Secrets of Paris_ A Novel - Luanne Rice [121]
The enemy fired, from a distance and at random, just one wretched cannon ball, which struck him in the middle of the body, and you can imagine the cries and lamentations of this army.
—TO MONSIEUR DE GRIGNAN, JULY 1675
THREE DAYS HAD passed since the ball, with no word from Lydie; the last Patrice had seen of her she was driving off, into the sunrise, away from Château Bellechasse, with Michael. Patrice felt optimistic, positive that Lydie’s silence meant that she and Michael were in blissful seclusion. Still, the calendar on Patrice’s desk warned her that only twelve days remained before Lydie would leave Paris, and Patrice resented losing any chance they had to spend time together. The thought filled her with panic and a sort of grief. She knew about vows to stay in touch, and although she believed that she and Lydie could do that, she knew it would be no substitute for their daily phone calls and frequent visits, for simply knowing that Lydie was just across Paris.
Patrice filled diary page after diary page with descriptions of the ball. What everyone wore, what everyone ate, what the orchestra played. Somewhere down the line, people would care about the details of a ball in late-twentieth-century France, not that they would ever see this. But it satisfied her, to think that she was recording history. Her mind kept wandering to the personal details: The set of Lydie’s mouth when she asked if Patrice had invited Anne. The way Patrice’s thoughts kept floating to her mother, wishing Eliza were there—enjoying herself, watching Patrice in her role as hostess. Kelly in defeat, avoiding Patrice and Lydie.
Kelly. The thought of her made Patrice frown. Kelly was off today. Kelly never seemed to lose hope. Yesterday she’d come to work smiling, asking Patrice and Didier if they had enjoyed the ball. Patrice remembered those days, early on, when she had so feared losing Kelly and Lydie that she had wished, fanatically, for Kelly’s petition to be denied. As if Kelly were just a checker or a chess piece or a tiddlywink, a little plastic counter in someone else’s game.
Patrice tried to get Kelly out of mind. She picked up the telephone. She dialed Boston, Massachusetts.
“Hello, Mother,” she said.
“Patsy, darling! How was the ball?” Eliza asked. “It was last Saturday, wasn’t it? I’ve had it on my little mental agenda …”
“Absolutely wonderful,” Patrice said. “All of Paris is talking about it. How are you?”
“Oh,” Eliza said and sighed. “The same—nothing much happens to me anymore.”
Patrice felt her shoulders tighten. “Why don’t you make something happen, for a change?”
“If this isn’t going to be a nice chat,” Eliza said brittlely, “I see no reason to run up your phone bill.”
“I mean, why don’t you go visit Aunt Jane in Cleveland? You’d like that, wouldn’t you?”
“Jane’s very busy these days,” Eliza said in a tone that suggested to Patrice that perhaps her mother and aunt had had a falling-out. The thought did not entirely displease her.
“Aunt Jane and her good causes,” Patrice said, inviting some gossip. “But why don’t you call her? You know she’d love to hear from you.”
“Well … maybe I will,” Eliza said. “Tell me what you’re doing, now that the ball is over.”
“I’m keeping a diary,” Patrice said.
“You always did, as a girl,” Eliza said.
“I did, didn’t I?” Patrice said, remembering the locked pink ones her aunt had given her every Christmas. She had regretted the tiny amount of space allowed per day.
“I kept a diary,” Eliza said. “All through my childhood. I had—oh, it must have been twenty volumes. I burned them the week I got married.”
This was astonishing: that Eliza could do anything as introspective as keep diaries, that she in fact had written them and burned them. “Why did you burn them?” Patrice asked.
“I didn’t want your father to read them,” Eliza said. Patrice heard a tiny giggle her mother had, perhaps, not intended