The French Photographer

by Natasha Lester

  Once in Montmartre, she bypassed Bricktop’s – she couldn’t afford that – and entered a club that was decidedly less elegant but definitely more fun, where the Montmartre patois syncopated between saxophone riffs and where one man, a munitions worker no doubt, tried to squeeze past her a little too tightly. She fought him off with a hard stare and a few well-chosen words and slipped into a seat at a table beside Renée, one of Monsieur Aumont’s daughters.

  ‘Bonsoir,’ Renée said, kissing her cheeks. ‘Do you have any Gauloises left?’

  Estella produced her last two and they both lit up.

  ‘What are you wearing?’ Renée asked with a bemused laugh.

  ‘I made it.’

  ‘I guessed as much. It’s not something you’d find on the racks at BHV.’

  ‘Exactly.’

  ‘Isn’t it a touch … outlandish?’

  Estella shook her head. Renée was wearing one of the Heidi-style dresses that had been hanging forlornly on the racks at Au Printemps as if they’d forgotten the way back to the mountains and she looked like every other woman in the club: demure, watered down, like the wine they were drinking.

  ‘Why would we expect anything less from Estella?’ Another voice, one with a smile inside it, carried over to their table. Huette, Renée’s sister, leaned down to kiss Estella’s cheeks. ‘You look magnifique,’ Huette said.

  ‘Dance with me.’ A man rudely interrupted them. He smelled like the Pigalle at midnight – liquored, fragranced with perfume from the necks of the dozen other girls he’d already taken a turn with on the dance floor. A man revelling in the advantage of his scarceness, who would have, with his lack of manners, no chance at all were most men not away fighting.

  ‘No thank you,’ Estella said.

  ‘I will,’ Renée said.

  ‘I wanted her.’ The man pointed at Estella.

  ‘But none of us want you,’ she said.

  ‘I do,’ Renée said, almost desperately, and Estella knew it was a sign of the times; a girl could spend all night without a dance partner and here was one before them, albeit coarse, but what did that matter?

  ‘Don’t,’ Huette said to Renée.

  As Estella watched Huette put a hand on her sister’s arm, a spontaneous act – one that told of how much she loved Renée no matter how irritating she could be – Estella felt a stab of yearning. It was followed immediately by an awareness of how silly she was; wishing for something she’d never have. She should be grateful that she even had a mother, rather than selfishly covet someone’s sister.

  The man pulled Renée to her feet, leading her to the dance floor, making sure to hold her as close as he could and Estella turned away, revolted, when she saw him press his crotch into Renée.

  ‘Come and sing. We’ll change the tempo to something fast so she can get away from him,’ Estella said.

  Huette followed her over to the four old-timers who comprised the band, with whom Estella and Huette had spent many evenings playing piano and singing, putting their school music lessons to work. Estella’s mother had learned to sing at a convent school she’d attended when she was younger and she’d always sung at home, adorning their apartment with music rather than useless gewgaws, and she’d passed on her love of song to Estella from a very early age. But while her mother’s preference was for operatic hymns, Estella’s was for deep and throaty jazz.

  The musicians didn’t miss a beat as they kissed Estella’s cheeks and Luc, the pianist, complimented her dress in a patois so thick and dirty no ordinary Frenchwoman could have understood it. He finished the song then stood up to get a drink at the bar. Estella sat down at the piano and Huette joined Philippe at the microphone. Estella picked out the notes to ‘J’ai Deux Amours’ and the crowd applauded appreciatively. As Estella played, she hoped everyone in the room had a love for Paris strong enough that it would save the city from whatever might soon befall it as the Germans drew ever closer. But Huette’s voice wasn’t high enough for the song so she bumped Estella off the piano and made Estella sing it, which she did.

  Every patron in the club joined her for the final chorus, letting Estella believe, for just a few seconds, that everything would be fine: that Paris was too grand, too legendary, too brilliant to ever be troubled by a short and grotesque man like Adolf Hitler.

