Code Name Hélène

by Ariel Lawhon

  “To pee. I’m about to explode.” And they do laugh then, but I don’t fault them for it given that my walk has turned into a waddle with the urgency of my mission. “If anyone comes within fifty feet of that stream, shoot them.”

  “You have my word…Duckie,” Rake shouts, but he’s laughing so hard he almost chokes on the last word.

  Nancy Grace Augusta Wake

  NANCY’S FLAT, RUE SAINTE-ANNE, PARIS

  January 1937

  “Well,” Stephanie says, drawing on her cigarette, “I hope you haven’t been sending him love letters. Women do stupid things like that after sex.”

  I fold a black pencil skirt and set it carefully into my suitcase. “How many times do I have to tell you that I did not sleep with Henri Fiocca?”

  She rolls her eyes. “Oh, I am certain there was no sleeping involved.”

  “Let me be as clear as I can. We. Are. Not. Having. Sex.”

  “But you’ve been seeing him for months.”

  “Yes. So?”

  “Isn’t that the way of things?” she asks. Stephanie sits curled up in the small wingback chair in my bedroom. The velvet is faded and it’s threadbare, but I’m certain there is no more comfortable seat in all of Paris than right there at my window with the sun shining through the frosted panes.

  “Often, yes.”

  My favorite green cashmere sweater goes into the suitcase next and I smooth out the creases so it will arrive unwrinkled. The color sets off my eyes and the wide neckline flatters my jaw. But it’s the softness of the thing—like a rabbit’s underbelly—that I’m certain will have Henri Fiocca purring in my ear when I see him tomorrow.

  Stephanie blows smoke out her nose, looking for all the world like the concept of not bedding a man has set her brain on fire. “Ma petite, say what you like to him, especially on the pillow, but never put it in writing. He will hold you to it forever otherwise.”

  She’s the one who brought up pillows, so I grab one from my bed and throw it at her head, but she ducks it easily, laughing.

  “I’ve had many conversations with Henri Fiocca, but none of them have involved pillows.”

  “That’s how the Count got me, you know,” she continues, ignoring me completely. “He swept me off my feet. Bought me flowers and wine and perfume. He sent me letters. Took me to Italy. Of course, I responded. Declared my love in return. And now, whenever I behave badly he waves those letters in my face. How am I supposed to take a lover like a proper Frenchwoman when he’s constantly reminding me of my oaths of undying fidelity?”

  Stephanie loves Count Gonzales; I know she does. And she remains staunchly faithful to him. But I am now uncertain whether that’s by choice.

  “I have sent exactly zero love letters to Henri Fiocca,” I say in complete honesty. However, I do not mention that we speak at great length on the phone several times per week.

  Stephanie is unimpressed. “And yet, here you are, packing your suitcase to travel south yet again. How many times is this in the last four months?”

  “Four.”

  She looks at me with those unnerving blue eyes. “And you will no doubt be staying—”

  “At the Hôtel du Louvre et Paix. Like I always do—”

  “—with a guest, no doubt.”

  “Unless you mean Picon, no. Fiocca has his own flat. Somewhere. I’ve never been there.”

  Stephanie tosses her cigarette onto the floor and grinds it out with the toe of her shoe. “And why not?” she demands. “What is wrong with you?”

  “Well, for starters, he’s never invited me.” She opens her mouth to interrupt again but I stop her. “Nor has he invited himself up to my room. And, yes, I bloody well know that I could do the inviting on both counts, but I just”—here I struggle to explain myself—“feel like there’s nothing wrong with being…”

  “Ridiculous?”

  “Hard to get.” I continue packing my suitcase. “That man could have any woman in Marseille.”

  “Have you looked at him? He could have any woman in France.” She shakes her head. “I despair of you ever becoming a proper Parisienne.”

  I stab a finger at her. “That’s my point exactly. Don’t you see? In this one instance I’d like to be different. If he wants me, he has to work for it. I won’t make it easy for him.”

  “He could be seeing ten different women while he’s waiting on you,” she says.

