The Heart of the Ritz

by Luke Devenish

  Polly envied the bond between them. She was not a friend in their eyes, but a pet. Until these women saw her otherwise, how could she trust them like they trusted each other? They were keeping things hidden, Polly reminded herself. This meant they didn’t trust her, either.

  Polly only now noted how appreciative masculine eyes lingered long at the Girls – taking in their enviable figures, their perfectly coiffed hair, their marvellous hats, their stylish and comfortable clothes. But when the same men’s eyes moved towards Polly they soon flicked away. On the Paris street, she was as dismissed as she’d been on the train by the soldiers.

  Polly felt the old hurt before she bit it back hard with a resolve: no more should she let herself feel stung by such male disregard, she told herself, not when she was at the cusp of such an exciting new life. She should take herself down a path where rejection was irrelevant in the face of purpose. This, Polly imagined, is what Marjorie might have done – or the Marjorie of her letters, at least.

  Her late aunt had given her a loaded gun, after all, and one day – perhaps one day very soon – Polly intended to fire it.

  4

  10 June 1940

  Polly as good as skipped down the Cambon stairs. It was extraordinary to her how quickly she’d come to feel at home in the Ritz. Not even a month had passed and yet she could have convinced herself she’d been living here far longer. At her elbow swung a somewhat bizarre, cylindrical-shaped box in the most startling shade of red. It was an impulse buy she’d purchased that morning from Madame Lanvin and she was keen to show it off.

  ‘Bonjour, Madame!’ Polly called out, spotting Mimi.

  The two griffons barked, and Mimi looked up from the Cambon lobby, where she had been running a finger along surfaces for dust. ‘Bonjour, Mademoiselle Polly. You look quite delectable. Like a blood orange sorbet.’

  ‘Do I, Madame?’ Polly was wearing another recent purchase, this one from Jacques Fath. It was a dress she particularly liked because, like the cylindrical box, she had chosen it on a shopping expedition unaccompanied by her guardians. It was an afternoon dress in a colour called bois de rose, with short puffed sleeves, a corselet waist, and a straight skirt, and it had a plain bust line that buttoned up through the centre. She had teamed it with a little bolero jacket. While it was true Polly didn’t feel wholly herself in clothes of such style and expense, she knew they helped her fit in this strange new world she now inhabited. Polly tried to make the cylindrical box hang just so at her elbow, but Mimi didn’t take the bait.

  ‘How have you been sleeping, my dear?’ the Ritz owner enquired.

  Polly considered this. ‘I suppose a little lightly, Madame.’

  This was like an axe blow to Mimi. ‘I shall order the mattress changed this very instant. Monsieur Claude!’ she called out, knowing that Auzello was at his desk all the way on the other side of the hotel.

  ‘It’s not the mattress – the mattress is lovely,’ Polly reassured her. ‘I’ve been sleeping restlessly because of all that’s going on. I can’t help thinking about it. Sometimes it keeps me awake.’

  ‘You make me confused,’ said Mimi. Then another thought occurred to her. ‘Are you in love, Polly?’

  Polly regretted what she’d started. ‘Of course, I’m not, Madame. The very idea.’

  ‘Hmmm,’ muttered Mimi, not entirely convinced. ‘At your age, you should be trying love on for size, you know. Just to see if you like it.’

  Polly stuck to the resolve she had made on her very first day in Paris. ‘I don’t like it and I know it already. There are too many other things of far more importance.’

  Mimi smiled. ‘More important than love?’

  Polly wanted to move on. ‘I mean the war, Madame.’

  Mimi pooh-poohed this. ‘Tell me, where are the bombs we were dreading? Where are the rampaging armies in the streets? There is nothing of war to be seen at all. It is simply posturing. And what have I said about the Ritz?’

  ‘Nothing changes,’ said Polly, by rote now.

  ‘Exactly. Now you will have a fresh mattress and I won’t be told otherwise.’ Mimi made her way with a wave towards the corridor of vitrines, and Polly went, somewhat gratefully, into the Cambon bar.

  ‘Bonjour, Guy!’ she called out as she entered.

  ‘Bonjour!’ he called back as she took up position, leaning her elbows on the chrome-heavy bar. ‘The usual, chérie?’ he asked.

