Coco at the Ritz, page 25
“Am I on trial for being unpleasant?” Coco looked hard at the Interrogator. What had happened in his life, what sorrows had he endured, to make him so angry?
“This morning, when you looked in your shaving mirror, what did you see?” she asked. “In the middle of last night, when you couldn’t sleep, what did you think about?” Coco had a genius for detecting weakness, and she was not surprised to see pain ripple across the Interrogator’s face. In a moment, though, it shifted into an angry glare.
“I thought about you,” he said, nodding toward the window and the square beyond. “Down there with the other German whores.”
The Interrogator licked his thumb and ran it through a sheaf of papers from one of his files. When he found what he was looking for, he stopped and read a note pinned to the top of the page. “Did you enjoy yourself at the Abetzes’ French party?” he asked.
Coco winced at the thought of having to defend her attendance at that dismal event. “Contrary to what you think, I did not like associating with Germans. Besides, it was a stupid party.”
“Why did you go?”
“I felt an obligation to Spatz, to others. Remember, my nephew owed his freedom, his life, to Spatz.”
Unmoved, the Interrogator continued examining his notes, flipping from one page to another. It struck Coco suddenly that he wasn’t actually reading the materials, but just nervously shuffling papers around. “You ate dinner every week at Bignon’s, the Nazis’ favorite bistro,” he said.
“It’s a public place, for God’s sake.”
The Interrogator leaned across the table toward her. “Here’s what you don’t understand,” he said. “In your world of luxury, of parties and restaurants, there was no war. You laughed and drank champagne that Nazis sent to your table. You raised your glass to them across the room and invited them to come to your boutique for perfume. You were one of them.”
“Nonsense!”
“Really?” The Interrogator sat back, an amused expression on his face. “I myself have seen you saluting the Germans with a raised champagne glass.”
“Were you at the Abetzes’ dinner, too?” Coco’s voice was hard with sarcasm.
“You should be careful what you say when dining out.”
Coco stared hard at him.
The Interrogator bowed his head deferentially. “Would Mademoiselle care for dessert?” he asked.
Coco’s eyes opened wide in a flash of recognition. “My God! The waiter! I knew I’d seen you before.” The Interrogator’s now-huge mustache hid half his face. If he’d been clean-shaven, she would have recognized him easily.
Coco shivered, as her evenings with Spatz at Bignon’s came flooding back. The dark paneling and burgundy flocked wallpaper, the waiter hovering, standing too close to their table, listening to their conversations. Then she remembered who she was and drew herself up. “Is this all because I sent a fork back?”
The Interrogator smirked.
“You were a terrible waiter,” Coco said.
“I’m no longer in that line of work.”
Coco recalled the many times she’d been rude to this man at Bignon’s. He was punishing her for her arrogance as much as anything, she was sure. That and her relationship with Spatz.
“Do you think arresting me is going to win you the Legion of Honor?”
“I am simply a patriot.”
“You think I’m not?”
“I love my country.”
“You think I don’t? I’ve spent my life here. In my work, I’ve drawn on all I know, all I love about France, her traditions, her beauty, her elegance, and I revolutionized one of her great arts. I tapped what was in me, what I was born with, what my country had made of me. I am France!”
Shouts rose from the courtyard. The boy jumped to the window and looked out.
“What’s going on?” asked the Interrogator.
“I don’t know. I can hear people arguing, but I can’t see them.” The boy started for the door.
“No,” said the Interrogator. He hunched his shoulders and tugged on the cuffs of his shirt as he stood. “I’ll go.”
When he’d gone, Coco turned to the boy. “Who is this mysterious major?”
“I don’t know. He’s in the Central Office. I’ve never met him.”
“He sounds like a reasonable man,” said Coco softly. “I heard you talking about him when your friends brought me in. He wanted you to wait for him, didn’t he?”
The boy shuffled his feet nervously.
“When he finds out you didn’t wait, you’ll be in trouble.”
“I’ve been taking my orders from Serge.”
