The Dress Thief

by Natalie Meg Evans

  The man opened a drawer and took out a marquetry box. ‘This was my mother’s sewing box. Take what you need.’ He pulled a pristine silk handkerchief from his pocket. ‘Create me something.’

  Alix thought, Paul, I’ll kill you.

  Shaking, she threaded a needle with silk, stretched the handkerchief on to a hoop, then sewed grimly until she found her rhythm. At that point, the tailor retired to a side office, leaving the door ajar and Alix heard him talking first to himself in Spanish, then on the telephone in French. All this time, Mlle Lilliane remained at the table, eyes open like a snake’s. It felt like an hour before the tailor came back into the room – though it was probably nearer twenty minutes. At last, Alix was able to hand over an image worked in satin stitch and French knots. The tailor took it from her, nodded, then commented, ‘She smells, you say, Mlle Lilliane?’ To Alix’s horror, he raised her hand to his nose. ‘Trout,’ he said in a satisfied voice.

  Alix’s eyes flared. ‘How did you know?’

  ‘This nose –’ he tapped it – ‘blended Ersa from fifty different ingredients and achieved a miracle of balance.’

  ‘Ersa?’

  ‘My signature perfume. Can you not smell it … orange flower, sweet almond … ?’

  She sniffed the air. ‘And rose oil?’

  ‘Perhaps. Ersa is complex. Only I know her secrets.’

  ‘You are M. Javier, aren’t you? Oh dear.’

  ‘Oh dear,’ he imitated, but he was smiling.

  He passed Alix’s embroidery to Mlle Lilliane, who snorted, ‘Very poor taste.’

  ‘Au contraire, Mademoiselle. It is the most beautifully worked fish I have seen in months. This young lady knows that to work in our business takes courage and a sense of humour.’

  *

  When Alix told her news that evening, Mémé slapped her face.

  ‘A couturier’s midinette – a skivvy – after everything I said? They’ll pay you a pittance and want blood for it.’

  Alix put her hand to her cheek. ‘Javier pays his girls well and some of the richest women in Paris buy only from him. You should be proud he offered me work.’

  ‘Alix, Alix, have you any idea what it took to get you that job at the telephone company? I went cap in hand to the Comte de Charembourg, begged him to ring the director of the company to make space for you.’

  ‘You saw the comte here, in Paris?’ Alix was confused. ‘Where did you see him? When?’

  ‘At his house in the 16th. When I went to beg his help in getting you a job, Mme la Comtesse keeping me on the step like a vagrant. Bitter medicine, drunk for your good.’

  ‘You should have told me he was here,’ Alix said stubbornly. ‘And I thought I got the job at the exchange on my own merits.’ The bubble on which she’d floated home burst. ‘You’re always so harsh, so buttoned-up. Why punish me for making the best of a life I didn’t ask for?’

  When Mémé gave no answer, Alix’s emotions rose. ‘My father would have been proud of me even if you aren’t. He always said I was an “original”.’

  Mémé sat down, throwing her hands wide. ‘You were barely five years old when your father died. The longest talk you had with him was about which spoon to eat your porridge with.’ She gestured at the portrait of Mathilda. ‘They’re all dead. You have only me.’

  Something snapped in Alix. She flung out of the room, shouting, ‘I bet my mother ran off to be a nurse to escape you.’

  ‘Aliki!’

  Ignoring the pain in that cry, Alix ran out of the flat. She’d spend the rest of the day with Bonnet. But, after puffing up the stairs of Abbesses, the Métro station of Butte Montmartre, she discovered her friend was otherwise engaged. He was in the square, part of a male group rolling knuckle jacks across a mat on the ground. A fold-out table was crammed with bottles and glasses.

  ‘Boys’ club,’ she muttered. ‘I’ll go and see Paul.’

  But at the Quai d’Anjou, she found the Katrijn away from her mooring. She stared at the empty patch of water, a formless sorrow coming over her. Paul was always here when she needed him.

  The old barge-woman Francine grinned down from her deck. ‘He’ll be back. He’s taken his sisters up the canal to visit his last living relation.’

  ‘He doesn’t have any relations, Francine.’

