The Ingredients of Love (6 page)

This could have signaled the end of the meeting, if Mademoiselle Mirabeau hadn't raised her hand at that very moment. Shyly, and with a wealth of detail that had everyone else yawning, she told us about an unsolicited manuscript. It was clear from the third sentence that it would never see the light of day in the world of books. Monsignac raised his hand to silence the unrest that was suddenly making itself felt in the room. Mademoiselle Mirabeau was so worked up that she didn't even notice the warning glances he gave us. “You did that very well, my dear,” he said as she finally put down her last page of notes.

Mademoiselle Mirabeau, who had only been working in our editorial department for a few weeks, blushed with relief. “There's probably no question of its being published,” she whispered.

Monsignac nodded with a serious expression. “I'm afraid you're right, my dear,” he said patiently. “But don't worry about it. So much that we have to read is garbage. You read the beginning: garbage. You take a look in the middle: garbage. The end: garbage. If something like that ends up on your desk, you can save yourself the trouble and…” He raised his voice a little, “there's no need to waste your breath on it.” He smiled.

Mademoiselle Mirabeau nodded her understanding, the others grinned noncommittally. The publisher of Éditions Opale was in his element, and rocked back and forth in his chair. “I'll tell you a secret, Mademoiselle Mirabeau,” he said, and we all knew what was coming, because we'd all heard it before. “A good book is good on every page,” he said, and with these lofty words the meeting was finally at an end.

I grabbed my manuscripts, ran to the end of the narrow corridor, and burst into my little office.

Completely out of breath, I fell into my desk chair and dialed the number in London with trembling hands.

It rang a few times, but nobody answered.

“Pick it up, Adam, damn it!” I cursed under my breath, and then the answering machine cut in.

“Adam Goldberg Literary Agency. Unfortunately you are calling outside office hours. Please leave a message after the tone, and we'll get back to you.”

I took a deep breath. “Adam!” I said, and even to my ears it sounded like a cry for help. “This is André. Call me back immediately, please. We've got a problem!”

 

Three

When the telephone rang, I was in the garden of a charming English cottage, pensively plucking a few withered leaves off a climbing rose that was growing up against a brick wall.

Birds were chirping, the morning was filled with an almost unreal sense of calm, and the sun was shining warm and mild on my face. The perfect start to a perfect day, I thought, and decided to ignore the telephone. I buried my face in a particularly opulent pink rose, and the ringing stopped.

Then I heard a click, and a voice that I knew well but that somehow didn't belong here spoke behind me.

“Aurélie?… Aurélie, are you still asleep? Why aren't you picking up the phone? Hm … funny … Are you just taking a shower?… Listen, I just wanted to tell you I'll be with you in half an hour, and I'm bringing croissants and
pains au chocolat
—you know you like them. Aurélie? Heeellooo! Hellohellohello! Pick up the phone now, please!”

With a sigh, I wrenched my eyes open and tumbled into the hall in bare feet to pick up the phone from its stand.

“Hello, Bernadette!” I said sleepily, and the English rose garden faded away.

“Did I wake you? It's half past nine!” Bernadette is one of those people who like getting up early, and half past nine is almost the middle of the day for her.

“Hm … hm.” I yawned, went back into the bedroom, wedged the phone between my ear and my shoulder, and fished under the bed for my slippers with one foot. One of the disadvantages of owning a small restaurant is that you almost never have an evening free. However, the undisputed advantage is that you can always start the day in a leisurely manner.

“I've just had such a lovely dream,” I said, and opened the curtains.

I looked up at the sky—no sun!—and became lost in thoughts of the summery cottage.

“Are you feeling better? I'll be there any minute!”

I smiled. “Yes. Much better,” I said, and noticed to my surprise that it was true.

Three days had passed since Claude had left me, and even yesterday when, admittedly somewhat bleary-eyed but by no means unhappy, I had done my shopping in the market halls and then in the restaurant in the evening greeted the customers and recommended the
loup de mer
that Jacquie prepares so well, I had hardly thought of him once. I had in fact thought a lot more about Robert Miller and his novel—and about my idea of writing to him.

