A Secret Kept

  I then call my father. His voice sounds feeble. Not at all like him. As usual, our conversation is brief and dispassionate. It seems my father and I are separated by a towering, hefty wall. We converse with each other, but nothing is exchanged, no tenderness, no affection. No closeness. And it has been like this all our lives. Why should it ever change? I wouldn’t even know how to begin. Ask him about his cancer? Tell him I know? Tell him I care? Impossible. He has not programmed me to do that. And as usual, like every time I hang up after talking with my father, hopelessness rears its weary head.

  It is now nearly eight o’clock. Laurence Dardel is most probably at home: 50 rue Spontini. I don’t have the code to get in, and I wait outside, smoking, pacing up and down to keep warm, until a person finally walks out of the building. The list outside the concierge’s door informs me that the Fourcade-Dardel family lives on the third floor. These dignified, red-carpeted Haussmanian buildings all have the same odor, I think as I go up—savory wafts from cooking pots, beeswax polish, flowery interior fragrances.

  My ring is answered by a young man in his twenties who is wearing headphones. I explain who I am and ask him if his mother is there. Before he can answer me, Laurence Dardel appears. She peers at me and says, smiling, “You’re Antoine, aren’t you? François’s son?”

  She introduces me to her own son Thomas, who wanders off with his headphones, and takes me into the living room. She hasn’t changed much with the passing of time. Her face is as I remembered it, small, sharp, and pointed, her eyelashes sandy, her hair drawn back in a neat ponytail. She offers me a glass of wine, which I accept.

  “I read about your grandmother’s death in the Figaro,” she says. “You must all be upset. We will of course be at the funeral.”

  “I wasn’t particularly close to her,” I say.

  She raises an eyebrow.

  “Oh. I thought you and Mélanie doted on her.”

  “Not exactly.”

  There is a silence. The room we are sitting in is conventional and bourgeois. There is nothing out of place here. Not a spot on the pale gray carpet, not a speck of dust to be seen. Traditional furniture, unimaginative paintings, rows and rows of medical books. Yet this apartment could be made into a gem, I note, as my expert eye singles out ungainly false ceilings, superfluous paneling, unwieldy doors. My nose picks up a persistent cooking odor. It is dinnertime, I realize.

  “How is your father?” Laurence asks politely.

  She is a doctor, after all. I don’t need to pretend.

  “He has cancer.”

  “Yes,” she says.

  “You know that, don’t you?”

  “I’ve known for a while.”

  “How long have you known?”

  She puts a hand under her chin, purses up her mouth. “My father told me.”

  I feel a slight wrench in my chest.

  “But your father died in the early eighties.”

  “Yes,” she says, “1982.”

  She has the same stocky build as her father, the same stubby hands.

  “You mean my father was already ill in 1982?”

  “Yes, he was. But he pulled through with treatment. Then he was all right, I believe, for a while. Until recently.”

  “Are you his doctor?”

  “No, but my father was until he died.”

  “He seems very tired,” I say. “Exhausted, even.”

  “That’s because of the chemo,” she says. “It knocks you out.”

  “Is it working?”

  She looks at me levelly. “I don’t know, Antoine. I’m not his doctor.”

  “Then how did you know he was ill again?”

  “Because I saw him recently, and I could tell.”

  So she too, like Dr. Besson, had noticed it.

  “My father has not told Mélanie nor me that he is ill. His sister knows—God knows how, because they hardly speak to each other. I don’t even know what sort of cancer he has. We know nothing. He will say nothing.”

  She nods but makes no comment. She finishes her glass of wine and puts it down.

  “Why are you here, Antoine? Can I help you?”

  Before I can answer her, the front door clicks and a burly, balding man comes in. I vaguely recognize her husband. Laurence tells him who I am.

  “Antoine Rey. It’s been a while! You look more and more like your father.”

  I hate it when people say that. His name comes back to me—Cyril. After a couple of minutes of small talk in which he expresses his condolences for Blanche’s death, he leaves the room. I notice Laurence glancing at her watch.

  “I won’t take up too much of your time, Laurence. And yes, I do need your help.” I pause.

  She looks at me expectantly. She has a vigorous, capable look that lends her a certain toughness. Almost like a man.

  “I want to look at my mother’s medical file.”

  “May I ask why?”

  “There are a couple of things I want to check. Like her death certificate, for example.”

  Her eyes narrow. “What do you need to know exactly?”

  I lean forward and say with a purposeful tone, “I need to know exactly how and where my mother died.”

  She seems taken aback. “Is this necessary?”

  Her attitude jars me. I let it show.

  “Is there a problem?”

  My voice comes out a lot sharper than I had planned.

  She jumps back as if I had poked her.

  “There is no problem, Antoine, no reason to get angry.”

  “Then can I have the file?”

  “I have to look for it. I’m not quite sure where it is. It may take a while.”

  “What do you mean?”

  She looks at her watch again.

  “My father’s files are all here, but I don’t have time to get it for you right now.”

  “And when will you have the time?”

  Once again, my voice has a nasty undertone that I can’t help. There is a mounting tension between us, a palpable hostility that surprises me.

