Till We Meet Again (12 page)

“Dear Lord, Vivianne, isn’t that just going to make it harder on me? I’ll sound as if I haven’t an idea in my head,” Eve had protested.

“Nobody cares about your brain power when you’re standing on a stage, my dear. You are there to impose yourself. Make yourself
unforgettable
.”

Unforgettable, Eve thought, as she stood with the footlights in her eyes. All I have to be is merely unforgettable. And I have five minutes in which to accomplish this. She took a deep breath and remembered the endless horizon as she had seen it from the big red balloon, remembered the moment when she had been at one with the reckless pilots of the great Air Show. Well, why not? she asked herself. After all, is it so remarkable to be unforgettable? I will, at least,
dare
.

Eve gave the accompanist the sign to begin, and as the first notes of
Parlez-moi d’Amour
sounded in the empty theater, Maurice held out his hand to his boss and Jacques Charles began to dig into his pocket. But as her voice crossed the distance between them, that contralto voice which was so intimate, so immediate, that voice which seemed to be singing directly into his ear, although the distance between the stage and the second balcony was great, he stopped and listened.

Jacques Charles listened to a voice that created a hunger in him where none had existed before, a voice that satisfied his hunger and then left him still needing more of the sound that was like the private beating of a beloved heart, a voice that seemed to hold some invaluable, yet still unlearned lesson. The impresario realized that he had grown so accustomed to hearing the pretty melody sung in Printemps’s wistful soprano warble that he had never paid attention to the words. The “tender things” that the lyric begged for touched him with thoughts of tender things remembered, tender things hoped for, and, during the space of a minute, lovesickness brushed him amorously, born in the throat of the girl in red.

Maurice started to say something when Eve finished her first song, but the producer put his fingers to his lips. “Please
continue, Mademoiselle,” he called, and Eve began
Mon Homme
. She sang the lyrics of a song that both men knew, as an article of faith,
belonged
to the great and evil-tempered Miss as absolutely as her fabulous legs belonged to her, as completely as the young Chevalier belonged to her. Maurice thought that it was a lucky thing for them both that the Miss hadn’t been here today to listen to this bold-faced and incredibly successful appropriation of her property. It would never belong to her again, not as it had before, and she would have been capable of murder. For his part, Jacques Charles thought that it was a shame that Chevalier, a good fellow, was not present to glimpse this opportunity to escape his stormy affair with the Miss. Or rather to escape it for another kind of enslavement, for no man who listened to this girl in red would leave the theater the same man he had been when he entered.

Eve finished singing, and both men found themselves clapping and shouting “Encore!” before they looked at each other sheepishly. It was not their business to scream for more like the customers. They were not civilians, after all.

Encore indeed, Vivianne de Biron thought in triumph. Madeleine would give them encores, but all in good time. First there was a contract to negotiate, and if they hadn’t been carried away they might have gotten her on decent terms. Now … it was another matter.

“To work, Maurice,” Jacques Charles muttered. “Perhaps la Biron will think we were just being polite.”

“You can always try to say that,
Patron
.”

“Not to Vivianne de Biron. I wouldn’t even try.”

“Because she was such a great Walking Girl?”

“Because she’d laugh in my face, idiot. I said she never got pregnant, I didn’t say she was stupid.”

4

H
ARD-HEARTED she might be, and undoubtedly a wicked woman, Vivianne de Biron reflected, but it was not a bad thing at all, in fact a decidedly fortunate thing, that Alain Marais had not improved as quickly as he had hoped. The doctors had insisted that he remain in the hospital until they were satisfied with him, and since the winter still continued wet and freezing and looked as if, in typical Parisian fashion, it might remain that way until Bastille Day in July, there was no danger that he might come home and discover his Madeleine in the process of being transformed into a debutante at the Olympia, the glorious Olympia, which he knew he could never hope to enter except as a ticket holder.

Vivianne had warned Madeleine to say nothing to him about her new job, and the girl had accepted her advice promptly, and without asking why. She must finally have heard Fragson sing. It was inevitable, since they were working on the same stage, in the same show, and Madeleine had been rehearsing new songs of her
tour de chant
every day at the theater. Yet she had said nothing, Vivianne thought. Some matters needed no comment, particularly between friends.

