The Perfume Collector

‘Already asleep on the job, eh?

She flicked her eyes open to see a blonde-haired girl standing in front of her, also a maid, only her uniform fitted. Hand on her hip, the girl had somehow contrived to position her cap at a fetching angle, just between two of the blonde kiss curls that adorned her wide forehead. There was a neatness and a compactness about her; a sureness in the swagger of her movements.

‘I’m Sis, short for Cecily.’ She thrust a hand out and pumped Eva’s palm hard. ‘I’m from Virginia, in case you hadn’t noticed. Looks like we’ll be sharing together. I knew my luck couldn’t hold out for ever. Had the room all to myself for nearly a week. Anyway,’ she sighed. ‘I guess I’m meant to show you around. Follow me.’

She led Eva down the long hallway and up a back staircase. When they got to the first floor she stopped. ‘Ever been in the front lobby?’

Eva shook her head, too nervous to speak. Already she was in awe of Sis; of her Southern drawl and her easy, careless attitude. She was afraid to speak in case Sis didn’t like her accent. It had happened to her in the house in Brooklyn, where the Scottish cook insisted on referring to her as ‘the Foreigner’ even though their employers spoke German and her own Glaswegian accent was only barely comprehensible.

‘Ever even seen it?’ Sis asked.

Again, Eva shook her head.

‘Figures. You have the look of someone who’s spent her entire life going round to the back service entrance. Come on.’ Sis pushed through the door at the top, and they peered out into the West Lobby.

By Hotel standards it was modest, intimate. But if it wasn’t the largest or grandest Hotel lobby in New York, it certainly was one of the most glamorous.

The marble floors shone beneath the oriental carpets, banks of settees were piled with velvet and silk pillows, and the bevelled mirrors which lined the walls reflected the beautiful profiles of the off-duty chorus girls parading through on their way to the bar.

Carefully chosen for the perfection of their figures, they were all the same height, with long shapely legs. Their laughter was punctuated by the clicking of their high-heeled shoes and the swishing of their daringly short skirts. A piano was playing and someone was singing.

A bellhop wove through the pockets of guests with a silver salver. ‘Madame Arpeggio,’ he called loudly. ‘Madame Arpeggio.’ The air smelled of brass polish, cigar smoke, and the lush, overripe sweetness of fresh-cut tiger lilies.

Eva watched as a small, round woman dressed entirely in black, her head crowned with a velvet turban fastened with a large ruby brooch, entered with a pair of enormous shaggy grey Irish wolfhounds. Their black leather collars were studded with pearls.

Instantly one of the doormen brought them water in china bowls, which they lapped loudly, creating puddles on the marble floor, while their mistress paused to light a cigarette and check her messages at reception.

‘Who’s that?’ Eva was so fascinated, she forgot about her resolution not to speak.

‘No one really.’ Sis sniffed. ‘Some filthy Prussian countess. Never bathes and doesn’t take those dogs out nearly as much as she ought to. Her room smells like a zoo. They’ve already changed the carpet once.’

The girls watched as she turned, and proceeded at a regal pace towards the elevator.

‘Thing is,’ Sis confided, ‘all the important people here look ordinary and the really fancy ones are usually broke or on the make. I’ll tell you, you’re in an upside-down world now,’ she said, shaking her head. ‘Takes a while, but you’ll get used to it.’

Eva shared a room with Sis in the attic eaves of the building; it had a basin in one corner, a shallow closet and two narrow single beds. The window looked into the light well of the tall building opposite and the alleyway below. There was no view of the sky.

Not that it mattered. Both girls were up at six and eating in the lower kitchen, which also served as a staff canteen, by six-thirty. Then they stood in line waiting for Mrs Ronald to inspect their uniforms and appearance.

Eva had successfully managed to take her uniform in; however, the gauzy white apron and cap were still too big, bordering on ridiculous. It was a fine line between hiring girls who would not excite notice among the guests and making sure that they matched Mrs Ronald’s inner vision of the overall chic of the establishment. So Eva was assigned the less desirable lower floors, in the hopes that she would grow another few inches over the summer.

