All the Flowers in Paris

by Sarah Jio

  Cosi nods.

  “And after you drink the water, you could use the pitcher to…”

  She giggles. “Mama! That is not ladylike!”

  I smile. “Well, in case of an emergency, is all I’m saying.”

  She runs to the window. “Look! From up here you can see everything, Mama! You can see the market and, look, you can see my school, too! I wonder if it’s time for arithmetic or spelling? I feel like a bird, Mama!” She flaps her arms playfully. “I could actually…fly away.”

  I am so lost in thought that I hadn’t considered that Cosi could be seen from the window. “No, honey,” I say. “Come away from the window at once. What if someone sees you?”

  She steps away from the window and nods gravely. “They could tell the bad man.”

  “Yes,” I say. “And we can’t take that chance.”

  She sits on the bed beside me and leans her head against my chest. “I’m worried about Papa.”

  “I know,” I say. “I am too. But you know what?”

  “What?”

  “He wouldn’t want us to worry about him,” I say. “He would want us to be smart and to find a way out of here.”

  She nods. “Like secret spies.”

  “Yes, like secret spies. He’d want us to put all of our energy into that.”

  She nods again.

  “And do you know what my mother would do, your grandmother, if she were here?”

  “What?” she asks, looking up at me with her big, green, curious eyes.

  “She was always so good at finding the positive side of a bad situation. You’re a lot like her, you know?”

  “I am?”

  “Yes, very much. I wish you could have known her. She was…sunshine, even on the rainiest day. She made everything wonderful.”

  “Like you do,” she says, squeezing my arm.

  I smile. “Mama could make the most painful tasks fun. Like doing laundry, or washing the dishes, or peeling potatoes, which I always hated. She made games out of everything, and it was magic.” It feels good to reminisce, to return to a time when life was uncontaminated by fear, to remember the way Mama’s face lit up when I ran into the room. “That’s what we’re going to do here. We’re going to make this an adventure. And you know how we’re going to do it?”

  “How?”

  “We’re going to pretend.”

  Her face brightens. “I will be a princess, and this is my tower. You are the queen.”

  “Yes,” I say.

  “And our knights are out fighting a war against barbarians, but we are safe here in our castle,” she whispers. “The king will return soon, my father and your husband, and he will bring me a hundred new dresses and…a puppy!”

  I smile. “And in the meantime, we will wait patiently and braid our hair and eat cake.” I hand her an imaginary plate, and she reaches for it, taking an imaginary bite.

  “Mmmmm,” she says.

  I know she’s hungry. I am, too. But we have our cake, and our pretend little world, and for now, that is the very best I can wish for.

  All day, I expect Reinhardt to return at any moment. I pace the floors anxiously, fretting about what will happen when he does. I prepare for the worst. He’ll unlock the front door and shout my name. I can’t let him come into the room. He might see Cosi, or worse, Cosi would have to listen to what he will do to me. It would traumatize her beyond words. I can’t let that happen. I’ll tell Cosi to stay under the bed, keep the dust ruffle pulled down while I go to the main room and face him there.

  But he doesn’t return, and by the time the little clock on the desk reads five o’clock, I remember Madame Huet’s warning not to be late for dinner.

  “I won’t be gone long,” I whisper to Cosi as she crawls under the bed.

  “Okay, Mama,” she says. She found a pen in the desk drawer earlier, and it might as well have been a rare gemstone. She loves her little journal so, and I delight in seeing her record her sweet drawings and stories inside its pages, especially now, when her imagination is all she has.

  I lift the dust ruffle to peek at her before I go. “I’ll be back before you know it.”

  “Yes, Mama,” she says. “I know. You are going to a very important ball. There will be music and dancing and delicious things to eat. Everyone’s waiting for you and they will bow and curtsy when you arrive down the grand staircase. Hurry—you mustn’t keep them waiting.”

  My eyes well up with tears. Yes. This is how Cosi and I will survive. Just like this. “Yes, my sweet princess.”

