A Week in Paris (37 page)

‘Adam, I’m sure that’s not always true. I certainly wouldn’t think that.’

‘No, but you’re different from everyone else, Fay. You understand.’

‘I hope I do,’ she said soberly. ‘Ow.’ While he’d been talking she’d sat very still on her stool.

‘Are you all right?’

‘I’ve got cramp,’ she laughed. She kicked off her shoes and hobbled over to the bed, where she sat down flexing and curling her feet.

‘I can rub them if you like?’ This, hesitantly.

‘No,’ she said, embarrassed. ‘It’s better now. Go on.’

‘I was wondering if it mattered,’ he said, his eyes not leaving her face. ‘About my father.’

‘It sounds awful, the whole thing. Terrible for you all.’

‘But does it – I don’t know – affect what you think about me?’ He waited, still gazing at her, poised as if on a knife’s edge for her answer.

‘No,’ she said finally. ‘How could what your father did be your fault?’

There was relief in his face, but still anxiety. ‘You don’t think it’s in the blood then? Or in my upbringing or something? Sometimes . . . well, this might sound stupid, but I feel I need to prove it to myself. That I’m not like him.’

How dreadful and grown-up it sounded, to have to demonstrate that one was not like one’s parents. Everything Fay had discovered about her mother and father over the previous few days had made her feel just the opposite – that she
wanted
to be like them, especially her father, brave and true as he was. She remembered then that she was angry with her mother for lying to her, but still, she hadn’t sorted out the reason for her mother’s behaviour yet, nor what the exact nature of the lies was. No, she felt much sorrier for Adam.

‘I think you’re a good person,’ she said quietly, ‘a very wonderful person,’ and she saw the light come into his face.

He swung himself off the chair and stepped over to her and she rose from the bed to meet him. Now his arms were round her and she leaned into him and tipped her face up to his and they kissed with small tender kisses that became deeper, more searching. And he pressed her close, and she felt his lips on her hair and her eyelids and he whispered in her ear, ‘Darling Fay, oh, my darling,’ and bent to nuzzle her neck. A rush of warmth flowed through her, causing a poignant stab of tenderness.

After a while he said, ‘How d’you undo this thing?’ his voice rough with longing as he tugged at the brooch of her stole. She unpinned it for him and the shawl fell about their feet. He kissed her some more and ran his hands over her body, pressing her close. Then he set her at arm’s length to look at her and there was a new confidence in his eyes that made her body turn electric under his gaze.

He rested his hands on her arms. ‘May I?’ he murmured, turning her round. His fingers on her zip were clumsy with impatience, but he got it undone, and helped her pull down the sleeves so that a moment later it joined the stole on the floor. And he lifted her up and went and laid her on the narrow bed. When he lowered himself beside her they kissed again. She felt for the buttons on his shirt.

And now each kiss, each caress woke deeper surges of desire within her as they twined together, exploring each other’s bodies blindly with hands and lips, the touch of skin on skin . . . and she was lost in his warmth.

There came a time, however, when he drew away, brushed back her hair and studied her face in the circle of light thrown by the lamp and she shivered, though whether from cold or his sudden absence she couldn’t say. ‘What is it?’ she said.

‘Don’t you think we ought to stop?’ he asked. ‘I mean . . .’

‘No,’ she said, loving him for his thoughtfulness. It was her first time, but she was surprised that she was so sure. She couldn’t bear to let him go. Here, in this little attic, away from the busy world, they were not bound by ordinary ties. Here, she could give him the love and the certainty he needed, and take the same for herself. She felt she knew him, knew him deep down, and something vulnerable in him called to the same in her. They were two halves of a whole. All this she knew, but hadn’t known long enough to put into words.

He smiled a smile full of tenderness and adoration, pulled the blankets over them both and bent to kiss her once more.

She drifted into languid wakefulness to find herself alone in the bed, the room bathed in bright sunlight. Rolling onto her elbow, she saw no sign of Adam. Come to think of it, she had briefly surfaced to hear him moving about earlier, but had sunk back into deep sleep. What time had that been? And what time was it now? Casting about for her wristwatch, her hand came upon it eventually under the bed. She squinted at the face. Half past eight. She groaned and fell back on the pillow, wondering where Adam could have gone and whether he’d be back soon, then slipped into a doze wherein her mind roamed happily over the pleasures of the night before. She remembered how they’d lain together afterwards face to face, and the softness of Adam’s breath on her in the darkness. She came to. The room was beginning to feel hot. Probably she ought to get up. Sandra might worry about where she’d gone.

