September in Paris Read online

  SEPTEMBER IN PARIS

  Andrea Blake

  Noelle was tremendously excited to be returning at last to Paris, her birthplace, for the first time since her childhood. Although she would be working there and not enjoying a holiday like most English people, she was determined to get the utmost out of her stay.

  At first sight her job as nanny to the children of an English diplomat would not seem to offer much scope for any social whirl, and indeed she got off to rather a bad start and a cold reception from her employer, Lady Tregan. Almost the only person to show her any friendliness was Mark Fielding, a friend of the Tregans.

  Then things cheered up when she met Alain de Bressac, a charming Frenchman much attracted to her, but Mark Fielding soon took it upon himself to warn her off Alain. But if Noelle gave Alain up, was there any guarantee that Mark would then take an interest in her?

  CHAPTER ONE

  The street lamps were pearly aureoles of brilliance in the late summer twilight as the big black car swept round the Place de la Concorde and up the Champs Elysees.

  Noelle, separated from the chauffeur by a panel of glass, leaned eagerly forward to peer at the darkening city. “Paris! I’m really in Paris at last!” she thought, with a tremor of excitement. And it was just as her grandmother had described it: the crowded pavement cafes, the enticing window displays and—up ahead now—the dark bulk of the Arc de Triomphe amid a swirl of speeding traffic.

  Presently, in a quiet residential street, the car drew up outside a huge iron-studded doorway. Noelle expected the chauffeur to jump out, but almost at once the doors swung inwards, as if of their own accord, and the car turned under the archway which led to an enclosed courtyard.

  “We have arrived, mademoiselle. This way, if you please. I will bring your cases in one moment.” The chauffeur was young and darkly handsome. As Noelle stepped out of the car, he gave her a smile that held a glint of mockery. Perhaps, as a Frenchman, he was amused by the unfeminine cut of her thick grey uniform coat, or by the schoolgirl’s grey felt hat with a plain blue ribbon round the crown.

  Noelle followed him into the house by way of a long narrow passage. He tapped at a door and someone called, “Entrez.”

  “Madame Duvet,” he said to Noelle, and indicated that she should go in.

  The room was furnished as a sitting room, but with a massive roll-top desk by the window. As Noelle entered, an elderly woman closed a large ledger and rose to greet her. “Good evening, mademoiselle.” She did not offer her hand. “I am Madame Duvet. I manage the household for Lady Tregan. She will see you in the morning. Now I will take you to your quarters.”

  Without a smile or a word of welcome she walked quickly out of the room, and Noelle followed.

  They went upstairs by, means of a small ascenseur, and emerged into another long passage.

  “The nursery suite is separate from the rest of the house,” Madame Duvet said, over her shoulder. She spoke excellent English, but with a strong accent. “You will never need to pass through the family apartments except when madame wishes to see the children. This”—she opened a door—“is the day nursery.” Her voice dropped. “Your bedroom is there, and these other doors are the night nurseries. Tonight, the nurserymaid is sleeping with the baby. You will find a meal waiting in your bedroom. The bathroom is across the corridor. Goodnight, mademoiselle.”

  When she had gone, Noelle took off her hat and slowly unbuttoned her coat. Not a very warm welcome, she thought wryly. Did Madame Duvet disapprove of English nurses, or was that brisk austerity her normal manner?

  She went through to her bedroom. It was plainly but comfortably furnished. There was a covered tray on the table. Noelle lifted the spotless napkin and found a plate of cold chicken salad, rolls and butter. There was also a teapot, a jug of milk and a small caddy. Looking round, she saw an electric kettle in the hearth. There was a tap at the door and the chauffeur brought in her cases. Noelle asked him to put them on the bed.

  “You have everything you require, mademoiselle?”

  He had taken off his peaked cap and his hair was black and curly.

  Noelle met his bold, interested eyes for a moment, then looked quickly away. “Yes, thank you,” she said politely.

  “Goodnight, mademoiselle.” She could hear the laughter in his voice.

  “Goodnight.”