  She stayed at the club for only a short time after that, laughing with Philippe and Huette and Luc until she became aware that they hadn’t managed to save Renée, that she was leaving with the brute of a man who’d asked her to dance and Estella suddenly felt tired, far older than twenty-two, and more melancholy than ever.

  ‘Time for me to go,’ Estella said, rising and kissing everyone twice on the cheeks.

  Once out in the Paris night, she didn’t walk straight back to the apartment. She wound her way through the dirt and dilapidation of the Marais, a dereliction all the more obvious at each of the hôtels particulier, once grand homes of the nobles that, no matter what had been done to them – their transformation into jam factories and the desecration of their stately courtyards beneath piles of cart wheels, pallets and lean-tos – still held their heads high. As Estella brushed her hand over the stone walls, the same way she’d caressed the roll of gold silk in the atelier, she wondered if the elegance imprinted in those walls – the same as the way a couture dress never lost the line that set it apart from pret-a-porter – would withstand Stuka bombings and an army of men in cold grey uniforms.

  The Carreau du Temple was quiet as she passed, the fabric and second-hand clothes sellers all abed, ready to be up at dawn selling the discarded garments they’d found in the rubbish bins of those who lived over by the Champs Élysées. Indeed the whole area was quiet, Estella often the only one on the street as she strolled through her city, taking in things she’d grown used to but which were too beautiful to take for granted now that they might be lost: the fading brilliance of the red, gold and blue painting over the porte de l’hôtel de Clisson, the building’s curved medieval turrets framing the gateway like a pair of plump sentries; the symmetrical pavilions and grand arched passage of the Carnavalet.

  Without meaning to, she found herself outside a house on the Rue de Sévigné, an abandoned hôtel particulier that her mother had often taken her to when she was younger, where Estella had played amongst the disused rooms, a place that Estella suspected was the location of her mother’s meetings with Monsieur Aumont. But with the blackout curtains in place, the streets glazed a preternatural blue by the covered streetlights, it was impossible to see if anyone was inside. Not French Baroque like its neighbours, and eschewing symmetry and form, the house lurked in true Gothic style, the hunchback of the street. Its coroneted turrets should have put her in mind of fairytale palaces but instead they made her think of women held prisoner at the top of the tower, all escape routes cut off.

  Impulse made her push open the wooden door that led into the courtyard, the statuary of the Four Seasons gazing imperiously down on her from the walls of the house, including a headless Summer bereft of his power. The gravel paths had not been swept and raked for many years but still formed a star shape, each spoke divided by hedges that had long since outgrown formality and now shot and twisted where they wished. Mint, probably once confined to a herb garden, waved its stems wildly, perfuming the air with the hot scent of danger. And then she heard it. The scrape of a foot over stone. Fear ran its teeth along her back like a zipper.

  She turned. There, collapsed on a rickety bench, was Monsieur Aumont. The smell of blood and panic rose off his clothes and his skin.

  ‘Mon Dieu!’ she gasped.

  He lifted his head and Estella saw a dark stain on the front of his shirt. ‘Take these,’ he whispered, passing Estella a small bundle, ‘to the Théâtre du Palais-Royal. Please. For Paris. Find l’engoulevent – the nightjar. You can trust him.’

  ‘Where is Maman?’ Estella demanded.

  ‘At home. Safe. Go!’

  He slumped over again and Estella moved in closer to see h
ow she could help him. She was able to lean him back against the bench, to see his pleading eyes. ‘Go,’ he repeated roughly. ‘For Paris.’

  Whatever she held meant nothing but danger. Yet it was important enough for him to have been injured seriously and also precarious enough for him to have added that one word – safe – when she’d asked about her mother. Had it only been an hour ago that Estella had been singing of her love for Paris? And now she was being asked to do something for her city.

  Monsieur Aumont closed his eyes. Estella unrolled the bundle. Maps of a building drawn on silk. She could slide them into the pockets she’d sewn discreetly into the lining of her cape, pockets perfect for moving copied dresses around the city. But she was so conspicuous: a cape of blue-black velvet trimmed with silver beads over a shining gold dress.

  ‘Go!’ Monsieur Aumont whispered for a third time, through gritted teeth.

