A telephone enquiry determined that responsibility did not lie with the Water Company, but the commune. All hearts sank as we wondered how our Suffolk village would deal with such an emergency and had a sudden vision of the Clerk to the Parish Council arriving on a bicycle equipped with rubber gloves, a mop and a bucket. Would a French commune be equal to the challenge? Jokes about French drains are no more accurate than allegations of Scots' parsimony. And yet, Frenchman still urinate universally as if they were enjoying the first morning in the Garden of Eden and Eve had not yet been created: and here in the Midi at least, we still have a myriad of Turkish loos, mere holes in the ground intended for women with voluminous skirts and no knickers. Then there's Madame next door, a respectable bourgeoise from Marseilles ;she looked horrified when she heard we had installed three bath rooms and three water closets in her brother's old house. " But monsieur, it is not a chateau and we are not Parisiens." How seriously would locals treat an overflowing drain ?

" Oh ye of little faith! " Bernard, the commune handyman, arrived at one thirty in the afternoon, that is to say in the middle of lunch. As my youngest daughter would say, " This was awesome." I have no doubt that a bloodless annexation of the South of France could be achieved on any day of the week between the hours of twelve and three. This is a sacred time devoted to eating, drinking and, some say, the making of babies. It is not a time of work and yet here was an Orgnacquois, apparently of sound mind, turning up to inspect drains and a foreigner's drains at that. Perhaps Bernard realised his faux pas, his act of national betrayal. Certainly in his shorts and wide brimmed leather hat he could have passed for an Aussie at a pinch. We showed him our cess pit in the cave. He shook his head. He inspected our sump behind the house and then removed the inspection cover in the lane to reveal a vast chamber of which any Victorian sanitary engineer would have been proud.. As if possessed of X-ray vision he pronounced the drain blocked. What is more he would see to it. It would be unblocked. He would arrange it on his portable. He put his hand to his ear , little finger extended, international sign language for telephone. In a few minutes he was back. It was all arranged. A large lorry would arrive with enough power to un-block the Channel Tunnel. " This afternoon?", we asked. " Oh no! Tomorrow at deux et demi." The dreaded demain. Back to the olive grove. But Bernard was as good as his word. The large white tanker arrived on time and blocked the lane in both directions. Many meters of black hose were inserted into various subterranean orifices. Bernard beamed. The young tanker driver with his tanned naked torso and pig tail looked like an Indian brave.

He dubiously inspected our sump, wound up his hose, shook his head and drove off. Bernard replaced the manhole cover and left triumphant.
Over yet an other cup of coffee Dominic and I began to apply a little more sober North European logic. If our outfall was blocked why had the sump not overflowed onto the drive and down into the priest's garden given the natural fall of the land ? In a sense, Dominic had been correct all along. The sewage was leaking into the cellar though not from the domestic system but the commune's sump. There was a serious fissure . The Jolly Swagman had been wrong and Geronimo right to doubt him. What were we to do now? We must go to the Hotel de Ville and confront the mayor. We must demand immediate action. But the mayor is a notorious fence sitter. There might be days, weeks even, of inaction. I would speak to the mayor's secretary. I would enlist the aid of Rosie, she of the beautiful legs, the smattering of English and the reputation for getting things done.
She knew who I was, of course, she said., and the house. I explained the problem. I stressed the gravity. I drew a diagram. She nodded her head vigorously in comprehension so that her butter-cup coloured curls shivered with assent. Rosie is blonde this year. I went home half -confident, resigned to more discrete trips to the olives.

The table was set for dinner and I was busy with aperitifs when someone said there was a white van parked behind the house. I went out to look and found Bernard. He stood by the sump with a balk of timber in his hand and three buckets at his feet. He greeted me effusively and explained the buckets contained sand, cement and gravel. He intended to mend the broken sump well and truly. I went back inside rejoicing. We had scarcely started on our drinks before Bernard arrived on the terrace towed by a large liver and white dog, a French spaniel, he explained. Yes, he would take a drink. Whisky would be fine if it was from Scotland. I wondered what he had been offered elsewhere, not " Buckingham Palace" blend all the way from Japan; more likely those unheard of varieties one finds in French supermarkets with names like " Highland Kilt " and " Caber Tossers' Cream". I poured a generous measure which he said was too much ! Was it pure malt ? How old was it and had it been matured in oak barrels ? He would take a little tap water with it. Quite the connoisseur our Bernard. The whisky finished he gravely took his leave, shaking hands with every member of the family and giving a slight bow to the ladies. "Remember, no water until the morning." He was dragged away by his spaniel.

Next morning ,first up and armed with a stout stick, I went out to inspect Bernard's handy work. The bottom of the sump was rock hard; there was even a small quantity of water lying there, product of a dripping tap or a leaking cistern perhaps. I went in to announce the good news to a grateful household. Civilisation had returned. We were Romans again and embarked on an orgy of showers, flushing loos and clothes washing. Sitting at breakfast, sweet smelling, showered and shampooed, Dominic asked, " By the way, where does the water go when it leaves here?" I didn't know but not " dans nos cave", not any more. Bravo, Bernard !
Tony Bowers