Paris by the Book(73)

“Okay,” Declan said, but he was agreeing with something he was thinking, not what I was thinking, which was can you wait? Can you be a friend and just a friend, just until I figure out what’s going on? But when I looked up, he was gone. He was still sitting there, but he was gone, gone from me, and I wasn’t getting him back. Not his easy conversation or his eyes or his shoulders, legs, his hands. All of it, gone. My purse savior, dance defender, daytime companion, gone.

“Declan,” I said.

“I’m really sorry,” he said. “And I mean that, I mean that word every way it can mean. I’m sorry for you, I’m sorry for me.” He twisted to find the waiter.

“Declan,” I said. “This is not—I hope this is not good-bye.”

“It’s not,” Declan said. “It’s something way stranger.”



* * *



—

Laurent thought something strange was going on, too. Or so Madame Brouillard reported when I returned to the store. I’d not been there for the morning delivery, which meant Laurent somehow roused Madame to have her sign for it (and, knowing Laurent, have her carry the boxes into the store). Madame did not like Laurent (he’d once told her he didn’t like books; they were too heavy; he preferred delivering mops). Madame did not like being roused. Madame did not like that the store had not been open of late during my usual hours—noon until dinner—and that she was pestered at all hours as a result. She’d not expected much, having turned things over to Americans, but she had expected better than this. And, worst of all, the store now seemed to be attracting dangerous people.

At first I thought she was referring to the crowd Ellie, Asif, and Declan had convened the other night, but no: Laurent said he’d seen someone “prowling” around. I wasn’t as confident as Madame seemed to be that prowling was the right word, but the gist of what Laurent was saying was clear.

And so was the gist of what Madame was saying: either I figure out how to run the store better, or she’d find a way to run us out. After all, I couldn’t be part owner of a business, as our visas required, if it wasn’t in business.



* * *



—

Of course I took offense at Madame’s threat—I was supposed to—but I wanted us to be doing better, too. In no small part because I wanted to show off for Eleanor. Maybe every other aspect of my life was a mess, but I wanted Eleanor to see that I’d managed to figure out this much, how to survive in Paris.

And we almost were. We’d spent down much of Robert’s prize money, but we were doing okay. Madame’s threat aside, the visas George had magically acquired for us were still working their magic. George also helped us negotiate for the assistance the government sometimes granted independent bookstores. If I’d had to pay for tuition or health care, the books, indeed, would not have balanced. But I didn’t have to pay for those things; George paid us handsomely, and Madame Brouillard, when she wasn’t browbeating me about my poor business abilities, made clear her own failings by not following up with me when I was late with my monthly payments (confusingly, when we discussed them in English, we called this the “mortgage,” but in French, she would use the word for “rent”).

Originally, I’d thought Eleanor and I would spend her first full day walking the city—the best cure for jet lag—but that would mean shuttering the store yet again. If I had had enough cash flow to hire an assistant (and Molly was all but begging me for such a position), things might have been different.

I was lugging the last of Laurent’s boxes into the back room when I heard the bell over the door, reminding me that I’d forgotten to lock it until I was officially open. Too late now, but so much the better; an early sale would help us make up lost ground. It might even be the man who had called in looking for a first edition of Sophie Calle’s cryptic 1979 photo essay Suite Vénitienne, which we did have and could never sell, because it was Madame Brouillard’s own copy and she wanted five hundred euros for it. If I sold it at that price this morning, though, I’d more than cover the cost of closing—or hiring Molly—this afternoon.

“Bonjour,” I called. “Bienvenue, bienvenue,” I said, dusting my hands and easing the bookcase-door aside.

“Good morning,” said Eleanor, in a tone that suggested it was not.

“I—well, here you are. I was going to be in touch as soon as I squared away things here,” I said, blinking hard. “Did you not sleep well?” I asked.

“The bed was awful,” Eleanor said. “And I want to apologize for last night.”

“Me, too,” I said. I paused.

I guess I thought Eleanor would go first. But she said nothing. So I said nothing.

“Well, I’m glad that’s over with,” I said.

“Not quite,” Eleanor said, drawing a folder out of her purse. “They should be ashamed, that hotel, what they charge for printing.”

“Oh—? We could have printed that out for you for free.”

“I wanted to see it first.” She looked at me. “It’s the police report. I don’t know if my calling them accelerated things or if things just came together, but—here it is. There’s nothing new in it, it’s everything I said.”

I stared at the folder. The stack of pages inside seemed insultingly small. Smaller than Robert’s manuscript.