Goodbye, Janette

by Harold Robbins

  “How am I going to do that?” she asked.

  “Make it so uncomfortable for him that he’ll be glad to go. Take him into court charging him with mismanagement of your and your sister’s assets, damaging your equities. You can even claim that he exerted undue influence on your mother, who was not mentally sound, to gain control of the estate. There are many things you can do.”

  “But how do I prove them?”

  “You don’t have to. That’s the good thing about it.” He smiled. “He has to disprove it.”

  She shook her head. “I don’t know where I could do that.”

  “Then give it all up. But it will be years before you have another opportunity like this. Did Jacques tell you that not only am I willing to back you but he has an important American also willing to invest?”

  “Yes,” she answered.

  “Then what are you waiting for?” he asked. “Unless you really don’t believe you can make a go of it.”

  “It doesn’t make sense,” she said. “I do all those things—meanwhile Lauren is living with them.”

  “Then take her back,” he said.

  “Could I do something like that?” she asked. “After all he is her legal guardian.”

  “But you’re her sister. You can always say that you’re taking her back because you’re afraid that he might harm her.”

  Janette was silent again.

  “Don’t be a fool, Janette,” he said. “He was a German soldier. A Boche. Nothing’s changed. Only now he’s occupying your business, not France.”

  She was silent again.

  “Janette Marie de la Beauville,” he said softly. “It’s a good name. Did you see it on the ad? It sounds much more important than Harry Winston.”

  She looked at him. “How do I get Lauren back?”

  “Simple,” he said. “Just go to their apartment with an excuse to take her out. And then don’t return her.”

  That was exactly what she did that afternoon. Meanwhile an appointment had been made with Maurice’s attorney for the following morning to begin the proceedings. By the time Johann had called it was eight o’clock and Lauren had already gone to bed.

  The servants had made a great fuss over her at dinner and she loved the attention. When the suggestion was made that she go to bed she had gone happily enough. A few minutes after Johann’s call, Lauren came into Janette’s room.

  “Aunt Heidi always tells me a bedtime story before I go to sleep,” she said.

  “All right,” Janette replied. “Let’s go back to your room and I’ll tell you a bedtime story.”

  The child climbed into bed and looked up at her. “Tell me a story about a princess.”

  “What princess?”

  “You know. The one who couldn’t sleep because there was a pea in her bed.”

  Janette thought for a moment. “I don’t know that one.”

  “Then what story do you know?”

  Janette tried to remember a story from her childhood. “Once upon a time, there was an old woman who lived in a shoe—”

  “I know that one,” Lauren interrupted. “And that’s not a story, it’s a nursery rhyme.”

  “Oh,” Janette said.

  “I want you to tell me a real story,” the child said.

  “I’ll have to think of one,” Janette said. “Tell you what. Give me until tomorrow and I’ll get a book with all the stories in it and tell them to you tomorrow night.”

  Lauren looked at her. “Are you sure you don’t know any stories?”

  “I’m sure.”

  “Not even a teeny one?”

  Janette laughed. “Tomorrow night I’ll tell you a dozen.”

  The child thought for a moment. “All right.” She held out her arms. “Kiss me good night.”

  Janette kissed her. “Good night.”

  Lauren hugged her. “Good night, Aunt Hei—Janette.” She put her head on the pillow and closed her eyes, then opened them immediately. “I forgot to say my prayers,” she said, jumping out of bed.

  She knelt at the side of the bed, clasped her hands and bowed her head. “Now I lay me down to sleep. I pray the Lord my soul to keep. God bless Uncle Johann, God bless Aunt Heidi and God bless my sister Janette.” She looked up at Janette. “Amen.”

  Janette was silent.

  “Say Amen,” Lauren said.

  “Amen,” Janette said.

  The child climbed back into the bed, lay back and closed her eyes. “Good night, Janette.”

