Secrets Of Paris Part 23

"Patrice, dear," Clothilde said. "Why don't you like me?"

"What an idea!" Patrice said. "It's you who doesn't like me." She had a psychic sense of talking to her mother.

"You are so huffy with me," Clothilde said. "I always feel I am saying the wrong thing to you."

"As a matter of fact, you just let me know it's pretty tacky of me to let my friends model d'Origny jewelry. I know you think I'm the tacky American."

Clothilde gave her a long look, then smiled. "Well, not exactly. I think of you as the 'young American.' So young, so modern. Really 'with it.'"

Patrice had to smile at Clothilde saying 'with it,' even if she didn't quite believe Clothilde's smooth excuse.

"Didier tells me you are quite sad over the prospect of losing your American friend and your maid."

Patrice really didn't want to discuss it with Clothilde, but at the thought of Lydie leaving Paris her eyes filled with tears, leaving her no choice. "Yes, I am. But he shouldn't worry-I plan to keep busy. I'm working on my own personal history of France."

The sympathetic set of Clothilde's mouth was replaced by an "O" of astonishment. And that alone was enough to dry Patrice's tears and make her smile.

The night before the ball, Lydie felt remarkably calm, well organized. Every item on two checklists, "the ball" and "Kelly," was checked off. Her third checklist, "moving," remained wide open, but she would turn to that in a day or so, when she and Michael had had the chance to discuss it. She had time, if she wanted, to do the things she imagined Patrice might do the night before a ball: set her hair, give herself a manicure, place damp tea bags on her eyes. But she felt charged up, full of energy that had no place to go. Twice she stepped onto the terrace, peered down the Seine. She wondered where the Hotel Royal Madeleine stood in relation to the Grand Palais. Tomorrow morning Michael and the d'Orignys would pick her up before dawn to drive to the chateau.

She cooked an omelet, then settled down to eat it and drink a gla.s.s of Beaujolais. She pulled the soft middle out of a crusty baguette; thinking of the expression "all my ducks in a row." Her mother had said it when Lydie was little. "I have everything I could ever want," Julia Fallon would say. "My Neil, my Lydie, and a wonderful life. I have all my ducks in a row." Lydie had envisioned the ducks, cute baby mallards swimming in a row. Now Lydie thought of her own life: waiting to reunite with Michael, optimistic about Kelly's pet.i.tion, ready to leave Paris for New York. Yes, all Lydie's ducks were in a row. Then she thought of a carnival shooting gallery, with tin ducks going around on a conveyor belt, waiting to be picked off by anyone who'd pay a quarter. The thought made her gulp her wine, and when the telephone rang, she was ready for bad news.

And those were Dot Graulty's first words: "I have bad news, Lydie. You'll get official notification soon enough, but Kelly Merida's pet.i.tion has been denied."

"Denied? Are you sure?" Lydie asked in a voice that echoed in her ears.

"All too sure," Dot said. "Someone from Immigration in D.C. called Bruce, and he told me."

"Do you know why?"

"Officially, they'll tell you it's because you didn't make your case strong enough. Between you and me, it's because she's a Filipino."

"But I can try again, can't I?" Lydie asked, the enormity of Dot's words suddenly hitting her. She felt blinded by them, as if they were the bright flash of a star exploding.

"Well," Dot said, "you'll want to try, but I wouldn't encourage you to bother. I'm truly sorry. I'm disappointed myself-I had a stake in this. You know I tried my best. In this place, sometimes it helps, sometimes it doesn't."

"Thanks for everything, Dot," Lydie said.

She sat still for a long time, not hanging up the phone. Then she dialed the number of Michael's hotel. The switchboard put her through.

"You ready for tomorrow?" he said when he heard her voice.

"Something terrible happened," she said, her voice tight and little. "It's about Kelly's..."

"Her pet.i.tion didn't go through?" Michael asked.

"No, it didn't," Lydie said.

"d.a.m.n it," Michael said. "I'm sorry. When did you find out?"

"A minute ago. Dot called to tell me. I just can't believe it," Lydie said, realizing that she was numb.

"Do you want me to come over?"

Lydie thought for a moment. She imagined negotiating an evening with her husband, their first in a long time. She believed that the fact she considered it "negotiating"-like a captain negotiating shoal waters or a lawyer negotiating a difficult deal-was a signal that tonight wasn't the night. "No, but thanks. I'll see you tomorrow."

"You sure will," Michael said. "Do you think you'll be able to sleep?"

Lydie felt pretty sure she wouldn't. "I'll try to," she said. Hanging up, she instantly called Patrice.

"Kelly's pet.i.tion has been denied," she said instantly.

Patrice was silent for a few seconds. "Wow," she said. "Wow. Does she know?"

"No," Lydie said, realizing that her hands were shaking.

