Large black leather portfolios of houses, house plans, and maps crowded the visitors’ table where clients and prospective clients looked to sell or buy or build. Before they understood how their lives had already been charted, she, Justine, Gabriel, and sometimes André would pore over the books, picking Faubourgs and land and houses on sale for prices they couldn’t comprehend. Grand-père also sold and bought land for businesses, though that wasn’t of much interest to them then—or now.
Grand-père walked out of his office, dusting the sleeves of his frock coat. “After all these years, you would think I would have learned to wear a coat at least the same shade of silver as the dust, instead of blacks and browns.”
Lottie flipped pages in the Faubourg-Marigny portfolio. “But you look so distinguished in those dark colors.”
“Is that your kind way of telling me that a gray coat and my silver hair might make me look like a riverboat gambler?”
“I doubt Père François would allow you to look like a gambler and still attend Mass. Certainly Grand-mère would not.” She closed the portfolio. “When your appointment comes, I’ll go to Barriere’s for another change of scenery. I won’t be there long. Unless you need me to be.”
“No, no. Come and go as you please. I suspect my client will be here at least an hour. He’s already looked at the properties for sale, so today we’re meeting to determine the ones he wants to purchase. We were scheduled to meet last week, but he was called away on other business. I’ve tried to keep the weekends free of work, but sometimes in this business you have to be available if you intend to sell.”
It sounded as if he was apologizing, though Lottie had no idea why he felt he should.
He glanced at his watch again; then he pointed to the door. “There he is. Joseph Joubert.”
Lottie looked out the long windows at the front of the office just as her grandfather said, “Isn’t that Gabriel following him?”
Chapter Twenty-Seven
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Joseph Joubert and Louis LeClerc started their meeting, delighted that the two young people with them could entertain one another. Lottie acted equally pleased, while Gabriel did his best to avoid eye contact with her.
The two men went into her grandfather’s office, and Lottie wished they could have taken the awkwardness between her and Gabriel with them and shut the door.
“I didn’t expect you would be here. Though, until Joseph stopped, I did not know I would be, for that matter,” said Gabriel.
“Grand-père saved me from boredom and brought me to the bookstore. He told me he had an appointment, but had he told me the name, I would not have known who he was. Or that you would be with him.” She didn’t want Gabriel to think he was the reason for her being at the office.
“Joseph is designing and building additions to our house and the café. I’ve been working with him.”
“Oh, I see,” said Lottie.
Pretending to be transfixed by a map of the Garden District, Lottie sat at the table and hoped she could outwait Gabriel. After ten times of visually tracing her finger up and down St. Charles, she’d almost conceded when he said, “You always won the breath-holding games.”
“Except for the time I passed out.” She let her eyes rest on his face.
“Oh, I disagree. That was most definitely a win. André and I proclaimed you champion. Remember, we looked for laurel to make you a wreath just like the Greeks would be awarded.”
She laughed. “The wreath. I didn’t forget the wreath for days. None of us did. Our first lesson in identifying poison ivy.”
He stood behind her, reached his arm over her shoulder, and pointed at the map. “Garden District?”
His sleeve grazed her neck, and at that moment she was grateful to be an expert breath-holder. She nodded.
“I think Monsieur Joubert might be talking to your father about land there. The Americans, he said, are attempting to outdo one another in who can construct the most pretentious house.”
Sitting in her grandfather’s office and struggling to limit their dialogue to unimportant topics was more painful than jabbing herself with her sewing needle. “I planned to walk to Barriere’s while I waited for Grand-père, since I expected to be waiting alone. Would you care to join me? We could go to Woodlief’s on Chartres Street, if you’d prefer. I don’t have a particular reason for shopping, so either is fine.”
“Let’s start at one, then if time permits, we can walk to the other,” Gabriel said.
If only he knew that, given different circumstances, she was willing to walk right into his life.