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Authors: Cecile David-Weill
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requisitioned for the summer at L’Agapanthe. Streamingin from my parents’ other residences, these chambermaids, cooks, and butlers, who had worked for my parents for ten or twenty years, seemed happy to come back to fulfill their assigned tasks. In fact, some retirees even returned to service for the occasion, to plump up their savings and renew old ties.
With a long weekend coming up, my only course was to find an open employment agency. I had no illusions: finding another treasure like Roberto would be a miracle. He’d been with my parents for twenty-eight years, a paragon of kindness, professionalism, and refinement. And it would not be easy to find a head butler who would share our approach to domestic service.
As we saw it, the expertise of our staff depended on years of apprenticeship and experience. The servants were expected to perform their duties appropriately and without any instruction from us. It would never even have occurred to us to advise our employees regarding their work, and why would we have done so, since we knew ourselves to be incapable of ironing a fluted sleeve or whipping up a soufflé Mornay? The new butler would have to be up to the job, because our long acquaintance with impeccable service made us excellent judges in the field.
He would also have to understand our devotion to protocol. We were never on familiar terms with ourstaff, because displaying any growing affection or general sympathy for them would have smacked of demagoguery. That was our way of showing them respect and appreciation for their skill. Sticklers for form, we addressed our cook as “Chef.” And we would never have disturbed the servants during their meals or leisure hours by entering their living or dining rooms, or have meddled in their personal affairs of the heart, family, workplace, or pocketbook. In short, we left them to their own devices. We kept a distance we considered ideal for a long-term relationship. Familiarity breeds contempt, as the saying goes. So we all stayed where we belonged: we, by behaving like employers, by giving orders respectfully, unemotionally, without any attempt to manipulate our employees; they, by sheltering behind a tradition requiring them to address us in the third person—“Would Madame like …?” Behind that facade, they were free to think whatever they wanted, and even not to like us.
Our staff enjoyed, if not our affection, our esteem. And so they deserved consideration and pleasant working conditions. L’Agapanthe was a “good house” for them as well. The laundry, kitchen, and pantry were air-conditioned. The servants received excellent wages, had everything they needed for their jobs: professional-quality appliances, the latest model steamovens, workstations worthy of the very finest restaurants, plenty of
sous-chefs
, even a raft of “scullions” to do the washing up. They had a private beach at their disposal, dining areas both inside the house and on a patio outside, simple but tasty food, a television lounge, comfortable bedrooms with their own bathrooms, and cars available for going out in the evening. And judging from the noise and laughter from their dining room at mealtime, the atmosphere “belowstairs” was good.
But our family ideal of service was possible only in a house like L’Agapanthe, where we could all live together. Because the social gulf between us was not as wide as the chasm between city centers and their suburbs, fashionable neighborhoods and slums, elegant town houses and tenements—although the town houses were becoming increasingly middle class, doing away with the social distinctions formalized by the parlor floor and the maids’ rooms up under the eaves.
Nevertheless, the invisible barrier between us was impossible to cross. The servants, so close to us and seemingly as varied and picturesque as our houseguests, formed a mysterious tribe whose proximity aroused my curiosity. I sometimes wondered how they lived and thought, like a
With a long weekend coming up, my only course was to find an open employment agency. I had no illusions: finding another treasure like Roberto would be a miracle. He’d been with my parents for twenty-eight years, a paragon of kindness, professionalism, and refinement. And it would not be easy to find a head butler who would share our approach to domestic service.
As we saw it, the expertise of our staff depended on years of apprenticeship and experience. The servants were expected to perform their duties appropriately and without any instruction from us. It would never even have occurred to us to advise our employees regarding their work, and why would we have done so, since we knew ourselves to be incapable of ironing a fluted sleeve or whipping up a soufflé Mornay? The new butler would have to be up to the job, because our long acquaintance with impeccable service made us excellent judges in the field.
He would also have to understand our devotion to protocol. We were never on familiar terms with ourstaff, because displaying any growing affection or general sympathy for them would have smacked of demagoguery. That was our way of showing them respect and appreciation for their skill. Sticklers for form, we addressed our cook as “Chef.” And we would never have disturbed the servants during their meals or leisure hours by entering their living or dining rooms, or have meddled in their personal affairs of the heart, family, workplace, or pocketbook. In short, we left them to their own devices. We kept a distance we considered ideal for a long-term relationship. Familiarity breeds contempt, as the saying goes. So we all stayed where we belonged: we, by behaving like employers, by giving orders respectfully, unemotionally, without any attempt to manipulate our employees; they, by sheltering behind a tradition requiring them to address us in the third person—“Would Madame like …?” Behind that facade, they were free to think whatever they wanted, and even not to like us.
Our staff enjoyed, if not our affection, our esteem. And so they deserved consideration and pleasant working conditions. L’Agapanthe was a “good house” for them as well. The laundry, kitchen, and pantry were air-conditioned. The servants received excellent wages, had everything they needed for their jobs: professional-quality appliances, the latest model steamovens, workstations worthy of the very finest restaurants, plenty of
sous-chefs
, even a raft of “scullions” to do the washing up. They had a private beach at their disposal, dining areas both inside the house and on a patio outside, simple but tasty food, a television lounge, comfortable bedrooms with their own bathrooms, and cars available for going out in the evening. And judging from the noise and laughter from their dining room at mealtime, the atmosphere “belowstairs” was good.
But our family ideal of service was possible only in a house like L’Agapanthe, where we could all live together. Because the social gulf between us was not as wide as the chasm between city centers and their suburbs, fashionable neighborhoods and slums, elegant town houses and tenements—although the town houses were becoming increasingly middle class, doing away with the social distinctions formalized by the parlor floor and the maids’ rooms up under the eaves.
Nevertheless, the invisible barrier between us was impossible to cross. The servants, so close to us and seemingly as varied and picturesque as our houseguests, formed a mysterious tribe whose proximity aroused my curiosity. I sometimes wondered how they lived and thought, like a
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