The Butler(24)

“I’m taking the apartment,” Olivia told her, feeling slightly sick.

“Congratulations. And would you like to meet our butler?” she said, and Olivia laughed. Why not? It was just as crazy as everything else she was doing, renting an apartment in Paris for a year, needing to furnish it and put in a kitchen, and interviewing a formal butler to hire as an assistant. It was the craziest thing she’d ever done, but she didn’t have to hire the butler if she didn’t like him. She had no obligation, and she did need help, and it would only be for a short time. For no particular reason, she assumed he was gay, living with his mother, and running a formal home. She didn’t care either way. Maybe he’d be fun to work with. Although Carson on Downton Abbey wasn’t gay. She remembered then that she had to give the woman an answer if she wanted to meet him.

“Yes, I guess I’ll meet him. Will tomorrow work?” Signing the lease would be enough stress for one day.

“I’ll see if he’s available and interested. I’ll call you back and let you know.”

    She called Olivia back while she was making a cup of tea to try to calm her nerves. “He can meet you anytime you like tomorrow.” She didn’t tell Olivia that he had sounded skeptical too.

“Perfect. How about four o’clock?” That way she could walk or shop or do errands, or go to a museum before she saw him.

“I’ll let him know. Call me on my cellphone and tell me how the meeting went. I hope you like him. He seems like a nice chap. He’s quiet and seems discreet.” She didn’t tell Olivia that he sounded tentative about it too. He hadn’t expected her to line up an interview so quickly, and the project sounded odd to him. He was a butler, not an assistant, and the agency seemed to know very little about the prospective employer, except that she was American, and renting an apartment for a year. He imagined that she had probably just gotten divorced or was running away from something. They didn’t think she had children, but they weren’t sure. Or dogs. He was on edge and dubious about the whole thing. And he had forgotten to ask how old she was. Probably either some cranky old dowager, or a spoiled rich girl indulged by her father. Neither possibility appealed to Joachim.

He said as much to his mother that night when she got home from work. He was already sorry he had agreed to the interview.

“See what you think when you meet her,” his mother said sensibly, smiling at him.

“I’m a butler, Mama, not an errand boy or an assistant.”

“You’ve done lots of things that an assistant would do. And errands, when you were younger. She’s a woman alone in a foreign country, renting an apartment, and she doesn’t speak the language. It doesn’t matter what she calls you, she needs help. That doesn’t make her spoiled or cranky. It means she can pay someone to help her get the job done. She’s probably a businesswoman, a lot of American women are. Don’t get all worked up about it. Go with an open mind.” As usual, she gave him good advice, and he put the interview out of his head and on the back burner for the night.



* * *



—

    Olivia was sitting in her apartment on the quai Voltaire with the keys to her new apartment in her hand. She had ordered a wire transfer from her bank in New York for the first month’s rent, and a security deposit, and the owner said she could go to the apartment and measure whatever she needed to. It had all gone smoothly, and she had done it. She felt calm about it now. She couldn’t wait to see the apartment again and was planning to go the next day. She was smiling as she walked out onto the terrace and watched the Eiffel Tower sparkling. It was magical, and this was home now, for the next year.

Olivia went to her new apartment the next morning at ten o’clock. She had the outer code to the building, and there was an intercom she didn’t need to use. No one stopped her, and she walked up to the second floor and let herself into the apartment. There was an alarm, but it wasn’t on. She flipped on the lights and walked around the sparsely furnished rooms. There was a bed and a chest in the bedroom and nothing else, a dining room table with six chairs of one kind and two of another. There were two couches in the living room that were decent looking, and no tables. The second bedroom was empty, and she could use it as an office, a closet, or a storeroom, and there was a counter in the kitchen, a few cupboards and a sink, but no stove or refrigerator. The bones of the apartment were as beautiful as she remembered, but the furnishings were paltry and inadequate, as she remembered too. She needed to replace them, but not spend a fortune. She wanted the apartment to be livable, comfortable, and cozy, but she wasn’t trying to replicate Versailles. She had been to the flea market once in Paris when she had come on a business trip and wondered if she could find decent things there at reasonable prices. The prices had seemed high to her, but the merchants were willing to bargain, and many of them spoke English, since a lot of Americans bought there. And Ikea was a great resource for basics, and simple, practical things.

    She walked around the apartment, trying to figure out what she wanted to do. A coffee table in the living room, some lamps, some comfortable chairs to sit in, better dining chairs that matched. None of it had to be expensive, just pretty and practical. She noticed the curtains again and how handsome they were. And she could see trees from her windows, which gave the place a country feel. The floors were as beautiful as she recalled. She wanted to get started, so it would already be more inviting when she moved in. And she reminded herself that she had owned and run a decorating magazine for ten years and would figure out what to do.