The Velvet Hours (8 page)

“Are you joking, Alex?”

“No, Papa. Not at all. Here, come take a look.”

His father could hardly contain his excitement. He extended his hand for me to shake. “Let me first introduce myself, Bernard Armel, bookseller and Alex's father . . . and you are?”

“Solange Beaugiron.”

“A beautiful name, for a beautiful girl,” he said as he approached the table where the two books were laid out. Immediately he began examining them with careful hands.

I watched spellbound as Monsieur Armel made great effort to minimize how much he touched the pages and how he handled the
book delicately, to prevent placing any unnecessary stress on the binding. He squinted as he looked over the mysterious Hebrew writing and made a few grunted sounds, as if he were confirming something to which only he knew the answer.

He spent only a few minutes looking at the book that was printed in Venice. It was the Haggadah that had evidently captured his interest.

“Where did you get these two books?” I noticed right away a change in his voice, like a musician's note that had slipped off-key. It no longer had even the slightest hint of playful flirtation. Rather, a sense of suspicion now threaded through his words.

“They were my maternal grandfather's,” I said, and my voice surprised me with its air of defiance. But I suddenly felt on the defensive.

“Your grandfather was Moishe Cohen?”

He stood silently for a few seconds before I responded.

“Yes,” I answered again firmly.

“Incredible.”

I watched as Alex's eyes focused on me. The energy had now shifted within the room. I felt like I was no longer a stranger, but someone with a connection to them and their community. Like a lost suitcase that had miraculously washed ashore.

“I knew him.”

“You did?” My heart leapt inside my chest.

“Yes, quite well, in fact. It's a small circle of people who are in the business of selling rare books, and even smaller with rare Jewish ones.

“Your grandfather had a gift for discovering many hidden treasures scattered throughout Europe. He was immensely respected within the field and within our community here.”

I held on to Monsieur Armel's every word as he spoke, for I knew almost nothing about my maternal grandfather.

“After Moishe died, I bought his whole collection. Or at least I thought it was his entire collection . . .” Alex's father said. “Actually, I bought everything directly from your mother.

“Your grandfather showed me this Haggadah only once, and I always wondered who had bought it . . .” He pointed to the book that Alex and I had just been looking at together. “It's so rare and valuable, I knew he was offering it for a price few people could afford. But I would have taken great pains to buy it as an investment.”

“Well, he didn't sell them,” I said, my voice now softening. “My mother took them for herself when he died.”

“Your mother . . .” His voice again changed to another key. This one almost wistful.

He looked up from the table and began to study me, scanning my features as though he recognized something familiar in them. “You have her eyes. That beautiful gray-green that shifts in the light.” His voice drifted for a moment.

“She was a beauty like you, and when she married your father, she shattered your grandfather's heart.”

*   *   *

He closed the Haggadah and placed the other book beside it. “Let's return to these in a bit . . .”

I smiled at him. Within only minutes of meeting him, I could see both the clinical expert and the warm father he was to Alex.

“Alex, why don't you prepare a pot of tea for us. Bring over those little cookies Solomon's wife baked for us this morning.”

“Yes, Papa,” Alex said. He smiled as he stood to oblige his father's request.

Until that moment, I hadn't noticed the discreet counter with the single burner and sink tucked into the far side of the room. I watched out of the corner of my eye as Alex filled the kettle with water and began to prepare the tea.

“Come.” Monsieur Armel motioned for me to go to the desk where Alex had first been sitting when I arrived. “I'll clear these papers and bring two more chairs.”

I followed him as he arranged the desk into a makeshift table with chairs. Then I sat down.

Alex arrived with a tray containing a plate of cookies and a pot of tea.

“At your service,” he joked as he placed down the tray. He poured the tea into three ceramic cups and then took a seat himself.

“Please take one, Solange,” his father said, moving the plate of cookies closer to me.

I smiled. They were the type of cookies I had always associated with my mother. In better times, one could always taste the luxurious taste of butter running through them. But the thumbprint of plum jam in the center was something that was typical in her baking. Now I wondered if there were other small things she did that had gone unnoticed by me, gestures she did privately in order to keep the connection to her past alive, even if only for herself.

Alex's father smiled as I nibbled at the cookie.

“May I ask, Solange, did your mother share any stories with you about your grandfather, or her life in the Marais before she married your father?”

I shook my head no.

“I suspected as such . . .” A small sigh escaped from his lips. “It was probably not easy for her to talk about her family, after what happened once she married your father.

“The last time I saw your mother, she was pregnant with you, and she had sought me out to sell some of her father's inventory. She was his only heir, and even though he had disowned her while he was living, he left everything to her at the time of his death.”

He studied me. “She couldn't have been more than a few years older than you are now.”