  “If so, I’ll find out. And that will be the end.”

  I suppose this is possible. Henri Fiocca doesn’t lack for opportunity. But something tells me he isn’t running around on me. Or maybe I am deluded. Regardless, I have a train to catch, a city to visit, and a story to find—the Hearst Newspaper Group will be expecting an article of some sort next week, and, given the calm political climate in Marseille at the moment, I will have to get creative to find one. For months I’ve been taking any opportunity that presents itself to travel south. It couldn’t be more obvious to Stephanie, or anyone else halfway paying attention for that matter, that I am practically hurling myself toward Marseille—and Henri—every chance I get. To be fair, however, he’s doing the same. Paris is landlocked, but you’d think it was the center of the shipping universe the way he makes excuses to travel north for work. Thankfully, he has no one to answer to but his father.

  Stephanie stretches, then picks a piece of tobacco from her tongue. “Trust me, ma petite, whisper your promises. Don’t mail them.”

  “Fine words from the woman who got me into this mess in the first place,” I say, slamming the lid of my suitcase a little harder than necessary.

  She grins now, and I see how delighted she really is about my growing love affair. “You’re welcome.”

  VERDUN’S RESTAURANT, MARSEILLE

  “Please don’t be angry with me,” Henri says the next night as he pulls out my chair. He sets his hands on my shoulders, thumbs caressing the soft green sweater. He drops a kiss to one cheek.

  I straighten my spine but don’t shake off his hands. “Why should I be angry?”

  “I’ve invited someone to join us for dinner.”

  “Who?”

  A whisper in my ear. “My father.”

  “Your—”

  “I didn’t tell you because I didn’t want you to be nervous.” Henri chooses the chair to my left instead of the one across from me.

  “I thought you didn’t want me to be angry?”

  “That either.”

  “Then you can’t spring something like this on me.”

  “To be fair, this is a first. Besides, I was afraid you wouldn’t come if you knew he’d be here.”

  “You were correct.” Honestly, if he’d told me we were having dinner with Satan himself I would have come. We’re eating at Verdun’s tonight. It’s my favorite restaurant in Marseille—or at least the ones we’ve been to so far. It is warm and elegant—white linens and candlelight—and the food is nothing short of a religious experience. I won’t admit this, however. I’d rather Henri think I’m upset. Who brings a girl to meet his father and doesn’t warn her first?

  Henri takes a quick, deep breath and huffs it out. “Listen, he wants to meet you. He’s been asking. I go to Paris a lot. He knows it’s for a woman. And I’d like you to meet him as well.”

  “Why?”

  “Because we’re…This is…not like the other relationships I’ve had.”

  I won’t smile. I. Will. Not. Smile. Henri Fiocca cannot have the satisfaction of knowing how pleased I am by those words. He can’t know how desperately I want to be special. To be the one he chooses. So I scowl at him instead. It’s the only way to mask the pure elation that I feel.

  “Merde. There he is,” Henri says.

  I catch the warning in his eyes—that sudden flash of surprise—just before he stands. Henri’s father is not alone.

  I follow h
is gaze and take in the couple who have just stepped inside the front door of Verdun’s. The man is clearly Henri’s father. They are identical. Same height. Same build. Same handsome face—though Henri’s is a good thirty years younger. His father’s hair is salt-and-pepper to Henri’s black. His laugh lines are deeper. His body softer. But they are one and the same. Cut from the same expensive cloth. The woman at his side, however, cannot be Henri’s mother.

  “That is…” I search for the name of the woman I met here five months ago.

  “Marceline,” Henri says. I’ve never heard him use this cold voice before, and it has my full attention. I return my gaze to him and note the clenched jaw. The single, furious twitch of his upper lip.

  “Why—”

  “I don’t know,” he hisses. “But I am sorry. I didn’t know, and she wasn’t invited.”

  “By you?”

  “Certainly not.”

  “Okay. I can live with that.”