Vivianne shrugged her shoulders and thought about Maddy’s future, for that was the name that the management had decided to give Madeleine. As Jacques Charles said, “Madeleine” had a decidedly religious ring to it, and if there was one thing you could say about Madeleine’s singing, it was more inspired by Venus than by any virginal saint.

He had decided to launch his debutante during the first half of the current revue, since it wasn’t destined to be replaced by a new show until summer.

“I don’t want to wait till then,” he had told Vivianne, once the contract had been signed and they were friends again, “because she’s ready now—I’ll make sure that the critics know she’s appearing. A new attraction’s always a good way
to get them back into the house in the middle of the season. Maddy’ll go on after the Hoffmann Girls and before the magician. Then Fragson sings, followed by the intermission. It’s the perfect placement.”

“How will you dress her?” Vivianne had demanded promptly, ready to go to battle if need be.

“In red, as you did, naturally. Your instincts were right. Just because you never wore clothes onstage doesn’t mean you didn’t understand them. With her hair she must always wear red, but not a chemise. No woman will ever dishonor my stage in a dress without a waist again. It’s far less seductive than a pillow slip. Maddy has the body, thank God, that is promised by her voice. I intend to do her justice, as I did you, Vivianne, before you turned into a professional manager.”

“Ingrate!”

“Ah, the classic stage mother,” he laughed, and kissed her hand. “Too bad you never could keep step with the others, but now I see your talents lie in other directions. I am deeply grateful to you, Vivianne, you know that, don’t you?”

“As you should be. I shall keep an eye on her costumes,
Patron
, don’t think I won’t.”

“I have every faith in you.”

“I shall also keep an eye on you,” she said severely.

“And quite right you are. Why should you be the first person in history to trust a producer?”

“Now,” said Jacques Charles to Eve, as she entered her dressing room on a morning in mid-March, the day after her first performance, “you’re ready to begin work.”

“But … I don’t understand.” She looked at him in astonishment.

“Yesterday Paris took you to its heart. The audience made a decision. They fell in love with you, my Maddy. Only an audience can confer that kind of love, and once they give it, they never take it away. It was victory, an unconditional victory. Look at these reviews—it’s glory, Maddy, nothing less than glory. So I say you’re ready to begin work.”

“I still don’t understand.” After the ovations that had followed her first performance, Eve had half expected the flowers and notes with which her dressing room was already filled, she had anticipated the compliments she had received from the other performers, but his words didn’t make sense.

“From the first time I saw you on stage, Maddy, I never
thought of you merely as a singer. The
tour de chant
is the first step in your career. Absolutely necessary, of course. Without it you can’t own the public. But it can also be a prison for a major talent. You have a potential I haven’t seen in years. You could become a star, the kind of star around whom a revue is created,
for
whom a revue is created. That means you must dance and act as well as you sing. Lessons, my girl, lessons!”

“But …”

“Don’t you want to be a star?”

Eve sat down on the couch in her dressing room and looked at the young impresario in confusion.

“I see,” he said, “you thought that you were already a star. And no wonder, after that reception by the crowd. But Maddy, there are stars and stars. You are indeed a star now, not a great star, not yet, although you shine so brightly. You will never share your place in the sky with anyone who has not also held the public of the Olympia in the palm of one hand.”

He looked at her closely and saw that his words had wounded her. “Don’t misunderstand, Maddy,” he said hastily, “you have every right to call yourself a star, if, to you, ‘star’ means being one name on a playbill, one name among many others. But if you have another dream, if you dream that one day people will flock to the Olympia just to see Maddy, never mind in what, because it is Maddy who matters more than any show, if you dream that one day Maddy will be known all over the world and tourists will fight for tickets to hear you, if you can see posters of Maddy on every kiosk in this city—then we have the same idea, you and I, of what it means to be a star. So! What do you say?” In his eyes Eve saw the unmistakable and utterly genuine excitement of a man who was offering her the world. This producer, who could engage any performer he chose, thought—no, he
knew
—that she had a chance. More than a chance.