  ‘Oh, he does. A great-aunt at Bobigny who washed her hands of Sylvie le Gal years ago. Didn’t approve of naughty dancing.’ Francine waggled her flanks. ‘Paul’s hoping his girls will melt her tough, old heart so he can hide them there when the authorities come to get them. I just hope the fuel’s worth it; he had to borrow a can off me.’ Laughing at Alix’s glum expression, Francine beckoned. ‘Step up, take a glass of pastis with me.’

  Alix didn’t really want to, but Francine’s toothless smile urged her aboard. Once there, one pastis turned into several. Alix finally wobbled off Francine’s boat as the light faded. Her cheek still smarted from Mémé’s palm, but the intervening hours had refashioned her anger. Mémé was getting old in a world that handed out no fresh starts to a seamstress with bent fingers. Mémé was scared of the future, of Germans, of everything.

  But by the time she was crossing the square in front of St-Sulpice, feeling the vibration of its famous organ in the slabs beneath her feet, Alix had reached a decision. She wouldn’t take the job with Javier. Not even for Paul’s sake, not even for Suzy’s. It was too loaded with risk, with expectation.

  She’d help Paul in other ways, she vowed. She’d slave at the telephone exchange, take every night shift going. Turn into Mlle Boussac and become a supervisor. That man in the dependable suit could sweep her off to a neat suburb – though he’d have to take Mémé too.

  That was a good plan. So why are you crying? she demanded of herself. Hope isn’t dead. It just feels that way.

  Chapter Six

  She stuck to her vow all the following week. Here she was, finishing another Saturday night on Rue du Louvre, another night shift. As Sunday’s dawn edged through the blinds of the exchange building, Alix pulled off her headphones and thought longingly of coffee. Sweet, strong coffee. She checked her watch. Less than an hour to go. At least she’d been kept busy. Usually the night shift was quiet, but today the din of switches selecting and clicking drowned the murmurings of her colleagues as they processed calls.

  ‘Bad weather over the channel. Sailings cancelled from all ports,’ the night shift supervisor had reported. Caller after caller was being told they must wait over an hour to alert family and friends in Britain that they were stuck in France. Alix swivelled her seat from side to side. Ooh, her back! She must not think of strong, sweet coffee …

  A light flashed in front of her and she plugged an answering cord into the jack and crammed on her headphones. ‘Which destination, please?’ When the answer came ‘London’ she prepared to inform another traveller that he would have to be patient. But there was no chance as the caller snapped, ‘Get me Abbey 2310. I need a line right now!’

  He spoke English, which annoyed her as it implied that her French was not perfect. In the starchiest English she could command, she said, ‘I’m sorry, sir, lines to England are full. Waiting time is eight hours.’

  The girl sitting beside her shot Alix a startled look and whispered, ‘Eighty minutes, Mlle Dujardin said. Not eight hours, Alix.’

  Alix pretended not to hear.

  Her caller was less than impressed too. ‘It’d be faster to swim.’

  ‘Do you like fog?’

  ‘Is that what I’m up against?’

  ‘It’s like mutton fat. Everything that moves is cancelled. The world needs to call London because Londoners love to discuss fog the way other people talk about vintage wine. There are infinite varieties.’ Aware she was drifting towards insolence, she re-starched her voice. ‘I will tell you when we can set up your call.’

  ‘Are you English?’

  ‘No.’ He had a nice voice now he wasn’t ordering her about. Sexy, even. But that didn’t get him off the charge of
rudeness. ‘I’m half English.’

  ‘May I say, the half that is speaks it very well.’

  ‘That’s why I am employed here.’

  ‘Of course. Look, I’m a journalist, and it’s vital I speak to my London editor before he wakes and leaves for the day.’

  ‘Your name, please?’ she asked.

  ‘Verrian Haviland.’ He spelled both names for her.

  ‘And your party, sir?’

  ‘Jack Haviland, Abbey 2310.’

  ‘I thought you said “your editor”.’

  ‘Who happens to be my brother.’

  ‘I see. Your present location?’

  ‘Laurentin’s hotel by Gare du Nord, in the passage behind the kitchen, unpleasantly close to the lavatory, shouting over clattering pans into a phone that smells of garlic and stale tobacco. Will you put me through?’

