Chasing Sylvia Beach (19 page)

And now, so was Lily.

“Right, then,” Sylvia prompted.

“Right,” Lily echoed, snapping to. Picking up the heavy box, she nudged open the front door. Carefully, she tucked the loops on the box onto the hooks affixed to the wall. Back inside, Sylvia was at the desk, glasses perched on her nose, reading some papers. It was the perfect time to ask, but she didn’t. Instead, Lily went about her tasks, rehearsing her request in her mind. She flipped the Open sign, pulled the stepladder out front, and hoisted the heavy Shakespeare and Company sign to its rung. She dragged the ladder back in.

“I need you to run this over to the library.” Sylvia held a book out to Lily, who responded with a questioning look.

“The Maison des Amis des Livres. Across the street. And hurry back. I have some more books to package and ship today.”

Lily crossed the street in the bright afternoon sun. She approached the French bookshop and paused to look in the windows. Small hardback volumes with gold trim were stacked in a spiral on green felt. The effect was very neat and proper, as a French bookstore should be. She pushed open the door. Her eyes slowly adjusted to the dark room. Bookcases lined the walls, and a few chairs held to the corners.

“Bonjour,” came a voice from the back.

“Bonjour,” Lily called out. She peered into the darkness. Adrienne sat behind a black lacquer desk. She was writing, her bosom pressed up against the desk. She was a large woman, even sitting down, with an incredibly delicate face. Lily approached Adrienne.

“You’re Sylvia’s new assistant?” Adrienne said in French.

“Yes,” Lily said. “It’s very kind of Sylvia to hire me.”

“You were very helpful at the reading. We’ll see what you’re saying after a few weeks’ work. It’s not always easy chez Sylvia.”

Lily put the book on the desk. “Here you go.”

Adrienne pressed a piece of paper over her writing, blotting the thick ink. “Wait,” she said. “I’ll just give you this letter to take with you for when you go to the post.”

As Adrienne folded the paper and tucked it into an envelope, Lily glanced around the tiny shop. It appeared more like someone’s private study than a bookshop. All the books were French. Lily studied a shelf of poetry, recognizing the big names—Baudelaire, Lamartine, Rimbaud—but most of the volumes were a mystery to her. If she didn’t find her way home, she’d be reading a lot more French. And German, too. The sound of a stamp pressed down on the desk brought her back to the room. She turned. Adrienne held out the envelope to her and returned to a small stack of books on the desk. She had already dismissed Lily, who lingered like a porter awaiting a tip. Adrienne glanced up without moving her head, her eyebrows neat lines across her brow.

“Okay, au revoir.” Lily backed toward the door. Outside, she looked back. Adrienne had already returned to her books. Lily waved good-bye to the top of Adrienne’s head.

As she made her way back across the street, Lily thought about the difference that seventy years of women’s liberation had made. Gertrude, Sylvia, Adrienne were all so tough, but Lily had developed her own veneer from working on Colfax Avenue in Denver. Still, she wanted their approval. What would it take to be recognized by them? Sylvia and Adrienne respected writers—and women writers above all. If she failed with Louise’s assignment, she might very well be stranded in Paris. How would she support herself? Perhaps she could sell articles to a newspaper back home, like Janet Flanner and Ernest Hemingway. She could start with simple observations, like the ones she’d been making in her notebook. Now that she had an in with Sylvia, maybe some of her contacts would help. Gertrude had given her advice. Maybe she could carve out a writer’s life in Paris.

Back at Sylvia’s, Lily shelved books. Sylvia greeted the few people who stopped in. Teddy welcomed everyone with a thumping tail and spent most of the day lying near the desk. A man cleaned the windows and Sylvia paid him five francs. Everyone who entered the shop was a friend and not a customer, and Lily witnessed very little money pass into Sylvia’s hands. No wonder she had such a hard time doing business. Especially now, with so few Americans abroad.

“Who buys books these days?” she asked Sylvia.

