I had cycled down for my morning
newspaper and had carried on around the riverbank until I came to a halt at the
Normandy Garden Dunkirk
I cycled down there again the next day. The mass was still there, only this time, as I regarded it, it moved. On closer inspection, the fabric was a sleeping-bag, and there was a person inside it.
Each day for a week I cycled past at the same time, and the sleeping-bag and its occupant were still there, fast asleep, mainly in quite cold and damp conditions, at nine ‘o’ clock in the morning.
I happened to be in the area the very next afternoon, with the little dog, and I saw her for the first time. She was sitting on the bench next to her sleeping-bag, listening to an i-pod. Her brow was furrowed in concentration. She was a woman of perhaps forty years of age, though it was hard to tell, because she had a face reddened and coarsened by the sun and the wind. She had black hair so short that it made Sinead O’Connor look like Peter Stringfellow. She had an aquiline nose and her ears were pierced for studs, though she wore none. She was clad in a nondescript blue dress that appeared to have been made from curtain material, a dress which stretched down to her ankles, and she wore what appeared to be brogues on her feet. She was a large woman, in the way that Mrs Mills was large, and, seeing her reposing in the folds of her sleeping bag, she reminded me of a pilot whale ploughing through theMediterranean sea .
I was doing a bit of shopping later, in the supermarket that piles ‘em high and sells ‘em cheap, when I almost ran into her. She was gazing intently at the cheeses. She was wheeling a trolley which contained her by now rather dirty sleeping bag. I caught a whiff of woman and sleeping-bag as I went past. I had once found a family of mice which had expired in a hat-box and the smell was not dissimilar to that. I wondered where she washed and where she cleaned her clothes and came to the conclusion that perhaps she did neither.
I happened to mention it later to Mr Elliot, who keeps his eye on everything regarding the people of the town.
“Oh, I know about her,” he said. “She’s French. She’s here on holiday. She says it’s the most quiet and peaceful place she’s seen. She says it’s beautiful. She can do what she likes here and no-one bothers her. I think she lives in, where is it now?…Chaillot, I think the place is,”
“Chaillot was the name of a film – The ‘Madwoman of Chaillot” with Katharine Hepburn”, I said.
I knew that because I had been to see it 40-odd years ago and had walked out after twenty minutes because I couldn’t make head nor tail of the plot.
“Do you mean Chailland?” I said. "I think that's in France."
“That’s it,” Mr Elliot said “Got it in one.”
I was determined to speak to the Madwoman of Chaillot/Chailland, to find out just why she had settled for the soil of theNormandy Garden Newark ,
New Jersey
The next morning, I pedalled furiously down to the Normandy Garden, only to find the stable door open and the horse bolted. There was just a slight indentation in the soil to show where she had been sleeping. She had gone at first light, vamoosed back to her home town before I’d had the chance to assuage my curiosity. I was desperately disappointed. I now have to wait another fifty weeks until she comes back, if she comes back. Some things are just a little too trying.
I cycled down there again the next day. The mass was still there, only this time, as I regarded it, it moved. On closer inspection, the fabric was a sleeping-bag, and there was a person inside it.
Each day for a week I cycled past at the same time, and the sleeping-bag and its occupant were still there, fast asleep, mainly in quite cold and damp conditions, at nine ‘o’ clock in the morning.
I happened to be in the area the very next afternoon, with the little dog, and I saw her for the first time. She was sitting on the bench next to her sleeping-bag, listening to an i-pod. Her brow was furrowed in concentration. She was a woman of perhaps forty years of age, though it was hard to tell, because she had a face reddened and coarsened by the sun and the wind. She had black hair so short that it made Sinead O’Connor look like Peter Stringfellow. She had an aquiline nose and her ears were pierced for studs, though she wore none. She was clad in a nondescript blue dress that appeared to have been made from curtain material, a dress which stretched down to her ankles, and she wore what appeared to be brogues on her feet. She was a large woman, in the way that Mrs Mills was large, and, seeing her reposing in the folds of her sleeping bag, she reminded me of a pilot whale ploughing through the
I was doing a bit of shopping later, in the supermarket that piles ‘em high and sells ‘em cheap, when I almost ran into her. She was gazing intently at the cheeses. She was wheeling a trolley which contained her by now rather dirty sleeping bag. I caught a whiff of woman and sleeping-bag as I went past. I had once found a family of mice which had expired in a hat-box and the smell was not dissimilar to that. I wondered where she washed and where she cleaned her clothes and came to the conclusion that perhaps she did neither.
I happened to mention it later to Mr Elliot, who keeps his eye on everything regarding the people of the town.
“Oh, I know about her,” he said. “She’s French. She’s here on holiday. She says it’s the most quiet and peaceful place she’s seen. She says it’s beautiful. She can do what she likes here and no-one bothers her. I think she lives in, where is it now?…Chaillot, I think the place is,”
“Chaillot was the name of a film – The ‘Madwoman of Chaillot” with Katharine Hepburn”, I said.
I knew that because I had been to see it 40-odd years ago and had walked out after twenty minutes because I couldn’t make head nor tail of the plot.
“Do you mean Chailland?” I said. "I think that's in France."
“That’s it,” Mr Elliot said “Got it in one.”
I was determined to speak to the Madwoman of Chaillot/Chailland, to find out just why she had settled for the soil of the
The next morning, I pedalled furiously down to the Normandy Garden, only to find the stable door open and the horse bolted. There was just a slight indentation in the soil to show where she had been sleeping. She had gone at first light, vamoosed back to her home town before I’d had the chance to assuage my curiosity. I was desperately disappointed. I now have to wait another fifty weeks until she comes back, if she comes back. Some things are just a little too trying.
