by Muriel Zagha
As for Raoul, he was, in many ways, being a model guest. He ate of everything, hugely. He had sweetly refrained from comment when Daisy’s father had brought out a bottle of Australian wine. He had sat in quiet, respectful bewilderment throughout the Queen’s speech. He had pulled crackers and even worn a party hat.
There were one or two niggles, however. Like that mildly embarrassing moment this morning when Daisy’s mother had walked into her daughter’s room to find her lying naked on her duvet while Raoul, also naked on the bed – but mercifully with his back to the door – was engaged in making a sketch of her.
‘Oh, whoops, sorry!’ Daisy’s mother had squeaked, hastily closing the door.
Daisy, who knew her mother well, had thought it best to go on with the day as though nothing had happened. Unfortunately, she had neglected to explain this to Raoul, who took it upon himself to say courteously, in the middle of Christmas dinner, ‘I hope we did not shock you earlier, Madame.’
Daisy’s mother stared at him wide-eyed and said, ‘Oh no, no! Of course not.’
‘Why? What happened?’ Daisy’s father asked jovially, passing the bread sauce around. Daisy’s father approved of Raoul because the Frenchman understood sports. Having grown up in the south-west of France, Raoul had played a lot of rugby in his youth and remained a devotee of the ballon ovale. The two men had talked at length of various episodes in the last Tournoi des Cinq Nations.
Daisy’s mother gave a little laugh. ‘Nothing, darling. Nothing happened.’
Raoul turned to face Daisy’s father and said, smiling wolfishly, ‘Yes, it was nothing. Your wife came in while I was drawing Daisy.’
‘Ah yes, Daisy told us she’d become a bit of an artist’s model in Paris. It sounds like good fun.’
‘Daisy has a magnificent body. It is a pleasure to draw her.’
‘Ha ha, well, she’s our little girl. Naturally we think she’s charming.’
‘Raoul.’
‘What, “Raoul”? It’s true. You are not ashamed of your body, I hope?’
‘No. But ...’
‘You know, Madame, I remember the first time I saw Daisy, I thought to myself: Wow, what I would really love is to see this girl totally naked, with all that long hair around her.’
After a short silence, Daisy’s mother said in a rather high, quavering voice, ‘Raoul, would you like a bit of salad? I made a real French dressing to go with it. I’m not sure it’s quite right, but I hope you like it!’
‘Yes, thank you, Madame. I think,’ Raoul said reflectively, piling leaves on his plate, ‘that generally English women are very beautiful.’
‘Do you, really? How nice of you to say so.’
‘Yes. Daisy is, of course. She is like a rose,’ he said, expressively opening his fingers out to suggest a full bloom. ‘And you too, Madame, are a very beautiful and fascinating woman.’
‘Oh, that’s a sweet thing to say. Thank you, Raoul.’
‘We do not know each other very well, you and me, but already I feel certain that there is a lot of sensual mystery in you, a lot of wonderful secrets.’
‘Secrets? Me?’ Daisy’s mother giggled, unconsciously checking the top button of her shirt. ‘Oh no, not really!’
‘You know, Madame, it’s funny because when I was a young boy I was very naïve. For example, I believed that in France we are the best for everything – the food, the wine – and that also our women are the most beautiful in the world. But since then I have travelled and met a lot of different people and it has opened my mind.’
‘Good for you, Raoul,’ Daisy’s mother said encouragingly.
‘So now I realise, for example, how interesting English women are. Particularly, in this country,’ Raoul said, turning to Daisy’s father, ‘you have the tomboys, the androgynous girls. That is a really great English type of girl. You know, with the very flat chest and the short hair like a schoolboy ...’
‘Cheese, anyone? Raoul?’
‘It must be wonderful,’ Daisy’s mother said, smiling brightly, ‘to see the world as you do, through an artist’s eyes.’
‘Oh thank you, Madame, but I am not really an artist, you know. I have not got a classical training. It’s just that I have always liked to draw women. I started very early, when I was a young boy, and I got more and more interested.’
‘Really? You never get bored of the same subject?’ Daisy’s father asked, calmly helping himself to a chunk of Stilton. ‘You never want to move on to landscapes, for example?’
