Crossing on the Paris (4 page)

Grasping the handrail, she looked upon her dear old friend, who returned her gaze from what appeared an exaggerated distance. An elderly man—a year or two older than she, although nowadays anyone would guess him to be far younger—he was stately looking and well dressed. With a melancholic smile, Vera noted that, however many years he might live on the Continent, something about him would always betray his nationality. What was it about him? The set of his jaw, his perfect posture? His full head of white hair? Were these things British?

Looking down at the handsome portrait he made—one hand tucked into a pocket, the other casually holding his cane—she could scarcely believe that she would not be seeing him again.

The party at the rail next to her shrieked with laughter as they popped their champagne and got caught in the spray. One of them lifted the bottle to his mouth to catch the gush of bubbles spilling out, dousing his theatrical traveling cloak to everyone's great amusement.

Ready to quit the decks, Vera lifted her palm to her friend for a final farewell. Before he turned to go, to take the train back to Paris, Charles tipped his hat to Vera and threw her a kiss. She watched him leave the dock, then, before retiring, allowed herself one last glimpse at France (though this port town was not
her
France), another mournful parting. Back in her cabin, she lay down. Vera had never liked forced gaiety and these big ocean-liner launching celebrations were the epitome of such nonsense.

Julie stood against the rails of the steerage deck and waved at her parents. She could see them at the farthest end of the dock. So small,
in mourning dress, they looked like a pair of blackbirds at the edge of a field. She thought she saw her mother wave back; from this distance it was hard to tell.

She slid her fingers along the sturdy rail. All her life, Julie had seen spectacular ocean liners come in and out of port, right outside their kitchen windows. She watched them as they passed through their surprisingly short life cycles: their feted launches and fashionable youths, their less popular mature years, then their retirement, sometimes terribly scarred by fires or accidents only five or eight years after their maiden voyage. This, however, was the first time she'd ever boarded one.

Julie's family was from a small working-class neighborhood wedged in among wharfs. A crooked collection of wattle-and-daub houses with canals on all sides, it was a veritable island within the port. She grew up with water all around her, water and great ships. But, up to now, she had never been on anything larger than her father's fishing boat, a vessel so humble it was too small to accommodate all his sons at once. This ship, the
Paris,
was even bigger than her quarter, her native Saint François.

She almost looked out at her parents again, but quickly turned her gaze. They had come to see their last surviving child leave home and Julie couldn't bear to see them so somber and resigned. It was time to go below, to get ready for work, but she could not yet make herself leave the deck, to disappear and abandon her parents completely. Besides, she wanted to see from this new perspective how the great ship would maneuver out of the harbor and, little by little, leave Le Havre behind.

There were still a few sailors and uniformed workers enjoying the festivities, shouting and gesturing to the people onshore. Just then, two young crew members who looked like brothers (except one was almost a full head taller than the other) shouldered into a spot next to her on the rail and waved vigorously at a blond girl holding a pug tightly in her arms. She grinned at them, waving the
dog's paw back. The shorter boy rolled his eyes, then looked straight down the sleek hull of the steamer, down to the water.

“I've never been this far off the ground,” he said to his friend.

“You mean, this far off the water!” his friend replied, looking down himself.

Julie peeked too, her neck reaching out farther and farther, her gaze gliding down the side of the ship until it found the sea. It was surprisingly far. She unwound the streamer from her fingers and let it drop, holding her breath until it reached the dark water below. She quickly looked back up and glimpsed out toward her parents. Both waited patiently; they were experienced at this. She shook her head with a sigh, knowing herself a poor substitute for sons.

“Hey,” said the short boy, still hanging over the rail, contemplating the water from that great height, “have you ever wondered where the extra water comes from when the tide rolls in?”

“Yeah,” replied his friend, nodding in mock seriousness, “it's a mystery . . . like, where does the extra meat come from when your pecker gets hard?”

His friend jerked his head up with a look of surprise, making his tall companion burst into laughter, clapping him on the back. Julie had to look away to hide her smile. Sailors! Had the soldiers in the trenches also joked around and laughed like that?

Suddenly, a boater hat, perched carelessly on a man's head down on the bow, was taken up by the wind. As it flew by, Julie stretched out her hand and caught it so effortlessly that the boys next to her stopped laughing at once and stared at her, as if she too had just come out of the sky.

Julie was so small that people generally didn't notice her at all, but when they did, they usually stared. Her hair was a remarkable shade of copper and, in sunshine such as this, had the metallic sheen of a well-polished kettle. Her skin, pale and delicate, had the translucent gleam of a pearl, decorated by nearly imperceptible
swirls of blue and pink. Her brother Loïc used to say she looked otherworldly, like an angel or a nymph, or like Pygmalion's statue at the very moment it came to life. But Julie was fully aware that what people were really staring at was the large birthmark that was wedged between her nose and her lip, perfectly outlining that tear-shaped groove in the middle.

She watched as the boys' gaze immediately found it, then bobbed back up to her eyes, embarrassed, yet unable to hide their distaste. This is how strangers had looked at her as long as she could remember; she was used to it.

“Great catch!” the shorter boy said, a few seconds too late.

She turned the hat around in her hands, shrugging off her skill. “I grew up with four brothers,” she explained.

Already, the owner of the hat had made his way to where she was standing, brushing it off as if the air had made it dirty.

“Thank you so much!” he cried. Though he spoke to her in French, his deep voice had a musical accent.

