It was time. She felt the was train slowing down and knew it was approaching Edinbourg. She rose abruptly, the voice of her father still ringing in her head, as if startled by a dream. She lifted her head towards the baggage carrier. Her hair long, straight, dark, dense and unevenly parting on each of her shoulders. As she reached for her suitcase, she revealed a baggy dress showing a pair of round and beige-couloured shoulders.

As expected, the train grew to a halt and she was the first passenger to descend on Scottish land.

It had been a long journey from her father's house in the outskirts of Paris. After having said good-bye to " Papa " and slamming eagerly the silver mercedes' door shut and making her way towards the trains, she stopped at Calais, from which she had taken a ferry ride to Dover. Although it was mid-August of the year 1971, the ride had been cold, windy and solitary. But what a relief it was to finally have escaped the golden cage ; no more tantrums, no more wining sister, no more dull mother nor pestering little brother. No more scoldings, no more hostages. She was light and free as the wind blowing in her face. As she stood on the boat, contemplating the French coast, she felt as if Life was opening its arms to her and beckoning her to come forth. And she did. Hesitantly at first, assuringly at last. In between, and without a single wisp of hesitation, she had simulated it a dozen times. She fared from Dover to Waterloo, and then from Victoria to Edinbourg. Although it had been nearly a dozen of hours since she had left her crimson carpeted bedroom, it seemed days and weeks since she had last seen her father's pleading eyes, begging her to spend yet another summer enclosed in the fortress. Yes, she sighed, life was definitely smiling at her. She had enrolled in a linguistic exchange and she knew that more than a mere scolastic introduction these exhanges were an initiation to life. A friend from school had amazed her with baffling tales about pubs and british gentlemen ; how they dressed and acted so elegantly, how they danced and laughed, and how frank and honest they were. And above all, how it was easy to meet real men, both handsome and mature, with real automobiles and their own money. How subtle and gentle their humour was. How soft, smooth and understanding lovers they made. The way they smiled at girls and spoke to them like subjects to a princess. She was exhilarated by the prospect of going abroad on her own, away from her father's house. And she was going to live in a real Scottish family, with people for whom French women were foreigners, exotic creatures with unshaven arm pits and generous features. For a woman she was. Although she had only decided and felt it recently, she was more than certain now. She hadn't had any real experiences with men ; most of her encounters had been boys with deep voices and shallow pockets, eager for sex but yet incapable of sustaining a romantic affair. She definitely felt somewhat different since her last summer. Was it the way she looked at herself, or the way men looked at her ? She had gained weight, but had gone to the hairdresser recently.

But it didn't matter. She had already pictured it : a small scottish cottage, a warm family sitting in a dark room with a smokey atmosphere. She imagined a stout and chubby blonde woman with her arms around a bearded husband and little boys running around in kilts. Gallons of whiskey would be the sole drink, tons of pourage the sole food. She had practiced pulling the face and smile she would put on when meeting the woman for the first time, and especially her posture when she would be introduced to the man of the family. " Let's face it, Marie-Pierre " she said to herself with an ego-boosting inward smile : " you're young, attractive and exotic ". If there's a place where you can do all the crazy things which you had been longing for it will be in Edinbourg. No more Papa, no more Maman, no more school, just short skirts and warm breezes, a distant language and sweet accents. Tall, slim and blue eyed men looking at her fevershily. As she was frantically contemplating her upcoming fate she grew nervous. She shuddered as she got off the train. What if my "welcoming mother" was actually single ? Was not the word " welcoming mother " a generic term, and led no indication on the marital status of her welcoming mother, nor on her age, let alone on her maternal experience? What if she was fifty years old? What if she was just like Maman, and made food for me and then just stare at me, like a castrated cat?

But no sooner had these doubts crossed her mind had a young blond man raised his arm at her, waiving his hands high up in the air, grinning as if he hadn't seen her in years.