But Madame Mallory ignored them all and stepped forward, the crowd parting to let her pass.

“You are not welcome,” Papa roared from the van. “Leave.”

“Monsieur Haji,” Mallory called back, stepping to the front. “I came to ask for your forgiveness. Please. I beg you. Don’t leave Lumière.”

A murmur of excitement rippled through the crowd.

Papa stood magnificently on the running board of the van, above everyone, not looking at Mallory, but like a politician appealing directly to the crowd. “Now she want us to stay, yaar?” he bellowed. “But the time for that has passed. It is too late.”

“Mais non, it is not too late,” she said. He still wouldn’t look at her, although she now stood at his feet. “Please, I want you to stay. And I want Hassan to come work in my kitchen. I will teach him French cooking. I will give him a proper education.”

My heart skipped. It was, however, this request for me to come work for her that finally got Papa to look down at the famous chef.

“You are utterly mad. No. Worse. You are sick. Who you tink you are?”

“Ah, merde, don’t be so pigheaded—”

But Mallory stopped herself, visibly trying to stay in control of her temper. She took a deep breath and tried again. “Listen, you, listen to what I am saying. This is a chance for your son to become a truly great French chef, a man of taste, a proper artist, not just some curry cook working in an Indian bistro.”

“Aaaarrgh. You just don’t get it.”

Papa stepped down from the van, his great belly aggressively thrust forward.

“What is it with you?” he yelled, forcing her back through the crowd, step by step, back to the gates. “Can’t you hear what I am saying? Nah? We can’t stand you, you barren old woman. We want nothing to do with you.” And by the time he had finished his tirade, she was back in the cobblestone street.

Alone.

We in the courtyard, we were jeering.

Mallory smiled softly, pulled some stray hairs behind her ear, and walked back alone toward her restaurant. We turned our backs, too, and went inside. But I would not be telling you the truth if I did not also admit to a small lump of regret sitting in the pit of my stomach, as we turned from Mallory’s incredible offer to the fussing festivities of my homecoming.

But Madame Mallory was not alone, for Monsieur Leblanc had seen everything from behind the curtains of the restaurant, and he rushed forward to greet her at the door, tenderly taking her hand. And anyone who would have seen his tipped, balding head would have recognized his tender hand-kiss expressed nothing but the deepest respect and affection.

And in the instant when those lips brushed the back of her hand, Madame Mallory understood how deep was Leblanc’s love and devotion, and she caught her breath, a girlish hand on her chest. For Mallory finally understood her great fortune, understood how lucky she was to have such a good and decent friend at her side, and it was this, Leblanc’s tender support, that gave her the feeling she could suffer through anything in the name of justice.

So none of us noticed, cavorting as we were under flashing disco lights within the restaurant, the quiet turn of events taking place outside the front door of Maison Mumbai. But batty old Ammi did. She wandered out from the garage, talking to herself about goodness knows what, and almost walked straight into Madame Mallory.

Ammi circled, as the chef calmly placed a wooden seat in the middle of our cobblestone courtyard.

As three large bottles of Evian went under the chair.

As Mallory sat down and crossed her arms over her bosom, a tartan blanket on her lap. The sun was setting behind the Alps.

“Wah?” said Ammi, puffing on her pipe. “Wah you doin’ here?”

“Sitting.”

“Haar,” said Ammi, “good place,” and continued on her walkabout. But perhaps something did get through her muddled brain, for Ammi eventually made her way into the party, through the gyrating bodies, and tugged at Papa’s kurta.

“Visitor.”

“Wah you mean, visitor?”

“Outside. Visitor.”

Papa swung open the front door and a chilly wind rattled through the hall.

His roar, I tell you, stopped the party in its tracks.

“Are you deaf? Are you mad? I told you to get out.”

We all piled out onto the icy steps to see what was going on.

Madame Mallory stared straight ahead as if she had all the time in the world. “I will not move,” she said calmly. “I will not move until you let Hassan come work for me.”

Papa laughed, and many on the steps joined in his mocking laughter.

But not I. Not this time.

“Crazy woman,” Papa sneered. “Never will that happen. But do what you want. You are welcome to stay there. Until you rot. Bye-bye.”

He shut the door and we returned to our festivities.

In the early evening the party disbanded. Our guests left through the front door, chatting to themselves, startled to discover Madame Mallory still sitting in the middle of the courtyard.

“Bonsoir, Madame Mallory.”

“Bonsoir, Monsieur Iten.”

The excitement of the homecoming was too much, and I mounted the steps to my room while the rest of the family went about their duties for the evening meal. I was so pleased to finally be with my things again in my room up in the turret—my cricket bat and Che Guevara poster and my CDs. But the world could wait, and I lay down on the bed, too tired even to get under the duvet.

It was late evening when I awoke and the downstairs dining room was in full roar. I went to my window; water dripped from the roof’s gutter.

There she was, down below, bundled up in a heavy overcoat. Someone had since plied her with blankets, and she was buried under them like an ice fisherman, patiently waiting in the night. Her head was wrapped in a flannel scarf, and I remember how a column of steam roared from her face with each breath. Guests arrived at the restaurant, uncertain of the etiquette required in such an unusual situation, and stopped nervously to chat with her, moved on, wished her well again as they left near midnight.

“Is she still there?”

I turned. It was little Zainab in her pajamas, rubbing her eyes. I took her carefully in my arms and we sat on the windowsill, staring down at the forlorn figure in our courtyard. We sat there for some time, almost in a trance, until we heard an odd noise different from the restaurant din. It was an unpleasant sort of chattering. Ammi, we figured, having one of her dialogues with the past, and we went into the hallway to help her snap out of it.

Papa.

He was peeking out from the upper corridor window, hiding behind the curtains. “What am I to do, Tahira?” we heard him mutter. “What am I to do?”

“Papa.”

He jumped, dropped the corners of the curtain.

“Wah? Why you sneak up on me like dat?”

Zainab and I looked at each other, and Papa barreled past us down the stairs.

Madame Mallory sat on the chair all that night and all the next day.

The news spread and her hunger strike became the talk of the valley. By noon a three-deep crowd had gathered at the gates of Maison Mumbai; by four in the afternoon a local reporter from Le Jura was at the gates, his long lens stuck between the bars, snapping away at the squat figure resolutely sitting in the middle of our courtyard.

When Papa saw this—saw this from the upstairs corridor window—he went absolutely mad. We could hear him roar all the way through the house, heard him pounding down the central staircase and out the front door. “Get away,” he yelled. “Go. Shoo.”

But the townspeople wouldn’t budge from the other side of the gate.

“We’re not on your property. We can stay here.”

Local boys jeered him, chanted, “Haji is a tyrant. Haji is a tyrant.”

“Monsieur Haji,” the reporter called out. “Why do you treat her so shabbily?”