To Paris
To read Dr. Watson’s accounts of Mr. H”s adventures, you might think that I am forever at the beck and call of my lodgers, without a life of my own. Something, I have to say, that is very far from being the case. Of course, I have become very fond of my two gentlemen over the years, and I would not be without them. Even Mr H with all his faults and demands – one must make allowances for genius. Nevertheless, my life, especially recently, has taken off in directions I could never have imagined when I first came here to Baker Street with dear Henry and our two beloved girls. I have already described some of my adventures elsewhere, and in my latter years have discovered quite a taste for travel. Indeed, I soon find myself getting restless if I do not head off somewhere or other once in a while.
I was thus most intrigued earlier this year to receive a letter from my sister Nelly, who lives in the north of England, the same sister, incidentally, who shared in the adventure of the Vanished Man, about which I have written elsewhere. It seemed that her only son, Ralph, a young man of twenty-one, had taken it into his head that he wanted to be an artist, and so had headed forthwith to France, to Paris, which apparently is where anyone aspiring to that calling must go these days. At least, that is what Ralph told his mother.
Since then she had heard little from him – the odd note dashed off from time to time– and she was worried that her little darling might have fallen into bad company; Paris being, as she wrote to me, such an immoral place. A dangerous place, moreover, with, as the newspapers reported it, anarchist bombs going off right, left and centre.
I should add here that Nelly, a couple of years older than myself, has always been a worrier, given to fanciful exaggeration; the sensational novels and scandal sheets to which she is addicted having coloured her perception of the world. In my opinion, moreover, she has spoiled Ralph to excess, indulging him, where a firm hand might have served the youth better. Like myself, sadly, Nelly was widowed quite young and thenceforth focussed all her attentions and affections on her only son; her daughter, Maria, being considerably older than the boy and well-settled.
Now it seemed nothing would content her but to travel to Paris and find out what was the matter with him, her concern for her darling outweighing any perils to herself from immorality or bombs. Since she could not imagine going alone, as she wrote in her letter, she begged for me to accompany her, especially since, as she said, “you speak the language, Martha.” I fear Nelly rather overestimated my fluency. It is true that I had enjoyed learning French in school, and later was able to practise it for a period, thanks to a charming young woman from Normandy whom Henry and I employed as a nursemaid when the girls were little. In the years since then, I have tried to keep it up, and have even been known to peruse the occasional story in that mellifluous tongue, enjoying the works of M. Guy de Maupassant in particular. However, without the occasion to speak it, my ability to do so had fallen somewhat by the wayside.
Still, a trip to Paris in early summer was a most tempting prospect, it being a city I had always wished to visit. I put down the letter and picked up my cup of tea. Why not, I thought. There was nothing at home that demanded my special attention at that particular moment, the gentlemen being about to head off away somewhere or other in the West of England, to solve another mystery, no doubt. Should they return unexpectedly, my maid Clara would be more than capable of holding the fort for a week or so.
I replied straightway to Nelly, before I could change my mind, accepting her invitation.
“They aren’t really white, are they?” said Nelly, as we stood on the deck of the ferry looking back at the Dover cliffs. “More greyish, I’d say.”
That is the trouble with my sister. Something I always forget in her absence and only recall in her presence: her unerring ability to find fault, to judge the world ever falling short of her expectations. She had already, in the two days spent with me in Baker Street, complained of the filth and dust of the city, and the cramped nature of the accommodation I could provide (the best rooms naturally being those of my lodgers). The very first thing, indeed, that my loving sister had told me was that I had got fat, that I looked crabbed and old – I who am barely fifty! I refrained from commenting in turn on her own wasted appearance, which in truth had rather shocked me – her yellowish complexion that spoke of a bilious constitution – except to ask if she was quite well, to which she sharply replied that there was nothing the matter with her.
She hastened to inform me, moreover, that I was far too accepting of Mr. H.’s unreasonable behaviour and untidiness.
“Those smelly experiments of his! If he were my tenant, Martha, I’d have given him a piece of my mind long ago.” She stated this forcefully to me in private, though in his presence I was amused to notice she became quite tongue-tied and wide-eyed, while he, I fear, barely registered her existence.
As for poor Phoebe, my clumsy and foolish maid, Nelly would, she insisted, have given the girl her marching orders long ago, sending her back where she came from. In vain I explained that Phoebe came from a large and needy family, and that, in addition, I had grown quite fond of her, despite everything. Indeed, that she was much improved from what she used to be, to which remark Nelly gave a meaningful sniff, as if all the more entrenched in her opinion.
She also proved very fussy about her food and got black looks from Clara when she sent back that treasure’s speciality, a mock turtle soup, because it contained onions, which, as she claimed, didn’t agree with her. She merely toyed with her roast capon, and ate only one spoonful of her Conservative pudding “because, you know, Martha, it is far too rich for my digestion.” No wonder, I thought to myself, that you are all skin and bones.