"We have to tell her."

"Tonight, Patrice?" Lydie asked, feeling suddenly tired.

"Think about it, Lydie," Patrice said. "Wouldn't you want to know right away? Doesn't she deserve that? Come on-I'll pick you up in Didier's car."

Twenty minutes later Lydie was hunched over the Plan de Paris, and Patrice was speeding around the Place de Clichy. "Hookers, Quik-Burgers, riot police: this is where she lives?"

"Take that next left," Lydie said. They stopped in front of a grimy tenement. Lydie would have liked to sit still for a few minutes, rehearsing what they would say to Kelly, but Patrice was already out of the car.

A young woman who closely resembled Kelly opened the door. Lydie cleared her throat, ready to introduce herself, when the woman called out, "Kelly! Patrice and Lydie are here!"

"We're famous," Patrice whispered.

Kelly came to the door. Members of her family stood behind her, fanning into a semicircle. Lydie looked from one to the other, wondered which was the brother who had smuggled Kelly across the border in his trunk.

"h.e.l.lo, Lydie, h.e.l.lo, Patrice," Kelly said, twisting her hands. She tried to smile. She glanced over her shoulder, then back. "I wish I had known you were coming; I would have...prepared."

"We know you don't have a phone," Lydie said.

"Please come in," one of the older sisters said, smiling brilliantly. "We are honored by your visit."

"Yes, please come in!" Now that they had absorbed the shock, they all began to speak at once.

"Listen," Patrice said, in a voice both strong and kind, "we have some disappointing news for Kelly. It's about, uh, your pet.i.tion."

Kelly's face fell so hard, Lydie had no doubt that she understood what Patrice was saying. Some of her family took a small step back. "It was denied," Lydie said, looking into Kelly's eyes.

"You can't take me to the States?" Kelly asked.

"No," Lydie said, knowing there was no way to soften the word.

"Don't worry about me," Kelly said right away. Her words were brittle, her smile quavering, and Lydie knew then they had made a mistake to tell Kelly the bad news in front of her entire family. In the first seconds, Lydie had thought they would provide strength, but now she saw that Kelly was ashamed to have them hear it.

"That's the spirit," Patrice said, her eyes s.h.i.+ning, taking Kelly's hand. "Didier and I are going to make you legal here: I promise."

Kelly nodded, still smiling but unable to speak.

"I'm glad to finally meet all of you," Patrice said to the others. Several of them stepped forward to shake her hand. "Kelly, I want you to know that you'll always have a place with me, and that Didier and I will look after you."

"Thank you, Mum," Kelly said.

"And if you don't feel like working at the ball," Patrice said, "I'm sure Lydie will understand. Maybe you need a little time to yourself."

"I'm sorry," Lydie said, stepping forward to kiss Kelly's cheek, wanting to close her eyes so she wouldn't always remember the look in Kelly's eyes. Then she and Patrice walked away, leaving Kelly to suffer the disappointment and kindness of her brothers and sisters.

Michael left the Hotel Royal Madeleine with endings in mind: an end to his time at the clean but impersonal hotel; an end, in twenty-eight days, to the Paris year; and an end to his relations.h.i.+p with Anne. The taxi, a Mercedes with a poodle sitting next to the driver, took him to Anne's building. He held the key she had given him, knowing he wouldn't use it; he wished merely to return it, but she wasn't home.

"Elle n'est pas la, Monsieur," the plump Spanish concierge said with a mean glint in her eyes. Michael had always felt her disapproval. "Elle n'a pas revenu hier soir."

"That's her business," he said, not wanting to give the concierge the satisfaction of seeming alarmed by the fact Anne hadn't been home all night.

At the Louvre, the guard stopped him. "She walks again," he said to Michael.

"What do you mean?"

"The ghost of Catherine de Medici," the guard said. "She was sighted last night, for the first time in seven years."

Michael laughed, tapped the guard's shoulder, brushed past him. He walked straight up the stairs to Anne's office. On the museum's top floor, Anne worked in a small room with a circular window overlooking the Seine. She loved telling visitors that in the days of Louis XIV it had been an artist's studio.

"Anne," Michael called, tapping at the door. He felt divided by worry for her whereabouts and by the wish to put this meeting off. He stood there a minute; he had just turned his back to the door, started walking away, when he heard footsteps down the corridor. Here came Anne in her wig and an ancient dress; although different from the last one, it was recognizably from the seventeenth century. Her smallness made her seem even more vulnerable, more capable of being hurt.

"'I can already notice his absence,'" she said in her Madame de Sevigne voice. "'Yesterday I went to the post office...to see whether he had turned me over to someone else there. I find all new faces, unimpressed with my importance.'"

"Anne, were you here all night?" Michael asked.

