this. What do you think?”

He watched as Christie took the bread and bit into it, wiping a dribble of dressing from her chin with the back of her hand and chewing for a few moments in silence.

“Well?”

Christie looked at the ceiling, nodded her head. “Shows promise,” she said, in her best wine taster’s voice. “Do I detect a hint of Hellmann’s?” She looked at Max’s stricken face. “No, it’s great. You could bottle it and make a fortune.”

“It’s never the same from a bottle. Here, take this tray and I’ll bring the rest. We’ll eat outside.”

An hour later, they were sitting at the stone table over the remains of lunch and the last of the pink wine when the clatter and wheeze of a weary engine announced the arrival of Roussel’s van, which was followed a moment later by a gleaming bottle-green Jaguar. As the dust thrown up by their wheels settled, a tall, elegant man, dressed in a putty-colored linen suit, got out of the Jaguar. He removed his sunglasses, smoothed his jacket, and brushed back a wing of graying hair from his forehead before walking over to Max.

“Jean-Marie Fitzgerald. Très heureux.” The two men shook hands, and Max introduced Christie. Muttering again how happy he was, Fitzgerald performed the ritual of the near-miss kiss-osculari interruptus-still favored by Frenchmen of a certain age and a certain class, ducking his head low over Christie’s hand but not quite touching it with his lips before straightening up.

“Fitzgerald,” said Max. “That’s a name I’d associate with Dublin; certainly not with Bordeaux.”

The Frenchman smiled. “I’m what the English sometimes call a ’bog frog’-half-Irish, half-French. There are quite a few of us scattered around in southwestern France. Our Irish ancestors must have liked the climate and the local girls.”

“I imagine your English is pretty good, then?”

Fitzgerald gave Max a rueful look, shaking his head. “Unfortunately, my English studies didn’t get much further than a few phrases-’My tailor is rich,’ that kind of thing.”

For once, this gem of Gallic humor didn’t bring a smile to Roussel’s face. He seemed uncomfortable, far from the relaxed, expansive soul of the previous evening. He was virtually ignoring Fitzgerald, and Max wondered if there was a problem between them, or whether it was just the instinctive mistrust that tends to exist between peasants and strangers in suits.

“Do you two know each other?” he asked Roussel.

A vigorous shake of the head. “Only since half an hour. Monsieur Max, are you sure you want to bother yourself with this? It’s hot, and I can easily show him what he needs to see.”