  ‘Oh, well, I’m not sure.’ She glanced at her little wristwatch. ‘Isn’t it still a bit early?’

  Guy gave her a very droll look and started assembling the ingredients.

  By now, Polly had been thoroughly introduced to Monsieur Guy Martin, Head Bartender at the Cambon bar, and a font of much wisdom and fun. He was a Cambon bar fixture, and rather handsome for a man of fifty, but he was not, Polly suspected, using a phrase once employed by her aunt in her letters, ‘the romancing kind’. Although she wasn’t entirely sure quite what was involved, she knew this was a code for being homosexual. According to Lana Mae, Guy was thought to have an Algerian lover called Baptiste, who ran the Dress Circle bar at the Théâtre du Vieux-Colombier. Polly couldn’t help feeling sophisticated with this knowledge.

  It had been decided between them that Polly’s signature drink would be a Brandy Alexander. It came in a champagne glass – the wide, Marie Antoinette kind, not the flute – which meant it looked elegant when held in a feminine hand. It was a mixture of cognac, something else that sounded like ‘cocoa’, and cream. It was certainly delicious although Polly couldn’t get used to the idea of drinking cocktails in the way that the other guests drank them, as a preferred refreshment over coffee or tea.

  As Guy set to making the cocktail, he clocked the new red Lanvin box. ‘The shape of that thing’s unusual, chérie.’

  ‘Isn’t it?’ said Polly, pleased that someone had noticed her impulsive purchase. ‘And what do you suppose it is for?’

  ‘Your fancy little feminine bits and pieces, just like your Hermès bag?’

  ‘Wrong, Guy.’ She opened the cap at the top and then, with faux ceremony, tipped a gas mask onto the counter. The bag had been designed to fit it perfectly. ‘What do you think?’

  ‘Ingenious,’ said Guy. And then, somewhat slyly: ‘So, how much was it?’

  ‘Guy!’ Polly protested. ‘That is something one never asks.’

  He waited.

  ‘One hundred and eighty francs,’ whispered Polly, in due course.

  ‘Including the gas mask?’

  ‘I’d already been given that by Monsieur Auzello.’

  ‘Extortionate.’

  ‘That’s very unfair,’ Polly protested. ‘It’s by Lanvin. And gas masks are so ugly to carry around.’

  ‘Exclusively extortionate. Madame Lanvin must have seen you coming, chérie.’

  ‘Oh you,’ Polly said, as if dismissing this. ‘My late aunt’s instructions were very clear that I should be suitably wardrobed. I’m simply obeying her wishes.’

  ‘Let’s have a proper look at what you’ve got on today then,’ said Guy. ‘Give us a little twirl.’

  Polly stood back from the bar so that Guy could better see her, and duly spun on her heel.

  Guy whistled. ‘Ooh-la-la.’

  But he didn’t quite convince her, because she didn’t convince herself. Polly felt the clothes didn’t sit on her properly. It was like she was playing dress-ups.

  Polly watched him work. ‘This afternoon I thought I’d visit the French Red Cross,’ she said.

  ‘To volunteer?’

  ‘Yes, to do something worthwhile for the war effort. I can’t spend my life shopping and reading magazines – it’s an absurd way to live. What do you think?’

  Guy wrinkled his nose. ‘Can’t see you driving some ambulance in that little ensemble.’

  ‘Don’t be silly. This is only what I’ll wear for the interview. I don’t want to look too young.’

  Guy let that slide.

  ‘While I was outside earlier this
morning, I saw a newspaper headline that said men aged over forty are being called up now.’

  ‘Did you?’ said Guy, apparently not much interested.

  ‘Will that mean you get called up, too?’

  Guy paused, and then brought a hand up to pat at imagined tresses at the back of his neck. ‘It’s at moments like this I regret having told you my real age.’

  ‘You mean fifty’s still too old to be mobilised?’

  Guy narrowed his eyes, arch.

  To Polly’s mind it only sounded like he’d had a lucky escape if it was true. ‘People were being quite emotional on the street,’ she went on. ‘The crowds were almost chaotic around the metro stations. First at Concorde, and then, when I walked down the rue de Rivoli, just the same at Palais-Royal.’