  And I’ll have to because Joseph, the maître d’, is leading them toward our table. They are twenty feet away. Ten. Five. We are standing, and I have summoned a half-hearted smile for the occasion. All teeth but no sincerity. I don’t think of myself as the sort of woman who gets nervous, but here I am, heart pounding as Henri introduces me to his father.

  “This is Nancy,” he says, setting my hand gently into his father’s.

  “Pleased to meet you.” My voice sounds hollow. Insincere. And I can see his eyes narrow.

  “Ranier Fiocca,” he says, but my brain records him simply as Old Man Fiocca. It’s the only way to distinguish him from Henri. They are too similar. He drops my hand without shaking it in return or pressing a customary kiss to the knuckles. I feel as though I have been measured and found wanting.

  “And Marceline,” Henri adds, the frost heavy in his voice as he looks at his father. “Though I must admit I was not expecting a fourth party.”

  “I invited her,” he says.

  “I see.”

  They glower at each other and I extend my hand to Marceline as father and son engage in a silent battle of wills.

  “We’ve met,” she says, glancing at my hand but not taking it.

  “Have you?” Old Man Fiocca looks from his son to Marceline, then to me. “Where exactly was that?”

  I take my seat and Henri joins me. He moves close enough that the entire lengths of our thighs touch. His hand is on my knee—a comfort, a warning. I don’t give Henri a chance to answer his father. I am too angry—too blisteringly angry at him for putting me in this situation—to give him the opportunity to smooth this over.

  “Well, the last time we saw one another, she was in the company of your son.”

  Of all the things I expect Old Man Fiocca to do, laugh is not one of them. But he does. Loud and startling. “Was she? I am glad to hear it! It’s been too long since they spent time together.”

  “I agree.” Marceline’s voice is a purr. But not a lioness. Hers is the voice of a jackal, one who takes her blood straight from the jugular. And her eyes are on me, looking for weakness. “Henri and I have a long history.”

  Our waiter arrives to take our drink order and we all, in unison, request brandy. No water. No wine. We’re going straight to the liquor. If our waiter is nervous, if he feels the boiling tension surrounding our small corner table, he doesn’t let on.

  But then Old Man Fiocca looks at me with a calculating glint. “Bring a bottle of Bollinger Cuvée Brut as well.”

  “Oui, monsieur,” our waiter says, then retreats at a fast clip toward the kitchen.

  The scent of baking bread and seared steak fills the restaurant, along with the rich aroma of bouillabaisse. Normally this would make my mouth water. But my stomach is a bag of knots instead, coiled and tight.

  Marceline has chosen the seat directly across from Henri, putting herself on display. She shimmies out of her fur coat, revealing a brown satin blouse, unbuttoned to a deep—almost immoral—V. I can see her clavicles and sternum clearly, along with the inner curve of each breast. It’s cold. It’s January for Pete’s sake. But there she is, no brassiere, nipples evident against the thin fabric. A delicate gold necklace rests along her collarbones, a pendant—in the form of the letter H—sits gently in the hollow, and she touches it lightly with one finger.

  Oh. Now I see what’s happening. H. Henri. She has staked her claim and Old Man Fiocca approves. To him, I am the unwanted guest. The interloper. And what better way to drive me off than to bring one of Henri’s old flames to our first meeting?

  Marceline situates her coat over the back of her chair. Smiles gently at Old Man Fiocca. Smiles seductively at Henri. But it’s the smile she gives me that is vindictive. She remembers what happened at our last meeting and is out for blood. Is desperate for it, in fact. Given the look on her face, I can see how clearly she has imagined this moment. Planned for it—which means she is likely behind this entire fiasco. So I give her a single nod. I see you, it says, and I will not be driven off.

  I am not the sort of woman who waits for the attack, so I’m drawing a breath, about to speak, when Old Man Fiocca asks, “Where exactly are you from, Mademoiselle…?”

  “Wake,” I say, taking a second to recalibrate. “I was born in New Zealand but raised in Australia.”

  “Not Français.” He gives Henri a disapproving glance as though beginning a list of my faults. “And what is it that you do?”

