The Night Rainbow A Novel - By Claire King Page 0,79
all over her fingers and a shiny brown guitar. There is a big boy, with thimbles on his fingers, who is carrying a big tray and scratching the thimbles on it.
Are you having a party? I ask. Josette laughs.
It’s the llevant de taula, she says.
The what? I don’t know those words at all. But Josette doesn’t speak English.
That’s Catalan, she says. In French it’s the lever de table: it means dessert.
These people are a dessert?
Josette laughs again. They have come to play us a song, and to invite us to the village fête tonight.
I remember now, how last year they came to our house. It was the day I saw Papa smoke a cigarette. Papa followed the band up the path on his tractor. They all arrived in the courtyard and Maman was hanging out clothes, just like Josette today. Papa asked them to play a song, and the words kept saying Je t’aimais, je t’aime and je t’aimerai. That is in French and it is telling about how the singer used to love someone and still does and always will. It sounds like it should be a happy song, but when they played it, it came out all sad. I thought maybe they had played the wrong song. But Maman and Papa danced to it in the courtyard, so close they looked stuck together, and Papa sang and Maman cried. Afterwards, Maman went back into the house, and Papa and the musicians drank some pastis and smoked some cigarettes and they made their glasses chink.
Everybody kisses Josette, and the man holding the accordion gives her a big hug.
So, what song would make you happy today? asks the man with the trumpet.
‘La vie en rose’, says Josette.
That is a song about life being pink, says Margot.
That’s silly, I say. You have to have all the colours.
Everybody laughs as though I have made a joke.
But I’m serious! I say. They laugh some more, and then they begin to play. It’s quite a happy song and Josette sings the words while we listen.
Sit down, says Josette when it is finished. So the musicians sit around the table and Margot and I sit on the grass and look at them. The man with the hat has taken it off and put it on the table. Underneath he has no hair! He takes out a red handkerchief and wipes drops of sweat off his shiny bald head.
Josette comes back with a bottle of wine and puts some coins into the hat with the green ribbon. Then she whispers in the ear of the man with the accordion. He smiles with his yellow teeth, then squats down next to me.
What’s your name? he says.
Pea, I say.
Pi? Like the number? he says.
Or Pie like the bird? says one of the ladies. Everybody laughs and I feel shy.
Pea just like pea, says Margot.
My name is Pea, I say. P, E, A. And this is Margot. I am five and a half years old, I say, and Margot is four.
The musicians all have their eyebrows up.
She is tall for her age, I say. They laugh.
Well then, he says. Your house is next, so come on, we’ll walk back with you.
The band has a white truck, like the peachman’s only bigger. It is open at the back and they all climb in and pull me up. Come on P, E, A, Pea, they say, come on Margot-Tall-For-Your-Age. And we get into the truck with the drum and the accordion and the trumpet and all of the people and we drive along the road. And they are playing happy music. A car passes us going in the other direction and the people wave at us. I wave back and do my best smile. I feel like a princess at last.
The musicians follow us around the house into the courtyard. They are still teasing me.
Shall we get your maman? says the man with the long hair and the trumpet. His hair is shiny and I would like to touch it to see what it feels like.
Better not, I say. She prefers it inside and she’s probably asleep.
Maybe we shouldn’t play, then, he says. We shouldn’t wake her up.
I think about it. I am still extremely cross with Maman. That’s OK, I say. She’s deaf.
Oh, says the man. OK then P, E, A, Pea, what song would you like me to play?
I try hard to think, but I can’t think of anything.