The Designer

by Marius Gabriel

  Suzy seemed amused. ‘If you say so.’

  Watching the two of them in some trepidation, Copper was reminded of Dior’s comment that they could be sisters. He was right. They had the same statuesque bearing, the same athleticism. Even their faces were alike, narrow and handsome, with perfect white teeth. The difference was that where Suzy was on the right side of that invisible line that marks a woman’s youth, Yvonne was clearly on the wrong side.

  ‘And how was your tea?’ Yvonne asked, turning to Copper. ‘Did you have the rose-scented macarons? And the vol-au-vents? They say they’re chicken, but alas, they are rabbit.’

  ‘I like rabbit,’ Copper replied.

  Yvonne inspected her disdainfully. ‘And someone has doused you in My Sin, it seems.’

  ‘She has that flawless Irish complexion and hair.’ Suzy took Copper’s arm and turned her to the light. ‘That bloom of youth. Look at her. There’s really nothing to match it, is there? The skin of a young woman is the most exquisite fabric there is.’

  ‘And the most short-lived,’ Yvonne retorted. ‘It doesn’t last long.’

  ‘Oh, quite. And once it is lost, it is gone forever.’ Suzy touched the other woman’s face with gloved fingers in a gesture that would have been compassionate, but for Suzy’s cruel smile. ‘Although, of course, you don’t mind that, being an antiquarian. The older things are, the better you like them, n’est-ce pas?’ She laughed merrily. ‘If it doesn’t have cobwebs in every nook and cranny, you turn up your nose in disgust.’

  Yvonne forced a laugh. ‘How witty you are. Are you still performing in that club of yours?’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘I do hope you can win the épuration round. One hears that they take a dim view of those who were too friendly with the Germans.’

  ‘I will take my chances with the épuration. In my experience, all men in uniform are much the same, whatever language they speak.’

  ‘I would hate to hear of you going to prison,’ Yvonne shot back, her eyes gleaming. ‘You wouldn’t enjoy it, despite your fondness for men in uniform. And you would miss your treats. Your little rabbit vol-au-vents, and so forth.’

  ‘Don’t worry about me. I have always made my own way in life.’

  ‘Not always,’ Yvonne said quietly.

  ‘Well, I do so now.’ A well-dressed couple had come into the shop and were inspecting an Empire chaise longue. ‘Don’t neglect your customers, Yvonne. A bientôt, my dear.’

  ‘Do drop in again, any time you have nothing better to do.’

  ‘You may count on it.’

  The two women kissed, careful not to actually touch rouged mouths to each other’s cheeks. Suzy put her arm through Copper’s possessively as they walked out.

  On the pavement outside, Copper pulled away from her angrily. ‘So that’s why you dressed me up so carefully today. To show me off like a pet poodle.’

  ‘Perhaps there was some such thought in my mind,’ Suzy said tranquilly. She was looking pleased with herself. ‘But you are hardly a poodle, chérie.’

  ‘Whatever I am, I’m not your possession. I was absolutely mortified in there.’

  ‘Why should you be mortified?’

  ‘Because you only took me in there to discomfort that woman.’

  ‘You asked to meet her.’

  ‘I didn’t!’

  ‘I must have mistaken your curiosity, then.’

  ‘You were horrible to her.’

  ‘Was I?’

  ‘At your worst.’

  ‘I think you exaggerate. Yvonne and I understand one another very well.’

  ‘You were practically at each other’s throats.’

  ‘Perhaps. But were we to forgive one another, we might both find life somewhat duller.’

  ‘So you take all your conquests in there to show them off?’

  ‘Don’t be silly.’

  ‘You do. I can see it in your face.’

  Suzy was laughing at her. ‘Of course I want to show you off. You are beautiful. And you are mine.’

  ‘I’m not yours,’ Copper snapped. ‘I’m going home.’

  ‘Copper, don’t go.’

  ‘Don’t call me again.’

  Copper was deeply offended. The episode had left her feeling used and acutely embarrassed. On her way home, she tried to work out why it had been quite so distasteful. It wasn’t just the mortification of being paraded like some creature on a leash; it was the feeling that she had been no more than a dart hurled in a battle between two middle-aged women. It was all very well to be Suzy’s friend, but not if that meant she became a pet – with a pet’s loss of dignity. There was something suffocating, too, about her pampering. She couldn’t wait to get Suzy’s clothes off.