Adam had penned her a note. She found it propped up on his typewriter.
Darling girl, I didn’t like to wake you. See you this evening after the concert. All my love, A
. She hadn’t seen his handwriting before. It was like learning another side to him, the tiny, stylish italics contrasting with the generous downstrokes of the A. She stowed the note in her bag, glad to have something at least of him. Last night she’d felt so sure of him, but this morning that certainty was beginning to leak. Why had he taken off without an explanation? Had he gone to the office? He hadn’t mentioned needing to leave quite so early. She dressed quickly, pulling the stole round her shoulders and slipping her shoes on, then let herself out. Before she closed the door she took a wistful look round the room. Mean and shabby some might think it, but to her it was perfect. It would be a part of her for ever.

Saturday

It felt faintly racy to be going out in a cocktail dress and evening shoes at ten o’clock in the morning. The cheeky young man who served Fay at the café near Sacré-Coeur gave her a complicit wink across the counter. She smiled back as she sipped her café au lait. The Fay she’d been in London would have minded about being treated this way, but here in Paris she felt different, a new person almost. Was it simply to do with how she felt about Adam, or was it the city itself, or maybe something about her that had changed? She couldn’t decide.

She ate the almond croissant the boy set before her and planned out her day. She’d take the Métro back to the hotel, freshen up and change her clothes. There was to be a short rehearsal ahead of the concert that evening, and before that she was to visit Mme Ramond, but the rest of the morning was hers. There was not that much time, but she knew what she needed to do. She’d visit the curé at the convent, and then she’d go back to her parents’ old apartment in Rue des Palmes des Martyrs. The current occupants might be home. She badly wanted to see where she’d once lived. Maybe it would help her remember more.

Arriving back at the hotel, she found there was no one on reception. The key to the room was on its hook – Sandra must be out – so she leaned over the desk and took it. Upstairs she found the chambermaid’s trolley in the corridor and when she entered the room saw it had already been made up. Either Sandra hadn’t slept there or she’d risen early for her and gone. Fay washed and dressed quickly, found a more comfortable pair of shoes and went downstairs. In the lobby she hung the key back in its place and headed for the front door, then hesitated. It would be sensible, she supposed, to try the curé’s number again first.

She was glad she did. The telephone at his house rang for a long time, but at last a faint-voiced woman answered in French and it took some effort for each to make the other understand. Eventually she discerned that the curé wasn’t at home and, no, he wasn’t at the convent either. He had gone to visit his brother in hospital. Fay was advised to telephone again after lunch. She thanked the woman and replaced the receiver and left the hotel intending to take the Métro to St-Germain-des-Prés, feeling somewhat frustrated in her plans and wondering what on earth it could be that the priest had to tell her.

The Rue des Palmes des Martyrs was full of life this morning, the shops open and market stalls set out on the pavement. A cyclist rang his bell furiously at Fay when she stepped into his path without looking and, to gain entrance to the apartment block, she had to squeeze past a badly parked car and a pair of women with prams, chatting.

The concierge was at his desk today, a middle-aged man with a cherubic face reading a newspaper while a radio emanated jangly French rock and roll. He gave her only a cursory nod when she volunteered her business and pointed to the lift. As she waited, the radio announcer interrupted Johnny Hallyday with the news. She caught the words ‘
le Président’
and ‘
l’Arc de Triomphe
’ as she rehearsed what she should say to the occupants of the flat. The only thing she needed to do, she decided when the lift arrived, was to keep her account simple.

When she emerged at the sixth floor she felt again that sense of threat. Was it merely the semi-darkness of the narrow corridor – or had the events of twenty years ago left their mark? Still, she told herself, there was no need to be fearful. Nothing here could hurt her now. This didn’t stop her pausing outside number 612, listening as she laid her palm on the familiar bevelled handle of the door. She could hear the rise and fall of a woman’s voice within, and lifted her hand and knocked.