Only once, when Jacquie put his arm around my shoulder in a fatherly way and said, “
Ma pauvre petite,
how could he do that to you, the sonofabitch? Ah, men are such pigs. Here, eat a dish of bouillabaisse,” did I feel a little pang in my heart—but at least it wasn't making me cry anymore. And when I got home last night, I sat down at the table with a glass of red wine, leafed through the book once more, and then sat for quite a while, pen in hand, with a sheet of white paper in front of me. I couldn't remember the last time I had written a letter, and now here I was writing a letter to a man I didn't know at all. Life was strange.

“Know what, Bernadette?” I said, and went into the kitchen to lay the table. “Something strange has happened. I think I've got a bit of a surprise for you.”

*   *   *

An hour later, Bernadette was sitting looking at me in total amazement.

“You've read a
book
?”

She'd arrived with a little bunch of flowers and a gigantic bag of croissants and
pains au chocolat,
fully intending to console me; and instead of a miserable woman with a broken heart weeping into one paper tissue after another, she'd found an Aurélie who, with gleaming eyes, excitedly told her an adventure story about a spotted umbrella that had floated away, a policeman on a bridge who had pursued her, an enchanted bookshop where Marc Chagall had been sitting and had offered her cookies, and about the wonderful book she had reached out for. How one thing had led to another, what a twist of fate! That she'd spent the whole night reading that fateful book, which had driven away all her lovesickness and aroused her curiosity. About her dream and the fact that she'd written the author a letter—and wasn't all this just so amazing?

Perhaps I'd been speaking too quickly or too confusedly—either way, Bernadette hadn't understood the most important thing.

“So, you bought one of those ‘Advice for the Lovelorn' books, and that helped you to feel better,” was how she summed up my own little personal miracle. “That's wonderful! I admit I wouldn't have thought you were the type for self-help books, but what's important is that it helped you.”

I shook my head. “No, no, no, you haven't understood, Bernadette. It wasn't one of those psychobooks. It's a novel, and I'm in it!”

Bernadette nodded. “You mean the heroine thinks like you do, and that's what pleased you about it.”

She grinned and spread her arms in a theatrical gesture. “Welcome to the world of books, my dear Aurélie. I must say that your enthusiasm gives me hope. Perhaps we'll make a passable reader out of you!”

I groaned. “Bernadette, just listen to me, will you. Yes, I don't read many books, and no, I'm not freaking out just because I've read some novel. I liked the book—liked it a lot, in fact. That's one thing. And the other thing is: There's a girl in it, a young woman, who looks like me. Her name is Sophie, that's true, but she has long, dark blond, wavy hair, she's middling tall and slim, she's wearing my dress. And at the end she's sitting in a restaurant called Le Temps des Cerises in the Rue Princesse.”

Bernadette said nothing for a long moment, and then she said, “And is the woman in the novel also together with a completely screwed-up weirdo called Claude who's cheating on her with another woman the whole time?”

“No, she's not. She's not with anyone and then later on falls in love with an Englishman, who finds French customs and behavior rather peculiar.” I threw a piece of croissant at Bernadette. “Anyway, Claude
wasn't
cheating on me the whole time!”

“Who knows? Anyway, let's not talk about Claude! I want to see this wonderful book at once!”

Bernadette was obviously getting all fired up. Perhaps it was just that she would have found anything wonderful if it led me away from Claude and gave me back my peace of mind. I stood up and got the book, which was lying on the sideboard.

“Here,” I said.

Bernadette glanced at the title.
“The Smiles of Women,”
she read out loud. “A nice title.” She leafed through the pages with interest.

“Look … here,” I said excitedly. “And here … just read that!”

Bernadette's eyes moved from side to side, while I watched expectantly.