‘Well, to me, a woman is a landscape.’
‘Ah?’
‘And there are so many different landscapes in the world. You are always discovering some new ones, you know. Different climates, different colours, different, heu ...’ Raoul mimed undulating hills, ‘geography.’
‘Of course, yes.’
‘All the time, I am learning amazing, crucial stuff. Like, for example, about the left breast of women.’
‘The ... left breast?’ Daisy’s father repeated blankly.
‘Yes, it was a girl who taught me about that. A dancer.’
‘Oh, was she a ballerina at the Paris Opera?’ Daisy’s mother said conversationally. ‘How lovely. I’m so fond of the ballet. Do you also enjoy it, Raoul?’
‘Yes, yes, of course. Those long legs and long necks ... gorgeous. But, in fact, this particular dancer, she worked at the Crazy Horse Saloon. You know that place?’
‘N-no, I don’t believe I do,’ Daisy’s father said, looking quite interested nonetheless.
‘They have the most beautiful artistic nude show there, a light show, with some of the most amazing girls in Paris,’ Raoul explained, gesturing. ‘This girl I’m talking about, her real name was Karine but she called herself Froufrou des Jarretelles. It was her name for the stage. Like, you know, a porte-jarretelle. What is the English word for that, Daisy?’
‘A garter belt,’ Daisy said, looking across at her mother and smiling apologetically.
‘Garter belt, all right! Anyway, Froufrou told me that when they audition a dancer at the Crazy, they always look at her left breast first, because, you see,’ Raoul continued, feeling rightly that he now had Daisy’s father’s undivided attention, ‘a woman’s left breast is usually less perfectly shaped than her right. So, if the left breast is completely gorgeous,’ he said, leaning back in his chair, ‘then chances are the rest of the girl’s body will be exceptional, really extreme, in fact.’
Daisy’s father swallowed, then said slowly, ‘Well, I didn’t know that.’
‘So, you see, inspiration is always there, around me. Especially at this moment of my life,’ Raoul added, gallantly kissing Daisy’s hand.
‘OK!’ Daisy said, jumping in when she had the chance. ‘Now, who wants coffee? No, don’t get up, Mum, I think Raoul should make it. He’s got a special talent for it, haven’t you, Raoul? Come on, into the kitchen. I’ll show you where everything is.’
Somehow, Daisy thought, reaching for a Brazil nut and looking across at Raoul, now ensconced on the sofa next to her father and watching Octopussy with every sign of enjoyment, they had kept getting drawn into these kinds of wince-inducing conversations since their arrival two days ago. Possibly Daisy’s strategy with Raoul – feigning a French-style blasé nonchalance when it came to sex-related topics so as not to come across as an uptight Brit – had worked a little too well. He now had completely the wrong idea about her family’s mindset and thought her parents as freewheeling and libérés as she was! Not, of course, that she really was, but Raoul did not know that. Such was life. It was lovely for once to come home with a presentable long-term boyfriend in tow but a certain degree of embarrassment was unavoidable.
Meanwhile Daisy had been troubled again by her weird dream pretty much every night, and even when she had dozed off for a while on the train on the way to Truro. Again she had found herself wandering down deserted Parisian streets in the middle of the night, only to wake up none the wiser with a loudly beating heart.
Daisy had not mentioned the strange dream to Raoul. It would probably bore him: after all, nothing happened in it. Besides, it was so unlike her to have serious, obscure dreams of this kind. From childhood she had typically dreamed of becoming a brilliant and celebrated shoe designer, or perhaps the youngest-ever editor of Vogue – that sort of thing.
Oh well, at some point she would discover what she was trying to find in the dream and then the whole thing would evaporate. Dreams were such silly things, anyway. They didn’t mean anything.
25 Isabelle
Many times over the last four years, Isabelle had thought about how it would be when Clothaire proposed, and had rehearsed the moment in her mind. She had imagined that he would perhaps choose the context of the pretty tea room on the Rue de Rivoli, the setting for many of their early dates. Her hand would be lying on the table, between her small pot of hot chocolate and her half-eaten Mont-Blanc, and Clothaire would slowly cover it with his own hand, look into her eyes and say ... Or he would surprise her as they sat reading side by side on a bench next to the fountain in the Luxembourg Gardens, suddenly dropping down on one knee and ...
