Julia’s Cats Read online

  But when she stepped to the counter to buy, some of the jauntiness left her and she became uncharacteristically tongue-tied. Her Smith College French, though rapidly improving, fell short, and she was reduced to pointing and making strange nasal sounds. The vendors weren’t impressed.

  Even though at six foot two she towered over the petite French housewives, she was awed by the way they muscled their way through the markets, poking, pinching, and squeezing the produce like persnickety government inspectors. Only the very freshest would do. Later she complained to Paul about the pushy matrons with the sharp elbows. He only shrugged—they were just being choosy, and in a country that boasted three hundred cheeses, there was a lot to be choosy about. He encouraged her to be persistent. Once these proprietors got to know her, they’d take to her. He called this gift for winning everyone over “the Juliafication des gens.”

  A fish head was the turning point. One day the market crowds thinned and Julia found herself alone with the fishmonger’s wife. She pointed at a filet of sole and the woman nodded curtly, then wrapped it. Julia haltingly asked if there were any fish scraps left. The woman smiled, held up a large fish head, and added it to the package.

  The next time Julia came into the shop, the fishwife had set aside another, larger fish head and, with a wink, asked about her pussycat. Julia’s French magically improved and the two began exchanging cat tales. Before long, they were gabbing about the fine spring weather, the first salmon of the season, and Julia’s plans for cooking her sole. Which wine to go with it. Where to find tender asparagus. Who had the freshest, tastiest pears. And best cheeses. Local gossip. Politics. In-laws. Edith Piaf. Cats who like to go in and out but can’t make up their minds. Enfin, kisses on both cheeks, two packages of fish in the basket, and fond greetings to Minette. À bientôt, Madame Child. Come back soon. Remember the salmon will be in next week. And fish heads for Minette. Toujours.

  JACKDAW JULIE

  JULIA HAD A WEAKNESS for gadgets and loved to hunt for bargains at Dehillerin, a kitchen gear bonanza in les Halles. Paul’s salary was stretched thin by the end of the month, so the proprietor was persuaded to let her buy on credit. Her skill at picking through bins of kitchen junque reminded Paul of a scavenger bird, so he began calling her “Jackdaw Julie.”

  Occasionally Julia asked him to join her as she trolled the marché aux puces, the giant flea market. The invitation usually meant she had seen just the perfect doohickey, a real steal she couldn’t pass up or carry home by herself. One time the object that caught her eye was an enormous marble mortar and pestle Paul described as “big as a baptismal font.” He followed her through a dark labyrinth of stalls to reach this treasure, gamely shifted it onto his back, and staggered toward the Blue Flash, breathing hard while Julia chattered about the lovely quenelles she wanted to try, and all the other delights she would soon be grinding, mashing, and pulverizing.

  Minette welcomed this latest find after giving it a thorough sniff test. It didn’t take long for her to see the potential for quiet naps in the cool, curved marble bowl, especially on warm summer days when ovens were roaring and stockpots bubbling.

  Julia’s growing collection required new rows of hooks higher up on the wall to hold her acquisitions—a ricer, three sizes of balloon whisks, and a set of measuring cups she had shipped from home after she discovered that the French preferred to add a “handful of this” or a “dollop of that” until the dish tasted just right. Beneath each cup Paul neatly inscribed its size on the wall. Several heavy iron skillets dangled from the lip of the coal stove—irresistible playthings for Minette. She padded on the stovetop, swatted at the dangling spoons, ladles, and saucepans, and set the whole batterie de cuisine crazily clanging, a carillon of cookware that brought a halfhearted scold.

  The kitchen came with an erratic gadget of its own, meant to compensate for the awkward upstairs/downstairs layout of the apartment. Like waiters who come and go as the spirit moves them, the balky dumbwaiter seemed to deliver meals to the dining room below only when it pleased. In cold weather Minette often dozed inside the contraption, preferring what little warm air might be trapped there to the chilly embrace of the marble mortar.