  She had meant to unpack at once, but the chicken salad was too tempting. She had been too excited to eat much earlier in the day and was suddenly ravenous. Plugging in the kettle, she washed her hands at the basin and sat down to supper.

  She was making the tea when she had a sudden feeling that she was being watched. The door leading through to the day nursery was still ajar, and from the corner of her eye she could see something moving through the aperture. Leaving the pot to stand for a few minutes, she unlocked her suitcases.

  It was several minutes before the child ventured to push the door further open for a better view of her activities.

  “Hello,” Noelle said quietly. “Who are you?”

  He came cautiously forward, a small tousle-headed boy in pale blue pyjamas. His feet were bare on the polished linoleum and he was clutching a grubby white rabbit with a red felt waistcoat.

  Noelle hung a dress in the wardrobe, then sat down to drink her tea. The child came nearer and she felt his wary brown eyes examining her face. “I’m Robert,” he said suddenly. “Who are you?”

  “My name is Noelle. I’ve come to live here.” She smiled at him. “You’ll get cold without a dressing-gown. If you want to stay here for a little while you’d better put this round you.” She took a white mohair stole from one of the cases and wrapped it round him, then lifted him on to a chair. “I like your rabbit. What’s his name?”

  “Eustace. Uncle Mark gave him to me.”

  Noelle went on with her unpacking and the child watched, gradually overcoming his shyness until he was chattering quite freely. When the room was tidy again, he let Noelle take him back to bed.

  “I like you,” he said confidingly as she tucked him in. “Ginette said you would be old and ugly, but I think you’re pretty—as pretty as Tante Anne-Marie.”

  “Thank you, Robert. Now go to sleep and I’ll see you in the morning. Goodnight. Goodnight, Eustace.”

  Back in her room, she undressed and cleaned her teeth. It was curious, she reflected, that Robert had never once mentioned his mother and father, although he had told her all about his Uncle Mark. Perhaps his parents were too busy to see very much of him. She had been told that Sir Robert Tregan was an important member of the diplomatic corps, and no doubt his wife had a great deal of official entertaining to occupy her. But, although it was her job to look after other people’s children, Noelle could never really understand how a mother could hand over her babies to a stranger—however highly qualified and efficient the stranger might be. She was inclined to feel sorry for the children of the rich: as infants and toddlers they were consigned to the care of nannies, then bundled off to boarding schools. It did not occur to her that her own childhood had lacked much of the happy unity of a loving family. But for her grandmother, she would have had to be brought up in an orphanage.

  Before getting into bed she opened the windows and leaned against the sill for a while. There was nothing much to see, because her room overlooked the courtyard, now a dark well of shadow. But to Noelle, for whom coming to Paris was the realization of all her dreams, even the night sky seemed to have a magical radiance.

  At last, remembering that she had a busy day ahead of her, she climbed between the clean sheets, wound up her watch and switched off the bedside lamp. In another part of the city, at one of the softly lit alcove tables at the Chez Gaspard, Anne-Marie du Val also glanced at her watch. It was the night
of her twentieth birthday and she could think of no better way of celebrating the event than by dining a deux with Mark Fielding.

  But the evening, although enjoyable, had not progressed as she had hoped it would. Sometimes she wondered if, in spite of his looks and charm, Mark was basically as stolid as most Englishmen were said to be. It was certain that, had a Frenchman been with her tonight, he would at least have been holding her hand by now, and probably kissing her fingers and murmuring exciting compliments. The secluded position of their table and the dimness of the restaurant’s discreet lighting would have made such advances perfectly convenable.

  But Mark, although he seemed to enjoy her company and was in every other way a perfect escort, had never attempted to make love to her, not even lightheartedly.

  “It’s time I took you home, Anne-Marie,” he said now, catching the waiter’s eye.

  “Oh, Mark—I am not a jeune fille any more! I do not have to be returned at the stroke of midnight,” she protested laughingly.

  “I thought we might walk,” he suggested. “These warm evenings will soon be over.”

