Eight

When the call came I was in the process of making a groveling apology to a very upset Mademoiselle Mirabeau.

During the meeting I’d already noticed that the normally so charming assistant editor would not deign to grant me a single look. And even when I really got under way and described a book in such witty terms that even the snooty Michelle Auteuil almost fell off her chair laughing, the lovely blonde didn’t react at all. All my attempts to get her to talk as I walked along the hall with her after the meeting failed. She said “Yes” and “No” and I couldn’t get anything else out of her.

“Come into my office for a moment, please,” I said as we reached the main office.

She nodded and followed me in silence.

“Please.” I pointed to one of the chairs beside the little round conference table. “Take a seat.”

Mademoiselle Mirabeau sat down like an affronted duchess. She folded her arms, crossed her legs, and I couldn’t help noticing the sheer light silk stockings she was wearing under her short skirt.

“Now,” I said jovially. “What’s bugging you? Come on, tell me what’s the matter.”

“Nothing,” she said, and studied the floor as if there was something really fascinating to be discovered there.

It was worse than I’d feared. When women insisted that it was “nothing,” then they were really mad.

“Hm,” I said. “Are you sure about that?”

“Yes,” she said. She had obviously decided to speak to me only in one-word sentences.

“D’you know what, Mademoiselle Mirabeau?”

“No.”

“I don’t believe a word of it.”

Florence Mirabeau just glanced at me before returning her attention to the floorboards.

“Come on, Mademoiselle Mirabeau, don’t be so cruel. Tell old André Chabanais why you’re so upset, otherwise I won’t be able to sleep tonight.”

I noticed that she was suppressing a smile.

“You’re not that old,” she retorted. “And if you can’t sleep, it serves you right.” She pulled at her skirt and I waited. “You said I shouldn’t look so sheepish,” she finally blurted.

“I said that to you? But that’s … monstrous,” I said.

“You did so.” She looked at me for the first time. “You really went for me yesterday when you were on the phone. And I was only trying to bring you that report. You’d said it was urgent and I spent the whole weekend reading and I called off my date specially and I did it all as quickly as I could. And that was all the thanks I got!” That incandescent speech had given her red cheeks. “You really snapped at me.”

Now that she said it, I remembered only too well that agitated telephone conversation with Adam Goldberg, which Mademoiselle Mirabeau had unluckily burst in on.

“Oh, mon Dieu, mon Dieu, I’m sorry.” I looked at the little mimosa sitting in front of me with a reproachful expression. “I’m really sorry,” I repeated emphatically. “I didn’t really mean to get at you, you know, it’s just that I was so worked up…”

“Even so,” she said.

“No, no.” I raised both hands. “That’s not meant to be an excuse. I promise to improve. Really. Will you forgive me?”

I looked ruefully at her. She lowered her eyes and the corners of her mouth twitched as she jiggled her shapely leg.

“As an apology, I’ll offer you…”—I leaned over thoughtfully in her direction—“a raspberry tart. How about it? Would you permit me to invite you to a raspberry tart in the Ladurée tomorrow lunchtime?”

She smiled. “You’re in luck,” she said. “I absolutely adore raspberry tarts.”

“Can I take it from that that you’re not mad at me anymore?”

“Yes, you can.” Florence Mirabeau stood up. “Then I’ll go and get the report,” she said in a conciliatory tone.

“Yes, do that!” I said. “Wonderful! I can hardly wait!” I stood up to accompany her to the door.

“You don’t have to exaggerate, Monsieur Chabanais. I’m just doing my job.”

“And let me tell you something, Mademoiselle Mirabeau, you do your job extremely well.”

“Oh,” she said. “Thank you. It’s nice of you to say that. Monsieur Chabanais, I…” She blushed again and stood hesitantly by the door as if she had something else to say.

“Yes?” I asked.

And then the telephone rang. I didn’t want to be rude again, and so I stood still instead of shoving Florence Mirabeau out of the room and throwing myself at the desk.

After the third ring Mademoiselle Mirabeau said, “Do go and pick it up, perhaps it’s important.”

She smiled and disappeared through the door. Pity: Now I’d probably never find out what it was she had been going to say. But Florence Mirabeau had been right about one thing …

That call was important.

I recognized the voice at once. I would have recognized it among a thousand other voices. As she had the first time, she sounded a little breathless, like someone who had just run up a flight of stairs.

