Madame Tussaud's Apprentice

by Kathleen Benner Duble

  “Where is Algernon?” I ask.

  “That’s the culprit’s name, is it?” Cook says, as she plunges her arms into soapy water to wash her frying pan.

  “He’s already out in the salon working, Celie,” Tante Anne-Marie tells me. “And when you are finished, you must change and go there, too.”

  “The place with those heads?” I ask, and I shiver, remembering the blood that looked so real.

  “In the morning light, I think you will find that the heads are far less menacing than they were in the dead of the night,” Tante Anne-Marie says.

  I’m not so sure of this. Still, this is the deal we have made to escape the streets. At least for the time being, I will enjoy the luxury of a roof over my head.

  Tante Anne-Marie brings me a clean dress and apron. “Where Manon will be taking you, you will need to dress properly.”

  “And where will that be?” I ask, envisioning crime scenes or prison cells.

  “Ach, so many questions,” Cook says, shaking her head with its white starched cap. “Take her away, Anne-Marie. She is giving me a headache with all her questions.”

  Tante Anne-Marie laughs. “You must ignore my sister. She complains much but does not mean most of it.”

  I start in surprise. The grouchy cook is the sister of kind Tante Anne-Marie?

  “Come, Celie,” Tante Anne-Marie says before I can ask. “Manon is waiting.”

  I follow her out of the kitchen and down a small corridor to a door I do not recognize. Tante Anne-Marie turns the knob.

  “Welcome to La Caverne des Grands Voleurs,” she says.

  “At last!” Manon’s uncle says, looking up and seeing me as I step inside. “Child, I indulged you today, but you must rise earlier if you intend to eat my food and sleep in my house. Do you understand?”

  “Oui, monsieur,” I say. But I say it automatically, for my attention is caught by the comings and goings in front of me. The rooms of the waxworks museum are lined with oil lamps and mirrors. Rich tapestries hang on the walls.

  Several men and women are working to finish a display. The men are lifting and moving various pieces of furniture about. Algernon is among them, and he turns, pleasure lighting his face when he sees me.

  His hair shines, all clean and tousled, and his face is free of dirt. He wears new breeches and a shirt with the cuffs rolled to his elbows. The muscles in his chest are tight against his new clothes. He looks like a handsome young gentleman doing chores on his estate, one for whom high-class women would swoon when he took off his jacket. And I can almost believe he belongs right here, among the wealthy and living this fine life.

  He raises a sardonic eyebrow at my dress, and I smile, for he has noticed the change in me, too. But even soap can’t erase the gleam in his eyes or the devil in his smile. He is plotting something, I can tell.

  “We are creating a scene of Monsieur and Madame Baston,” Tante Anne-Marie says, interrupting my thoughts. “Do you know of them?”

  I nod in response to Tante Anne-Marie’s question. All of Paris knows of the Bastons. The husband killed his wife by stabbing her twenty times and then cutting out her heart.

  I look at the tableau in front of me. The women in the room are tweaking the clothing of the waxwork people, adding pieces of jewelry to the neck and gown of the lifelike display. A wax woman sits upon a chair, her hand to her chest, and her eyes wide with fright. Blood drips down the front of her bodice. Above her, a wax man stands with a bloody knife, his hand poised to bring the blade down again.

  I think then of seeing my own family, each of them lying dead, breath gone from their bodies. The violence of the scene reminds me of Papa’s bloody forehead, and I quickly look away before I am sick.

  Manon comes out from behind a screen, wiping her hands. “Bonjour, Celie. Are you ready to get started?”

  “Please. I don’t want to draw dead or murdered people.” I am barely able to whisper.

  “It is not just the people I will have you draw, but their living spaces and surroundings. And I do not want to hear complaints. You have a roof over your head, and food in your stomach,” Manon says, her voice firm. “Now you must earn those things. All of us must.”

  “Some people don’t,” I snap back, my heart thudding with the thought of drawing bloody crime scenes. “Some people sit all day doing nothing, while the rest of the world waits on them. I’ve seen them in the Palais-Royal.”

