Joan Juliet Buck - The Ghost of Rue Jacob

 

 

That's a little low. Hi. So, they say that ghosts are people caught between two worlds. I'm caught between two worlds. I'm an American who passes for a French person. This makes me really rare. It also means I don't know if I'm American or French. It also means that 15 years ago I was asked to go to Paris as editor in chief of Paris Vogue, the first time an American has ever been asked to edit a French publication, and the last. [laughter and applause] I wasn't used to working in offices, I hadn't had a desk job at that point for years. And so, I had to go to Paris and act like a grown up, and I also needed to work very hard. But worse than that, I had to find an apartment that would be fitting for my station.

 

So, I looked at a lot of apartments, and they were too big or too small or too dingy or too dark, or all of them too ordinary. Until one day I was in the Rue Jacob, every American's favorite Paris street. The Rue Jacob is picturesque. It's on the Left Bank, and it's easy to pronounce Jacob. [audience chuckle] And it's full of antique shops that have very beautiful objects in them, objects that you would want to put in your very beautiful apartment on the Rue Jacob, if you could find such a thing, which I did, up a stone staircase from the 17th century, the color of honey or freshly baked bread. Two gigantic lacquered doors opened into a foyer, and there was a dining room on the right. And then there was a living room, 18 feet wide, 18 feet long and 18 feet high. A perfect cube. [audience chuckle]

 

And next to it was an American kitchen, the realtor said. I was reassured. [audience chuckle] And there was a study. There was a long corridor, and at the end of that was a bedroom that was another perfect cube. All of this perfection covered in moldings from the late 18th century five minutes before the revolution. [audience chuckle] The place was perfect. [audience chuckle] Also, 15 years ago, this perfection, this palace, cost only $200 more than my rather dingy, boring apartment on the Upper East Side.

 

So, I found myself in the office of a pair of rather peculiar lawyers near the Place Saint-Sulpice. And they put this piece of paper on the desk and they read-- they read, "Madame, you must hereby attest that we have informed you on this day that the apartment situated at 11 Rue Jacob moves at night. [audience laughter] Please sign here and initial on top." So, I sign. I initial. They also warned me that given who I was and what I was doing in Paris, I would certainly be giving parties in this magnificent apartment if I could possibly keep the more corpulent guests around the perimeter because they couldn't really vouch for the safety of the middle of the floor. [audience laughter]

 

So, the possessor of this very beautiful rental, I move in. I figure out that I'm going to put the bed on the wall. There's this wall between the study and the bedroom. I put the bed there. What am I going to do about the very high windows? Oh, beige felt curtains felt cheap, practical. And all the French people say, "Oh, that is so intelligent fent." [audience chuckle] And I give a party, and I keep the more corpulent people around the perimeter. [audience chuckle] And there's an exceptionally fat Italian designer who I keep by the window. I ask him to “Please, will you make sure tell me who's coming?” [laughter and applause]

 

And these parties are not really parties. They're work. Everything is work. I'm working 20 hours a day so that when I come home to bed, I crash. I sleep like a dead person. After four months, I realize I don't have to work 20 hours a day. I can work 19 hours a day. So, I'm beginning to get a bit more normal. And that's when, in the middle of the night one night, I awaken because there is a pull on the bedclothes on my left, as if somebody's lying on the covers next to me, and there's a soft little hand touching my forehead. [audience reaction] And I lie there wondering if somebody's actually in the room. 

 

And with a great act of courage, I put out my arm and I turn on the light, and there's no one there. Now, I'm the editor in chief of Paris Vogue. I absolutely refuse to believe that any of this nonsense is happening. [audience chuckle] It's ridiculous. However, the next day, I do go around the corner to the church of Saint-Germain-des-Prés. [audience laughter] And I'm not quite sure how you do these things, but I go into the office and there's a woman there making notes in a notebook. And I wait. And she looks up. She asks me for my name. I give a fake name because I don't want people to know that I think what I'm about to tell her, and it's not the right kind of name. She looks at me skeptically, and I say, "I live around the corner. And I think my apartment is maybe haunted. Is there a priest who could come and--" [audience laughter] And the woman who's got a greasy bun and greasy glasses looks at me through the greasy glasses with total contempt, and she says, "Madame, that is superstition." [audience laughter]

 

So, I leave the church of Saint-Germain-des-Prés and I know one thing. I'm not going to let a second person in Paris know that I'm crazy enough to think that there's something in my bedroom at night. So, I go back, I give another party. Everybody says it's so wonderful. And I don't tell anyone what happens at night in my room. And in fact, I'm really lonely. So, it's not bad. [laughter and applause] So, one June morning, a cold, freezing June morning, I wake up one of those horrible, gray French June mornings. And I turn on my light and there's no electricity. And I think, "Oh my God, I forgot to pay the bill. And they've cut me off. The French, they're always punishing you." [audience chuckle] So, I go to the office, I get the bill paid. That evening, I have dinner with friends who are Italian. They're really nice. I've known them a long time. Maybe I can confide in them. And I do. And the wife says, "Wait a second. You have no electricity. You have something in your bedroom and you're going home tonight and you're going to go to your bedroom with a candle? No, no, come stay with us tonight." I say, "Great, great, great. Thank you very much. Can I please just pack a little bag?" 

