I guess that meant I’d have to get up and find a cafe to get some coffee, so I got up and, after looking around, found that one of the twelve-foot-high doors led to a bathroom. It was a two-seater, just like back home, but one of the johns was plumbed wrong. Imagine putting all that money into a place and then hiring a plumber who don’t know beans.
The lady was gone when I came back into the bedroom and was I some embarrassed. She’d made my bed and unpacked my suitcase all in the time I’d taken to do my personal business and slick back my hair. She’d left the tray though, and I drank the milk from the little shiny pot figuring maybe they only used glasses for wine in France—and ate the twisty roll that was wrapped up in a napkin.
I sat on the side of the bed until I got bored so I got up and looked out the high window. I couldn’t believe how high I was. At least six floors. Wonder if they knew airplanes flew this high? Finally I looked down and into the gray shadows of the street; my hotel and the other buildings surrounding it kept the sun from shining into it. I could see a few glassed in places—shops probably—and some window boxes full of red geraniums. I wondered how they kept them alive if they never got full sun, but then on down to the left about a block I could see real light. And lots of cars.
So this was Paris, France.
Well, I’d come this far, I might as well go see it while I was here, I thought. I picked up my purse and chose a door. It led out into the long hall I remembered from the day before and I walked up and down it for about ten minutes, looking at other tall doors and after a time, not remembering which one was the one that I’d come out of.
I woulda spent my whole first day in Paris in that hallway if I hadn’t heard a bell go off and one of the doors open. Two people stepped out of a little room and the boy with the round cap acted like he wanted me to come in. Well, sure, I knew it was the elevator and I got on it.
The lobby was small with a frayed-around-the-edges elegance to it; after all it was only a block off the Champs-Elysees. It was about ten o’clock and people with suitcases were coming and going. And the man at the counter was always ringing a little brass bell like he was trying to learn a new tune. Every time he played it, one of the uniformed boys ran forward to see what he wanted.
I went straight to a big over-stuffed chair and sat down. I sat there for four days.
My chair was made of a rough feeling fabric, cross-hatched like a lattice with bouquets of roses growing in the diamond- shaped part. It musta been something in its day, but when I sat in it the arms were dark, so stained from the grip of other sitters that you couldn’t properly see the original design. And the cushion had been the resting place of so many travelers that it had the trench of their behinds impressed into it—bigger behinds than mine—but after four days, it bore the shallow indention of my shape and I became more afraid to leave it and its comfortable odors and embracing arms.
For a while that first day, I didn’t attract much attention. About two o’clock one of the uniforms brought me one of them shiny trays and I took the glass of juice that was on it. I was going to pay for it, but by the time I opened my purse, he was gone.
Wine doesn’t taste exactly like Grapette. But some. And, thirsty, I drank it, the sameness of the taste reminding me of the gas station and the cold drinks I’d had there. And I thought of all the times I’d pumped gas between gulps of the sweet drink and of Poteau and…even of Billy Roy.
About five the boy came back with another tray with hard bread, milk and more of the hot black drink. Before I could stop him, he poured the milk into the cup with the black stuff and so not to hurt his feelings, I drank it that way. And ate the bread.
About seven, I had to go to the bathroom, so I stood up, feeling weak, and went to the copper-topped desk. “Excuse me,” I said, “I want to go to my room now.”
After a hurried conversation among the three men behind the counter, one of them came forward and said, “I speak English. Can I help you?”
“I want to go to my room now,” I repeated.
“Are you a guest here, mademoiselle?”
“No, I can pay. But I need to go to my room and I don’t know where it is.”
“What is your name?”
“Bonita Faye Burnett.”
He looked in the book that was as big as a Bible and said, “But of course, Miss Burnett. You’re in room 509.” And he handed me a key hanging from a brass ball the size of a baseball. “Do you know where the elevator is located?”
“Yes, thank you. I mean, really, thank you.”