  I go out the door and find Madame Huet standing in the hallway, so near the bedroom, it’s almost as if she materialized there. “You’re late,” Madame Huet says, hands firmly placed on her hips.

  “I, I…I’m sorry,” I stammer, startled to see her. How long has she been waiting there? Did she hear Cosi and me talking?

  “Don’t let it happen again,” she says, walking ahead. I follow her to the dining room on the other side of the apartment, with walls made of dark mahogany panels and a large table with at least a dozen chairs. I imagine many high-ranking Germans have dined here.

  “Sit,” the housekeeper says, pointing to a chair at the end of the table.

  I take my seat as she disappears through a door, then returns a moment later with a tray, which she places in front of me. I haven’t eaten all day, and at this point, anything edible would do, but this is much better than edible. I inhale the savory aroma on my plate—roasted potatoes, carrots, and a fine cut of steak that is breaded in a way I have never seen. It looks divine.

  “Thank you,” I say, reaching for my fork and taking a bite.

  She watches me from the doorway to the kitchen.

  “It’s…very good,” I say.

  The housekeeper frowns. “Flattery will get you nowhere with me.”

  I have to find a way to smuggle food back to the room for Cosi. Could I wrap some of the steak in a napkin? Too messy. Instead, I eye the basket of dinner rolls as Madame Huet steps back to the kitchen for a moment, then tuck two into the bodice of my dress. Instead of swallowing the last bite of steak, I hold it in my mouth, then stand, eager to return to the bedroom.

  “Finished, I see?” the housekeeper says. I can’t tell if she’s pleased or irritated by my clean plate.

  I nod, walking back to the bedroom and closing the door behind me. I pull the bit of meat from my mouth and exhale deeply.

  “Cosi,” I whisper.

  Her little head peers out from under the bed.

  “Look what I brought back from the ball,” I say, handing her the bit of meat and roll. “I’m sorry it isn’t much. The…count and countess of Luxembourg have enormous appetites, you know.”

  She smiles, wolfing down the scraps I’ve brought her without a single complaint, then drinking a little water from the pitcher on the floor. I wish I could give her more. I’ll try harder tomorrow, maybe sneak into the kitchen while Madame Huet naps. I’ll find a way.

  Hours pass, and Cosi dozes off in the bed beside me. I let her sleep like that for as long as possible, with a cautious ear peeled, before moving her beneath the bed. I hate the thought of her spending the night on the cold, hard floor, but it’s the only way. At any moment, Reinhardt could return.

  And, just as the arm on the clock points to eleven o’clock, I hear the front door open, and heavy footsteps on the floor.

  CHAPTER 17

  CAROLINE

  “Good morning!” Margot says the next day, greeting me with her little boy attached to her hip. He’s no more than two, with the sweetest cheeks and wispy brown hair.

  I smile. They’d both been asleep when I came home last night. “I’m so happy you’re here. Did you find everything you need?”

  She nods. “This apartment is amazing.”

  I look around. “It is, isn’t i
t? Though a little ridiculous for one person to have such an enormous space, I suppose.” I grin. “It’ll be nice to share it with you.”

  I can smell something delicious coming from the kitchen.

  “I’m making breakfast,” Margot says. “Not anything like Jeanty, I assure you, but…if you’re hungry.”

  “That sounds wonderful,” I say. “Thank you.”

  We have breakfast on the balcony, a delicious egg and vegetable hash, then move to the living room and sip our coffee while Élian plays with a stack of plastic measuring cups I brought out from the kitchen. He giggles and claps his hands as he stacks them this way and that, then bangs them together.

  “Élian is such a great name. I don’t think I’ve heard it before. How did you come to name him that?” I ask, taking a sip of my coffee.

  “I saw it on a World War Two monument when I was a girl,” she explains. “It was one of thousands of names of victims of Nazi hate crimes in Paris during the occupation. For some reason, the name just jumped right out at me. I was instantly smitten.”