  “I will find it as soon as possible. I will call you when I have done so.”

  “Fine,” I say, getting up hastily.

  She rises too, her pointed face red. She looks up at me.

  “I remember your mother’s death well. It was a terrible moment for your family. I was about twenty years old, I had just met Cyril, and I was studying to be a doctor. I remember my father calling me and telling me that Clarisse Rey had died of an aneurysm. That she was dead by the time he got to her, that there was nothing he could do.”

  “I still need to look at that file,” I say firmly.

  “Going back into the past never does any good. You are old enough to know that.”

  I say nothing. Then I find one of my cards in my pocket. I hand it to her.

  “Here is my number. Please call me as soon as you have located the file.”

  I walk out as fast as I can, not saying goodbye, my cheeks burning. I close the door behind me and scuttle silently down the stairs. I don’t even wait till I’m outside to light a cigarette.

  Despite the resentment, the fear of what I don’t know and don’t understand, as I run to my car in the cold darkness, I feel close to my mother, closer than I have felt in years.

  The Rubis agency calls me at the end of the following day. A charming, efficient woman called Delphine. No problem giving me the file. It has been thirty-odd years after all. All she needs is for me to drop by at their bureau. She’ll check my ID and have me sign a piece of paper.

  It takes me a while to get from Montparnasse to the Opéra. Trapped in heavy traffic, I listen to the radio, take deep breaths, try not to let my unease take over. I haven’t slept well for the past weeks. Sleepless nights, endless questions. Feeling dwarfed by something I cannot comprehend. I keep meaning to call my sister, tell her all I have learned, but I hold back, still. I want to know the whole story for myself. I want to have all the cards in my hand. The Rey dossier the Rubis agency is about
to give me. Dr. Dardel’s medical file concerning my mother. And then it seems to me I shall know what to do and how to tell Mélanie.

  Delphine keeps me waiting for a good ten minutes in a fancy ivory and crimson waiting room. Is this where spouses suspecting their other halves of adultery wait with anticipation and angst? There is no one around at this late hour. Delphine at last appears, a womanly creature dressed in ruby red, flourishing a warm smile. Private detectives don’t look like Columbo these days.

  I sign a release form, show her my carte d’identité, and she hands me a large beige envelope that has been sealed with a thick wad of wax. This has not been opened in years, I can tell. “REY” is typed out in big black letters. I am told that what is inside is the originals of what was sent to my grandmother. I long to open it as soon as I get into the car, but I force myself to wait.

  At home, I make coffee, light a cigarette, and sit down at the kitchen table. I draw a deep breath.

  There is still time to put the envelope away. To never open it. To never know. I look around the familiar room. The boiling kettle, a scattering of crumbs on the counter, an unfinished glass of milk. The apartment is quiet, Lucas is no doubt asleep, and Margaux is in front of her computer. I wait, still. I wait for a long time.

  Then I seize a knife and slit the envelope open. The seal gives way, cracks in two. It is done.

  The first items that tumble out are a couple of black-and-white press clippings from Vogue and Jours de France magazines. My parents at cocktail parties, social events, races—1967, 1969, 1971, 1972. Monsieur and Madame François Rey. Madame wearing Dior, Jacques Fath, Schiaparelli. Were these dresses lent to her? I don’t remember her ever wearing them. How gorgeous she looked. So fresh, so pretty.

  More press clippings, this time from Le Monde and Le Figaro. My father and the Vallombreux trial, the one that made him famous in the early seventies. I find two more small clippings: the announcement of my birth and of Mélanie’s in the Figaro’s Carnet du Jour. I then find a large manila envelope. Inside are three black-and-white photographs, two color ones. Bad quality, grainy close-ups. But I have no trouble recognizing my mother. She is with a tall, platinum-haired woman who seems older than she. Three of the photographs are shot in Paris, in the streets. My mother is looking up and smiling at the woman. They are not holding hands, but they are evidently close. It is fall or winter—they both have coats. The two color photos are taken in a restaurant or a hotel bar. They are sitting at a table. The blond woman is smoking. She is wearing a purple blouse and a pearl necklace. My mother’s face is somber, downcast eyes and tight mouth. In one photograph the woman is stroking my mother’s cheek.

  I lay all the photographs out on the kitchen table carefully. I look at them for a while. A mosaic of my mother and this stranger. I know this is the woman Mélanie saw in our mother’s bed. This is the American Gaspard mentioned.

  Inside the envelope is a typed letter addressed to my grandmother from the Agence Viaris. The date is January 12, 1974. A month before my mother died.

  Dear Madame Rey,

  As per your instructions and according to our contract, here is the information you requested concerning Clarisse Rey née Elzyère and Miss June Ashby. Miss Ashby, of American nationality, born in 1925 in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, has an art gallery in New York City on West 57th Street. She comes to Paris every month for business and stays at the Régina Hotel on the place des Pyramides in the first arrondissement.

