Wild Lavender (20 page)

But no sooner had the café emptied than it started refilling. The new audience rushed towards the bar, shouting greetings at each other and passing drinks over the sea of heads. Madame Baquet greeted the arrivals in English, and stopped for a moment to chat to a girl in a purple dress with roses on the sleeve and neckline. Eugene swapped places at the piano with Charlie and warmed up the atmosphere with a jazz riff. The Americans had arrived.

Eugene leaned across the piano. ‘You’ve got a good crowd tonight. That’s Scott Fitzgerald and his wife, Zelda,’ he said, indicating with his chin a man and woman entwined in each other’s arms. They were attempting to
dance in the crowded space, splashes of whisky spilling from their glasses. The man’s features were fine and his mouth so delicate that he looked almost feminine. His partner’s face was more severe. Her salmon pink gown had silver straps across the back and flared out from her hips into a bell-shaped skirt. I wondered if that was what a four thousand franc dress looked like.

‘They always run with the “in crowd”,’ said Eugene, not missing a note on the piano despite talking to me. ‘If they like you, they’ll spread the word.’

I rubbed my hands over my dress as if trying to press imaginary creases out of it. The tremble in my legs grew worse. ‘Showtime,’ Eugene said, and smiled. It took two attempts for me to stand. I eyed the bright faces. For some reason I had thought the supper crowd would be more subdued, but this throng was like a lit-up Christmas tree.

I clambered onto the platform, nearly losing my balance. I glanced at a table of six sitting in the far corner and wondered why I hadn’t noticed them before. Everything about them—the carnations in the men’s buttonholes, the charcoal painted under the women’s eyes, the restrained way they sipped their drinks—gave them away as Parisians. The man at the end of the table caught my eye. His skin was a shade of gold not usually seen on city men and was like honey against the sable colour of his hair and eyes. He was sitting next to a woman with a beauty spot near the corner of her nose. She reminded me of an elegant Siamese cat, sleek and perfectly formed with even features and skin like cream. I’d thought I looked good in my dress, but compared to her I was as unkempt as an alley cat.

The man with the sable eyes turned in my direction and we locked gazes. My heart gave a jolt, as if I had reached for a light switch and touched a live wire instead. Did I know him? No, I had never seen him before, yet something inside me
recognised
him. I forgot where I was, and would have stood there for ever if Madame Baquet hadn’t leaned across the table to welcome them and blocked the man from my view. I took advantage of the pause to think about
something the rehearsal pianist had told me about capturing an unsettled audience. ‘Sing to your home crowd,’ he had said. By that he meant that I should sing to the friendliest face in the audience, then gradually draw the others in too.

Was the sable-eyed man my ‘friendly face’? Madame Baquet slipped back into the crowd and I saw that the man was leaning across the table admiring one of his female companion’s bracelets which she held out for him. Perhaps my songs wouldn’t be refined enough for him. The Americans, on the other hand, were ready for some fun.
Who should I sing to?
Eugene glanced at me, waiting for my signal. I swallowed but couldn’t get rid of the lump in my throat. I caught sight of Zelda Fitzgerald. She was draped over her husband and flirting with another man next to him, her cigarette holder drooping from her mouth. There was something in her frail arms and vicious mouth that said she was not long for this world.

‘“
La bouteille est vide
”,’ I said to Eugene. ‘We’ll start with the champagne song.’

Eugene introduced me and I launched into the song with gusto, but my effort was met with indifference. I squinted into the darkness. No one was paying attention to me, not even the sable-eyed man. Who was I supposed to sing to in order to draw in the others if
no one
was interested? The French table was drooling over its
hors-d’oeuvre varié
, the Americans were lighting each other’s cigarettes and swapping tales. Madame Baquet weaved her way among them, trying to draw their attention to me, but it was the role of the performer to captivate the audience, not that of the hostess. She was only responsible for making sure her guests had a good time, irrespective of me. Please look at me, I begged the sable-eyed man. But he continued to eat his artichoke with relish. I was having trouble making myself heard above the babble. I could have been singing anything in any language and no one would have been any wiser. I glanced at Eugene but he was too wrapped in his music to notice that I was in trouble.