The sights of London in general she compared unfavourably with those of her own northern city, the one exception being almost on my doorstep in Baker Street. The Waxworks Museum of Madame Tussaud thrilled her utterly. It is not a place I myself like to visit. I find the lifelike and yet lifeless statues unnerve me with their pale and damp-looking skin, so many of them indeed, representing dead people. I do not even care to look upon our dear Queen Victoria, who lives yet, thanks be to God, and wondered if she had ever set eyes upon this copy of herself, in all her youth and beauty, her late consort at her side, and what she thought of it. I should certainly not like to see myself set up like that for idlers to gawk at, and cannot help but fear that, someday, likenesses of Mr. H. and even dear Dr. Watson will be found there. I sincerely hope not. Still, I was so happy that at last Nelly had found something to interest her that I refrained from sharing my revulsion.
She was particularly attracted to the Chamber of Horrors, with its life-size representations of murderers, among them the body-snatchers Burke and Hare and that most unnatural woman, Mary Anne Cotton, who poisoned her three husbands and eleven children. Not to mention the death masks of the victims of the French Revolution, poor King Louis and Queen Marie Antoinette set beside a viciously authentic-looking guillotine.
“But imagine, Martha, poor Ralph falling victim to that!”
Nelly, having learnt that the instrument still served in France as a means of execution, had half convinced herself that her son had already been inveigled into a life of crime by various sinister individuals. When I expressed astonishment that she should imagine such a thing, she referred me to a novel she had recently perused in which the dashing hero, falsely accused, had only escaped the guillotine’s blade by the skin of his teeth.
“It was quite terrifying, Martha, to read of it. I could hardly bear it.”
Somewhat exasperated, I suggested to her that she really ought to change the subject matter of her reading material, the yellow press in which she delighted was giving her a distorted view of the world.
“The world is generally not like that, Nelly,” I said.
She sniffed.
Little did I know, of course, that what lay ahead of us would come to resemble those very sensational tales in no small fashion. But, forgive me, I anticipate.
To return to our journey. After disembarking from the ferry at the port of Calais, we boarded the train to Paris and soon were speeding through northern France. It had turned into a gloomy day with louring clouds, and, though it felt hot and humid, we had evidently left the sunshine behind us in England. The landscape meanwhile was flat and uninspiring, a dispiriting enough start to our adventure. Nelly, however, was buried in yet another of those hair-raising novels she favoured, and so I was at least spared her judgment on the scene. For myself, I had acquired a Baedeker travel guide to the French capital and was eagerly picking out places to visit, for I was determined to make the most of our stay, never mind what young Ralph might be up to.
We eventually arrived at the Gare du Nord, a great vaulted hall of a place. A motley crowd that included many low-life individuals, was pressing all about us and we were quick to find porters for our bags, holding fast to our reticules meanwhile in case they should be torn from our hands. I was as relieved as Nelly when she spotted Ralph waiting for us. To be honest, I should not have known him. The skinny, awkward lad I remembered from past visits had grown into a tall and slender young man with something of the athletic look of his late father. But while the latter was always well groomed, Ralph’s fair hair hung in strings and the meagre little beard he sported on his chin resembled nothing so much as an eruption of rust.
This provoked a cry from Nelly almost before she had greeted him.
“Ralph,” she said, “whatever do you look like? You need a visit to the barbers…” and then regarding his attire, “and to the outfitters.”
The boy frowned. I imagined he thought he looked quite the bohemian with his beard and smock and beret and ragged scarlet cravat, and I felt a little sorry that his mother had not saved her exclamations at least until after they had exchanged embraces.
He nodded rather curtly at me as if not quite sure who I was.
“Aren’t you going to say hello to your Aunt Martha?” asked Nelly, in a tone one might use to chide a small child.
“Hello, Aunt Martha,” Ralph replied, parrot-fashion, with a sort of a sneer.
I greeted him back warmly, however, and added that I was delighted to have the opportunity of seeing a city I had always dreamed of visiting.
“Why haven’t you come before, then, if you wanted to so much? After all, it’s not darkest Africa.”
Oh dear, I thought. This confrontational attitude did not bode at all well for our trip.
He had reserved rooms for us in a hotel, near enough, he said, to his studio apartment in Montmartre. We piled into a cab with some difficulty, given our large cases, the driver growling something incomprehensible and spitting. It proved a most uncomfortable journey, rattling over the cobblestones, clinging on for dear life.
Worse was to come. Alighting at place called Pigalle, we found ourselves in a decidedly seedy and run-down neighbourhood, not at all what I had been expecting from my guidebook. None of the broad boulevards of Baron Haussmann here. No elegant architecture, just higgledy-piggledy structures looming over narrow, sunless streets. Ralph led us down one of these to a most unprepossessing-looking establishment. Indeed, I should never have taken it for a hotel, save for the wording in broken letters indicating as much over the door. Hôtel de lube was the name this place graced itself with, though I doubted that the dawn of its name was visible from any of the grimy little windows.
While Ralph spoke in French to a fat and slovenly woman behind a reception desk, Nelly looked about herself with dismay.
“What is this place, Martha?” she whispered. “It doesn’t look quite…”
At that moment a stout middle-aged man in a dark suit and hat descended the stairs, giving us a startled look as he passed out into the street. Behind him ambled a young woman in considerable dishabille. Her hair was falling about her face and her lips were smudged with red. She went behind the desk and helped herself to a cigarette.