After inspecting the girls’ hair and nails, Mrs Ronald briefed them as to which guests were checking in and which were checking out that day, along with any special preferences.

These included the actress who required black velvet curtains hung in her suite so that she could sleep during the day and whose room must only be serviced at night, when she was on stage at the Ziegfeld Follies a block away. And the movie producer who had a horror of anything which had been used by other people; his bed, mattress and bedclothes had to be replaced, new each time he came and the sheets were to be washed separately from those of the other guests, a duty which he only trusted Mrs Ronald to perform (but which she regularly passed off to one of the other girls).

Then there were the more common requests: extra ice buckets, satin sheets, special requests for certain types of flowers – hothouse roses and gardenias were the most popular. Some guests requested that there be no paintings or artwork in their rooms while others couldn’t bear certain colours and had them banished from sight. Imported foods were provided at vast expense – chocolates from Paris, fresh pineapples from Mexico, black tea from India, and thick, long Cuban cigars. Extra pianos were delivered almost daily, as were exotic pets, new automobiles and hunting guns; and police guarded vans carrying jewellery, which was stored in the vaulted Hotel safe.

Dance floors were installed so that stage stars could practise their routines, furniture removed, massage tables and exercise equipment set up. One week the entire Grand Ballroom was turned into a championship boxing ring when Jack Dempsey was fighting Jack Sharkey at the Yankee Stadium.

Guests frequently brought their own staff as well. Extra valets and ladies’ maids hovered on the edges of the lobby, unsure of their place outside the dominion of their homeland. Not quite guests and yet not quite servants when their employers departed for the day, they were often both suspicious of and intoxicated by their new-found freedom.

The city itself had a dangerous effect on their normally restrained personalities. More than once they lost not only their heads, but their positions as well.

There was the valet who was found to be posing as his employer, the Prince of Wales, who ran up enormous gambling debts in Harlem before being discovered in flagrante with a black prostitute in his master’s bed. And the lady’s maid who had never tasted alcohol before and yielded to temptation, only to wake up somewhere near the waterfront next to an Italian dock worker who politely informed her, in broken English, that they were married and he would like to claim his conjugal rights.

Eva was assigned to learn her duties from Rita Crane, an older woman of indeterminate age and one of the world’s most unsuccessful secret drinkers. Rita kept a flask in the depths of her laundry cart, an old rubbing alcohol bottle filled with gin in her locker and a vial of morphine in her handbag that her doctor prescribed for her ever deteriorating nerves. Every morning she showed up, hands shaking, arms covered in bruises. Eva wondered if she’d been beaten with a stick but of course, couldn’t ask.

Rita had probably once been a beauty. But too much drinking, too many ex-husbands, and a fondness for good old-fashioned English cuisine had left her quite round; her bust large like the prow of a ship tapering to two hefty legs, ribboned with varicose veins. Her features were lost in the soft folds of her white skin, and her eyes had a curious downward slant which made them seem automatically sad. Her lips were so thin as to be nothing more than an idea for a mouth. Rita moved as if resentful of gravity; as though the whole idea of a physical body caused her untold inconvenience. On the whole she was like a creature raised underwater, without the benefit of light for which eyes were optional and a spine a positive luxury.

There was a violence to Rita’s scrubbing; a furious zeal to her bed making and a positive rage to her dusting which left Eva in no doubt that she was not only capable of murder but most likely experienced in it as well. Her last husband had died eleven years ago. Now she was married to her job. She hated and resented it, uttering a constant stream of profanities under her breath, the way a nun recites a rosary. Yet she was fiercely committed to performing each task to her own exacting standards. Over the years Rita had tailored her expectations of life and others accordingly – anticipating the worst at every turn and managing to find the damp, dark potential in any cloudless sky.

For an entire two weeks, Rita supervised every move Eva made; correcting her toilet-bowl cleaning technique, insisting that she sweep each carpet in perfectly straight vertical lines and then again horizontally, chastising her for the lack of artistry with which she arranged the linen hand towels, all the while attacking her youth, personal appearance and general foreignness as she felt appropriate.

Eva soon learned that when Rita was drunk she was much easier to handle. In fact, in the canteen after her shift she could be almost funny.

