Save Me the Plums - Ruth Reichl Page 0,86

exactly the George Cinq. The bathroom’s down a flight of stairs, and if you want to take a bath you have to request the key from an unkempt gentleman at the desk who grumbles loudly about having to rise from his chair. I think I’m too old for forty-five-euro hotels in squalid neighborhoods. And our readers would hate it.” He peered gloomily down the empty street. “Are you sure you’ve got the address right? We haven’t passed a single restaurant.”

“Pretty sure.” But I was beginning to get nervous; the metro station was blocks behind us. Had I misunderstood the directions? “I think it’s just around the corner. Alec said this was the best cheap meal in the city, and I guess you can’t expect convenience when you’re paying twenty-five bucks for a three-course dinner.”

We walked on. With each block the neighborhood became less prosperous. The restaurant, when we finally found it, was small and spare, with bare wooden tables and hard wooden chairs. The waitress took one look at our unhappy faces and relieved us of our coats. “Did you think you were lost?” Her entire face turned into a welcoming smile and she hurried off, returning with an enormous ceramic terrine filled with game pâté, a plate of cornichons, and a basket of bread. She gave Bill’s shoulder a motherly pat. “This should revive you.”

I tore off a hunk of bread and scooped up a slab of pâté. The flavor filled my mouth—strong, rustic, a pâté with conviction. “God, this is good.” As I took a bite of the crisp, salty pickle, I had a quick taste memory of the working-class France I’d known before my three-star days. I pushed the terrine toward Bill.

The air was filled with the soft melodic thrum of French, its cadence a kind of music. From the kitchen came the comforting thunk of pans and the scent of roasting meat, onions in butter, a hint of thyme. The wine was young, slightly sharp, but well made. The waitress kept our glasses filled.

The food was simple but very fine: a pile of petit gris, the tiny shrimp you find only in France, still in their shells. Fat white asparagus, simply steamed and drenched in sweet butter. A plump roast chicken with fresh morels and a sauce made of cream so rich it gleamed like gold. A handful of tiny strawberries, a cloud of chantilly, a wedge of Brie.

I sighed—I hadn’t meant to—and Bill studied my face. “Maybe,” he said, “you can go home again after all.”

“We’ll see,” I said. “Our lumpy beds await us.”

But when I opened the door to my austere little room, I threw the window wide, breathing in the air of Paris. In the tiny space between two buildings, I could just make out the moon. I slept without dreaming, and in the morning a plump maid in a blue apron knocked on the door and, with work-reddened hands, offered me a slightly cracked bowl of café au lait. On the tray were two croissants, a square of butter, a dish of apricot jam. I ate greedily, splashed water on my face, and walked out into the lovely light of early spring.

The hotel was at the foot of the rue Mouffetard, one of my favorite market streets; today the air smelled like strawberries. The stalls were filled with bright-green watercress, mesclun, frisée, and leaves of mâche. Fat spears of asparagus poked up their heads with such a curiously aggressive air I could not resist them. Munching the raw stalks, I stood at the fishmonger, admiring a big floppy turbot, a pair of eels, small, shiny rougets spread across oceans of ice.

In the bakery next door, people were queuing for croissants, and I looked into the window as a small boy stuffed an entire brioche into his mouth. A few doors down, a woman rushed out of the cheese shop, and as she careened into me I caught the fine scent of ripe Camembert, that seductive mixture of mushroom, yeast, and cream. Church bells began to ring. No meetings, no ad sales: The day stretched invitingly before me.

Bill was standing at the top of the street, looking so disgruntled that I did not ask how he had slept. “Tonight’s hotel is bound to be better.” I tried to soothe him as we meandered down the hill into the university district.

“It had better be,” he replied morosely. “Changing hotels every night is hard enough when you’re staying in great places. But this—”