Paris: The Novel

you.” Claire went to talk to a young painter. Marie began to make her way through the groups of guests, nodding or smiling to those she knew, but feeling a little disengaged from the proceedings.
    How strange it had been to encounter de Cygne again. It was quite agreeable, but it took her mind back to those days at the turn of the last century, just before she’d married, and for a moment or two, she found herself almost transported back to those days, and the people around her seemed to dissolve into the background.
    She soon pulled herself together. There were people to meet, people who might be useful to the store. She looked around. As she did so, she noticed someone looking intently at the painting of the Gare Saint-Lazare by Norbert Goeneutte—her painting. The man had his back to her, but she was sure she knew him. He turned.
    It was Hadley. The realization was so sudden that it made her gasp. Not only that, he was completely unchanged. If anything, he looked even younger. The same tall frame, the same mane of hair, the same eyes, gazing straight at her. Dear God, he was more handsome than ever.
    Her heart skipped a beat. She felt the need for air. It was as though, by some strange magic, she was a girl of twenty again.
    How was it possible? Had the meeting with de Cygne opened some mysterious corridor between the present and the past? Had she, in the middle of this party, unwittingly taken a journey in H. G. Wells’s time machine? Was she hallucinating?
    His eyes were on her. Now he started to come toward her. Dear heaven, she was blushing. This was ridiculous. And yet, strangely, there was no light of recognition in his eyes. Had she turned into a ghost? No, he was going to introduce himself.
    “
Je m’appelle Frank Hadley
.”
    His French accent left much to be desired.
    “Frank Hadley?” She said the name in English.
    “Junior. My father …”
    Of course. Everything suddenly made sense.
    “You can speak English to me, Mr. Hadley. I am Marie Fox, Marc’s sister. I remember your father from many years ago. He knew my late husband too. You look just like him.”
    “Oh.” He smiled broadly. “My father told me to contact Marc when I came to Paris, but he thought you lived in England, so I didn’t imagine we should meet. You fit the description my father gave me exactly.”
    “Really.”
    He smiled.
    “He said you were very beautiful.”
    She stared in surprise, but there could be no doubt about it. He was flirting with her. The cheeky monkey. He was looking straight into her eyes now, and she realized that his own eyes were rather beautiful, and full of life. To her embarrassment—but she couldn’t help it—she felt herself going weak at the knees.
    This was ridiculous. She could be his mother. She managed an entire department store.
    “I’m going to be in Paris for some months,” he said. “My father gave me very clear instructions. He told me to learn French, and not to come back until I was fluent.”
    The hint wasn’t blatant, but it was quite unmistakable. He was telling her that he had come to learn French, and that he was available if she cared to teach him.
    They looked at each other. A couple of seconds passed. And then, suddenly, Marc appeared beside them, with Claire.
    “Ah, Frank,
mon ami
,” he said, “I see that you have met my sister. Now let me introduce you to her daughter, Claire.”

    Luc Gascon had started smoking during the war. It was the thing to do. Every
poilu
in the trenches seemed to have a packet of Gauloises in his pocket. The little blue packets and the strong, Turkish aroma of the cigarettes suggested comradeship. And they were supposed to steady the nerves. If a man were taken to a field hospital, like as not, the first thing the orderlies or the nurses would do was give him a cigarette. Luc had started smoking mainly because he was bored.
    And he had just been smoking a Gauloise when he met Louise. It was at the cinema. As usual, it was his genius for making himself useful that enabled him to pick her up.
    The Louxor wasn’t just any cinema. It had only just opened then, in 1921, but it had instantly become one of the exotic landmarks of Paris.
    Sitting splendidly on its corner site on the boulevard de Magenta, a short walk east of the Moulin Rouge, the Louxor was a mock Egyptian palace worthy of the pharaohs or of Cleopatra herself. With its Egyptian pillars, its golden ornaments and richly painted walls, it reminded Luc ofthose fantasy Oriental