Hotel Vendome Read online

  “Doing her homework upstairs, I hope.” And if not, they both knew she was probably roaming the hotel, visiting her friends. She loved pushing the maids’ carts, and distributing the lotions and shampoos, and they always gave her spares.

  “If you see her, tell her to come and have tea with me when she’s finished,” Mrs. Van Damme said with a smile. Heloise often did that, and they shared tea sandwiches of cucumber or egg salad, and éclairs from room service. They had a British chef, originally from Claridge’s, who was in charge of only their high tea, which was the best in the city, even though their main chef was French, and had been personally recruited by Hugues too. He had his hand in every aspect of the hotel, whether “front of the house” or back. It was all part of what made the Hotel Vendôme so special. The staff was trained to provide personalized attention, and it started with Hugues.

  “Thank you very much, Madame Van Damme,” Hugues said politely, smiling at her, as the elevator door closed. After that he walked back through the lobby, thought of his daughter, and hoped she was doing her homework, as he had said. He had other things on his mind, although he looked so totally unruffled that no one would have suspected the chaos that was going on in the basement of the hotel at that moment. They had had several calls from guests, since they had had to shut off the water to most of the floors half an hour before. They explained that they were doing some minor repairs, and the hotel operators and desk clerks were assuring anyone who called that they expected to have the water back on within the hour. But the truth was that a pipe had burst in the basement, every engineer and plumber in the hotel was working on it, and minutes before, outside plumbers had been called.

  Hugues looked calm as he reassured everyone with a smile. Seeing him, one could only assume that he had everything in control. He mentioned the water shutoff lightly to each guest who checked in. He told them that water service would be restored imminently, and asked if room service could send anything to their room. He didn’t say it, but there would be no charge for it, of course, to make up for the lack of water and the inconvenience. He had preferred to stay in the lobby himself so arriving guests had a sense that all was in order. All he could hope was that the burst pipe could be located and repaired quickly. They were hoping that room service wouldn’t be forced to close; the main kitchen was already swimming in six inches of water, and everyone they could spare had been sent to the basement to help. There was no sign of any of it in the lobby. He was planning to go downstairs himself in a few minutes to check the situation again. And from what he was being told, the flood in the basement was getting worse. Despite all their renovations, it was after all an old hotel.

  As Hugues greeted a Spanish aristocrat and his wife, just arriving from Europe, the scene in the basement was one of utter chaos. No one observing the calm appearance of elegance in the lobby could have suspected what a mess it was downstairs.

  In the basement men were shouting, the water was rising, and a torrent of water burst from a wall, as engineers in brown uniforms waded through the flood, and were soaked from head to foot. Four plumbers were working on it, and all six of the hotel’s engineers had been called back into work. Mike, the head engineer, was close to where the torrent was coming from, and working like a demon to try and locate the source. He had a belt around his waist with a series of wrenches hanging from it, and as he tried one after another, a small voice behind him told him to try the biggest one. He turned in surprise as he heard the familiar voice over the ruckus, and saw Heloise standing there, watching him with interest. She was up to her knees in water, wearing a red bikini and a yellow slicker, and she pointed to the biggest wrench on his belt.

  “I think you have to use the big one, Mike,” she said calmly, standing very close to him, with her big green eyes and bright red hair still in neat braids. He could see that her feet were bare beneath the water.

  “Okay,” he acknowledged, “but I want you to go stand over there. I don’t want you to get hurt.” She nodded very seriously and then smiled at him. She had freckles and was missing both her front teeth.

  “It’s okay, Mike, I can swim,” she reassured him.

  “I hope you won’t have to,” he said, grabbing the biggest wrench from his belt, which he had been about to use anyway. Whatever went on in the hotel, Heloise was always there to see it. And she particularly loved hanging out with the engineers. He pointed to where she should stand, and she obediently went to higher ground and chatted with some of the kitchen staff who had come out to see what they could do to help. And with that the outside plumbers arrived and waded into the rising water to join the others. A number of the bellmen came down to carry bottles of expensive wine out of the wine cellars, and the kitchen staff joined them to help.

  Half an hour later, after intense work by both the engineers and outside plumbers, the leak was located, the right valves were turned off, and the plumbers were working on the repair. Heloise waded back in to see Mike then, patted his shoulder, and told him he had done a really great job. He laughed as he looked down at her, picked her up, walked her back to the sous chefs in their tall white hats, white jackets, and checked pants standing just outside the kitchen, and set her down.

  “If you get hurt, young lady, your father will kill me. I want you to stay here.” He knew the directive was useless. Heloise never stayed in one place for long.

  “There’s nothing for me to do here,” she complained. “Room service is too busy. I’m not supposed to disturb them.” She knew not to get in their way during peak hours.

