The Milliner's Secret Read online

  She took peony-pink lipstick from her evening bag. ‘We’re all wearing mouths big this year,’ she informed her reflection. Stroking mascara into her eyebrows to darken them, she added, ‘The day I’m seen all in black is when I’m lying in an ebony coffin.’ She’d taken off her doll-hat to bathe, and now she put it back on. Hot-pink feathers clashed with her lipstick.

  Shame about the ankle, which looked like a piano leg.

  She found Dietrich sprawled on the sofa, as in happier days, staring into a glass of wine. That had not been his habit before. He’d only ever drunk wine at table.

  ‘Knock, knock,’ she called gently from the doorway. He stood up, saying, without inflection, ‘I would know you anywhere, Coralie.’

  ‘You look more yourself too.’

  He’d changed from uniform to a suit of pale grey-blue, a white shirt and a dark blue tie. Conservative, but human.

  ‘Come, sit down,’ he said.

  ‘You’ll have to help.’ She displayed her tender ankle. ‘I did it running after your friends in the club.’

  ‘They are not my friends.’

  ‘You speak the same language.’ She sank gratefully on to the sofa. ‘I don’t know how I’m going to manage. I hate the Métro and buses are rarer than camels in Paris because you lot have nicked all the fuel.’

  He did not rise to the jibe. ‘You had better get a bicycle, then.’

  She couldn’t hold back a gurgle of amusement. ‘Very sensible.’

  ‘A bicycle will give you freedom.’

  ‘Freedom. I wonder. Pour me another glass of kirsch.’

  They sat side by side, nursing their drinks, like strangers who have arrived at a cocktail party on the wrong night. Living in a crowded house, Coralie’s ears had grown used to constant background noise. Truth be told, she’d never been good with silence, awkward or contemplative. ‘Please tell me that Ottilia’s all right.’

  Dietrich put down his glass and held out his hands, palm up. ‘Do you see blood?’

  ‘Proves nothing. Even Jack the Ripper washed his hands, I should think.’

  He gave a sardonic nod. ‘You have still an answer for every occasion, like the drummer boy clashing a cymbal after the music has stopped.’ He frowned. ‘That was badly constructed, but I spoke not a word of French for three years.’

  ‘Well, you’re in the right place to brush it up.’

  He ignored that too. ‘From boulevard de Clichy, I took Ottilia to the house of somebody I trust. In a day or so, that person will take her to another place of safety. I will learn that location when I need to. It is how these things work.’

  Coralie knew that. Arkady and Florian had been moved around Paris in similar style until the police had stopped looking for them. ‘How was Tilly?’

  ‘Tilly? Oh, Ottilia. Quiet. You had drugged her.’

  ‘No, but . . .’ She mentioned her suspicion that Ottilia had found sleeping tablets in somebody else’s bathroom. ‘And then we made her drink champagne.’

  ‘So. She will sleep, which is the best thing. But why to God did you take her to a nightclub that is a hive of Abwehr and SS?’

  Gulping kirsch was her excuse not to answer. She wasn’t about to divulge machinations, which, in a colder light, felt every bit as ill-advised as Ramon had judged them to be. Had Dietrich not arrived when he had, Ottilia would now be in Gestapo custody. She and Una might be in the neighbouring cell. Their only triumph: to flush Serge Martel out of the shadows.

  ‘Where is your daughter?’

  ‘In bed, I hope.’ She wasn’t going to discuss Noëlle. ‘When you came up the stairs behind me at the Rose Noire, you said, “I can’t save both of you.” May I assume that your intentions towards me are honourable?’

  ‘I would not say that.’

  Without intending it, they’d moved closer. Dietrich touched her jaw, a fingertip pressure that sent a ripple into her stomach. She looked into his eyes, distinguishing the brown flecks from the green and the gold. If she was going to get under his skin . . . Did she want to? No. Not under, against. Dietrich was no more indifferent to her than she was to him. If she were to lean nearer, trace the hard line of his mouth . . . what were the odds that he’d pull her to him and kiss her?

  That was what the old Coralie would have done, but she’d outgrown factory-girl manners. She’d learned how to sit with modest allure. To walk with her hips forward, head high, eyes soft . . . Tempting to put it to the test, to find an excuse to move about the room, but her piano-leg ankle kiboshed that. ‘Your friend Kurt reminded me that we’d met before.’