Sylvia lit a cigarette and laughed wryly. “No one in Paris.”

Lily was surprised to see her laughing. But perhaps she had long ago come to terms with the fact that her shop wasn’t a viable business, but a charity case supported by friends. Lily imagined that it might be a relief for Sylvia to close the shop, not to have to run the business while searching for food and getting by under the surveillance of the Nazis.

“Yet you survive.”

Sylvia blew smoke toward the ceiling. “Yet I survive. Thanks to the help I get. I’m glad you can lend a hand. Getting ready for this Exposition and running the shop is more than I can handle.”

“It’s my pleasure.”

Sylvia asked her how long she planned to stay in Paris. This was Lily’s chance to ask about the cot in the back. Lily hedged this question, as she had with Paul. She spoke of how she loved Paris and said could stay here forever.

Sylvia squinted at Lily. “You aren’t like those whooping Americans, here for a thrill. What would keep you here?”

“There’s not a lot to take me back home,” she said. “I don’t really know what to do with myself there.”

Sylvia smiled. “I understand that. That’s what drove me here in the first place. My family doesn’t understand.”

“What did your family want for you?”

Sylvia stubbed out her cigarette.“They knew better than to want a good marriage for me. They knew I wasn’t the sort to buckle under the regime of a man other than Father. Somehow they knew there was only one man for me: Father.” For a few seconds, she was lost in thought as if imagining a life back in Princeton with her father. Then she brought herself back to Lily. “What about you?” Sylvia asked. “What does your family expect of you? A nice husband, of course.”

“I studied writing in school,” Lily said. “They think I should get a nice steady job at a newspaper. But news doesn’t really interest me.”

“What does?”

“Reading, and writing stories. Wandering around looking at things. I’m a bit of a dreamer, if the truth must be known.”

“Then you are in perfect company at Shakespeare and Company. Dreamers abound there.”

“Are you a dreamer?”

Sylvia narrowed her eyes and looked at Lily. Lily was beginning to recognize this look. It was probably not designed to intimidate whoever was under the gaze, but that’s the effect it had on Lily.

“I was a dreamer. But the years have beaten it out of me. You’ll see.” She pointed at Lily. “Time withers dreams. You see all those old people sitting on benches in the Luxembourg Garden? They’re replaying their early regrets, wishing they’d bought that bouquet of flowers, wishing they’d done something other than the correct and proper thing. Wishing.”

“What do you wish you had done?”

“Hmm . . .” Sylvia seemed to contemplate Lily’s question. “I can’t say. I think I’ve done everything I wanted to.”

“Surely there’s something,” Lily prompted. Sylvia lit another cigarette and held the pack toward Lily. She wanted one, but refused to get lured into the habit again. She said no and Sylvia exhaled smoke before continuing.

“Okay . . . I wish I had spoken up sooner to Mr. Joyce. Before things got so bad between us. There. I said it.” She shook her head. “I don’t know why I told you that.”

Lily smiled. “I’m glad you did.”

“Why, so you can run out and spread gossip around the town?”

“Of course not. Because now you have that off your chest. You can breathe easier.”

Sylvia laughed, her chuckle turning into a cough. Lily waited until the spasm passed before asking another question.

“How have you survived all these years here by yourself in a foreign country?”

Sylvia’s cigarette perched like a parrot at the end of her fingers. “First,” she said, “I am not alone. I have Adrienne. And second, I don’t feel like I’m in a foreign country. America feels more foreign to me now. I’ve grown quite accustomed to France and her ways. I think I’ve become more frog than American.”

Nothing dampened Sylvia’s determination. Maybe that’s how she had survived so many years teetering on the edge of bankruptcy. It was so different from Lily’s era, where if something didn’t work out or wasn’t comfortable—a marriage, a job—it could be swapped for a new one.

Lily asked if Sylvia ever wanted to return home, but Sylvia insisted that Paris was her home.

