Marcel brought over her coffee and the éclair and refilled Marguerite’s cup without being asked.
‘Merci, Marcel.’ She gave him an approving nod and his whole demeanour changed as he said something in rapid French back to her.
‘He’s a good man,’ said Marguerite to Nina as he bustled away like an important penguin. ‘He hides it rather well.’
‘Do you come here often?’ asked Nina, intrigued once more. It didn’t look like the sort of place that someone like Marguerite would frequent – surely there were much smarter places around?
‘It is convenient,’ said the other woman, almost reading her mind. ‘And I suppose I have the memory of what it used to be like.’ She gave a wistful smile, which softened her rather haughty face and made her seem suddenly a lot less intimidating. ‘And you live in Paris?’
‘Temporarily. I only arrived the day before yesterday. It’s a long story.’
‘I have plenty of time and I enjoy a good story.’ Marguerite’s eyes twinkled with mischief again, transforming the elderly matriarch into naughty Tinkerbell, and Nina found herself telling her the whole story, omitting of course the bit where Sebastian said she was the last person in the world he’d want help from. Not because she wanted to spare him and make the other woman think well of him but because it would lead to far too many questions.
In the end, she stayed chatting with the older woman for a good hour. Every time she thought they’d finished their conversation, Marguerite would ask her another question or tell her something about a part of Paris she should visit. She almost wished she’d brought a notebook. By the time she finally stood up and said she must go and do some work, Marguerite knew all about her family and that she was staying in Sebastian’s flat. In turn, Nina now knew where the best boulangerie was in relation to the flat, the nearest good restaurant and the only supermarché she should frequent, if she must.
Marguerite rose to her feet and Marcel rushed over to help her shrug on her coat, escorting to her to the door, opening it for her and ushering her out.
Nina finished her second cup of coffee and decided to be helpful and take it over to the counter, to save Marcel a job. Despite standing in front of the counter, he carried on noisily slotting dirty coffee cups in the tiny under counter dishwasher. She waited until he finally looked up and acknowledged her.
‘You’re still here.’
‘I am,’ she agreed with a smile, which was tough to keep up under his stern glare. ‘And I’d like to see the kitchen.’
‘Be my guest,’ he said, going back to his coffee cups. The song from Beauty and the Beast took up a refrain in her head, despite the fact that Marcel was as far from welcoming as he was a singing candlestick.
For some reason she started humming the tune under her breath.
Marcel looked up, his face morphing into an expressionless mask and pointed to the back of the shop and then once again turned back to what he was doing.
So it was going to be like that, then?
For a minute she felt like an intruder stepping into the Beast’s castle as she entered the kitchen. Oh heck. It was spartan. And filthy. Nina shivered as she walked into the centre of the huge room. A layer of dust coated most of the surfaces and she was convinced that if she turned the taps on it would take a while for the water to groan and splutter its way out of the pipes. It was going to take her hours to clean this place up. Something that Sebastian had failed to mention.
The floor felt greasy beneath her feet as she walked on the slightly slippery surface to put her bag down on one of the industrial stainless-steel benches. From the size and scale of the place, it was clear that once upon a time, the kitchen would have produced all the baked goods sold in the shop. There were still all the ovens along the opposite wall as well as large scale fridges on another.
She opened one of the drawers under the benches, the stiff runners making a metallic groan, the jumble of utensils popping up and trying to burst free like an unruly Jack-in-the-box, as if they’d been crammed in hurriedly. There seemed to be no rhyme or reason as to the contents; whisks, wooden spoons, spatulas and rolling pins. Even rulers? None of which looked particularly clean. There were traces of ancient pastry and cream crusted on some items. A second drawer held more of the same, as well as a third.
Shelving under the benches held an assortment of bowls, glass, earthenware and stainless steel in a mind-boggling number of sizes, all tucked haphazardly into each other. Sauté pans, heavy-bottomed pans and frying pans were stacked in leaning Tower of Pisa piles, handles pointing every which way like a distorted spider’s legs.
How on earth was she ever going to get this lot sorted in time?
And there was no chance of appealing to Marcel’s better nature, she wasn’t sure he had one. He’d made it quite clear she was on the side of the enemy. She was on her own.
Really on her own. There was no one she could ask for help.
For a minute the panic threatened to swamp her.
No, she could do this. She needed to make lists, prioritise and get some labels to mark up all the shelves and drawers so that everything had a proper place to live.
When she returned to the café area, it was still deserted. Marcel didn’t even look up at her. Mischief prompted her to say. ‘Is Marguerite your only customer?’
‘There are few ladies like Madame du Fourge around. She is old school Paris. Genteel. Elegant. She comes here every day.’
‘She does?’ Again, Nina frowned.
‘It hasn’t always been like this,’ snapped Marcel.
‘Sorry, I didn’t mean…’
‘Yes. You did.’ Marcel’s eyes shimmered with sudden emotion. ‘Once, this was one of the best patisseries in Paris.’ He waved a dismissive hand towards the pale-blue, -painted panels on the wall under a pink-painted dado rail. ‘When I was a child, I grew up four streets away. We would come here for a Saturday morning treat. They made the best mille-feuilles. It was the speciality of the house.
‘But the owner passed it onto his children. They were not pastry chefs. Things changed. We stopped making patisseries here in the kitchen. Everything is delivered now. It is not the same. And soon we will close and your Monsieur Finlay will open his bistro.’ Marcel closed his eyes, as if in pain.
‘I guess if the patisserie isn’t making money…’ Nina gave a tiny lift of her shoulders, trying to be sympathetic.
Marcel glared at her. ‘If it was run properly, it could. No one has cared for fifteen years.’ With a sudden petulant pout, he added, ‘So why should I?’ With that, he flounced away to wipe one of the tables which didn’t even look as if it had been used.
Nina frowned after him. Why was he working here then? Clearly, he’d been at the top of his game once.
With a sigh she looked at her watch and decided that she would come back tomorrow. She had a few days to get prepared and hopefully Marcel would be in a better mood, although she wasn’t counting on it.
‘So what’s Sebastian’s apartment like?’ asked Nina’s mother on her fourth day in Paris.
‘Nice,’ replied Nina, lifting her eyes from the screen where she was Facetiming with her mother, to take a quick look around