I showed the new man in the elevator my key and with a shudder that made my stomach dip, he took his little room back to the floor with the long hallway. Only this time I knew my number and used the heavy key to open the door.
Someone had been in the room. They’d unmade my bed and left a piece of chocolate on my pillow. I ate it and drank some water from the bathroom and went to sleep.
The next day, I got to the lobby earlier. I’d had my milk and roll in my room and even had taken a bath. A man was sitting in my chair, but I stood beside it and waited until finally he got up and left and I settled in it, wiggling to reshape the cushion to my backside.
I sat there all day, watching the people, making up stories about them and thinking about Billy Roy. Thinking about when I’d pulled that trigger and wondering if Harmon suspected—if anyone would ever find out. Wondering if I had the strength—I was so tired—to ever get out of that chair and see Paris.
The next day I knew I didn’t and that I wouldn’t. I was hungry and felt thinner. Guessed I’d just waste away in that chair and that little guy with the apron would come along and sweep me into that pail that he swept the cigarette and cigar ashes into and dump me outside somewhere.
I drank the wine the boy brought me. And I ate the hard roll and drank what I had decided was the French version of coffee. When it got dark outside, I went back to my room, made supper from the chocolate and went to sleep again.
It was on the fourth day when I realized the uniformed men and the suited ones behind the desk were talking about me. They’d gather around awhile and then all turn to look at me. I smiled at them and they looked away.
Sometime around noon I recognized the taxi driver who’d brought me to the hotel. He was talking to the clerk who had spoken English to me on the first night. I woulda smiled at him if our eyes had met, but he only glanced my way once and left.
After he was gone, the man came from around the counter and headed my way.
“Mademoiselle, do you need any help?”
“No, I know where my room is,” I answered, but when he kept standing there, I added. “Well, I am hungry.”
And he took me by the arm and it was a good thing—I felt as weak as I had when I’d had the poison ivy—and led me into another big room—one where I’d seen people going in and out, but hadn’t bothered to find out where they were going. It was full of pink-colored tables and he sat me down at one and snapped his fingers at the white-aproned fellow standing there.
Before I knew it, he brought me a big plate of what looked like yellow sunshine and I ate it; it was eggs with ham in it. And I ate all the rolls and drank milk from a real glass. And when I was finished, the clerk came back and said, “May I join you?”
It turned out that the clerk’s name was Thomas and he’d been to the states—Florida. Well, sure, I knew where that was and told him so and that broke the ice.
I told him about always wanting to come to Paris, but that now I was there—here—I didn’t know what to do. I didn’t speak French and actually didn’t even know where to go if I did.
“Well, what had you planned on seeing in Paris?”
“Nothin’. I just always wanted to come here.”
“What about the Eiffel Tower?”
“Oh, yeah. The Eiffel Tower,” I remembered. “And the Loorve.”
“The Louvr
e,” and he pronounced it slowly.
I repeated, “The Louvre,” like he did.
“Good. Now, Miss Burnett…”
“Bonita Faye.”
“Now, Bonita Faye, there is an English speaking tour that leaves from an office near the Seine every day at one o’clock. Would you like to take it tomorrow?”
“Yes, please.”
“Good, I’ll call and make a reservation for you. Now you need to go back to your room and rest. You look like you’re still suffering from time lag.”
“Time…what?”
He smiled and his face scrunched up as he tried to find the words to explain in English. “There’s a time difference between here and the states…”
“Oklahoma,” I interrupted. “Poteau, Oklahoma. That’s where I’m from.”
“Yes, well, there’s a time difference between France and Oklahoma and when you fly here, you pass through these different time zones. Your body doesn’t realize it and it gets tired trying to keep up. That’s why you’ve been so tired and…and…lethargic since you arrived. That and no food. May I take the liberty of ordering your supper to be sent to your room?”