“I spent my childhood in the States,” she said, “but from my adolescence forward I lived in Europe. My friends are here, my family comes to visit, and this is where I can live in peace in my small way and share what I love the most—good literature.” She pronounced it “litrature,” with a British accent.

Lily laughed. “Your bookshop is great. People sure love it, don’t they?”

“Well, they used to, when there were people here with plenty of francs to spend. Now things just get worse and worse. Who knows what Hitler and Mussolini will be up to and what that will do to our little Odéonia.”

The phone rang shrilly, ending their conversation. Sylvia chatted in French while Lily refreshed Teddy’s water bowl. It was getting easier to connect with Sylvia. Here was her chance to ask about staying. The longer she waited, the tenser she became. She checked the grandfather clock. She hadn’t made any progress toward finding the book Louise wanted. With Sylvia present, Lily didn’t feel comfortable snooping around.

She wandered over to the window where the cat reclined alongside a stack of books. Two dead wasps cluttered the corners of the window box, and a thin layer of black cat hair carpeted the surface. Lily reached in and propped up a copy of Edith Wharton’s
A Backward Glance
that had fallen over. She spread the pages so that the book would stay up. She could fix this display up in a jiffy. A dusting and a good clearing out of the cobwebs would make a big difference. She could place a copy of
Translation
in, alongside the T.S. Eliot books. Then people would know that Eliot was in
Translation
and buy a copy. The racks at the sides of the case were half empty; she could replace them with new books and literary journals. She glanced at Sylvia, who was still chatting. Lily pretended to straighten up the books on the table while keeping an eye out for the title Louise had mentioned. But nothing related to Norse mythology.

Sylvia hung up the phone and crushed out her cigarette. The ashtray was nearly full.
I’ll have to empty that
, Lily told herself. Sylvia caught Lily staring and resumed her stern look.

“Sylvia?”

“Mmm?”

“I need to ask you a huge favor.”

Sylvia frowned. “What now? You’ve lost the bike, now what? You want to take over the shop? Well, fine.” She waved her hand as if dismissing something. “I should hand it over to a young whippersnapper like you.”

“No, of course not!”

“Well, what is it, then?”

“It’s . . . I . . . I need a place to stay. I can’t stay at the hotel anymore.”

“Why not? Run out of sous?”

“It’s not that—though, yes, I can’t really afford to stay there. It’s . . .” Lily wasn’t sure how Sylvia would respond to the news that she was involved with someone on the hotel staff. It did seem awfully quick, even to her modern sensibilities. “It’s the hotel keeper. She’s kicking me out. I have to find another place to stay. Today.”

“Today? You waited this long to tell me this?”

“Well, I didn’t really have a chance until now. I’m sorry to ask. I hate to impose. But I promise I won’t be a bother.”

“Don’t fret,” she said. “You can stay on the cot in the back. There’s no heat there, but the days are getting warmer so that might help. I’ll warn you, though. Lucky will be very happy and will take it as an opportunity to use you as a hot water bottle.”

The tension slid off Lily’s back. She hadn’t realized that she’d been scrunching her shoulders until she felt the release.

“Thank you, Sylvia! I didn’t know where else to go.”

“Your aunt can’t take you in?”

Lily had forgotten her aunt lie. “She’s, she . . . her apartment is a mess, what with packing up and all. I can’t stay with her. Plus she’s busy saying good-bye to her friends, so . . .” Lily trailed off, hoping this was a good enough explanation for Sylvia. Sylvia just stared at Lily, her forehead creasing in a frown. Finally, she spoke.

“The cot in the back room has sheltered many a writer, so why not you? Of course.” She returned to her papers, still frowning.

“Thank you, Sylvia. You’re the best.”

Sylvia tsked. “Get to work, young lady. I’m feeling a headache coming on. Enough chatting.”

LATER THAT AFTERNOON, Sylvia was at her desk going over an account ledger when she grimaced and let out a gasp.

“Are you okay?” Lily asked.

“It’s just a migraine,” Sylvia muttered. Her jaw was clenched and her eyes closed.