Sitting on the train on the way home to Paris, Isabelle had reviewed these familiar scenarios in a new and colder light. Somehow the proposal scenes had become more difficult for her to picture and, ultimately, to believe in. What had changed? Was it those guilt-inducing memories of rolling around with Tom in his bed? Or was it the nagging, unresolved question of Belladonna’s sighting of Clothaire with a mystery girl? No, something else had happened. It was dawning on Isabelle that outside of her daydreams Clothaire was not and never had been at all romantic. It was all for the best, really. Marriage was a serious, lifelong commitment, not the stuff of romance and fantasy. The sooner they did set a date and tell everyone of their intentions, the better.
Isabelle imagined herself standing next to Clothaire in formal evening dress at the Bal de l’X, a smart springtime charity ball given by the Ecole Polytechnique, a prestigious military college, at the Paris Opera House, which they had ritually attended with their friends fot the last few years. Perhaps this would be the best time to announce their engagement. They could dispense with the romance of a proposal.
She might as well mention this plan to Clothaire tonight, since he would be there to meet her when she got off the train at the Gare du Nord, after which they were expected at her parents’ for dinner. They would spend the night at her flat, which was vacant since Daisy had gone back to England for Christmas. Isabelle wondered briefly how Daisy’s love life was going. There had been a fling with Octave, she had heard from her housemates, and Isabelle now regretted not including a word or two of caution about that incorrigible seducer in the list of the practical guidelines she had left for Daisy in her flat. Since then, Jules had mentioned something about Daisy’s new boyfriend, an artist who was quite a lot older than her. Tom was a few years older than herself, Isabelle thought irrelevantly, though you’d never notice it. She shook her head impatiently.
Later, when she got to the platform exit and scanned the sea of expectant faces, looking out for her boyfriend’s familiar saturnine countenance, she was instead greeted by the sight of her two sisters – nineteen-year-old Camille and sixteen-year-old Aude – beaming and waving at her.
‘Isa! Bienvenue à Paris!’ Aude cried, throwing herself into her older sister’s arms and hugging her enthusiastically.
A little older and therefore much closer to the Papillon ideal of the well-brought-up jeune fille, Camille smiled at Isabelle above Aude’s shoulder, waited patiently for her elder sister to disentangle herself from her younger one, and then stepped forward to kiss Isabelle lightly on both cheeks.
‘Salut. Good trip?’ Camille asked.
‘Yes, thanks. Hé! Dis donc, you’ve had your hair cut,’ Isabelle observed, ruffling Camille’s new sleek bob.
‘And you are wearing your hair down. That is quite a change! It suits you.’
‘Mais c’est incroyable!’ Aude exclaimed, holding Isabelle at arm’s length. ‘She looks just like a petite Anglaise!’
Isabelle looked down at her fawn military jacket and brown tartan miniskirt, with its hint of dark gold lurex. They were a gift from Chrissie, samples from Savage’s last winter collection. Back in London, he had convinced her that she looked wonderful in the outfit, but now, under the gaze of her more conservatively clad siblings, Isabelle began to have her doubts.
‘It’s not ... too much, is it?’
‘No, it’s really cool!’ Aude said longingly. ‘I wish I had one just the same.’
‘You look great,’ Camille confirmed, adding: ‘You are perhaps wondering where Clothaire is?’
‘Yes. I thought ...’
‘He called us to say that he had a last-minute empêchement. He sounded very harassed and said he only had time for one call, so that’s why he didn’t call you.’
‘Of course,’ Isabelle said automatically.
‘Don’t worry. He will meet us at home a bit later. In fact he’s probably there already.’
‘Of course,’ Isabelle said again. She was puzzled.