It’s up to me.
The words from the ‘Scheherazade’ song flashed into my mind.
It’s up to me.
I remembered how terrified I had been the day I was catapulted into the starring role at Le Chat Espiègle because of an emergency.

I began singing my opening number from ‘Scheherazade’, leaving Eugene to carry on with the champagne song. A rowdy bunch of Americans might be able to drown out a nightclub singer, but they would have a hard time competing with the lung capacity of a music hall performer. I took a breath, and let them know just how powerful my voice could get. In less than a moment the conversations ceased, knives and forks were laid down, glasses steadied, and all eyes turned to me.

At first, the sudden change from bedlam to silence unnerved me. Eugene, unfazed by my switch to another song, continued to play the champagne tune. For a few bars we were discordant but then I thought of Madame Baquet drifting from singing with me to discussing my contract with Monsieur Etienne, and I faded back into the champagne song as if that had been my intention all along. I finished the number with the feeling that I had either destroyed my chances at the Café des Singes or I had made an impression. My heart leapt to my throat when I realised that the sound in my ears was no longer my blood pulsing but applause.
‘Elle est superbe!
’ someone shouted. ‘She is terrific!’

I completed my repertoire reeling from the warmth beaming towards me from the audience. They rose after my encore to applaud more loudly and shout ‘Bravo!’ My first performance in Paris was not just a success: it was a triumph. The Americans rushed forward, clasping my hands and shouting at me in their casual French. ‘
Tu es magnifique!
’ There were so many notes being thrust into our tip jar that Eugene had to ram his fist into it to push them down. Zelda Fitzgerald dropped in a pearl ring. ‘For good luck,’ she said, touching my cheek with an icy finger.

I had a feeling that someone was watching me and turned to find the man with the sable eyes standing behind
me. ‘A memorable performance, Mademoiselle,’ he said, smiling, and slipped a roll of notes into my jar.

It was as if someone had smashed a champagne bottle over my head and I was struggling to see through the sweet fizz. I opened my mouth to speak, but nothing came out. He said something else but I missed it because of an explosion of laughter from the Americans who were taking another round at the bar even though it was almost closing time.

‘
Au revoir
,’ he said, still smiling. ‘I hope I will see you perform again.’

My eyes did not leave his back. I watched him join his companions, who were busy collecting their coats. When he turned around and sent me one more glance before walking through the door and into the night, I sensed that I had met someone who would one day change my life.

I
made three times more in tips than I had been expecting at the Café des Singes that night. Never having had money before, I had no idea what could be done with it besides spending it. The next day, inspired by Odette’s sense of style, I went shopping. I traipsed through the dress, shoe and cosmetic sections of the Galeries Lafayette, my legs quivering and my mind racing from one thought to the next. But it wasn’t the money or the shopping that caused those feelings. I savoured the sable-eyed man’s smile in my mind. Was it possible that a few words exchanged with a stranger could have made me feel so…what…? Alive?

I didn’t return to my room until after dark. I tipped the taxi driver for carrying the bags and boxes to my door. He eyed the clutter of rotten brooms, pails and rubbish at the end of the landing. I had been so caught up in my acquisitions that it hadn’t occurred to me to be embarrassed about the dilapidated state of my building. The driver must have wondered what someone with so many parcels from the Galeries Lafayette was doing living in such a dump. I watched him make his way down the stairs, his nose pinched against the odour of mould and dog piles that infused the air.