He accepted his hat back with a small bow, then looked into her face. She noticed that his eyes did not dip down to her birthmark; they had not yet seemed to find it.

“I bought this hat just this morning. A ridiculous purchase for an engine man.” He smiled and put out his hand. “I am Nikolai Grumov.”

He was big and tall, reminding Julie of those strapping American soldiers she'd seen during the war who all looked as if they'd grown up on dairy farms, raised on milk and beef. Although he was probably just a few years older than she—maybe twenty-four?—his shaggy brown hair was beginning to recede. His tanned face, she saw, was lightly pocked. All in all, he had a ruggedness she found appealing. She shook his large, warm hand with a smile.

“Julie Vernet. Pleased to meet you,” she said, stumbling slightly over her words. “I'm also working here on the ship.”

“You must be in the service crew. We don't get pretty girls down in the engine room.” Nikolai grinned.

Julie, unused to attention from men, blushed and looked down. Suddenly, a loud honk blasted out, the first warning that the ship would soon be leaving the harbor.

“That reminds me! I have to report for duty!” Julie said.

She picked up her bag and, as she pushed away from the rail, looked back at Nikolai.

“Maybe we'll run into each other again?” she suggested shyly.

“I sure hope so!” He winked, saluting with his boater.

She scooted past him and went inside, feeling his eyes on her still. Inside the door, she paused and smiled to herself. This voyage might be a new beginning indeed. Julie then realized she had forgotten to wave a last good-bye to her parents. She took a deep breath—it was too late now; she would feel silly going back out on deck with that boy still there—and promised herself to write to them as soon as she had some free time. She put her bag over her shoulder and headed toward the female workers' dormitory.

Even though the ocean liner was huge, she knew where to go and made her way for the lower level. During her training classes—her weeks spent at the Centre d'Apprentissage Hôtelier—she had nearly memorized the layout of the entire ship. She had not learned much more, however, as the women on board did the same jobs they did on land: laundry, cleaning, child care, or working in shops and salons. The English lessons, a mandatory course for people working the French Line, weren't so difficult for the people from Le Havre, which had been overrun with Allied soldiers during the war.

Julie went down various stairways, the air getting warmer and warmer, the drumming noise from the engines louder and louder, until she arrived at the tip of the bow. This area, which felt the ship's roll more than any other, was used for storage, equipment, and housing women workers.

She peeked into the female dormitory and saw a low-ceilinged room filled with bunk beds, lockers, and benches, all riveted to the
checkerboard floor. Next to the dormitory, there was a dining room. Dim lightbulbs dangled over long tables and benches, from one slanted metal side to the other. A cheerless place for the female crew to spend their free time, eating, sewing, playing cards.

As she walked toward her bunk, a few heads popped up and murmured greetings, which were barely audible over the dull drone from the engines below. Most of the women, however, were busily tying aprons and arranging caps, trying to get to their stations without delay.

Julie smiled at the women she passed. At a glance, she could guess the jobs they'd been hired to do. The pretty girls, with stylish hairdos and delicate hands, obviously worked in the public eye, in the concessions, selling tobacco or flowers. Others, attractive still, but in a more practical way, were probably hairdressers or manicurists, or maybe maids or nannies for the second-class passengers who weren't traveling with their own. The big, strong women were most likely washerwomen; their faces looked watery and worn, as if they too had been left to soak.

Julie, considered too unsightly to work with the genteel passengers and too small to wash clothes, was put on maid service for the steerage class. Just as well. We are neighbors down here under the waterline, no need to go rushing about, all over the ship.

She sat on her bed and opened her bag, thankful she'd been assigned a lower bunk. She brought out an intricate piece of white lace with a stylized
V
in the center and put it gently on her pillow, smoothing it with her hands. It was from her mother, a lace maker, and dated back from when Julie was a little girl. She could still see her younger mother tatting at the window and hear the sounds of the bone bobbins—
click, click, clack
—as she wove, plaited, and looped the strands together. That was before she'd gotten the arthritis.

Almost everything—the collars, cuffs, coifs, the linens of all kinds—had been sold. Of course, that was the whole point!
Though her work was done for the wealthy families of Le Havre, her mother managed to save a few pieces for her children. This one she'd intended for the future bride of her eldest son. Then came the Great War.

Mme. Vernet lost her four sons, a boy each year, in chronological order. Jean François, the eldest, was killed immediately, in Lorraine, the very first week of the war. Émile fell at Ypres, then Didier at Verdun. They lost Loïc in 1918, right before the armistice. Although the war was won, the Vernet family had been defeated. Without a proper owner, this piece of lace was given, without ceremony, to her youngest, her daughter.

“You might as well have this, Julie,” her mother had sighed, handing over the lacework, folded up in a tiny square. “Seeing as you're leaving home.”

Julie stored her other things in her locker—toiletries, undergarments, a book stuffed with letters—then pulled out the brand-new black uniform, so starched it smelled scorched. She thought again of her parents, also in black, standing silently on the dock, not touching each other. This is how it had been since they'd lost Loïc, their final sacrifice to the war.

“Mademoiselle Vernet?”

Julie looked up to see the frowning face of a thin, lined woman of perhaps fifty. She looked from Julie to her clipboard and back again. They were alone in the dormitory; all the other women had reported for duty.

“Yes?” Julie gave her a hesitant smile, causing the woman's brow to furrow. She decided on a solemn look.

“Yes,
ma'am.
I am your superior here,” she said, standing straighter. “Madame Tremblay, head of housekeeping.”