 

So, we go back to my apartment, we put the husband in the living room with some tequila, and the wife says, "Let's take a look at this ghost of yours." So, I walk down the long corridor with two votive candles, and I know there's nothing to see because I've never seen anything. And we go into the bedroom, and I turn to face the bed, and there on the bed, I see the indentation of a body lying there. At that very moment, the wife says, "You know what? I think I'll wait for you in the living room." [laughter and applause]

 

So, now I really don't know what to do, because if I ask her if she's seen it and she hasn't seen it, I'm nuts. So, I just let her go. And I put my candles down and I pack my little bag. And the next morning, the bill is paid, the electricity is put on again. And that evening when I come home, the first thing I do, I move that bed from that weird wall over to the other side of the room in front of the bricked-up fireplace, underneath the mantelpiece that's made of marble that looks a little bit like a tombstone, but it's kind of a good place for the bed. And all the French people come and look at the bedroom and they say, "You know, [chuckles] you really want to sleep there because it looks like a grave." [audience laughter] And so, I lie. I say, "Oh, I really like it." And they say “It's very punk. Yes.” [audience chuckle]

 

So, when I'm sleeping over there, nothing happens. I'm okay. And I think about the building, and the people who own the building have exactly the same apartment above me. Foyer, dining room, the cube living room, the study, the bedroom. And one October night, I'm awoken in the middle of the night by the sound of somebody in the room above me being thrown from one end of a wooden floor to the other and hitting the far wall with a thud. And then there's a scream. And then there are blows and more screams and wails and cries and some kind of snorting sound. And the sound of the violence is so loud that my room is moving. So, I put on some shoes, I put on a coat. I run downstairs to the courtyard because I want to see what's happening in that room above my room. And I see my pale beige felt curtains in my window. And above, I don't see anything. There's no noise. There's nothing moving. There's no light. There's no shadows. There's just the October full moon reflected in the closed windows.

 

So, I go back up to my room, and I do what any American would do. I get out a sage stick from New Mexico, [laughter and applause] and I light it, and I get a shell and I put it on the table next to my bed. And I put the sage stick in the shell because this is going to get rid of whatever's going on. But the flames jump up, the flames multiply. Something in my bedroom is feeding the sage stick, and it burns so bright and so hard that it scorches the table.

 

The next day, I call my neighbors, my owners, and I insist on going upstairs for a drink. I'm going to be really brave. And I go up the stairs, and they offer me a really teeny glass of wine, and they show me their apartment. And it's terribly neat and rather austere, just like them. And I say, "So, your apartment is exactly like mine?" They say, "Yes, yes. But, of course, we sleep in the dining room." [audience chuckle] I say, "Oh, really? Why don't--" "Oh, no, no, no. We never go into the back room. [chuckles] No, no. We're much happier in the dining room." [audience laughter]

 

Okay. So, now I really don't know what to do because I'm not going back to the Catholic church after they've humiliated me like that. But I have a tame Tibetan acupuncturist. [audience laughter] I go to Dr. Tong Lang. And I say, "Do you ever do any exorcism?" He says, "Well, not personally, but I work with lamas who can clean various auras in various places just by looking at photographs." So, I go back to my place. I photograph the bedroom. This was 1997. I take the photos to be developed. I don't want anybody at the magazine to know about this. After the fashion shows, the photos are developed, I take them in to the Tibetan lama acupuncturist, and he promises that he will get it to the other lamas. And I think, "I'm out of my mind." Right?

 

Then my father comes to stay and he thinks the apartment is very beautiful. I don't discuss anything about what I might suspect. We're standing outside the apartment, outside the glorious lacquered doors one day, and he's just standing there stock still, and suddenly he's thrown down the stairs. And I run down, I pick him up. He's actually okay, but I know that something from the apartment threw him down the stairs. And that's it. I go to the Right Bank. I find an apartment, an ordinary 19th century apartment with no drama about it. And everybody in Paris says, "You're moving to the Right Bank when you have this palace on the Rue Jacob?" And I say, "You know what? I really think the Left Bank is just so over." [laughter and applause] And they say, "You're right."

 

So, one day I'm in the Café de Flore, I haven't quite moved yet, and there's a young designer who I know vaguely who's been to the parties, who comes running up to me who says, "Cherie, you're leaving that apartment?" And I say, "Yes." And he says, "How can you do that?" I say, "Well, you know." And he says, "Tell me something. I would do anything to live in that apartment. Have you given the lease to someone else?" I say, "No." He says, "Is there someone else living there?" [audience chuckle] And I have a moment where I think “Hmm”. And then I think he'd tell everybody, and I know he'd tell everybody. And he says, "Please, please, please, I want to live in that apartment. Can I have the lease?" And I say, "Yes." [laughter and applause]

 

So, I give him the lease. I move to the Right Bank, I get a boyfriend. I'm no longer lonely. The magazine begins to sell incredibly well. I become friends with Malcolm McLaren. [audience chuckle] Everything goes absolutely fabulously. And once in a while I go to the Rue Jacob because I would like some antiques to put in my 19th century apartment. And sometimes I pass in front of my old place and I see that there's a scaffolding. I see there are painters doing extraordinary things to it. Karl Lagerfeld is apparently paying for all the work. 

 

And I never go up there. I never run into the young designer anymore. He's nowhere to be seen. Two, three years later, I see him in Milan and I say, "Hey, you're not in Paris anymore." He says, "Well, you know, I never sleep in Paris. I sleep in Rome, I sleep in Milan, I sleep in Brussels, I sleep in London, and I'll sleep at the airport." And I say, "Really? How's your apartment?" He says, "Oh, honey, it's so haunted."