“Ralph,” I said in sharp tones. “This place will not do.”
I did not know exactly what my young nephew was up to, though I had my suspicions.
He turned back in some surprise. The concierge and the young woman stared at me as well.
“What?” he said.
“Oh, Martha.” Nelly grabbed my arm. “If Ralph thinks it will suit us, then I am sure it must.”
“Admittedly it is not the grandest place, mother. I only wished to save you money. Paris is an expensive city, you know.”
“Nonetheless,” I said. “We are not staying here.” I picked up my cases, turned and walked out the door.
Nelly scurried after me.
“Martha,” she said, “whatever are you doing?”
“Perhaps your son is unaware that the place is a brothel,” I said. “Or perhaps he thinks it is funny to install his mother and aunt in such a place.”
“Oh, I am sure…” At that moment, Ralph joined us. “It’s not true, is it Ralph?”
“What?” He looked sullen.
“Your Aunt Martha says… Oh, I cannot repeat it.”
“We will find somewhere respectable,” I said firmly. “In a better part of town.” I glared at the boy. “We are not so poor that we have to stay in a house of ill repute.”
“Is it? Goodness!” Ralph replied, seeming all innocent. “Oh, aunt, I had no idea. You obviously have more experience of such places than I have….”
I was aghast. Even Nelly was shocked.
“Ralph!” she exclaimed.
He looked rueful at last. “I only meant coming from London,” he said. “You must see all sorts of things there.”
I decided to let the insult go. There was no point quarrelling at this early stage. It was perfectly clear to me why Ralph was behaving this way: He did not want us here. He was annoyed with his mother for treating him like a child, but in fact was behaving just like one, a spoilt brat, paying her back.
“My Baedeker,” I said handing it to him, “recommends some suitable establishments. Perhaps listed here you can find one for us.”
His face had turned red. He took the book from me and thumbed through it.
“The Hotel de Provence in Faubourg Montmartre…” he said finally. “It isn’t far.”
We took a cab – a larger one than before – and this time travelled in relative comfort toward a much more salubrious part of the city. As it turned out the Provence had no free rooms, due perhaps to its mention in Baedeker. However, the friendly concierge was able to direct us to another establishment very nearby, the Hotel Lilas. Again, from the outside I should hardly have taken it for a lodging house but for the sign. It was a narrow building, squashed between similar structures, but rising up on many floors. Inside, the reception hall looked most respectable and clean; rooms, happily, were available, and the price was acceptable too – less, I think than one would pay for similar in London – which again made me suspect Ralph’s motives in trying to install us in L’Aube.
Nelly and I were both fatigued after the long journey, but hungry as well. I asked the concierge, in my rather halting French to recommend a nearby restaurant. It seemed to surprise Ralph that I knew anything at all of the language, Nelly being quite ignorant of it. I must explain here, in parenthesis, that, in the following account, I have smoothed over the inadequacies of my command of this most musical of tongues, certainly not to promote myself, but rather to make the exchanges less tortuous for my readers.
The good woman directed us to an establishment in the same street and said that Père Perrot would look after us well, especially if we mentioned that Madame Albert had sent us.
The name of the brasserie was Le Petit Bonhomme, which could equally well have described its owner. Père Perrot was a small round jolly man, bald-pated but with a slick black moustache and a habit of rubbing his hands together exclaiming, “Bon, bon, bon!” He became almost coy on hearing that Madame Albert had recommended him, seating us in as much style as the modest premises could provide. Thereupon he reeled off a list of the dishes on offer, too fast, I confess, for me to follow. However, Ralph, although to my ear speaking French with a very strong Northern English accent, was able to interpret for us, and we enjoyed a delicious repast. At least I did, with my coq au vin and crusty bread to soak up the juices. Nelly, meticulously picking out the onions and various unknowns from her pot-au-feu, pronounced her dish “rather spicy,” though I can hardly imagine that it was. It looked like a good plain meat stew to me. Ralph, I noticed, paid rather more attention to the red wine than to his plate of grilled sardines. In fact he drank most of the bottle, even becoming quite convivial, as if he really were most pleased to see us. He proposed a toast, “to Paris, art and good fellowship.” We clinked glasses in the time-hallowed manner, and sipped the wine, although Nelly, after tasting it with a grimace, pronounced it “too sour,” and laid it aside, in preference to plain water.
Conversation, at first quite lively, on the subject of the city and all it had to offer the visitor, soon became heavy-going, especially since Ralph proved reluctant to talk about himself and his artistic ambitions and achievements to date. As I said, Nelly and I were worn out, so the little wine I imbibed went straight to my head, and soon I could not stop myself from yawning. For Ralph’s part, rather than raising his spirits as it did initially, the second bottle of wine seemed to make him ever more morose. That, or perhaps the good humour he had previously displayed was a mask that now slipped away.
It was with general relief, therefore, that we said “bonsoir” to Père Perrot and “goodnight” to Ralph, and adjourned to our hotel, where I quickly slipped into a dreamless sleep between sheets considerably cleaner and well-starched than I imagined we would have enjoyed at L’Aube.