  Estella nodded at last. Because now she felt the absolute truth of the words she’d sung at the club: her city was being violated and, perhaps, if she did as Monsieur Aumont was begging her to, she could prevent one more trespass on Paris’s honour.

  Chapter Two

  Estella hurried out of the courtyard and into the street, the maps whispering like rumours in her pockets, unable to stop thinking of all the stories she’d heard: Germans dropping poisoned sweets by air into the streets to make the children in the city ill; Germans dressed up as nuns to spy on the citizens of Paris; German parachutists landing in the city at night. Every person she passed she feared might be part of the Fifth Column, fascist sympathisers helping the Germans, who would therefore do anything to stop her from reaching the theatre with her delivery. Still, she moved down Rue Beautreillis, past the ancient clock that hung rusted and unceasing, reminding Parisians that while their city might be immortal, they were not, and neither was she.

  Then, hoping the circuitous route she’d taken might have allowed the city to draw its cape over her and hide her within its folds, she turned right and walked on to the Palais Royal. Finally she reached the theatre and thanked God for her dress which might be just fine enough to make it seem as if she belonged in a place like this.

  She ascended the curving, plushly red staircase and, at the top, found herself in an intimate and opulent reception room – beautiful in any other circumstance – well lit by a chandelier so large and so dazzling that she drew her hand up to her eyes. Swagged red velvet curtains hung over openings that she assumed were entrances into the theatre itself. The walls were papered in deep burgundy trimmed with gold; everything was accented in gold – the chandelier, the balcony railing above, the cornices, the trimming around the ceiling fresco, the bas-relief that arched elegantly over the door at the far end of the room. Women wearing dresses Estella recognised as Chanel, Lelong, Callot Souers lounged in a scattering of low red velvet chaises and men laughed and sipped cognac and calvados. She knew that, for many, life cavorted on and the parties and revelry continued but after what she’d just witnessed, entering the theatre was like stepping onto the moon, or someplace else equally removed from the reality of a German army on the march into Paris.

  The notes of a foxtrot rang out from a piano and a few couples began to dance, although there was hardly the space. Estella let the hood of her cape fall from her head, shook her long black hair loose and stepped into the room.

  How would she know who or what the nightjar was? Her gaze swept over the women and then the men. She saw the eyes of one man, who stood in the centre of the room surrounded by a circle of people, flicker curiously towards her in a manner different from the lascivious stares a handful of others were bestowing upon her.

  It wouldn’t do to quail, to act as if she didn’t belong. She crossed the room boldly, cape flying behind her, dress concealing her shaking legs. She didn’t need to push her way through the circle because it opened to allow her in, the confident attitude of her shoulders and head, an attitude she’d copied from the house models she’d seen at the fashion shows, gaining her admittance.

  Once at the man’s side, she kissed both his cheeks, smiled and said a loud, ‘Hello darling,’ her voice again copied from the house models who tried to seduce the husbands of rich clients, often with success.

  ‘I’m glad you came,’ he murmured, sliding an arm around her waist, playing along so she knew she was right.

  ‘I have an interest in ornithology,’ she whispered. ‘Especially les engoulevents.’

  Nothing betrayed that what she’d said had aroused his interest. ‘Shall we dance?’ he asked, taking her hand and excusing himself from the crowd, leading her over to the couples swirling around in time to the music.

  He went to undo the bow of her cape which was still tied at her neck but she shook her head, not wanting the maps to pass into the hands of the theatre attendants. ‘I’d prefer to keep it on,’ she said.

  Then she found herself in his arms, circling the floor, the damned music having slowed to a waltz and, given the time of night and the state of inebriation of most of the theatregoers, proximity was all that seemed to matter and she knew it would look out of place if they were at arm’s length. As he stepped closer to her, she did the same until they were chest to chest, cheek to cheek. He was all hard muscle and tanned skin, as if he spent his time outside rather than in an office, his hair almost as dark as hers and his eyes brown. He was extraordinarily handsome and in other circumstances she might have felt rather more pleased at the situation she’d found herself in. He wasn’t French though; his command of the language was impeccable and so was his accent but it was almost too schooled, too perfect to be his birth-tongue.

