Without Reservations_ The Travels of an Independent Woman - Alice Steinbach [12]
Suddenly, Liliane’s voice interrupted my thoughts. “It’s one of my favorite photographs,” she said, pointing to a postcard lying on top of my purse.
The card, which I planned to send to a friend in New York, was a reproduction of a famous 1926 picture taken in Paris by the great Hungarian-born photographer André Kertész. A bold-looking, vivacious woman reclines on an Art Nouveau love seat, her arms and legs arranged with abandon against the plush velvet cushions. Her pose gives the effect of a woman dancing horizontally. Kertész, whom I had interviewed once for my newspaper, titled the image Satiric Dancer. A print of the photograph hung in my living room at home.
“It’s a favorite of mine, too,” I said, picking up the postcard. “There’s such joy and fearlessness in that face, isn’t there? It’s like the look you see on a child’s face before the age of reason sets in.” We both laughed. “But I’m curious. How did you become familiar with the photo?”
“I studied photography in New York for a while and fell in love with Kertész’s work,” she said. “Brassaï, too. Do you know Brassaï’s photos of Paris?”
Liliane had hit on a passion of mine: photography. Within minutes we were discussing Brassaï, also a Hungarian, who had moved to Paris, where he became famous for his pictures of Paris nightlife in the 1920s; and Atget, the venerated master photographer of the city, who, beginning in the 1890s, photographed Paris almost every day for more than twenty years. After agreeing that Atget was the architectural historian of Paris and Brassaï the Colette of the camera, we compared notes on cameras we liked and why color prints could never approach the beauty of black-and-white photographs.
We finished lunch and ordered coffee. Then more coffee. By this time we had traded our personal histories, or at least as much as we wished to trade. Liliane, who was born in Rio de Janeiro but grew up in London, ran an interior design business from her Chelsea flat. Her two children, both teenagers, were away at boarding school. She made no mention of their father. She did mention, however, that she was not alone in Paris; an Englishman named Justin had accompanied her. The purpose of the trip to Paris, Liliane said, was to visit her ailing aunt.
I was surprised by the warmth and openness of Liliane’s personality; it contrasted so strikingly with her exotic, unapproachable appearance. But even her warmth and charm could not completely dissipate my awareness of her astonishing looks; from time to time I found myself studying her face as one would a painting.
She seemed interested in my trip and asked question after question: Don’t you get lonely? What did your sons think of your decision to do this? Don’t you worry about your job? Do you know people in Paris? By the time we rose to leave, it was as though I’d had lunch with an old friend.
Outside we walked along the rue du Bac, stopping to peer into the shop windows at some amazing display of antiques or ancient jewelry. As we walked, I noticed how much attention Liliane’s appearance commanded. Especially from men. I felt a twinge of envy, one I tried to brush aside. Liliane, I noticed, was not unaware of the stares she drew; she seemed to play to her audience in a flirtatious way, something she hadn’t done in the tea shop.
Before we parted, Liliane asked if I liked jazz. “Justin and I are going to a jazz club near your hotel after we visit my aunt,” she said. “Would you like to join us?”
“Yes, very much.” I agreed to meet them at La Villa at 10:30 that night. To my surprise, just before we parted, Liliane reached out and hugged me.
After leaving Liliane, I decided to walk over to the Musée d’Orsay. Along the way I saw a half-dozen things that made me think about pulling out my reporter’s notebook. A man sitting outside the museum impersonating the Mona Lisa; a dog roller-skating alongside his master;