The Velvet Hours

by Alyson Richman

  * * *

  For days afterward, she spoke to no one. She instead willed herself to be stronger. To forget. To create a tourniquet around her heart. She bound her breasts tightly with yards of muslin until all the milk dried up. She spent hours fashioning a special corset that enabled her to tighten the laces from the front. She showed herself no mercy, pulling the corset tighter each day until she had regained her former silhouette.

  A week later, dressed in a simple cotton dress, her hourglass figure proudly displayed, Marthe walked in to the Gouget Brothers’ dress shop on Rue Montorgueil to interview for a position as a seamstress.

  She began the new job at once, but she found no comfort in her needle and thread. She had a restlessness inside her that would not leave her. Still only twenty-one, her beauty had returned to her and she was hungry for things that existed outside the store. Paris was aflutter with excitement. Monsieur Eiffel had begun constructing his impressive tower of steel. And the streets were full of the most extraordinary fashions.

  She could imagine herself with great ease in these sumptuous dresses made from luxurious silks and lace. The other women who came into the Gouget Brothers’ store rarely had a figure to rival her own.

  But none of these women noticed the poor seamstress on her knees, who fitted the muslin patterns against their virtuous, white corsets and who hemmed their dresses and adjusted the cuffs of their sleeves.

  On a whim, she decided to go to an audition for chorus girls with one of the other seamstresses from the dress shop, who had one day whispered to her about an open call at the upscale theater, Les Ambassadeurs.

  “I wish I could,” she had told Camille. “But I fear my dancing and my voice are rather unremarkable.”

  “What you might lack in your vocal cords, you make up in how you would fill out the costume,” Camille teased.

  She knew it was true. All traces of her pregnancy had evaporated. She had a neck as long and as slender as a tulip stem, a generous bust, and a waist that could be encircled by two firm hands. When she stood in for a fit model at the store, the other seamstresses would fawn over her perfect proportions. And her face would come alive as the silk draped against her skin.

  So she went to the theater with Camille. She stood on the wooden stage with the lights radiating off her skin. She gazed out on the expanse of near-empty seats and was not afraid. On the contrary, she was thrilled by the vastness of the space. Almost instantly, she could imagine every seat filled, with all eyes on her and the other singers dressed in costumes far lovelier than anything she owned.

  A man named Julian called out the names of the girls who were auditioning. He told them they could each choose what song they would like to sing. Marthe knew few songs by heart, so she chose “Vive la Rose” because it was romantic and lyrical. The range of the song was also not too challenging, so she knew she would be able to project.

  When the list of those who had been selected was posted outside the theater, she huddled close next to Camille, both of them searching the list for their own names.

  “Your name!” Camille cried out. “‘Mathilde Beaugiron!’ There you are!” Her finger tapped the line of cursive black script. Camille, who had not been selected, only showed excitement for her friend, not jealousy or envy.

  “This pays five more sous a week than working at the shop!”

  But it wasn’t only the extra money. It was the chance to reinvent herself, to feel alive and to sparkle under the glow of lights. A sense of exhilaration came over her.

  She walked back to the shop with Camille, and later that afternoon, after she put down her needle and thread for what she believed would be the last time, she gave her notice to the Gouget brothers.

  “You’re leaving us for the chorus in a dinner and dancing show?” one of them asked her in disbelief.

  She straightened her back and looked at them with her wide, Gallic eyes.

  “Why, yes. Plus, a little bit of acting, too.”

  She saw both of the brothers’ eyes fall to her breasts one last time, as though their departure was what saddened them the most.

  Seeing her name on the list had given her a newfound confidence.

  “But first, I’ll need this week’s wages.”

  Her forwardness shocked them, and even she had been surprised at how quickly they went to retrieve the ten sous they owed her.

  “Well, good-bye then,” she said as she folded the bills and placed them inside her purse. “If you ever miss me, you can always come see me perform at Les Ambassadeurs.” With that, she picked up her bag and walked proudly out the door.

  * * *

  In the beginning, the girls at the theater had not welcomed her. They looked at her ample cleavage, her sculpted calves, and saw their newest member as competition. Behind her back, they laughed at her demure underpinnings, her milk-colored corsets, and petticoat without an edge of lace. But they underestimated her eye for detail. Her desire to do more for herself than just dance and sing.

  She had never been one for gossip or mindless conversation, preferring instead to observe. So she studied the other women as though they were their own form of education. When she was alone in the changing room, she secretly examined the labels of their clothes to discover the names of the dress shops they preferred. She took note of their festive colored corsets, the ones they wore beneath their silk dressing gowns, with the flashes of color peeking out like an invitation. She learned what exotic blooms impressed them, and what flowers were left behind.

  During her first months at Les Ambassadeurs, she had not yet learned how to fully exploit her charms. She sang with her eyes straight ahead, focusing on the back door of the theater, and never played the coquette. And so evening after evening, not a single bouquet arrived for Marthe. It wasn’t until one of the other dancers felt pity toward her, that she was given some advice that would change her fate.

