A New George Sweet Doorway Mystery… “A Door… ajar…” (Part Three)

1990: Mme. P and I clinked our glasses, and sipped the icy champagne… well, I sipped. She swigged half the flute and quickly topped hers off again, and laughed heartily. “You drink zee champahnia liken Americain! You moost grahb zee joy ov zee champahnia! Note teep toe op to eet like an old ladeee!”.  She clinked my glass again, almost too hard, and saluted me, expecting me to do the same… and I did. But I glanced at the rim as I raised it to make sure I wouldn’t be swallowing a chip of the delicate crystal. I wouldn’t, thank God.

She finished her glass, refilled again, and filled mine till it just began to overflow and then murmured close to my ear in another cloud of baloney and blue cheese, “Eez eet time for anozer story ov de maisonette? You know my price…”, and now a lusty chuckle from deep inside that ample bosom. I blushed and looked at my shoes, but laughed along with her at my expense. My sad command of French amused everyone up and down the block, and had made me a bit of a celebrity, especially when I made errors of vocabulary, grammar, and pronunciation, which ended in suggestive or outright pornographic faux pas. Gales of laughter till tears ran down reddening cheeks; that was my experience at least every other week, but I wanted everyone to be delighted especially when I was picking out the best baguette, the freshest filet, the brightest Bordeaux. And so, I smiled into her leek-green eyes and struggled, “la mayzonay day jar-dinn don lay-twalls”. I tried my sweetest grin on her, and she melted. “Verry goot! You air eemprooving all zee time! Zee lassons air goot! Ahnd now, dee store ahnd dee champania!... ahnd mebee latair som Chanterelles et Escargots en Croute a l’Alsace. Tu es d'accord?”… and I did. She settled in on the seen-better-days chintz sofa with the wonky back leg, she stared straight ahead, and slowly started. I looked down at the amber glow of the windows and their reflection on the misted pavement…

1978:  It was a cool, almost frosty night as the sun set on another winter day in Paris. The door to her maisonette was slightly ajar, and golden light poured out like warm caramel onto the drizzle-dampened chill of the concrete deck. Shivering in her retreat on the very top floor of her house in the Rue Chelque Chose, Veronique waited for her lover, her intended. In the 1920s, it had been a gardener's greenhouse on the roof. In the 1930's, after the crash, her parents closed the rest of the house and moved into it, lovingly naming it la Petite Maisonette de Jardin dans les Étoiles. That was her mother’s sense of humor… and her father’s ebullience. No amount of heartbreak or loss ever sank their quiet joy, or their deep love.… for each other and for her, their only child, born late in their lives. Though small, it was the most charming home for blocks, and for her, as well as the potted plants before her, it was a magical place in which to grow and thrive. How unfair that she didn’t ever experience that same joy as she reached adulthood, especially after her wonderful parents passed away within just a few months of each other. Now, she stood, pierced through with aching cold and humiliation, waiting for Stephan to come home. Stephan, with his stale jokes and corny and constant puns... and his repeated mocking of anything French. She shuddered as the image of him in a stained T-shirt filled her mind… swigging his beer, belching. He’d pretend he was a struggling author and suddenly spout in an exaggerated Maurice Chevalier accent, “Eet was one of doze nights een Paree that Le Stéphan loved where everyzing was painted ‘le bleu’ as ‘le light’ glowed from ‘les windows’, and he laid on the ‘la chaise’ eating Lay's Potahto Cheeps from ‘le bag’ while Sondheim’s ‘A Leetle Night Music’ wahfted through ‘la nuit’.”

Alas! Their passion had cooled into nothing more than congealed gravy on a greasy plate... She chuckled darkly in her fury at the comical/horrible images that swirled in her imagination. Even angry, she still weighed everything through the eyes of a comedienne. A comedienne whose performances had gotten edgier month by month until her audience’s laughter was overshadowed by their discomfort.

Where was he? Perhaps painting the town red, with that Ondine. You know... Her. Poor Veronique had only one solution. Become a Sapphist! A... Lesbian! She laughed out loud! Enough of those HORRIFIC Male Creatures with those dangly things! Cut it off! Her sparkling, green eyes alighted on her father’s garden shears; the ones that still razored the sturdiest rose branches as if slicing through butter. …But no… He’ll be home any minute with his idiot chatter, his puns, and someone else’s perfume sticking to his sweaty shirt.  Patience. Wait. Watch for the figure to move against the soft glow of light. Reach out with your arms! Your arms that once held him with so much passion. So much love… and then… she heard the front door creak open inside and then close. She stepped back into the shadows. The little lock turned. The mail was dropped on the table. A chair was dragged so he could put his jacket over the back. His shadow crossed the billowing curtains and then out through the opened door. He wondered why had she left it ajar on a February night? He stepped out onto the pavement… and then over to the railing… to look for her below in the street? Could he really be that stupid? Could she be that lucky? Relax, breathe out, take aim... She moved like a deadly machine; swiftly, silently. Directly at him, arms outstretched. A vehicle of revenge. And like some pathetic, clumsy pedestrian stumbling into the path of rushing steel and death, he turned at the last moment to see the horrible blank stare. The arms, like battering rams. The hands open-palmed and resolved. Those blank, cold, eyes. No. Oh God. No.

As she turned to leave the balcony, she stopped to listen in the still night air. How long would it take before her fiancé’s body hit the pavement below?---there!… a distant mash, a bit sharper than she had expected. And then the deafening silence before the first horrified scream… of many!... far away. ln her heart, she knew she was free now and had taken the right decision. The night mist was just settling in when she closed the door behind her. She was about to light a fire when there was a firm knock on the front door. The arresting officers hustled her out so fast she never had time to turn out the lights. As she trudged down the leaning flights of creaking stairs, she began to hum Edith Piaf’s “No Regrets”, lighting on a few words here and there, in English, then French, then back again. She chuckled at the irony and at her own folly. The two gendarmes gasped, stopped and looked into her smiling face. That wry and so-wise smile of someone young but who has lived a hundred lifetimes. They could not resist. Their hands softened on her arms, more supporting her now than escorting her down the steps, and as she went, she whispered “Goodbye my little home. Good bye.”

(End of Part Three. Stay tuned for Part Four of A New George Sweet Doorway Mystery… “A Door… ajar…”)

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