I laid out my treasures on the bed. I could hardly believe that the emerald dress with the elbow-length sleeves was mine and that I had bought it with money that I’d earned singing. My most expensive purchase was a jacquard coat. Just throwing it over my shoulders warmed me. I put on all my new clothes, including the linen chemise I had bought
to replace my frayed one, and opened the box that contained the silver mirror and stand. I set the mirror up on the bed and stood back as far as I could, trying—unsuccessfully—to catch my full reflection.

I had intended to dine at the Italian
crémerie
on Rue Campagne where I’d eaten the previous night after my show. The owner, a former artist’s model, served soups for only a few sous. Artists who didn’t have money could pay by pinning their pictures on the walls. But when I walked past the golden lights of the Café de la Rotonde, I decided to celebrate my success there.

The sound of laughter and the aroma of coffee liqueur swelled around me as soon as I entered. Two men at the bar looked me over. A waiter showed me to a table near the door, although judging by the chatter coming from the back room, that was the place to be. A spirited argument was taking place, so lively that I caught snatches of it above the sound of the clinking glasses and cutlery.

‘The Surrealists! The Revolution!’ a voice shouted.

There was a laugh of derision. ‘We shall see about that!’

Two women leaned on the wall near the door to the room. One of them puffed on a cigarette holder. Her face was made up like a painting: bright moons of green shone above her eyes and her lips were blood red against her pale face and black hair. When she laughed, the point on her nose became sharper and made her face even more arresting.

‘Kiki! Kiki!’ her blonde companion laughed, dabbing at her eyes with a Chinese handkerchief. ‘You are bringing me to tears.’

I ordered a Pernod and sipped at its liquorice milkiness while trying to choose between a plate of raw oysters and steamed mussels. I decided on the mussels cooked in white wine. While I ate, I watched more people file through the door: men in scruffy suits with paint on the cuffs and
couples in evening wear. They were French, German, Spanish, Italian and American. The American women still lit cigarettes even though there was a sign on the counter to say that ladies weren’t allowed to smoke in the café. Odette had told me that many of the city’s famous artists and entertainers gathered at the Rotonde, or the Dôme opposite, but I had no idea if the faces I was looking at were those of celebrities or not. I finished my meal and paid the bill. I dreaded using the chilly lavatory in my apartment building, so I decided to visit the ladies’ room before I left.

After tipping the attendant, I stopped to check my appearance in the mirror. The lighting was brighter than in my apartment. I took out my compact and made a few swipes at my nose, then became aware of somebody standing next to me.

‘Was he angry when you told him?’ the woman said. She seemed to be addressing her reflection. I assumed that she was drunk.

‘Are you angry at me, Simone, for making you do it?’

I spun around. I knew that profile: the fine cheekbones, the perfectly straight nose. ‘Camille?’ With all that had happened since I last saw her, I had forgotten my anger at having been duped. But gradually the memory of being made a fool of returned to me.

‘Perhaps I can make it up to you,’ Camille said, still smiling at the mirror. ‘Would you like to join me and my companions for dinner? They are some of the wealthiest men in Paris.’

Something about her coy manner caught me by surprise and I accepted her invitation without thinking.

I followed Camille to a table in the back room. Three men in dinner suits rose to their feet. The first introduced himself as David Bentley; he was a sturdily built Englishman who spoke French well. The two other men were Parisians. With their thin faces and opaque eyes, they could have been brothers. But they weren’t: they introduced themselves as François Duvernoy and Antoine Marchais.

When we had all sat down, David Bentley—who insisted that I call him Bentley because that was his ‘name among friends’—asked me how I knew Camille. I explained that we had appeared together in a show in Marseilles. I told myself that I was being gracious in not mentioning how Camille had deserted us. Bentley wrapped his fingers around Camille’s wrist and stroked the translucent skin with his finger. She was wearing a diamond bracelet; much larger and more elaborate than the one Monsieur Gosling had given her. I only had to glance at Camille’s silver beaded dress and fox-fur wrap to guess that she had replaced Monsieur Gosling with a wealthier man.

