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  'THROUGH A GLASS BRIGHTLY'

  The French Lesson is published by Jaguar Press, UK. Copyright,Robyn Elliot, 2016. All rights reserved.

  Reproduction of passages within the text is only permissible with the prior agreement of the author. All events and persons depicted are fictitious and any similarities to individuals, either living or dead, are

  entirely coincidental.

  ROBYN ELLIOT'S

  The French Lesson

  Chapter One

  The rain had just started to lash down by the time Daniel Hastings, barrister, slipped into the café-restaurant and was enveloped by its coffee imbued warmth. He loved Guillaume's, he loved the cool French-ness of it, the understatement, the illusion that in here he could sit by the window at his usual morning table, and feel perfectly safe. Daniel – Danny to everyone except judges, and the Colon – had a problem with feeling safe.

  In fact, he was a quivering, nervous wreck. The table was a welcome anchor, and Danny sat down on the plush leather seat that he pulled from it. He fished his case papers out of his briefcase, and started to put them on the table, pondering as he did so. Danny did a fleet reckoning. He looked up, to confirm he was on schedule. He needed to keep to it; it gave him a sense of order, control over his nerves, and as long as he was near a clock, he could keep a check on everything in the known universe.

  To confirm the accuracy of the large, big faced clock on the wall, Danny pulled back the sleeve of his suit, revealing his own watch face healthily synchronized. He made another reckoning. A daily reckoning, that never deviated, not even by a minute. He had an hour. An hour to sip on the fantastic coffee, try and relax; and whether he succeeded or not, he would certainly try. An hour to look over the case papers, and valiantly attempt to gather his thoughts.

  Danny glanced up again. His eyes quickly swept the room that was on two levels, separated by an elevation of five stairs. He recognized the morning regulars. Sitting drinking coffee, eating breakfast, reading paperwork, tapping away on their devices. Nodding slightly in satisfaction that everything was in perfect order, Danny began to arrange his papers so that he could cross reference them. More order. To keep his mind descending into a tailspin of panic. Katharine, friend and colleague, had helped him with that, the cross referencing stuff and just about everything else, when he had returned to work after being so ill.

  He straightened the papers. Again. He flexed his long fingers, as if they were afflicted by arthritis rather than tension. Momentarily, he wished it was arthritis alone. He was 27 years old, and too young to be as tense and uptight as he was. He flexed his fingers again, and rearranged his papers. Again. Once he was satisfied the papers were in order, so his pale blue eyes could sift the typescript on them with minimum fuss, he allowed himself to be relieved of his heavy overcoat. Danny slipped it from his shoulders and turned, to drape it over the chair. He knew one of the waiters, Bruno most likely, would come and, with minimum fuss, retrieve it and hang it on the large, brass antique coat stand adjacent to Danny’s table.

  After a couple of minutes, Danny stopped staring at the papers in front of him – his mind had started to drift from their content to those new paint colors he had seen in Mastiglio’s art supplies shop, 200 yards from Guillaume's – realizing that his coffee hadn’t arrived. And his coat was still draped, wet from the rain now slashing across the window to his right, over the chair. Strange.

  Danny loved Guillaume's for the coffee, the food, the ambiance; and the orderly manner of the service. The waiters were French but should have been German, if their sense of organization had anything to do with it. That was Guillaume's expertise - serving up fantastic coffee, superb food, and immediate, discreet service. Danny occasionally exchanged pleasantries with the restaurant’s 30ish owner, and he could see that the guy knew his stuff when it came to running a place as good as this. He didn’t know Guillaume's background, of course, but the little bit he was aware of, was impressive. Bruno, the currently missing in action waiter, would fill Danny in with titbits now and then. Just desultory conversation, nothing more. Danny couldn’t bear forming full sentences until at least 9am.

