The Paris Library(81)

“During the Library’s annual closure, Felix and I will go on holiday. Deauville is supposed to be delightful. Nanny will watch Christina, and if anyone asks, I’ll say I stayed with you.…” Still on her cloud of happiness, Margaret floated out to the reading room.

The chocolates were delicious. I’d send the rest to Rémy. I would. After one more piece.



* * *




THAT EVENING, while Boris and the Countess went over the budget in her office, I manned the circulation desk. When the phone rang, I expected to be asked to deliver books. “I demand to see Clara de Chambrun.” The caller spoke in French with a slight German accent. “Let us say nine thirty tomorrow. Tell her to enter directly, and express my regrets at not being able to call at the Library.” He didn’t give me a chance to reply before hanging up. What did Dr. Fuchs want with the Countess? Would we lose another friend?

Upstairs, I peeked into the Countess’s office. When Boris noticed me, his brows rose in concern. Of course, he knew something was wrong, he was a librarian—part psychologist, bartender, bouncer, and detective.

“I have a message,” I said.

The Countess peered over her reading glasses. “Well, what is it?”

“I’m afraid Dr. Fuchs insists on seeing you at his office tomorrow,” I said.

“Oh, does he?”

“You and the general should leave town,” Boris said.

“So they can arrest you in my place?” she replied. “What exactly did he say?”

I repeated his message.

“I’ll accompany you,” Boris said.

I didn’t want him to go—he had a wife and little girl who depended on him. I tried to find a convincing argument. He had the keys, so he had to be here to open in the morning? No, he would simply hand them to me.

“From what I’ve seen,” I said slowly, “Dr. Fuchs has a soft spot for women. It’s better if I accompany the Countess.”

“I’m not taking you to pay a call on a Nazi!” she said. “What would your parents say?”

“Honestly, my father didn’t want me to work with the capitalist foreigners here, either. Papa’s a commissaire, so my family has already had dealings with Nazis.” I said this only to win the argument. I never thought about how my father spent his days, or with whom.

“Are you certain about accompanying me?” she asked.

I was afraid to go to Nazi headquarters, but as I considered the leather-bound books on the Countess’s shelves, the novels I delivered to subscribers, and Professor Cohen’s manuscript hidden in the safe, I decided that words were worth fighting for, that they were worth the risk.

“Absolutely.”

There was no time to dwell on what might or might not happen—we were too busy running the Library. I returned to the circulation desk, where Mme. Simon demanded, “Where the devil have you been? I could have walked right out with these books!”

When the last subscriber had left for the day, I shoved Professor Cohen’s books into my satchel and hurried up the boulevard. It was just past seven, but the murky silhouettes of buildings loomed. I’d grown up in the city and felt as safe on the avenues as I did in Maman’s arms. But tonight, each time I glanced behind me, the man in the tweed suit was there. When I crossed the street, he did, too. I looked back; he stopped and leafed through a magazine at the kiosk. I walked briskly. He continued, as if on an evening stroll, a scowl on his sinister face. In the shadows, I saw his briefcase in one hand, and in the other… the glint of a gun, its barrel staring at me.

Taking a sharp right, I leaned against the grimy building. My legs twitched, urging me to break into a run. I peeked around the corner. As he drew closer, I saw that what I’d thought was a barrel of a gun was a rolled-up magazine, probably purchased at the kiosk.

I went out of my way to lose him, and scurried along posh Faubourg Saint-Honoré, past Hermès, then the presidential palace, looking for a place to hide. I wasn’t far from Le Bristol, where Miss Reeder had stayed at the beginning of the Occupation. I’d delivered books to infirm guests there. I broke into a run, and before the doorman could reach his post, I threw open the door and dove toward the front desk, where I begged the concierge to let me out the back way. He whisked me across the sumptuous oval salon, through a trompe l’oeil door, into the cacophonous kitchen, and onto a side street.

As I caught my breath, I wondered if I should deliver the books or go straight home. I decided that I had a right to see whomever I liked.

“I wasn’t sure you were coming,” Professor Cohen said.

“I took the long way.”

She ran a hand over the book cover as lovingly as Maman caressed my face. The professor had checked Good Morning, Midnight out at least ten times. When I asked why she liked it so much, she replied, “Jean Rhys is fearless. She tells the truth, and writes for the forlorn and the vulnerable.”

I opened to a random page, the way I usually did to get to know a book. Paris is looking very nice tonight.… You are looking very nice tonight, my beautiful, my darling, and oh what a bitch you can be! I cringed. That wasn’t how I thought of my city, not at all.

Seeing my reaction, the professor said, “Remember, Rhys is describing Paris as a foreigner with little money and no one to help her.”