by Hazel Gaynor
“What a dreadful state to arrive in,” Clara said as she stepped from the car. “Look at how wrinkled and creased I am. I’ve never looked so disheveled.”
She looked perfect to me, but I couldn’t bring myself to say so. “I don’t think anyone will be looking at your outfit, Clara. Anyway, who cares how creased we are. We’re in Paris!”
“Paris is the fashion capital of the world, Madeleine! Of course people will notice my outfit.”
Travel weary but thrilled to be in this beautiful city, we were greeted by the concierge and shown to our suite, a bright airy space that overlooked a small courtyard with a garden shared by the tenants of the adjacent buildings. The bedrooms were cozy, each furnished with a large bed covered in floral silk, dainty bedside tables, and a chest of drawers that gleamed as if the wood had just been polished. I threw my coat and handbag onto the bed in the room overlooking the street, glad to be first to stake my claim to our sleeping arrangements, just as I always had when we were children. I remembered how Clara would say it wasn’t fair, and how our mother would tell her not to be so silly and to take the other bed.
“Madeleine, come and look,” she called from the sitting room.
The surprisingly spacious room showcased a set of chaises, a polished mahogany desk, and a quaint window seat with a direct view of the Arc de Triomphe, just visible in the distance. I moved to the window to take a closer look.
“It’s beautiful, isn’t it?” I gasped.
Clara agreed that it was very pretty, but her mood turned serious. “I just wish we were here under different circumstances,” she said as she took off her velvet-trimmed gloves and perched in one of the chairs. “This isn’t a sightseeing holiday. It’s a duty we are carrying out for Violet.”
I sprawled over the chair opposite her. “It is a duty, yes, but Violet also wants us to experience the cities we’re visiting. She wants us to go sightseeing! You know how she is. She would hate to think of us being all sad and serious and having no fun at all, especially when Paris is outside, waiting for us to discover it. In fact, she’d be furious!”
Clara offered a small smile. “I suppose so. Should we read her first letter to us? She said we should as soon as we arrived in Paris.”
“Over lunch? I’m famished and it’s always better to digest important news on a full stomach.”
Clara stood up. “Fine. Over lunch. But I’ll need to take a soak first.”
“Well, make it a quick one, before I pass out. I know how many hours you spend in the bathroom.”
As Clara ran her bath and put a record on the gramophone player, singing along to a Benny Goodman number, I peered down at the pedestrians and out across the patches of emerald lawn to the left of the building. The trees in early spring were blossoming and the pale afternoon light illuminated the ornate buildings. I took my journal from my bag, eager to capture my first impressions.
PARIS
As the sky shifts from gray to brilliant blue, fresh raindrops coat everything and shimmer in the sun. Stone buildings carved with elegant frescoes line the streets, their curled-iron balconies fitted with a table for morning coffee or for watching the passersby in the street. Some look like a small city garden with their potted flowers in red and white and purple.
As we rode from the train station, we alternately glided over cement and bumped over cobblestones. We took in the sights of gleaming storefronts graced with perfumes and beautiful fabrics, glistening pastries and fresh meats, and a thousand things between. Bicyclists joined the flow of cars along the boulevards, their happy bells chiming and mingling with the roar of motorcar engines. As we turned onto the Champs-Élysées, I absorbed every sight, every sound, every smell: fresh bread, soot mingling with damp air, and the hint of greenery on the breeze.
The skyline here is so unlike New York’s. Paris doesn’t have any monoliths of steel and glass blocking the sun. The light here is different, rosy gold when the sun shines, and from the lattice window where I now sit, the Arc de Triomphe de l’Étoile beckons in the distance, a gateway to the city beyond.
Satisfied, I put my journal away and pulled the packet of Violet’s letters from my suitcase. Three were marked Clara and Madeleine, along with our instructions for each city, to explain more about each person she wanted us to visit and where exactly she wanted us to go. Three other letters were marked with the names of those she’d written to: Frank, Matthias, and Margaret. But there was another letter stuffed among my belongings. Edward’s letter to Clara.
