‘For what? Seeing me off your land like a bad smell?’
I chew my bottom lip. ‘I’m sorry for both. Either …’
He carries on drying the cups. ‘Was it the long hair or the tattoos that made you assume I was bad news? Or maybe you’d been listening to local gossip?’
‘I don’t know anything about you. But I did assume … Look, I brought you something, to say sorry.’ I try to move this on.
He raises both eyebrows now. ‘You brought me something?’
I reach into my pocket, pull out a euro and hold it up.
‘I owe you one euro,’ I say, and I slide it across the shiny polished bar. ‘For the bread machine.’
He smiles and reaches out, his fingertips just touching mine as he takes it and drops it into the till with a dramatic gesture.
‘Merci,’ he says, then looks back at me.
Am I forgiven? Will I be able to work here, opposite the man I practically accused of drug-dealing and assaulted?
‘You’ve paid your debt. It’s fine.’ He starts to wipe down the already clean bar.
‘And I made you this. Well, I was baking, back at the mill …’ I pull the cake tin from my basket and push it over the counter. The old men wander in from outside and up to the counter to see what’s going on. ‘I thought you might like it.’
Laurent stops wiping the bar and looks at it, then at one of the old men, who says, ‘Qu’est-ce que c’est?’
For a moment I think it was a terrible idea, but I’ve come this far.
Laurent smiles. ‘He wants to know what it is,’ he translates.
‘Yes, I got that, thank you.’ I lift my chin and look at the men staring at the cake tin.
‘A Victoria Sandwich.’
‘Un quoi?’ says one, cupping a hand over his ear.
‘Un gâteau.A Victoria Sandwich,’ says Laurent.
I lift the lid, take it out of the tin and put it on the bar.
The three old men frown at it. ‘An English cake!’
‘British,’ I correct.
They eye it suspiciously.
‘It’s made with eggs, flour, sugar, homemade strawberry jam,’ I say, pulling out a knife from my basket – a favourite I always took, rolled up in a tea-towel, when we went on family picnics. I cut the cake into twelve slices, then push it towards Laurent and the gathered men.
They raise their eyebrows.
I see one reach out and take a slice. He bites into it, crumbs tumbling over the counter.
Laurent nods slowly. ‘I see.’
There’s an uncomfortable silence that is interrupted by surprised ‘nom nom’ sounds coming from the elderly man eating the cake. The other two reach for slices themselves.
Laurent chuckles. ‘That is a good reaction,’ he says. And I feel a little relieved. Someone is eating what I made and likes it. I can bake, I remind myself.
‘So, is that it? You came to bring me a euro and cake?’
