get to the hotel.”
Le Gare du Nord loomed
into sight while Chris and Amélie were sleeping. He had Gabriella Dixon’s
mobile number and address in London and Paris on his phone. Lying on his chest,
his daughter smelled of the woman’s woody perfume which mingled rather
pleasantly with her usual scent of Johnson’s baby products. He half-dreamt of her
taking him by the hand, telling him everything was alright in a peremptory but
comforting tone. He peered at her through his eyelashes, while she concentrated
on her work screen; absent-mindedly scratching her neck where one wisp of pale
hair kept irritating her skin.
It occurred to him that she either hoped or assumed he wasn’t
‘attached’ to Amélie’s ‘mum in Paris’: intuition or simply the bold gambit of
the modern woman? She was attractive, if a little buttoned-up; and he could
easily imagine her naked - smooth- limbed as a mannequin - and mollified by a
few glasses of good wine. He wanted to be moved, excited at the prospect of a
clandestine meeting with Gabriella Dixon in a European city, but he felt the
fingernails of doubt and disappointment sinking into his flesh, bringing him
fully to his senses.
“Perhaps we can share a taxi?”
she asked him on the platform, as passengers alighted with their luggage and
began to stream past them into the busy station. “Where are you going?”
“My wife is picking me up. It
was lovely to meet you,” he replied, unable to meet her gaze but touching her
lightly on the small of her back.
Her footsteps slowed beside them as he wheeled Amélie
resolutely away into Paris.
Chapter Twelve
Chris pointed to the Rue Saint Georges on his pocket map and gave the taxi driver instructions in English:
satisfied that he had had a stab in French, but had been met with a blank look
and the response: “Anglais?”
After about twenty minutes, the
driver’s incessant muttering and covert whistling made Chris suspicious that he
and Amélie were being taken on a circuitous, costly route:
“I’m thinking anywhere here
will do,” he said, firmly, when twenty minutes had elapsed and he hadn’t
recognised any of the street names on his map. “ Arretez ici, s’il vous plait!”
“No, no, we are near,” replied
the driver, who brought his cigarette arm back in through the window, performed
a swift U-turn amidst a cacophony of blaring horns and steered them down a side
street: to Chris’s relief the Rue Saint Georges.
The metre displayed a fee of
seventeen Euros: feeling it was within his moral rights to play the witless
tourist that he had been cast, Chris proffered fifteen:
“Sorry. It’s all I have.
Merci,” and he, Amélie and their luggage hastily scrabbled out of the taxi.
Their hotel was a smart
Parisian townhouse situated near a Metro station. They climbed a few steps into a
tiled reception area with an elaborate wooden desk and a revolving plastic
stand bedecked with Tourist Information leaflets: everything from bateaux trips
on the Seine to evenings of glamour and enticement at the Moulin Rouge . Chris browsed through the
display while he waited for the concierge to come off the telephone.
“Ah, you must be Mr Chris
Skinner from London!” the latter cried. He was a tall, rotund Frenchman in a
brocade waistcoat, with black oily curls and a beard. He wore spectacles with
unfashionably thick lenses that didn’t flatter his lively blue eyes and
generally hospitable physiognomy. They shook hands warmly.
“And the baby Englishman?”
“English woman. In fact, half French woman.”
“Splendid! This explains why
she is not quite as ugly as you.”
A couple of chamber maids who
had been lurking in a doorway behind the desk smirked at each other and made a
giggly exit.
“They find me funny, Mr
Skinner,” said the concierge, who was, in fact, Paul Bénard, the owner of the
hotel. “But not so much when I deduct their wages for insubordination! ” This he shouted for
the girls to hear, and,
Le Gare du Nord loomed
into sight while Chris and Amélie were sleeping. He had Gabriella Dixon’s
mobile number and address in London and Paris on his phone. Lying on his chest,
his daughter smelled of the woman’s woody perfume which mingled rather
pleasantly with her usual scent of Johnson’s baby products. He half-dreamt of her
taking him by the hand, telling him everything was alright in a peremptory but
comforting tone. He peered at her through his eyelashes, while she concentrated
on her work screen; absent-mindedly scratching her neck where one wisp of pale
hair kept irritating her skin.
It occurred to him that she either hoped or assumed he wasn’t
‘attached’ to Amélie’s ‘mum in Paris’: intuition or simply the bold gambit of
the modern woman? She was attractive, if a little buttoned-up; and he could
easily imagine her naked - smooth- limbed as a mannequin - and mollified by a
few glasses of good wine. He wanted to be moved, excited at the prospect of a
clandestine meeting with Gabriella Dixon in a European city, but he felt the
fingernails of doubt and disappointment sinking into his flesh, bringing him
fully to his senses.
“Perhaps we can share a taxi?”
she asked him on the platform, as passengers alighted with their luggage and
began to stream past them into the busy station. “Where are you going?”
“My wife is picking me up. It
was lovely to meet you,” he replied, unable to meet her gaze but touching her
lightly on the small of her back.
Her footsteps slowed beside them as he wheeled Amélie
resolutely away into Paris.
Chapter Twelve
Chris pointed to the Rue Saint Georges on his pocket map and gave the taxi driver instructions in English:
satisfied that he had had a stab in French, but had been met with a blank look
and the response: “Anglais?”
After about twenty minutes, the
driver’s incessant muttering and covert whistling made Chris suspicious that he
and Amélie were being taken on a circuitous, costly route:
“I’m thinking anywhere here
will do,” he said, firmly, when twenty minutes had elapsed and he hadn’t
recognised any of the street names on his map. “ Arretez ici, s’il vous plait!”
“No, no, we are near,” replied
the driver, who brought his cigarette arm back in through the window, performed
a swift U-turn amidst a cacophony of blaring horns and steered them down a side
street: to Chris’s relief the Rue Saint Georges.
The metre displayed a fee of
seventeen Euros: feeling it was within his moral rights to play the witless
tourist that he had been cast, Chris proffered fifteen:
“Sorry. It’s all I have.
Merci,” and he, Amélie and their luggage hastily scrabbled out of the taxi.
Their hotel was a smart
Parisian townhouse situated near a Metro station. They climbed a few steps into a
tiled reception area with an elaborate wooden desk and a revolving plastic
stand bedecked with Tourist Information leaflets: everything from bateaux trips
on the Seine to evenings of glamour and enticement at the Moulin Rouge . Chris browsed through the
display while he waited for the concierge to come off the telephone.
“Ah, you must be Mr Chris
Skinner from London!” the latter cried. He was a tall, rotund Frenchman in a
brocade waistcoat, with black oily curls and a beard. He wore spectacles with
unfashionably thick lenses that didn’t flatter his lively blue eyes and
generally hospitable physiognomy. They shook hands warmly.
“And the baby Englishman?”
“English woman. In fact, half French woman.”
“Splendid! This explains why
she is not quite as ugly as you.”
A couple of chamber maids who
had been lurking in a doorway behind the desk smirked at each other and made a
giggly exit.
“They find me funny, Mr
Skinner,” said the concierge, who was, in fact, Paul Bénard, the owner of the
hotel. “But not so much when I deduct their wages for insubordination! ” This he shouted for
the girls to hear, and,
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