Secrets of Paris Read Free Page A

lovely.”
    “Flying to Paris from Ireland is like taking the Eastern Shuttle to Washington,” Michael said. From his tone Lydie could tell he felt grateful to Julia for her enthusiasm.
    “Well, we took the boat, but yes—distances are so different over there. It’s a short trip from Paris to anywhere in Europe. You’ll have a marvelous time.”
    “It’ll be great,” Michael said, speaking to Lydie.
    She said nothing, but smiled at him. He was trying to assemble a cardboard carton. The sight of her tall husband—a whiz on any basketball court but a klutz when it came to anything remotely mechanical—trying to transform a sheet of corrugated cardboard into a vessel that would actually hold their belongings made Lydie laugh.
    “Here, let me,” she said, folding flaps, slapping on the plastic tape without even taking off her gloves.
    “What a woman,” Michael said, bending down to kiss her.
    “She’s one in a million,” Julia said. “After she won her first race at Watkin’s Glen, her father said she could do anything. Do you remember that nice dinner we all had afterward?”
    “Sure,” Lydie said, quivering with the memory. They had drunk champagne, and after dinner her father had bought her a cigar. She could picture her parents perfectly: their proud smiles, her mother’s girlish smile, the absent way her father reached over to touch Julia’s shoulder. It killed Lydie to think Margaret Downes had already brought her car in for its second paint job in six months, that Neil had already fallen in love with her. The happy expression on her father’s face that night, so full of love, had been for Margaret.
    Lydie crouched, assembling another carton. Michael sat beside her, pulling the tape out of her hands and holding them tight; he knew what the memory meant to her. Julia said nothing, looking on. She had started to cry but stopped herself. Lydie eased her hands from Michael’s grasp, ripped off a piece of tape, closed a seam. Every crack she taped, every box she built, brought her closer to leaving. And, somehow, the idea of leaving the scene of her father’s death and crime filled her with doom. She felt wild with an abundance of unfinished business.
    “A year in Paris,” Julia had said. “I can’t imagine any couple who could enjoy it more than you.”
    But it wasn’t working out that way, Lydie thought now, entering the Bibliothèque’s vast courtyard. With their great luck, she had thought they would be the most frivolous pair in Paris. But Michael’s exhilaration had turned to patience; he was waiting for Lydie to get back the spirit he had fallen in love with. So far it hadn’t happened. Since coming to Paris, Lydie felt a gulf widening between herself and Michael, and she couldn’t do a damned thing about it.
    Just before a race, Lydie always experienced a vision. In a flash she saw the crash, the rollover, herself paralyzed in a hospital. And the vision always refined her concentration, made her take great care and drive more safely. Now, walking numb through the streets of Paris, she felt as if the crash had happened, and she hadn’t even seen it coming.

    “Why didn’t anyone tell us it stays light in Paris till midnight?” Michael McBride asked. He was watching Lydie cook dinner. They stood in the kitchen of their Belle Epoque apartment overlooking the Pont de l’Alma. A roasting chicken sizzled in the oven.
    “It’s nowhere near midnight,” Lydie said, smiling. “It’s ten-fifteen, and the sun’s going down.”
    “Lydie!” Michael said, feeling impatient but vowing to stay calm. “I think you’re missing my point. All I’m saying is that the sun would have set two hours ago in New York. It’s something different, and I think it’s neat.”
    “Paris is farther north than New York,” Lydie said. “New York is actually on the same parallel as Rome.”
    Michael let it drop. If he opened his mouth again, he knew Lydie would come back with another rebuttal. They kept