I Always Loved You (8 page)

“It's curious, though, isn't it?” Berthe said, skirting the danger of Suzanne's largesse. “Degas treats this one as if she is made of china. Have you ever seen him dote on anyone with such singular attention before? Why, he's even brought her a drink. Look how he takes her by the elbow. Look how he makes Édouard pay attention to her.”

“Do go see to her, would you, Berthe? Who knows how she'll fare once the men get going. I'll deal with the maid. Degas will bite off my head if I don't have food on the table soon. One would think the man hardly eats, the way he pretends to faint from starvation when he doesn't consume his dinner by seven.”

Berthe crossed the room to join Édouard and Degas and to welcome his guest. Eugène joined them. As his arm encircled her waist, Berthe greeted the gesture with a slight shudder.

“Ah. Madame and Monsieur Manet,” Degas said. “May I introduce the lovely Mademoiselle Cassatt? I should warn you, Mademoiselle Cassatt, that this Madame Manet is best known as Madame Morisot. There are far too many Madame Manets in this family. And we wouldn't want Mademoiselle Cassatt to mistake Berthe for your wife, would we, Édouard?”

Mary, who had spent the last few minutes listening to Édouard Manet and Degas good-naturedly insult one another, noticed that Berthe flinched slightly.

Édouard said, “Tell me, Degas, weren't you recently raving to me about a woman in the Salon so impressive that you went hunting for her? I believe you said you made a fool of yourself over her, didn't you?”

Degas gaped at Édouard and stated that he had no idea what Édouard was talking about.

“Welcome to our unruly Thursdays, Mademoiselle Cassatt,” Berthe said. “Monsieur Degas, you've been remiss. You must introduce her to everyone or I will do it for you.”

Degas placed his hand on Mary's back, and in the crowded parlor, this possessive movement of Degas's caught everyone's attention.

“
Messieurs et mesdames
, I present Mademoiselle Cassatt. I have invited her to exhibit with us next year. May you all abandon your bad manners to welcome someone whose talent exceeds all of yours. Especially you, Édouard; see if you can be hospitable to a woman who draws better than you ever will.”

In the silence that followed, while everyone appeared to assess what she thought of his bad manners, Mary fought not to betray the chagrin that flooded through her. The performance at the door, it seemed, had not been enough; she would be forever judged by what she said next. This was the way of intellectuals—Philadelphian or French, no matter: You had a moment, no more, to establish yourself. And Mary had been in Paris long enough to understand the clannish nature of Parisians, their intolerance of foreigners, their disdain of the Americans invading their boulevards and museums, clutching their Baedeker guides and immolating the French language. Nor did it matter that she was an artist. In this crowd, there would be no easy acceptance.

“You must ignore Monsieur Degas,” she began, “who seems tonight to possess the tongue of the devil. I claim neither talent nor pride, only honor at being here tonight. My thanks to Madame Manet”—ignoring Berthe Morisot, Mary looked about the room until she spied the figure of the older woman, seated in a chair, who nodded in reply—“for forgiving my cheek in accepting Monsieur Degas's invitation. I am most grateful to be in your home tonight.”

This crowd adored cheek. Combined with the false humility, of which everyone approved, her cheek turned out to be irresistible, apart from the abominable accent that they collectively decided to ignore, choosing instead to embrace her Americanism with a generosity they extended to no one else, except James Whistler, whom they all knew from his early days studying at the atelier Gleyre, and who, when over from England visiting, was beloved because he traded witty barbs with Degas all night, thus freeing the rest of them of the burden of sparring with him, if only for an evening.

No one noticed when dinner sailed out on the tarnished silver trays. All the guests surrounded Mary, though Claude Monet held back. Of the many things he disliked about Degas, he especially didn't like him always dragging new artists into their midst in an attempt to balance out the landscapists. An American? Degas, he decided, was going out of his mind. She probably painted teacups or something, by the look of her. Renoir stepped forward and kissed her hand. Lately Monet had been snubbing him, and tonight Renoir decided to show his old friend what it was to be a gentleman in the presence of a lady, as this woman undoubtedly was, since the silk alone in her dress had probably cost her a fortune. Renoir was an expert on anything to do with silk. Édouard, stung by Degas' comment, was challenging everyone to a drawing duel, declaring that he would run to his studio to get them all lead and paper, though he moved only enough to admit Mary's new admirers into the fold. Émile Zola merely bowed in Mary's direction. Gustave Caillebotte, tidy and handsome, smiled and kissed her hand. Zacharie Astruc and Stéphane Mallarmé made chivalrous comments and promptly turned away. But Monsieur Pissarro took Mary's hand in his and smiled without reserve. Next to the extravagant black beauty of Berthe Morisot, who had extracted herself from her husband's arm and taken Pissarro's elbow, he seemed like light itself.

