Wild Lavender

by Belinda Alexandra

  TWENTY-THREE

  Camille had returned from Germany in 1930, when the film industry converted to sound and she couldn’t get away with mouthing words any more. Whenever we bumped into each other at premieres and balls, we always said that we would catch up, but never did. That was, until the summer of 1935 when Camille was renting a villa in Cannes with her lover, Vincenzo Zavotto, of the Italian shipping family. She invited André and me to stay there in August.

  ‘I have never understood why you have anything to do with Camille Casal,’ groaned André when I told him about the invitation. ‘She is so condescending when she speaks to you, it is like watching a cat torture a mouse.’

  André’s viewpoint surprised me. Was that how he saw us? When I was younger I had idolised Camille, but our relationship had changed over the years. My success had put us on a more even footing, although we were more like colleagues than friends. I would never confide in Camille the way I did Odette.

  ‘I have known her for years,’ I said. ‘She got me my first part with the Casino de Paris. I would be embarrassed to refuse her now.’

  ‘As you wish,’ he said, running his fingers through my hair. ‘I am happy to go with you. But be careful of her. She has a reputation of being a snake.’

  André wasn’t saying anything about Camille that I hadn’t heard from other people. Her aloofness and opportunism hadn’t won her many friends. But I knew about her daughter, and that made me interpret her motives differently. If I had given birth to an illegitimate child I would have had a family to help me. Camille had no one. She had been generous to me; I didn’t think it was asking so much to be her friend, at least socially.

  The contrast between the blue of the bay in Cannes and the white-walled villa on the hillside reminded me of the two colours I had always associated with Provence. Camille and Vincenzo were sunning themselves by the pool when André drove the car up the gravel driveway. Vincenzo, hair slicked back and bronzed all over, leapt up to greet us. Camille slunk after him.

  Vincenzo introduced himself in an affected French accent. He was a playboy from head to toe with his square sunglasses, belted swimming shorts and manicured feet. But he was likeable nonetheless when he flashed his pearly smile. I had heard that Camille still carried a torch for the War Ministry official, and only saw Vincenzo to keep herself amused.

  Camille called the maid to bring us a drink. ‘You must be exhausted from the heat,’ she said. ‘I’m surprised that you decided to drive.’

  ‘We took our time,’ said André. ‘We had a few rest stops along the way.’

  ‘Very wise,’ said Vincenzo. ‘Come, have a seat. The maid will show you the rooms afterwards.’

  We sat down at a table by the pool. The maid brought us glasses of Pernod. The aniseed flavour coated my tongue and took me back to Marseilles 1923, with me and Bonbon walking past the cafés of the Canebière. Bonbon was old now and her companions, Olly and Chocolat, were gone. Camille slipped off her sunglasses and rubbed her eyes. She was still beautiful but she was showing signs of age. Her skin wasn’t pure cream any more; there were freckles on her cheeks and lines around her eyes. But to my mind, she was still the ultimate screen goddess.

  After dinner that evening, Camille fell asleep in the armchair. ‘She’s had too much sun,’ grinned Vincenzo. ‘You two should take a walk on the beach.’

  After driving the past few days, the thought of stretching our legs was tempting and we rallied to his suggestion.

  ‘Smell this air,’ I said to André, running across the lukewarm sand to the water. The waves bubbled like frothy milk around my ankles. ‘And look at the sunset. It is so beautiful! I am sure that dusk in the south of France lasts longer than anywhere else.’

  André stood behind me and put his arms around my shoulders. ‘It’s nice to be like this, isn’t it? To be out in the open space.’

  ‘It is,’ I agreed. ‘It reminds me of the first trip we made on the île de France.’

  He pressed his cheek against mine. ‘Simone, I will be thirty in December. When we return to Paris, I am going to tell my father that we are getting married.’

  I turned around and looked at him. ‘Do you think he will give us his blessing?’