  Alix choked back a giggle as much from shock as amusement. She shot a look behind her. The supervisor, Mlle Dujardin, sat a few feet away, writing up a report. Familiarity, especially giggling, was strictly forbidden. ‘I have to send every request to another section or issue a “request and schedule” card. I can’t influence the connecting switchboard.’

  ‘But you could prioritise?’ He had a graze in his voice as if he smoked too heavily, but he sounded cultured. Alix wondered what he was doing in that kitchen corridor. She knew the places near Gare du Nord station. They opened before dawn to feed railway porters, road sweepers and tired prostitutes.

  She said, ‘Not without appropriate authorisation.’

  ‘And that would be too much to ask of a stiff-necked telephone operator?’

  Her fingers hovered over the plug. One pull would terminate. But she surprised herself by answering sweetly, ‘It would be. Fortunately for you, I’m not stiff-necked … Well, I am, but only because I’ve been working all night.’

  A pause. Then, ‘I’m truly sorry. I’ve had a hellish week and I really have to speak with my brother. He’s in a position to save a man’s life.’

  She’d heard it all in her months on this switchboard, all the life-or-death reasons why one person’s call should jump the queue. So why did she instinctively believe this man? Mlle Dujardin had closed her report book and was heading out the door. Alix whispered into her mouthpiece, ‘Is this true – a man could die?’

  ‘Yes. He’s in prison in Spain, where I’ve just come from. He’s in a desperate condition. My brother knows people in the British government who can pull strings. It’s a shot in the dark, and every hour counts.’

  Alix thought quickly. ‘Give me a little time. I’ll do my best, but I’ll have to break the rules.’ She heard a whisper of relief.

  He asked, ‘May I know your name?’

  Her neighbour was listening avidly so Alix replied, ‘I’m not at liberty to say.’

  ‘Not allowed to fraternise? One last question: will you marry me?’

  That giggle finally got out. ‘Perhaps. But this time you really will have to go to the back of the queue.’

  *

  Alix slipped the earpiece off and muttered to her neighbour, ‘I have to powder my nose.’

  Ignoring her colleague’s protest that surely she could hold on to the end of the shift, Alix ran along a corridor to a room where female operators sat at consoles either side of a gangway. Mlle Boussac was on duty in this section. She was at the end of an aisle, engrossed in some problem. Satisfied she’d chosen a good moment, Alix searched the rows for the destination sign ‘London’.

  She selected a girl the same age as herself and placed a priority request card in front of her. She’d filched it from Mlle Dujardin’s desk and filled it in herself. ‘It’s been authorised,’ she said, her stomach diving. She was risking her job for a stranger.

  The girl looked unsure. ‘Hadn’t we better check?’

  They looked to where Mlle Boussac was tapping the end of a connector cord. ‘She looks busy,’ Alix whispered.

  At that moment, Mlle Boussac straightened up and looked straight at Alix. Then another operator summoned her to where a rapidly flashing light indicated an electrical fault.

  ‘You’re new, aren’t you?’ Alix asked the girl, and tapped the card. ‘It’s fine. It’s from the ministry.’

  ‘Which ministry?’

  ‘The ministry. They always get priority.’

  *

  The following day, Monday, Alix was reported for breaking telephone company rules regarding the strict order of customers’ calls. The girl who sat beside her had seen her take the request card and told the supervisor.

  Alix was docked a day’s pay and warned that no more infractions would be tolerated.

  *

  But the following day, Mémé called in at the exchange in great distress. Mlle Boussac sent a secretary to fetch Alix from the switchboard and to bring a glass of water.

  Alix found her grandmother perched on a chair, trembling so hard her water was in danger of spilling. Alix took the glass away from her. ‘Mémé, what is it?’

  ‘The Germans are trying to break into the flat.’

  ‘Germans, in St-Sulpice?’

  ‘All morning I’m hearing tap, tap, tap –’ The rest was lost as Mémé flowed away in Yiddish. Alix caught one name –

  ‘Hitler was trying to break in at our door?’ She exchanged a glance with Mlle Boussac, who looked as though she was sucking a bee.

  ‘Not the door, the roof! He’s lifting the slates to come in that way.’

  ‘Why would he?’ Alix asked. ‘How would he get up there in the first place?’