“Mademoiselle Cassatt, as you have discovered, our dear friend Monsieur Degas, while a genius, is not always kind. To say nothing of his arrogance and presumption,” Pissarro said.

“It's true. Monsieur Degas has abandoned me in public several times,” Berthe said.

“Though you are never without an escort, my pet,” Eugène said. “Not if you want one.”

Everyone waited for Berthe to reply, but she didn't. It was easy, Mary thought, to overlook Berthe's husband. He looked a great deal like his brother, but there was something of the shade about him. His features failed to compel and his voice had a petulant quality.

Into the void Degas said, “I resent your comment, Pissarro. I am never presumptuous and rarely arrogant. And I am very fond of you, Berthe, as you well know.”

“You are always arrogant, Degas,” Pissarro said. “I apologize for him, Mademoiselle Cassatt. Mostly, we men forget that we are not in a café and therefore behave abominably.”

“Monsieur Pissarro never behaves abominably, do you?” Berthe said. “Madame Pissarro won't mind if I steal you, will she?”

“I would mind,” Eugène said, but everyone ignored him.

“I'm terribly afraid she will mind,” Pissarro said. “I've left her behind for the week in Pontoise with the children, and when I return home, I'll be made to repent my abandonment. Perhaps I am as unkind to her as Monsieur Degas was to you.”

Suzanne Manet, strands of loosened hair straggling about her reddened cheeks, toured the room, saying, “Oh, do come and get your plates, everyone, before the fish is hopeless.”

The fish was hopeless. Gustave Manet quietly slipped out as people queued for plates, thereby avoiding the fish entirely. Degas endured the buffet line twice to bring Mary a plate and another for himself. He sighed and said, “At least it's not swimming in butter like the asparagus.” The collective sighed too. It was awkward standing about with china and cutlery, a glass of champagne balancing on the nearest ledge, subject to thievery and spillage. Mary Cassatt set down her plate, her half-eaten food congealing on the china, while Berthe didn't even touch hers.

•   •   •

Soon after, all the men abandoned their plates for the candlelit corner next to the piano, where a few rested their elbows on its ebony skin and the rest sprawled in armchairs, twirling their delicate flutes of amber champagne, which they held by their stems. No one spoke, but they eyed one another as if waiting for a starting gun, boredom and anticipation warring on their spectral faces as the flickering candlelight painted shadows on the wall. Someone lit a cigar. Mary moved to join them, but Berthe motioned to her to sit beside her on a brocade loveseat away from the men.

Stéphane Mallarmé brought the tips of his fingers together and leaned forward into the ring of men, a serious but quizzical smile on his face. “Monsieur Zola,” he said. “Do you think your book
L'Assommoir
deserves its success when your prose, usually so evocative, is lazy at the oddest junctures? Sometimes I think you are getting careless.”

Mallarmé's voice betrayed no mockery as he lobbed this bombshell, but instead affected an urgency of inquiry, as if he'd been worrying about this regrettable flaw of Zola's for a long while and was happy to finally have the chance to discuss it.

“Zola has been dodging him forever,” Berthe whispered to Mary. “Stéphane wants a literary duel, albeit a civilized one, but Zola won't give him one.”

Mary whispered back, “This is what you call a party?”

“No,” Berthe said. “This is Paris.”

This is Paris.
People were always explaining things to her by invoking the city, just as she was always declaring that Paris was shining or raining. One couldn't help it, she supposed, if Paris held a magnetic spell over all its inhabitants.

“If I may, Mademoiselle Cassatt,” Berthe said, “I think that some of this posturing has to do with you. Forgive me, but no matter how welcoming everyone was, you should know that you are at a disadvantage. Monsieur Degas is always dragging in strays.”