  Janette walked to the door. “Good night, little sister.” She turned out the light and closed the door behind her, then went down the stairs to the library. The telephone began to ring.

  It was Jacques. “I just called Johann and he told me that you did. They’re very upset.”

  “Too bad,” she said. “You called him?”

  “Yes.”

  “Why?”

  “I had an idea. Perhaps a practical approach to the problem would be for Tanya Couture to enter into an agreement with Carolo for the additional financing. That would minimize the exposure.”

  “What did he say?”

  “I never got a chance to talk about it. He told me what happened and wanted to know if I knew anything about it. I said I didn’t but I don’t know if he believed me.”

  “It doesn’t make any difference,” she said.

  “It does to me,” he said. “I’ve never lied to him. I wouldn’t like him to think I would lie to him over this. Why on earth did you ever do it?”

  “Don’t be stupid,” she said. “You saw the way he was at the meeting. He had already made up his mind and with his Teutonic stubbornness would never change it.”

  “But your sister was happy with them. There was no reason to drag her into it.”

  “She’ll be happy here. And she was already in it. Half of the whole thing is hers.”

  “We would have found another way,” he said.

  “There is no other way,” she said. “Maurice convinced me of that. I should have listened to him a long time ago but I didn’t.”

  “Maurice’s only concern is himself. He smells a chance to get back into the business. That’s why he’s pushing you.”

  “You don’t approve?” Her voice grew cool.

  “You didn’t have to do it that way,” he said.

  She got angry. “Who the hell are you to sit in judgment? You’ve pimped and fucked for everything all your life. For your jobs, for stories, for publicity. Now you’re afraid you’ve blown your job with Johann because you crawled too far out on the limb with me, so you’re trying to crawl back into his good graces.”

  “That’s not true!” he said vehemently. “You don’t know Maurice like I do. He’s trying to use you like he tried to use your mother.”

  “And you don’t? You fucked with my mother and used her. You fucked with me and used me. How many others have you fucked and used? I don’t need your fucking approval! As far as I’m concerned you can go and crawl as far back up that Nazi’s ass as you want to!” She slammed the receiver back on the telephone and sat there feeling the trembling inside her.

  The door opened. She looked across the room. Lauren was standing there, the tears running down her cheeks.

  “What do you want?” Janette snapped.

  The child stood there. “I want to go home,” she cried.

  “You are home!” Janette said sharply. “Now go back up to your room and go to bed.”

  “I’m not home. And it’s not my room,” Lauren said, sniffing stubbornly. “And I can’t sleep. There are ghosts there.”

  “There are no ghosts,” Janette said.

  “Yes, there are,” the child insisted.

  “What ghosts?”

  “The marquis is standing at the foot of my bed and laughing. And when I open my eyes he runs away.”

  Janette stared at her silently.

  “Are you my sister?” Lauren asked. “He keeps saying that you’re not my sister.”

  Janette crossed the room and kne
lt beside her. “Of course I’m your sister.”

  The child looked up into her face. “Do you love me?”

  “You know I love you, chérie,” Janette said softly.

  “As much as Mommy loved you? As much as Mommy loved me?”

  Janette was silent for a moment, then she felt the tears springing to her eyes. “Yes, my darling.”

  ***

  Twenty minutes later they were standing at the door of Johann’s apartment as he opened it. He looked at them silently.

  Janette’s voice was strained. “I’ve brought her home.”

  There was a movement behind him. “Aunt Heidi!” Lauren cried and ran through the door into Heidi’s arms.

  Janette began to turn away. Johann’s voice stopped her. She turned back, her eyes blurred with tears. “Yes?”

  Johann blinked her eyes. “Why don’t you come in?” he asked gently. “There is much we have to talk about.”

  Book Three

  Lauren

  The chief steward came out of the flight deck and walked through the darkened first-class cabin to the galley that separated it from the economy class. He looked approvingly at the breakfast trays all set up and ready for serving. “We’ll be in fifteen minutes early,” he said.