“The major is his superior, true?”
The boy looked at Coco but said nothing.
“I don’t trust your boss, do you?”
“I don’t know.…”
“They’re looking for your uncle. What do you think the FFI will do to Antoine Lebel when they find him?” Coco leaned back in her chair and regarded the boy through lowered eyelids. His face contorted with worry. “I think you should call the major and stop this travesty before it gets out of hand. Do you have his number?”
Coco reached for the phone, picked up the receiver, and held it out to the boy. “Make the call,” she said. “I think the major will appreciate your loyalty, and it could help your uncle. And once I’m out of this place, I’ll do my best to help as well.”
The boy remained fixed in his seat.
“Tell me,” Coco said in the soft tone she’d used with her nephew when he was young. “How did you end up working in this place? I imagine you growing up in a quiet town with nice parents.”
Like a guilty child, he leaned forward in his chair and poured out the story of how he ended up with the FFI in Paris. “At home, the most dangerous thing I did for the Resistance was join a raid on the town hall. I was given a rifle and told to stand lookout while the leader of the cell and a group of other Resisters broke the lock on the front door. They stole a few identity cards and ration tickets.
“Then one day after the Liberation, a group of fighters who’d been hiding out in the woods showed up at our farm. My mother fed them and put them up for the night. The next day I drove with them to Paris. We ended up at the Prefecture, where I ran into Serge on the stairs. He asked me if I could take notes, and here I am.”
Coco crushed the tip of her cigarette with her shoe and pushed it into the pile of butts on the floor. The smoky mess of ash and white stumps ringed in red lipstick revolted her, and she felt her stomach turn. “Can you get me a glass of water?”
During her working days, that simple request made during the pose in her studio had always struck terror in her seamstresses and mannequins. She’d never been known to ask for a glass of water when she was pleased with their work. The request for water was always a precursor to a litany of complaints about crooked pleats and ill-fitting sleeves, about too-wide hems and too-narrow seams.
The door opened, and the Interrogator strode in. He’d heard her request.
“No water,” he said without looking at Coco as he took his seat behind the table.
“What? This enormous building, and there’s no water?”
“You can have some when we bring you down.”
The longer the Interrogator refused to look at her, the more Coco babbled on. “Doesn’t anyone ever clean this place up? How difficult is it to mop the floors? On my way in I saw a heap of garbage in the entrance mixed with human hair.” She lit another cigarette and talked around it. “Why punish women for behaving foolishly in love—something we’ve all been guilty of at least once in our lives? It’s men who commit the atrocities of war. Look at what the Resistance did at Bignon’s. Maybe you’d understand, if you’d been there and seen it.”
The Interrogator looked up with an expression of smug satisfaction. “I planned it.”
Coco pulled the cigarette from her mouth and stared at him. This stiff former waiter constantly shuffling through his files didn’t seem capable of planning a road trip vacation, let alone a terrorist attack. But he had access to the reservation log. He knew when the German officers were coming in. She wasn’t surprised he’d botched the job, with so many innocents killed.
“You’re a murderer!” she cried.
The Interrogator sneered. “I killed Nazis. I didn’t fuck them.”
Coco turned away sharply. The Interrogator continued. “Someone informed, and the Nazis arrested me. Your friend von Dincklage was there in the townhouse where they’d brought me. He didn’t see me, but I recognized him when they led me past the salon where he was talking and laughing with his friends. On the top floor, there were cells where they questioned and tortured prisoners.”
“Spatz would never torture anyone,” said Coco. She drew on her cigarette and expelled a lungful of smoke.
“No, he was too refined. He left that to others. They beat me so I could hardly stand. They wanted me to tell them where my colleagues were.”
“Did you?”
“I didn’t tell them a thing.”
“I see you survived.”
“I escaped.”
“You escaped from a Nazi torture chamber?”
“They were so pleased with their savagery that they forgot to lock the door. I got out down the fire escape.”
