Save Me the Plums - Ruth Reichl Page 0,46

forbiddingly chic that I hesitate to enter. Inside, a woman, her black hair cut into a Louise Brooks bob, caresses a small white dog. She looks up, catches my eye, and waves me imperiously in.

“I have the perfect dress for you.” She lifts a cloud of black lace from a hanger. “It is a wonder. It is from Saint Laurent’s second collection for Dior in 1959.”

Cradling the armful of froth, she leads me to a corner of the shop roped off in black velvet and waits as I remove my clothes. As she slowly lowers the dress over my head, I notice a label sewn inside: “Severine.”

“What does that mean?”

She produces a very Gallic shrug. “Who can say? Perhaps it is the name of the woman who owned the dress.” She tugs the bodice, patting it gently like a beloved pet. “Don’t look!” she commands.

As she meticulously closes each tiny hook, the dress enfolds me, until it is hugging my body like a lover. On her knees now, she finishes closing the dozens of hooks; this odd ritual seems to go on and on. At last she stands, tugging at the skirt, fluffing it a bit.

“This dress was meant for you. It is perfect.” She leads me into the light and turns me, very slowly, to face the mirror.

I have been transformed. The woman in the glass is voluptuous, with curves in places I have never had them. A dress can do this? This person is glamorous. Elegant. She is Maria Callas. Paloma Picasso. Severine.

“You’ll take it, of course.” It is not a question.

I have never wanted anything so much as to be the woman in the mirror. Of course I’ll take it. “How much does it cost?”

She waves a hand as if this is of no moment. “Let me negotiate with the proprietor of the shop.” She goes to the desk, picks up the phone. “I assure you,” she says in French, “this dress was meant for her!”

There is a silence. At last she gives an ecstatic cry. “Merci, Didier, merci, merci.” Turning to me, she says, “He has agreed to take two thousand francs off the price! Your dress is only fifty thousand francs.”

I nod, too dazed to do the calculation. And then I comprehend what she has said. “Sixty-five hundred dollars?”

For one wild moment I actually consider how I might pull off such an acquisition. But it is, of course, absurd. The woman is so disappointed that she takes her time releasing me, clearly hoping I will glance into the mirror and change my mind. The minutes crawl silently by. Finally her fingers separate the last hook from its eye, and I can step out of this amazing and impossible dress. I attempt an apology: “This dress belongs in a museum.”

“Oh, no!” She gathers the dress to her bosom as if trying to console it. “Clothes were meant to be worn. And this dress was meant to be worn by you! You must reconsider.” She presses her card into my hand. “You will”—she looks deeply in my eyes—“forever regret it if you leave Paris without this dress. Think about it.”

I can’t stop thinking about the dress. And then I can’t stop thinking about the fact that I am thinking about it. If I don’t buy the dress, I give up the woman I was in the mirror. If I do buy it, I become a woman who spends thousands of dollars on a dress. There is no middle ground.

Suddenly I know exactly what I need to do.

* * *

—

THE NIGHT IS damp, the streets misty and dreamlike. Rain has dappled the sidewalk with puddles that capture the lights of Paris in beautiful blurs of color. Nobody else is out, and I walk among the ancient buildings in a profound and satisfying silence until I reach the entrance of a small emporium.

I was seventeen the first time I came to Paris by myself. I rented a room in an austere pension near the Gare de Lyon run by the world’s most suspicious landlady. Cabbage boiled endlessly in her small kitchen, and the sour smell pervaded the halls. I spent my days wandering the fancy food shops of Paris, gazing wistfully into Fauchon, Maison de la Truffe, Ladurée, and Androuet. But it was Caviar Kaspia that captured my imagination, and I began to save my francs.

At lunch I limited myself to bread and cheese. Nights I dined at a student cafeteria. When I had enough for a