The real photographs, those framed on the walls, weren’t there twenty-seven years ago. Clotilde recognised Cassanu, Lisabetta, Papa, sometimes in close-up. She recognised herself too, and Nicolas – she in her christening dress and her brother as a first communicant. In another photo they were both climbing a Genovese bridge above a waterfall. She had no memory of the place or the year when the photograph was taken, but she didn’t care, she just allowed herself to be submerged in the emotions it evoked.

There wasn’t a single photograph of her mother.

Not one.

In some photographs, on the other hand, mostly hidden behind Cassanu and Lisabetta, Clotilde recognised the claw-fingered witch, the one they had passed on the road leading up to the farm. A little further down, pinned on to the wall, she spotted some photographs she had sent years ago: her and Franck on the Rialto in Venice; Valentine on a tricycle; all three of them, hats on their heads, posing in front of Mont-Saint-Michel. Clotilde was hypnotised by the pictures, moving from one to the next, inviting the generations to meet inside her head.

It was Lisabetta who urged her to go and sit down because it was getting late. Papé seemed to be dozing in his chair when they came back out into the yard. When they were all seated under the pergola, it was Cassanu who spoke, however, while Lisabetta disappeared into the background, flitting between the kitchen and the terrace, cutting bread and pouring Corsican wine, bringing plates of ham and sausages and jugs of water.

The meal seemed endless. After rushing through their shared memories, the conversation seemed to flag, each subject eked out like a scarce resource. Clotilde couldn’t help staring at the sun that was dipping down towards the sea like a huge clock fixed to the end of the table.

Tomorrow, when you visit Arcanu Farm to see Cassanu and Lisabetta, please go and stand for a few minutes beneath the holm oak, before night falls, so that I can see you.

Before nightfall …

The sky was turning red, and Clotilde’s face was also flushed as she got to her feet. Lisabetta had just served the pudding.

‘Excuse me. Excuse me, just for a moment,’ she stammered.

She took Valou’s hand.

‘Come with me, don’t ask any questions. Come on. We’ll only be a few minutes.’

~

Franck and Cassanu had stayed at the table.

Lisabetta cleared the plates and cutlery with unusual speed, leaving the men with some glasses and a bottle of lemon liqueur, before mysteriously disappearing. Cassanu smiled and looked at his watch.

‘Lisabetta will join us again in twenty minutes,’ the old man explained. ‘My wife is the perfect hostess, as I’m sure you’ve noticed. But she is willing to defy three generations of Corsican hospitality in order not to miss an episode of Plus belle la vie …’