  Guillaume hailed from Paris, and had opened this place because he was a real Anglophile and wanted to educate the English about food. The way Bruno had delivered this momentous and selfless action on Guillaume's part, without a shred of irony seeing as they were in the epicenter of a city now renowned for good eating, had amused Danny. That, and Bruno’s deadly seriousness about everything. Which was fine with Danny. Bruno didn’t engage in witty repartee, thank ye Gods, as that would have had Danny heading straight for the door. What Bruno did do, and do well, was anticipate Danny’s order as soon as he walked through the door, on a weekday morning at 8am sharp, hang his coat on the coat stand, serve up a café latte, large. And then leave Danny alone. To work, to ponder, to mainly stare out of the window onto the busy streets beyond the immaculate window. No one bothered him. Danny could sit here, and pretend he was working. What he was really doing, and doing with little purpose or success, was trying to figure out a way to get the hell out of all of this.

  He didn’t mean Guillaume’s.

  Agitation started to make Danny fidget in his chair. He glanced at the clock on the wall. 8.06am. He had been here a full six minutes, with no coffee and his coat drying increases on his chair. He shuffled his papers, knowing he should be reading them. Danny’s teeth bit gently into his lower lip, working at the flesh until it swelled slightly. He heard the chink of cups, the low, subtle murmur of conversation. It seemed everyone else in the entire world had their order. He raised his eyes from the papers, and discreetly looked for a waiter. No sign of Bruno. The bustling efficiency of the short, bulky figure was definitely missing this morning. He saw the other waiter, Fabrice, but he worked the tables on the lower level, with Jean-Paul. They were both moving between the tables with smooth ease. Immaculate, in white shirts, black waistcoats and black aprons so starched that you could slash your wrists on them and bleed steadily for a month. Danny wondered if he should try and catch Fabrice’s eye. Or gather up his papers, and head for his Chambers.

  That thought didn’t appeal. Danny swallowed hard. A film of sweat settled on his upper lip. His dark navy suit, in which he was immaculate, contained his lean, willowy frame like a cotton lined straitjacket. The sense of order he always felt here was rapidly dissipating. Danny glanced up again, trying to appear casual, unhurried, hoping he didn’t look as frantic as he was starting to feel. The slightest thing set him off these days. His heart started kabooming against his ribs. His eyes fixed on Fabrice again, as if the waiter would sense the desperate gaze, and come to Danny’s rescue.

  It was Guillaume who rescued him. The Frenchman emerged from the kitchen, a quiescent kitchen this morning. Amidst his encroaching anxiety, Danny quickly observed that Mathieu, this place’s certified lunatic head chef magnifique, was not in yet, to commence his reign of terror. Guillaume glanced over to table six and saw Danny sitting there, without coffee, with wet coat.

  Danny fixed bayoneted glances with Guillaume, who for a brief moment looked boiling furious. Danny knew the look of incandescence wasn’t for him. It was for Bruno, oddly dilatory. Oddly absent. Guillaume quickly assessed the situation. Only Danny occupied the second level, the other regulars usually came in and took their tables near his around 8.15am onwards. Danny, the lone coffee drinker – rather, non-coffee drinker – sat amidst his papers, trying to appear nonchalant
at the lack of service and attention he was on the (non) receiving end of.

  He momentarily pitied Bruno. The look in Guillaume's eyes was priceless, that was for sure. Then, it disappeared, as Guillaume gestured for Fabrice to speak to him. Danny looked at his papers again. He felt his cheeks start to tingle, the slow, subtle sting of embarrassment prickling at the clear skin. He didn’t want to get Bruno into trouble, and on the end of a lashing from his boss. Danny knew how that bad that could feel.

  He could hear the edge of their low, muted conversation. Rapid French was exchanged, then Danny heard the swish of the heavy wooden door adjacent to the kitchen, marked Staff Only. Guillaume had disappeared behind it, leaving a stony faced Fabrice in his wake. Danny looked up, and his eyes watched that door, expecting Bruno to emerge, shamefaced into bringing him the errant café latte, large, for gratis. A few seconds ticked by. Danny shifted his eyes from the door that contained all promise of getting a coffee before 9am, to the clock on the wall. 8.10am. To Danny, it seemed like several ice ages had elapsed since he had sat down and thought that for one hour at least, he could sit, and dream. Fuck the paperwork, he thought, fuck it. Just give me my fucking coffee, for Christ’s sake!