  “And do you think you are one of these people?” Manon snorts. “Non, Celie, you have but two choices in this life you’ve been given, ma petite. You may continue to steal from the rich, as you have in the past, sleeping in a filthy, muddy alley and starving most days, hoping you are never put in jail or hanged. Or you may work to entertain them, robbing them legally as we do, and sleep in fine sheets with your belly full.”

  I am brought up short by her words. It has never occurred to me that there are more ways to take from the very people who have taken from me. Could this work—legitimate work—help assuage the anger that burns deep in my gut? Can I find the same satisfaction here that I get each time I steal a silver trinket from a baroness’s house, or lift a pocket watch from a marquis?

  “So what will it be, Celie?” Manon asks. I can see her patience is beginning to run out.

  I hesitate. I do not know if I can find the courage to face these horrors, but I can try. For food and a bed and a chance to practice my art, I can try. Slowly, I nod. And with that gesture, I begin my training.

  • • •

  Manon gives me a tour of the waxworks first. At La Caverne des Grands Voleurs—the Cave of the Great Thieves—the exhibits consist of gruesome scenes of murder and hangings. Here, fake blood spills on lovely rugs. Eyes pop from skulls. Black tongues hang from severed heads. A blue light casts eerie shadows over the criminals, creating a world of sinister intents. Walking around these exhibits, I begin to regret my hasty agreement to draw these scenes.

  Later in the day, I accompany Manon across town to the Palais-Royal. An odd wave of homesickness washes over me as I walk among its shops and gaming tables, smell the scent of newly baked baguettes in the air. But I know it is only Algernon beside me that I miss—certainly I don’t regret having food and a bed now.

  At Le Salon de Cire, the lines are long. In front of the museum, a giant of a man is shouting for people to come and see the exhibits.

  Manon makes her way through the crowd.

  “How are our takings for the day?” she asks the giant.

  “You’ll be pleased,” the man says, opening a box to show coins gleaming inside.

  I have seen the man often, but from a distance. He is so tall that I feel like a flea standing next to him.

  “Celie, this is Paul Butterbrodt. He is our barker, calling and drawing the crowds to our exhibit. His voice can be heard above all the others announcing our shows, and that is why we employ him. Just as we’ve engaged you for your drawing skills,” Manon says.

  Paul Butterbrodt laughs. “My big girth attracts them also, wouldn’t you say?” His belly rolls when he laughs.

  He holds out his hand, and I shake it. I like the big man.

  “How much does he weigh?” I ask Manon as we slip into the Salon.

  “Two hundred sixteen kilos,” Manon answers. “His voice is good, but his size is why he is so right for us. Giants, dwarves, sickly thin people, and exotic natives from afar fascinate the wealthy. They want any entertainment that is unusual or strange. His size helps bring people to us.”

  Inside Le Salon de Cire, the exhibits are amazing, and I begin to relax. Drawing scenes like this will be a joy.

  They have a tableau of the king and queen receiving callers.

  “Is this truly what they look like?” I ask. The queen’s bodice shimmers with jewels and the king’s waistcoat has silver threads running through it.

  “Oui,” Manon says. “The dresses we use for the queen are made for us by the queen’s dressmaker herself, Rose Bertin. We want every detail to be accurate. That
is why we need you, Celie. No one can compare to me when it comes to recreating these figures in wax, but your drawings are amazing in their details. My efforts are not half as good as yours.”

  We move further into the gallery, Manon explaining to me who I am seeing in each exhibit: Benjamin Franklin, the great statesman from all the way across the sea in America; Voltaire, the great writer, as he sits at his desk penning his next work; the brave general, Lafayette.

  “It is two sous to enter here,” Manon explains, “but twelve sous to be allowed to approach and stand near the figures.”

  I see the attraction of this place. It makes you feel as if you have actually been among these people.

  “People may hear the news that is called out by the ballad singers or peruse the papers if they can read,” Manon continues. “But we show them the news. And we must constantly be changing the exhibits, so that what they see is in keeping with the latest information being passed around the streets. Do you understand?”