  “I am a journalist.”

  “Is that so?”

  I nod.

  “And what do you cover?”

  “Politics, mostly. But also current affairs. And sports, occasionally. I covered the Olympics last year in Berlin.” If this were a different conversation and he a different sort of man, I would tell him what it felt like to stand in that stadium and watch Jesse Owens beat Adolf Hitler’s best runners to win the gold medal. And then, what it felt like, afterward, to interview the son of black sharecroppers from Alabama knowing that he had just changed the world. I would tell him about standing in the shadow of the Hindenburg as it passed over the field. An engineering marvel desecrated by the black swastika painted on its sides. If he had come to meet me instead of to chase me away, I would tell him any number of things, not the least of which is how enamored I am of his son.

  As expected, he is unimpressed. “And which French newspaper do you work for?”

  “Not a single one,” I say.

  “Pardon?”

  “I’m a freelancer. I work for the European bureau of the Hearst Newspaper Group.”

  “Hearst?” he says, as though he’s really saying maggot or feces. “They are American?”

  “Yes.”

  “I am familiar with that tabloid.”

  The one thing I can tolerate about Marceline—the single feature on her entire, beautifully smug face—is the fact that she does not have a perfect smile. There is an overlap in her two front teeth. Just a small imperfection. So, when she flashes her triumphant grin, it is slightly warped.

  I do not need Henri to defend me, and the fact that he doesn’t makes me love him all the more. Yes. I love him. I cannot help it. I realized this at the train station today. He found me and kissed me on the platform, in full view of every person there. And then he dug around in my handbag for Picon and kissed him too, right on the nose. Picon returned his affection with a lick right on the chin and I thought my poor battered heart might explode from the joy of it all. My little dog is asleep in my hotel room, on a cushion that Henri Fiocca bought for him. It is purple velvet with black piping and Picon looks like a monarch perched right there in the center. Like the bloody king of England. So Old Man Fiocca and Marceline can say or do what they please, because I have everything I’ve ever wanted.

  I turn to Marceline. Change the subject. “And what do you do?”

  “She’s a secretary,” Old Man Fiocca answers for her
.

  “For who?”

  “Albert Paquet,” she says, as though I ought to know who this is.

  “Police Commissioner Paquet,” Old Man Fiocca clarifies.

  I ignore him and continue looking at her. “It must not pay well.”

  “Why do you say that?” she asks.

  I nod at her décolletage. “Apparently you can’t even afford a brassiere.”

  Marceline goes perfectly still, lips parted slightly, as though surprised. And I suppose she is. Most Frenchwomen employ subtlety in their battles, death by a thousand paper cuts. Whereas I prefer a direct attack. Piss or get off the pot. It takes her a moment to rally, and I can see her eyes hardening, her thoughts gathering, when Old Man Fiocca laughs. The sound is one of delight. He believes my barb to be the opening bell in a boxing match and he leans forward, eager to see what will happen next.

  Once, when I was a very young teen, in Sydney, one of my older brothers took me to a seedy part of town. It was a dare—just a way to pass the time on a boring Saturday afternoon—but we went to an establishment where women wrestled one another, barely clothed, while covered in oil like greased pigs. We didn’t stay long, and, in truth, I didn’t understand the point of the entire situation at the time. It took many years of puzzled contemplation to figure out that some men enjoy watching women fight. If they expose themselves in the process, even better. Looking at him now, at the pure, fiendish pleasure in his eyes, I am certain that Old Man Fiocca would have very much enjoyed that wrestling match. Hell, he’s tried to set one up tonight.

  Our waiter returns with brandy and champagne on ice. He pops the cork and evenly pours the golden, bubbling liquid in four separate flutes, but I reach for my brandy and don’t even wait to see if Old Man Fiocca will offer a toast before I take my first sip. Henri’s hand settles onto my knee again and I think it might be a warning, but this is a war I am determined to win.

  Henri leans to his left and I hear him whisper, “May I have a word with you outside, Papa?”

  Old Man Fiocca nods. “Oui.”