“Yeeees,” she said finally. “That is certainly a bit strange. But,
mon Dieu,
remarkable coincidences do happen. Who knows, perhaps the author knows your restaurant or has heard something about it. A friend who ate there on a business trip to Paris may have enthused to him about it. Something like that. And—don't get me wrong here, you're a very special person, Aurélie—but you're not the only woman with long, dark blond hair…”

“And what about the dress? What about the dress?” I pressed her.

“Yes, the dress…” Bernadette thought for a moment. “What can I say, it's a dress you bought sometime, somewhere. I assume that it's not a model that Karl Lagerfeld personally designed for you, is it? In other words—other women could also have a similar dress. Or it was on a mannequin in a shop window. There are so many possible explanations…”

I made a dissatisfied sound.

“But I can understand that this must all seem very surprising to you. I'm sure it would be the same for me at first.”

“I can't believe that it's all just coincidence,” I insisted. “I just don't believe it.”

“My dear Aurélie,
everything
is chance or fate—if that's what people want to believe. For my part, I think that there's probably a simple explanation for all these remarkable coincidences—but that's only my opinion. Anyway, you found that book at just the right moment, and I'm truly happy that it's taken your mind off things.”

I nodded, feeling a bit disappointed. Somehow I'd imagined a rather more dramatic reaction. “But you must admit that things like this don't happen very often,” I said. “Or has something like it ever happened to you?”

“I admit everything,” she said with a laugh. “And no, nothing like that has ever happened to me.”

“Even though you read so much more than me,” I said.

“Yes, even though I read so much more,” she repeated. “Pity, really.”

She glanced critically at the book and then turned it over. “Robert Miller,” she said. “Never heard of him. But at least he's damned good-looking, this Robert Miller.”

I nodded. “And his book saved my life. So to speak,” I added quickly.

Bernadette looked up. “Did you tell him
that
in your letter?”

“No, of course not,” I said. “At least, not directly. But yes, I did thank him. And invite him to a meal in my restaurant, which—as you said—he either already knows or has heard of.” I said nothing about the photo.

“Oh, là là,”
said Bernadette. “You really want to know, don't you?”

“Yes,” I said. “And anyway, readers often write to authors when they've really liked their books. That's not so unusual.”

“Will you read the letter to me?” asked Bernadette.

“Not on your life.” I shook my head. “Postal confidentiality. And anyway, I've already sealed it.”

“And posted it?”

“No.” Only then did I realize that I had no idea about the address. “What do you actually do when you want to write to an author?”

“Well, you could write to the publisher, and they could then forward it to him.” Bernadette picked up the book again. “Let's see,” she said, and looked for the publication details. “Ah, here it is: Copyright Éditions Opale, Rue de l'Université, Paris.” She put the book back down on the kitchen table. “That's not far from here,” she said, and took another sip of her coffee. “You could almost go there personally and hand the letter over to them.” She winked at me. “Then it'll get there much quicker.”

“You're so silly, Bernadette,” I said. “And d'you know what? That's exactly what I'll do!”

*   *   *

And that's how I ended up that evening taking a slight detour and walking along the Rue de l'Université to stick a long, thick envelope into the mail slot at Éditions Opale. The envelope was addressed to “The Author Robert Miller/Éditions Opale.” At first I'd just written “Mr. Robert Miller, c/o Éditions Opale” but “The Author” seemed somehow more formal and solemn. And I must admit that I felt a little solemn as I heard the letter landing softly on the other side of the big front door.

When you send off a letter, you are always setting something in motion. You enter into a dialogue. You want to communicate your news, your experiences, or your feelings, or else you want to know something. A letter always consists of a sender and a recipient. As a rule, it requires an answer, unless you're writing a letter breaking up with someone—and even then what you write is aimed at a living person and produces—unlike a diary entry—a reaction.

I could not have expressed clearly in words what sort of reaction I was actually expecting to this letter. It was at least more than simply putting a period after my thanks for a book.