CHAPTER 16
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LUCIA:
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IN PARIS, WE SEEMED always to be in motion.
On the flimsy pretext that we had brought no luggage and needed clothes to tide us over until Tilly arrived, Charley dragged me to Parisian modistes with a zest she had never exhibited in London. She drew me along to the Vionnet boutique on Avenue Montaigne, where she was welcomed with great warmth. (Mademoiselle, according to the vendeuse, was a dear client of its Fifth Avenue boutique in New York City.) She dragged me to the Babani boutique on Boulevard Haussmann for Fortuny’s hand-pleated silk Delphos gowns whose artistry Marcel Proust had expounded in his magnum opus. (Wouldn’t Tilly love these—and Aunt Merry too?) To Jean Patou for tennis dresses. To the ateliers of Louise Chéruit (Proust mentioned he
