The Secret Language of Stones (11 page)

Chapter 10

I returned to the shop in an even worse rain than when I'd left. Inside, Monsieur Orloff raised his eyebrows at the time of my arrival. I didn't apologize as I put away my umbrella and hat. I stayed in most of the time. Ten minutes of tardiness should have been overlooked.

“Did you hear anything about the Bolsheviks or the Romanovs?”

“No, but there was news about some German spies,” and I told him what I'd overheard.

“Above us and below us.” He shook his head. “There are Bolsheviks underground too. I'm sure of it. Where else would you hide in Paris?”

I didn't answer. He'd asked a rhetorical question I heard at least once a day.

“You remember the last piece we made for the actress Paulette Gillard, yes?”

“Of course.”

I knew her lover Pierre Zakine well. A longtime friend of my great-grandmother's, he owned an art gallery and met my mother when she'd lived at Maison de la Lune. He'd become her dealer over twenty years ago and visited us in Cannes often. Once I moved to Paris, he'd started coming to the store just to check up on me and always picked up a little trinket, as he called the ready-made pieces in
our cases, sometimes as a gift for his wife or his daughter. After many such visits, he commissioned a piece of high jewelry for his mistress and, liking it so much, began to order more of Monsieur Orloff's creations. Like many men of the upper classes, he'd not allowed the war to interfere in his life any more than absolutely necessary. After all, the nightclubs were still open and Maxim's still served. As long as you could pay, there were still oysters to feast on and champagne to buy and lovely ladies to bed.

“Well, we're making another gift for her,” Monsieur said. “So let's go over it.”

This was how Monsieur Orloff mentored me, by involving me in his own pieces. First, he'd show me his design, always a gouache on fine paper from Sennelier's store. After discussing the piece's intricacies, he'd explain about his choice of gems and color values. Then I'd estimate the number of stones, and together we'd visit the vault to choose and collect them. Monsieur Orloff often allowed me to make the first selection; then he inspected and either approved or replaced my choices, always explaining why.

When I first came to work for him, he rejected at least three-quarters of what I'd selected, but we'd reached a stage where he rarely found fault with any of my picks. If I couldn't find stones that were the right shade or size, Monsieur would send me to the gemologist, Monsieur St. Croix, to purchase what we required.

“This is a daunting design,” Monsieur said that morning. “It's a necklace, yes, but the flowers can be removed from the stem here and here and worn as a clip. And then, I want the petals to be
en tremblant
.”

I stood by his shoulder and gazed at the gouache study. The new piece comprised two roses on stems, with leaves. The bud and the bloom met in the center, their stems wrapping about the neck. Because Monsieur wanted the petals to tremble, they would be mounted on hidden springs.

“We'll use rose-colored diamonds, Opaline. As well as pink sap
phires. Dark rubies for the shadows and folds of the petals. We want to complement her complexion, so you know the shades to pick. Tsavorites and emeralds for the leaves and brown diamonds for the stems. I'm expecting a client, so why don't you go down today on your own, find what you think will work, and I'll join you later and see how you've done.”

I nodded, too excited to trust myself to speak. Monsieur had taken me into the vault hundreds of times but had never sent me down alone. Going on my own constituted a large step. In addition to jewelry and gems, the vault contained objets d'art Monsieur was safekeeping for émigrés. He also kept some of the smaller antiques Grigori had bought but hadn't put on display yet. And I knew from overhearing an argument between Grigori and his father that Monsieur did not allow even his son to visit the vault alone.

“If you'd become a jeweler, you would be going into the vault,” Monsieur said whenever Grigori complained.

“Is that the only thing you can ever say to me? ‘If you were a jeweler' this . . . ‘if you were a jeweler' that . . . ,” he'd spit back, and storm out of the room.

I ached for Grigori. As much as I admired and revered Monsieur, he was too angry at his eldest son for being the only one of his children to not follow in his footsteps. Making jewelry is not just a profession; one needs passion to sustain oneself through the long hours of sitting at a bench, sometimes wearing cumbersome glasses, using minute tools and always being careful and meticulous.

