Girl in the Afternoon (7 page)

Auguste considered himself a judicious, levelheaded man, fair, good with people. Only when it came to Colette did a sort of insanity rise up in him, or at least that's how he saw it. And these days she was taking everything out of him. Their arguments escalated, and they weren't followed, anymore, by stormy lovemaking. Early in their marriage, the arguments were a harmless game, each trying to one-up the other until someone gave in and they collapsed into each other's arms. But after Léon died, Colette wouldn't let him touch her, not until the day they fought like they'd never fought before. Over what Auguste couldn't remember. It wouldn't have mattered. They needed the fight. Colette smashed a mirror with her pearl brush, and Auguste put his fist through the wall. It ended with Colette on her knees in tears, Auguste sinking to the floor to comfort her.

After that, only a passionate fight could arouse them.

Only now, when Colette started in, Auguste just felt overwhelmed and incredibly tired.

The first time he retreated midargument, Colette threw a teacup that shattered on the back of his head. He almost grabbed her, but that was exactly what she wanted, so he forced himself to walk straight out of the room, cutting off her shrill scream with a decisive, satisfying click of the door. In spite of the blood trickling down his neck, he had felt delighted that he hadn't given in, which made him realize how much power he'd handed her all these years.

Auguste reached across the chessboard and picked up the black king, balancing the hefty piece in his hand. He had no idea of the crippling events that would unfold over the next few months, and he couldn't have predicted his part in them. But he would think back to the moment he stood waiting, unable to call up to his wife, seeing his powerlessness so plainly, like the king in a chess game who can only move one hopeless space at a time.

*   *   *

Colette
had always had a temper, but the rage inside her now was different. In some dark corner of her mind, she knew it had started the moment she saw Henri kissing Aimée the night before he left. Her daughter's back had been pressed up against the wall, and her hand clutched Henri's as he bent over her in a kiss that reminded Colette of what it was to be desired. They were tender, but desperate, and Colette felt a surge of anger—
How dare they—
and then a deep longing, and something she refused to acknowledge as jealousy.

The morning Colette dressed for the Salon de Paris, she pondered how lucky Aimée was to be supported in her art. Colette's papa would never have done such a thing. When she was seven years old, her papa made her play the piano for a roomful of people. She'd stared at her sheet music in terror, forgetting everything she'd learned. The room was silent, everyone waiting. Even though she knew she'd get a beating afterward, she began banging away nonsensically on the keys, tears streaming down her face. More than anything, she wanted her papa to stop her. But he only watched until she'd exhausted herself, turning to the room when she was finished and crying, “Utterly talentless!” then, laughing, “It's a good thing she's pretty. Otherwise we'll never get rid of her.”

If he could see her now. Colette craned her neck to view the back of her dress, pleased with this new look. It was the latest fashion, teal silk with brown stripes, long fitted sleeves and a boned jacket bodice. Finally the cumbersome crinolettes had gone out of style, and a woman could walk into a room without popping through the doorway like a cork, Colette thought, tilting her hat.

She turned from the mirror as Jacques came running into the room. “Maman!” He grabbed the bottom of her dress, and she almost scolded him for pulling at it, but stopped herself.

Jacques, precious, little Jacques, was the only part of Colette's life that felt sweet and good, the only part where her anger softened. If he were naughty, she'd forgive him instantly, taking him in her arms and kissing him all over his soft face. If it weren't for Marie and Madame Savaray, the boy would be quite spoiled.

“My darling, little love.” Colette picked him up. “Where is Marie? Are you running about the house all by yourself?”

The boy giggled and pointed to the door.

“Well, then, let's go see if we can find her,” Colette said, and walked out as Jacques pulled a satin streamer on her hat and sent it trailing to the floor.

 

Chapter 8

The Salon de Paris was unthinkably crowded, and the unpleasant smell of warm bodies mingled with the sting of varnish in the central hall as the crowd moved like a single body up the grand staircase.