Time lag, I thought that night when I ate the small piece of fish covered with a funny-tasting gravy. The waiter had brought it and set it up on a little table right in my room—with a flower in a vase and everything.
Maybe it was “time lag,” but more maybe it was that Paris was the stopping point of where I’d been running ever since I’d raced off Canaval Hill. When I’d reached the finish line, I’d just stopped cold. Now with the clerk’s help and with aid of the little book I’d found on my bedside when I’d woke up from a really good nap, I could start over…start a new race.
I was excited as I flipped back and forth through the pages of what the name said was a French-English—English-French dictionary and phrase book. Did you ever? I asked myself as I looked up the French words for “thank you.”
“Merci” seemed to be the right word for it.
THIRTEEN
Claude was my other sign of forgiveness.
There’s never been a better friend to anyone than Claude has been to me. Except Patsy.
When I finally did leave the Cafe Roy the day Claude brought me my first chocolate eclair, he followed me.
I didn’t know it at first.
It’s amazing how quickly you adapt to unusual customs. The bicycle riders of Paris had at first fascinated me, but then I got used to them. There were more bicycles passing me on the street in front of my hotel in one minute than there were in all of Poteau and maybe more than in the whole state of Oklahoma. All of Paris moved around on two wheels. The war had been over some years, but with expensive gasoline still in short supply, the real people of Paris still pumped on two legs for their daily bread.
Having grown accustomed to bicycle riders in the street beside me, I didn’t pay any attention to the one that coasted along behind me on the way to my hotel. It was when I was starting through the heavy, carved double doors of the hotel that I heard the low whistle that made me turn my head.
There was Claude leaning over the handlebars of an old bicycle. He’d exchanged his white waiter’s coat for a brown cotton windbreaker and his shiny hair hung like black cellophane from beneath a faded beret.
“Oh, hello,” I said and turned to approach him.
Claude took off his cap and replied. “Allo, mademoiselle.”
“Do you live around here?”
“Allo, mademoiselle.”
“I’m sorry. I don’t speak French.”
“I am Claude.”
“Yes, I know. You told me. I am Bonita Faye.”
“Pardon?”
“Bo-ni-ta Faye.”
“Ah, Bo-ni-ta Faye.”
“Well, its good to see you. I must be going in now.” I didn’t move.
“English?”
“American.”
“Oui, oui, American. Speak English.”
We stood staring at each other. I was reminded of me and Harmon in my kitchen the Sunday morning he came to tell me about Billy Roy. Only Claude and I didn’t have any chicken to eat. Suddenly, on impulse, I reached into my purse and pulled out my English-French dictionary. The first part of it is English-to-French, but the back part is French-to-English. I gave it to Claude.
He took it eagerly, so I knew he could read. He fumbled through the pages and looked up and said, “accompany.” More fumbling. Then, “picnic?”
“Yes, I’d love to. I mean, oui.” I took the book. With my finger in place on the word, I asked him “when?”
“Ah, demain.” I handed him the dictionary again. After a second he said, “Tomorrow.” Then, laughing, Claude held up ten fingers, then one. I nodded my understanding. Eleven o’clock. Like my taxi-driving friend Denis Denfert, he started rattling off lots of words in the language I wish I could speak. He cocked his head to one side in a quizzical pose like a puppy as he spoke as if he was trying to see if I understood any of it.
I didn’t.
We laughed in embarrassment.
“Tomorrow, le livre.” He pointed to the dictionary.
“Oui, I wouldn’t dare come without it. Adios.” No, Bonita Faye, wrong language. “Au revoir.” I turned quickly before Claude saw the pain that slapped my eyes as I spoke the French word for “good-bye.” I remembered where I had been the last time I said it.
FOURTEEN
It wasn’t just the fun of going on the picnic with a handsome young man at a park in Paris, France. Or giggling over the dictionary that began to fall apart with our constant use of it. Maybe it was the amusement of speaking to each other with our eyes. Certain looks meant, “Do you understand this…or that?” “Am I making myself clear?” “Did I say that right?” Maybe it was the satisfaction of getting to know someone different. Or just getting to know someone. Probably it was all of it.