I’d forgotten all about it with the endless schedule of entertainment and distractions on the Queen Mary. And Clara hadn’t mentioned it. Presumably, she thought it was lost, tossed into the wastebasket along with the newspapers among which she’d hidden it.
As she hummed happily to herself in the bathroom, I paused. Should I tell her I’d found it and claim complete innocence? Or would it be better to save it for another day? I didn’t want to spoil things when we’d only just arrived.
As any good journalist knows, there’s a wrong time and a right time to pursue a story.
After a moment of hesitation, I slipped the letter between the pages of my journal.
For now, this one could wait.
* * *
ONCE WE’D REFRESHED ourselves, we ventured out for lunch, walking along the streets near the hotel and through the adjoining neighborhoods, past little markets and the occasional vendor and a wineshop with a black awning fluttering in the breeze. I gazed at the buildings, admiring the early-nineteenth-century style, and commented on the beautifully manicured trees and pristine sidewalks. Mothers pushed their children in strollers decorated with lace trim or walked their little city dogs on dainty leashes. It was all so picturesque. Though I was grateful to be staying in such a beautiful neighborhood, I also longed to see the real Paris, where the less fortunate lived and worked to scratch out a living. I wanted to see what was happening behind the city’s elegant façade. As always, I wanted to find the grit, the truth of the place.
We chose a quaint brasserie several blocks from the hotel. A menu board outside the door advertised a prix fixe meal that we couldn’t resist. After being seated at a cozy table by the front window, we ordered a bottle of Bordeaux and dug into a delicious vegetable terrine, followed by steaming plates of coq au vin. I’d never tasted a chicken stew like it; the meat was tender, and bright herbs flavored the rich wine broth. I sopped up every last drop with a piece of crusty bread.
While we waited for dessert, I took Violet’s first letter to us from my handbag. I recalled how she’d hesitated for a moment before pressing the little bundle of letters, tied with a red ribbon, into my hands. “Take care of them,” she’d said. “And of each other.” I glanced at Clara across the table now, lost in her own thoughts. Were we taking care of each other or merely tolerating each other?
“Do you want to read it, or should I?” I asked.
“You read this one. I’ll read the next.”
I opened the envelope and took out two sheets of folded writing paper, and an old photograph.
My dearest girls,
If you are reading this, then I presume you are already in Paris. Isn’t it the most beautiful city? I could hardly believe it was real when I first saw it.
I chose the beautiful Hotel George V for the duration of your stay. It is one of the city’s most prized hotels, and I only want the best for my girls.
The next stage of your trip is to Amiens. I traveled there, too, with my sister, Margaret, all those years ago. It was a silly idea really, to follow in Nellie Bly’s footsteps and meet the writer Jules Verne at his home there. But he was ever so kind and didn’t seem to mind at all that two excitable American girls had landed on his doorstep. He said, “Any friends of Miss Bly’s are friends of mine.” He took us ballooning over Paris with a marvelous gentleman called Monsieur LaChambre. I felt like I was flying. I don’t think I’ve ever felt so free.
Monsieur LaChambre’s great-nephew, Monsieur Malraux, is expecting you
at his ballooning factory outside Paris, when you return from Amiens. He will take you on an ascent in a tethered balloon. I hope you will enjoy the experience as much as I did. It really does change your view of the world when you see it from the clouds.
At this, I stopped reading and looked at Clara. “We’re going on a balloon ride! Good old Violet!”
“You might be,” Clara countered. “I’m not stepping one foot into a balloon basket.”
I rolled my eyes at her. “Don’t be such a bore. It’ll be fun. Anyway, that’s for another day. Let’s see what else Violet has to say.”
But there is another reason I want you to go to Amiens. A far more important reason than visiting the homes of famous novelists.
It is strange that my life should circle back to this little corner of France, so many years later. You see, your dear grandfather Frank was billeted in Amiens during the Great War. He was considered too old to fight, but volunteered with the American Red Cross to use his medical knowledge. He was happy to do his part when America entered the war.