  Julia’s lunchtime repertoire was expanding. She found some charming pastry tins and wanted to try her hand at tartelettes, the tasty munchies she often snacked on at the market. She lined the little tins with butter and pastry dough, fluted the edges with the back of a knife, pricked the bottoms with a fork, and baked them to a golden brown. The sides collapsed and they weren’t as pretty as the ones she bought, but they smelled heavenly. She put them in the dumbwaiter to cool while she whipped up the filling, fondue de volaille (chicken in a cream sauce)—one of Paul’s favorites.

  She sautéed some shallots, brought the cream sauce to a simmer, and finished just as the door slammed below. At that moment a frantic scrabbling came from the back of the dumbwaiter, and before Paul could get up the stairs, Minette shot by him in a blur.

  When Julia pulled out the rack of cooling tartelettes, every one had been thoroughly tasted and little was left but crumbs. Paul got quite an earful of Julia’s growing vocabulary of colorful French expletives, but he soothed her by offering to eat the delicious filling all by itself, as long as it was accompanied by a nice Sauvignon Blanc. They agreed that from now on Julia should always thoroughly check inside the dumbwaiter to be sure a hungry cat wasn’t waiting for le déjeuner.

  THE JOY OF COOKING

  WHEN IT CAME to food and cooking, the embassy wives and Julia’s friends back home thought she was becoming a bit eccentric. Her curiosity about the flavors in a new dish and her habit of begging the chef for the recipe were seen as odd and slightly déclassé. In the postwar years, American housewives had been led to believe it was shameful to spend so much time in the kitchen. Convenience ruled, with Bisquick, Jell-O, and Gravy Helper lining pantry shelves. Preparing meals for their families was considered a chore, not the joyous experience Julia found in hunting for the freshest ingredients, then peeling, chopping, simmering, and sharing with friends.

  Pots, pans, and poussiequette

  Cooking at home in Paris, however, could be a challenge, although she’d finally managed to buy one of the ice-block coolers the French fancifully called le frigidaire. Shortages persisted and political unrest brought strikes, so gas and electric service were unpredictable. During one outage, the iceman didn’t cometh, and Julia lamented that several weeks of Minette’s frozen dinners had melted.

  In the Roo de Loo kitchen

  Through it all, Julia was undaunted. She’d never been happier. She lived in a country obsessed with food, married to a man who adored her and adopted by a cat who made the perfect kitchen companion.

  THE PUSSYCAT HOSPITAL

  ALONG WITH HER very own boulangerie, fromagerie, and pâtisserie, Julia began frequenting the local vétérinaire. She noticed Minette rubbing her ear, and after the vet diagnosed a common ear infection, he surprised Julia with the news that their poussiequette, with her three-toned coat, was no ordinary gutter cat but a rare Spanish breed, le tricolore. Julia always knew Minette was special: “I never saw another like her … her fur is fox-color, black & white in asymmetrical patches like a piece of camouflage for an autumn field.” Now Minette was very possibly feline royalty, like the Chartreux, the woolly blue-haired cat with coppery eyes, prized by the French since the Middle Ages.

  According to tradition, the Chartreux were bred by the Carthusian monks, who also turned out a high-class, pale green liqueur at a monastery near Grenoble. Charles de Gaulle loved his noble Chartreux cats for their sweet disposition and for being, like the monks, almost mute. Minette, on the other hand, was a feisty kitty with a robust miaou and she wasn’t afraid to use it. She was more rascally than royal, but that’s what tickled Julia and Paul.

  They were learning a lot about cats. Minette’s ears swiveled like radar at minute sounds that dogs—let alone people—only dream of hearing. Especially the pitter-patter of tiny mouse fe
et behind baseboards. Feline noses boast an astonishing one hundred million olfactory cells, fourteen times more than humans’. Minette certainly won the cat lottery when she landed in Julia’s kitchen, where every day brought heavenly treats for the nose as well as the taste buds. She also had a penchant for plants and flowers, and one day gobbled up a bouquet of mimosas before Jeanne, the maid, could put them in a vase. After that Julia bestowed on Minette a more formal moniker befitting her new elite status: Minette Mimosa McWilliams Child.

  One morning Minette wouldn’t gobble or even nibble anything and moped listlessly around the apartment. When she refused a bite of her favorite sausage, Julia sensed a real emergency and hustled her to the vet. This time it was something more serious—distemper, or worse, pneumonia. Reluctantly they left her at the clinic for three days. Now it was their turn to mope around the house. After they brought the lethargic kitty home, she took an unexpected turn for the worse. Their poor puss looked half dead, a miserable little fur lump, wheezing under a chair, refusing to budge.