  The dark-haired stewardess filling the glasses with orange juice and tomato juice smiled. “Good. I can’t wait to get home and take a bath.” She turned on the heating button of the ovens. She glanced at her watch. “The eggs will be ready in twenty minutes.”

  “Time enough,” the steward said, reaching for the telephone intercom and turning on the cabin lights at the same time. He spoke directly into the telephone, first in French, then in English. “Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. It is six thirty A.M., French time. I have the pleasure to inform you that we will reach Paris fifteen minutes ahead of schedule, eight forty-five A.M. French time. We will now begin the serving of the breakfast.”

  As usual, the insomniacs were the first to raise their window blinds, and the sun low over the horizon streaked into the cabin waking those who were still clinging to sleep. The rest of the passengers began to stir.

  Lauren looked out the window. There was nothing to see, everything hidden by cloud cover. She turned as the stewardess gently touched her shoulder.

  “Good morning, miss,” the stewardess said in English. “Did you have a good rest?”

  Lauren pushed her long blond hair back from her face, answering in French. “Not bad. I’ve been too excited. It’s the first time I’ve returned to France in almost ten years.”

  The stewardess was surprised at the girl’s French. It was pure, without any trace of an American accent despite her appearance, which was typically California American. Sun-tanned, blond hair even more whitened by the sun, large, clear blue eyes. “Jus d’orange ou tomate?” she asked.

  “Jus d’orange,” Lauren answered.

  The stewardess lowered the serving tray in front of Lauren and placed the orange juice on it. “Would you like some coffee now?”

  Lauren nodded. “Please.” She picked up her bag and opened it. Inside was a small bottle filled with pills. She opened the bottle and shook a few into her hand, then picked up the juice.

  The stewardess smiled. “Vitamins? All Americans must take their vitamins with breakfast.”

  Lauren smiled. “Of course.” She wondered what the stewardess would think if she told her that not all the pills she took were vitamins. The red was an upper. She swallowed the pills with the juice as the girl placed the coffee in front of her. She lit a cigarette and turned to the window again, looking out. Ten years. It had been a long time. More than half her life.

  Suddenly she felt a nervous tightening in her stomach. Janette would be at the airport. She wondered if Janette would recognize her. But it didn’t matter. She would recognize Janette. She saw her picture a thousand times a year, in papers, magazines, even on television commercials. What was it one of the news commentators had said? One of the ten most beautiful women in the world.

  She remembered one time she had been with Harvey on the beach at Paradise Cove, lying on a blanket to keep the hot sand from burning them alive. But the sun was good, sending its warmth into her body while the breeze kept her skin cool. She rolled over on her stomach and opened the magazine. Almost the first thing she saw was a color photograph of Janette. It was an advertisement for a bikini. The copy was simple. “The Briefest Bikini, by Philippe Fayard for Janette.” Then in smaller letters under the photograph: “At better stores everywhere from $90.”

  A shadow fell over the magazine. “Wow!” Harvey said. “That’s a dynamite chick.”

  For a moment she felt a twinge of surprise. Or maybe jealousy. In some ways Harvey was an asshole. He never saw anything. He lived in a world that existed only between his surfboard and his dope collection. He never went anywhere without his surfboard—even at night there it was, tied to the roof rack of his VW. And in a cleverly concealed compartment in the door of the car were always at least twenty little plastic baggies of different kinds of grass. His mood collection, as he called it. A grass for every purpose from giggling to dreaming to fucking. Right now his primary interest was working with a friend of his up in Humboldt County to develop a grass that had no seeds, thereby eliminating the need to clean it, and of course with higher THC content than any other. It was a good thing his father never asked him what he did with his allowance, because he had already invested more than a thousand dollars in the project, which also included more than two hundred dollars which she had given him.

  She looked up at him, squinting her eyes against the sun. “What did you say?”

  “Dynamite chick,” he said, still staring at the photo.