“Is that Monsieur André Chabanais?” she asked.

“It is,” I replied, and leaned back in my seat with a broad grin. The fish had bitten.

Aurélie Bredin was enthusiastic about my offer to help her to meet Robert Miller “by chance,” and questions one to three of her rather caustic e-mail to the unfriendly editor at Éditions Opale seemed to have been forgotten for the moment.

“What a fantastic idea!” she said.

I also found my idea fantastic, but I obviously kept that to myself. “Well, it’s not all that fantastic but … it’s not bad,” I said.

“This is really incredibly nice of you, Monsieur Chabanais,” Aurélie Bredin continued, and I basked in my sudden importance as a go-between.

“Il n’y a pas de quoi. You’re welcome,” I said. “I’m just glad to be of service.”

She said nothing for a moment.

“And I thought you were a grumpy old editor who kept everyone away from his author,” she said apologetically. “I hope you’ll forgive me.”

Triumph, triumph! This was obviously the day for apologies.

Admittedly, I wasn’t being offered raspberry tart, but I have to admit I’m not that keen on it. Aurélie Bredin’s feelings of remorse tasted immeasurably sweeter.

“But my dear Mademoiselle Bredin, I couldn’t possibly hold anything against you even if I wanted to. After all, I haven’t exactly shown myself from my best side. Let us forget the whole unfortunate beginning and concentrate on our little plan.” I rolled up to my desk on my office chair and opened my diary.

Two minutes later the matter had been arranged. Aurélie Bredin would turn up at half past seven on Friday evening in La Coupole, where I’d reserved a table in my name, and we’d have a drink together. At about eight Robert Miller (with whom I ostensibly had an appointment to discuss his new book) would also arrive, and there’d be plenty of opportunity to get to know one another.

I’d dithered a moment over the choice of restaurant.

A small intimate restaurant with cozy, red plush seats like Le Belier would obviously have been more suitable for my real purposes than the famous Coupole—that big, lively brasserie that was full every evening. But on the other hand it would have seemed a bit strange to be meeting an English author in a place that seemed to have been made just for lovers.

La Coupole was innocuous, and since the author was never going to turn up I thought I’d have a better chance of continuing the evening in the company of the capricious Mademoiselle Bredin if the restaurant was not too romantic.

“In La Coupole?” she asked, and I could hear immediately that her enthusiasm was not unbounded. “Do you really want to go to that tourist trap?”

“Miller suggested it,” I said. “He has something to do in Montparnasse beforehand, and anyway he loves La Coupole.” (I would also have preferred Le Temps des Cerises, but I obviously couldn’t say that.)

“He loves La Coupole?” Her irritation was audible.

“Yes, well, he is English,” I said. “He thinks La Coupole is great. He says that that brasserie always makes him … cheerful because it is so lively and bright.”

“Aha,” was all that Mademoiselle Bredin had to say to that.

“He’s also a great fan of the fabuleux curry d’agneau des Indes,” I added, finding that I sounded most convincing.

“The famous Indian lamb curry?” Mademoiselle Bredin said. “I’ve never heard of that. Is it really that good?”

“No idea,” I replied. “You as a chef will probably be better able to judge than most people. And Robert Miller found it absolutely superb the last time he was here. After every mouthful he said, ‘Delicious, absolutely delicious.’ But the English aren’t exactly spoiled when it comes to cuisine—you know, fish and chips! I imagine they go totally overboard when someone puts some curry and some grated coconut in the food, hahaha.” I wished Goldberg could have heard me at that moment.

Aurélie Bredin didn’t laugh. “I thought Robert Miller loved French cuisine.” She obviously felt that her honor as a chef was being impugned.

“Well, you can ask him all about that yourself,” I replied, in order not to have to discuss our author’s culinary predilections any further. I doodled a line of little triangles in my diary with a ballpoint.

“Has Monsieur Miller actually received your letter now?”

“I think so. But I haven’t had an answer yet, if that’s what you wanted to know.” She sounded a little piqued.

“I’m sure he’ll write to you,” I said. “At the latest after he’s met you in person on Friday.”

“What do you mean by that?”

“That you are a totally enchanting young woman whose charm no man could resist for long—not even an unworldly English writer.”

She laughed. “You’re bad, Monsieur Chabanais, do you know that?”

“Yes, I know,” I replied. “Worse than you think.”