The Paris Orphan

by Natasha Lester

  He nodded.

  “Do you ever see her?”

  “We don’t converse via telepathy.”

  She smiled, although she had no idea if he was being sarcastic or joking. “Will I see her?”

  “You’re assuming the photographer is female.”

  “I know she’s female. Her body of work has a degree of compassion for the subject that I’ve never witnessed in that of a male photographer.”

  “Cartier-Bresson. Penn. Mapplethorpe. They’re not compassionate enough for you?” He folded his arms across his chest.

  “No.” D’Arcy was emphatic. “They were technically masterful but empathically absent. Like Ansel Adams said, a great photograph gives expression to precisely how the photographer feels about their subject and thus illustrates how one feels about all of life.”

  He raised an eyebrow in response and she supposed that throwing Adams into the conversation probably made her sound like either a show-off or a know-it-all. Or both.

  But he only asked, “What about Capa?”

  Ordinarily she might concede to Capa. Not today. “Shouldn’t you be defending your client rather than listing the photographic canon, a group of men who need no more recognition?” she replied.

  “You didn’t just come to babysit photographs on a plane, did you?”

  Yes, because that’s all an art handler does, she almost snapped back. Instead she said, “I’ve been flying for more than a day—Sydney is on the other side of the world, after all—then on a train and a car for another few hours. What I really need to do right now is sleep and then tomorrow I’ll get started. If you could show me where my room is? Given you’ve had notice of my forthcoming stay, I assume you have that organized.”

  “Célie will show you.” He indicated a woman who’d just appeared from nowhere. As her travel-fuddled brain shut down, D’Arcy followed the woman up the stairs, which spiraled within the turret, then down a long hallway and into a room that she would peruse tomorrow. Right now, all she wanted was a shower and her bed.

  * * *

  D’Arcy woke the following morning thankful that her nomadic existence meant she’d learned to sleep whenever and wherever, and that jet lag never bothered her. She yawned and stretched and, for the first time, reveled in the luxury.

  Sheets so sumptuous they must be Egyptian cotton. A true French bed of curved and carved wood, the molded flowers spilling delicately across the headboard, the wood painted a soft creamy white, D’Arcy thought at first, but then she realized the paint held the palest note of blue, offset by the velvety blue-gray wallpaper. Matching carved bedside tables stood on either side.

  She sat up and swung her feet over the edge of the bed, walking over to the soft white drapes, pulling them open to reveal doors that led onto her own balcony. Her stomach growled and she realized she was starving and had no idea what to do about breakfast. Would they feed her? Or would she have to drive to the nearest town and grab some coffee and croissants?

  In answer to her question, a knock sounded on the door.

  “Come in,” D’Arcy called.

  Célie appeared, breakfast tray in hand, loaded with croissants and baguettes and cheese and fruit juice and—D’Arcy sniffed the air—coffee.

  “Breakfast on the balcony?” Célie asked in French.

  “Oui, merci.” D’Arcy followed her out and breathed in the wild scents of the French countryside—musky sweet chestnut, the strong fragrance of artemisia, spicy licorice and citrus. Yellow buttercups frolicked over the garden below and she could see that a loose formality played hide-and-seek with the natural landscape: pleached limes bordered a mass of wild orchids, a separate garden room had been created with drooping mulberry trees to house the potager, which was full of strawberry and blackberry bushes, as well as the most vividly orange pumpkins D’Arcy had ever seen, perfect for flamboyantly gilded fairytale carriages. There was even a maze.

  D’Arcy sank into a chair, sipped her coffee with closed eyes and felt the kind of contentment wash over her that was an infrequent visitor in her life.

  “Would you like anything else?” Célie asked.

  “I think everything is perfect,” D’Arcy replied, the French her mother had always spoken with her rolling off her tongue as familiarly as the English she ordinarily spoke.