Back in Lille, Eva had a grandfather who was a drinker. When her grandmother needed him to be sober for an important event, she always treated him to his own personal supply of chocolates. ‘The sugar calms him,’ she used to say.

Eva couldn’t afford chocolates but she began to make Rita cups of very sugary tea throughout the day. Rita in turn grumbled and complained but drank them just the same. While it didn’t make her pleasant, at least it kept her from being downright vicious.

By the time Eva ended her training period, she had mastered all the arts of domestic service, including the proper display of hand towels.

Rita had gained seven pounds.

Soon Eva adapted to the regular rhythm of Hotel life. In the evenings the girls laundered and ironed their clothes, mended and gossiped. There was a radio in the pantry of the lower kitchen that the staff crowded round, listening to the Silvertown Cord Orchestra or the comedy antics of Amos ’n’ Andy. Drinking was out of the question; Mrs Ronald was very strict about that. And the only dancing they did was with each other. A tall, lanky black girl named Wallace was the recognized Charleston expert and willing to teach anyone for the price of a Coca-Cola, even though chances to use their new-found skills were next to nil. On Saturday evenings, they went to confession at St Boniface. On Sunday mornings, early, they went to Mass.

There were occasional treats – matinée performances tucked into the balcony at the Strand theatre, followed by a sandwich at the Riker’s Drug Store counter. Sometimes, they went to stare at the lights of Times Square, waiting to see the crowds leaving the theatres and discuss what the fashionable women were wearing.

Other times, they strolled across Central Park to Fifth Avenue, walking down past the grand department stores but never daring to go inside. There were places in the East End, small shops run by immigrants where fabric could be purchased, shoes traded, coats and jewellery pawned.

Sis took Eva to the public library and showed her how to get a card. Every week, Eva read her way through the works of Charles Dickens, Jane Austen, Anthony Trollope, Henry James and Elizabeth Gaskell. She dreamed of heroines from modest backgrounds attracting unprecedented attentions, soaring tales of love across social divides and sudden unexpected reversals of fortunes. In these pages, anything was possible, even for a girl like her.

‘The trouble with you is, you’re a romantic,’ Sis pronounced one Sunday afternoon, as they all sat knitting by the radio in the kitchen. ‘That’s not going to get you anywhere. You need to be practical. Romantics get their hearts broken too easily.’

‘That’s true,’ Rita agreed for once, resting her swollen feet on an empty vegetable crate. ‘You need a man with a good solid job who doesn’t drink or gamble. One that won’t hit you or the kids too much and that goes to church. None of my husbands ever made it to Mass. Let that be a lesson to you,’ she warned. ‘Truth is they were never sober enough to make it out of bed on a Sunday morning.’

Sis considered. ‘Maybe my Charlie knows someone.’

She was already engaged to a young doorman from the Iroquois Hotel and was the supreme social architect of the backstairs staff. Sis treated marriage as a coup; a strategic overthrow of the natural male instincts which must be systematically attacked and maintained through military ruthlessness and fortitude.

At seventeen, she’d already vetted and refused more men than the rest of them combined. With her first month’s earnings she’d invested in a bolt of real lace from Ireland for her wedding dress. Sis knew which neighbourhood she wanted to live in, right down to what houses she would accept and had long decided on the names and professions of her future children (all of them boys). Despite her modest circumstances, she’d amassed a considerable collection of housewares, china and linens, stored in a trunk underneath her bed that she referred to as her ‘hope chest’.

Charlie was only a few years older than Sis and had yet to receive so much as a kiss from her. But Sis already managed his money and his career; she had him working extra shifts and taking an evening class in accounting with a view to heading up reception some day.

And he was in awe of her. Sometimes he came to meet them in the park or after a movie (Sis wouldn’t let him sit next to her in the dark in case he got the wrong idea), and Eva could see the mixture of fear and pride in his face when he was around her.

‘Pick a man with an overbearing mother,’ Sis advised. ‘Charlie’s mum is a widow with seven kids to feed and only a Bible to keep her warm. Charlie feels guilty from the moment he wakes up in the morning and what’s more, he’s used to taking orders from a woman.’