  By then the desk was getting frantic calls. People who wanted to get dressed for the evening were discovering they had no water to bathe or shower with, and anyone calling room service was told that they were extremely busy, and all orders were delayed, but the hotel was offering free wine or drinks. Hugues knew that an event like this could seriously damage the reputation of a hotel, unless handled with grace and poise. He called all of their most important guests himself to apologize and asked the catering manager to send a complimentary bottle of Cristal to each of their rooms, and he was fully prepared to discount the rate for every room affected, for that night. He knew that it would cost him, but it would cost him far more not to. Problems could occur in any hotel, but how they were handled made all the difference between a second-rate hotel and a first-class hotel like the Vendôme, which was what they called a “palace” in Europe. So far no one was truly furious at them, people were just annoyed, and happy with the free wine and champagne. How they ultimately felt about the inconvenience would depend on how fast it was going to take the plumbers and engineers to make the repairs. They had to do the best they could that night, and in the ensuing days they would have to make more extensive efforts to replace the broken pipe. Right now, all they needed was water for the hotel, to get service back to normal.

  Forty-five minutes later Hugues was finally able to slip away from the front desk and went down to the basement to see what was happening there. Pumps had already been set up to bail the water, and a cheer went up just as he arrived. The plumbers had been able to do what was necessary to circumvent the pipe and turn the water back on. The room service staff were working frantically to deliver bottles of wine and champagne to the guests. Heloise was dancing around in the water in her slicker and bikini, grinning happily minus her front teeth, and clapping her hands. And the moment she saw him, she waded over to her father, who looked at her with a rueful expression. He wasn’t happy to see her there, but he wasn’t surprised, and the sous chefs she’d been talking to all laughed. Heloise was always where the action was, just like her father. She was as much a part of the hotel as he was.

  “What are you doing down here?” her father asked her, trying to sound stern but without much success. She looked so cute that it was hard for him to be angry at her, and he very rarely was, even though he prided himself on being strict. But he could never quite pull it off. Just looking at her melted his heart, and her missing front teeth made her even more irresisti
ble, and she made him want to laugh in her red bathing suit and yellow slicker. She had dressed for the occasion. Since her mother had left, he helped her dress for school every morning.

  “I came down to see what I could do to help,” she said practically. “Mike did a wonderful job. There was nothing for me to do.” She gave a little shrug of her shoulders as her father laughed. People always commented that she looked very European.

  “I hope not,” her father said, trying not to laugh. “If you’re the chief engineer now, we’re in big trouble.” As he said it, he walked her back into the kitchen, and then went to congratulate his plumbers and engineers for their good work. He was always deft at handling his staff, and they liked working for him, although he could be tough at times. He expected a great deal of them and himself, and everyone agreed that he ran a tight ship. It was his training and what the hotel guests loved; they could rely on a high standard of excellence if they stayed at the Vendôme. Hugues ran it to perfection.

  When he came back to the kitchen, Heloise was eating a cookie and chatting with the pastry chef in French. He always made her French macarons, and she took them to school for lunch. “What about your homework, young lady? What happened to that?” her father asked her seriously, and Heloise opened her eyes wide and shook her head.

  “I don’t have any, Papa.”

  “Why is it that I don’t believe you?” He looked carefully into the big green eyes.

  “I did it all before.” She was lying to him, but he knew her well. She much preferred cruising around the hotel to sitting in the apartment alone doing her homework for the Lycée.

  “I saw you in my office making paper clip necklaces when you got back from school. I think you’d better check again.”

  “Well, maybe I have just a little math to do,” she said sheepishly, as he took her hand in his own and led her to the back elevator. She had left a pair of red clogs there when she waded into the flood and retrieved them now for the ride upstairs.

  As soon as they arrived in the apartment, Hugues changed his suit and shoes. The cuffs of his trousers, and his shoes, were soaked from his brief visit to the basement. He was a tall, thin man with dark hair and the same green eyes as Heloise’s. Her mother was an equally tall blonde with blue eyes. The great-grandmother that Heloise had been named after had had red hair like Heloise.

  Hugues wrapped her in a towel and told her to change her clothes, and she reappeared a few minutes later in blue jeans and a pink sweater and pink ballet shoes. She took ballet class twice a week. Hugues wanted her to lead the life of a normal child, but he was well aware that she didn’t. Without a mother, her life was already unusual, and her entire world consisted of the hotel. She loved everything that happened there.

  With a mournful look at her father, she sat down at the desk in the living room, once she was dressed, and took out her math book, and the notebook from school.

  “Make sure you do all of it. And call me when you’re finished. I’ll come up and have dinner with you if I can. I have to make sure everything has calmed down first.”

  “Yes, Papa,” she said quietly as he left the apartment to go back to the reception desk and check on things there.

  Heloise sat looking dreamily at her math book for a few minutes, and then tiptoed to the door. She opened it a crack and looked out. The coast was clear. He was back in the lobby by then. And with an elfin toothless grin that made her look like a pixie with her freckles and red hair, Heloise let herself out of the apartment and slipped down the back stairs in her jeans and pink ballet shoes. She knew just where her favorite night maids would be. And five minutes later she was helping them push the trolley with all the creams and shampoos and lotions on it, as they turned down the rooms for the guests. She loved turn-down time, when they delivered little boxes of chocolates to each guest, from La Maison du Chocolat. The chocolates were delicious, and as they always did, Ernesta and Maria handed one of the boxes to her, and after thanking them, she helped herself to the chocolates with a grin.

