Who had inseminated Laura? Heaven only knows. An audacious suitor? A stranger? The elderly gentleman acro…Who had inseminated Laura? Heaven only knows. An audacious suitor? A stranger? The elderly gentleman across the way, breathing into his spyglass as though it was a pipette? The eldest of the little boys? The possibilities, alas, were legion and the investigation Madame Austier had entrusted to the little maids turned up nothing. Laura denied having been impregnated by anyone. She had woken up one morning certain that she was expecting a child, and that’s all there was to it.Les Fugitives is one of my favourite of the UK’s wonderful small independent press scene, one with a very specific remit: to publish "Short, new writing by award-winning francophone female authors previously unavailable in English or in the UK.” There 2017 release Blue Self Portrait and 2018’s Now Now Louison were among my favourite novels of each year. The 2019 release The Governesses, translated by Mark Hutchinson from Anne Serre’s 1992 debut Les Gouvernantes, is another wonderful book: an erotic fairy tale, barely 100 pages long, but every sentence finely honed, a credit to author, translator and publisher. The story tells of three governesses who work in a large country house and grounds for Monsieur and Madame Austeur, hired by the former: When they hired the governesses the house had been peaceful. A bit too peaceful, perhaps. ...It was chaos he needed. He was there to govern opposing forces, to conjure up sweet sounds and muffle shrill ones, to lead the orchestra with his baton, to blow on the embers and put out fires, to dispel darkness and raise the sun. Instead, here he was with a Madame Austeur who’d become an open book to him, obedient to his dreams, leaving him with nothing further to desire. The day the governesses walked into the garden, Monsieur Austeur was standing behind the net …