  “Fate,” I say.

  She nods. “I decided then and there that if I had a son, that’s what I’d name him.” She looks down at her mug. “Jacques never liked the name. He said it…” She pauses for a moment, her face suddenly awash with worry. “Never mind.”

  I reach for her hand. “You’re here now. You’re safe.”

  She nods.

  “Anyway, I wanted to honor the past, but also give the name new meaning, new life.” She watches her little boy playing happily on the floor. “I’m not sure I’ve done that.” The bruise under her left eye is healing but still visible.

  “What do you mean? Of course you’ve done that!”

  Her eyes well up with tears. “I wanted so much for him.” She shakes her head. “Instead, he got an alcoholic father and a broken mother.”

  “You are not broken,” I tell her. “You are a wonderful mother, and though you may not know it, you have such strength. One day Élian will understand that you fought for him.” I smile. “It will only get better from here.”

  “Do you think so?”

  “I know so.”

  She smiles. “I feel terrible admitting it, but I wasn’t so sure about you for a long time.”

  “It’s okay,” I say.

  “I remember when you started coming into the restaurant, about three years ago. You seemed…so sad. I tried to talk to you several times, tried to cheer you up. But you were…I don’t know…it was almost as if you were unreachable. Like a stray cat in need of medical attention, but if anyone got too close, you’d scratch them. And then Vic bought Jeanty, and he was so enamored with you, and you barely gave him the time of day.”

  I sigh. “I’m sorry. I don’t know why I acted the way I did. My past remains a black hole, I’m afraid.”

  “Then, after your accident, you came in again, and I expected more of the same, but you had…well, you’d changed. It took me a while to see that. I had no idea you could be…”

  “Normal?” I say with a smile.

  “No, I mean that I didn’t know you had such warmth, such kindness under all those layers.”

  I kneel beside Élian and tap two of the measuring cups together, and he giggles. “Sometimes it takes the worst to bring out the best in us, I guess.”

  “You bring out the best in Victor, you know,” Margot adds.

  “Do you think?” My mind wanders back to Provence, the strange phone calls. Emma. The flowers I never received. I haven’t heard from him since we returned. Not even a text.

  “Yes,” she says. “But I…” She pauses for a moment, then begins again, “I just wonder if…” Her voice trails off.

  “Wonder what?”

  Élian waddles toward the balcony, and Margot stands up quickly to scoop him up. “Time for your nap, my little friend,” she says, planting a kiss on his cheek. “I may take a snooze with him,” she continues. “I didn’t sleep much last night, and this mama is exhausted.”

  “After all you’ve been through, you need the rest.”

  She disappears down the hall to the far bedroom, and I think about the box of letters I found in the closet, just as the doorbell rings. I run to answer it, my heart fluttering, thinking that it might be Victor. Instead, I open the door to find Estelle.

  “Hi,” she says. “Is this still a good time?”

  “Oh yes, yes,” I say. The appointment I’d made had entirely escaped my mind. “I’m sorry. Please come in.”

  She sits down on the sofa and sets the letters I gave her on the coffee table. “These letters were”—she pauses, shaking her head as if astonished—“an unbelievable find.”

  “I’m pleased to hear that,” I say.

  “While Céline was smart not to give away too much detail in her writing, her letters do link her, as I suspected, to this apartment. They also impart a sense of desperation. She was in trouble, that was obvious. The question is, did her beloved, Luc, ever come to her rescue?”

  I sigh. “What more have you discovered?”

  Estelle nods. “I had some luck reading the pages of Esther’s memoir under the ultraviolet light I told you about. Some passages were too badly damaged to make out, I’m afraid, but the puzzle is coming together. Céline—a widowed mother of a young daughter—and her father owned a flower shop, right here on the rue Cler. After her father was roughed up by a German soldier, they went to Esther for medical help. The rest is a bit fuzzy, but from what I can piece together, the family suddenly went missing. Esther writes that she had hoped they had escaped, but from what I can make out, that was not the case.”