‘
Bertrand!
’
A
moment later the door was opened by a boy who, judging by his short slight stature, was twelve or thirteen, but when he smiled at her and said, ‘
Bonjour?
’ in a growl that cracked at the second syllable, Fay realized he must be a year or two older than that.

She returned the greeting and asked in French, ‘Your mother or father, are they at home? May I speak with one of them?’

‘
Ah, oui, ma mère est ici
.’

‘
Qui est là, Bertrand
?’ The boy moved away as a small wiry woman came to the door. She had a patient, gentle face, with deep shadows under her eyes.

‘I am sorry to trouble you, madame,’ Fay said. ‘My name is Fay Knox. I’m from England and I’m visiting Paris.’ Fay then managed to say that she used to live in this flat as a child and she wondered if she would be allowed to see inside.

The woman’s face registered astonishment, then reluctance. ‘It is not very convenient now. We have been away, you see, and only returned last night.’

‘Please, I’m going back to London tomorrow.’

The woman sighed. ‘I suppose you can come in, just for a moment.’ She cast a glance down the corridor as though checking whether anyone was there, then widened the door for Fay to enter.

Fay found herself in a bright but untidy living room with windows that looked out at the building opposite. In an alcove near the window, a vase of drooping tulips stood on a gate-legged table. Something else used to be there, she sensed, but what? Her gaze swept the rest of the room eagerly. It did feel familiar, somehow, but much smaller than when she’d been a child, which was to be expected. A mahogany dresser filled the wall opposite the windows. She had sudden knowledge of how satisfyingly the brass handles of the drawers would rattle if she touched them. The sofa and chairs were surely different, and she had no memory of the geometric pattern of the carpet. She wasn’t certain what she’d hoped to find here – some sort of connection with the place, she supposed, a sense of belonging – but she didn’t, she really didn’t. Other people lived here now and in a hundred ways they’d made it their own.

She turned to them, the woman and her son. They were watching her silently as if to see what she’d do.

‘I remember it a little,’ she said slowly. ‘How long have you lived here?’

The woman thought for a moment. ‘It was soon after the Libération we came,’ she said. ‘Some years before Bertrand was born. We were lucky. My husband knew someone living in this block who told us one of the flats was empty.’

‘My family lived here during the war,’ Fay said softly and the woman nodded.

‘Someone said there had been a married couple with a little girl and then they had gone away. The girl, that was you?’

‘Yes.’

The woman frowned. ‘What did you say your name was?’

‘Fay. Fay Knox.’ She spelled it out for her and the woman looked more engaged than she had up to now.

‘Knox,’ she said to herself. ‘Well, Mademoiselle Knox, perhaps you’d like to see the kitchen? Come, it’s this way – though of course,’ she said with a little laugh, ‘perhaps you remember.’

Fay did remember. She followed the woman into the small square kitchen where the dirty breakfast crockery lay stacked by the sink. Three plates and three bowls. Maybe the third ones belonged to Bertrand’s father. Apart from the number of inhabitants, everything was different to how it must have been when Fay lived here. The stove was of a more recent origin, and there was a modern Formica worktop, and cupboards where she didn’t expect them to be.

Remarking on this, she added, ‘It’s very nice though, isn’t it?’ She peeped out of a window to see a paved courtyard below with an old gnarled tree just coming into leaf.

‘Thank you,’ said the woman, looking pleased. ‘This cabinet is the old one, though.’ She pulled open a deep drawer under the worktop and started to rummage through the contents: light bulbs, bits of folded brown paper, coils of string. Fay wondered what she was looking for. ‘Everything is so untidy,’ she sighed, eventually giving up and shutting the drawer.

It occurred to Fay to wonder what had happened to the Knox family’s possessions. ‘Was anything left here from our time?’ she asked. ‘When you moved in?’

‘All the furniture, of course – the flat is rented furnished – but there were no clothes or anything personal, if that is what you mean.’

‘Yes.’ Perhaps her mother had come back for their possessions. She thought again of that strange feeling in the living room that something was missing and suddenly knew. It was where the gate-legged table was now – the table must have been moved there to fill the empty space. ‘Was there a piano?’ She remembered the bulk of it, the grain of the wood, her small hands bashing the keys. She had a vision, too, of her mother playing, the swiftness and sureness of her fingers dancing up and down the notes.