  The coffee. Delicious, smooth. A bridge to thought and dreaming. Guillaume's was the place for Danny to dream, gazing from the window. He needed that precious hour. It was the hook, the line, to connect him to the dream. The simple dream. But not an easy dream. If it was an easy dream, Danny wouldn’t be a barrister. He’d be an artist. A painter. He’d be calm, and at peace. The coffee would be a bonus. Not a lifeline. Not a bridge for dreams. Milk and coffee beans were not that magical. But for Danny they were a breathing space for him. Before 9am, before the cavernous jaws of Chambers consumed him.

  He drew in a sharp intake of breath, as he saw the door start to open. Or rather, be thrust open, as the swish was altogether more noticeable. It was propelled forward with some force, like a hand had thumped at it in anger, to clear the way for the dilatory waiter to emerge into the naked light of...well, waitering.

  Swiftly, Danny lowered his eyes again, pretending to be engrossed by his papers. The typescript seemed to move on the white sheets and Danny blinked, realizing his eyes were watering slightly from the effort of staring at something he really didn’t give a toss about. He could hear more rapid French being exchanged, only this time, louder, loud enough for heads at the other tables to turn. This was not unusual, for arguments to be heard – or seen – in Guillaume's. That was part of the allure of the place. And invariably because of Mathieu, the malleus maleficarum of waiters; emerging with polar bear menace in his whites, from the lair of his kitchen, to berate the waiters, or Guillaume himself, very publicly and very loudly. The Anglo Saxon flying liberally, in a heavy French accent.

  Only this wasn’t Mathieu storming angrily in French. And it wasn’t Bruno, either. Bruno was too professional, too good at his job, to be in this situation in the first place. Briefly, Danny wondered if Bruno had finally had enough of Mathieu’s tyranny, and had organized an escape committee. Membership of one. Fleeing, on a motorbike across barbed wire barricades, black, starched apron flying behind him like a badge of honor.

  Danny kept his eyes fixed on the papers. The typescript was blurring now. He blinked again, rapidly, as he listened to the quick fire discussion in French taking place – discussion, in the loosest sense of the term – between Guillaume and a waiter. Yes, definitely a waiter, as Danny allowed his eyes to briefly shift sideways, to see a tall, slim man clad in the immaculate uniform that Guillaume insisted upon, for morning as well as lunch and evening service. Waiter or not, he was giving to Guillaume as good as he was getting. Jesus, thought Danny, will one of you just bring me my bloody latte? He looked again. For a minute, he thought he saw a similarity in the way the two men were locking horns, in their mannerisms and their build. Then, abruptly, the waiter picked up a notepad and pen from the polished marble surface of the bar, and began making his way towards the short flight of stairs. Shit, thought Danny, he’s coming over, then checked himself. Yes, he’s a bloody waiter, of course he is.

  The papers on the table suddenly assumed fascinating proportions for Danny. He pretended he was immersed in his reading, and that he had completely, totally, utterly forgotten that he’d been sitting here for 10 minutes without his usual coffee. And that he didn’t give a toss. Who needed Guillaume's superb coffee when he could be having far much fun trying to scrape his tongue from the roof of his mouth caused by terminal thirst.

  He heard the waiter – his waiter, now – making a big deal of ascending the three wooden stairs, or it seemed it was a big deal to Danny from the clicking sound of the guy’s shoes. Staccato steps that denoted anger, Danny was convinced. He reached for the pen he had abandoned earlier, that lay next to the earthenware bowl of condiments. That pen became the closest thing a stylo can be to friendship in those moments, as the waiter of the year came to Danny’s table, still mumbling French, but under his breath now. Danny picked up the pen, and began scribbling nonsensical annotations in the margins of one of the papers, convinced it would make him look very business-like and unconcerned. It was a pity he couldn’t do anything about his face, which was starting to sting with bells on now, from his anxiety levels reaching defcon two.

  Danny felt hands resting over his own. The panic, the sense of impending doom, the shortness of breath, wracked his body. It was one of the worst he’d had in a while, like he felt he was about to expire at any moment. The hands covered his still, and he was vaguely aware that fingertips were gently stroking the prominent veins there.

