The Making of Minty Malone. Isabel Wolff

lovely,’ I said, sinking into the boat-sized bed. I looked at the huge bouquet of congratulatory pink roses and the bottle of chilling champagne. ‘It’s lovely,’ I said again. ‘It’s just so …’ A hot tear splashed on to my hand.

      ‘Oh, Minty,’ Helen said, and she was almost crying too. ‘Incredible,’ she repeated, putting her arm round me. ‘Just unbelievable.’

      ‘Yes,’ I wept, ‘but it’s true. He did it. And it’s only now that it’s beginning to sink in.’

      ‘But why did he do it?’ she said, shaking her head.

      ‘I don’t know,’ I sobbed. ‘I don’t know.’

      ‘Oh, Minty – you’re well out of it,’ she said, furiously blinking away her tears. ‘You don’t want a man capable of such a cowardly, despicable act. You’re well out of it,’ she reiterated, crossly.

      And I thought, I’m going to keep on hearing that – again and again. That’s what people will say: ‘You’re well out of it, Minty. Well out.’ And though it won’t help, they’ll be right. It’s bad enough when a man breaks off his engagement, but doing a runner in the church? Outrageous! ‘You’re well shot of him!’ everyone will tell me confidently. ‘What a cad!’ they’ll add. Oh God.

      Helen stood up and opened the French windows. I followed her out on to the terrace. Pretty pots of tumbling geraniums stood in each corner, and a white satin ribbon had been threaded through the wrought-iron balcony. The table had been laid, for two, with a white damask cloth, sparkling silver cutlery, gleaming porcelain, candles and flowers. The perfect setting for a romantic sunset dinner à deux. I just couldn’t bear it.

      ‘I’ll ask them to clear it away,’ I said, bleakly. Then I sat down and took in the view. Ahead of us, to the right, was the Eiffel Tower, its cast-iron fretwork now illuminated like electric lace. To our left was the spire of the American Cathedral, and, further off, the gilded dome of Les Invalides. And then my eye caught the Pont de I’Alma, and the eternal flame by the tunnel in which Princess Diana had died. Worse things happen, I thought to myself, with a jolt. This is dreadful. Dreadful. But no one’s dead.

      ‘You will come through this, Minty,’ Helen said quietly. ‘You won’t believe that now. But you will. And I know you’ll be happy again one day.’ And as she said that her gold crest ring glinted in the evening sun.

      ‘Dum Spiro, Spero,’ I said to myself. Yes. While I have breath, I hope.

      ‘Audrey Hepburn stayed here,’ said Helen excitedly in the hotel dining room the following morning. ‘And Greta Garbo. And Sophia Loren. And Jerry Hall.’

      ‘And Minty Malone,’ I added bitterly, ‘the world-famous jiltee – and winner of the Miss Havisham Memorial Prize.’

      Lack of sleep had left me in an edgy, sardonic mood. It wasn’t that Helen’s presence in the bed had disturbed me – it was so big I’d hardly noticed. It was simply that I’d been far too stressed to sleep. So at two a.m. I’d got up and wandered around the suite in my nightie, wringing my hands like Lady Macbeth. Then I’d rung reception.

      ‘Oui, madame?’ It was the same concierge, still on duty.

      ‘You did say “round the clock”, didn’t you?’ I whispered.

      ‘Oui, madame.’

      ‘Could you get me something then?’

      ‘Of course, madame. At the George V no request is too big, too small, or too unusual.’

      ‘In that case, can you get me a copy of Great Expectations by Charles Dickens. In English, please,’ I added.

      ‘And you would like this when, madame?’

      ‘Now.’

      ‘Eh, bien sur …we do have a small bibliothèque. I will ‘ave a look.’

      ‘Thank you.’

      Five minutes later there was a knock on the door and a bellboy appeared, clutching a leather-bound copy of the book. I gave him twenty francs. Then I sat down in the sitting room and turned the thin pages until I found what I was looking for.

      [Miss Havisham] was dressed in rich materials – satins, and lace, and silks – all of white. Her shoes were white. And she had a long white veil dependent from her hair, and she had bridal flowers in her hair, but her hair was white …But I saw that everything within my view which ought to be white, had been white long ago, and had lost its lustre, and was faded and yellow. I saw that the bride within the bridal dress had withered like the dress, and like the flowers, and had no brightness left but the brightness of her sunken eyes. I saw that the dress had been put upon the rounded figure of a young woman, and that the figure upon which it now hung loose, had shrunk to skin and bone …

      ‘How are you feeling, Minty?’ I heard Helen say.

      ‘How do I feel? Well, just a bit pissed off.’ My new, ironic levity surprised me. ‘I’m going to design a new range of bridal wear,’ I added.

      ‘Really?’

      ‘Yes. I’m going to call it “Anti-Nuptia”.’

      ‘Oh, Minty.’

      I looked round the dining room and felt sick. It was full of infatuated couples. Just what you need when you’ve been abandoned by your husband-to-be. They all looked sated with sex as they locked eyeballs, and tenderly rubbed ankles under the tables.

      ‘Why don’t you eat something?’ Helen said.

      ‘I can’t.’

      ‘Go on, try,’ she said, pushing a basket of croissants towards me.

      ‘Impossible,’ I said. And it was. I’ve never dieted. I’ve never really had to. But now it was as though someone had turned off the tap in my brain marked ‘Eat’. The petit pains might as well have been made of plastic for all the interest they aroused in me. All I could manage was a few sips of sugary tea.

      ‘What shall we do today?’ I said.

      ‘I don’t know,’ said Helen. ‘I haven’t been to Paris since I was twelve.’

      ‘I know it pretty well,’ I said. ‘In fact, I’ve been here eleven times.’

      ‘Minty,’ said Helen slowly, while she delicately chomped on a pain au chocolat. ‘Why did you choose Paris for your honeymoon when you’d already been here so often?’

      ‘I didn’t choose it,’ I replied. ‘Dominic did. I would have preferred Venice,’ I went on with a shrug, ‘but Dom said the train journey would take too long, and so Paris it was.’

      ‘I see,’ she said, archly. ‘That was nice of you.’

      ‘And of course Paris is a lovely city.’

      ‘Minty …’ said Helen, carefully. She was fiddling with her teaspoon.

      ‘Yes?’ Why on earth was she looking at me like that?

      ‘Minty,’ she began again, ‘I hope you don’t mind my saying this, but you often seemed to do what Dominic wanted.’

      I thought about this for a few seconds.

      ‘Yes,’ I conceded. ‘I suppose I did.’

      ‘Why?’

      ‘Why?’ Why? God, why did she have to ask me that? ‘Because I loved him,’ I replied, ‘that’s why. And because …’ I felt my throat constrict ‘ …I just wanted him to be happy.’

      She nodded. ‘Well, what shall we do today?’ she said, briskly changing the subject.

      ‘We can do whatever you like,’ I said, bleakly. ‘We’ll be tourists.’

      And