I will never forget the day the letter arrived announcing his death. So many years have passed since, and yet it only feels like minutes. He was killed by a German sniper as his unit was on the march to a field hospital somewhere near the Somme river. He hadn’t been away long, and the armistice was announced soon after. It still catches me by surprise when I reach for his hand at sunrise and discover his side of the bed empty. How can he not be there? How can he be gone forever, snatched from me so cruelly in the last months of the war? There hasn’t been a single day since I waved him off that I haven’t thought about him, when I don’t miss him terribly.
He called me his best girl.
One of my greatest regrets in life is that I never traveled to France to visit his grave, to say my final farewell. Part of me couldn’t accept that he was gone, you see. I felt that if I didn’t see his final resting place, there was a chance he would walk through the door and lift me up into those big arms of his and plant a kiss on my cheek and tell me he loved me more than all the steel girders in Manhattan.
Frank Bell was the sweetest, gentlest soul and he loved you both dearly. I only wish he had lived to see you grow up into the wonderful women you’ve become. I have enclosed a photograph of him.
He was laid to rest in a military cemetery just outside Amiens. That is all I know.
Please read my letter to him when you find him.
Violet
X
We sat in quiet contemplation before Clara broke the silence.
“Do you remember Grandpa Frank?” she asked as she studied the photograph.
“I have vague memories. You?”
She nodded. “The same.”
The last clear memory I had of him was a sunny afternoon when he’d given us cherry lollipops, his large warm hands in mine as we’d walked on the beach. I recalled how I’d missed him when he left to go to war. I’d never had to work hard for his love like I had for my father’s; Frank never scolded me for coming home with scraped knees or climbing on the furniture when I shouldn’t, and he admired the crabs I brought back from the beach and let crawl around the garden. He’d always been proud of me, just as Violet had. The rest of my family . . . well.
I put the letter and photograph away as our waiter arrived with a dish of crème caramel. Our conversation lulled as we dug into the creamy dessert and thought about Violet’s words.
“How is your writing going?” Clara asked when we’d nearly finished.
I was surprised by the question and wasn’t quite sure how to respond. Was it just small talk, or did she really want to know?
“It’s going fine,” I offered.
“Are you still in touch with that work colleague? Bill somebody. A journalist?” She took a sip from her coffee cup, peering over the rim, watching for my reaction.
Clara had always assumed Billy Jenkins was more than a friend, but I’d never had any romantic interest in him. I’d never explained what had happened between us and preferred to keep it that way. Clara would only say I told you so and scold me about trusting strangers.
I’d met Billy at the public library when we’d both approached the circulation desk for assistance with research on the same story. He seemed pleasant enough, and it was always nice to meet someone in the same line of work. We’d struck up a conversation about politics over coffee and cigarettes, and met again the next day, and then the next week and so on, until we met regularly to swap ideas and opinions and share progress—or lack of—on our submissions. I’d thought we were friends, two writers trying to help each other break into the world of journalism—until the day he pitched a story I’d shared with him in confidence. The editor at the New York Times was impressed enough to offer Billy a position as a regular on their staff. The deceit and betrayal still stung, but at least I knew my ideas were sound. Now I was more determined than ever to succeed without anyone’s help, least of all a man’s.
“Bill nobody,” I replied, and changed the subject. “How about a stroll along the Seine to walk off some of this food.”
“I’d like that,” Clara replied. “It will be nice to enjoy the water without feeling nauseous.”
I pressed my hand to my mouth in a faux exclamation of surprise. “We agree on something?”
Clara crossed her arms over her chest. “Don’t get used to it.”
But I wondered if I could get used to it. If I wanted to get used to it. I certainly didn’t need Clara back in my life, especially if it meant bringing Hancock with her, but I couldn’t deny that there was something right about being around her, even if she drove me crazy with her airs and graces and misplaced fears. She was, after all, my sister, and like her or loathe her, I was stuck with her.
