Anio Szado (35 page)

He asked, “Cornmeal?” and ran his fingers through the granules. “The color is like the morning sun in early springtime.”

I said, “It will reflect the brightness of the stars and the prince’s planet in the sky.”

For an instant, Antoine seemed to be about to smile. Then he said, “If you think you will win me over with cornmeal, you are wrong.”

His indignation vibrated through every step. As he closed the door, Consuelo and I shared a look of amusement and triumph.

A day later, we were unrolling a bolt of ivory fabric on the floor and cutting out the first item for the
Little Prince
collection. Consuelo danced around as I snipped. I had promised her that the first outfit would be for the character of the rose, to be played by Consuelo herself. The fabric separating on either side of my scissors was only the base of the design; the flower would rise in appliqué from the floor-length hem, arching her stem up the front, and spreading her red petals across the entire bodice
and on toward the shoulders. But even the base threw Consuelo into such excitement that she circled my operation, clapping, occasionally kicking up the edges of the fabric, and I had to tell her to sit and be still for a while or the dress would not get made.

By the time I had cut the pieces, my partner’s patience was gone. “Are you done?” she asked again.

“This is only a fraction of the job.”

“I just want to see it pinned onto me. Then I’ll believe you’re really going to make it, that I’ll finally get to wear the rose.”

No one had ever waited with such sweet anticipation for anything I had ever made. I took to explaining the steps to Consuelo. I wanted her to know exactly how much care and thought I was putting into this dress. “When you lay down the pattern pieces, you have to make sure you follow the direction of the fabric. See the weave? This is the warp; that’s called the weft—or the woof.”

“Woof-woof!”

“If you lay the pattern down any which way, the fabric will pull and drape incorrectly.”

“You are a master of draping. Or ‘mistress,’ I should say.” Consuelo was on her tiptoes, too excited to stand still. “Keep working, Mistress Mignonne.”

I bent over the project. “If I’m your mistress, what are you to me?”

“Your masteress.”

She is so silly, I thought. No wonder Antoine cannot entirely stop loving her; she is, at heart, a child.

Tiring days later, I finished the first dress. And what a dress! It fit Consuelo like a satin skin, caressing her shoulder blades, swelling with her breasts, hugging her ribs. Only after it had risen with the peaks of her hipbones did it begin to fall, plummeting straight to the floor from the contours of her hips. At the ground, the line broke just so. The ivory dress was stunning
because it paid homage to the fine, full shape of Consuelo’s figure, but what lifted the dress beyond stunning, making it unforgettable, was the shimmering red rose that dominated its front.

Consuelo walked the length of the parlor, back and forth. With each step, the rose moved as though bending to the wind or arching to hear a loved one’s voice. She swiveled her hips and the rose sashayed with her. She was the rose, through and through, bright and shiny-eyed, glowing with beauty and pride. She said, “No one in New York is designing anything like this. There is nothing anywhere to match it.”

“It’s meant to be unique. Like the prince’s rose.”

“There are other roses in the story.”

“I know.”

“But we aren’t going to include them in our show. Just one rose. Just me.”

I put my hands on my hips. “We are not going to feature only one rose. It’s a fashion show. We need to get clothing out there. We won’t have time to make a whole garden’s worth—we can take care of that by painting masses of them into the set. But we need at least a few good pieces.”

“Oh, Mignonne. Why even bother? They’ll pale in comparison to me.”

“Not every woman can wear something like your dress. The other roses will be simple dresses and separates. I have a couple dozen things sketched out. Take that off and we’ll go through them.”

I was releasing the zipper down Consuelo’s back when there was a brisk knock on the door and it began to open. Quickly, I zipped the dress closed.

Antoine came in. “Consuelo, where is my—” He stopped.

I could see from his expression, from the slight adjustment in his posture, that the image of Consuelo in the form-fitted dress warmed and loosened everything inside him. His eyes roved over the satin. My own face heated as I watched him take in the sight.

“Hello, Tonio,” said Consuelo. “You like it.”

It wasn’t a question; there was no need for a question. Antoine had not even managed to tear his gaze away from her long enough to notice me glaring at him. How dare he come in here and ogle Consuelo? He never would have stared at me like that in front of his wife. My nails dug into my palms.

Consuelo performed a languorous spin. In the moment her face was turned from her husband, he finally glanced sheepishly at me.

He can’t help himself, I thought. It’s the perfection of the dress that does it to him. My God, how convoluted this has all become. I must not let myself resent that which I have created. This is success; I must not push it away.

Most mornings, I woke early and had coffee with Leo, updating him on the progress of the show without mentioning the relationship between my partner and the man Leo liked to refer to as my honey pie. Then I took the subway uptown and let myself in, letting Consuelo sleep on for another hour or two—if she was home. She and Antoine had rented a house in Northport, Long Island, for the summer. She continued to come into the city for lessons at the Art Students’ League, but her sessions at the apartment had become sporadic.

Now it was almost September, with the show booked for mid-November. We were getting nowhere, complained Consuelo. “We can’t have a show with one dress.”

I gestured toward a hanging rack. “For Pete’s sake. I’ve been blazing through the collection. But since you raise the issue, I don’t think all your traveling back and forth has been good for your productivity.” I didn’t point out that her set design sketches lacked sophistication, sensitivity, and appeal.

