Page 23 of A Mother’s Love

She ordered crab salad and a virgin Bloody Mary, and almost giggled as she sat there.

She wished that the girls could have seen her.

Olivia would have been proud of her, going to a trendy restaurant alone in Paris.

This was what she had come to Paris for, a little glamour, not just to revisit the Louvre.

She put her shopping bags with her morning’s purchases under the table, which left barely enough room for her alligator Birkin.

She took time eating lunch, she had the whole day to herself, with no reason to rush.

The stores would be open until seven, and she had hours more to shop.

She ordered an espresso after lunch, with a dollop of whipped cream on top, which tasted sinful, and sat sipping it slowly.

The man who had arrived at the restaurant right after her, who was seated at a table nearby, finished his lunch before she did, and walked past her when he left.

He wended his way through the crowd of people arriving and leaving.

Halley saw someone bump into him, and he dropped his coat for an instant, picked it up gracefully, apologized for standing too close and smiled at her, and then made his way out of the restaurant and left.

It was such a beautiful day that he didn’t bother to put his coat on, and he disappeared into a cab.

He was attractive and well dressed, and had smiled at her admiringly.

Halley was having fun checking out what the women were wearing, old and young, fashionable and flashy, trendy, long blond hair, jet black hair with gelled spikes, the men in leathers and suedes, in very expensive motorcycle boots, most in designer sneakers, and alligator shoes.

She had a second espresso and asked for the check.

She didn’t expect it to be a cheap lunch, and it wasn’t, but it was worth it for the show as well as the delicious crab salad.

She reached down for her bag to get out her wallet with the credit cards.

She groped under the table, and all she found were the shopping bags with her morning purchases.

Her Birkin had obviously slipped behind them.

She finally looked under the table to locate it and didn’t see it.

She pushed the shopping bags aside, and still couldn’t find it.

She got up, walked around the table, moved the tablecloth aside for a better view.

Her bag wasn’t there. She felt her breath catch.

She thought someone must have moved it, and looked around to see if it was on a chair at a nearby table, but still didn’t see it.

She panicked for a minute. She had never lost a bag before, but she knew there had to be a reasonable explanation.

A bag that size and that unusual didn’t just disappear.

She would have seen it if someone walked out with it.

And everyone in the restaurant, or close to her, was wearing Birkin bags, newer and flashier than hers.

She felt totally lost and the ma?tre d’ came over to her to see what was wrong.

She was standing next to her table with a confused expression.

“Is there a problem, madame? May I help you?” he asked her in English. And in the stress of the moment, she forgot her college French, and answered him in English.

“My bag…I can’t find it…this is crazy. It has to be here somewhere…

” She was turning in circles, and felt like a crazy person looking for her lost bag.

He caught the eye of a nearby server in a tight short black leather skirt, with dyed black hair piled on her head, in thigh-high boots, and told her in rapid French what had happened.

He asked her several questions and she shook her head.

She hadn’t seen anything unusual happen.

He handed her Halley’s shopping bags, and took a small flashlight out of his pocket with a powerful beam.

He looked under all the neighboring tables as Halley watched him.

She felt sick as he looked at her and shook his head.

He took her arm then, and spoke to her in a low voice.

“Look closely as we walk around. If you see your bag, tell me. Sometimes we have customers we don’t know, though we know most of them, and women take bags they want sometimes.

It has happened before. Your bag was alligator, yes?

” She nodded. She felt like she was in a bad movie, a French thriller, and she followed him throughout the restaurant, looking under tables with his torch, and scrutinizing every customer and handbag.

When they had finished, he turned to her with a dismayed expression.

“I believe your bag has been stolen, madame.” It obviously had been but that made no sense to Halley.

“But I didn’t see anything, or feel anything.

The bag is huge, I would have seen someone walk out of the restaurant with it.

” She thought of the few minutes when she had closed her eyes and turned her face to the sun, it could have happened then, but the thief would have had to be lightning quick to get the bag and run out of the restaurant with it, and people would have seen him or her do it.

“These are professionals who do these things, madame. They are not amateurs, and they are very good at it. We see it in this neighborhood all the time. This is where they come for the expensive merchandise they steal, and sell all over Europe and in Asia. Your bag will disappear very quickly.” He wasn’t reassuring.

“What do I do?” Halley felt suddenly helpless, as though someone had stolen her most precious possession, and she had no recourse.

And in the bag she had her passport, money, credit cards, and a million little trinkets and treasures she had just thrown in.

The keys to the house she was renting, and the address, and the realtor’s folder.

Within seconds, if he rifled through the bag, the thief would know where she lived and have access to the house.

“You must go to the police immediately. I will have someone take you. But first we will look at our security video. Perhaps we will see something.” He was being very helpful, and the waitstaff were chattering among themselves and nodding, telling each other what had occurred.

It wasn’t the first time. But it was always unpleasant.

They felt sorry for the American it had happened to.

She looked shocked and disoriented. Some women screamed and had hysterics.

One customer had lost an alligator tote bag her Chihuahua had been asleep in.

Fortunately, the thief had abandoned the dog on the sidewalk and kept the bag, and the woman had nearly fainted, and screamed when they brought the dog back.