  She reached the apartment in a temper, to find Pearl nursing a spectacular black eye.

  ‘What the hell happened to you?’ Copper demanded.

  ‘I walked into a door.’

  ‘Walked into a fist, you mean. And I know whose.’ She examined Pearl’s face angrily. The bruise extended from the swollen eye right across Pearl’s cheek, fading from violet to yellow. ‘How can you keep going back to that bastard?’

  ‘What about you, Copper Pot?’ Pearl said wearily. ‘She’s got you dressed up in her cast-offs. And drenched in her perfume. What’s that for – to cover the smell of cat?’

  Copper escaped to her room and changed out of Suzy’s silk outfit. Her wardrobe was starting to fill with Suzy’s gifts. One couldn’t really call them cast-offs – most were fine Lanvin designs no more than a few months old – but they all carried something of Suzy on them. Where another woman’s dresses might have smelled of her favourite perfume, Suzy’s clothes had a hint of her body. Under the arms, they smelled of Suzy’s musk, bringing emotions flooding back into Copper’s mind. She wondered whether Pearl wasn’t right in her dire warnings that this relationship with Suzy would change her forever. It probably would. But perhaps she wanted to change. What else was life all about?

  She was in her shabby old dressing gown when the knock came. It was Christian Dior, carrying a little white dog under one arm.

  ‘It’s Jacinthe,’ he said apologetically when he’d been admitted and was settled in front of the stove with a glass of red wine. ‘Bébé’s dog. She’s been locked in his studio all this time. Poor little thing, she’s almost starved to death. He’d left food and water, but it obviously ran out. I wondered whether you could look after her? Until Bébé is back with us?’

  Copper took the trembling little animal, feeling the fragile, birdlike bones under the matted curls. ‘Of course I’ll take her.’

  Copper took Jacinthe to the bathroom to wash her. She was in a pathetic state, her fur knotted and filthy, and her eyes rolling in distress. She also smelled awful. Dior came to sit with Copper and observed as she gently lathered the small dog.

  ‘How is Bébé?’ she asked.

  He sighed. ‘They won’t let me see him yet. But I’ve been through these cures before with him and it’s terribly hard. He gets very ill. Last time, he almost died.’

  ‘Oh, Tian! What a tragedy.’

  ‘Yes. He is the most brilliant person I know. But with Bébé, there are no half-measures. He can’t stop until he’s completely shattered, whether it’s work or play. He simply pours himself out. The rest of us eke out our talents in a miserly fashion because we know how limited they are.’ Dior leaned on the edge of the tub. His face, shiny with steam from Jacinthe’s bath, was melancholy. ‘I don’t think he can last much longer.’

  ‘Don’t say that.’

  ‘I can’t lose any more people I love, Copper. It’s too much.’ He wiped his tears and swallowed a gulp of his wine. ‘Thank you for taking Jacinthe. You’re so kind. I would take her myself, but every time I see her, I start crying.’

  ‘It’s no problem,’ she replied gently. She understood Dior’s sensitivity much more now.

  Jacinthe appeared to have rolled in linseed oil which had dried, and she had to concentrate on di
sentangling the fine fur.

  ‘May I ask,’ Dior enquired carefully, ‘where your Russian gentleman has gone?’

  ‘He’s away on business.’

  ‘One hears that his business is somewhat delicate, yes? You must be worried about him.’

  ‘I’m worried to death,’ she confessed, ‘but it doesn’t do me any good.’

  ‘How are things with Suzy?’

  ‘Sometimes she’s delightful, other times I feel like strangling her. Today I felt like strangling her.’ She gave Dior a brief résumé of the Yvonne episode.

  Dior grimaced. ‘I’m afraid that Suzy is not discreet.’

  ‘She treated me like a possession. But I don’t belong to her. I’m not even a lesbian.’ Seeing Dior’s raised eyebrows, she exclaimed, ‘I hate the word, to be honest with you. Why does it have to be used at all? Why should we be put into boxes in this way?’