Clara
Paris was like an Impressionist painting, all gentle color and romantic detail. I couldn’t wait to capture it on canvas: sunrise over the Seine, the bustle of the Champs-Élysées, the delicate curves of the Sacré-Coeur. As I admired a copy of Degas’s famous Danseuses bleues that hung in our suite, it struck me that Paris was like a ballet itself. Everyone moved as if carefully choreographed, dancing around each other with a delicate energy, so different from New York with all its noise and determined bustle. Paris drew me in, and I felt the last remnants of concern and hesitation about the trip dissolve as I slid beneath the bedcovers that evening, full of good wine and hearty food, and relieved to be free of the sensation of everything swaying beneath me.
I slept like the dead and woke refreshed.
“I’d like to visit the Left Bank today, watch the artists at work,” I said as I applied rouge to my cheeks. I needed only a little, my skin having taken some color from my hours sketching on the sun deck of the Queen Mary.
“Well, I can’t be in Paris a minute longer without visiting the Eiffel Tower,” Madeleine replied. “Imagine the views from the top! Why don’t we do that first, and have lunch in the Latin Quarter by Notre-Dame after?”
I shook my head. “You know I can’t stand heights. I have absolutely no intention of going to the top of that tower.”
Madeleine’s chin nearly hit the floor. “But it’s one of the most famous landmarks in the world, Clara. You have to climb it, see Paris from above!”
“I’m perfectly happy to see Paris from the ground,” I insisted. “But you go, if you must.”
“I must,” she replied.
And that was all there was to be said on the matter.
“Are you going to wear your new French parfum today?” Madeleine asked as she ran her fingers through her hair and considered it styled for the day ahead.
I glanced at the ornate perfume bottle on the dressing table. A second gift from Charles that had arrived while we’d been at lunch the previous day. Only the sweetest scent for my young bride-to-be. Only the best for my Clara.
“I’d rather not walk around Paris smelling like Charles Hancock’s mother,” I said with a huff, and immediately regretted being unkind about Charles in Madelei
ne’s company.
Madeleine burst out laughing. “It isn’t one of her favorites, is it? Poor Chuck! He seems to have a talent for giving you things you don’t like.”
I folded my arms. “Charles has given me plenty of perfect gifts,” I snapped. And yet, even as I defended him, I had trouble remembering anything I’d truly loved, and my thoughts strayed again to the gift from Edward, and then to his lost letter.
“Like what?” Madeleine pressed. “You don’t even like your engagement ring.”
I glared at her. “Of course I like my engagement ring! Don’t be absurd.”
“Then why do you seem so serious when you look at it?”
Her words stung. A surge of anger brought color rushing to my cheeks. “What a ridiculous thing to say! You’re just jealous, Madeleine. You can’t stand for me to have nice things and a husband. Poor little Madeleine, always trying to keep up.”
Now it was her turn to look furious. “I don’t need to keep up with anyone, and most definitely not with you. Besides, if husbands are all as ruthless and heartless as Charles Hancock, I’m fine without one. More than fine! You hardly know the man, Clara, and he clearly doesn’t understand you. Do you really intend to spend the rest of your life with him?”
For a moment, I was speechless. How dare she! “I know him perfectly well.”
At this she laughed cruelly. “Oh, Clara. You don’t know the first thing about what he’s up to with his business schemes, the people he’s happy to trample all over to get what he wants.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about, but I don’t believe a word you say. You’re mean and spiteful. Always have been. Always will be.”
I stalked into my bedroom, pulled my case from the closet, and flung it onto the bed.
“What are you doing?” Madeleine asked, her face a picture of surprise as she appeared at the bedroom door.
“Packing my things. I’m not staying here with you a moment longer.” I stood up tall and placed my hands on my hips. “I knew this was a terrible idea. You can see Paris on your own. The way you’re going, you’ll spend the rest of your life doing things alone. You make it impossible for people to love you, Madeleine.”