  ‘He has been through Hell. As have I.’

  He sounded so remorseless, so bitter, that it was easy to re-dress him in his uniform. To remind herself that, during the last war, he’d fired on British pilots, and would doubtless have been doing so in this war had he been a few years younger. They must not become lovers. Innocence had gone. ‘Nice and roomy in here,’ she said, thinking, Tease him. Laugh at him. Remember how he hates it? ‘Heavy job, was it, getting all those crates down the stairs?’

  ‘Are you asking me where the von Silberstrom collection has gone?’

  ‘You can’t blame me for being curious.’

  ‘I don’t. Not for that . . .’ He left the comment dangling. ‘It is safe.’

  ‘Who from?’

  ‘A good question.’ He got up and went to the window. Not to look out: it was pitch dark, shutters and curtains drawn. He was putting space between them. ‘What would you think if I told you that the collection is awaiting inspection by my old comrade, Göring, for his personal acquisition? That what he does not want will be sent to Germany, as a gift to the Führer?’

  ‘I’d think Teddy Clisson was right. That you’re a swindler.’

  ‘Teddy is too kind. What if I were to tell you that all the pieces by Jewish artists and the degenerate works of all races will either be burned or sold to fund the Reich?’

  She stood up, and hot pins burst in her shin. ‘I would remind you of a bookshop on rue de l’Odéon where you told me that, in Germany, they burned copies of A Farewell to Arms because it challenged narrow thinking.’ Had she hit home? Impossible to tell. ‘What about those Dürer engravings Teddy wanted so badly? I suppose they’ve been spirited into safe-keeping.’

  She’d surprised him with the memory. ‘They too are safe,’ he said.

  Staying upright took real determination, but she wanted to say her next words while looking him in the eye. ‘You damn Nazi.’

  Dietrich came towards her, anger in every line, but before he reached her, a knock came, followed by ‘Hello!’

  Another knock, at the door to the room they were in. Coralie suspected Dietrich was grateful for the interruption.

  ‘Komm herein!’

  A man in uniform entered, carrying a tray covered with a white cloth. Dietrich indicated he should take it through to the dining room. After the man had left, he offered his arm to Coralie and said, with a hint of mockery, ‘Shall we go in to dinner? We will be gossiped about, you know. Not because we are together, alone, but because it astonishes German chefs to be asked to cook so late.’

  She’d never been inside the dining room before. It had previously been full of boxes. It was a pleasant room, with striped wallpaper, shutters fixed back, the window open to let in a night breeze. Chairs and the table were of lime-washed wood, a provincial Louis Quinze style similar to some that Teddy Clisson owned. The steward had left the candles unlit, and they agreed to stay in darkness so they could enjoy the open window. Coralie lifted the lid of a chafing dish and what she saw flummoxed her. ‘What are those?’

  ‘Spätzle. They’re Knüdeln. “Noodles”, I think, in English.’

  ‘Dumplings, you mean?’

  ‘Without a dictionary, I couldn’t swear it. They are dropped into boiling water, then cooked in melted butter and I grew up on them.’

  The main part of the meal was a Rouladen, a flank of beef rolled around bacon, dill pickles and a grainy mustard. The vege
table was red cabbage cooked with apple, and the combination of sweet, savoury and sharp was utterly intriguing. Coralie would have cleared her plate twice had she not been wearing a dress with a belt.

  Dietrich had opened a bottle of wine, whose label announced it to be from a vineyard in the Rhône region, near Avignon. Rich and beautifully balanced, it tasted a world away from the vin ordinaire that was all she could buy. Last September’s wine harvest had gone ahead in the regions unaffected by the carnage of battle. France was still a great wine producer, but the Germans were getting the best stuff.

  ‘“Where blind and naked ignorance delivers brawling judgments, unashamed . . .”’

  ‘Hey?’ His words confused her, partly because he’d spoken English.

  ‘Tennyson, The Idylls of the King,’ he elucidated. ‘Did I tell you I studied at Oxford University, as a Rhodes scholar?’

  ‘You didn’t tell me much about yourself at all. Did I tell you I studied at Magdalen College?’

  ‘Magdalen, Oxford?’ Only he pronounced it ‘Maudlin’.