  Miss Ashby and Madame Rey, during the course of the weeks from September to December 1973, met every time Miss Ashby came to Paris, which totals five times. Madame Rey each time came to the Régina Hotel in the afternoons and went directly up to Miss Ashby’s room. Madame Rey came down again a couple of hours later. On one occasion, December 4, Madame Rey came after dinner and did not leave the hotel till the next morning at dawn.

  Please find our invoice enclosed.

  Agence Viaris, Private Investigators

  I look closely at the photographs of June Ashby. A striking woman. Her eyes seem dark, but the photographs are not good, I can’t really tell. She has high cheekbones, the wide shoulders of a swimmer. She doesn’t look “butch.” There is even something intensely feminine about her—her long, slender limbs, the bead necklace around her neck, dangling earrings. I wonder what she said in English the day she came to confront Blanche, which sounded so horrible according to Gaspard. I wonder where she is now. I wonder how she remembers my mother.

  I feel a movement and quickly turn. Margaux is standing directly behind me, wearing her dressing gown. Her hair is pulled off her face, making her look like Astrid.

  “What is all this, Dad?”

  My first reaction is to shamefacedly hide the photos, cram them back into the envelope, and invent some story about sorting out old documents. But I do not move.

  It is too late to lie. Too late to be silent. Too late to pretend I don’t know.

  “This was given to me tonight.”

  She nods.

  “The brunette. She looks so much like Mélanie . . . Isn’t that your mother?”

  “Yes, that is my mother. And the blond lady is . . . her friend.”

  Margaux sits down and examines each photograph with interest.

  “What is all this about?”

  No more lies. No more silence.

  “My grandmother was having my mother and this woman followed by a private investigator.”

  Margaux stares at me.

  “Why would she do that?” Then it hits her. She is only fourteen, after all. “Oh,” she says slowly, her face flushing. “They were lovers, right?”

  “Yes, they were.”

  A pause.

  “Your mother was having an affair with this lady?”

  “That’s right.”

  Margaux scratches her head thoughtfully. She whispers, “Is this like some kind of huge family secret that nobody ever talks about?”

  “I guess so.”

  She picks up one of the black-and-white photographs.

  “She looked so much like Mélanie. It’s amazing.”

  “She did.”

  “Who is the other lady, her friend? Did you ever meet her?”

  “An American. This happened a long time ago. If I ever met her, I don’t remember her.”

  “What are you going to do with all this, Dad?”

  “I don’t know,” I reply truthfully.

  I unexpectedly have a vision of the Gois passage being lapped away by tongues of seawater. Soon, only the rescue poles indicate that a road lies deep beneath the surface. An uneasy feeling washes over me.

  “Are you okay, Dad?”

  Margaux’s hand grazes my arm. The gesture is such a rare one coming from her that it both startles and moves me.

  “I’m okay, honey. Thanks. You get to bed now.”

  She lets me kiss her. She slips away.

  There is only one thing left in the envelope, a thin sheet of paper that has been crumpled and smoothed out. It is written on the Hotel Saint-Pierre stationery. The date reads August 19, 1973. The shock of my mother’s handwriting strikes me like a blow. I read the first lines with a thumping heart.

  You have just left your room, and I am slipping this under your door, not leaving it in our usual safe hiding place, and I pray you get it before you catch your train back to Paris . . .

  My head seems a little clearer, although I feel my heart still thrumming painfully, as it did in Gaspard’s room a couple of days ago. I go to the computer and type out “June Ashby” on Google. The first item that pops up is the art gallery that bears her name on Fifty-seventh Street in New York City. Specializes in modern and contemporary art by women. I search for data about her, but there is none on the site.

  I go back to Google, scroll down the page. Then I see it.

  June Henrietta Ashby died in May 1989 of respiratory failure at Mount Sinai Hospital in New York City. She was 64 years old. Her renowned art gallery on 57th Street, founded in 1966, focuses on modern Eu
ropean art by women, which she introduced to American art lovers. It is now run by her associate, Donna W. Rogers. Miss Ashby was a gay rights activist, cofounder of the New York lesbian social club and advocacy group Daughters of Hope.

  I feel a piercing sadness learning that June Ashby is dead. I would have liked to know this woman, the woman my mother loved, whom she had met in Noirmoutier in the summer of 1972. The woman she had loved in secret for more than a year. The woman my mother was ready to face the world with, the woman she wanted to raise us with. I am too late. Nineteen years too late.

  I print out the entry and clip it to the other documents in the envelope. I look up Donna W. Rogers and Daughters of Hope on Google. Donna is a weathered-looking woman in her seventies, with an astute face and cropped copper hair. The lesbian social club has a rich and interesting website. I surf through it, reading about meetings, concerts, gatherings. Cooking lessons, yoga, poetry seminars, political conferences. I forward the link to Mathilde, an architect I worked with a couple of years ago. Her girlfriend, Milèna, has a hip bar I often go to in the Latin Quarter. Despite the lateness of the hour, Mathilde is in front of her computer and e-mails me right back. She is curious as to why I sent her that link. I explain that the social club was cofounded by a woman who had been my mother’s lover. Then my cell phone rings. It is Mathilde.

  “Hey! I didn’t know your mother was a goudou,” she says.

  “Neither did I.”