Honeymoon in Paris: A Novella

my own vanity – dazzled as I was by the reflection of me I had seen in his paintings, and in his eyes.
    And now his magic dust had blown away, and I was left – a wife: this pinch-faced accuser. And I did not like this version of myself.
    I walked the length of Paris, along the rue de Rivoli, up to avenue Foch and down the backstreets of Invalides, ignoring the curious glances of the men, the catcalls of the drunks, my feet growing sore on the cobbles, my face turned away from passers-by so they did not see the tears that brimmed in my eyes. I grieved for the marriage I had already lost. I grieved for the Édouard who had seen only the best in me. I missed our intense happiness together, the sense that we had been impenetrable, immune to the rest of the world. How could we have come to this so soon? I walked, so lost in my thoughts that I barely noticed it had begun to grow light.
    ‘Madame Lefèvre?’
    I turned as a woman stepped out of the shadows. When she stood under the guttering streetlight, I saw it was the girl to whom Édouard had introduced me on the night of the fight in the Bar Tripoli – I struggled to recall her name: Lisette? Laure?
    ‘It is no hour for a lady to be out here, Madame,’ she said, glancing back up the street. I had no answer for her. I wasn’t sure I could actually speak. I recalled one of the girls at La Femme Marché nudging me as he approached:
He consorts with the street girls of Pigalle.
    ‘I had no idea of the hour.’ I glanced up at the clock. A quarter to five. I had been walking the whole night.
    Her face was in shadow, but I felt her studying me. ‘Are you quite well?’
    ‘I’m fine. Thank you.’
    She kept looking at me. Then she took a step forwards and touched my elbow lightly. ‘I’m not sure this is a good place for a married woman to walk alone. Would you like to join me for a drink? I know a warm bar not far from here.’
    When I hesitated she released my arm, took the smallest of steps backwards. ‘Of course, if you have other plans I quite understand.’
    ‘No. It is kind of you to ask. I would relish an excuse to get out of the cold. I … I don’t think I’d noticed how chilled I am until just now.’
    We walked in silence down two narrow streets, turning towards a window lit from within. A Chinese man stepped back from a heavy door to let us in, and she exchanged a quiet word with him. The bar was indeed warm and the windows fugged with steam, a handful of men still drinking. Carriage drivers, mostly, she told me, as she shepherded me towards the back. Laure Le Comte ordered something at the bar and I took a seat at a table at the rear. I peeled my damp cape from my shoulders. The little room was noisy and cheerful; the men had gathered around a card game that was going on in the corner. I could see my face in the mirror that ran along the wall, pale and damp, my hair plastered to my head. Why would he love only me? I wondered, then tried to push away the thought.
    An elderly waiter arrived with a tray, and Laure handed me a small goblet of cognac. Now we were sitting there, I could think of nothing to say to her.
    ‘It’s good we came inside when we did,’ she said, glancing towards the doorway. The rain had started up properly now, running down the pavements in woven rivers, gurgling in the gutters.
    ‘I think so.’
    ‘Is Monsieur Lefèvre at home?’
    She had used the formal version of his name, even though she had known him longer than I had.
    ‘I have no idea.’ I took a sip of my drink. It slid down my throat like fire. And then suddenly I began to talk. Perhaps it was desperation. Perhaps it was the knowledge that a woman such as Laure had seen so many kinds of bad behaviour that she could not be shocked by anything I had to tell her. Perhaps I simply wanted to see her reaction. I was unsure whether, after all, she, too, was among those women I now had to view as a threat.
    ‘I found myself in an ill temper. I thought it better … to walk.’
    She nodded, and allowed a small smile. Her hair, I noted, was pulled into a neat twist at her collar, more like a schoolteacher than a woman of the night. ‘I have never been married. But I can imagine that it changes one’s life beyond all recognition.’
    ‘It is hard to adjust. I had thought myself well suited to it. Now … I’m not sure I have the right temperament for its challenges.’ Even as I spoke I was surprised at myself. I was not the kind of woman given to confidences.