  ‘Magdalen Street, Bermondsey. Let’s see if I can remember something . . . “Don’t Care didn’t care, Don’t Care was wild. Don’t Care stole plum and pear, Like any beggar’s child.” You always used to grow more poetic as the night wore on, I seem to recall.’

  ‘As the night wore on? How will this one end?’

  ‘How would you like it to end?’ Blame the wine, her fingers crept across the table to meet his. It had to be the wine. He was despicable and she didn’t want him.

  And he did not want her, patently, because he left the room. He came back after a few moments with an attaché case, which he put on the table, shooting the clips. Attaché cases were the world’s greatest passion-killers, she thought, after bloomers and dirty nails.

  After closing the blackout curtains and lighting the candles, he took out a letter. ‘You stole from me. I should have taken more care as I had early warning of your habit.’

  She couldn’t deny it. She’d taken a key from his pocket then a letter, the one he placed like an accusation on the table. Even upside down, she recognised the ruler-straight address and the German stamp. Returning to his seat, Dietrich waited for her to speak, hands clasped. The ruby on his middle finger glowed in the candlelight.

  Dodge the opening punch, get a quick one back. Donal’s advice. ‘You broke into my house yesterday. Kicked the doors in.’

  He admitted it without hesitation. ‘You were hiding in the roof.’ At her reaction, a string of swearing, something like laughter rippled through him. ‘You are no Houdini. Where else would you hide? Besides, indents in the hall carpet suggested that an attic ladder had just been pulled up, but the most compelling evidence? Teacups on the table.’

  ‘Maybe I don’t like washing up.’

  ‘But you do like your tea, and in these days of empty shelves, I cannot see you leaving a cup unfinished, unless forced to escape. Had you had let me and Kleber in, we wouldn’t have had to break your locks. We could have taken Ottilia and saved you much distress.’

  ‘Why didn’t you tap on the ceiling?’

  He thought about it. ‘Had I been alone, I would. To get a panicking Ottilia through a hatch safely or with dignity . . . no.’

  ‘Not much care for my dignity when you questioned me at the Lutetia.’ Crossing my legs for hours. ‘You were bloody uncivilised.’ Dangerous words, because she read a matching volatility in Dietrich. Were they to erupt at the same moment—

  Dietrich slid the letter towards her, but kept his hand upon it. ‘Before I forget, you really should not leave the dial to your wireless set at the frequency for Radio Londres. BBC broadcasts are prohibited and the penalty for listening—’

  ‘Is having your ears shot off by firing-squad, I should think. You buggers are making forty new laws a week, but thanks for reminding me about that one.’

  ‘Listen to Radio Paris instead.’

  ‘And put up with Pétain telling us how much in charge he is?’

  ‘It plays perfectly good music.’

  ‘It plays propaganda. We’re supposed to sing “Oh, How We All Love The Germans” to the tune of “Yes, We Have No Bananas”.’

  ‘Shut up, Coralie. This letter, how much did you read?’

  ‘The opening line, “Mein lieber Vater”. No more, I swear it. I don’t even know which of your children sent it. I never got to tell you, but I’d learned a bit of German so I could have had a stab at reading the lot, but it was private. It was yours.’

  ‘And yet you opened it. You have no idea how wrong that was.’ He came to stand beside her, took her face in his hands. She felt the band of his ring at the side of her mouth. Then against her temple. She flinched as he drew out hatpins and removed the dainty hat, turning it in his hands. ‘This is a ridiculous pretension.’

  ‘It’s my living.’

  ‘And you want to live.’

  ‘I have to survive. I have a child.’

  ‘Ah, yes, a child. You want to live for her and you want your child to live.’

  Of course she did!

  ‘And yet you should count your life in hours. Serge Martel knows you are English.’

  She experienced a sensation that was becoming familiar. The constriction of the throat, the feeling of insects crawling through the veins. ‘He only suspects—’

  ‘He knows. We watched you tonight, Kurt and I, from the darkest corner of the club. You, your sophisticated friend and Ottilia, and those Waffen-SS idiots. Martel slithered up to us.’ Dietrich adopted an unctuous tone: ‘“Monsieur le Comte, Herr Kleber, such an honour. How extraordinary, your petite amie is also here. But different tables? No quarrel, I trust?” His breath is a kind of poison. “Is it Mademoiselle’s alien status that is perhaps distasteful to you? How well she hides her English birth, hein?”’