  “We had a lot of work to do in the basement today,” she informed them seriously in Spanish. They had been teaching her Spanish ever since she could talk. She had been fluent in both French and Spanish as well as English before she was five. It was important to Hugues that she speak several languages. And he spoke Italian and German too, since he was Swiss.

  “So I hear,” Ernesta, the motherly Puerto Rican woman, said to her and gave her a hug. Heloise loved being with her and held her hand. “You must have been very busy this afternoon,” Ernesta said with a twinkle in her eye, as Maria, the pretty young second night maid, laughed. She had children of her own the same age as Heloise. And they never minded having her join them for their turn-down service to every room. She was always hungry for female companionship and got lonely alone in the apartment.

  “The water was up to here,” Heloise said, showing them a place just above her knees. “But it’s all fixed now.” Both women knew there would have to be more extensive repairs in the coming days. They had heard it from the engineers.

  “What about your homework?” Ernesta asked her then, as Heloise avoided her gaze and played with the shampoos. They had recently changed brands to a more luxurious one, and Heloise loved the way it smelled. “Did you do it?”

  “Yes, of course,” Heloise said, grinning mischievously, as they pushed the cart to the next room, and Heloise handed her two more shampoos. She followed them on their rounds until an internal alarm went off for her, and she knew it was time to go. She kissed them both good night then and scampered up the back stairs, just in time to get back to their apartment and sit at the desk again. She had just finished her last math problem, when her father walked in to have dinner with her. He had ordered it from room service, as he always did, although later than usual tonight. Her schedule had to be flexible to adjust to his, but having dinner together was a ritual that was important to them both.

  “Sorry I’m late,” he said as he walked in. “It’s a little crazy downstairs tonight, but at least everyone has water again.” He was just praying they didn’t spring another leak, but things were holding for now, as long as they did the necessary repairs soon.

  “What’s for dinner?” Heloise asked as she closed her math book.

  “Chicken, mashed potatoes, asparagus, and ice cream for dessert. Sound okay to you?” her father asked her with a loving look.

  “Perfect,” she smiled at him as she put her arms around his neck. She was the woman in his life, and had been the only important one for the past three years since her mother left. And as he hugged her, their dinner arrived. The chef had added escargots for Heloise, because he knew she loved them, and profiteroles for dessert. It was hardly an ordinary dinner for a child, but it was one of the perks of living in the hotel, for both of them. Hugues had built-in babysitters for her, and they both had all the services that the hotel provided, including gourmet food.

  They sat down properly in the dining room of the apartment, and they talked about the hotel, as they always did. She asked him what important guests had checked in, and if any movie stars were coming soon, and he told her a simplified but accurate version of what he had done that day, as she looked at him adoringly. He liked teaching her about the hotel. And with Heloise to love, and the hotel to keep him busy, Hugues needed nothing more in his life; nor did Heloise. They lived in a sheltered world that suited them both to perfection. She had lost a mother, and he a wife, but they had each other, and that seemed like more than enough for now. And in his fantasies about the future, Hugues liked to think that when she grew up, they would run the hotel together. Until then they lived in the hotel that had been his dream.

  Chapter 2

  HUGUES HAD STRUCTURED the hotel in the traditional way he had learned at the École Hôtelière and at all the important hotels where he had worked. And he made good use of his staff. He had a back office, which handled all the business aspects of running the hotel, reservations, sales, marketing, and accounting, all fu
nctions that were vital to the operation of the hotel. The human resources staff were part of the back office too, and they dealt not only with the employees but with the labor unions, which was crucial. A strike could cripple the hotel. Hugues had picked his staff with infinite care and knew full well how important they were. If reservations weren’t diligently handled with minute precision, and carefully kept track of, or if accounting was inaccurate, it could put them out of business. And he kept a careful eye on all the administrative aspects of the hotel. He had a profound respect for how important the back office was, despite the fact that their guests never saw any of those people, but the smooth running of the hotel depended on the competence of the administrative staff, and he had chosen them well.

  The front desk and concierges worked hand in hand and were key faces that the hotel guests saw on a constant basis. Without a smoothly run reception desk, and supremely competent concierges, his guests would have swiftly shifted their allegiance to other better-run hotels. Among the many functions they performed, they had to meet the sometimes-exotic needs of their VIP and celebrity hotel guests. They were used to movie stars, who insisted on changing suites three and four times until they found the one that pleased them, had their assistants send long lists of special dietary needs in advance, and required everything from satin sheets to orthopedic mattresses, special items for their children, air filters, hypoallergenic pillows, and masseurs to be standing by day and night. The staff were used to unusual requests and took pride in adapting to their most demanding guests. They were also accustomed to some of the more unpleasant behaviors of their VIPs, who frequently accused the maids of stealing valuable items that they had misplaced or lost themselves. In the past three years, they had not had a single case of real theft by employees, had been able to calm hysterical guests who falsely accused staff, and had proved otherwise in each instance. The hotel staff had learned how to handle difficult guests and take accusations of that nature in stride. Hugues demanded criminal background checks and bonded all his employees to protect the hotel and the guests.