  He kissed me lingeringly. ‘Everyone knows that he will. He knows he will. I have chosen a beautiful and intelligent woman who speaks several languages and is an elegant hostess. You are three rungs higher than any of the daughters of his friends. The fact that you also love and understand me will make me a better businessman and a good father.’ André rested his chin on my shoulder. ‘He and the whole of Tout-Paris know that there has been no other woman except you.’

  I turned back to the ocean. So this was it? How quickly life was changing! I had loved my time in the music hall and films but I couldn’t go on at that pace for ever. I was almost twenty-seven and I wanted at least four children. I imagined tiny pairs of hands reaching up to mine and four upturned faces, two girls and two boys.

  ‘I have already told my mother,’ André said.

  ‘What did she say?’

  ‘She said that we should look for a house.’

  The sun seemed to stop in its tracks and the water around my feet rippled away. ‘Really?’

  ‘Maybe in Neuilly or Les Vésinet. Somewhere we can have a garden but not too far from the city.’

  So our patience and faithfulness had paid off. Monsieur Blanchard could not deny us the happiness we had earned. I smiled, thinking how wonderful it would be to finally live with André as man and wife. I had loved him ardently for all the years we had been together, but sometimes I’d had doubts that Monsieur Blanchard would really agree to our marriage. And yet, somehow, it had worked out. I was going to be André’s wife at last.

  André slept late the following morning, while I was wide awake before breakfast. I looked out the window at the teal blue ocean and was pleased to see Camille sitting by the pool, watching Vincenzo swim his laps.

  ‘You look as happy as a cat that has just caught a bird,’ said Camille, glancing up from her deckchair when I stepped onto the patio.

  ‘André and I are getting married,’ I said, forgetting André’s warning to be wary of her. We had waited long enough; I wanted to announce the good news to everybody.

  Camille looked startled, as if I had somehow insulted her. ‘He asked you?’

  I nodded. She turned her eyes towards the pool. ‘Are you sure? He might love you but I don’t see how his parents will approve. Those kinds of families marry for power.’ Her voice was dry and hard. I hesitated, not sure how to react to her less than enthusiastic response.

  ‘They have known for years,’ I said. ‘André’s mother adores me and his father said if we were still together when André turned thirty, he would give us his blessing.’

  Camille looked unconvinced. She cast her eyes over me, taking in my figure and clothes. I felt like a young girl standing before the headmistress. I was telling the truth but she made me feel as if I were lying. I realised that I was gaining what Camille had always wanted but never found: someone to give her and her daughter security. She had been ahead of me in every step in life, but in this one thing I was the winner.

  ‘Has Monsieur Blanchard formally given permission? Has he made a public announcement?’ she asked.

  I shook my head. ‘All that will happen when André and I return to Paris.’

  Camille’s face settled into a more serene expression but something lingered in her eyes. ‘Do what you want,’ she said, lying back in the deckchair and slipping on her sunglasses. ‘I just wanted to warn you that I know about those kinds of families. I can only predict things ending badly for you, even if they do let you marry him.’

  I realised a rift had opened between us. Camille was not used to having anything less than the upper hand in our relationship. But now that I was about to marry André I felt more secure and less needy for her approval. I shrugged and turned to walk down to the beach. I would be alone with my happiness if Camille would
not share it. But I could not shrug off the chill of premonition in her words.

  As soon as we returned to Paris, André and I embarked on our search for a house. We marked our territory on a map and learnt the street names by heart. I kept my ‘film work hours’ but used them to contact real estate agents and inspect houses. We enlisted the help of Odette and Joseph, who we intended to put in charge of decorating and furnishing the house. The four of us travelled around Neuilly together. Paul Derval had suggested that we stick to street and house names with thirteen letters for good luck, but we let Kira be our guide. When we arrived at a house I set her down by the gate. If she lifted her tail and ambled inside, sniffing the path and following her nose to the house, then we continued too. If she didn’t, there was no point in going any further.

  ‘You will like this one,’ said Joseph one morning as he drove us along a tree-lined street. ‘The exterior and the garden are perfect. I will have the interior stripped out to create something beautiful for you.’