She never saw the bag again and didn’t care.

Halley followed the ma?tre d’ to the back office, while someone else took his place at the entrance to the restaurant.

She followed him in, and they sat down at a monitor on a desk.

He entered a code, entered the approximate time they were guessing it had happened, and the video started as Halley entered the restaurant, was led to her table and sat down.

And the man who had come in right behind her was taken to his.

The ma?tre d’ sped up the video then, and they saw the same man pay, stand up, leave his table, and approach her to pass her table and leave the restaurant.

Halley was paying no attention and drinking her coffee, as someone appeared to bump into him.

If she looked closely, she could see that the man in the black suit and turtleneck had dropped his coat artfully next to Halley’s table, stooped quickly to pick up the coat, just a fraction of a second longer than it should have taken, gathered up his voluminous coat over his arm, and headed straight out of the restaurant after a brief smile at Halley.

He hailed a cab on the street the minute he was clear of the restaurant and disappeared.

“Was it him?” she asked after seeing the video. You couldn’t see her bag on the screen.

“It was when he dropped the coat,” the ma?tre d’ said knowingly.

He had seen it done before. “He scooped up your bag under it. The coat was only a device to hide whatever he stole today. It could have been you or any woman in the restaurant.” There must have been forty or fifty Birkin bags there that day, and he chose hers.

It was totally rotten luck for her. “The bag was under the coat on his arm when he left.” He took the tape out of the machine to show the police, but the ruse wouldn’t be new to them either.

It was standard procedure, and the pros knew exactly what kind of restaurant to go to, and with the outdoor terrace and the good weather, there was more activity and chaos than usual right after Christmas.

It had worked to the thief’s advantage. And he’d even had lunch while deciding which bag to steal.

He was very well dressed, like all the other diners, in order to blend in.

There was nothing remarkable or ominous about him.

He had looked very relaxed while he ate and chose his prey.

“He must have seen your bag when he walked in behind you,” the ma?tre d’ suggested.

“It’s an unusually large size,” she said, sorry she had worn it that day.

“He’ll get an excellent price for it, in Spain or Italy or Germany.

There’s a market for them in Liechtenstein, I’ve been told, and a big market in Asia and Africa.

It will be out of the country by tomorrow,” the ma?tre d’ told her, and her heart sank.

“You should go to the police now.” He spoke to a waiter who had been watching the security film from a little distance.

He told him to take her to the police station, and one of the servers called a cab.

“Oh my God,” Halley said, suddenly mortified, “I can’t pay for lunch. I have no money.”

“Your lunch is complimentary, madame. We are very sorry this happened here. It does happen a great deal in this neighborhood, to tourists and to Parisians. These thieves are very good at what they do. Your passport?” he asked her.

“It was in the bag. Everything I have with me is in that bag.” She felt overwhelmed by a wave of panic as she thought of everything in the bag, and she was fighting back tears.

Nothing like it had ever happened to her.

It was a terrible feeling of helplessness and vulnerability, which wasn’t like her. She felt violated and afraid.

“He may throw the contents away on the street, and someone will return your passport to the embassy. You must cancel your credit cards right away.” She nodded and then her eyes widened again.

“My phone!”

“He will probably sell that. Do you have an application to locate the phone?” he asked hopefully. She shook her head.

“I didn’t think I’d ever need it. I’ve never lost a phone. My daughters have. I never do. Until now.” She felt as though she had been stripped naked of every essential element she needed, especially while abroad, and her identity.

“Would you like to make a call or send a text on my phone?” the ma?tre d’ offered kindly.

“Yes, I’m so sorry…if you don’t mind.” She sent a single text to Millie, her assistant.

“It’s Halley. Bag stolen, please cancel credit cards immediately.

Going to police now. Don’t tell girls. Will buy new phone.

Love, H.” She was normally so efficient, she wasn’t careless, and she hated dramas and helpless women.

But she felt like one now. The thief had stolen everything she needed to function normally in Paris or anywhere.

She had no money to pay for anything, no credit cards, no passport, and no phone.

She couldn’t even get on a plane and go home without a passport.

And the thief had the keys and address of the house. He could rob it while she was out.

She felt dazed as she walked out of the restaurant. The servers handed Halley her shopping bags and apologized again, as she and one of the waiters got in a cab to go to the nearest commissariat de police, or police station.

Two of the servers and the ma?tre d’ watched her leave and wished her luck. She apologized again for not being able to pay for her lunch, and they sympathized with her over the loss of her bag.

She sat in the cab, fighting back tears, trying to be brave.

She didn’t ask where they were going. She didn’t care, and aside from everything else the thief had taken with it, she loved the bag, and she knew the ma?tre d’ was right.

She would never see it again. She felt small and violated and scared, and hadn’t felt that way in years.

It was a familiar feeling and the hallmark of her childhood.

She was shocked by how quickly that sensation surfaced from the past. She felt helpless and stripped of her identity as they drove to the police station, with no one to help her, in a foreign country and a language she didn’t speak well.

And she suddenly felt like a lost child in a dangerous world where she was alone.

The feeling was one she had forgotten and it came back in a rush now, and was every bit as vivid and terrifying as it had been when she was a defenseless child.