  He was waiting for her to say something. And Estella knew from the way Monsieur Aumont had spoken, from the blood on Monsieur’s shirt that he, and perhaps her mother, were involved in something far more dangerous than helping refugees at the train station and that this man was a part of it. She wouldn’t have trusted him with anything except that Monsieur Aumont, who she’d known since she was a child, had said she should.

  ‘I believe I have something for you,’ she said, switching to English.

  That surprised him. ‘Who the hell are you?’ he asked, also in English, his voice controlled.

  ‘Nobody you know,’ she said, reverting to French.

  ‘You’re not very good at being surreptitious.’ He indicated the dress that she’d thought might spin heads, but that was the last thing she wanted right now.

  ‘No one with anything to hide wears a dress like this,’ she said.

  He tried to hide it but she heard it. A laugh.

  ‘Nothing about this is funny,’ she snapped, the last vestiges of her courage almost giving out. She needed to get this done and then return to help Monsieur Aumont – please God let him be all right – and finally go home and hope like she’d never hoped before that her mother was safe.

  ‘You’re very prickly.’

  ‘Because I’m so goddamned furious,’ she retorted. ‘I need to hang my cloak somewhere safe. Where can you recommend?’

  ‘Peter, over by the staircase, will look after it.’ All the while they danced and their faces continued to smile and nobody in the room except the man and Estella knew that things were not quite as they seemed.

  Estella nodded and pulled herself out of his arms, untying the ribbon at her neck as she walked away, letting her hand rest for just an instant on the left side seam, assuming if he was the kind of man who took delivery of maps that were worth bleeding for, he’d notice her action. She had no desire to lose her cloak; it had cost her a month’s wages to buy the fabric. But it was a small price to pay if it helped Monsieur Aumont. And her mother. And Paris.

  She passed the cloak to the man indicated and hurried down the stairs, desperate to be home. She strode out into the night, away from things she didn’t want to understand, things that scared her too much, things that made her realise the life she’d known, growing up in an atelier in Paris surrounded by beautiful things, was over.

  Th
e touch of a hand on her arm made her jump. She hadn’t heard footsteps but somehow he was standing beside her, passing her a black jacket. ‘Put this on,’ he said. ‘You won’t make it home alive at this time of night in that dress. Your cloak had blood on it. Is it yours?’

  He moved a hand up towards her cheek and she flinched, but realised from the attitude of his hand that he hadn’t been about to strike her, but to do something far more gentle – to check that she wasn’t hurt. Her reaction made him move his hand away so swiftly it was almost like he’d never raised it.

  ‘It’s not my blood. It’s Monsieur—’

  He cut in. ‘It’s best if I don’t know his name. Can you take me to him?’

  Estella nodded and he followed her, his knowledge of Parisian streets seemingly as good as her own, never questioning her route, walking quickly but casually beside her. As they went through the Passage Charlemagne and into the Village Saint-Paul, its crumbling whitewashed courtyards creating a maze that nobody would be able to follow them through, he looked across at her quizzically.

  She spoke the first words they’d shared since they left. ‘Not much further.’ Then, ‘Who are you?’

  He shook his head. ‘It’s safer for you if I don’t tell you.’

  A spy. She had to ask, even though she knew he could have, once they were hidden within the walls of the parish village, shot her or stabbed her or whatever it was men like him did to those who got in their way. ‘Whose side are you on?’

  ‘I haven’t said thank you,’ he said, which wasn’t really an answer. ‘But those papers will help the French people a great deal.’

  ‘And the British?’ She pressed for more information.

  ‘And all the Allies.’

  Suddenly the wooden doors of the house on the Rue de Sévigné stood before them and Estella slipped into the courtyard. She stopped when she saw that Monsieur Aumont had fallen to the ground.

  She darted forward.

  He stopped her. ‘I’ll do what I can,’ he said. ‘He deserves a decent burial and he’ll get one. I promise.’