The Paris Spy (Maggie Hope Mystery #7)(22)
Basically, I have no problem parachuting out of a plane or fighting Nazis, but I can’t seem to fall—no, stay—in love.
Her Aunt Edith had raised her to be strong, self-sufficient, and independent. And she was. Except whenever she was with a man, part of her was always terrified. She couldn’t be weak, couldn’t be vulnerable, couldn’t be out of control. She loved mathematics partly for its cold beauty, its lack of emotion. In math, either you were right, or you were wrong. Math couldn’t hurt you, abandon you, leave you, damage you.
Freud would have a field day. Wasn’t that what had led her to sabotage things with John in America? If she were honest with herself, she had to admit she didn’t really think he was with a divorcée. Picking a fight with him had been easier than maybe moving to Los Angeles, getting engaged, starting a new life. Because what if she needed him? Would he run away and leave her, like her father did?
Her heart hurt, literally hurt, and she pressed her hands to her chest, as though to postpone its breaking. I need to forgive my father for not being the man I needed him to be. She put her arms around herself. Maybe someday.
No wonder finding her sister—her half sister—felt so important. She tried to picture Elise Hess, whom she’d met on her mission to Berlin over a year ago, and failed miserably, evoking only blond hair and the ghost of a sweet smile. I don’t even remember what she looks like. How am I going to find her?
She ran the taps in the claw-foot tub and began to undress. Pull it together, Hope. All she wanted to do was get into a bath and wash away the horror of the day.
She threw in a generous handful of bath salts, then slipped under the surface of the hot water—courtesy of the Nazis, she realized; no one else in Paris had hot water. For a moment, she was able to lean back, relax the muscles in her neck and shoulders, and clear her mind.
But not for long. As she breathed in the fragrant air, she was startled by a knock.
“Who is it?” she called, heart racing. She stepped out of the tub and grabbed a peach-colored towel. Had she been found out? What could have given her away?
“It’s Coco,” came the hard-edged voice.
Maggie found a bathrobe and cracked open the door, flustered and dripping. Chanel didn’t seem to notice. “Do you enjoy the ballet?” the couturiere asked without preamble.
“Er…yes?”
“I seem to have an extra ticket for tonight. The Paris Opéra Ballet,” Chanel explained, as if Maggie were a slow child, “at the Palais Garnier. Would you like to join me?”
“Why…of course, thank you so much, mademoiselle.”
Elise’s father, Miles Hess, was a renowned conductor, who had undoubtedly played at the Palais Garnier. Maybe someone there, the evening’s conductor, might know him, might know the address of the Hess family’s flat in Paris. Going to the ballet could possibly bring her one step closer to finding her sister.
“The curtain’s at eight, so I’ll meet you downstairs at the Rue Cambon entrance at seven-thirty. My driver will take us.”
“Of—of course,” Maggie managed, fingers plucking at the neck of her robe. “But what about the curfew?” The Nazis had imposed a 9:00 P.M. curfew on Parisians.
“I have special papers that allow my companions and me to be out late.”
Really, Maggie thought. And how exactly did you get those? But she said only “Thank you so much, Mademoiselle Chanel. This is so kind—”
“Call me Coco.” The couturiere turned to leave, then swiveled back, as if on a runway. “By the way, you have the advantage—you know my name, but I don’t know yours.”
“Paige,” Maggie answered with assurance. She’d practiced saying her new name over and over again, until it felt natural. “Paige Kelly.”
—
Coco Chanel went back to her rooms down the hall, which always smelled faintly of No. 5, a modern mix of ylang-ylang, neroli, and rose, which the maids sprayed each day. She’d had to move most of her furnishings—her blackamoors, Jacques Lipchitz sculptures, and the silk divan she’d reclined on for Horst—to the rooms above her atelier when she’d moved from her grand Ritz suite to smaller rooms after the Occupation. But she would not part with her Coromandel screens, large burnished panels painted with flowers and exotic birds. They were precious reminders of her tragic love affair with “Boy” Capel.
Chanel stripped off her impeccable suit, revealing a girlish figure. She slipped into a rich paisley robe with satin lapels that flowed to her ankles, one of Boy’s she refused to part with. She went to the second bedroom, which served as her closet, and examined dress after dress on padded silk hangers, looking for something to wear for the evening’s performance. As she fingered the black sequins of a slim gown, she had a sudden thought and went back to her sitting room. There she perched on one of the gilt chairs and placed a phone call to her atelier.
“Yes, I need you to go to the files,” she told the shopgirl on the other end of the line. “I want to know about a dress, the blue floral in the spring ’thirty-eight collection. Is there any mention of a Paige Kelly?”
During the pause that followed, Chanel examined her pointed, red-varnished nails, then opened the drawer of her dressing table, searching for something amid the stationery, envelopes, and fountain pens.
After a few minutes, the girl on the other end of the line returned. “Yes, mademoiselle. You sold a number of pieces of that collection, including a blue floral dress, to a Paige Claire Kelly.”