Coco regarded the Interrogator with an expression of stunned disbelief. She drew a deep breath, then laughed. “You fool! They let you escape. They followed you, and you led them to your colleagues.”
The Interrogator’s hands tightened into fists, and his jaw clenched.
Coco sensed her advantage now and pressed. “The Nazis probably killed them all. It’s a wonder they didn’t kill you.”
Trembling, the boy asked, “Serge, there was a farmhouse of Resisters in Sarlat who all got shot. And your fiancée, Valentine—wasn’t she there, too?”
“Shut up!” the Interrogator screamed.
“So, you’re responsible for the death of your own fiancée? And how many others?” Coco said sharply.
“We were at war!”
“I didn’t kill anyone.”
His face red with rage, the Interrogator reached across the table, grabbed Coco by the hair, and jerked her head toward the files on his desk. “These are the innocent deaths,” he cried. “Tens of thousands. Murdered by people like you who lived high while the Nazis crushed our country.”
Coco struggled to pull free. She gripped the edge of the table and twisted her shoulders. After a protracted struggle, the Interrogator released her with one sharp yank of his arm. Coco fell back into her chair.
The Interrogator was still standing, leaning over her with a murderous look. “It’s all here—your betrayal, your treachery, your corruption. Your guilt. You fucked the enemy and you liked it.”
“How dare you speak to me like that.”
Coco rose to her feet again. She wanted to slap the Interrogator hard across the face, but he lunged for her throat.
“Stop it, Serge!” The boy shoved the Interrogator, who stumbled backward, then righted himself, teetering from side to side.
Suddenly, the door creaked open, and the lawyer Michel Pelissier stepped into the room. “What’s this?” he demanded.
Coco was astonished to see him. “Michel! My God, what are you doing here?”
“Are you the major?” cried the boy.
“That’s right,” said Pelissier.
He nodded to Coco and turned to the Interrogator, who was rubbing his chin. “What’s going on? I was to question her, not you. And those women downstairs? You heard the orders. The head shaving is to stop! This comes straight from Colonel Rol-Tanguy. Haven’t you seen the posters all over town? There are reprisals for soldiers who disobey his orders.”
“I didn’t know,” the Interrogator told Pelissier. He covered his mouth with his hand, as if to hide his lie.
Pelissier spoke sharply. “We’re not barbarians. We have more civilized ways to deal with collaborators. Once the government has been reestablished, we’ll have courts for official trials.”
Sweat beaded the Interrogator’s face. Coco noticed that under the table, his knees were shaking.
As Pelissier took Coco’s hands in his and kissed her on each cheek, her expression relaxed into a smile. She felt tears coming and tried to hold them back, but they overflowed in a single burst. “What are you doing with these salauds?” she cried.
“My dear Coco, these are good men,” said Pelissier. He removed a handkerchief from his pocket and gave it to Coco. She wiped her eyes. Pelissier moved away to perch on the wood table with his hands folded in front of him. “We’re on the same side, though they’ve been on the front lines, while I’ve worked behind the scenes. I’ve had plenty of time on my hands these past four years; my law practice hasn’t exactly been thriving.”
“I never dreamed you were part of the Resistance. Does Amélie know?”
“No. Wives don’t know. I wanted to tell her, but it’s necessary to follow the rules.”
“What about Misia and Cocteau?”
“None of our friends know.” He smiled without warmth. “Amélie, by the way, thanks you for the dress you gave her from your stockroom.”
“Oh, that old thing.”
“She still wears the clothes you made for her before the war. I especially love that navy silk gown splattered with silver paillettes. It reminds me of the night sky in Provence.”
“I wore that dress myself. It was the hit of the 1939 spring collection, my last.”
What a glorious career Coco had created for herself, defining the new with simplicity, purity, and cleanliness. And now look at her. She was sixty-one and exhausted. She knew she must look a fright. And what was to become of her? She closed her eyes. A fantasy défilé of gorgeous dresses floated around her, designed by her much younger self. But when she looked again at the filthy interrogation room with the stained walls and trash-strewn floor, she could no longer count on those memories of beauty that had always been her shield from despair.
