TRAVEL TALES

A Girl From Finistère

My summer of eerie footsteps, ancient castles, windswept fantasies and a place called the end of the earth

Josselin, Brittany, France (photos by author)

One August, when the 39 C heat in southern France, where I live, melted candles and almost melted me, I rented a small house in Brittany’s northwest. Josselin, a lively little town on the banks of the Oust, had a massive Gothic castle, timbered houses, outdoor cafes and endless stalls and stands filled with temptation.

Best of all, daytime temperatures hovered around 19C and some days even required a sweater. It was bliss. Danielle, the ebullient and chatty French-American owner, would be living in the house for a week before she returned to the States. Nearing retirement age, she was counting the days until she could return to France to live full-time again.

Shortly before I arrived, she’d emailed to ask if I would mind Camille, a young French student, occupying the attic bedroom. The girl would be gone all day and was very quiet; as an incentive, Danielle took a hundred euros off my month’s rent. Camille had saved her life, Danielle said without elaborating, and she wanted to repay her.

As Danielle and I ate dinner at the kitchen table one evening, the front door opened, and Camille walked in. A tall, unsmiling girl with lanky dark hair and round glasses. With the briefest of nods, she disappeared. We listened to her footsteps on the stairs as she climbed up to her attic quarters.

Danielle rolled her eyes. “She can be a little moody. She is from Finistère,” she added as though that explained everything.

My summer dwelling, Josselin, France

It was several days before I saw Camille again. Before Danielle returned to the States, she’d given me a tour of Josselin. The congenial little bistro where locals gathered, restaurants she liked and tourist spots to avoid. It didn’t take much persuasion on her part for me to try the local cider and galettes (crêpes) for which the region is famous. Evenings, we’d sit in her kitchen, eat dinner and talk. Danielle elaborated slightly on how Camille had saved her life. The girl had walked in to find Danielle lying unconscious on the bedroom floor. “If she hadn’t found me, I’d be dead,” Danielle said, but seemed reluctant to say more.

After Danielle left, the house seemed changed. Less cheerful, a little eerie. My bedroom was up a flight of narrow wooden stairs just below Camille’s attic room. I’d hear her footsteps on the stairs late at night; sometimes I’d hear her leave in the morning. After a restless night, I went down earlier than usual to make coffee. Camille stood at the sink, then, realising I was there, she quickly disappeared.

Sometimes, she’d return in the early evening, and I’d hear the TV downstairs. Reluctant to go down and talk to her — no idea why — I stayed in my room. I’d set up a writing space in front of the bedroom window — my suitcase upended on a nightstand, my papers out all over the bed. During the day, I’d explore Josselin, eat meals out and be back in my room before Camille returned.

A few days passed that way; I began to feel depressed. I was alone, which I didn’t mind, but not alone because I felt Camille’s presence, whether she was there or not. A week passed with me mostly at my makeshift desk. An email from an agent in the States who wanted to look at a book proposal sent me into a frenzy of rewrites and more rewrites. If I heard Camille downstairs in the kitchen or moving about in the attic above me, I’d wait for her to leave before going down to make coffee, or an improvised meal — usually scrambled eggs with cheese.

Then the sleepless nights began in earnest, followed by a cloud of gloom that I couldn’t shake. I could go for a walk, have coffee, anything, but I didn’t even want to venture out to the post office. It seemed ridiculous, me hermit-like scribbling into the night, creeping downstairs at odd hours, Camille silent but for the floorboards creaking above me.

I thought of Jane Eyre — was I the madwoman in the attic? Who was Camille? And how had she saved Danielle’s life? I started locking the bedroom door.

One evening, I forced myself to leave the house and deliberately stayed out later than usual. There’d been an Irish band playing in the square. I was a fan of certain Irish music; during a trip to Ireland years ago, an upcoming concert by the ballad singer Christy Moore on the day I was supposed to fly back to the States was reason enough to reschedule my flight.

While the Josselin group didn’t wow me, I stayed and listened until they’d finished, then returned to the house. Camille was sitting on the living room floor watching TV. When she barely acknowledged me, I decided to break the silence. In garbled French, I mentioned the Irish music I’d heard. In reasonably good English, she replied that some Irish music was like the music of Finistère, where she was born and where she’d lived for much of her life.

Finistère, means the “end of the earth,” she said.

And then she asked if I’d like her to take me there.

Concarneau, Finistère, France

It’s been nine years since that summer in Finistère, looking through pictures brings back that eerie feeling in the house after Daniele left and the sound of Camille’s footsteps on the stairs.

It all seems strange and far-fetched now — although I’d accepted Camille’s invitation to go with her to Finistère, upstairs in my room I considered making an excuse not to go. If nothing else, I wondered what we’d talk about on the way there. I went anyway. From my journal:

The drive from Josselin to Carantec, in the Bai de Morlaix in Finistère took just over two hours. The landscape on an intermittently sunny August day was less moody and mysterious than I’d imagined, but so was Camille. In Finistère she became animated, no longer the silent wraith who’d appeared behind me in the kitchen.

She pointed out villages I would have driven through without noticing, showed me where her grandparents once lived, told me about festivals, music and local traditions. The further west we travelled, the more she seemed a part of the landscape. I thought of Danielle’s one-word explanation of the girl’s strange behaviour, “She’s from Finistère.”

Some pictures from that day: The Bai de Morlaix and Roscoff.

Her grandparents had lived in Roscoff, a fishing port where locals once gathered seaweed, part of the daily life for those on the Breton seashore. We ate lunch in a cafe, bought ice cream and strolled through the streets. I saw magnificent scenery, small villages and coves I would probably not have found on my own — even with a guidebook.

By the time we returned to Josselin, I felt we’d established enough of a connection that I gave her my e-mail and suggested she might like to visit Languedoc. I would show her around. She smiled.

Inever heard from Camille again. I’d left a note on the kitchen table with my email address, but she never responded. I was disappointed for a while, but in a way it seemed fitting. I can’t imagine her, even briefly, under the hot Languedoc sun.

In her book, The Price of Water in Finistère, Swedish writer Boldil Malmsten wrote, “In the same way as there’s a partner for every person, there’s a place. All you have to do is find the one that’s yours among the billions that belong to someone else; you have to be awake, you have to choose.”

Malmsten chose Finistère after living half her life in Sweden. France feels like my place, even if Languedoc wasn’t love at first sight. For Camille, Finistère was that one place; away from it — even a short distance — she was a different person, not fully alive until she returned.

I once wrote to Danielle; she never responded either. And I never learned how Camille had saved her life.

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