“I’m sorry to hear that. Can I help?”

“There’s nothing to be done. Not that I haven’t tried. Best to rest it out.”

Silence settled between them while Sylvia kept her eyes closed. Lily wished she could take away her pain. After a few minutes, she spoke quietly.

“I’ve had migraines, too. They’re horrible.”

Sylvia leaned her head back like she was trying to catch rain on her face. Her expression was gray and tight, her mouth twisted into an ironic grimace like she was about to say something funny but was holding back. “Yes, well, I have them nearly every day. Life at the bookshop has given me a regular pain in the head.”

Lily asked what remedies she had tried. Putting her head down on the desk, Sylvia replied, “Everything. Ampoules, black coffee, dark rooms, goat’s milk, homeopathic treatments. Every remedy known to man. Nothing works. The only thing that ever got close was massage by an old doctor I saw. And the liver extract. That made me quite jouncy.”

“I know of something that helps me. It might work for you.”

“I doubt it.”

“Well, can you try it at least?”

Sylvia raised her head an inch. She peered at Lily from under a wave of hair, her mouth pursed.

Lily sighed. “You’re not very eager to get rid of this migraine, are you?”

Sylvia pushed off from the desk and sat back in her chair. “Fine. Try me.”

“Okay. Lean back. Take your two thumbs, like this.” Lily demonstrated, placing her thumbs at the bridge of her nose. Sylvia raised her hands and imitated the gesture. Lily instructed her to apply pressure. Sylvia closed her eyes. Lily had gotten migraines all the time when working at the bookstore. Maybe it had something to do with book dust or book customers. She guided Sylvia through the motions of rubbing her temples. Sylvia glanced up at Lily, her hands moving across her face. For a second she appeared hopeful, young almost.

“I can watch the shop if you need to lie down,” Lily said.

“You can handle it?” Sylvia stood.

“Of course. And don’t stop with the acupressure.”

“The what?”

Lily gestured toward her head. “Pressing on your face.”

Lily knew Sylvia soon wouldn’t care if she could handle the customers or not. No one had come in during the last hour. Sylvia went upstairs, accompanied by the sound of creaking steps. Teddy stood at the curtain, glancing back at Lily as if unable to decide whether to stay or go. Finally, he nudged the curtain aside and ascended the stairs, click-clacking his way to his mistress.

Here was Lily’s chance. She started at Sylvia’s desk, crouching down to inspect the spines of the books stacked there. Nothing. Lily was about to peek in the largest drawer when the door chime rang. Looking up, she almost tipped over the ink bottle on the desk. Her heart beat faster at the thought of being caught in the act of snooping. A tall blond man who looked to be in his thirties walked toward her. She recognized him immediately. It was the man from the reading.

“Hello,” he said, glancing around. “Is it possible to speak with Miss Beach?” He spoke in fluent French with a pronounced German accent. Lily stumbled over her French.

“No, she’s not available. She’s a bit unwell. Maybe if you return in an hour, she’ll be available.”

He frowned and glanced at his watch. Lily offered to help but he refused.

“Not necessary. I will return in an hour. Good-bye,” he said, bowing slightly. At the door, he turned back around. “Hmm, perhaps you can help me with something else.”

“Yes?”

“Do you have
The Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas
by Gertrude Stein? I would like to borrow it.”

“Probably,” she said, though she had no idea whether they had the book or not.

Lily, scanning the shelves, wondered if it would be in fiction or biographies. She didn’t know how to classify Gertrude’s book, a collection of anecdotes about her circle of friends—Picasso, Matisse, Apollinaire, and many other great artists and writers. The style was rather plain but Lily loved being in the position of voyeur, looking through the keyhole at the sometimes-dissolute life of these artists seeking inspiration.

Within a few minutes she found the book and returned to the desk. The man watched her every move. He was attractive, his eyes a deep blue, his face sculpted, with an aquiline nose. He smiled and she blushed, hoping he hadn’t read her thoughts.