It took the Savarays two hours to locate Aimée's painting. The rooms opened one into the other, and they kept going in the wrong direction, having to loop back and start again. Of course they stopped to view the most talked about pieces, and every few feet they ran into someone they knew. By the time they found the
S
section, Aimée was high strung and agitated.

The small canvas was not hung well. It was positioned high on the wall and overpowered by a neighboring canvas full of bloody horses and muscular men. Looking at Leonie perched sideways at a table with her strange smile, Aimée's enthusiasm, all the buildup for this moment, dropped out from under her. It was pathetically commonplace, her technique precise and formulaic. There was nothing original about the painting other than the light-color scale she'd used, and that would only draw criticism from this crowd if anyone even bothered to stop and study it.

The disconcerting voice inside Aimée's head, the doubtful, skeptical one, had been right all along. Her art had become her self-worth, and it wasn't very good.

“Not the best placement,” Colette said to Madame Savaray, who stood with a tight-lipped scowl, arms pulled to her sides trying to brace herself against the inevitable stranger who might, at any moment, bump into her.

“Well, at least it's not up there.” Auguste pointed to the paintings crammed near the high ceiling.

Colette brushed her hands together as if shaking off any responsibility for her daughter's mediocre work. “It's uncomfortably bright, and there's far too much color. I don't know why I didn't notice that before.”

Aimée bristled. Her parents were so boringly conventional. “Better to be noticed for originality than not noticed at all,” she said. “Édouard would understand.”

Colette rolled her eyes. “Édouard, Édouard,” she laughed, hooking her arm through Auguste's.

Madame Savaray thought it a fine painting. Although—and she did hate to agree with Colette—it was much too bright for her taste. Regardless, she was no art critic, and she didn't see that her opinion on color held any importance.

“Fine work, my dear,” she said, but all Aimée heard was obligatory praise. “Come along now.” She took Aimée's hand and drew her away from Auguste and Colette, who had moved on to a painting of a half-naked woman in repose. “There's more to see, and I, for one, don't know how much more of this stuffy place I can take.”

Five rooms later, after looking at a sickly depiction of a dead fish, Madame Savaray excused herself and sat down on a green circular sofa in the middle of the room, insisting Aimée go on without her.

Pushing through throngs of people, Aimée made her way down the stairs to the
M
section. Édouard was standing in front of his painting,
Gare Saint-Lazare,
gesticulating with grand gestures as onlookers pressed closer. When he saw Aimée he tipped his hat and smiled.

Leaving his audience, he came through the crowd to her, looking very grand in his top hat and white double cravat.

“My dear.” He pressed his lips to the top of her glove. “Congratulations. You've made it into this madness.” He rested his arm lightly on her waist. “It's criticism as usual,” he whispered, guiding her past walls of paintings neither one of them had any interest in viewing. “The Salon rejected two of my paintings this year. And this after the success of
Le Bon Bock
! The ill-mannered lot of jurors infuriates me as much as anyone.” He grinned at her. “But, here we are, giving our blood in hopes of a medal. I suppose the reviews can't get as bad as they were for the Salon des Refusés
,
poor devils. I told Monsieur Renoir they'd be in for it, undermining the values of the académie, shoving antiestablishment down the jury's throats.”

Aimée paid no attention to the critics. The paintings at the Salon des Refusés had awed her: Berthe Morisot's
The Cradle,
Edgar Degas's
The Laundress,
and Monet's
Impression, Sunrise.
Those artists captured air, rhythm, truth, and simplicity. They were on the edge of something exciting, something reckless.

“The jurors are the same lot who ran screaming from Wagner as if the music had stung them,” she said, the warmth of Édouard's hand a small fire on her hip. “They're not looking to be excited or intrigued, certainly not shocked. They're looking for tradition and stability. It makes them feel safe.”

“Like yourself?” Édouard said.

Aimée glanced at him, not sure if he'd meant it as an insult, or a challenge, but Edouard kept his gaze straight ahead and only gave a squeeze to her hip that made her feel certain it was a challenge.

*   *   *

After
a short rest, Madame Savaray left the upstairs rooms and went down to the lower level.