  I shake my head. “Then what happened?”

  “Well,” she continues, “my theory is that Céline was detained by a Nazi soldier, right here, and possibly with her little girl.”

  I cover my mouth.

  “I’m still combing through the databases to see if I can trace her father to any of the work camps, but so far I haven’t come up with any matches. As hard as historians have worked to identify all victims of the Holocaust, they estimate that thousands remain unnamed, their stories untold.”

  “I know this happened so long ago,” I say, rubbing my forehead. “But there has to be someone in the neighborhood who was young enough at the time to remember…something.”

  Estelle shrugs. “If you know of anyone, I’d love to talk to them.”

  “Wait,” I say, recalling Monsieur Ballard. “Hey, would you like to join me for a late lunch at Bistro Jeanty tomorrow? There’s a regular there who might prove himself useful to you. We could see if he’s there. He’s a treasure trove of knowledge. Maybe he’ll have a nugget for your project?”

  Estelle’s eyes are big. “I’d love that!” She glances down the hallway toward the bedrooms. “I wonder if you’d mind if I had a look around.”

  “Of course not,” I say. “But I have some guests staying with me, and I’m afraid they’re asleep at the moment.”

  “No problem,” she says. “I’ll come back another time.”

  “Anytime,” I say, standing up. “I’m sorry. I need to leave soon for an appointment, but I’ll see you tomorrow at Jeanty.”

  “Yes,” Estelle says, tucking the items on the table into her bag again. “Thank you, Caroline. You’ve been so very helpful.”

  As I collect my coat and purse, I think about the possibility of Céline being held hostage in this very apartment by a monster, maybe even with her little girl, and I shudder. No wonder Monsieur de Goff despises these walls. No amount of new paint could cover the dark stain of evil. But then a burst of sunlight filters in from the windows, casting a playful shadow on the door, and I remember there is power in the light. I pray that Céline found it.

  * * *

  —

  I TAKE AN elevator up to Dr. Louis Marchand’s third-floor off
ice, where a receptionist offers me a cup of tea and tells me my therapist will see me soon. Dr. Leroy had made the recommendation, but I’d been skeptical. How could a stranger, even with a PhD, access the boarded-up passageways of my mind?

  “He’s the best in Paris,” she’d promised. “It’s at least worth a try.”

  And so, here I am, trying.

  I’m escorted into a room down the hall, where I take a seat on a burgundy velvet sofa. On a table beside me is a box of Kleenex and a book about Tuscany. The cypress trees on the cover remind me of something, but, of course, I don’t know what.

  “Hello,” a man says, walking in the room. “You must be Caroline.”

  “Yes,” I say, with a nervous smile.

  “I’m Dr. Marchand, but please, call me Louis.”

  I nod. “Louis.” He’s at least sixty, maybe older. His smile is warm, his eyes kind. I imagine the thousands of people who have shed tears on this sofa.

  “Tell me about yourself,” he says, crossing his legs and reaching for a notebook and pen on the table beside him.

  “Well,” I say. “That might not be that easy.”

  “Ah, yes,” he says. “Dr. Leroy sent your file over.”

  I shrug. “I don’t even know where to begin.”

  He nods. “Let’s start with now.”

  “Okay,” I say hesitantly, looking around the room, pausing a long moment before I shrug and take a deep breath. “My name is Caroline, and I live at eighteen rue Cler. The rest?” I sigh. “I have no idea.”

  “Ah,” he says, smiling at me as if I’ve amused him a great deal. “I hate to act like a smart-ass, Caroline, but you do.”

  “I do?” I shake my head. “I do what?”

  “Know the rest…about yourself.”

  I sit up higher on the sofa, clutching the pillow beside me. “Monsieur, I mean, Dr. Marchand, I mean, Louis, perhaps you don’t understand. I was in an accident. I lost my memory.”