  Anne-Marie concealed her dismay. The English enthusiasm for walking was something incomprehensible to her, and her flimsy satin slippers were not designed for such rigours. But she agreed that it was a delightful idea, and went to the cloakroom to retouch her lips and apply fresh scent from the phial in her silver bag. Perhaps moonlight and the quietness of the side-streets would prove more effective than candle-glow and muted violins. Outside the restaurant she slipped her hand through his arm, but kept silent. The majority of Frenchmen liked a woman to be animated. Feminine chatter, no matter how scandalous or nonsensical, amused and interested them, But most Englishmen seemed to prefer a mute companion—or perhaps they were merely more accustomed to it, if one judged by the lack of frivolity of the average English woman.

  At last, when her elegant slippers were becoming extremely uncomfortable, they reached the river, and she suggested that they should walk along the quai to the next bridge. Down there, by the shimmering water, where the trees cast patches of shadow on the stones, something might happen.

  She shivered slightly, wondering what Mark would be like as a lover. She was not the only woman to find him attractive. Several of her sister’s friends, both married and single, were intrigued by his dark good looks and slightly enigmatic manner.

  “Are you cold? We can take a taxi the rest of the way.”

  “No, no. It’s a lovely night,” she said quickly. “Tell me, are you used to that now?” She indicated a couple sitting on a bench, locked in a passionate embrace. “Or does it still shock you a little?”

  “I don’t think I was ever shocked by it,” Mark said, smiling down at her.

  “But one does not see it in London. I thought the English disapproved of such behaviour?”

  “They don’t disapprove of the practice—they just like more privacy,” he said laughing. “Anyway, lovers are one of your principal tourist attractions. People go to London to see Buckingham Palace or the Houses of Parliament. They come to Paris to absorb romantic atmosphere and to be mildly scandalized.”

  “But an Englishman would never kiss in public—not even in Paris?” Anne-Marie asked lightly. It vexed her to have to be so deliberately provocative, but she was growing impatient. For several months now she had wanted Mark to take her in his arms, to discover what it would be like to feel his firm lips pressing upon her own.

  “Englishmen are human, you know,” Mark said dryly.

  “Are they? You are the only one I have known for any time. They are supposed to be interested only in football and racing,” Anne-Marie replied airily.

  He grinned. “In England, they think all French girls are naughty little hussies.”

  “Hussies?” She spoke almost perfect English, but this word was new to her.

  “Flirts ... coquettes,” Mark explained.

  “Oh, but that is so,” she said seriously. “We do like to be attractive to men, to please and amuse them. Don’t English girls wish to be like this?”

  “Yes—but they go about it differently.”

  “You prefer their way?”

  “I never generalise about women,” Mark said teasingly. “It depends on the circumstances.”

  By the time they reached her home, Anne-Marie’s feet were burning.

  “You will come in for a drink?” she asked. “Robert and Monique shall not be back from the reception yet.”

  “Thanks, but not tonight. I have some papers to go over.”

  Inwardly she was fuming with frustration, but nothing showed in her face as she gave him her hand.

  “It was a lovely evening, Mark. Thank you.” As if by impulse, she stood on tiptoe and brushed her soft full lips against his cheek.

  “It was my pleasure, cherie.” Mark returned the gesture with a brotherly pat on the shoulder. Then he pulled the bell and waited for the butler to open the door.

  In the house, Anne-Marie went into the empty drawing room. She poured herself a stiff shot of vodka, lit a cigarette and kicked off her shoes. She was angry and piqued, but she was not defeated.

  Noelle was woken by the clatter of a milk churn below her window. She blinked at the unfamiliar room, then quickly sat up, fearing she might have overslept. But it was not yet seven o’clock.

  Nevertheless she got up at once and began to brush her hair. She had inherited her hair from her father. It was a dark chestnut brown and naturally curly, so she did not have the expense of permanent waves and sets. Her pale skin and candid hazel eyes were also a paternal legacy. It was only in the upward tilt of her eyebrows and the small square chin that she could find any likeness to those photographs of the young smiling French girl who had been her mother.