  We pulled up outside a house with oatmeal-coloured walls and white shutters and columns. The garden was overgrown with lilac and wild rose.

  ‘It is peaceful,’ I said.

  I placed Kira near the gate where she hesitated a moment, sniffing the air. She was getting matronly in her middle age and stubborn. But then she moved forward and sauntered down the path to the front door. We cheered.

  ‘The interior colours are hideous,’ said Odette, while Joseph slipped the key into the lock. ‘Ignore them. Think of the layout.’

  The entrance way was powder blue with gilt detailing and a black and white tiled floor. A chair sat in the corner with some dusty books scattered around it.

  ‘Imagine it all in beige and white,’ said Odette, leading us into the drawing room. ‘With natural wood, sleek lines and a couple of Directoire pieces and Japanese vases mixed to give it a soft touch.’

  ‘I like the sound of that,’ André said as we climbed the stairs to the upper floor.

  Joseph threw open some double doors and led us into a light-filled room with a marble fireplace and bay windows. ‘The master bedroom.’

  ‘It’s huge,’ I said. ‘And it looks over the main garden.’

  Joseph and André wandered down the hallway, opening the doors to the other rooms, while Odette and I circled the master bedroom and imagined the possibilities.

  ‘Jean-Michel Frank made me a suite with dark wood and ivory upholstery,’ said Odette. ‘Something like that would look good in here.’

  ‘Simone, come quickly!’ called André from downstairs. Odette and I found the men in a room with French doors looking out onto the garden. André turned to me. ‘Wouldn’t this make a wonderful music room? Or a room for dancing? We could put in a polished floor and…voilÀ!’ he said, sweeping his arms into a waltz pose. Kira appeared from under a table, pranced across the floor and pushed on the doors before running out into the garden.

  ‘Can you get it fixed up by the end of the year?’ I asked Joseph.

  ‘Of course,’ he said, folding his arms and surveying the room. ‘I would be delighted.’

  André and I smiled at each other. All that remained was to tell Monsieur Blanchard formally, which André intended to do the following month when he and his father travelled to Portugal on business.

  I reduced my performing engagements and put my energy into the house instead. There was little structural work to be done, so the decorating progressed quickly. Odette’s colour scheme for the interior—butterscotch, vanilla, toffee, cocoa and cream—was so delicious-looking that sometimes I was tempted to lick the walls. The tones would ‘warm up’ the modern furniture which was to be finished in tortoiseshell, bronze and leather.

  One afternoon, Odette and I were sitting on the terrace, mapping out designs for the garden. We wouldn’t do much to it until the spring, but with the house well on the way to being finished we wanted to keep going.

  ‘A visitor is here to see you, Mademoiselle,’ my maid, Paulette, announced.

  ‘Who?’

  ‘Madame Fontaine.’

  I glanced at Odette. ‘André’s sister.’ I told Paulette to show Guillemette to the terrace and to make us some tea.

  ‘Should I leave?’ asked Odette.

  I shook my head. ‘She didn’t make an appointment with me so why should you go? Besides, she is a dragon. I don’t want to face her alone. I’m sure she is here to say something nasty about the house.’

  Paulette returned with Guillemette. She had three sons now and motherhood had not improved her figure or her temperament. She barely waited for Paulette to retreat and for me to introduce Odette before she pointed an accusing finger at me and blustered, ‘So you think you have won, do you?’

  ‘What do you mean?’ I asked her.

  She took a step closer, trying to intimidate me. She was powerfully built but I was taller and I disliked her too much to be threatened by her. ‘You think you can wheedle your way into my family and drag us all down to your level.’

  Odette let out a shocked hiss.

  ‘I haven’t wheedled my way into your family—’

  ‘You intend to marry my brother, do you not?’ she spat, making a gesture towards the house. ‘It looks to me as if that is your plan.’

  I folded my arms. I remembered the way Guillemette had treated my mother and it infuriated me as much as if it had happened a moment ago. André and I had been happy together for ten years. Yes, I had made my career as a performer, but I had never danced naked. André was the only man I had ever been with. I had enough money of my own not to need any of the Blanchard family fortune. I simply wanted to marry the man I loved.

