Wanting to get to know him better, and upset by his dismissive attitude, she orchestrated a dinner with him and the film’s director. After dinner, she and Serge danced, and when he stepped on her toes, she realized that this man she thought arrogant was really very shy. That first night, he took her to a transvestite bar, then a club where the American blues singer Joe Turner sang, then to a Russian nightclub, and then to the Hilton Hotel, where the desk clerk asked, “Your usual room, Mr. Gainsbourg?” Nothing sexual happened that night, because he fell asleep, but very quickly they became inseparable. They went to Venice, stayed in a corner suite in the Gritti Palace, drank at Harry’s Bar every night, and fell madly in love. When they first returned to Paris they stayed at L’Hôtel, where Oscar Wilde had died. They then moved to Rue de Verneuil, where Serge selected every piece of furniture and designed everything in the house. “Serge had seen Dalí’s house and was very struck by the fact that he had black astrakhan on the walls,” says Jane. “So Serge wanted black on his walls, but he wanted it to be felt, the special felt that was used for policemen’s trousers. He could never take any change. After I had Charlotte, when she got so big that her legs came out of the crib I said, ‘I must buy her a bed, Serge, without offending your eye,’ and he said, ‘Put socks on her.’ I never saw him take a bath. He was the cleanest man I ever knew, he knew how to wash all the bits, but in 13 years I never saw him take a bath, I never saw him go to the loo, I never saw him completely naked, the children never saw him naked—and they tried like mad.”

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