“Strays?”

“New painters,” Berthe said. “I don't want to be unkind, but Degas seems to think that anyone he discovers is wonderful, and we don't always agree with him.”

Mary tried to forgive Berthe the cruelty of the word
stray
, though she was finding it hard to reconcile the suddenly unsympathetic woman beside her with the extravagantly feminine paintings she had exhibited at the Rue le Peletier.

“I see. And how did you prove yourself?” Mary said.

“I'm married to Eugène. And I paint.”

“As do I,” Mary said.

“They will exclude you until they approve of your work, and maybe not even then.”
They
will exclude
,
as if Berthe were including her now. And maybe she was. Maybe this was the way French women made friends. They warned you of the hurdles ahead and then sat back to see how you fared.

“How did you meet Monsieur Degas?” Berthe said.

“He begged the introduction; he apparently has admired my work for some time.”

Berthe looked away, but Mary felt her small victory.

In the corner, Zola had commandeered the end of the piano, the place of power, his bulk leaning against the instrument. He had emitted only a low growl of a sigh in response to Mallarmé's taunt. Degas, seated beside him, eagerly took up the gauntlet. “Unfair, Stéphane, when Zola imitates life in art so clearly that he defines realism. The triumph of his mimesis trumps whatever lazy prose you accuse him of.”

“You realists band together,” Mallarmé said. “I agree Monsieur Zola is the definition of modern, as are you. And Émile knows I admire him. But excellence is a responsibility. It's fine to describe a sky, and you do it well,” he said, turning to Zola, “but the character's contemplation of it has to have some connection to the narrative. Some reason why it exists in the novel. Nothing can be superfluous.”

“Excuse me, Stéphane, but a novel is not a poem,” Zola said. “You are mistaking the two genres as one.”

“Nothing is superfluous in a poem,” Mallarmé said.

“Watch,” Berthe whispered. “Now Monsieur Zola will insult Monsieur Mallarmé.”

“All poetry is superfluous,” Zola said.

“
See?
” Berthe mouthed.

“You mistook my meaning, Émile,” Mallarmé said. “And you lack curiosity.”

“I will mistake your meaning every time you tell me how to write a novel when you are capable of composing only twenty or thirty lines. You write neat little rhymes, but nothing of scope,” Zola said. “And besides, nobody understands what your poems mean anyway.”

“Density is not a fault,” Mallarmé said.

“But clarity is a virtue,” Zola said. “And besides, everyone looks at the sky, so why not include a little description of it? It hardly ruins the narrative.”

Degas, feverishly rolling his empty glass between his palms, said, “Let's apply your argument to you, Émile. If what you say is true, that Stéphane is unqualified to critique you, then how are you qualified to critique art when you have never painted a picture?”

Zola made a show of pulling his pocket watch from his vest. He always left the Manets' Thursdays early so he could attend his own Thursday salon, which everyone knew didn't begin until ten o'clock, after his friends had left the theater or the café chantants and were in need of a watering hole and companionship until two or three in the morning. Several guests here would migrate there this evening, after Suzanne finished her first two piano pieces, drifting out with nods and apologies and spilling with relief onto the street, where they would shake off the pall of Suzanne's need and head to the Gare Saint Lazare, where they could easily find a hack to whisk them to the more convivial Zola's.

“Oh no you don't, Émile!” Degas roared. He turned to Berthe. “What time is it, Madame Morisot?”

“Nine o'clock,” she said, consulting the clock on the table that Degas could just as easily have consulted, but hadn't, to make his point.

Degas raised his eyebrows at Zola.

Zola feigned nonchalance and secreted his watch back inside his vest pocket. “One must eat, as you well know, Degas, and they pay me for those articles, and in my defense, and to my visionary credit, I insist you admit that I have defended this group when everyone else has attacked you. Where is your gratitude? Besides, have you never decorated a fan, say, to feed yourself?”

“You know I have, but I don't paint a critique of your writing to make money.”

“Here is the difference between writers and painters. You are handicapped by your medium, paint, whereas a writer is a savant of sorts, using our more facile medium of words to inquire about and observe any subject. In fiction, we present a mirror; in critique, an opinion. The medium is the same: words. Just try to use paint to present an opinion. Our medium encompasses everything. Words reign.”