  It was very tempting to sit on the balcony all morning and drink too much coffee and eat too much pungently oozing cheese and fresh baguette. No bread in the whole of Australia ever tasted as good as the bread in France. But she had work to do so she threw on her version of jeans and a white shirt—her choice of shirt being a once lemon-colored, now faded to cream 1970s Ossie Clark chiffon blouse, with a bow at the collar and the bleached-out lines of a Celia Birtwell print still visible. She eschewed yesterday’s cowboy boots in favor of a pair of scuffed vintage boots with the traces of once bright embroidery.

  Before she went downstairs, she telephoned her mother to let her know she wouldn’t be back in Sydney any time soon.

  “Hello, darling,” Victorine Hallworth said as soon as she picked up, and D’Arcy smiled.

  “You’ll never believe me if I tell you how fabulous this chateau is. And I’m staying for two weeks,” D’Arcy crowed. “It’s like a dream job. Delicious food. Amazing views. And photographs I adore.”

  “You sound happy.” D’Arcy could hear her mother smiling down the line.

  “I am. In fact, I might write a piece about it. I’ll send a pitch to Maya tonight.”

  “I’m sure she’d love to have another piece from you. You haven’t written for her for a while,” Victorine said.

  “I haven’t,” D’Arcy agreed, freelance writing being just one of the many things she dabbled in over her peripatetic existence. “But this place is just begging to be written about. You’d love it. It’s the France of everyone’s dreams.”

  “The France of my dreams is probably a more tarnished vision than the one you have in front of you now. Although you’re making me want to come out and see you. Where exactly are you?”

  “Not far from Reims.”

  “Not my favorite part of the country.” Her mother’s voice seemed to catch on the words.

  “How can it not be your favorite part?”

  Her mother paused before replying. “Just memories. From a long time ago. You have a wonderful time and enjoy it for both of us.”

  “I will. I love you, Maman.”

  As D’Arcy hung up the phone, she frowned. They hardly ever spoke about her mother’s childhood in France, a country Victorine hadn’t visited since she was in her twenties, even though she’d insisted on D’Arcy learning French and had always encouraged D’Arcy’s own visits there, from exchange trips in high school, to university in Paris. Despite that, her mother had told her to enjoy herself, so she would. She went downstairs, jumped in her car and drove to the nearest quincaillerie—the hardware shop—for supplies.

  Back at the chateau, she carried everything inside and almost beheaded Josh with a piece of plywood. “Sorry, I didn’t see you,” she said after he’d leapt out of her way.

  “I didn’t need that ear anyway,” he said, mock-rubbing the side of his head.

  “You’d better tell me where to put everything before I injure anyone else. I don’t want to risk hurting Célie and not having that divine breakfast tomorrow.”

  “Oh, but I’m expendable.” He actually smiled.

  “Naturally.” She smiled back. Perhaps he’d just needed coffee yesterday. He seemed much nicer today. Although he was still wearing a perfectly pressed shirt and the trousers of an expensive suit, so perhaps the stiffness of demeanor to match would soon reappear.

  “Follow me. The salon de grisailles might work.”

  He led the way through the chateau to an enormous room, a sitting room now, although it looked to D’Arcy as if it must once have held elegant receptions or balls, the columns proudly arching up to the ceiling indicating its history. It had the same view as D’Arcy had seen from her balcony that mornin
g, the grounds rolling away in a riot of color and perfume down to a canal. The room was furnished as tastefully as D’Arcy’s, the soft blues and grays that had lent the room its name present here also in the paneled wood walls, inset by boiserie, which arrested D’Arcy’s attention. They were painted in silver, pearl, black and white and depicted a child in a forest of strangely stunted and twisted trees; D’Arcy couldn’t tell if the child found the trees’ presence haunting or soothing.

  She tore her gaze away from the panels. “I’m going to be making a bit of a mess,” she said doubtfully.

  “You can work on the terrace if you like.” Josh opened the doors at the back of the room. “Or there’s the winter garden over there.” He pointed to a windowed enclosure that would be ideal on a cooler day but most likely roasting in summer.