  When she was dressed she went into the day nursery. The table by the window was laid for breakfast, but the other doors were still closed. Noelle went in to Robert and found him propped up in bed, sharing a biscuit with his rabbit.

  “Good morning,” he said politely.

  “Good morning. Good morning, Eustace.” She then closed the window. “Can you dress yourself, Robert?”

  “Yes, but Ginette says I’m too slow.”

  “Well, there’s no hurry. You start while I have a look at the baby.”

  He scrambled out of the bedclothes. “She’s not very pretty. She cries a lot,” he said informatively.

  “Perhaps she has tummy-ache.”

  “I don’t think she likes Ginette.”

  “See if you can be all dressed by the time I come back,” she said, with a smile.

  She was about to enter the other night nursery when it was opened by a young girl in a crumpled dressing-gown. At the sight of Noelle, she looked confused and faintly alarmed.

  “Good morning.” Noelle walked past her to the high wicker bassinet in the corner of the room.

  The window had obviously been closed all night, and there was a saucer of cigarette stubs on the floor by the divan. The sourness of smoke lingered in the stale atmosphere.

  “Do you speak English?” Noelle asked, over her shoulder. The baby was asleep. Evidently it had been fed earlier, as a used bottle stood on top of the locker.

  “A little,” the girl said sulkily. It was clear that she expected a reprimand.

  Noelle looked at her more closely. She was probably fifteen or sixteen: a pretty little thing with long dark lashes and a mass of soft dark hair.

  “Do you mind if I open the window? The baby needs fresh air.” Noelle did so, then went back to the day nursery. “What time is breakfast?” she asked, as the girl hovered uncertainly in the doorway.

  The girl indicated a bell push, then scuttled back into the other room and, closed the door. Noelle pressed the button, then went to see how Robert was getting on.

  Presently another teenage girl brought up a tray. There was a boiled egg for Robert, a covered dish of overdone bacon for Noelle and plenty of rolls and butter. While the second girl was setting these things on the table a
nd covertly staring at Noelle, Ginette reappeared. She was evidently modelling herself on Brigitte Bardot. A tight cotton bodice topped her gingham dirndl, her mouth was shiny with pale pink lipstick and her hair was only slightly less tousled than before.

  “What is she like?” the second girl asked.

  Ginette shrugged. “Can’t say yet.”

  Noelle was on the point of telling them that she understood French when some instinct made her keep silent.

  After she had bathed the baby and wheeled the bassinet on to the balcony, she found out where everything was kept. Ginette had disappeared and Robert was playing contentedly with his wood blocks.

  About eleven o’clock, the housekeeper appeared. “Madame wishes to see you,” she said coldly.

  When Ginette had been recalled to mind the children, Noelle took off her apron and followed Madame Duvet.

  The main part of the house was reached by a small door at the end of the nursery landing. Beyond this door the floors were thickly carpeted, the walls hung with pictures and tapestries.

  “This is the salon.” The housekeeper indicated a high gilded doorway at the head of the wide marble stairs. “Madame usually wishes to see the children for an hour in the afternoon. Sometimes she has guests, so it is necessary for them to be clean and well behaved.” She gave Noelle a severe look, as if doubting her capacity to fulfil these requirements.

  Presently, after turning several corners, they came to another door. A maid in a brown silk dress and ecru organdie apron had just come out with a breakfast tray. She gave Noelle an appraising glance, then nodded at the housekeeper.

  “You may go in,” said Madame Duvet. Noelle’s employer was seated at a spindle-legged rosewood dressing table. She was wearing a white lace neglige and her dark hair flowed almost to her waist so that, at first sight, she looked like a lovely young girl.

  “Good morning, Nurse.” She examined Noelle through the looking glass, her eyebrows lifting slightly. “They have made you comfortable, I hope?”

  “Yes, thank you, madam.”

  “Good.” She rose and moved to a chair by the window where she arranged herself gracefully, then lit a cigarette. “You are younger than I had anticipated.”