“Nothing. For the moment. Thank you very much,
Patron
, but I have nothing to say.”

“Nothing?” he said, incredulously.

“Please, don’t think that I’m ungrateful or stupid. I … I’m still confused … I was so excited after last night that I didn’t sleep at all … I … I just don’t know what I want right now.”

“I understand, Maddy—it’s normal. Look, I’ll give you all
the time you need to think about it. Take a day, take two days—and when you’re ready, come and see me in my office. We have a lot to talk about.”

He gave her an encouraging smile and hurried off, thinking gloomily that not to know what you wanted was almost as bad as not wanting anything at all. If Maddy wanted to become a star, she shouldn’t need more than half a minute to think about his offer. If she
really
wanted to become a star, she should have been pounding at his office door early this morning, the minute he’d arrived at the theater, demanding to know what his plans were for her.

Late that afternoon, with half an hour to herself before she had to dress to leave for the theater, Eve sat huddled in an armchair in front of the tall windows from which, only a few months before, she had been able to watch the slow setting of the sun of autumn. Now it was almost dark outside, but the day itself had been sunny, that one bright March day which keeps the spirits of Parisians from withering completely during the winter; the day on which the waiters in the cafés hastily set up tables on the sidewalk for a mob of customers, although they knew perfectly well that tomorrow they would have to take them inside again.

Eve shivered and held a cup of hot tea in her hands to warm them. All afternoon, during rehearsals with her accompanist, she had felt cold to her bones in spite of the stuffiness of the theater, and even now, wrapped in her coziest dressing gown, she couldn’t get comfortable.

Why, she asked herself for the hundredth time, why had she been subjected to the words of Jacques Charles and why had she had to hear the sincerity in his voice and why, oh why, had she had to feel the leap in her blood when he talked about Maddy who could be famous, Maddy who could become a great star? The modest little stardom he had spoken of with such kindness—had she ever been guilty of hoping for more than that? Had she ever even allowed herself to dream of more? Wasn’t it enough to dare to sing at the Olympia? Why should she be asked if she wanted more? Any success greater than that which she had achieved would mean that she would lose Alain.
Why should she be tempted so cruelly?

Eve got up from the armchair and went to look for a warm scarf to wind around her neck. In the bedroom she stood for minutes in front of the huge armoire in which Alain’s suits
hung in an impressive row. She opened the door and inhaled the scent that came from the expensive wool, an odor that had seemed, for the last two and a half months, to be all that was left of her lover in the apartment. Although she visited him in the hospital as often as possible, it wasn’t the same. The aroma of his tobacco, his cologne, his hair oil, and his body all blended into a marvelous smell that left her more desolate than before. She put her cold hand under her dressing gown and brushed her fingers lingeringly over her breast, trying to arouse a sense memory of his touch. She ached for him.

“Eve.” A voice spoke from the doorway to the bedroom, and Eve screamed and whirled around.

“Alain! My God, Alain! Oh, you terrified me, coming in like that, what are you doing here?”

He laughed at her consternation, and held her tightly in his arms. “The doctors let me out an hour ago. I wanted to surprise you. Give me a kiss. Ah, that’s so good. So good—in that hospital bed it never tasted like this—I was in danger of forgetting, I tell you. I’m so glad to see you, sweetheart. I’m glad you didn’t let me chase you back to Dijon.” He held her at arm’s length and inspected her face. “You look different, Eve. I’ve never seen you put makeup on your eyes before. It makes you look older. I don’t like it. Who taught you—Vivianne?”

Hastily, Eve nodded her assent. “Alain, darling, are you sure you’re strong enough to be home? Did the doctors give you an examination before they let you go? You’re so thin.”

“You sound too much like my mother. I’ll have to prove to you exactly how strong I am,” he said, picking her up in his arms and carrying her to the bed. “Give me your mouth, first give me your mouth and then, then I’ll take all the rest of you … you’ll find out just how strong I am.” His laugh was triumphant.