  ‘Because for one thing, as we have already discussed, being a lesbian is Suzy’s profession. And for another, if we are not put into boxes, the rest of the world does not know what to do with us. Besides, the very fact that you claim not to be a lesbian means that there must surely be such a category for you not to belong to.’

  ‘I thought you were supposed to be bad at logic,’ she replied dryly.

  ‘I never made such a claim. I am a logical man.’ Jacinthe was now as clean as could be achieved without drowning her, and he helped Copper lift the trembling animal out of the water and wrap her in a towel. ‘I have spent most of my life being acutely ashamed of what I am,’ he said in a low voice. ‘I have endured agonies, as many men like me must. I would not wish you to endure the same agonies.’

  ‘Pearl says men will always be disgusted by me if they know what I’ve done.’

  ‘I think men are far more likely to accept a woman who loves women than a man who loves men. In fact, it’s exciting to many men, which is how Suzy makes her living.’

  ‘I don’t understand that.’

  Dior was drying the little dog’s ears and muzzle with the care of a mother. ‘You women can do as you please with each other and it’s charming and inconsequential.’

  ‘Inconsequential!’

  ‘It’s simply beauty seeking a reflection. There’s an innocence about it. Like children at play.’

  ‘Tian,’ she exclaimed. ‘In some ways you understand women very well. But in others – well!’

  He raised his hands in mock surrender. ‘You’re right, you’re right. I’ll stick to my dresses.’

  Not hearing anything from Henry was very difficult. Though Henry refused to talk about his work, Copper was certain that he was in danger. As he had predicted, newly liberated France was being ravaged by strikes and sabotage. Rioting broke out almost every week as the police attempted to get strike-breaking workers past the picket lines. Communist saboteurs, apparently under the impression that the Lille–Paris Express was being used to carry troops, derailed the train at Arras. In the horrendous crash that followed, dozens were seriously hurt and sixteen were killed. The streets of Paris filled with armed police. The government assured the country that the situation was being contained. But nobody knew what was really going on beneath the surface.

  As the violence intensified – and harsh weather returned, with blizzards and a coal shortage – Copper’s worries about Henry grew darker. His silence turned from a relief into a daily, hourly worry that gnawed at her. She was constantly aware of mingled anger and anxiety churning in her stomach. How could he just vanish like this? If he loved her as he said he did, how could he treat her this way?

  Unless – and this thought terrified her – he’d been captured or killed. The more she tried to push the idea away, the more it pressed in on her. He’d told her he was gathering intelligence about the communists, but the truth was that she had no real idea what he did, or who he was fighting. Had he been captured? Or had he been put up against a wall and shot?

  Or was she wasting her sympathy and had he simply tired of her and found a less troublesome, more compliant playmate? That thought was excruciating in a different way.

  He didn’t strike her as the sort of man who would propose marriage when all he wanted was a roll in the hay. But then, she’d been desperately wrong about a man before, hadn’t she?

  Some people might say she’d played hard-to-get with Henry. Perhaps he’d felt she was being false. Perhaps he’d grown disgusted with her.

  On a Sunday morning, while the church bells of Paris were still ringing, Copper was roused from her bed by a trembling Dior, his eyes staring from a white face.

  ‘I’ve had a call. It’s my sister. She’s alive.’ He clutched at her. ‘She’s coming home.’

  The news had come from the Red Cross. The prison where Catherine had been held had been liberated by the Russians. A pitiful handful of survivors had been found. The rest had been massacred by the SS, starved or frozen to death. But Catherine, as Madame Delahaye had always predicted, had survived. She was one of the first to be sent home. She would be on a refugee train arriving the following morning at the Gare de l’Est.

  All this Dior told her in a state of trembling excitement as they left the apartment together. ‘We must prepare her room,’ he said. ‘And eggs. We need eggs!’

  ‘Why eggs?’ Copper asked, half-laughing at his earnestness.

  ‘To make her a cheese soufflé. It’s her favourite dish; she will expect it. And they say she is thin. We’ll need to feed her up. A cheese soufflé is the most nourishing of dishes, you know. We always had it when we were sick as children.’