  “When you sing, search for a single pair of eyes in which to anchor yourself. So that the man believes you’re singing only to him.”

  The girl came closer to Marthe. “And don’t forget, sometimes the most sensual part of the body is the part they never anticipated seeing.”

  So the next performance, Marthe took those words to heart. She searched the audience for a pair of eyes that burned the brightest, finding a pair that belonged to a slender, handsome man in a dinner jacket, sitting at one of the tables closest to the stage. She took note of how his eyes lit up at the sight of her, and she immediately latched on to his gaze, directing the words of the song solely to him. When her sleeve slipped off her shoulder, revealing a globe of white polished skin, she could feel his eyes hard upon her. He smiled, even after the lights had dimmed.

  * * *

  Charles came to watch her every Wednesday, each time sending her orchids, and always taking the seat closest to the stage. She would anticipate the arrival of his carriage outside the theater. The swing of the black lacquered door, the quick grasp of his hand pulling her inside. She memorized the scent of the leather seats, a blend of sandalwood and hide, powerful and immediate. The Oriental perfume of his tobacco that floated in blue clouds from his pipe. She knew the sound of her skirt as it rustled under his searching hands. She knew the taste of his tongue as it touched her own.

  For nearly six months, they used his carriage for their private nest, as his driver expertly led the horses through the quieter streets of Paris.

  There was much one could do within the confines of polished wood and glass. She became an expert in acrobatics. Arching her back against the corner of the damask-lined walls, lifting her legs at half angles. Offering herself to him underneath the layers of her dress.

  Her wardrobe was now an array of colorful silks and expensive laces. She made sure she wore his gifts—the gown from the Callot Soeurs and the black garter from the most expensive lingerie shop in Paris—both for his pleasure and for her own. Every Wednesday,
she waited with anticipation until the curtain fell and she could be in his arms again, with the carriage wheels rolling beneath them and the moonlight highlighting those warm, white places of hers that he skillfully managed to expose.

  * * *

  The trip to Venice was the first time he had seen her completely naked. Her body released from her corsetry, her limbs finally free to move and stretch unhindered by the confines of his coach. He had gone to the bath while she lay in the bed. She waited for him without a peignoir, without even the flimsiest material between the linens and her skin. This time there would be no garter, ribbons, or lace. The surprise would be the lack of any veil; her body completely bare.

  He pulled away the covers, and as the gas lamp flickered on the nightstand, she felt his eyes soaking in the sight of her. She sensed his desire in all its strength and undulations. The hunger. The thirst. The belief that she was wholly his to touch and possess.

  She rejoiced to be loved, to be adored, to be touched by such gentle and refined hands. There was a new music to their passion. Beyond the breath and the small cries, emerged the unfamiliar pleasure of being two unknown travelers in an exotic city far from their own. Here, with none of his peers to recognize him, he allowed her to loop her arm around his own as they walked brazenly in the Venetian daylight. Here, he did not check his watch or leave her after his caresses had cooled from her body. Here, she was as precious to him in the day as she was to him in the night. And it thrilled her.

  He had promised Marthe her own place upon their return, but she held her breath waiting to see if he would make good on his word. For she knew more than anyone that a man could take what he wanted, and then leave nothing in return.

  But Charles had followed through on his promise. He pressed the heavy bronze key in her hand and then led her through the rooms of her new apartment. The place was even more beautiful than she could have ever imagined, with one room leading into the next.

  “It’s all for you,” he told her. She felt his voice like a caress, a wisp of air on the nape of her neck.

  She had gasped when she first arrived in the bedroom. A large headboard upholstered in silk and embroidered with butterflies occupied most of the room.

  On the left, a stream of bright light poured through the tall windows. Another carved fireplace. A large mirror with a frame made of golden flowers. And, finally, the source of the perfume. On the mantel, five small vases. Each one filled with violets.

  “For us,” she whispered back.

  She felt his hands on her shoulders, then her waist. She felt him reaching for her as he did when the locomotive had churned beneath them. She felt her head dizzy from the fragrance. And the bed was soft as he pulled her near.

  2.

  Marthe

  Paris 1888

  He came the next afternoon with a birdcage painted gold and a canary, as yellow and as small as an egg yolk, chirping inside.

  “To keep you company,” Charles told her. He dangled the gilded cage in front of her like a lantern.

  She took it from him and placed a finger through the wire to touch the bird’s downy feathers.

  “You spoil me,” she said as she kissed his cheek.

  “It’s my greatest pleasure.” She watched as he removed his hat and gloves.

  She was still in her robe de chambre, a gossamer silk confection edged in silver lace. Another gift he had bought for her during their week together in Venice.

  She placed the birdcage down on the table, and she felt his fingers touching her wrist, the patch of skin hidden beneath her sleeve.

  “My beautiful girl,” he whispered into her ear. He was behind her now, his arms wrapped around her waist, his face buried in the curve of her neck. And when she lifted her eyes, she saw their embrace like a portrait moving within a golden frame.

