Secrets of Paris_ A Novel - Luanne Rice [10]
Their breakfast table overlooked Avenue Montaigne and Montmartre in the distance. The early sun lit the Basilica with white light, and to Lydie it looked holy, the way it might appear in a child’s prayer book. She broke off a piece of croissant, savored the flavor of butter and yeast. She drank her café crème slowly; when the cup was empty, she would have to leave for work.
“I should go in a minute,” Lydie said. “I have a shoot at Tolbiac.”
“Tolbiac? Chinatown?”
“Yes. For a young French designer who wants nothing French in the background. He’d love to shoot the ad in Hong Kong, but he can’t afford a location outside Paris.”
“Where do you come up with your ideas?” Michael asked, laughing. “Chinatown in Paris. I’ll be damned.”
“And this afternoon I meet Patrice,” Lydie said. “I wonder if her husband is d’Origny of d’Origny Bijoutiers. I’m sure it’s family-run.”
“What is it?”
“One of the super-snazzy jewelry houses in the Place Vendôme. I’ve borrowed from them. For a layout on Hungarian royalty I used a d’Origny pearl collar made of two hundred pearls. One hundred ninety-eight were white, but one was black, another pink. Baroque. Very beautiful and odd.” Lydie grew silent, as she often did when recalling an old layout or planning a new one.
“I remember that piece,” Michael said. “I’m glad you’re seeing Patrice, you know.”
“I know,” Lydie said. Michael had never kept watch over Lydie’s friendships before, but now Lydie wondered whether Michael wanted someone to take her off his hands.
“Have I told you George Reed is coming from the United States today?” Michael asked.
“No,” she said, surprised that he had not. George Reed was Michael’s immediate superior at Rothman, Inc., the man who had arranged for Michael to work on the Louvre in exchange for the participation of a French architect on the National Gallery project in Washington, D.C.
“We have a meeting at the Ministry of Culture,” Michael said.
Lydie stood, faced Michael. He slid his arm around her neck and kissed her. His neck smelled like soap and powder. His remark about Patrice stuck with her, made her wonder how far apart they had grown. She couldn’t even ask him if he meant what she thought he meant: would it be a great relief to him if Lydie found a confidante? They stood there for a few seconds, hugging. Lydie didn’t want to let go.
Later, stepping aboard the Métro, she tried to imagine Michael’s meeting with George. Michael’s contacts in France were not being as cooperative as everyone had hoped they would be. The work was not moving swiftly. It seemed that French architects and designers resented the assignment of an American to turn the Louvre’s Salle des Quatre Saisons into an information center. Even Charles Legendre, Michael’s assigned liaison, lagged when it came to introducing Michael around.
Lydie knew that Michael planned to create a seventeenth-century atmosphere in the Salle. In spite of the conservatism of his ideas, he was having trouble convincing curators to find him paintings by Poussin and la Tour. He had located a master artisan from Burgundy to build an information desk similar to tables by A.-C. Boulle, cabinetmaker to Louis XIV, but the Ministry had so far refused to approve the work order. One terrific plan for repairing the mosaic floor and another for redirecting the flow of tourists existed only on paper. And Michael’s worries were not eased by the knowledge that his French counterpart in the United States had already met the President and First Lady, who admired the new painting gallery he had designed for Washington’s National Gallery.
Lydie had a vision of Michael shaking George’s hand, grinning a little too earnestly perhaps. His mother had once told Lydie that as a child Michael had suffered stomachaches whenever he felt he had disappointed someone—his family, a teacher, his basketball coach—and Lydie knew he still did. She felt a rush of sorrow and love for him, the man she loved more than anyone in the world.
The photographer, the models, and Jean-Claude Verglesses stood on the sidewalk in front