  ‘All right, we’ll find some eggs.’

  ‘And flowers. We need flowers!’

  They raced around Paris. Eggs, butter and milk were still scarce in the city. Only a few shops could obtain them, and there were long queues at all of these. They waited in line at two, Dior beside himself with anxiety and frustration, only to be told after an interminable procession to the counter that none were available.

  At the third, however, they struck lucky, and were able to buy six precious eggs and a pat of butter; and at the fourth, a small jug of milk and a piece of cheese just big enough to make a soufflé.

  ‘She was right,’ Dior kept repeating. ‘Delahaye was right. They all tried to tell me Catherine was dead. But Delahaye knew. She knew. I’m going to cover that woman with gold.’

  At the market on the Île de la Cité, under the shadow of Notre-Dame, they found spring flowers for sale.

  ‘Those won’t all fit in her room,’ Copper warned Dior, who had gathered armfuls.

  ‘Then we’ll put them all around the apartment,’ he replied, barely visible behind the bouquets. She was half-expecting him to buy one of the little birds that were also on sale, hopping and chirping anxiously in tiny cages.

  Together, they prepared Catherine’s room. Dior lit the stove to start warming up the air. Copper prepared the bed, making it as pretty and warm as she could. There were not enough vases for all the flowers Dior had bought, so he had to run downstairs to his neighbour to borrow a couple more. He kept bursting out laughing with sheer joy, or exclaiming aloud. It was indeed a miracle. As the full horror of the Nazi extermination machine had been revealed to the world, it had seemed less and less likely that Catherine could possibly have survived. After all, millions, as they now knew, had died, either killed out of hand or worked to death in the appalling conditions of the camps.

  ‘I am trying to find Hervé, her fiancé. He must be told she’s coming back. Oh, I won’t be able to sleep tonight,’ Dior said, when the place was finally to his satisfaction. ‘How will I close my eyes?’

  ‘You must try,’ Copper said gently.

  In the event, it was she who could not sleep, imagining the joy of the reunion to come the next day. Dior had passed a year of the utmost anxiety since Catherine’s arrest; and what Catherine had passed through, God alone knew. The little clairvoyant had been right, after all, however. Catherine Dior was alive. And that was all that mattered.

 
; Eleven

  The Red Cross train was due in at nine in the morning, having set off from Germany the previous day. The Gare de l’Est, like all Paris stations these days, was crowded with troops and civilians passing through Paris from all parts of Europe. It was a rainy day and a dim light filtered through the vast barrel roof of steel girders and dirty glass, barely reaching the depths of the echoing station below, where crowds heaved to and fro in abysmal confusion.

  Dior was in a pitiable state, trembling with nerves and filled with apprehensions. ‘What if she has missed her train?’ he kept asking. ‘What if she was taken ill? What if we miss her in this dreadful mob?’ He was carrying a bouquet of roses, which in his agitation he was almost crushing against his chest. ‘What if—’

  ‘None of those things will happen,’ Copper said, determinedly steering him towards the right platform. ‘Look where you are going, Tian!’ He had almost been run down by a porter pushing a trolley piled six feet high with trunks.

  The train was late. They waited among a group of people in a similar state of anxiety to their own, seething around the group of Red Cross officials who were obliged to keep repeating that yes, the train was coming, that yes, delays were normal in these times, and that no, nobody had been left behind. Now and then, someone would dart to the very edge of the platform in order to peer down the line and be chased back by an elderly stationmaster.

  At last, approaching mid-morning, a singing of the steel tracks announced that a train was coming. A cheer went up. The train trudged with painful slowness into the station, as though the journey had been too much for it and its wheels were hurting. It came to a halt at last. Clouds of steam, released from the boiler, poured from the locomotive, condensing on everything. Dior was clutching Copper’s hand as the doors began to clatter open and figures, dimly visible in the billowing steam, emerged from the compartments.

  The Red Cross officials had erected a barrier to keep the crowds away from the passengers. This arrangement was causing much anger. People were calling to their relatives and trying to reach those they could recognise. The officials were steadfast. The refugees were to be released to their families one by one, their names ticked off on lists.