The Last Dress from Paris(73)
And with that, the laptop is flipped back open and the online application form hastily loaded in front of us. What I don’t say, but am most definitely thinking, is that if I do handily manage to land this job—and yes, it’s a massive if—it would conveniently solve one more problem. How to see a whole lot more of Leon.
18
Alice
DECEMBER 1953, PARIS
THE TOILE DE JOUY
“Are you sure all the arrangements are in place? He suspects nothing?” Alice whispers. It’s a force of habit now. She’s pacing back and forth across the bedroom floor, every muscle flexed and strained, a swirl of nervous energy making her feel queasy.
Anne absorbs her stress, knowing very well the potential consequences of what the two of them have planned for today.
“Everything is in place.” A huge sigh heaves from deep within Anne’s chest. “I have done exactly as you asked. Camila was very accommodating. She is expecting you and will make sure everything is handled with the utmost discretion. But, Alice, please, this is very risky. You need to be extremely careful.” Anne traces Alice’s footsteps around the bedroom, trying to force eye contact, needing to be sure Alice is paying attention.
“No buts today, Anne. I don’t want to hear it. It’s been weeks. We’ve waited long enough. If it’s not safe now, I’m not sure it ever will be, and as wonderful as Antoine’s letters are, I cannot survive on those alone.” She disappears into the dressing room.
Alice raises her arms and stands on her very tiptoes, pushing aside a pile of cashmere scarves from the top shelf, feeling her fingers connect with the smoothness of the small black lacquered box she has hidden there. Her most precious possession.
“Alice! Really, not now. Please. What if Albert comes in?” Anne moves across the room, weighting herself against the bedroom door. She knows she won’t stop him, but she may just delay Albert long enough, should he decide to make a surprise appearance.
“I just want to read the last one again, that’s all. We have time.” Alice sits on the edge of the bed and takes out the most recent of Antoine’s beautiful love letters, those ferried across Paris by Anne. Alice’s own fountain pen has never been so productive. The second she finishes one of his, she pens her own, filling it with all her hopes and dreams for the future they will soon be planning together, sealing it with a kiss, and insisting Anne leave the residence to post it that very moment. She reads the words aloud, causing Anne to pin herself even tighter to the doorframe.
What are these few weeks when we know we will have forever together? That’s what I keep telling myself. But being apart from you, Alice, is a pain I have never known before. I can’t even sustain myself with the memory of our last kiss because I believed it was our very last. How do you kiss goodbye someone you know you will love for a lifetime? Even longer? Every day I think of you in that prison with him and it physically hurts me. Come to me, Alice, let’s build a future together that is full of love and happiness. One where he doesn’t exist. One where you wake every morning smiling and your every day is filled with laughter. I so desperately want to do that for you.
I want to be that man.
Antoine’s letter only serves to remind Alice quite what is at stake today, and, reading the fear on her face, Anne takes the box from her and places it back in its hiding place.
“I know I have asked you this a million times, but are you absolutely sure he never had you followed to Antoine’s apartment that day?”
“As sure as I can be.” Anne, like Alice, is doubting herself now that the moment they will know the answer to that question is almost upon them. Because Alice is almost confident she has been patient and clever enough. Almost sure her acting skills have been convincing enough. Almost sure of what she wants.
But she also knows Albert is not a man she can afford to underestimate. If he had Anne followed after Antoine passionately kissed Alice in the embassy gardens, he’ll know that within hours of staging their goodbye, Alice risked everything, writing with details of this meeting. If he has somehow seen the note Anne was instructed to deliver, he will know where to find them today—in one of the small private rooms on the upper levels of Dior on avenue Montaigne. Somewhere she feels safe. Somewhere they won’t be disturbed—if all goes according to plan.
But has she done enough? She thinks back to breakfast this morning with Albert and how it followed the same pattern as every breakfast since he delivered his ultimatum. She shudders as she thinks about how she bolted her eggs and bacon, nearly gagging on the rind, barely tasting a mouthful, keen to be away from him as soon as possible, yet somehow trying to look relaxed and guilt-free. How every morning his slow, deliberate, calculated movements have made her stomach churn with an acidic hatred. Seeing in the lightness of his face how much he enjoys keeping her seated under his gaze and the scrutiny of his questioning. Watching him raise a fork to his mouth, keeping it held aloft, unhurried, while he finishes reading a sentence in his newspaper. How he relentlessly chews his food, every strong rotation of his jaw making her stiffen with resentment.
“Today’s plans?” he asked this morning, without lowering his newspaper.
“An appointment at Dior.” She vacuums all hatred from her voice. This is the one place she feels Albert is guaranteed not to venture.