Coco Chanel_ An Intimate Life - Lisa Chaney [157]
His words would of course prove correct, and time was running out.
25
War
The Paris spring collections for 1939 continued, meanwhile, with their escapist historical theme. Vogue said that “Paris, the worldly, the sophisticated—Paris, where a woman is hardly considered a passable beauty until she is thirty-five—this Paris has suddenly gone completely innocent, quaint, modest, girlish.” Describing the “modest grace” of the evening clothes, the magazine said, “You can choose between the provoking gypsy modesty of Chanel’s bodice-and-skirt dresses, Mainbocher peasant types, or the eighteenth-century modesty that is in every collection.” Gabrielle’s day clothes remained simple, but for evening, she “did” charming peasants, too, and had full skirts in multicolored taffetas, puff-sleeved and embroidered blouses, short bolero jackets and handkerchiefs tied at the neck. And while her signature (fabric) camellia flowers were pinned to shoulders and necklines, she also had several pieces taking up a tricolor theme, trimming them with red, white and blue. For the first time, Gabrielle was interviewed by the American National Broadcasting Corporation (NBC) in Paris. Schiaparelli was interviewed, too, but separately.
In January 1939, Franco’s fascists’ success had driven almost half a million Republican soldiers and civilians to flee across the border into France; in February, the Republican government had followed them into exile. With the army routed, Madrid was left to the fascists and starvation. In March, Hitler invaded Czechoslovakia; three weeks later, Mussolini invaded Albania, opening up a route into Greece. France’s coalition leader, Edouard Daladier, declared the introduction of emergency powers, and began talks with Britain and the Soviet Union on an alliance to prevent Hitler from invading Poland. To the consternation of London and Paris, Stalin now chose to sign a nonaggression treaty with Germany. This gave him the possibility of regaining territories in the Baltic, Romania and Poland, taken from Soviet Russia at the end of the First World War, and also meant that the balance of power had swung in Germany’s favor.
No sooner had Gabrielle returned to Paris from La Pausa than Daladier called for general mobilization. Shortly afterward, the brilliantly authoritative New Yorker correspondent in Paris for fifty years, Janet Flanner, wrote of a transformed capital:
The greatest emotion was centerd around the Gare de l’Est, where thousands of soldiers have entrained for the northern frontier... Mostly they have been in uniform and steel helmets . . . Also, mostly their mothers, wives, fathers, and sisters have shed no tears, till the troop trains have pulled out . . . There are no flags, flowers or shrill shouts of vive la patrie! as there were in 1914. Among the men departing . . . the morale is excellent but curiously mental. What the men say is intelligent not emotional.” . . . Let’s stop living in this grotesque suspense and get it over once and for all.” . . . Few Frenchmen are thrilled to go forth to die . . . Yet all . . . seem united in understanding that this war, if it comes, is about the theory of living and its eventual practice.1
Among the millions called up was Gabrielle’s nephew, André Palasse, whom she asked to visit her en route for induction into the army. André’s health had never been robust, and Gabrielle was concerned. As predicted by those in France and Great Britain who believed that appeasement was a waste of time, Hitler now invaded Poland. On September 3, Britain and France together declared war on Germany.
Three weeks later, Gabrielle put into effect a most dramatic response to the announcement of war: she closed down her couture house and laid off most of the workforce. Only the boutique at 31 rue Cambon would remain open, selling the perfumes and jewelry. Gabrielle was now almost unanimously reviled. Many of her workers believed her decision was in retaliation for their strike action in 1936; others felt that