“Is this the book you’re looking for?”

The man approached the desk. “Yes, that’s the one.”

“I loved this book,” Lily confessed. “Being part of their world, hearing about their lives driving an ambulance during the war, all the famous people they know . . . it was fascinating.” Lily stopped, embarrassed to have revealed such enthusiasm. The man just nodded, thumbing the pages. “Anything else?”

“That’s it. Until I can speak with Sylvia.”

“Your name?” Lily said, opening Sylvia’s file box of library members.

“Heinrich. Heinrich Werden.”

Lily flipped through the
W
’s until she found his card.

“Here it is. Werden.” She silently read the addresses on the card:

Rathausstraße 15, Berlin

78 rue de Lille, German embassy, Paris

She wrote the title on his card, her mind racing. Was he a Nazi? That angelic face smiling at her now, was it hiding a future war criminal, a genocidal power monger? A shudder passed through Lily at the idea. She wondered why he was borrowing this book. Wasn’t this the kind of work that would easi-ly find itself on the long list of degenerate art banished from Germany by Nazi officials? Maybe this title had already been a victim of book burnings. Gertrude was Jewish and lesbian as well—two crimes in the eyes of the Nazis. Suddenly, she heard herself questioning him. “Why are you borrowing this book? Isn’t this degenerate art, according to the Nazis?”

Heinrich pulled back as if surprised by Lily’s random question. He stared at her for a moment, then grinned.

“Hmm! I do not see what is shocking about me reading this book. It’s my job to be interested in everything that revolves around the arts and is also a great pleasure. Anyway, I do not know if this book is degenerate or not. I promise you’ll be the first notified if this is the case.” He paused and smiled. “And isn’t it said that it’s good to have your enemies close to you?”

“Enemies?” Lily retorted. “How can you have enemies in art? You either love or hate it, that’s all. I’d say Hitler is the enemy of art!”

He raised a shaggy eyebrow. “You are a surprising young woman. Are you a communist sympathizer, being as virulent as you are?”

Taken aback, Lily stammered, “No, not at all. I just say what I think.” She paused. “And Hitler will lead you to war!”

He slowly put his hand inside his jacket. Lily pulled back, a crazy thought crossing her mind:
He’s going to shoot me dead for that.

“May I?” he said, taking out a metal cigarette case.

“Of course,” she said mechanically, relieved.

He offered her one, but she refused. She watched him open the case and remove a cigarette with his nimble fingers, thin and long, perfectly manicured—a real pianist’s fingers. While he lit the cigarette, she imagined those fingers on her skin. Shuddering, she immediately drove the thought from her mind. He released a puff of smoke and spoke calmly.

“It seems that you misunderstand completely the intentions of the Führer. He does not seek war. He would only like a relationship of peace and trust with our neighbors. He has said multiple times that he is an ardent pacifist.”

Does he buy that? Lily wondered. Either he naively believes what he says or he really knows the purpose of Nazism and spreads its propaganda to quell suspicions. Lily brought up Spain, and Heinrich shrugged.

“To have peace, he must first show his muscles. With this, he gains respect in the eyes of others.” Heinrich grew enthusiastic, waving the cigarette and speaking urgently. “Hitler has restored the German people’s pride and self-confidence after years of chaos and despair. No one else could have done what he has accomplished.”

Lily was incredulous. Couldn’t he imagine that the chaos was not behind them but ahead? Could Heinrich imagine that his idol would bring unfathomable death not only to Europe but to his own precious Germany?

Heinrich chuckled to himself. “I do not know why I tell you all this. Are you English?”

“No, American.”

“American? Ah! We have many famous supporters overseas. One day perhaps I will visit your country,” he said, holding his cigarette aloft while expelling smoke.

Lily tucked his card back in the cardboard box. “I don’t know if there are Nazi sympathizers in the States, but I do know one thing—”

Before she could finish her sentence, a noise on the back stairs interrupted her. Teddy emerged and rushed over to sniff Heinrich, waving his short tail with excitement. Sylvia appeared a moment later.

