because Miss Adams wanted to meet her to thank her before she checked out. And checkout was at one P.M.
Eva Adams called Hugues in his office at noon and asked him if he would bring Heloise to her suite. He called Heloise in their apartment and told her to get ready, and she was when he got there. She was wearing a pale blue smocked dress that she had worn several times to weddings and her Mary Janes with short white socks. She looked very pretty, and she had put a ribbon in her hair, and was excited to meet the movie star again.
Eva Adams opened the door to them herself and greeted Heloise with a broad smile and bent down to kiss her, with a quick glance at her father over her head. Heloise blushed nearly the color of her hair and looked at her in open adoration.
“You are one terrific kid, do you know that? You found my bracelet, Heloise. I thought it was gone forever.” As she smiled at her, she handed her a very large box and a small one, and Heloise stood staring at her in amazement.
“Thank you,” she said without opening either of them. All the people in Miss Adams’s suite were rushing around getting ready to leave, the dogs were barking, and one of the children was crying. It didn’t seem like the right time and place to open the gifts, and she didn’t seem to expect it, so Heloise thanked her and kissed her on the cheek, and she and her father left and went back to their apartment, so she could open the gifts that Eva Adams had given her. She was a little overwhelmed by the experience of meeting her and being thanked so profusely. And she opened the big package first, while her father watched her. He was relieved that the bracelet had been found. They didn’t need a scandal at the hotel, that a major piece of jewelry had disappeared at the Vendome. Heloise had done not only Eva Adams a good turn but her father as well, and Ernesta with the reward.
Heloise tore off the paper and pulled open the box. There was tissue paper inside, and when she removed it, she saw the most beautiful doll she had ever seen. She had a delicate face and looked a little bit like Heloise. Miss Adams had inquired at the desk and been told that Heloise had red hair, and so did the doll. She was beautifully dressed and had several changes of clothes, and long silky real hair that Heloise could comb. She took the doll out of the box and stared at it in awe, and then she clutched it to her and looked at her father, and he smiled as he watched.
“She’s very pretty. What are you going to call her?”
“Eva. I’m going to take her with me when I visit Mommy.” It was the prettiest doll she’d ever had. She couldn’t wait to show all her friends in the hotel. It was a suitable reward for an eight-year-old girl. And then she remembered the much smaller box. It was a small velvet box, and she opened it and saw a small diamond heart on a chain inside it, and inside the heart was the letter H, for her name. She was even more stunned than by the doll, and her father put it around her neck. It was small enough not to be shocking on a child her age, but it was a beautiful and obviously expensive gift.
“Wow, Papa!” she said, bereft of words, as she looked at herself in the mirror, still holding the doll close to her.
“Why don’t we go down to the lobby and say goodbye to Miss Adams when she leaves? You can thank her then for the gifts, and write her a thank-you letter for when she gets home.” Heloise nodded and followed him out of the apartment, holding the doll and wearing the necklace, and only minutes after they reached the lobby, Eva Adams and her entourage appeared, and Heloise stepped forward shyly to thank her, and Eva bent and kissed her again. She was wearing the bracelet, and had on an enormous sable coat and hat and diamond earrings on her ears. And she looked every bit the movie star as she swept through the door to the street. The paparazzi who’d been there all week went crazy outside, and hotel security helped Eva and her party into two limousines as rapidly as they could. Heloise and her father stood on the sidewalk and waved as they drove away, and he put an arm around his daughter as they walked back into the hotel. Heloise was beaming and knew she’d never forget her as she wandered into her father’s office. Jennifer smiled at her.
“That was pretty exciting. What are you going to do for the rest of the day?” Jennifer said warmly after admiring Heloise’s new necklace.
“Eva and I are going to a wedding in the ballroom at three.”
Her father looked up at her from his desk with a serious expression. “I don’t want either of you asking for cake or catching the bouquet. Is that understood?”
“Yes, Papa.” Heloise smiled broadly at him. “We’ll be good, I promise.” And with that she left his office, carrying the doll, to cruise the hotel and show her two rewards from Eva Adams to all her friends.
“That was sweet of her,” Hugues commented to Jennifer after his daughter left, thinking of how beautiful the actress was and how kind to his daughter.
“It was only fair,” Jennifer said. “That was quite a piece of jewelry she almost lost, even if it was insured.” And she was happy too that Heloise had gotten such pretty gifts.
“I have to do something about her going to all the weddings,” Hugues commented with a worried look. “One of these days someone will complain.”
“I think she’s fine,” his assistant reassured him. “She’s very well behaved. She always dresses appropriately. And she’s awfully cute.” He didn’t disagree.
Miriam finally contacted Hugues at the last minute to set up Heloise’s trip to London for Christmas. Heloise had been worried that her mother wouldn’t call, but at last she did. She took the doll with her when Hugues put her on a plane to London the day before Christmas Eve. It was the first time she would be spending Christmas with her mother since she left four years before.
Hugues was nervous about her going, but he thought he should at least try to keep her mother in her life. She only had one mother, even if Miriam wasn’t attentive to her. He hated it when Miriam upset or disappointed their daughter. She was thoughtless and selfish more than she was intentionally cruel. Heloise was going to be there for two weeks if all went well, and he hoped it would.
He hadn’t laid eyes on his ex-wife since the divorce and didn’t want to. In all fairness, she had demanded no money from him since she was still making a lot of money from modeling then, and she had married Greg almost immediately after the divorce. And she hadn’t wanted custody of Heloise even then. All she wanted was Greg. She had been obsessed with him, and from what Hugues saw in the press, if it could be relied on, she still was. And now she had two children with him.
Poor Heloise had been abandoned by her mother and left out. And no matter what Hugues did or said to put a balm on it, inevitably it was still a wound for the child. But selfishly, in some ways, he knew it was easier for him to have Heloise to himself. Legally he had sole custody, and in reality it was as though she had no mother at all, except for the pain in Heloise’s eyes when she talked about her, which cut through her father’s heart like a knife every time he saw it.
When the plane landed in London, their driver was waiting for Heloise with a Bentley. He took charge of Heloise’s luggage and chatted with her on the way to their house in Holland Park. Heloise had slept on the plane, and she was holding her doll on the ride to the house. It gave her comfort and made her feel less scared.
The driver walked her up the front steps, and a butler let them in, and he smiled as soon as he saw her and walked her upstairs to a sunny sitting room where Miriam was nursing her infant son. Her eighteen-month-old daughter was careening wildly through a sea of toys.
Heloise hadn’t seen her mother in a year but was used to her new look from pictures in magazines. Miriam was in
“What a pretty doll.” Miriam smiled at her as though she were someone else’s child.
“Eva Adams gave her to me. I found her diamond bracelet that she’d lost in some towels,” Heloise explained almost shyly. Her mother became more of a stranger to her every time they met. Miriam had replaced her with two babies by a man she loved. Heloise was the reminder of a life and man she wanted to forget. And Heloise had no mother figure to replace her with, except the people who worked at the hotel. The only real parent she had now was her father. And she missed having a mom to cuddle up with, even though she loved her father.
Miriam leaned over and kissed her then, over the baby’s head. He looked up at Heloise with interest, and then went back to nursing. He was a chubby, happy-looking baby. His older sister Arielle climbed into her mother’s lap then, cuddling her mother and brother. There was no room for Heloise in her mother’s arms, or her life. And a few minutes later Greg walked in and looked surprised to see Heloise as he glanced at his wife.