It’s excitin’ getting to know a new person. It can only happen once to any two people; they start out as strangers and break through a burdensome barrier that, once it has fallen, can never be erected again. At the end of the day Claude Vermeillon and I were friends.
It would be downright tedious to us both if I were to describe to you the stilted, formal and fractured dialogue we used to get acquainted. So, I’ll just tell the gist of it.
Claude was a year younger than me. He was a student at the University of Paris and attended classes from seven in the morning to eleven when he reported to work at his uncle’s cafe on the Champs-Elysees. That’s why I always saw him there when I came in around one. And he left the Cafe Roy at three o’clock to catch the Metro back to Bois de Boulogne where he lived with his sister, Simone, in the Hotel Regina. Simone was the manager at the hotel that was owned by the same uncle who had the Cafe Roy. If it weren’t for relatives, the French would never have jobs.
Bois de Boulogne was its own town located on the same side of the Seine as the Champs-Elysees, miles away from but easy to get to from Paris; like it is to get to Fort Smith from Poteau.
The French are an emotional lot. When they are angry, it is always to the nth degree and when they are in despair, everyone cries with them. Sympathetic tears ran down my cheeks as much as Claude’s when he told of the tragic death of his parents as we sat on one of the Cafe Roy’s white tablecloths on the grass by the River Seine. What I didn’t understand of his story, I felt.
Now, he said, and his emotions switched again, he was finishing his studies at the University of Paris and he was going to be successful and famous. But most of all he was going to be “riche-riche.” That meant he was planning to be filthy rich. I thought our communications had broken down, I thought Claude said he was going to make money by buying and selling money. “Oui.” He pointed to the word in the dictionary again when I questioned him. He was going to buy and sell money to make money. Oh, well, I thought maybe that
’s what they do in France.
We wiped our tears away with Claude’s handkerchief and drank some more wine. Then he said, “You?” in French. I picked up the scattered pages of the dictionary and systematically showed him the words for “father, unknown”…“mother, dead.” He was sympathetic with these events, but obviously shocked to see me point to “husband, dead.” He looked like he might cry again, but when I gave him a dry-eyed look, he didn’t. Instead he grabbed the dictionary from me and after flipping through its pages, told me I was too young to have been married. Now, he said, he would call me “madame.” I told him I preferred “mademoiselle.”
The next day was Sunday. The cafe was closed so I toured the Louvre again. God, I loved that Winged Victory. Between that and getting lost a couple of times on the bridges crossing the Seine, I made it through the day and even had some fun. I suddenly felt like a Parisian when I sat at a strange sidewalk cafe and ordered “croque monsieur” and they actually brought it to me without any of the usual language hassle. That gave me the courage to buy a red felt beret from a street vendor who helped me put it on, tilting it on my head until he was satisfied it looked right. When I was out of sight of the vendor, I pulled out the red silk scarf I had also bought and tied it around my neck, using my reflection in a shop window for a mirror to guide my efforts. There I was in my white cotton camp shirt, gathered black skirt, cinched at the waist with a wide, red belt and my Paris accessories. God, I thought I looked good. I walked down the Champs-Elysees to my hotel feeling like I was what mama used to call “the talk of the town.”
Claude and I played a little game when I walked into the Cafe Roy at one o’clock on Monday. “Mademoiselle,” he said pointedly as he seated me at “my” table. He brought me a Coca-Cola without my asking. What fun. What children we were. I ordered my usual “Mr. Sandwich,” and Claude presented it to me with an exaggerated flourish.
We met a lot after that. We’d take walks down by the Seine and watch the boats on the river or sit on the dark, damp steps and try to talk without my dictionary. Claude taught me the French words for water and tree. And I taught him happy and good.
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