‘You haven’t told me about Monsieur Dargent’s reaction when I left,’ she said, slipping her wrist away from Bentley’s explorations. ‘Or whether you have forgiven me for making you deliver my news.’

It was difficult to gauge her tone but I sensed that she was more interested in what Monsieur Dargent had said about her leaving than whether she had put me out or not. I told her that there was nothing to worry about. The scandal had done us good and the show had been a success. She pursed her lips and I realised that wasn’t the answer she had been expecting. She assumed that the show had collapsed without her.

‘The season would have been better if you had been Scheherazade…’ I began, then paused. The show had been a success when
I
played Scheherazade, but somehow I couldn’t bring myself to tell Camille that I had performed the part. What was it about her that made me so subservient?

Bentley asked us if we wanted champagne. ‘Yes,’ said Camille, then turning back to me asked, ‘What are you doing in Paris?’

‘I sing at the Café des Singes,’ I said. ‘But only two nights a week. I’m looking for other work.’

The champagne arrived and Bentley ordered the waiter to pour us each a glass. ‘We are here to celebrate Camille’s success,’ he said, pushing a glass towards me. ‘She’s going to star at the Casino de Paris.’

‘The Casino de Paris!’ I cried. ‘That’s as good as the Folies Bergère!’

‘Better,’ said Bentley, leaning towards me. ‘They have superior singing and dancing at the Casino. The Folies Bergère is spectacle and nudes.’

I felt sorry for him. He was in love with Camille, but from the detached way that she spoke to him I suspected he would be replaced when someone even wealthier came along, just as Monsieur Gosling had been.

‘Let’s have a toast,’ said François, holding up his glass. ‘To Camille.’

‘To Camille,’ we repeated, clinking our glasses.

Camille turned to me. ‘They haven’t found someone to fill my original slot in the first half,’ she said. ‘I could speak to the manager about giving you an audition. It’s only a one-song and dance slot but it
is
the Casino de Paris.’

I was grateful for her offer but after what had happened at the Folies Bergère audition I wasn’t confident that I would succeed. The Casino may have been less frivolous than the Folies, but their standards for beauty would be just the same.

‘It’s time to move on to dinner,’ said Antoine, signalling to the waiter for the bill. ‘How about Le Boeuf sur le Toit? They have good jazz.’

‘No,’ said François. ‘It’s too loud. Let’s go to Fouquet’s.’

Bentley shook his head. ‘You’ll just be following this crowd there. I say the Tour d’Argent.’

‘I’ve already eaten,’ I said, as pleasantly as I could. The Rotonde had been a splurge for me. I might be new to Paris but I was informed enough to know they were naming some of the city’s most expensive restaurants and, despite my growing visions of grandeur, I still had limits.

‘Then eat again,’ laughed François, pointing at me. ‘You could do with some more weight.’

‘Bentley will pay,’ Camille whispered to me.

‘I still think we should go somewhere with music,’ said Antoine.

‘Le Boeuf sur le Toit is full of South American playboys. We’ll lose Mademoiselle Fleurier to them—I’m warning you,’ said Bentley.

They hooted with laughter. I smiled too, although I didn’t get the joke.

We squashed ourselves into a taxi: Camille and Bentley in the front and me in the back between Antoine and François. The bulk of our overcoats, scarves, hats and gloves pressed against each other as if we were a load of clothes in a garment-maker’s truck. The taxi crossed the Seine to the Right Bank. We passed by the Egyptian Obelisk in the Place de la Concorde.

‘This is where Louis XVI was executed,’ Antoine said, tapping the window with his knuckle. ‘And later on, Queen Marie Antoinette and Robespierre.’

‘It doesn’t seem the kind of place where something like that could have happened,’ I said. I imagined a revolutionary crowd gathered on the cobblestones, shaking their fists and shouting, ‘Off with their heads!’

‘It certainly doesn’t,’ said Bentley. ‘When you look at the pretty lights it’s easy to forget the bloodthirsty history of Paris.’