  Julia and Paul couldn’t bear the thought of losing Minette, so they transformed the salon into a “puss-pital” and nursed her day and night, forcing the kitty to inhale eucalyptus steam and swallow batches of large pills. The gas heater ran constantly until the apartment filled with noxious fumes and they felt queasy too. They didn’t even flinch when the vet prescribed kitty suppositories, which worked all too well, forcing them to drape all the chairs with towels.

  They had never nursed a sick cat before, let alone one they adored, and all they could do was watch, wring their hands, and fret: “It’s sad to see a little animal suffer and not be able to communicate with it.”

  They had all but given up hope when one miraculous day, without warning, their “one-time-surely-dying pussycat” was up on all fours, looking “lively as a grackle.” They both exulted when they saw her green eyes glowing across the dining room table. Minette had reclaimed her usual chair and sat waiting patiently for dinner to be served.

  LE CHAT ET LE CHAPEAU

  WITH PAUL SETTLED into his new job, Julia was looking for something useful to doooo. To fill an afternoon, she eagerly accepted an invitation to join some embassy wives for a fashion show at the House of Dior. She wrote to her sister-in-law, Freddie, about sitting among rows of women decked out in sable and diamonds, with “eyes half closed” and a world-weary look she knew she could never pull off.

  Julia was keenly aware of her appearance and had once flirted with fashion as a career. After college she wrote a style column for a hometown paper, but her “good cloth coat” Republican upbringing hadn’t prepared her for the fashionistas who strolled the boulevards of Paris. She was dying to learn the secrets of those effortlessly chic women. Was it their haute couture or something more mysterious that made them look fabulous anywhere, anytime, in anything?

  Since the French didn’t bother to make dresses for women her size, she summoned skills she had learned as a Pasadena debutante-in-training. Upper-middle-class girls like her learned to apply makeup and took basic cooking and sewing classes while waiting for Mr. Right to drive up in his new Buick. She bought stylish patterns to sew her own suits and dresses and discovered a deep satisfaction in making useful things with her own capable hands.

  Why not make hats too, and maybe even sell them? Hatmaking had become a trendy hobby among some of her new embassy friends, so it wasn’t hard to find someone to give her lessons. Soon she was spending afternoons in the drafty living room, pins between pursed lips, sketching and gluing her creations. Her market basket was crammed with her new stock-in-trade—feathers, beads, sequins, and tiny birds with sparkly eyes—all of it an answer to a playful cat’s prayers.

  Playcat

  Minette began each game of “le chat et le chapeau” by skidding across Julia’s worktable, sending fake bananas and rosebuds flying. Then she’d snatch and hide them all over the apartment. Days later the kitty would suddenly appear with a wild look and a feather in her mouth, then gallop away as if possessed. As expected, Jeanne wouldn’t play along, but Julia loved her mischievous cat in the hat.

  SISTER ACT

  JULIA WAS FEELING gloomy just thinking about Paul’s upcoming trip to Lyon without her. She moaned, “I am a very spoiled woman indeed, because I have hardly at all been separated from my husband even for lunch, and I miss him.” But her mood brightened when her sister, Dorothy, arrived for an extended stay chez Child.

  “Dort” was a younger, even taller McWilliams, with a voice eerily similar to Julia’s. She breezed into Roo de Loo like a springtime zephyr, gushing about her Atlantic crossing and the marrrrrvelous people she collected along the way—an old English baron, a charming French widow, an actress, and her dubious companion, the Roué. She helpfully impersonated all of them for her bemused hosts in fractured but enthusiastic French.

  Lured by the sisters’ swooping laughter, Minette came to join the party with a battered brussels sprout in her mouth. Once she had their attention, she dropped it on the carpet and swatted it under the sofa. Dort got down on all fours, reached into the dust bunnies, grabbed the sprout, and bounced it back to Minette. They pitched it back and forth until nothing remained but a pile of leaves and a panting pussycat. A new compagnon was in the house.