The three sisters piled into a taxi en route for the parental apartment, and Isabelle, looking out of the window at the glistening darkness of well-remembered Parisian streets, gave kindly, absent-minded answers to Aude’s questions about her London life. Once she was reunited with her parents, things became curiouser. Clothaire had apparently just rung Isabelle’s mother to excuse himself from dinner and, indeed, from turning up at all that night. There was, he had said vaguely, an urgent crise he needed to attend to. Her parents were very put out and would have liked an explanation, which Isabelle was unable to provide. As a result, there was a slight sense of strain to the evening, and Isabelle was particularly grateful to puppyish Aude for her insouciant stream of chatter.
By the time she got to bed in her own flat, Isabelle was too tired to give much thought to what might have happened to change Clothaire’s plans. She had also been pleasantly distracted by Daisy’s surprise: bunches of flowers in every colour, like cheerful notes of music, had been left in every available container in the flat to welcome her home.
In the morning Clothaire turned up on her doorstep, looking white-faced and tetchy. Such impulsive behaviour was very much out of character and made Isabelle feel on edge. After a perfunctory kiss, he sat her down next to him on the sofa and impatiently parried her attempts at conversation.
‘It is really not the moment for chit-chat, Isabelle. I want to speak to you about something important.’
At first Isabelle thought Clothaire was actually going to propose. Then, looking at his expression, she changed her mind. Quite suddenly, she knew with absolute and chilling certainty that he had somehow found out about Tom. But how? Jules was the soul of discretion, but was it just possible that Chrissie had blabbed to Daisy? And that the story had then made its way into the circle of her Paris friends? In any case honesty was the best policy, since they were, after all, planning to spend the rest of their lives together.
‘This is not easy for me to say, Isabelle.’
‘No,’ Isabelle replied in a small voice. ‘Clothaire, I’m really sor—’
‘No, no, no. Be quiet and listen to me.’
‘OK. Go ahead.’
Clothaire glared at her. ‘You know, don’t you, that I was completely against your going away to London, but did you listen to me? No, of course not.’
Isabelle sighed and nodded a few times. Clothaire lit a cigarette and went on more calmly: ‘So you accept that as a fact. Good. I did warn you before you left that your disappearance would create problems. Well, I was right, absolutely right.’
Isabelle took a deep breath, steadying herself in preparation for Clothaire’s accusation.
‘Let us get one thing clear, Isabelle. You cannot blame me for what happened. The whole thing was your fault. You behaved very selfishly. You deserted me. I was lonely. And I have certain needs, like all men. So of course I had to turn to
someone else. It was the natural thing to do.’
Isabelle blinked and looked up at him.
Clothaire smiled thinly. ‘Yes, you see, if you weren’t interested in being with me, there was somebody else who was. Someone quite attractive, I might add.’
‘Who?’
‘It is not important who she is,’ Clothaire said, waving his cigarette. ‘Anyway ...’
‘Clothaire, it is important, if you prefer her to me, don’t you think?’
‘Let me finish, Isabelle. You have this habit of interrupting my train of thought. It is exasperating. Surely I have mentioned this to you many times before?’
‘Yes, you have. Many times.’
‘I am very good at evaluating people’s characters, as you know. It did not take me very long to discover that this girl was not, in fact, at all what I expected. She is difficult, very difficult – very capricieuse. And endlessly demanding and critical – of me!’ Clothaire shook his head with some severity. ‘It was a shock and a disappointment, as I’m sure you appreciate. But I am over it now. So you will be pleased to hear that I have ended things with her. And,’ he said taking Isabelle’s hands in his, ‘I am willing to take you back.’
‘You are willing to take me back?’
‘Yes, Isabelle, I am. Provided, of course, that you curtail this absurd stay in London. I want you to come back here, where you belong.’
‘I slept with Tom,’ Isabelle heard herself say in her flutelike tones, much to her surprise.
‘You ... what? Slept with ... who, did you say?’
‘I slept with Tom Quince.’
‘Never heard of him. What are you talking about?’
‘Meredith’s great-nephew. You met him at the Halloween party.’
‘At the Halloween party?’ Clothaire said, narrowing his eyes. ‘But that is absurd. All the men there were homosexual.’
‘Not all, just Chrissie. Karloff and Jules are together now. And as for Tom ...’
Clothaire’s face flushed a dark shade of brick-red. ‘You mean the ... florist? That guy? I do not believe it. I mean, you do not even really enjoy ...’