Coco Chanel_ An Intimate Life - Lisa Chaney [14]
What had made these young women so unalike, when they had so much in common? Both were the children of impoverished, nomadic market traders. Adrienne was first sent to Moulins at ten; Gabrielle joined Aubazine at eleven and neither girl’s parents could scrape together the money to spare their daughter the stigma of charity status. There was, though, one significant difference between them: Adrienne had always felt cared for. Her parents made regular visits to Moulins to see their favorite daughter and Adrienne often visited her older sister Louise, who lived not far away with her husband, the stationmaster at Varennes. Adrienne made the best of her lot, and a lovable and vibrant personality had endeared her to the nuns at Notre Dame. She benefited from her time there and became a charming and competent young woman.
Louise, having long since rejected the nomadic life that was her birthright, didn’t mind that Varennes was a one-street, nowhere place consisting of her husband’s railway station, an inn, a church and a short straggle of houses. She happily occupied herself with her children, the housekeeping and maintaining the niceties of her improved social position. And it was she who drew the Chanels together, at Varennes, where they had the semblance of a home. Even Gabrielle’s recalcitrant father called in on occasion, albeit secretly, so as to avoid seeing his children. (Gabrielle’s disillusionment intensified when, one day, Louise let slip this information.)
While Gabrielle was at Aubazine, she and Adrienne may have met on the odd occasion, but after Gabrielle’s arrival at Moulins, the two girls became firm friends. Adrienne’s parents (Gabrielle’s grandparents), Henri-Adrien and Angélina, had finally come to a halt in Moulins, not far from the convent. In 1901, a young woman’s reputation still required her being chaperoned in public and, accordingly, Louise would have accompanied the girls on their visits to her home.
Adept with a needle and a woman of some artistic flair, Louise had a great passion for hats. Following her periodic orgies of window-shopping in the fashionable spa town of Vichy, nearby, she would visit the haberdasher’s and buy the wherewithal to conjure the latest stylish hat. Adrienne and Gabrielle were willing pupils, their imaginations fired by these flights of fancy. Gabrielle recalled with venom the needlework her “aunts” had imposed upon her at “their gloomy house” (presumably, the convent). She much preferred Louise’s modish hats and was elated when she was able to abandon working on her trousseau, “embroidering initials on towels . . . and sewing crosses in Russian stitching on my nightdresses, for a hypothetical wedding night,” which made her “spit.”1
Despite the new proximity to her grandparents and the home-loving Aunt Louise, the only extended family member for whom Gabrielle developed any real affection was Adrienne. For the rest, she was pretty well impervious to any advances from them. Although we can’t be certain, it appears that her mother’s relations in Courpière had virtually no contact with her and her siblings after Jeanne’s death. She may, though, simply have erased them from her story because she resented them for not having taken her in.
Moulins, an ancient cathedral town situated in central France, was previously seat to the dukes of Bourbon. In 1901, it was a garrison town, whose livelihood largely depended upon the military regiments stationed on its perimeter. Following Gabrielle’s years of seclusion at Aubuzine, this bustling provincial center must have seemed a bright prospect indeed. But before she could savor life in town, she had to watch from the sidelines in the convent for one last frustrating year. At year’s end, on the mother superior’s recommendation Gabrielle joined Adrienne as an assistant in a smart draper’s shop in town. Lodging with their