“It can’t be helped. Tonio is crazy about the Bevin House. It’s a big white mansion, right on the water. He says he’s never had a better place in which to write.”

A pang gnawed at my insides, but I said, “That’s good. I’m glad it’s coming along. We can’t finish what we’re trying to do until he completes his manuscript. Even if we don’t use everything in the story—”

“We can’t use the whole thing!”

“We’re not going to. We can leave out a lot of the early stuff—the men the Little Prince visits on other planets before he arrives
on earth—but we have to get the rest right, everything having to do with the rose.”

“And how all he wants in the world is to return to her and take care of her and show her how much he loves her.”

“That hasn’t changed in the manuscript, has it? You’ve seen the latest version?”

“Oh, Mignonne,” said Consuelo, “that will never change.” She reached up to run a cool finger behind my ear, down the slope of my neck. I shrank from her touch. “Don’t look so anxious, darling. The manuscript is getting done. The essence of the story won’t change. He’ll just change words and change them back again before he delivers it to his publishers in the next three or four weeks. And then everything will go back to how it was: just you and me, nestled up here in our little creative cubby, and Tonio doing whatever he does across the hall.”

“You’re giving up the summer house?”

“Not yet. But have you ever spent fall or winter in a grand mansion? Of course you haven’t. A home of that size is exhausting in the cold. Tonio isn’t partial to furnace heat, and the fireplaces are a monster to feed.”

She turned me around to massage my shoulders. “It’s too bad I wasn’t able to have you visit us there, darling. I begged Tonio all through August to let me invite you to stay for a week.”

Could this be true? Antoine didn’t want me near?

Consuelo’s breasts brushed against my back. “It’s nothing personal, darling. But as a count, Tonio does have social standards to uphold. Besides, you’d be bored—my husband always locked away working, me entertaining our famous friends night and day. What would you have done with yourself?”

With the Saint-Exupérys resettled into their respective apartments, Antoine had started dropping in now and then, watching and smoking, pacing.

Once, when Consuelo was out of the room, he said, “Do not let her push you around too much. She can be unbearable if you are not used to her, and even dangerous. She throws things.”

“You think she’ll throw something at me?”

“She may, and her aim is very good. She has broken plenty of furniture as well. Perhaps I should check on you more often.”

But another time when I had let myself in and was working alone, he entered Consuelo’s apartment and fixed upon his wife’s photograph. He jumped when he realized I was there. He turned the image facedown on the tabletop and left without a word.

I picked up the portrait. How absolutely stunning Consuelo had been. Antoine had told me once that when a man is in hopeless love with a beautiful woman, he must destroy all his photos of her or he will never find peace. He had not been talking about his wife, or so I thought; he had mentioned it in the context of Madame Fiche’s destruction of the white silk. But still … I stared at the door as though I could pull him back in. He didn’t return that day. Neither did Consuelo show up, not that day or the next.

She had told me once that the only cure for the pain of love was flight.

Then came a morning when Antoine intercepted me in the lobby and pulled me outside, his expression grim. “My publishers want to ruin
The Little Prince
.”

The wind picked up. I smoothed down my hair. “They don’t like the story?”

“They want me to change the ending. They say it is unpalatable.”

“It isn’t unpalatable; it’s unbearable.”

His expression collapsed. “Truly?”

“It will break the hearts of everyone who reads it. It’s exactly what it should be. You can’t change it.”

“Lamotte, too, insists I must not. I will not.”

“You know, you’ve only told me what happens. You’ve never read the ending to me.”

“And now, without the studio, I cannot.”

“Read to me in the park. In a restaurant. Anywhere.” I glanced back into the lobby. Both the doorman and Elmore had disappeared. “It’s been a while. Do you miss me?” I touched his jaw; it was uncommonly rough.

“How can they think it is acceptable to pressure me? I put my faith in them. Have they no faith in me? They say they will delay the publication date to February to give me time to make the changes. They are willing to forgo Christmas sales—my best chance at royalties!”

I lifted his jacket collar against the cold. “Even if you changed the ending for the book, I would still want to use the original one in the show.”

“You would?” He grabbed my arms. “Of course you would! That is precisely what you should do. You must do the show.”

“Really?”

“We will work together. What do you need for the production? My God, Mignonne, how are you paying your rent? I will write you a check. I will give you a copy of the manuscript so you can get everything right. And I will insist that my publishers take orchestra seats. Eugene Reynal and Curtice Hitchcock will see for themselves, firsthand, that audiences agree with me: the ending should remain as it is.”

I hesitated. “And if the audience doesn’t agree?”

“Contracts can be broken. The book will not see print.”

Keep Antoine in New York, alive. Avoid disgracing myself and my family name. Seal the fate of
The Little Prince
.

I thought, I’m not a savior; I’m not strong enough; I’m not made for this.

“Look at these drawings.” Antoine brought Consuelo’s sketchbook to my worktable. He flipped pages. She had reinterpreted the simple scenery of the story as enormous peaked and menacing sand dunes, pierced with rocks jagged as claws, frowned upon by a malevolent-looking moon whose teeth resembled fangs. “Look what happens when she gets her way. I cannot have these sets in the show. It would be an embarrassment. I need to do something about this.”