  “I’ll take the terrace,” D’Arcy said, exiting through the doors. She dropped her equipment onto a table that she could use as a workbench. “I’ll build a crate for each photograph that isn’t already packed,” she said, “but they’ll need to be double-crated. You must have some insulated crates somewhere?”

  He nodded and disappeared, and D’Arcy began to saw and hammer. She did build crates occasionally; certain clients were fussy and D’Arcy had a reputation for being able to take care of an artwork from start to finish. She knew how to pack and how to transport and how to negotiate with customs brokers and sometimes couldn’t believe that a fine arts degree had led to her becoming a kind of glorified babysitter for priceless artworks. But she also knew she loved it, even the carpentry that was her job right now.

  Once the first crate was ready, she started on the condition report for the accompanying photograph. Josh arrived back with the insulated crates just as she’d finished.

  “I need your autograph,” she said, passing him the paperwork.

  He read it over, frowning, glancing at the photograph referred to and eventually seemed to concede to her description as being accurate.

  “I’ll work in the salon this morning so I can read each report and sign as you go,” he said.

  “It’ll be noisy. Sawing and hammering are hard to do quietly.”

  “I don’t mind noise. I used to work in the bullpen of a law firm in Manhattan; twenty associates are probably a lot noisier than a saw.”

  “Wow, this must be a huge change of pace,” she said.

  He shrugged, not elaborating any further.

  The morning went on with D’Arcy fashioning crates, completing condition reports, having Josh sign them, which he did wordlessly, but at least never disagreeing or asking her to change what she’d written. In between the whirr of her saw or her drill, she could hear Josh speaking on the phone in impeccable French. It felt as if hardly any time had passed before Célie appeared with food and D’Arcy realized it was after two o’clock. More baguettes. Cheese. Tomatoes. Charcuterie. Her stomach growled loudly.

  “I’m starving,” she said to Célie in French, who smiled.

  “Wait until you try the tarte tatin I have for dessert,” Célie said.

  D’Arcy groaned. “I’ll be sure to leave room for it.”

  Josh came out onto the terrace as D’Arcy sat down. “You speak French much too well for an Australian,” he said.

  D’Arcy finished chewing her mouthful of bread. “Are Australians not known for their linguistic skills?” she asked innocently.

  “Not generally, no. You’re an island in the middle of nowhere. There’s no pressing need to speak anything other than English.”

  “And Americans are somehow different? You have a pressing need to learn French because Canada’s on your doorstep?”

  “Touché,” he said, that hard-to-provoke smile reappearing. “What I meant to say is, why do you speak French so well?”

  “My mother is French. And your mother is…?” she guessed, knowing that to speak the language so well, he must have learned as a child too.

  “French Canadian.”

  “Aha.” She reached for more bread. “So tell me about the bullpen. How did you get from there to here?”

  “Preventing corporations from being sued for obscene amounts of money, while guaranteed to give you a short-term, fist-pumping high, is pretty soulless,” he said flatly. “I did a degree in law and art history—the bizarrest combination, but that’s what I wanted to do. When an artists’ agency was looking for agents with legal and contractual expertise, I applied, not really expecting to get it. But I did. Then, because I could speak French, I was asked to run the French office for the agency after a year or so.”

  “Which means you mustn’t be too bad at being an agent. But shouldn’t you be in Paris, rather than here?”

  “I come here at least once a week. The photographer was my first and most important client. And when the photographer’s work is traveling across the oceans, it’s doubly important that I’m around to make sure it goes safely.”

  A short silence followed, into which a chasm of questions opened. Who is the photographer? Do you speak to her in person? What is she like?

  The work D’Arcy was crating bore no name. The artist was known only as The Photographer and, while D’Arcy suspected she was female, nobody really knew for sure. It was a circumstance in which the mystery of anonymity added to the creative genius of the photographs, and created a media storm that hadn’t abated for years. Every now and again it flared up, as somebody pushed a new theory about the identity of the photographer, an interest that had been stirred again as the photographs prepared to leave Europe for the first time ever, touring to Australia and then on to America. And D’Arcy, who’d been working as an art handler and sometimes curator for years, had been the one lucky enough to be chosen to go to France and escort the photographs. Of course, the prospect of getting close to brilliance had been a huge incentive, as had the intimation that she’d been specifically requested.

