“Can we see it?” Lucie asks with a sparkle in her eyes.
“It’s long gone.” Yas makes a sweeping hand gesture. “We don’t even know where exactly it was.”
This is one of those moments when I hate that the existence of Mount Evor has to be kept secret from 99.9 percent of the world’s population. In the gardens of Château des Neiges, there’s an amazing natural grotto decorated by none other than Bernard Palissy. He filled its nooks and crannies with whimsical fountains, unique shells, enameled terracotta lizards, toads, turtles, and aquatic animals oozing water onto the rock.
The House of Valois-Montevor has taken better care of it than the French Bourbons did of theirs. Our grotto is still there, well preserved and open to the public. Evorians love it.
But I, Maximilian Valois-Montevor, am not allowed to rub that fact into a single snub French nose.
Damn!
Yasmina’s voice snaps me out of my internal rant. Sharing some other tidbit, she guides us toward the Grand Alley. The weather is a bit chilly for mid-April, but sunny and perfectly springlike. The reason we’re roaming the Tuileries Garden during office hours is to give our rookies a warm, informal welcome and to foment team spirit between Lucie and me.
She’s been at MINDFUCH for two days now. The plan is to give her a week to acclimate and to build trust between us by assigning her easy, inconsequential tasks.
Not that I understand how “easy, inconsequential tasks” build trust, but hey, I’m no expert. Nor am I qualified to offer an opinion on the interpersonal dynamics among employees. I was born into top management.
Yas points toward the east end of the Gardens. “Catherine de Medici had a new royal palace erected over there.”
“What palace?” Lucie asks, perplexed.
“The Palace of Tuileries.”
Lucie tilts her head to the right, squinting. “Er… I’ve been to the Tuileries Garden before, but I don’t recall seeing it.”
“That’s because it’s gone,” Yas says. “The Paris Commune radicals burned it down in 1871.”
“Oh, good!” Lucie exclaims.
Everybody goggles at her.
She wrinkles her nose. “I mean, not good that it was demolished, but good to know I didn’t miss an entire palace on my previous visits.”
“Not just any palace, but one where King Louis XVI and his family were held before their execution.” Yas turns to me, adopting a woeful expression. “May those royal martyrs rest in peace!”
Lucie’s gaze travels from Yas to me, her eyes narrowing. And I want to shake Yas for saying those words in such an emphatic manner to me. I hope Lucie decides it’s simply because Yas and I are monarchists and leaves it at that.
Yas finally shifts her condoling gaze away.
Our group has now passed the round pond and reached the oval pond. Miraculously, we find enough vacant green Fermob chairs for all of us. We put them in acircle and hang out by the pond for a short while, soaking up the sunlight.
Yasmina picks up where she left off. “Henry IV’s gardener restored the gardens and planted mulberry trees. The idea was that France should produce its own silk and reduce its dependence on China.”
“Huh.” Lucie smiles a mischievous smile. “Sounds like history moves in circles.”
Yas nods before continuing, “In the 1660s, Louis XIV’s landscape architect redesigned the Tuileries, turning it into a symmetric French-style garden. And then the king did something revolutionary; he opened the Tuileries to visitors.”
While she continues her historical exposé, I listen to the birds chirping in the trees behind us and watch the sun catching in Lucie’s glossy, wavy, light-brown hair. Her uneven bob looks home cut but, somehow, that only adds to her charm.
In different circumstances, I would’ve wined and dined her in the best Michelin Guide restaurants, and lavished expensive little trinkets on her. I would’ve slowly and methodically led her to the point where she would’ve yearned to test how sturdy the bed in my Paris apartments was. We would’ve had great fun for a month or two and then parted ways.
But I can’t do that with Lucie Laborde.
Twenty minutes later, we leave the Gardens and head to themétrostation. Riding the overcrowded Parisian subway is part of MINDFUCH’S team-building regimen, I am told, in the category of “adversity reveals true character.”
Looking around, I spot Anders, who’s never too far away. He nods from across the street and discreetly gestures at me to fall behind.
“I’m very sorry, but I have to take care of something,” I say to the others. “See you later at the office.”