While Grigori possessed a great love of beautiful things and an excellent eye, he was best on the floor, describing with just the right phrases the artistry of a piece. Why it was a worthwhile investment. The joy it would bring.

With great ceremony, Monsieur Orloff handed me his keys to the vault.

After lighting a kerosene lamp to take with me, I unlocked the first door just outside the workshop. Downstairs, at the landing,
instead of going right toward my suite, I went left, walked past the bomb shelter down an incline and reached a second locked door.

I unlocked that door and opened it, immediately getting a nose full of the musty scent rising from the quarries. Walking the long twisting hallway to the vault, I held my breath at every turn. As always, I feared what I might hear. Some days the hum of the burial chambers, even though they were far away, was more audible than others. I'd gone down a few times without being assaulted, but most days I heard the dead's whispers and they frightened me.

That afternoon was one of the worst days. Twice I thought about turning around and running from the din, but the image of Monsieur's disappointed face kept me moving.

Using Monsieur Orloff's keys, I opened the next door, which led to a narrow hallway only wide enough for one. The rough-hewn stone walls and floors and thick wooden crossbeams hadn't been rebuilt since the seventeenth century. In the dark, the lamp's beam and my form cast more shadows. Twice I tripped on rocks, only barely finding my balance before falling. Heart pounding, I kept going till I reached the very last door.

Made of steel, it was the only modernity in the ancient passageway. Using the last of the keys, I opened the heavy portal and shone my lantern in, setting alight an Ali Baba's cave of riches.

I never could enter the vault without sucking in my breath. I'd been to the famous gilt Palais Garnier opera house, seen the ornate riches of Versailles, visited the Louvre and examined the cases of ancient jewels and objets d'art, frequented the finest jewelry stores in Cannes and in Paris. None of them was preparation for the Orloff vault.

The long narrow room consisted of a series of archways carved out of stone walls. Each fitted with wooden shelves covered with forest green felt. Altogether, there were five archways on the right wall, three on the back wall, and five on the left. Ninety-one shelves crammed to overflowing with gold and silver jewelry and objets d'art.
Platters, goblets, plates, picture frames, pitchers, creamers, teapots, coffeepots, candlesticks, and candelabras. Head mannequins with necklaces of pearls and diamonds and rubies and emeralds and sapphires encircling the painted flesh-colored wood. Velvet cases, some holding rings, others with earrings. Almost nothing was enclosed; everything was on view. I once asked Monsieur why. He said stones need to breathe like we do. They need to be seen and show off their colors; gold needs to shine.

Monsieur was a man of few words. Often curt. Difficult to read. But when he talked about his gems, I saw the lover he must have been to Anna, the poet's soul living inside his craggy exterior.

Since so few Russian émigrés trusted the banks after living through an overthrown regime, they used La Fantaisie Russe to store their most prized possessions. Inside the vault, a large leather ledger sat on a podium. Every piece was recorded with a drawing, the name of whom it belonged to, and its particulars—weight, height, dimensions. Many of these items were heirlooms, and if I focused on them and touched them with my bare skin, I could sometimes be connected to the spirits of their owners and hear messages. An experience I had come to dread. Since we were supposed to wear white cotton gloves when we handled everything in the vault to avoid scratches, I made sure to keep mine on during the entirety of my visits.

At the far end of the room, I knelt beside the small safe. The enormity of the trust Monsieur placed in me worried me. I turned the tumbler to the right and then the left in the sequence he'd taught me. What if someone was to break in while I was there? I knew a pistol sat on the shelf to the right of the safe. Identical to the one upstairs in the showroom in the top drawer of the desk. Even with my small hands, I could hold it.

When I first went to work for him, Monsieur Orloff took me to the Bois de Boulogne and taught me how to use the gun. After several weeks of practice sessions, he declared me fit to defend the shop if I ever needed to. I was surprised at how brave I became with
that small cold metal weapon in hand. In the midst of an angry war, with Paris going dark every night and rumors of spies infiltrating the city, knowing how to protect myself provided at least a kernel of comfort.