"That is a question I should ask as well," she said. "Where were you last night? No longer do you visit or call me..."

"I was at my hotel," he said steadily, alarmed by her appearance.

"I understand you have a ball to go to."

"Who told you that?"

"You told me about the ball, cheri cheri. I have always hoped we could go together. We would be the most elegant couple there..."

"Anne, I'm going with Lydie. I'm going back to her."

"I am not terribly surprised," she said.

"I do care about you," Michael said. "Are you all right?"

She laughed harshly. "Did you think I would fall to pieces when you told me?"

"The guard told me he saw a ghost last night," Michael said uneasily. "Did you sleep here?"

She smiled, saying nothing. He thought he detected something dark behind her smile, and it frightened him. For one moment, he saw her as an evil force, now revealing a side of herself no one had ever seen. Like the moon, rotating as she revolved, she presented only one face to those who saw her. Like the moon, half of whose surface is never seen from earth, Anne turned her other face away.

"Don't worry about me, eh?" Anne said. "We had a good time together, and I treasure it."

Michael nodded but said nothing.

"Leave now, Michel," Anne said, in as sane a voice as Michael had ever heard. He obliged.

The weather is wonderful...I find the countryside lovely, and my Loire River is as beautiful here as at Orleans. It is a pleasure to meet old friends en route. I brought my large carriage so that we are in no way crowded.

-TO F FRANcOISE-MARGUERITE, MAY 1675 DAWN WAS ABOUT to break and Chateau Bellecha.s.se stood in mist rising from its moat and from the Loire River, wide and sluggish, on whose banks it stood. Built of smooth stone, asymmetrical, the chateau had pointed turrets, balconies, ma.s.sive doors that could hold back an army. Roses clung to its walls, and perhaps it was the chateau's fairy-tale delicacy that made Lydie give the roses old names: Florizel, Belle Isis, Belle de Crecy. Lydie remembered telling Kelly the news last night and pressed closer to Michael. All the way down from Paris he had responded every time she'd stirred; now he pressed her right back. to break and Chateau Bellecha.s.se stood in mist rising from its moat and from the Loire River, wide and sluggish, on whose banks it stood. Built of smooth stone, asymmetrical, the chateau had pointed turrets, balconies, ma.s.sive doors that could hold back an army. Roses clung to its walls, and perhaps it was the chateau's fairy-tale delicacy that made Lydie give the roses old names: Florizel, Belle Isis, Belle de Crecy. Lydie remembered telling Kelly the news last night and pressed closer to Michael. All the way down from Paris he had responded every time she'd stirred; now he pressed her right back.

"Sleeping Beauty, we've come to rescue you," Patrice said from the front seat, but in a flat voice. How were they going to accomplish this? How could they stage a festive ball when everyone felt miserable? Lydie felt like a bundle of nerves: the least thing was going to set her off. She had arranged for several country-house-weekend sort of activities for the photographer's benefit: the grouse hunt, dressing for the ball, and the ball itself. Now all she wanted to do was snuggle under an eiderdown.

Tiny stones crunched under the wheels as Didier steered the car into a lot behind the stable. The other vehicles in their caravan from Paris followed. Lydie, Michael, Patrice, and Didier climbed out without speaking, stretched, looked around. A perfect lawn stretched to the riverbank in one direction, to a dense forest in the other. Lydie and Patrice stood together as Michael and Didier directed the truck, full of props and two borrowed hunting dogs, and four cars, full of servants, photographers, and d'Origny's guards, to park beside his car.

"Did you sleep last night?" Patrice asked.

"No," Lydie said. "Did you?"

"No," Patrice said. "I can't bear to face her today. I wish she'd decided to stay home." Both women looked toward the truckload of servants, Kelly and her sister among them. They had urged Kelly to stay with her family; when she would not, they had invited her sister to come with her.

"Once Kelly says she'll do something, she does it," Lydie said. "She would think that by not coming she'd be letting me down."

"There's a sorry little tone in your voice that tells me you think you let Kelly down," Patrice said. "You didn't. You went to the mat for her."

"We're going to miss our chance, if we don't hurry," Didier said, removing his gun case from the trunk.

Lydie tried to organize herself; they would have to rush to set up the hunting shots in time to catch dawn and the morning mists. Then the entire day loomed ahead, until the ball that night. Michael came to stand beside her. Although he didn't touch her, his presence strengthened her. Lydie sighed.

"You did your best," Patrice said. "Tell me you know that."

"At the moment I'm a bit distracted. Here we are, photographing jewels at a beautiful chateau. Doesn't it seem a little...unbalanced?" Lydie asked.

"But you'll get through this, won't you?" Patrice asked anxiously. "For Didier?"

At Patrice's concern for her husband's project, Lydie smiled. "Yeah. I'll even do a good job."