  JuPaul agreed that Dort’s first Parisian experience should be a sublime meal. They chose a small neighborhood restaurant on the rue Montorgueil that came with Julia’s highest endorsement: “the best food I’ve had (they REALLY CARE).” The next day they took the “standard JuPaulski Walk #1” around their Saint-Germain-des-Prés neighborhood, ending with drinks at their favorite café, Deux Magots, or in Julia parlance, “two maggots.” Julia proudly took Dort around to meet the butcher, the fishmonger, and her new best friend, Marie des Quatre-Saisons. The rosy-cheeked blonde, who ran a tiny crémerie just around the corner, could judge the ripeness of her cheeses to the hour, or so it seemed to Julia.

  The two sisters spent a luscious afternoon ambling arm in arm through the Luxembourg Gardens, munching on waffles and fresh raspberry juice from a sidewalk cart. It was Easter vacation, and the park was full of children tugging on balloons and nannies pushing prams. They watched the children play while catching up on family gossip and each other’s lives. Although Julia and Dort looked and sounded so much alike, they had scarcely spent any time together as adults, and relished this chance to become reacquainted. Through her sister’s eyes, Julia was falling in love with the City of Light all over again.

  When Dort got around to unpacking her trunk, she discovered she had a helper. Telltale bits of chewed paper lay scattered all around, and she found a small potato buried under a pile of sweaters—Minette’s calling card. The cat had pawed her lingerie into a tangle and sat smugly inside one of Dort’s spacious shoes with a brassiere draped rakishly over one ear. It was clear to Julia the mischievous Minette was well on the way to “making Dortie’s life HELL.”

  One day Julia and Dort were practicing how to be French on the telephone. Dort held her nose and chirped loudly: “OUI, OUI, J’ÉCOUTE!” (Yes, yes, I hear you!) Minette, who was sleeping in a flowerpot, sat bolt upright. Her ears stiffened, and she leaped onto Dort’s lap and nipped her hand. Next it was Julia’s turn. She pinched her nose and squeaked, “Oui, oui, j’écoute!” and she too was rewarded with a little love bite.

  Again and again the sisters emitted nasally shrieks, and each time Minette answered with a friendly nip. Dort thought they had trained the cat to perform a unique trick, but Julia guessed that their high-pitched voices must have been touching “some chord of amorous response.” It was springtime, after all, and Minette was a frisky jeune fille.

  MATCHMAKING IS NO PIQUE-NIQUE

  WARM BREEZES WAFTING through the windows of Roo de Loo lifted the spirits of every resident, including Minette, who had a serious case of printemps fever. She raced up and down the stairs at breakneck speed, tumbled into laps for an instant, then flew to the door and yowled pitifully. Julia and Paul thought it just
might be a young kitty’s fancy turning to love.

  They felt their own springtime urges. Hand in hand they took long strolls along the Seine, and every warm weekend they piled into the Blue Flash and headed out to explore the countryside, often with friends. One bright April day, Julia decided to throw together a last-minute picnic to celebrate the oceans of red tulips blooming in the parks. She made an early market run to fill a basket with the makings of a simple but tasty lunch: crisp baguettes with sweet Normandy butter, cold tarragon chicken, salade verte vinaigrette, fromages, fruits, and of course, vin du pays. Plenty of vin du pays.

  The bois de Boulogne was a favorite pique-nique spot, especially after Paul pointed out that the Impressionist Édouard Manet chose this leafy glade as the setting for his masterpiece, Le déjeuner sur l’herbe (Luncheon on the grass). The idea of picnicking in the nude like the woman in the painting appealed to Paul, but Julia demurred. The weather could be so changeable.

  Spring fever

  So it was on this day when they planned to dine alfresco with their French friends, Jean Asche and his wife, Thérèse. As the hour drew near, the skies suddenly turned dark, wet, and windy, ruling out a blanket in the park. Undeterred, Julia suggested they picnic at Roo de Loo.

  The couple arrived with a surprise in their picnic basket: a macho white tomcat with tiger markings and an eye for les femmes. For some time there had been talk of Maquis as a potential suitor for Minette, and the indoor picnic was a perfect chance to test the chemistry. According to letters written by their surrogates, Jean and Julia, “Maquis and Minette have been exchanging loving messages for a year.”