  She glanced around the beach. It was filled with girls, alive and real, with even briefer bikinis than in the photograph, yet here he was, impervious to them and staring at the magazine. “It’s my sister,” she said, handing the magazine up to him.

  He took it, still looking at the photograph. “Yeah,” he said and then the gist of her words registered in his brain. “Did you say your sister?”

  “Yes.”

  “You never told me you had a sister.” There was a note of skepticism in his voice.

  “It never came up before,” she said.

  “I never saw her,” he said.

  “How could you?” she asked. “She lives in Paris.”

  “France?”

  “That’s where Paris is,” she said shortly. She was getting annoyed. There was no reason for him to make all this fuss about it. She sat up. “I could use a toke,” she said.

  He fished in his little paper bag and came up with a joint. He lit it and passed it to her. She took a couple of quick hits. As usual, it was the best. A Harvey special. She felt better, the annoyance leaving her.

  He fell to the blanket beside her. “When did you see her last?”

  “Almost ten years ago,” she answered. “When I first came here.”

  “Did she look like then?”

  She thought for a moment, then nodded her head. “I suppose so. But I was a little girl and she was my beautiful big sister.”

  “When are you going to see her next?” he asked.

  It was at that moment that she made up her mind. “This summer, right after graduation,” she said. “Ten years was a long enough time.

  Long enough, she thought, looking out the window as the ground at Orly rushed up to meet the airplane. Long enough.

  ***

  The immigration officer looked up at her in surprise as she passed her passport to him. “You’re French?” he asked.

  She smiled. “Yes.” The passport she had given him was French, even though it had been issued at the Consulate in Los Angeles.

  “I thought you were American,” he said.

  “I live there,” she said. “This is my first visit here in ten years. I was only seven when I left.”

  He smiled and stamped the passport, pushing it back to her. “Welcome home,” he said.


  “Thank you.” She picked up her passport and went to collect her luggage. In the baggage area she saw a man standing, holding a small cardboard sign in his hand: “Mlle. Lauren.” She went up to him. “I’m Lauren,” she said.

  He bowed. “Jean Bergére, service d’accueil, Air France. Your sister asked me to help you with your baggage. If I may have your baggage checks, please.”

  “I only have one bag,” she said, giving him the baggage check.

  “That will be simple,” he said. “Come, I will pass you through customs and then come back for your bag. Your sister is waiting outside.”

  She saw Janette as she cleared the customs barrier. She stopped for a moment, looking at her. There was no mistaking her. She had a presence, a quality that radiated and made her stand out from the crowd. She stared toward her almost at the same moment that Janette saw her.

  She hesitated a moment, then broke into a run, coming to a halt in front of her. They stood there just staring at each other, then suddenly she smiled. “Are you really my sister?” she asked in French.

  Janette answered in English, her voice trembling between laughter and tears. “You better believe it.” Then she pulled Lauren close to her and hugged her tightly. “It is I who do not believe it. You’re so big and so beautiful. What happened to the little girl I saw last?”

  Lauren’s own eyes were damp. “She grew up.”

  “You’re taller than I am,” Janette said.

  “American vitamins.” Lauren laughed. “But you’re even more beautiful than I remembered and much more than any of the photographs that I’ve seen.”

  “C’est pas vrai,” Janette said. She turned and gestured. A young man dressed in a severe business suit and tie came toward them. “My secretary, Robert Bleu,” Janette said.

  The young man extended a delicate hand. “Pleased to meet you, Miss Lauren,” he said in stiffly accented English.

  “Pleased to meet you,” Lauren said.

  “Robert will collect your luggage and bring it to the house. This way you can ride with me to the office and then the chauffeur will take you home.”

  Lauren felt a slight disappointment. “Do you have to go to work today?”

  “The collections are almost upon us,” Janette said, taking her arm and leading her toward the exit. “We have only three weeks left to the end of July and a thousand things to get ready. We have our showing right after Dior.”