my old dress into my hands. ‘I can’t sell this rag. You’ll need to pay entirely with francs.’
I handed her enough francs to more than cover the cost of the dress, but still she asked for more, shaking her head saying it just wouldn’t do. After I had given her everything I had she motioned to the woman with the rosewater, snatching back my old dress from my hands.
‘Spray her.’
*
Thin and measly Armistice Army soldiers guarded the front entrance of the Hotel du Parc between two flapping blue, white, and red Vichy flags. I walked in with my head held high, as if I was used to walking into the Parc with a lunch tin on my arm. The old front desk was now a processing area for visitors, and I made my way toward two men who looked like concierges with French kepi hats and shoulder boards.
‘Hallo,’ I said. ‘I’m—’
‘Mademoiselle Ambeh,’ one said.
‘Yes,’ I said, and they both looked at each other, smirking. ‘Do you know me?’
‘We know of you,’ one said, pointing down the corridor. ‘Office number sixteen.’
They whispered to each other as I quietly made my way down the stuffy carpeted corridor to Gérard’s office. The offices were guestrooms from when it was a spa and the secretaries had small desks in the corridors. I found Gérard’s secretary chewing on a pencil and staring out the window. Her hair was done up in tight ringlets—older, maybe early fifties, and probably a wife to someone in the regime. I introduced myself, and she pointed to a chair for me to wait.
She watched me openly, her eyes gazing at my new dress. ‘Adèle, you said?’ Her cheeks rounded when she talked.
I nodded, smiling. ‘Mmm.’
She opened a window to filter out some of the hovering cigarette smoke, and I shifted around in my seat, uncomfortable from the unwavering heat. Sweat beaded between my breasts and on my neck, which made the scent of rose all that more distasteful and stickier on my skin. Think about the cigar box, I told myself, shifting again.
I practised what it would be like to open the cigar box and offer him a cigar, choosing one out of many as he looked at me. Smiling—or would he be licking his lips? Then the words I was thinking came tumbling out, ‘Want one?’
The secretary glanced up. ‘Want what?’
I cleared my throat. ‘Nothing.’
She got up from her chair and adjusted her thin dress belt. ‘I believe they’re almost finished,’ she said, putting her ear to the door, listening to the muffled voices inside Gérard’s office. She hopped back in her seat and turned toward her desk just as the door swung open.
I straightened up at the sight of Gérard, and my hands instantly trembled. ‘He’s attracted to the way you are,’ Marguerite had said. I took a deep breath. Be yourself.
Gérard’s guest was a man with slicked-back hair. I guessed he was a member of the police, but by the style of his suit I started to think he was someone even more important. ‘Absolutely, Monsieur Bousquet,’ Gérard said, and my heart skipped a beat with this news—René Bousquet, head of the national police.
I closed my eyes briefly, thinking about the grass and the sun, but nothing seemed to help my thumping heart. My palms sweated.
Bousquet stopped in the doorway on his way out of Gérard’s office, a cigarette pinched between two fingers. ‘We understand each other. Good.’
‘Fully, sir.’
They laughed, patting each other’s backs. His secretary stood, motioning for me to get up. ‘Stand,’ she said very concerned, and I quickly moved to my feet, but Bousquet walked down the corridor, never even batting an eye in my direction.
Gérard stood in his doorway, his mouth open as if still laughing.
‘I see my lunch has arrived.’
I swallowed, feeling my heart thrashing against my ribs. ‘Certainly has, Gérard,’ I said, placing a hand on the tin.
He glanced at my hands, which were still trembling and I curled them into fists. ‘No water from the Source des Célestins?’
The Source des Célestins was a warm spring that flowed from decorated iron taps under the park pavilion. It was common to see people lined up near the Allier River in the morning and early afternoon wanting to get a sip of the sweet, bubbling water. Many believed the water could heal the most vicious of maladies, even reverse the signs of ageing. Others believed it was just water.
‘I couldn’t get a foot near it. There were people everywhere walking the promenade,’ I