  Guy was as indifferent to war worries as Mimi had been. ‘It’ll all blow over, chérie, you shouldn’t fret about it. You should be out enjoying yourself.’

  ‘There were lots of men carrying suitcases,’ she added, doggedly. ‘Wives and children were making goodbyes.’

  Guy just shrugged.

  ‘Oh, and the Louvre was still closed. It was so disappointing. I’m still yet to see any of the art. There were big lorries at the entrance. I think they might have been putting the paintings inside them.’

  ‘Want me to take you down to the hotel’s air raid shelter then?’ Guy said. ‘Just in case the Boches show up?’

  ‘I didn’t realise there was an air raid shelter?’

  ‘Oh, it’s very chic,’ said Guy. ‘Monsieur Auzello’s made the chaises longues more comfortable for longer stays by adding sleeping-bags purchased especially from Schiaparelli.’

  Polly wasn’t quite sure whether to believe him or not, yet knowing the Ritz, the existence of such a facility did not seem beyond the realms of possibility. ‘Maybe some other time.’

  Guy finished mixing the drink. ‘Here.’

  She longed now for a nice cup of tea instead. Yet she didn’t feel she could say so. ‘I shall have it at my table, thank you very much.’

  ‘Of course, you will,’ said Guy, before adding, under his breath, but not so far under that Polly wouldn’t hear it: ‘Anything for Mademoiselle de la Muck . . .’

  Polly just laughed.

  She took a seat at a little table in the corner that Guy had told her Cole Porter had once occupied, for days at a stretch, in 1934, where he wrote ‘Begin the Beguine’. Given that Polly had also once heard from another quarter that the lively Mr Porter had written the hit song when travelling on an ocean liner, she took the story with a grain of salt. Still, it didn’t hurt any to know that the famed American had occupied the same chair as her.

  As she sipped her cocktail, Polly became aware of a new staff member she’d first glimpsed a day earlier. A boy of around Polly’s own age, he was being ‘given’ to Guy at the bar. Blanche Auzello, sober today, was spending time carefully explaining what she wished him to learn in Guy’s care. Given Madame Auzello had no role in the hotel’s management, this was odd. Polly only picked up one or two words. The clearest was ‘nephew’.

  She observed the exchange as covertly as she could from her little table in the far corner. The young man was dressed in the hotel’s standard uniform for males who fell low in the hierarchy: black upon black, apart from the blinding white of his shirt, which was starched so much that it crackled. He wore it with a crisp white bow tie.

  It was his hair that most struck Polly, magnetic in its attraction, being almost impossibly blond, as if bleached in the Sahara, or by a life lived entirely at sea. It was not the sort of blond one often saw among the darker-haired men of Paris. If a woman of the city had sported such a hair colour, people would think she had dyed it. It was the hair of someone from another country.

  It was German hair.

  Blanche departed, and the young man was left looking expectantly at Guy, his hands placed behind his back. Guy at once corrected this and gave him a long white napkin which he was required to drape across his left arm, in which he would also carry a small tray. An apron was found, also in white and he was sent to clear tables.

  Polly realised with some astonishment that he was actually aware of her. She had seen him glance once in her direction, when he had first been brought into the bar, and Polly expected that to be the end of his interest. Yet he’d glanced at her again while Blanche had been talking, and his eyes had lingered upon her. He’d done a funny little head toss then, almost as if he was greeting her. This only left Polly confused.

  He now made his way around the room, picking up empty glasses and enquiring of patrons whether they wanted something more. One or two of them spoke to him, but not much. He was awkward and seemed out of his depth. Polly suspected that one of the things Guy had been asked to instruct him in was ‘charm’.

  Eventually, he came to her table.

  He picked up her empty Brandy Alexander glass and placed it on his tray.

  ‘Would Mademoiselle like something else?’ He did the head toss again.

  Before Polly thought to stop herself, she gave the same head toss back. This made both of them smile. Polly was free to look at him properly now. He was decidedly handsome, perhaps not conventionally so, for his looks weren’t those of a matinée idol’s, but he was striking all the same. His eyes were a soft, rich brown, which was slightly surprising, given that Polly had been imagining the sharpest of blues to go with his very blond hair. He was also quite tall – taller than the average French man – and lean. He looked to Polly as if he might do well in a running race.