I bit my lip. It was a bittersweet thought to imagine
Maman
at the cusp of motherhood.

“She came to me first, because she knew I had been your grandfather's friend for years. And I told her I'd buy everything from
her . . . How funny she didn't answer me when I inquired about the Barcelona Haggadah. Now over twenty years later, I know why. She had kept it for herself all along.”

“I don't think she would have sold it for any price,” I said in her defense. “My mother kept things that were precious to her for reasons that transcended money.” I lowered my eyes. “Though I'm sure she knew it was worth quite a bit of money . . .”

“I would have paid handsomely for it,” he told me. “The
Yisrael Zemirot
is valuable, but certainly not as much as the Barcelona Haggadah. It's priceless for many reasons. It's not just the age and rarity of the book, it's also the story of the people who created it.”

I raised an eyebrow.

“It's absolutely extraordinary to be able to see this book resurface again after all these years. As I mentioned before, your grandfather showed it to me only once. I had heard a rumor that he had somehow come to own it, and I hounded him for months before he finally agreed to show it to me. That said, he always kept the story on how he acquired the Barcelona Haggadah shrouded in mystery.”

I gazed at the table with the two books I had brought to the Armels' shop. I had always suspected they were worth a bit of money, but I was even more grateful to learn more about my mother.

“You have no idea how interesting the story is about how this book was created. It wasn't just conceived as a prayer book for Passover, but as a project between two people in love.”

Alex turned his head and looked at me. I could sense that both of us were about to hear a story that even he had never heard before.

“This particular Haggadah was written by a Sephardic rabbi and illustrated by his wife in the fourteenth century. The couple produced only one book in their lifetime, and it's the one in your possession.” He paused for a moment before continuing.

“Rabbi Avram had a master calligraphic hand, and his wife had considerable artistic talent, particularly in painting. Early on in their
marriage, they conceived of an idea of doing a Haggadah together. Rabbi Avram would write the story of Passover and the prayers as they were handed down over the centuries, and his wife would paint the illustrations. It took them over twenty years to finish it.”

He opened it to one of the pages with the painted border of birds and lions. The heavy parchment was stained in places, and some of the gold leaf that had been used was almost completely gone, but the wife's talent was clear.

As Alex's father told the story of this Haggadah's unique conception, I imagined the rabbi writing with his wife working alongside him, doing the illustrations with her brushes and paint, so many years ago. It was a magical and mystical image.

Monsieur Armel closed the book and then carefully lifted it. “Can you imagine working on a single book for twenty years?”

I shook my head.

“Well this book is almost four hundred years old. So when you think of it, twenty years is not so long to make something that has withstood all these centuries of turmoil, wars, and the perpetual threat of floods and fire,” he explained.

“But it's like the Jewish people. It continues to go on, even though each century threatens to extinguish it.”

I felt a shudder pass through me.

“Did your mother ever tell you that she was Jewish, Solange?”

I felt my stomach turn inside.

“She only told me a few months before she died,” I answered, my voice almost inaudible. I knew I had nothing to be embarrassed about with the Armels, and yet a sense of shame flooded over me.

Alex's eyes fell downward. “With Hitler, now perhaps it's not very good timing . . . to learn this news.”

His father made a look of disgust. “Hitler.” He shook his head. “He is what we now must fear, more than the bombs and trenches of another war. He wants to extinguish every last one of us.”

I made a pained face.

“I'm sorry . . .” Alex's father tried to smooth over my obvious discomfort. “It's just that Solomon tells us terrible things. Things he hears leaked out from Germany.” He let out another loud sigh.

“I suppose we must just try to be hopeful that France really does stand by
liberté, égalité
and
fraternité
,” I said.

Alex took the last sip of his tea. “It's nice to be surrounded by a woman's optimism, right, Papa?”

Monsieur Armel smiled.

“My mother passed away some time ago. So it's just the two of us now.”

“Just like me and my father,” I said.

Alex nodded. “It's good to have someone in our shop that is not telling us to prepare for gloom and doom. Unfortunately, as my father alluded, Solomon has told us that we have much to fear if the Germans enter France.”

I shuddered. It wasn't solely the Jews that feared a German occupation. All of France feared it. Even those who were not alive during the First World War heard stories about the cruelty and barbarity of the German army.

“I have to think the French army will do everything in their power to stave off an invasion. Plus, we've spent all these years preparing the Maginot Line of defense,” I offered. “Surely that will help us.”

Alex opened his hands. “We can only pray that you are right, Solange.”

*   *   *

The talk of Hitler had unnerved each of us. Despite Alex's filling both his father's and my cups with more tea, none of us touched another cookie or took another sip.

