On Green Hair, Camels and Shepherdesses

I fear the pharmacist at Guemene-Sur-Scorff may have played a cruel jape on poor Jacques yesterday as, having used his new dye last evening, he arrived to drive Chief Patissier to work this morning with his hair a rather startling shade of green. It is most unbecoming but at least on a positive side it goes rather better with his livery than the red, which I always thought clashed rather.

Madame Grognonne attempted to rectify the problem by toning the colour down a tad, with the red lead paste she uses to polish the kitchen grate, but it was a rather unsatisfactory solution, as it runs down his forehead at the slightest provocation so that he looks as if he has some sort of festering head wound. I fear there is nothing for it but to have his hair shaved off completely.

Meanwhile Madame Grognonne has bound his head in bandages and He is masquerading under the falsity that he has injured his cranium in an unfortunate accident Chez Nous involving youngest, Madame Grognonne’s rifle, and a cider barrel suspended from a rope.

I think if one is planning to tell an untruth then it is always better to keep it simple. In my experience most people will believe anything, providing one says it with sufficient conviction and it is not too convoluted. I remember when I was a small child boarding at the convent in Bordeaux one of the girls claimed to have seen a vision of three wise men complete with camels travelling through the convent grounds one of whom had stopped to talk to her to seek directions. Of course if she had only kept her story simple and chosen to see the Virgin Mary instead she might well have achieved sainthood by now. As it was we were confined to our dormitories for a week as punishment and she was required to write, “I must not tell lies” five hundred times in four different languages. Interestingly enough, we discovered some weeks later that she had indeed seen the camels who were from a travelling circus and had got separated from their companions having taken a wrong turn at Grenoble. Her family had her removed from the school soon after.

I do hope my paint arrives soon as, what with Loic and his bandaged knees and Jaques and his head wound, I feel I have the makings of a heroic painting entitled “our brave young soldiers returning from in la guerre”. I would have, of course, to get Loic to remove the spade attachment on his leg first.

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The painting today is of Joan of Arc who, as a young girl, claimed she saw visions of the Virgin Mary and held long conversations with various catholic saints, as a result of which, and possibly as well because of her penchant for wearing armour and men’s clothing, she was burnt at the stake as a heretic. Bearing this in mind my school friend was perhaps wise to stick with camels as I am certain that the catholic church does not view visions of dromedaries transversing convent lawns as quite so heretical, however, with the current Pope one can never be to sure of course.