Eva nodded.

She never argued with Sis’s advice. It wasn’t sensible if you wanted a quiet evening.

‘Good God!’ Rita laughed, jerking her head towards Eva. ‘You’ve got your work cut out with that one! She’ll be a lot tougher to shift than you, Sis.’

Everyone turned to Eva.

She felt her cheeks colour.

‘She’s not done growing yet, is all!’ Sis shot back. ‘Besides, you managed to get a few husbands and you’re not exactly the Queen of Sheba!’

Still, when the conversation changed, Eva got up and went outside.

It was true: she was too thin, her face too long; her features seemed stretched out like a cartoon character from the Sunday papers.

Sis was tall and blonde, like a smiling Gibson Girl in an advertising poster.

Eva was short and dark and foreign-looking.

She wandered out into the back alleyway, sitting alone on the back steps. The warm humid air of New York clung to the night, unwilling to relinquish its suffocating hold. And yet to Eva, the city had an underlying hum of possibility; a constant forward motion that promised, no matter what, that change was on its way.

In every book she’d ever read, the heroine was subject to self-doubt and unjust criticism. And in every case, it only served to harden their resolve. Besides, what did Rita know? If Eva wanted a life scrubbing toilets, she could follow Rita’s advice. But she didn’t. She wanted something more.

She wasn’t certain what, exactly, or how she would get it. But for right now, she didn’t need to think about that. She could simply sit, basking in the glow of not-so-distant stars, which must be somewhere, blinking behind the thick layer of cloud that masked the evening sky.

Paris, Spring, 1955

The offices of Frank, Levin et Beaumont were located on the Rue de Rivoli, on the upper floors of one of the galleried arcades. Grace had the last appointment of the afternoon, and, after a somewhat confusing conversation with the secretary in her halting French, had been shown into Monsieur Tissot’s chambers, which occupied a corner, with two windows overlooking the north wing of the Musée du Louvre.

Grace sat, still in her overcoat, her handbag firmly anchored on her lap. It felt unreal to be here, like an overly vivid, slightly alarming dream.

She wasn’t used to travelling on her own. Mallory had insisted that she stay at the Hôtel Raphael, where she’d been with her mother before the war. Located near the Champs-Élysées, it was discreet and quietly grand; much nicer than anything Grace would have chosen for herself. Her room wasn’t terribly large but it had high ceilings and was decorated in soft pink and the palest eau-de-Nil, feminine candyfloss colours mirrored in the silk taffeta swags and thick, embroidered bedspread. There was even a chandelier above her bed. Lying on her back last night, she’d stared at it, amazed. Clearly the French expected something rather more interesting to occur here than the English did.

There was a small balcony, barely a few feet wide. Grace opened the doors and stepped outside, gazing over the wide tree-lined street below.

The city seemed extravagantly, shamelessly beautiful. In London, entire blocks had been levelled in the war; whole neighborhoods gone. The landscape was punctuated by gaping concrete wounds and piles of charred rubble; grotesque monuments to once great structures. But here, the pavements were smooth and even, the skyline intact. Whatever damage the occupation had done, Paris had put it behind her.

Even the air smelled more refined; not full of damp, oily coal but clear, fragrant with continental sunlight and warmth.

The coffee at breakfast had been shockingly strong, the croissant flaky and buttery – more like a biscuit or a cake. How decadent that people ate them every day! It was only the potential shame at being caught that prevented Grace from jamming an extra one into her handbag.

Later that afternoon, walking across the Jardin des Tuileries to her appointment, a kind of giddiness came over her, accompanied by a sudden realization: no one knew her here. Her anonymity both thrilled and disorientated her.

The concierge had given her a street map, but she found herself unable to concentrate on the neat little labelled lines when the city itself surrounded her. She’d always heard that Paris was elegant but had struggled to imagine how. She’d assumed it would be rigid; the demanding intolerance of perfection. But, being here, she was struck by the easy naturalness of everything. From the tall, slender trees, their leaves rustling high above her, to the chalky gravel that crunched beneath her feet or the classically proportioned buildings that rose, uniformly constructed from the same blonde stone, it was all orchestrated to hold the light. The entire city was enveloped in a halo of glowing softness.