For a half hour, I sat on a small stool beside the safe and searched through pink diamonds, rubies, sapphires, brown diamonds, emeralds, and tsavorites, picking out my choices for the jeweled flower.

Finally, I heard the distant footsteps of Monsieur coming downstairs. Nervousness fluttered inside my chest. I wanted him to approve of my selection and perhaps even offer a word or two of praise.

Looking up from the glittering gems, I listened. Something was wrong. The sound wasn't coming from the right direction. The footsteps weren't descending from the stairs, but approaching from behind the vault's wall. From the tunnels running behind the section of the subbasement owned by Monsieur Orloff.

The noise increased in volume, sounding more like voices than footsteps but still muffled and hard to decipher. Was I picking up the hum from the dead and mistaking it for sounds being made by the living? Concentrating, I thought I could hear levels and tones of several people speaking.

It seemed that in a room or a cavern abutting Monsieur Orloff's vault, people were gathering.

I put my ear against the back wall and listened, almost able to make out the chatter, but there was too much noise, too many people talking all at once, as if there was one set of voices on the other side of the wall itself and another beyond it.

I have a bad ear for languages. I know how to speak English since my mother was born in America and talked to us often in her native tongue. While I certainly heard the Orloffs speaking Russian often, I'd never picked it up. To me, Russian, Polish, German, Czech, and Yiddish were almost indistinguishable and equally indecipherable.

Choosing yet another section of the wall, I put my ear against the cold stone and tried again. No clearer. For a few minutes, I moved
around, repeating the same action, searching for a spot where the sound would be more distinct, but the walls were too thick.

Was I hearing German? Could these be spies? Or was my sense of direction off and it was Monsieur Orloff hosting a Two-Headed Eagles meeting? I just couldn't tell. Too many voices, too much noise.

As I worked my way around the room, I noticed one of the alcoves was set back farther, deeper into the wall. Maybe the sound would be more audible from there. As I quietly moved items off the shelf, I continued listening. Was it a mélange of unconnected voices from the heavens? Had I turned on some kind of psychic switch? Even though I wore gloves, was I hearing the people who'd once owned the antique objects in the vault before they were handed down or bought by their present owners? Had talking to Jean Luc opened a portal? Was I now a receptor even when I wasn't trying to be one? I needed Anna's help more than ever. I had to learn how to control my abilities so I could step out of the nightmare when it overwhelmed me.

Succeeding in emptying the shelves and removing them, I stepped into the alcove, put my ear up to the wall, and listened.

The only thing I became more sure of was that whoever was beyond this wall was speaking neither French nor English. If they were, I would have been able to pick up a hint of a word or accent. Pressing closer, I knocked over a candelabra, which clattered as it fell from a table onto the floor. The crash surprisingly loud.

The noise on the other side of the walls ceased for a moment. Then, just as it picked up again, I noticed a flicker of light above and to my left. Investigating, I found a slim crack in the rocks with half an inch of loose mortar. Using a fingernail, I picked at it, dislodging another half inch more, creating a peephole.

I moved the lantern away to the other end of the vault. If there was someone beyond the wall, I didn't want them to see its glow and find me out.

Finally, afraid I would spot German uniforms—or, worse, not see anyone and discover the sounds were not of this time or place—I leaned forward and peered into the room beyond the vault.

Men's legs. Hands. A long cream-colored cylinder I couldn't identify.

The dimness of the chamber, the angle and size of the hole, didn't allow for much visibility. As far as I could tell, my peephole was only a few feet above the floor. I was almost eye level with chalky, muddy shoes. Five—no, six—sets of feet. Maybe seven. Too much movement, too many shadows. The noise was no more distinct. I realized I had, in fact, been listening to what these men were saying as well as hearing voices from the antiques around me. I couldn't separate the sources.

This was some kind of new hell.

Closing my eyes, I tried to remember Anna's advice on how to control the messaging. But we'd only worked on my psychometry, on what to do when I was touching something, not how to deal with untethered responses.