  ‘Mademoiselle?’

  Polly realised she had let rather a lot of time slip by while she pondered him. ‘Sorry. I don’t know. I don’t think I should. It’s not even eleven yet.’ She made a confession. ‘I’m rather new to all this. I still don’t know if I’m a cocktail sort of person at all.’

  He blinked. ‘As you wish.’ He made as if to leave her and then didn’t move at all.

  Polly’s confusion increased. Was he seeking a conversation? ‘Who are you?’ she asked him, for want of anything else.

  ‘I’m Tommy, Mademoiselle.’ He waited and smiled at her.

  Polly had learned enough about French politeness to know that no hand may be shaken unless the other person offers it first. She did so, although she wasn’t sure if this was the done thing between a hotel guest and a member of staff who was not of Monsieur Auzello’s rank. She felt unexpectedly captivated at pressing her skin to his. His hand was wide and long-fingered, soft, and very clean.

  ‘And who are you?’ he asked.

  Polly quite liked his disregard of formality. Such a question had never been asked of her by any member of staff, either because they already knew who she was, or because they couldn’t expect to know. ‘I’m Polly,’ she told him, ‘Polly Hartford.’

  ‘You’re not French?’ he asked, even though they were speaking it.

  ‘No,’ she told him. ‘I’m from Australia.’

  ‘Oh?’

  She could see him thinking that he’d never met someone who wasn’t from the same hemisphere as himself. She suspected it made her exotic.

  ‘I don’t think you’re from Paris either,’ said Polly. ‘Is that a slight accent you have? Alsatian perhaps?’ She had heard that Frenchmen from that region often seemed foreign to other French ears. To ask if a person was ‘Alsatian’ in these times was a better word to use than ‘German’.

  ‘I am sort of Hungarian,’ he told her, uncomfortable. ‘My full name is Tomas Harsanyi.’

  It was her turn to be struck by the exotic. ‘Sort of?’

  He didn’t elaborate. ‘I’m fully a French citizen.’

  ‘I see.’

  She glanced to the bar and saw that Guy was glancing back at her. Any second, she knew, he would order Tommy to stop gossiping with guests and start working again. Yet, the order didn’t come. Guy went back to mixing cocktails for other patrons.

  He clearly wanted her and Tommy to talk. She couldn’t ask Tommy to take a
seat with her, however, for that would have been a step too far in staff–guest relations, if not for her, then certainly for Claude Auzello, should he have walked in. So, she remained in Cole Porter’s chair, while Tommy remained standing.

  ‘You’ve not been called up?’ she asked him.

  ‘Not yet,’ said Tommy. ‘I’m still seventeen.’

  ‘Oh? I’m sixteen,’ she told him. ‘I had my birthday in March.’

  ‘Yes?’

  She almost wondered if he’d wish her a late happy birthday, but he didn’t. Yet he seemed to want to continue the conversation. ‘Have you worked at the Ritz very long?’ Polly asked, already knowing the answer.

  ‘No. This is my second day.’

  ‘You’re doing very well,’ she said, encouragingly. ‘It can’t be easy, learning so many new things. I’m sure I’d be quite hopeless at it.’

  ‘I am Madame Auzello’s nephew,’ he told her, without having been asked. ‘She is an American, but she also has Hungarian blood.’

  ‘I see.’ She wasn’t sure why he wanted her to know this specifically.

  He now seemed to be searching for something else to say. ‘Your clothes,’ he said, finally, ‘they are very new on you.’

  ‘Oh! How nice.’ Then it occurred to her this wasn’t exactly a compliment.

  A blush came to his face. ‘I’m sorry,’ he told her. ‘I didn’t mean to say something like that.’

  ‘But you did say it.’ She decided she wasn’t offended, as she smoothed her skirt in her chair and adjusted her bolero jacket. ‘I don’t feel very comfortable with haute couture yet, and I don’t know if I ever will. Honestly, you wouldn’t believe what people are expected to pay. And apparently, I must expect to make some terrible fashion mistakes to begin with. That’s according to my guardian Alexandrine.’