The French were fluent in the language of beauty, just as she’d been told. But it was a more subtly encompassing comprehension than she’d anticipated. In fact, it made sense. Who wouldn’t construct the corners of buildings to curve gently rather than meet in a point if they had the means and inclination? And who wouldn’t match all the roof tiles in the city radius to create a harmonious landscape of sloping shades of bluey-grey, augmented with squat terracotta chimney pots? Anything else seemed careless.

Likewise, while the men and women were no more naturally attractive than their English counterparts, they dressed with an assurance and attention to detail that would have been considered the height of arrogance in England. Here, maintaining a certain chic was apparently nothing less than a civic duty.

Even now, in the lawyers’ chambers, there was a unity and precision in the colours, shapes and sizes of the furniture, as if an editor had walked through earlier, removing any distractions.

The door opened and two men walked in.

The first one was an elderly gentleman with stiff, formal bearing and a neat white moustache. A younger man stood respectfully behind him.

‘Madame Munroe?’ The elderly gentleman greeted her unsmilingly, with a curt nod of his head. ‘I am Henri Levin,’ he announced in heavily accented English. ‘This is my firm. And this is Edouard Tissot, my associate. He will look after you. I trust his service will be satisfactory.’

With that he gave a brisk little bow, turned on his heel and left.

Grace didn’t know quite what to make of this abrupt introduction.

‘Please forgive him.’ Monsieur Tissot stepped forward. He looked to be somewhere in his mid-thirties; tall and slender, a feature highlighted by his traditional pinstriped suit. His dark hair matched his black eyes; his expression was both reserved and intelligent. ‘He’s not used to speaking English,’ he explained, his voice lowering discreetly. ‘He’s terrified you will ask him something he won’t understand.’

‘Oh, I see,’ she said, nodding.

He held out his hand. ‘Allow me to welcome you to Paris, madame.’

‘Thank you.’ Grace extended her own, expecting him to shake it.

However, instead he held it lightly, his lips hovering just above the white flesh of her wrist, before releasing it.

It was both a quietly formal and yet intimate gesture; he hadn’t actually touched his lips to her skin. But still her skin tingled where they might have been.

‘And let me begin,’ Monsieur Tissot continued, ‘by saying that I am very sorry for your loss. Please allow me to assist you in any way possible during your stay.’

‘Thank you very much,’ Grace murmured, averting her eyes. She’d decided in advance it was best to say little or nothing until she knew more. Instead, she moved the subject on to safer ground. ‘Your English is very accomplished, Monsieur Tissot.’

‘Thank you.’ He acknowledged the compliment with a nod. ‘That’s precisely why I was chosen to meet with you.’ Taking a seat behind his desk, he searched through a stack of legal files. ‘I’m sorry to make you come all this way, Madame Munroe. However, the terms of the will are quite specific. And of course there are a great many signatures required and other details to attend to.’ He pulled the correct file out, scanning the documents enclosed. ‘Here we are. The inheritance comprises largely the likely proceeds from the sale of a property, as well as a portfolio of stocks which are currently managed by the stockbroking firm of Lancelot et Delp.’

She must’ve misheard him. ‘Pardon me, did you say a property?’

‘Yes. An apartment. Or a flat, as you English say. The deceased was living in it up to the point of her death and therefore unable to liquidate the funds earlier. We’ve had the property assessed and I can assure you, it’s quite valuable.’ He took some official-looking papers out and arranged them on the desk. ‘Madame d’Orsey had a power of attorney prepared, so that we could oversee the sale on your behalf. I only await your signature in order to proceed.’ He looked up. ‘I’m making the assumption, perhaps mistakenly, that you would prefer to have us deal with this matter rather than handle it yourself.’

Grace leaned forward to look at the papers, only the words made no sense. ‘They’re in French. Aren’t they?’

‘Ah! Yes,’ he admitted, shaking his head. ‘I apologize. I would be happy to go through them with you. Or if you prefer, you may have your English lawyer approve them. I can arrange to have them translated—’