  Célie came in with a platter of tarte tatin that filled the air with the vigorous scent of apples and the decadent sweetness of caramel. D’Arcy reached for a slice, before saying to Josh, “You’re not going to tell me anything about the photographer, are you?”

  “I’m not,” he agreed.

  “You could at least pretend you might drop me a hint to draw out the anticipation.” D’Arcy forked the tarte tatin into her mouth. “Oh, it’s so good.”

  “I don’t play games,” Josh said simply.

  “I’d worked that much out. Luckily the culinary incentives more than make up for your lack of interest in giving me morsels. How can you not stay here all the time? If somebody made me food like this and gave me a bed like the one upstairs and a view so spectacular…” D’Arcy flung her arm out to encompass the divine surroundings. “I’d never leave.”

  “Is this your way of warning me I’m going to have to evict you at the end of a fortnight?”

  “See,” D’Arcy stood up. “You can be amusing if you try. Now, I’m going to work off my lunch by sawing some wood. And here are two more condition reports for you to frown at.”

  She passed him the reports, catching the upward quirk of his lips and turned around before he could see her matching smile.

  The day sped onwards. Toward late afternoon, she felt someone’s eyes on her. She looked up to see Josh, in running gear, watching her.

  “I’m going for a run. You can leave any more condition reports on the table.”

  “Do you mind if I log in to my email on your computer? I have my laptop but by the time I hook up to your modem, it’s probably quicker if I just use yours.”

  “Sure.” He nodded. “It’s in the office along the hall.” Before he turned away, he added, “I told Célie we’d have dinner down in the folly.” He pointed to a structure halfway between the house and the canal, almost lost beneath a clump of startlingly red-leafed beech trees. “At about eight. If that suits you.”

  “Well, a girl’s gotta eat. Enjoy your run.”

  Eight

  Running. Just the thought of it exhausted her. D’Arcy checked her w
atch and saw that it was after seven o’clock but of course it was still so light, a true European summer. She brushed off the sawdust, located Josh’s office and logged into webmail. The email she’d been hoping for was sitting at the top of her inbox and she clicked on it before she could stop and think about it. As she read the words, she flopped into the nearest chair, shoulders sinking.

  She hadn’t been chosen for the fellowship. She’d applied—she’d thought carelessly, unworried if it didn’t come off—for a Jessica May Fellowship for Women Artists. But the rejection hit her with more force than she’d thought it would. It meant the slender hope she’d been holding on to that she might still be able to do something about her dream of being a documentary filmmaker—a dream that had started and been nourished at university but which had since withered under the pressure of finding work that actually paid money—was now something she needed to relinquish. She hadn’t pursued it actively for years, had let it flit around in her head in moments of solitude on plane trips and long truck rides couriering others’ artworks, had told herself the fellowship would be the thing to get her going again. But, with no fellowship, she couldn’t afford to dream.

  She finished reading the email, ambitions cruelly resurrected on discovering the sentence: The board thought your project idea excellent and worthy of a fellowship but we found your explanation of the creative process lacking. We encourage you to apply again, paying particular attention to how you will translate your idea into a documentary, and your plans for how the narrative will unfold.

  It was tempting to curse the board—they didn’t know what they were talking about; they wouldn’t recognize talent if it came and sat beside them—but D’Arcy knew, in her heart of hearts, that her explanation of the creative process was lacking. She’d dashed off the application three hours before deadline in her usual whimsical fashion and probably hadn’t provided the rigorous detail required to be truly competitive. Her mother might say that D’Arcy hadn’t really wanted to succeed because then she would have to commit to a twelve-month project, whereas D’Arcy’s life consisted of short-term contracts and minimal obligations. Which was the best strategy for avoiding disappointments like this one.