  ‘You must have told him, then. Nobody else ever knew.’

  ‘I have never told, Coralie. It has to be your lapse, your carelessness.’

  ‘So what will you do?’

  ‘Martel hopes I will reward him for silence. He plans a little blackmail, I think. It would solve the problem if I took you to eighty-four avenue Foch myself and turned you over to the Gestapo.’

  ‘You hate me that much?’

  ‘Ten lifetimes could not dispel what I feel towards you.’

  ‘This letter . . . I shouldn’t have opened it . . . No, it was hiding it, wasn’t it? That was the very wrong thing.’

  He returned the letter to the attaché case, shutting the lid with aggressive clicks. ‘Goodnight.’

  She couldn’t get up quickly enough to follow so she turned in her chair. ‘Tell me why.’

  But he was gone, and she was left contemplating the remains of dinner. To her astonishment, she slept deeply that night and woke as the midday sun blared through a gap in the curtains. She found a letter outside her bedroom door.

  rue de Vaugirard, 1 a.m.

  14 July

  * * *

  Dear Coralie

  * * *

  Had I more self-command I would have stayed. Did you really believe I might turn you in to the Gestapo? No, I am not so debased. I doubt Serge Martel will denounce you either, as he perceives you to be under my protection. Should you ever be questioned, I have few qualms, as you stood up well to my interrogation. I am obliged to leave Paris, so have arranged for a car to take you home. Before then I must – I need – to make you understand the grievous wound you inflicted. Be brave enough to take breakfast with me, around eight o’clock.

  * * *

  Dietrich

  Eight o’clock . . . She found her watch. Only four hours too late.

  CHAPTER 23

  La Passerinette reopened on 3 September 1940, a full year after the outbreak of war. The hats Coralie had snatched back from Henriette Junot drew a stampede. She’d added black gauze and feathers to the pink models and her customers were enchanted by this departure from the usual autumn tans and russets. Journalists mingled with clients at the
reopening party. Fewer pages and ersatz paper took away the gloss, but magazines thrummed with the latest ideas and were desperate to tell their readers how to be chic with less.

  As for the doll-hats, Coralie was selling all that the Ginslers could make. The response had initially been cautious, so Coralie had recruited Una, who had not only survived that night at the Rose Noire, but now had a Waffen-SS Sturmführer among her troupe of official admirers. ‘All above board, hands above the table. He will never put a toe over my threshold, and take that how you please.’

  Una had moved back into avenue Foch, picking up the reins of her social life. She was again a leader of fashion and a nursing heroine. Having declared that ‘To wear a hat no larger than a teacake is not only modish but patriotic’, she had established the doll-hat craze in under a week.

  They proved popular with German soldiers, who discovered that they could buy an authentic Paris hat small enough to send home to a wife or lover in the regular mail-transport. Men in uniform queued down boulevard de la Madeleine. At the end of September, Coralie deposited twelve thousand francs at the Crédit Lyonnais bank. One day, she hoped, it would find its way to Ottilia.

  Of Dietrich, she’d heard nothing since finding that letter outside her bedroom door. She guessed that he had taken her absence at breakfast as a slight.

  She thought of him, however, every time she set off to work on her new bicycle. She’d been wobbly at first, horrified to find herself cheek by jowl with cars and vans. The streets were a battle zone, military troop trucks demanding right of way, French vehicles snarling with frustration. Many drivers had attempted to overcome the fuel shortage by converting their vehicles to run on gazogène burners that consumed wood and charcoal and belched out smog. Coralie would carve through the chaos, competing with high-stepping trap-pulling ponies for the bit of space granted to them.

  She found her confidence, however, and soon she was flying the four kilometres between home and shop twice daily. She created her own style à la bicyclette. A short jacket, comfortable culottes, ankle socks, a silk square to keep her hair in place and a hatbox in her front basket. Free advertising. Arkady had attached a klaxon to her handlebars. Friendly shopkeepers would get a toot, and so would German troopers taking breakfast in their Soldatenheime. Coralie was happy – as happy as anyone in hungry Paris could be. She was busy and successful and she felt safe. Even though he was absent, Dietrich had somehow erected a protective screen between her and those who might seek to betray her. Noëlle was thriving in the care of a new nanny, and Coralie had her flat to herself again, Arkady having joined Una at avenue Foch.