  I nod.

  “Now come,” Manon says. “You have seen what we do here. Next you must see what others are doing, so you will know the competition we face.”

  • • •

  For the next several nights, Manon takes me from show to show, returning late in the night. I see horses dancing the minuet, a tightrope-walking monkey, a girl who dances with eggs tied to her feet, a Spaniard who drinks boiling oil and walks barefoot on red-hot iron, a fortune-telling dog, a white rabbit that can do algebra, and an equestrian show with an orchestra and jets of flame that shoot out all around the horses as they perform.

  I am dazzled, even as I understand that I am at these entertainments for free, that the showmen have given Manon a pass, as Manon does for them when they are training their apprentices.

  An apprentice. That is what Manon has told me I am to become. I am delighted by the prospect of drawing all day, eating well, sleeping in a bed, and collecting coins from the wealthy. Could I ask for more?

  And yet, I think of Paul Butterbrodt. Does he mind having people stare at him as they go in the waxworks? And what of the girl dancing with eggs on her feet, or the Spaniard who must drink hot oil night after night? Do they not feel used by the crowds of men and women dressed in fine silks and jewels, who have come simply to be entertained?

  My own family was used, too—to grow food for the Comte d’Artois and the king and for the clergy. As in all things, the wealthy rule, and farmer and entertainer are both used for the services they provide. So perhaps, in the end, there is little difference between us, and Manon is right. At least robbing the wealthy in this fashion is safer and more comfortable, for both Algernon and me.

  Chapter Six

  The next morning, when I wander down to the kitchen, I find only Cook.

  “Where is Manon?” I ask.

  “Where she should be,” Cook replies, “at the king’s palace with his sister.”

  She bangs down a plate of sausage and toast. “Eat up. My sister will be along shortly to take you to Dr. Curtius.”

  I make a face. I do not want to spend the day with that crabby old man.

  “And there will be no more of these late awakenings,” Cook continues, as she turns another sausage over in the pan. “Manon is done training you. Now others will show you the rest. And you will be in bed at a decent time and up at an earlier hour. I will no longer be making breakfast at this unreasonable juncture of the day.”

  With these words, Cook tosses a warmed sausage onto my plate, and I have to hide a smile. “Oui, mademoiselle.”

  “Mademoiselle? Mademoiselle? I’m Tante Marthe to you,” Cook grumbles.

  “Oui, Tante Marthe,” I say, and grin. Tante Anne-Marie is right. Tante Marthe makes a lot of noise, but she has a big heart. I like her, but know better than to tell her that. Tante Marthe is just like Algernon. My growing fondness must be kept a secret.

  Algernon—I have not seen him in a week, and I miss him. When I fall into bed after a late-night show I have attended, it is his face that fills my dreams. And I wake longing to see him. I had not known that in agreeing to this arrangement, we would be separated so much, and I wonder if being apart bothers him as much as it does me.

  “Ah, Celie,” Tante Anne-Marie says as she comes into the kitchen, “hurry up, child. Dr. Curtius is waiting for you.”

  Inside the wax house, Dr. Curtius is sitting at a long table, working with a head, but not a wax head. This one is made of clay. He is bending and shaping the clay with his fingers, brushing down the cheeks with his thumbs.

  “Celie is here,” Tante Anne-Marie says.

  “Leave her,” Dr. Curtius commands.

  Dr. Curtius does not say anything, and I begin to grow restless.

  Finally he turns to me, impatience at my fidgeting evident on his face. “It is time for you to learn the process of making wax figures. Come. Sit next to me. And I will explain, for you will need to see as I see in order to draw for me in the right way.”

  He pulls out a stool, and at last, I sit.

  “A wax head,” he explains, “takes between ten and fourteen days to complete. To start, we take measurements of the head. Today, you will be my subject.”

  He pulls out a pair of tongs and puts them around my scalp. He measures the width of my head, and the length of my face from the top of my skull to my chin, using a piece of string along with the tongs. With each measurement, he jots down numbers. Though I cannot read, I do know numbers, as Maman had taught me the value of money and how to recognize amounts when they were written, so I might barter well in the village.

