Coco Chanel_ An Intimate Life - Lisa Chaney [97]
Whatever Dmitri and Gabrielle’s private concerns, their leisurely weeks on the Riviera had been a refuge of order and tranquility for Dmitri and a balm to Gabrielle’s much-troubled spirit. Their holiday had passed off without mishap with the exception of one dramatic event as they drove back to Paris.
When the time came to leave the south, they decided to break up their journey en route to Paris by stopping along the way. With the Rolls-Royce retuned, they planned to drive along the Riviera, turn inland after Marseille and then follow the old road on up to Paris. Dmitri was keeping an eye on the calendar because he wanted to be in the capital in time for his beloved sister’s birthday. Up early on April 27, the travelers were met by unpleasant weather: it was cold and wet, and as they left Monte Carlo, the road was very slippery. Taking the “low road” to Nice and Cannes, Dmitri drove slowly and with great care.
As a result of what he called a “wretched misunderstanding,” they found themselves driving right past the place where Arthur had been killed a year and a half earlier. Dmitri described seeing a cross marking the spot where the accident had taken place. (It has only recently become known that this was erected by Gabrielle.) Dmitri was mortified at this most unfortunate incident, and recorded its dreadful effect upon Gabrielle. She became very quiet, “frightfully melancholy,” and they drove on through the driving rain in complete silence. Meanwhile, as a driver of some experience, Dmitri couldn’t help but find the apparent cause of Arthur’s accident mysterious, noting to himself that not only was the road at that point completely level, there were no ditches alongside it either. Although Dmitri and Gabrielle tried to push the misery of this episode aside, it hung heavily upon them for the rest of the day. On reaching Marseille, they retired for the night very early.
The strength of Gabrielle’s reaction, on seeing once again the place where Arthur had died, reveals how little she had recovered from his loss. As few of us are prepared to expend more than a minimal amount of imagination on the thoughts and feelings of others, taking what they offer us pretty much at face value, almost everyone had chosen to be convinced by Gabrielle’s pose. Her real feelings were hidden behind that great vitality. Long ago, in her miserable childhood, her intelligence and defiance had taught her the habit of self-protection, of revealing herself to almost no one.
Bearing this guardedness in mind, while most had believed her relationship with Arthur was rather insecure, among their inner circle there was an implicit understanding that their union was a profound one. Captivated by Gabrielle’s allure, her knowingness, her intelligence and gaiety, Arthur had also been struck by her seriousness and her sheer breathtaking force, qualities all leavened by her great femininity. But it was that very force, which was making her so successful, that had led to Arthur’s loss of courage and rejection of her. He made, he believed, a simpler choice: Diana—and came to regret it.
Was that the ultimate cause of Arthur’s accident, as he had driven along the Cannes road toward a Christmas with his sister? There was no satisfactory resolution to his dilemma: staying with Diana or going to Gabrielle. Had Arthur’s tiredness at the end of that long journey south been the last factor heightening his overwrought state of mind, so that he brought about his own death? The possibility of his suicide must have occurred to Gabrielle that day when she had sat, weeping, beside the wreck of her dead lover’s car.
The following day, Gabrielle and Dmitri left old Marseille behind them.