Belle Epoque by Elizabeth Ross Read Free Book Online

evidence of how the job can treat even the toughest character. I turn around and watch as Marie-Josée approaches her.
    “Oh,
ma puce
,” Marie-Josée murmurs. “Come on, it won’t be as bad tonight.” Marie-Josée takes the handkerchief from her sleeve and wipes away the younger woman’s tears.
    Cécile sniffs loudly. “It’s not fair. It’s impossible to see him with her.…” She trails off with a convulsion of sobs. I take my time braiding my hair, all the while listening in on their conversation, half guilty, half intrigued.
    Marie-Josée continues with her mother hen words, comforting her. “I know it’s hard, but it’s your job to push him to the client. It’s how it’s supposed to be,” she says.
    Cécile shrugs off Marie-Josée’s touch, tears streaming down her face. “She doesn’t love him like I do.”
    Marie-Josée shakes her head at our inconsolable colleague, then begins to make her way over to me. I turn my attention to the ribbon at the end of my braid and fiddle with it, pretending I wasn’t eavesdropping.
    “It’s always somebody’s turn at tears with you young ones,” says Marie-Josée. “Help me with my dress.” She turns her back to me and I undo the hooks with difficulty; they’re tight, and it takes some strength to unfasten them.
    “What’s wrong with Cécile?” I ask, prying open the last catch.
    She slings the bodice over a chair, then steps out of the skirt of the dress. “Now undo a few laces on this corset,” she tells me. “I can’t breathe.” I do as I’m told, and she sighs with relief when I manage to loosen it. “There’s always one client who’s a cruel mistress, Maude.”
    I think back to our earlier conversation and her “nouveau riche” client. “You mean the sort who doesn’t know how to use a repoussoir?” I ask.
    “No, worse than that,” she says, taking a seat, and the stool creaks under her. “The kind who smiles and jokes with you inpublic, takes your arm, whispers confidences and exchanges coy smiles. But then she turns on you. You are a doll to be thrown across the room in a tantrum. Hearts will be broken and feelings trampled on. You have to be stronger than that.” She nods toward Cécile, who is still sniffling. I let myself stare at her for a moment and try to imagine what exactly happened. Getting caught up in a client’s life until it gets under your skin—it’s an impossible position for a repoussoir. I don’t want that ever to be me.
    There’s a knock on the dressing room door and the girls stop talking for a moment. “Is everybody decent?” a calm male voice calls out to a rustle of skirts and muted squeals. “I have wages to distribute.” The handsome man whom Durandeau consulted at my interview walks into the dressing room carrying a box of envelopes. The girls look as though they’re experiencing a chain reaction of skipped heartbeats as he walks past them. Marie-Josée explained that Laurent is responsible for recruitment and accounts. She also told me that he is the reason many of the repoussoirs are here. His good looks and charm are Durandeau’s secret weapon. It’s a tricky task to recruit ugly women, but no girl can be mad at him for wooing her into the agency. No one can be mad at him for anything.
    He calls out our names one by one, and the girls give him their best smiles when he hands over their pay—except Cécile, who has a friend collect her wages.
    “Maude Pichon!”
    A glimpse of him is a treat, but it’s the brown envelope containing my pay that I’m most excited by—it’s the only thing keeping me afloat in Paris.
    When it’s her turn, Marie-Josée saunters over to him wearing only her undergarments and a wicked smile, rolls of flesh nearly bursting out of her flimsy cotton chemise. I throw a hand over my mouth, shocked.
    “You know, my client came down with whooping cough, so I’m free for you this weekend,” she purrs in his ear. “There’s a new show at le Chat Noir.… How