Secrets of Paris_ A Novel - Luanne Rice [46]
“I’ll see you later,” Michael said as Didier continued up the stairs. Anne squeezed his hand and stood there, watching Michael go.
“She is lovely,” Didier said.
“Yes,” Michael said, wanting to talk about her but feeling a warning coming from Didier.
“Be careful. I had my head turned more than once in my first two marriages. Lydie is a wonderful girl.”
Michael said nothing. He couldn’t think of Anne and Lydie at the same time. He didn’t want to leave Lydie, but he couldn’t imagine giving up Anne. He felt drunk on her, unable to sleep, never hungry, as if all his needs were sexual and romantic and only Anne could fulfill them.
Michael knocked on Pierre Dauphin’s office door, and was bid to enter.
“Didier!” Pierre exclaimed, coming around his desk to shake Didier’s hand. Pierre, stout and bald, came midway up Didier’s chest. He dressed like an academic in tweed; he wore an ascot instead of a necktie.
“Giselle is well?” Didier inquired. “And your mother?”
“Both are fine,” Pierre replied. “I will be passing the Place Vendôme one of these days with Giselle’s necklace—the sapphire one? The clasp seems to be broken.”
“Be sure to ask for Boris personally, eh? I shall tell him to expect you,” Didier said.
“So good of you, Didier.” Pierre had noticed Michael the second they entered the room; for some reason, however, he pretended not to have seen him until this instant. “Our young American!” he said.
“Hi, Pierre,” Michael said.
“What is this excellent news about your appointment as curator of the Salle des Quatre Saisons?” Didier asked.
Pierre flushed and opened his mouth, gaping like a fish. Michael stared him straight in the eye, to avoid looking at Didier. “But that is not definite, not by any means,” Pierre said. Then, as the idea dawned on him that someone as well-connected as Didier might have inside information, his eyes lightened. “Where, might I ask, have you heard that?”
“Well, isn’t it a foregone conclusion?” Didier asked.
“You are the Salle’s architect, Michael,” Pierre said. “Was it you?”
“I just do my work and hope someone will give me a Poussin,” Michael said. “I keep out of politics.”
“Was it Jacques de Vauvrey?” Pierre asked Didier fervently, naming the Minister of Culture. “I know he is a member of your club …”
Didier held up his hand. “I’ve said too much, obviously. In any case, I wish you the best. Au revoir, Pierre.”
In the hallway Michael laughed, but he also felt irritated at Didier for interfering.
“This will work out perfectly,” Didier said, chuckling. “Pierre will think he is about to be named curator of your Salle, and so he will give you the painting, thinking he is bringing it along with him.”
“Unless he isn’t named,” Michael said. “He’s not going to let that painting go until his appointment is definite.”
“Pierre Dauphin is a pompous little fellow,” Didier said. “His grandfather was a baron with no money. Pierre bought a necklace for his wife for their fifth anniversary, and every spring he comes to have it fixed. It is a very nice piece of jewelry, but he thinks that because he patronized my office twenty years ago, we owe him great fealty.” He shook his head. “I would like to see him give you that painting.”
“So would I.” Michael appreciated the sentiment, but he still felt annoyed. Didier had barged in, as if his Frenchness gave him the right to take over. In that sense, he was no different from Charles Legendre or Pierre himself: they figured their nationality gave them a natural superiority within the Louvre.
In the back of his mind, however, was the knowledge that Michael was really angry at Didier for what he had said about Lydie and Anne earlier. Things with Lydie had been going downhill for so long; now that Michael had found Anne, he had stopped caring so much about reversing them. But back there in the stairway for just a moment, Didier had reminded him that he had to put on the brakes, and now an image of Lydie’s sad smile came to him. So Michael