I could feel a growing knot in my stomach after our discussion and decided it was time to return home. I thanked both Alex and
his father, then walked back toward the worktable and let Alex rewrap the books in fresh brown paper.

“We assume you are not interested in selling these,” Monsieur Armel said with understanding.

I nodded. At this point, I would not sell them for all the money in the world. My mother had her reasons for not selling them, and I would honor her wishes. And although I could not read the Hebrew or understand the layers of history that Alex and his father saw in these two rare books, for me it was still a thread that bound me deeply to her.

As I walked home that afternoon with the sunlight on my hair and the books clutched even tighter to my chest, I felt my mother's spirit deep within me. I heard her voice, and saw her face fluttering before me. I had learned another chapter of her life today by bringing her books to Alex and his father. And her words, that “every book has a journey all its own,” echoed in my ears.

Paris 1898

T
hey never spoke of his illness. Charles had made it clear to her that, no matter how much time remained for him, he did not want to spend it dwelling upon his declining health.

Marthe had now spent a decade with Charles as his exclusive lover. She had become an expert at maintaining the beautiful illusion he so loved. But whereas it was easy to re-create herself with silks and satins, or further refine herself with the collection of art and porcelains, it was far more of a struggle for her to silence her growing concerns about him.

His malaise had become the white elephant in the room. And although Charles refused to discuss it, his physical deterioration was undeniable. Marthe felt it constantly—whether they were sitting in her parlor or wrapped in each other's arms in her bed. His illness was overtaking him.

He no longer possessed his insatiable hunger for her. He moved more slowly and she sensed his need to conserve his energy. Where there had once been athleticism in their amorous entangles, now there was a palpable fatigue.

His illness proved a challenge to Marthe. Her entire adult life she had cultivated ways to banish life's unpleasantries from her mind. But Charles's sickness was not something that could be forgotten by shutting one's eyes tightly. It remained a shadowy presence that, as much as she tried, she could not keep from penetrating the walls of her apartment.

His eyes were jaundiced most of the time. His lips chapped and cracked. Even his beautiful skin now appeared ashen to her.

Sometimes she felt herself unable to remain muted, no matter how much he insisted it wasn't something he wished to discuss.

“I come here to forget the outside world . . . to be with you.”

“But it's not the outside world when it concerns you . . . your health.” She was trying desperately not to cry, but her voice was cracking.

“What will happen to me when you go?”

“You still have your youth, my sweet girl,” he said, though Marthe was approaching her thirty-fourth year. “You only need to walk on the Champs-Élysées or by Eiffel's tower of steel, and some rogue will snatch you up for sure.”

“I don't want just any rogue.” She lowered her eyes. “I only want you.” Around her neck was his necklace. She almost never took it off.

His finger reached for the butterfly clasp that had fallen forward, and touched it lightly.

“You already have the best of me, Marthe. You own my heart.”

She could feel herself starting to unravel. The first sign was the tears. She would do anything not to come undone in front of him. She had bitten her lip so hard when Louise Franeau had carried off
Henri, she had cut right through her skin. And now she could taste the blood again on her tongue.

She was afraid if she spoke any more, her voice would betray her. He had treated her more kindly than perhaps anyone ever had. Marthe knew that her situation could have turned out very differently with him, when she first came under his wing. She was aware of men who simply paid by “the visit” to certain women of notable beauty and charm. Paris had a whole hierarchy for women of pleasure from the highest-paid courtesans to the girls at the lowest brothel. Marthe was lucky she hadn't ended up like so many of those poor girls, for most of them had childhoods much like her own.

But Charles had treated her as generously and as kindly as he possibly could. He had denied her nothing. The only thing he had asked in return was for her to respect their arrangement. To not interfere with his life with Émilienne. And to open her arms for him when he needed her love.

*   *   *

The thought of losing Charles plagued her. Even with the pearl necklace as financial security, she could not imagine her life without him. She needed him to get well.

“The pocket watch,” she whispered. He reached into his coat, handing it to her as he did with each visit. The gold casing was now worn with its own patina. Clutched between her own fingers, she wondered if Charles often held it in his closed palm, the memory of her washing over him as the metal warmed in his hand.

She opened it to reveal the dial, the hands locked in the position from the last time he lay in her arms. “Are you going now?”

“Yes, my dove. Émilienne is already waiting for me.”

She fought back her tears to look at him with clear eyes. She saw past the yellow in his eyes, the sallow of his cheeks. Without a sound,
she began to turn the small dial to adjust the watch's hour and minute hands to the time of the clock on her mantel.

“Time will stand still until then.” She placed the watch down on the table and, softly, brought his hand to her cheek, before kissing it and closing it shut. How she wished he could keep her kisses contained in the well of his clenched hand.