“What’s this? A customer?”

Lily chimed in. “Mr. Werden came to see you.”

“Bonjour, Miss Beach,” the man said, tipping his head.

Sylvia nodded and smiled, brushing her hair back from her face.

“I learned from your assistant that you were ill. Are you better, Miss Beach?”

“It’s nothing. Just an insignificant headache. To what do we owe this pleasure?”

Lily couldn’t tell if Sylvia was sincere or not. She welcomed the man—the Nazi?—as she had welcomed any other customer.

“I’m here about the book I mentioned at the reading. I came to get it.”

Sylvia shook her head slightly. “Ah, that book. It is very rare, you know. I am not certain I can bring myself to part with it.”

Lily faded against a bookshelf, pretending to be busy neatening the books. What was so valuable to Sylvia that she resisted selling it?

“I’ll give you a good price,” the man said, stubbing out his cigarette in the ashtray on the desk.

Sylvia hesitated. Heinrich pulled a pen from his pocket, and wrote on a piece of paper on the desk. Then he handed it to Sylvia.

“I imagine you have some small financial worries at the moment. What I’m offering may help alleviate some suffering.”

Reading the number on the paper, Sylvia pursed her lips. Finally, she spoke.

“You win. I cannot refuse this sum. This does not mean I’m happy to let go of this book.”

Heinrich nodded, all gentleman. “I can understand that. I will take great care of it, I promise you.”

Sylvia took a key from the drawer and went to the glass case. Opening the cabinet, she removed a book from the back shelf, then laid it gently on the desk. A large book, the binding appeared old but the gold embellishments on the cover shone. Heinrich leaned over it and smiled. He removed a checkbook from his pocket and wrote Sylvia a check. She quickly put it in the cash box in the drawer but not before checking the amount.

“Lily, can you prepare the book for Mr. Werden?” She held it out to Lily, who took the tome with both hands.

“Of course,” said Lily.

Heinrich and Sylvia continued chatting. At the shipping desk, Lily turned the book to see the cover. She paled. In gold letters on the cover was the title:
Yggdrasil: The Secret Power of Nordic Mythology.
This was her ticket home, right here. And it was going to slip away, in the worst possible way, into the hands of a German who was likely a Nazi. She glanced at the others, but they were engrossed in conversation about Spender’s poetry. Was this the Nazi who had demanded Sylvia’s copy of
Finnegan’s Wake
, the Nazi who had prompted the closure of the shop? What could she do? Take the book and run? But where to? She didn’t even know how to contact Louise.

“Lily! Lily, are you asleep? Mr. Werden is waiting!”

Lily shook herself from her daze. “No, I’m not sleeping. I just . . . this is such a beautiful book, I couldn’t help staring.”

She quickly pulled a large piece of brown wrapping paper off the roll, tearing it with a loud shhhhoo! Carefully wrapping the book, surrounding it with string, she fought back tears. She couldn’t let them see her like this. Swallowing, she passed her hand over the package, then turned to give it to Heinrich. He politely thanked her and Sylvia and left. Lily’s only ticket home vanished, accompanied by the tinkling chime above the door. Heaviness settled on her.

“Lily, what is this Stein book doing on the desk?”

Lily came to. “Oh, no! He borrowed it,” she cried.

She grabbed the book and ran to the door. She caught sight of Heinrich entering a limousine on the other side of the street. As she rushed to cross, a loud horn sounded, startling her backwards. A green behemoth of a vehicle shot past, sounding its horn again. In a flash, Lily Heller, born July 10, 1987, imagined being caught under the wheels of the Gare du Nord–Gentilly bus on May 17, 1937. Adrenaline coursed through her, making her tremble. She desperately wished to be somewhere, anywhere but here. But seeing the sedan ready to leave its parking place, Lily came to her senses and ran across the street, checking for traffic first. She tapped several times on the back window. It lowered.