Pelissier was not the only aristocrat in her social circle who spouted leftist views while enjoying a luxurious life of grand houses, servants, cars, bespoke suits, and couture. At dinner parties over the years, she’d heard these men and women voice their support for unions and labor laws, and, more recently, de Gaulle and the Resistance. But Coco hadn’t thought Pelissier or the others would actually act on their beliefs. Still, at that moment, she was glad to see him. “It was nice to see you at Sert’s the other day,” said Coco. “I haven’t seen you much—just at Misia’s Bastille Day party and that time I ran into you at Bignon’s.” Was it a coincidence that he had been there? Or was he helping to collect information on her and Spatz?
“Amélie and I have stayed mostly at her mother’s old place in Bordeaux, as far from the Occupiers as we could get,” said Pelissier.
He removed a lighter and two cigarettes from a case in his jacket pocket. He clamped one cigarette between his thin lips and offered the second to Coco. She took it, glancing furtively at the Interrogator as Pelissier lit both sticks. “This man understands nothing,” she said, taking a long, sibilant drag. “Collaboration or resistance. That’s it.”
“You and I know things aren’t that simple.” Pelissier blew a jet of smoke out the side of his mouth. He stood and moved away from the table, toward the window. “Has Spatz gone back to Germany?”
Coco shifted uncomfortably in her seat. “Yes.”
“She knows where he is, but she won’t tell us!” blurted the Interrogator.
“I don’t,” Coco said evenly.
Pelissier shot a fierce look at the Interrogator, then turned to Coco. “I remember when I first met Spatz. It was at one of Hélène Dessoffy’s parties on the Riviera.”
“She never paid her bills on time.”
“Did you know that she and Spatz were lovers? Even recently? You must have heard.”
Coco felt a coldness spread through her limbs with a sharp sense of betrayal. She fought against it. So what if Spatz slept with Hélène Dessoffy? Virile men always had women on the side. Boy Capel did. The Duke of Westminster did. Reverdy was married, for God’s sake! Fidelity was for lovers in cheap novels. Anyway, Dessoffy had nothing to hold Spatz, except her soft docility. That he could get from many others. But from her—only from her could he get elegance and sophistication matched by intelligence and achievement.
“I’m sorry, Coco.”
“Dessoffy is a moron. She has fat arms, like white sausages,” said Coco.
“I agree, she’s not too bright. She thought Spatz was a harmless diplomat. He fooled me, too, all those years ago on the Côte d’Azur.” Pelissier paused for a moment and moved away from the window, toward Coco’s chair. He faced her directly. “Back then, Spatz chose Hélène because she had a house near the naval base in Toulon, where a lot of classified materials were kept. Her late father had been a high-ranking naval officer, a hero of the first war. Spatz was trying to learn secrets about French navy operations, a job made easier by the officers he met at Dessoffy’s parties. Spatz told me he was working as a journalist. He said he’d been thrown out of the German diplomatic corps because he was married to a Jew, a Jew he no longer was in love with, so he’d taken up reporting for a newspaper on the Riviera. I felt sorry for him.”
“Spatz can take care of himself,” said Coco.
“But he needs women to cover for him. He needed Dessoffy. She helped him flee to Switzerland in 1939 when war broke out between France and Germany. Dessoffy wrote letters to Spatz in Switzerland, which French intelligence agents intercepted, and…”
“I know all about that.”
“What I’m sure you don’t know is that while Hélène was in prison, Spatz slipped over the border to visit her mother at her home in Toulon. When the maid showed Spatz into Madame’s sitting room, he got right to the point. If Madame Dessoffy would agree to receive Spatz’s German colleagues from time to time and share interesting information with them and arrange meetings for them with the French naval personnel who revered her husband, Hélène would be released immediately. Madame Dessoffy refused, even at the cost of her daughter’s freedom. A few weeks later, having no evidence against her, French authorities released Hélène. By then, though, Spatz had no use for her. He had you!”