When she first saw the painting, she didn't think much of it. A little village dashed off in rather sloppy brushstrokes. It was the girl who caught her attention. She sat idle in the grass, staring straight out at Madame Savaray, who gave a small gasp when she leaned in. Straining her eyes, she read the title
Girl in the Afternoon.

Her chest heaved. It was not a moment she could have predicted, and yet it came as one anticipated, dreaded. She should have been prepared, with a plan, but she stared at the painting with no idea what to do.

“
Grand-mère?
”

Madame Savaray whipped around to see Aimée and Monsieur Manet standing directly behind her.

Stepping quickly in front of the painting, she cried, “Oh, here you are!” Her voice strained and unnaturally cheerful.

Édouard tipped his hat. “Madame Savaray, you're looking magnificent. That dress suits you admirably.”

She gave a tight smile, her eyes darting around Édouard's shoulders and over Aimée's head. Viewers who had looked eager earlier, now appeared tired and disinterested, not to mention wilted, which was exactly how she felt. That, and stricken.

“Are you quite all right?” Aimée asked.

Madame Savaray noticed Édouard's hand linger over Aimée's for just a moment. “Perfectly,” she said. “Where are your parents?”

“I haven't any idea.”

“We were just making our way to the garden,” Édouard said. “You look as if you could use a bit of air yourself.”

Madame Savaray nodded. “I most certainly could.”

“Ah, there's Monsieur Lerolle.” Édouard shot his hand in the air. “I must go say hello. Let us meet up in the sculpture garden, yes?” he said, and disappeared into the dust that rose from the thousands of feet shifting over the cast-iron floors.

Aimée looked suspiciously at her
grand-mère,
who had not moved from the painting. “It can't be all that bad,” she joked, taking a short step around Madame Savaray who was forced to step aside.

Aimée had gotten it into her head that Leonie must be modeling for someone else and that her
grand-mère
somehow thought this was a betrayal. It took her a few moments before she recognized the figure sitting on a lawn in front of a church, the curved line of the girl's nose, her slight frown, and the tilt of her chin as she lifted her gaze, her expression confrontational, as if challenging the viewer. It was her, but it was her in a place she'd never seen, in a place she'd never been. And it was this she stood trying to make sense of, feeling strangely displaced. When she finally understood, a flush of heat surged through her, and there was a fierce ringing in her ears. The room seemed to tilt and slide away as her
grand-mère
's hands anchored onto her shoulders and pulled her away.

Outside the sun was glaring, the sky a blinding sheet of white. Aimée stood blinking, the people around her shapeless, inhuman forms. Voices swarmed like hundreds of insects, and her skin tingled.

Madame Savaray popped open her sunshade and walked them briskly down the sanded pathway, past lush greenery and rows of sculptures, the milky busts and thighs formless mounds of white behind Aimée's blurred eyes.

She forgot about Édouard, she forgot about her parents, she forgot about Leonie, who she was supposed to meet at three o'clock in the buffet. If it weren't for her
grand-mère
's firm grip on her arm, Aimée would have forgotten about her as well.

Swept up in the herd of bodies pouring out from the Palais de l'Industrie, they dropped onto the Champs-Elysées and found themselves suddenly free, walking swiftly away from the silk and satin and feathers and ribbons and all that sickening perfume.

“What we need is something to eat,” Madame Savaray said. “Not here. The restaurants will be much too crowded.”

Madame Savaray slowed their pace, welcoming the shade of the chestnut trees that lined the boulevard. After being packed in like animals, she was grateful for the fresh air. These events took more out of her than she cared to admit, and in spite of the confusing emotions tumbling inside of her, she found herself thinking how a row of chestnuts were more valuable to her than all the art in the world.

By the time they found a respectable café, Madame Savaray's knee ached, and she was grateful to sit down. Aimée wasn't hungry, but Madame Savaray—who hadn't eaten since breakfast—ate heartily: onion soup, grilled herring with mushrooms and asparagus, which was always her favorite this time of year, followed by a large scoop of praline ice cream. After which she ordered them each a glass of champagne.