  Then Dr. Curtius takes a piece of clay and begins to mold it with his hands and a knife, measuring the length and width of the piece as he has measured my head. I watch as my likeness slowly begins to take form.

  “This will be a rough one only,” the doctor says, as his hands pinch and poke and pull on the clay. “If I was working on a real subject, this would take hours. But as you will not be involved in this part of the process, we will move along.”

  Finally, he holds the sculpted work next to my face. “Not a bad likeness.”

  “It’s amazing, monsieur,” I say, and it is. He has shaped me perfectly.

  “Please call me mon oncle,” he says. “It is how I like to be addressed by persons younger than myself in my own home. D’accord?”

  I nod my agreement.

  “So once the clay head has been made, we cover the head in plaster,” l’Oncle continues. “We do this in sections. You may help me with this, if you are careful.”

  Taking a small brush, I dip it into the wet paste l’Oncle has by his elbow, following his lead and smearing the material on the front of the clay head.

  “Be sure to make the plaster smooth,” l’Oncle directs me. “You do not want a mold with bumps in it.”

  I do as he instructs, applying the gooey substance over the entire face of the clay model, smoothing it out as I go along. I am absorbed completely in the task, for it is much like painting and drawing, and my fingers fly over the form. I look up at him when I have finished.

  “Not bad,” he says.

  “For your first time,” he adds.

  • • •

  When the plaster dries on the front of the head, I remove it from the clay and cover the back of the head, letting that dry, and then the sides. When they are finished, I clean each section, and then l’Oncle shows me how to bind them together.

  “I will do the next part,” l’Oncle says, “but watch closely.”

  Taking a large pot filled with hot vegetable wax, l’Oncle slowly pours the liquid into the hollow mold of the head I have created. Steam rises into the air.

  “The trick is not to shake while you are pouring.” L’Oncle grits his teeth as he holds tightly to the pan. “If you wobble, the face will have lines on it, lines you do not want, and there will be no fixing it.”

  I watch as wax pours out in one continuous stream, until it is to the top of the upturned neck.

  There is a knoc
k at the door.

  “Entrez,” l’Oncle calls out, setting the hot pan aside.

  Algernon comes in, and my heart leaps to see him standing there.

  “What is it you want?” l’Oncle asks.

  “That delivery of horsehair is here,” Algernon says.

  “Hmmm,” l’Oncle says, “I’ll want to see the quality of it. Celie, you may go and have your supper. The wax must harden anyway.”

  I nod, and l’Oncle leaves the room. He cannot be gone fast enough. I am breathless to be alone with Algernon.

  When l’Oncle is gone, Algernon looks me up and down, and I feel myself flush under his gaze.

  “And now you are a lady, I see, all dressed up and clean,” he says, mockingly.

  I curtsy. “As are you, monsieur. Are you enjoying good food and clean linen as much as I am?”

  This brings an unexpected frown to Algernon’s face. “I may be clean, but I’m still what I always was, Celie—a man who believes in equality for all men, and one who will do anything to get it. I hope you have not forgotten that that is who we are, what we are striving for?”

  I shake my head, startled by his outburst. Of course I have not forgotten. How can he think this of me? I know I have been busy attending nightly entertainments, but that does not mean that our plan to join the rebels has completely escaped my mind. The desire to effect change still burns brightly for me.

  He turns and runs his eyes over the room. “I’ve been doing a little inventory taking, and there is quite a lot here for us to swipe, eh?”

  To my shock, what I feel at his words is dismay. While I still mean for the rich to pay for their crimes, I realize that I do not want to steal from these people. The last two weeks have been marvelous, waking in a bed, eating three whole meals every day, studying a new form of art. I would feel bad taking their things. I like the aunts and uncle, and I am sure Manon could easily track us down again.

  There are many wealthy to steal from in Paris. How can I convince Algernon that Manon need not be one of them?