She nodded. ‘I want too much flavour. From now on that’s all I want.’
Roger stopped in front of them. He looked from one to the other and smiled. ‘I’m done. Shall we go back to the hotel?’
‘I’m so sorry,’ Grace touched Roger’s hand lightly. ‘I’m afraid I won’t be coming with you.’
A week later, Grace unlocked the door and Mallory walked inside.
‘So, this is it!’ Mallory strolled into the empty drawing room. ‘You weren’t joking, were you?’ She whistled. ‘It’s huge! Now I can see why you want to keep it.’ She held up the cardboard box she was carrying. ‘Where shall I put this?’
‘Oh, anywhere.’ Grace lugged her suitcase in.
‘I hate to be the one to point it out, but you have no furniture.’
‘Yes, I had noticed that.’ Grace opened up the French doors. A warm breeze wafted in, tousled the girls’ hair.
They walked out on the balcony.
‘I have a whole speech prepared, you know.’ Mallory leaned her elbows on the railing. ‘About how you really ought to reconsider. Think of your family, your friends. That’s me by the way.’
‘Yes.’
‘But the truth is,’ she sighed, ‘I envy you, Grace.’
‘Really? I don’t know what I’m doing, Mal. Or how I’m going to manage.’
‘You’ll manage just fine. I’m not worried about you.’ She looked across at her friend. ‘But what am I going to do in London without you?’
Grace reached out, took Mallory’s hand. ‘I’ll probably be back in two weeks, with my tail between my legs.’
‘Then I’ll march you right back to the airport and put you on the plane again. I want you to be happy, really I do. I just wish you didn’t have to do it so far away.’
‘You can come and stay.’
‘Don’t think I won’t. And just for the record,’ Mallory wiped a tear from her eye, ‘I have a real bone to pick with this Eva d’Orsey. How dare she leave you a fortune!’
Grace smiled, gave her hand a squeeze.
‘So, seeing as I’m here,’ Mallory walked back inside and opened the cardboard box, ‘let me help you unpack.’ She unwrapped the tissue paper from the little china figures, lining them in a row on the wooden floor. ‘My God!’ she laughed, shaking her head. ‘They’re even more ghastly than I remembered! What are you going to do with them?’
‘I don’t know.’ Grace picked one up. A shepherdess with a lamb, sitting on a tree stump covered in ivy. ‘They sort of grow on you, don’t you think?’
‘No.’ Mallory passed her another one – a little girl with long blonde hair, picking daffodils. ‘I can’t believe she went out of her way to make sure you got these.’
Grace looked over at her. ‘What did you say?’
‘Well, it’s just so odd that she saved these for you, gave them to the concierge, put your name on the box. You would’ve thought it was the family jewels, for God’s sake!’
The family jewels.
Of course . . .
Grace picked another one up. The tree stump was wood, the lamb was wool, the daffodils were paperwhites . . .
‘My God, Mallory! You’re a genius!’
‘Really? I’ve never been accused of that before.’
Grace turned the figure over. It had a hole at the bottom; the figures were hollow inside. She poked her fingers into the recess.
Nothing.
She turned over the shepherdess.
Empty.
But when she looked in the bottom of the woman with the veil and fan, lounging on a chair with her cheek in her hand, she found it. A tightly rolled scroll of paper, tucked deep inside.
‘What is that?’ Mallory peered over her shoulder.
Grace unravelled it. The paper was covered with very fine writing; a long list of chemical ingredients, very specific measurements.
‘It’s the family jewels.’ Grace passed it to her. Malloy’s eyes widened.
La Formule Originale de Ce Soir, it read.
Paris, Winter, 1954
She was standing in his office, by the window overlooking the Louvre, when he came in that morning.
‘I’m sorry,’ his secretary whispered, taking his briefcase and coat by the door, ‘but she was early. I didn’t know what to do with her, so I showed her in.’
‘It’s fine,’ he told her, though slightly irritated to be caught off guard. He walked in, positioning himself behind his desk. ‘Madame Hiver?’
The woman turned to face him. She was attractive, perhaps in her early forties, with dark greying hair and rather surprising pale green eyes. She was wearing a deep navy suit, a hat and gloves, and on the desk, lying across her handbag was a small Latin prayer book. When she crossed to greet him she moved slowly, carefully, as if with some effort. And he could see, as she came closer, that her skin was sallow; her remarkable eyes ringed with bluey circles. Removing her gloves, she held out her hand. ‘Monsieur Tissot, how kind of you to meet with me so early.’