The Paris Architect: A Novel

“You idiot,” said Celeste. “A wife always knows.”


“I did it for us, whether you believe it or not.”

“I don’t believe it. But I am impressed that you played both sides. Getting money from the Jews and designing your beloved architecture for the Boche. I guess you can have your cake and eat it too. But leave it to you to screw yourself in both directions. You’re either going to be killed by the Gestapo for helping Jews or killed for being a collaborator. I don’t know exactly what you’ve gotten yourself into—I don’t want to know. I could put up with that slut you have on the side, but not this. I’m not going to be tortured or deported because of your foolishness.”

“So what are you going to do?”

“I’m leaving you.”

“You’re what?” Stunned, Lucien shot up from his chair and looked down at his wife.

“You heard me. Our marriage was finished anyway. It was a bad match from the beginning. To use one of your dumb architecture metaphors, the marriage was built on a weak foundation, and it just crumbled.”

“In war you have to make hard decisions. I—”

“And you made the wrong decisions. No matter how you look at it, you’re screwed. Stop fooling yourself, Lucien; you’re not a man of high moral fiber. It’s just like I said before—an architectural Mephistopheles.”

Lucien walked to the tall kitchen window that overlooked the courtyard. Except for a scrawny black cat prowling at its edge, the space was deserted.

“There’s something else.”

“What?” he answered irritably, his back toward her, bracing for more abuse to be hurled at him.

“I’ve met someone,” she said in a soft quiet voice.

It was as though someone had hit him on the back of his head with a shovel. He almost fell forward. Lucien placed his hands on the sides of the window frame and dropped his head. After a minute, he walked out of the kitchen to the foyer closet and grabbed his tweed jacket. Slamming the door behind him, he ran down the stairs instead of waiting for the lift. He was so beside himself with anger that it took him almost five minutes to notice he’d walked ten blocks along the rue Saint-Denis. Three hours later, when he returned to the apartment, Celeste and her clothes were gone.





32





“Don’t lie to me, Gaspard. You’re not leaving me for another woman.”

“One of my students. We’ve…”

Juliette Trenet walked up to her husband and looked into his eyes. He immediately looked away.

“I wish it were one of your students,” Juliette said. “Then I could bear the heartbreak.”

Gaspard said nothing, gazing at the oriental rug in the vestibule of their apartment.

“Professor Pinard called you into his office, didn’t he?”

“No, that’s not…”

“And he gave you a choice—me…or your job.”

“Juliette, please…”

“And you chose your professorship in medieval literature.”

Gaspard, a short, handsome man with light brown hair, stepped back from Juliette.

“All because Vichy and the Nazis decreed that because my grandmother—whom I never even met—was Jewish…I’m now officially Jewish.”

Juliette went over to the coat rack and held up her forest-green flannel blazer, which had a yellow felt star on its front breast pocket. “Even though I’ve never set foot in a synagogue or know a single word of Hebrew.”

“The way they decide who’s a Jew is ridiculous.” Gaspard shook his head. “A priest at a parish in Ménilmontant was classified a Jew.”

“I was fired from a job I loved because I’m a Jew. And now the only man I’ve ever loved is leaving me because I’m a Jew.”

“It’s not…”

“Please, please tell me this isn’t happening, Gaspard,” Juliette cried out. “That I’m just having a terrible nightmare. For God’s sake, wake me up.”