  ‘Perhaps he jumps from the building next door.’ Mémé rocked forward.

  Alix thought, Is it delusions? A new fear struck her – her grandmother failing in her mind, needing constant attendance. Then a bird flew past the office window and another possibility dawned. ‘Mémé, d’you think you could have been hearing pigeons? They’re nesting, fluttering about the chimney stacks. They woke me this morning.’

  Mémé’s brows furrowed. ‘Pigeons? You are sure?’

  ‘Spring’s here and they’re pairing. Don’t they make a racket?’ As her grandmother nodded slowly, Alix burst out, ‘Oh, Mémé, you got upset over nothing, walked all this way and you’ll have to go up those stairs again.’

  ‘I am all right. It’s my hands that hurt. I don’t walk on my hands.’

  Mlle Boussac glanced at Danielle’s feet, her expression hardening. ‘Alix has a point, Madame, considering you sprained your ankle so recently. What will your doctor say when he hears you walked across Paris to come here?’

  Mémé, oblivious to danger signals, inspected her ankles carefully. ‘Have I sprained my ankle? I don’t think so. I’m stronger than I look.’

  Mlle Boussac did not challenge Alix immediately. But after Mémé left, Alix was summoned before the head of department. While he looked on in stern silence, Mlle Boussac asked Alix if she had lied. ‘On 4th March you claimed your grandmother needed to visit the doctor and requested time off.’

  Alix admitted it.

  ‘You wanted to see a young man, I suppose.’ Anger flooded Mlle Boussac’s cheeks.

  Alix agreed. A young man, yes. It was simpler.

  ‘It seems, Alix Gower, I have been mistaken in my estimation of your character. The company may tolerate one misstep but not two.’

  The head of department was inclined to agree. Alix was invited to collect her coat and leave the premises.

  On Rue du Louvre she stared around, her hand over her mouth. The air was thick with exhaust fumes. Outlines of buildings melted under her shocked gaze. She’d been sacked. What was she feeling … relief?

  Maison Javier.

  Out of one job, she had no choice but to take another. As she crossed the street, she wondered whether her English caller had reached his brother and saved his Spanish friend.

  Chapter Seven

  He often came to this church to hear its organ and view its famous Delacroix murals. ‘Jacob Wrestling with the Angel’ was his favourite. B
ut today he couldn’t face Jacob, a man abandoned to a combat he could not win. So he found a seat, bent his head and prayed she’d come. He wasn’t sure she’d got his letter inviting her to meet him inside the church of St-Sulpice. He’d left the note with a concierge, who’d promised to ‘find someone to take it upstairs’ before pushing it into her grimy apron.

  He wished someone was playing the organ today. Bach ideally, something complex and ear-filling. In its midweek silence, this monumental interior made him feel judged. And alone – though on the other side of the aisle a handful of women moved their lips in prayer.

  She wouldn’t come. He should never have suggested a church for a meeting. But he’d wanted somewhere they could speak in whispers without attracting notice.

  ‘Whenever I’m here I marvel at the money you Catholics spend providing a home for God. It says much for your confidence in his presence.’

  He whipped round to see Danielle Lutzman settling behind him. His immediate thought was, She’s aged so much since she came to see me. Was it a year ago that she’d called at Boulevard Racan to ask his help to get her granddaughter into some employment? That once-handsome face was now a wizened apple, dwarfed by a sombrous hat.

  ‘I come sometimes to hear the organ,’ she said, misreading his shock. ‘A Jewess may hear a little Bach or Handel without taking anything that is not rightfully hers. It is the nearest I come to God, and my father would have shaken me, my husband too. Bolshevists to the bone. The only music my father liked was the clatter of falling monarchies.’

  ‘What would he have made of this place?’

  She stared upward. ‘He’d have wanted it made into a grain store.’ Fastening spectacles on her nose, she said, ‘I received your note but I’ve been unwell. A little mad, I think. Would you believe, I thought a pigeon on my roof was that liver-worm Hitler coming for me? I read in the newspaper about his Gestapo police and cannot stop thinking of the day I was taken by the police from my home in Kirchwiller. I am so scared in Paris. I did not think I would be.’

  ‘What made you leave London? You had a home and a life there.’