Coco Chanel_ An Intimate Life - Lisa Chaney [16]
The celebrities at the great caf’concs in Paris were invariably from impoverished backgrounds. Armed with singular personalities, they cloaked themselves in glamour and sang with black humor about the exacting lives of the poor. Gabrielle must have harbored fantasies of becoming such a celebrity when she persuaded the manager of La Rotonde to take her on as a poseuse. Not a girl with come-hither eyes or the traditionally prized voluptuous female form, she possessed her own particular allure. So did Adrienne, whom she soon persuaded to join her.
While Gabrielle can’t have had much of a voice, by some accounts this is when she acquired the sobriquet by which the world came to know her. One of the songs she is supposed to have sung to greatest effect was a verse from a popular caf’conc revue called Ko Ko Ri Ko. Another was “Qui qu’a vu Coco dans l’Trocadéro?” (“Who’s Seen Coco at the Trocadéro?”). She was game, with a quick sense of humor, and character was what the cabarets wanted above all. Her admirers were noisy in their approval. For an encore, they simply chanted the word found in both her songs: “Coco! Coco! Coco! And at La Rotonde she was soon La Petite Coco. Gabrielle herself always insisted that her nickname had originated with her father—and Coco was a known diminutive for a child—but the story of her stage name has stuck.
In a short time, the spirited and entertaining Chanel girls became favorites of the officers and their crowd, an indispensable complement to an evening. Among their aristocratic companions was a young haut bourgeois, Etienne Balsan, whose family’s considerable fortune derived from astute investments in wool. At Châteauroux, in the Indre, in the center of France, where fine wool had been made for centuries, the Balsan family’s vast textile factory produced cloth for military uniforms (and the British police) with great success. The Balsans virtually owned the town and kept a number of fine houses in the environs. The three sons were expected to enter the family business, but their social lives as well-to-do fin de siècle bachelors were colorful. In time, both Etienne Balsan and his older brother, Jacques, were to make names for themselves far beyond the family trade in wool.
Following their father’s premature death, Etienne was sent to private school in England by his uncle, Charles, in an attempt to instill some discipline into the boy. From England, he had sent home a telegram from his dog, Rex, saying, “My master has arrived safely, Rex.” He then bought two horses, which he used at the local fox-hunting meets. Etienne was obsessed with horses, and during his time away he paid little attention to his lessons. Neither, after the initial telegram from his dog, did he make any more effort to contact his family. Summoned home by Uncle Charles, Etienne was unconcerned. His despairing relation failed to appreciate that beneath Etienne’s apparent lack of purpose was the seed of a serious and disciplined calling. He was simply not interested in the same things as his uncle and informed him that under no circumstances would he enter the family firm. It was only with great reluctance that the young man was cajoled into military service.
To Etienne’s horror, his service saw him stationed with a foot regiment rather than the cavalry. This was insupportable, and he soon had himself transferred to a place where he could spend his time with horses. A series of events led to a posting to Algeria, in the African Light Cavalry, where he found himself very hot and very bored. Caught sleeping on sentry duty by the regimental governor, he was reprimanded for dereliction of duty. Etienne foolishly answered back (the regimental governor was in civilian dress and Etienne didn’t recognize him), was thrown in the lockup and was then to put