  He had placed mirrors throughout the apartment, and she wondered if this was done on purpose, so that they could share in the pleasure of seeing how they looked wrapped in each other’s arms. That this was part of what enthralled him, to see the art of lovemaking unravel before him. It was part of the parlor game. To take what was hidden and expose it. Reveal it like a pearl shucked freshly in his hand.

  She felt the pressure of his chest against her as he peeled her robe off her shoulders, and watched as both of their eyes met at the sight of their reflection, every one of his caresses captured within the glass.

  She had known about the demimonde, that half-world that she now occupied. A world that existed in suspension, between the warmth of a jewel box apartment and the cold of the streets. A world where beautiful women existed smelling of lavender and rose. Where they welcomed men into their smooth, scented arms for a few hours, before their lovers slipped from this world to the next.

  She was aware of this special world even before she had stepped onto the stage of Les Ambassadeurs. At the Gouget Brothers, where she had pinned dresses on women who were not wives, but who nonetheless had an abundance of large, crisp banknotes within the silk lining of their purses. They did not have a gold wedding band on their fingers, but they did have an independence of which she and Camille were envious.

  And within a week of starting at Julian’s theater, Marthe had seen how quickly the embodiment of beauty and illusion was devoured by the men who paid money to see a stage filled with girls as ripe as cherries. Girls whose job was not only to sing and dance, but to provoke dreams and desires, their mere sight inspiring thoughts of sensual possibility.

  But this was how illusion was created on a small scale. Men like Charles, who had money and a title, were able to create their own private world. A world created purely for their comfort.

  They became architects of their own pleasure. They financed apartments near Pigalle, where they could explore their own desires in private. Where the shadows were just as important as the light. Where they could enjoy a woman who was not afraid of their passion, but who, on the contrary, reveled in it as though it were the most delicious meal.

  * * *

  It was an undeniable fact that she had always enjoyed pleasure, even before Charles had named her Marthe de Florian, for she had always had a weakness for the sensual and beautiful things in life. She had learned to master sewing early, to avoid the fate of being a laundress like her mother. She had seen her mother lose her beauty in the endless washings, and watched as her hands became dry as ash. The wooden scrub boards that erased a woman’s youth as quickly as if it were a simple stain. And so Marthe had learned to pull a needle and thread early on.

  By the time she was ten, she already knew how to hem and mend. She was quite pleased with herself, to have a skill that enabled her to keep busy and earn some money, rather than spending hours as her mother did, washing other people’s soiled clothes.

  She would never forget the first time she touched silk. It was in an apartment that had curtains the color of the sky.

  Her mother had dispatched her to pick up a client’s basket of laundry. She was barely eight years old, but her mother had sent her proudly in a wool dress and tights to the address she pinned to the clothes.

  Mistakenly, she did not enter through the servant’s entrance of the apartment, but somehow arrived at the main door. The maid had been kind and neither admonished her nor taken her to the kitchen, but rather let her remain in that splendid foyer for a few moments as she fetched the clothes. Perhaps the maid acted this way because the mistress of the house was not at home, or because she sensed the wonder in Marthe’s young eyes. Or perhaps it was a little of both. But regardless of the reason, as Marthe stood in the foyer waiting, she had marveled at the beauty around her. Realizing that no one was watching, she found herself unable to control her curiosity and reached over to finger the silk.

  There was mystery in that first touch. As wondrous as the first time she remembered snow melting in her hand. She pulled herself closer. First it was her fingers wrapping around the clo
th, then she pulled her entire body into the folds.

  She had been so distracted by the sensation of the silk wrapped around her that she had not heard the maid’s footsteps bringing the basket of laundry.

  “Child, you must get out of there,” she said kindly, but urgently. “Please . . . you don’t belong there!”

  She had stood frozen from the words, the material dropping from her fingers.

  The silk fell perfectly back into place, but the words the maid had uttered made her grow cold. She took the basket and left the apartment in a hurry, shivering the whole way home.

  * * *

  It was a terrible thing to be so cold that you could never feel truly warm. This had been the way Marthe remembered so much of her childhood in the apartment on the Rue Berthe where she had grown up. That wretched place where she had awakened one morning to find her sister’s body lifeless beside her. She had clasped her small body for warmth, but instead found Odette stiff and cold.

  She would never forget her mother washing Odette’s only white dress, the one her sister would be buried in. She watched her mother iron it through her tears. Marthe had shuddered at the sight of the large hole, and then, the soil that engulfed the tiny pine box whole. She had been incapable of erasing the image of the spray of flowers, limp from her hands, having clutched the stems too tightly, on top of the mound of wet earth. And now her heart had broken because they didn’t have enough money to have her sister’s name—Odette Rose—carved in stone.

  She remembered the stream of men who came and stayed for only an hour at a time in the months that followed her sister’s funeral. The scent of alcohol and perspiration. Her mother’s desperation that stole what was left of her youth and clouded the light in her eyes.