  “Good. That’s it. Breathe…slow, slow…it’s okay, everything’s okay…here, hold onto me.”

  Danny closed his eyes, leaned his head against the dank wall. He felt his hands being enveloped, into warmth, fingers stroking his palms now, the lightest touch, but offering a world of comfort. Strong, too. Like an anchor against his panic.

  “Breathe, slow, nice and slow, just take your time…it’s all good…promise.”

  Danny focused on the voice, and the aroma of cool, temperate forests again. The French accent was soothing, sensuous, taking the edge off his anxiety. Slowly, gradually, Danny felt his breathing start to slow down. The voice guided him, and he followed it slavishly. He allowed his fingers to interlink with the fingers that had been stroking his palms. Danny opened his eyes, looked into beautiful gray ones, gazing up at him.

  “You’re doing great…that’s it…nice and slow breathing, no rush...breathe, now, breathe, breathe…”

  He gazed back at the smoky gray eyes. As his breathing began to calm under the subtle hypnosis, his chest relaxed to just a dull ache, his sweating skin leaving him shivery. Danny looked down to see how his fingers were still entwined. Except for the guy’s thumb, which stroked the inside of Danny’s wrist in a circling motion, almost absently. Danny looked up again, still concentrating on slowing his breathing, to see the guy crouched in front of him, the crisp, black apron fanning over his knees.

  They stared at each other, as Danny’s breathing continued to slow down to non-cardiac arrest rhythm. His mouth was bone dry, and he coughed, trying to clear his throat. The soft, stroking motion of his rescuer’s thumb was incredibly soothing. And incredibly pleasurable. Just slightly, the tempo of Danny’s breathing altered further, as his senses retuned, focusing on the sensations flickering over his wrist. Danny closed his eyes again, needing to gather himself together. Looking into those gray eyes was distracting him. He was supposed to be calming down, not heating up. That kind of dangerous oscillation meant Danny junior could start misbehaving at any moment, and Danny senior just concentrated on breathing.

  He heard the rustle of clothing, as the guy stood up. The loss of his touch, the absence of the sensation on the nerve endings over his wrist, left Danny feeling bereft. He heard the door open, then swish shut. Danny opened his eyes again, and looked around him. He glanced down, to the side of the upturned crate he was sitting on, to see cig
arette butts abandoned, half smoked, sodden from the earlier downpour. The rain was like a fine mist now, making Danny’s naturally wavy hair start to curl. Oh God, he thought, reality returning. He was about to look at his wristwatch, when the door opened again.

  The guy crouched down in front of him once more, a concerned look on his handsome face. Danny sat there, and just drank him in. Along with the water he had been offered. Over the rim of the glass, Danny looked at him. Even the guy’s beard was perfect. On him, anyway. Not too whiskery, it hugged his face, making him look rugged without appearing rough or unkempt. God, no. The guy was immaculate. His hair was dark brown, a little ruffled, his eyes, well, the eyes! His nose was very Gallic, it dominated his face splendidly. Danny would have guessed he was a Frenchman, he just looked so very French. So very sexy. Even more so, when the swagger was in abeyance. ButI could live with the swagger, thought Danny, and drained the cup, his mouth swishing the cool liquid over his teeth and tongue.

  For a few moments, Danny held the gaze of the gray eyes, peering for as long as he dared over his glass. Realizing the guy wasn’t going to look away first, Danny obliged instead.

  “Feel better?” came the soothing French voice.

  Danny, staring at the wet sheened ground, noticed how the tips of their shoes touched. Danny nodded.

  “Yes…” he started, his voice developing a croak that suggested either the quickest onset of laryngitis in medical history. Or nervousness, which was one of Danny’s more regular symptoms. His medical records of late denoted ‘an overly anxious disposition, aggravated by stressful situations. Avoid’. When Danny, being a barrister after all, asked to read his own medical records, he had been unable to resist a bit of cross examination of his doctor. Avoid what? The stress, or the anxious disposition? Both, would be recommended, had come the laconic reply. Shall I just rewind till I get back to my childhood, then, Danny had ventured.