We arrived in Rue Boissy d’Anglas and filed into Le Boeuf sur le Toit one after the other. It was so crowded inside the nightclub that we could barely move. I thought we would be jammed near the door for ever but the waiter managed to find us a table. The sommelier brought champagne in an ice bucket. The jazz music thrummed in my ears. From where we sat, we could see the band on stage with their glistening trombones, clarinets and saxophones.

‘Everyone is here tonight,’ said Camille. ‘Look, there’s Coco Chanel!’ I followed Camille’s gaze to a dark-haired woman with a wide, sensuous mouth. She was wearing a dress that draped over her body in scalloped tiers. She wasn’t what I’d expected from Madame Chardin’s description. Her dress was uncomplicated and floated around her each time she moved her arm to sip her drink.
But she wore chunky earrings and strings of baroque pearls around her neck.

‘I thought her theory was to pare things down,’ I said. ‘One decorative item only.’

Bentley glanced at me. ‘She is a designer,’ he chuckled. ‘She makes her money by setting a fashion and then changing it.’

‘There’s your friend,’ said Antoine to Camille, nodding his head towards a man with a crooked smile.

Camille turned to me. ‘Maurice Chevalier. He performed at the Casino de Paris in the previous show and made two thousand francs a night.’

‘Two thousand francs! What does he do?’ I asked.

‘He dances around the stage with a straw hat, tells jokes and sings songs full of innuendo. They say he’s going to be snapped up by Hollywood.’

‘Hollywood?’

‘America. The movies,’ Camille said, amused by my ignorance.

‘They say he’s ruthless,’ said Bentley, cutting the end off a cigar with a pair of gold clippers. ‘He dumped Mistinguett after she risked her life to save him from a prisoner-of-war camp.’

Mistinguett, I knew, was ‘Queen of the Paris Music Hall’ and France’s most famous singer.

‘You have to be ruthless to succeed,’ said Camille.

Bentley smiled, although I was not sure why. I sensed a bad end for him if he were truly in love with Camille.

I turned to the dance floor and watched the couples twirling around it in a lively shuffle.

‘Would you like to dance?’ François asked me, putting down his glass.

‘I would like to,’ I said, tempted more by the music than the note of flirtation in his voice, ‘but I don’t know this dance.’

‘If you can walk, you can foxtrot,’ he said, reaching out his hand to escort me. There was barely enough space for us on the dance floor in between the other couples, but
somehow François was able to guide me through the steps. It was surprisingly easy to pick up the slow-slow-quick-quick rhythm of the dance. The slow parts were long and graceful, the quick ones short and lively. We moved around the floor, sometimes bumping into other couples who were too in love or too tipsy to notice. We passed one elegantly dressed man with pouches under his eyes. ‘That’s the Prince of Wales,’ François whispered in my ear. ‘His grandfather was a great lover of this city and its women. He was heartbroken when he had to give up being a Parisian in order to become king. I wonder if this prince will feel the same.’

The music changed tempo. Half the couples fled the dance floor and were replaced by others rushing onto it. ‘I can’t do this one,’ said François. ‘You have to be a good dancer.’ The people around us were kicking their heels and flapping their arms like birds to the syncopated rhythm. It was the most energetic dance I’d ever seen and it made me laugh because it was so full of
joie de vivre
. François excused himself but I remained in the frenzy. The dance could be performed as a couple but there were half a dozen people dancing it on their own. The footwork wasn’t difficult for me. I had the knack of breaking dance sequences into steps quickly and I couldn’t resist joining in the fun. Before I knew it I was shimmying and crisscrossing my knees along with the rest of the crowd. I even improvised a few hip slaps and head turns of my own.

After a couple of fast numbers, the dancers slowed down or left the floor and the band slid back into a foxtrot. I returned to the table just as the waiter arrived with a tray of dishes.