Madam Yves Le Grand

One of the finest women I have ever met in France was Madam Le Grand. She worked, although she certainly did not have to work, for Colombelle three days a week in her shop in the Louvre des Antiquaires. I shopped there every trip I made to France.  It is so unlike most of the antique shops in Paris, very refined, very clean, and very aloof. 

Madam Le Grand was the exception.  she was as beautiful as she was hospitable.  Colette Le Grand wanted something to do after her husband died besides going to the Louvre over and over and over, seeing new things each trip.  Before she started working, however, she came to America for a total immersion course in conversational English.  The teacher fell in love with Colette and asked her to marry him. But, France was her home so she reluctantly refused.  Back in France she accepted the job of three days a week with Colombelle at the Louvre mall of antiques. I first bought from Colette after I had given her employer, Colombelle, my book called French and German, Dolls, Dishes and Accessories.  When Colette was in the shop three days a week the minute an American crossed the threshold, out came one of my books, (she bought them all some how) and a crusade was launched on my behalf.

I was alone on a trip to Paris during Desert Storm and decided to get a hotel near the place where Madam Le Grand worked, Hotel Regina...a movie As Good As it Gets was shown in that movie I believe.  It was a safe place although I must admit I traveled alone a lot carrying cash and I never once was afraid in either England or France. It was a winter trip.  I loved to go there in just that kind of weather.  Just brisk if one kept moving and I certainly did that.

Colombelle, the owner, found great things and many of them appeared in several of my books.  She had a good eye.  On this particular trip, she had a blue enameled French (toy) stove with St. Nicholas impressed on the top left burner surface. It weighed I'd say fifty pounds, Andy said thirty but then he was lifting it was he?  Not then. It was very expensive and really not my thing, but I knew people who would fall all over it and it would also look great in one of the next books. I kept going to and from the shop and on the last night, with only an hour before closing I decided to take one last look.  The trunks were packed and locked so I knew I would have to take it as a carry-on.  Luckily Madam Le Grand was in the shop and the owner was in the country when I hurried through the door .  I told Colette that if we could get the stove into the bag on wheels and if it coasted correctly up and down the hall, then I would take it.  We did, it did, and it became mine.  On the way back to the hotel I shined a few shins, but then the French are not litigious.

The next day I cursed myself more than once as I eased into my plane seat right in the midst of a rugby team from New Zealand.  The boy next to me was LARGE, sweet, and interested in everything about me.  He soon asked what on earth I had in the bag that he had heaved into the over-head compartment.  I told him to pray that it did not fall on anyone's drunken head during the flight. Since there is evidently no age limit for drinking in the air over international water the rugby team consumed more canned beer than I have ever seen.  They took a perverse delight in yelling, "Look Doris", we were all friends by then, as they smashed empty cans against their foreheads for my entertainment. My seat companion could not drink due to a queasy stomach, another pretty picture to contemplate during the 8-hour flight. I made friends with the entire drunken lot and this friendship came in handy when we reached American soil. They gleefully helped with the heavy trunks and boxes full of antiques. The heavier they were the happier the team was because we were all safe in the wonderful United States of America. 

Books:

I am reading Vintage Affair.  It is very good and a suggestion from a friend who knows I was an antiques dealer, collector etc.
You can read part of it on Amazon books to see if you like it.