  ‘That,’ I said, ‘is none of your business.’

  Guillemette’s eyes turned red. Her face became so flushed I thought she might burst into flames. ‘It is very much my business,’ she screeched. ‘I have three sons and I do not intend for them to have an immoral aunt. I have tolerated you long enough as André’s companion but I will certainly not tolerate you as his wife.’

  Odette stood up. ‘Madame Fontaine, if you cannot speak calmly and with civility, I suggest you leave,’ she said.

  Odette’s poise in the face of Guillemette’s hysteria reminded me of those fairytales where a beautiful princess must match her wits against a wicked witch. Guillemette accused me of base behaviour, but Odette had shown her that the only vulgar person was Guillemette herself.

  When Guillemette realised that she could not frighten us, she turned to leave. Before she did, however, she pointed her finger at me again. She was about to speak but stopped herself. Her face broke into a smile. She pushed past Paulette, who was stepping out onto the terrace with a tray, and stormed through the house. A few minutes later we heard a car motor start.

  ‘Mon Dieu,’ said Odette. ‘I have never met anyone like that in my life.’

  But I couldn’t respond. I had been too unnerved by Guillemette’s smile.

  On the day that André was due to return from Portugal I sat in the drawing room all afternoon, waiting for the sound of his car. I had received a telegram from him to say that he had arrived safely, but after that had heard nothing. He returned after nightfall, the car wheels crunching on the gravel and the headlights glinting through the window. I rushed to the door to meet him, and wrapped my arms around his waist, cowering against the stinging wind.

  ‘It is blowing a gale,’ he said, stepping into the hall and bringing a swirl of leaves and twigs with him. He handed his coat and hat to Paulette.

  ‘Come on,’ I said. ‘There is a fire in the drawing room. I will get you a drink.’

  André looked up at the ceiling then dropped his gaze to the walls and furnishings. ‘These chairs,’ he said, running his hands over the leather, ‘they’re fantastic. They make you want to sink into them.’

  ‘Please do.’ I handed him a glass of cognac. ‘I can’t wait to show you the rest of the house. All the main rooms are finished.’

  ‘After dinner,’ he said, taking a
sip from his glass. ‘I didn’t eat on the train.’

  ‘Well, after dinner then.’

  I looked at André more closely. He was smiling but there was something else…a tension in his eyes.

  ‘André, what happened?’ I asked, kneeling by his side. ‘Don’t keep me in suspense.’

  He stared at me, distracted. I had brought his thoughts back from miles away. It is because he is tired, I persuaded myself. Not because his father has changed his mind. No; André would have telephoned or written to me straightaway if that were the case. I had told him about Guillemette’s visit before he left for Portugal and he had laughed it off. ‘Guillemette reacts hysterically to everything. I’ve never known my father to pay attention to her,’ he’d said.

  ‘Let me show you the master bedroom,’ I said. ‘Then you can see the other rooms tomorrow after you’ve had a rest.’

  I led him up the stairs, pointing out the mirrors and furniture Joseph, Odette and I had chosen. Although he was enthusiastic about each piece, he also seemed to be growing more miserable with each step. The fireplace in the bedroom was lit and Kira was curled on a rug in front of it. André stepped towards her. Whenever she saw him, Kira would roll over on her back so he could scratch her stomach. André bent down to her but stopped halfway and slid to the floor as if he had been shot. I rushed towards him. He was holding his face in his hands, crying.

  ‘What is the matter?’ I asked, cradling him in my arms.

  André rubbed his face and stared at me. ‘I love you,’ he said. ‘I want us to be together for ever.’

  A gust of wind blew through the trees outside the window and somewhere I heard a branch snap.

  André’s face twisted. He pressed his wet cheek against my throat. ‘It’s all right,’ I said. ‘What happened? Did your father refuse?’

  ‘It is worse than that,’ he said, standing up and stumbling to the window. ‘He says that if I go ahead and marry you, he will banish me from the family.’