An Artist in her Own Right

by Ann Marti Friedman

  “My husband complained of headaches for some time. His doctor was of the opinion that they were caused by a weak blood vessel in his brain. The doctor said it was a condition that had stemmed from the time of hardship he faced during the siege of Genoa, when he served with the army.” I was inventing as I spoke, but I managed to put the right amount of pride into my voice, making his death a consequence of service to France, something to be commended rather than censured. “I think we will find this blood vessel burst in his time of mental distress and caused him to fall into the water by accident.” My strong voice and direct gaze challenged the policeman to say otherwise.

  He was not fooled but he was willing to take direction. “As you say, Madame.” He bent his head obediently to write down what I had said in his notebook. I gave instructions for the delivery of Antoine’s body to the same funeral service we had hired for Maman Madeleine. The policeman bowed and left.

  I sent for Père Martin. Together we prayed for my husband’s soul. We set the funeral for three days hence, enough time to put a notice in the newspaper and notify all those who should attend. I asked him to break the news to the Amalrics.

  The funeral Mass on 29 June was well attended. All the most prominent artists in Paris were there, including Madame Vigée-Lebrun, who had known Antoine as a child, and all his students, those hopefuls of the next generation, unusually subdued and decorous. The Amalrics brought Cécile. Josée was at my side. The service was a comfort to me, bringing Antoine back from the shameful, solitary manner of his end to the ritual of honoring the dead. His soul wandering in Purgatory would at least be accompanied by our prayers. Afterward the doleful procession made its way out to Père-Lachaise where a chamber of the Gros-Dufresne family crypt stood open to receive the coffin. The sepulcher had been built after Girodet died, when Gros was beginning to feel his own mortality; my mother was the first of us to be buried there. I touched my fingers to the inscription on Maman’s tombstone.

  Eulogies were said while we sweated in the summer sun. Over and over I heard that Antoine was loved and would be missed. I hoped that he could hear this and be comforted. As always, there were the regrets that he could not have heard them and taken heed in his lifetime. I thanked the speakers.

  The funeral repast took place at a restaurant next to the cemetery. Because of the warm weather it was held out-of-doors. The young men from Gros’s studio soon regained their native high spirits. I marveled that Antoine, whom I had known only in his middle and old age, should once have been as young as they, a mere lad in David’s studio before the Revolution. Josée and I sat at the head table with Antoine’s sister and her family, as well as Madame Vigée-Lebrun, her niece Eugénie and the dreadful man she married, Tripier-Lefranc, who had idolized my husband and could only with difficulty be civil to me. My sister and her family were also there, but Henri was probably sleeping off a hangover. I was grateful for his absence, as his feelings for Antoine were chiefly resentment that his famous brother-in-law had not done more to help him.

  Reluctantly we returned to the city in the late afternoon. Needing solitude more than solace, I dismissed all those who would have come home with me.

  The maid had cleaned and aired the house while I was gone, putting away the black cloth of the mortuary chapel where the coffin had stood, sweeping out the dead flowers and leaves. In the bedroom, she had put Antoine’s personal effects into the armoire that held his clothes and made up the bed with fresh linens. I looked at the unnatural tidiness of the room and realized it was a widow’s bedroom now. For the first time that day, I burst into tears.

  Oh, Antoine! All those wasted bitter years we spent together – I am crying again as I write. Père Martin came the next day to give me comfort, and I took it, but for the wrong things – not for my sorrow for your final action but for my self-pity for being a suicide’s widow. Looking back, I realize how hollow it all was and how wasted were the years of bitterness, eating away the best part of me for far too long. May we both find peace.

  Chapter 14

  Paris, 1835-1840

  I did not linger for long in sentimental regret over the failure of our marriage. This period lasted precisely one week, until the reading of Antoine’s will.

  As on the day of my engagement, we gathered in the notary’s office, the Dufresne family on one side of the table, the Gros-Amalric family on the other. Even after a quarter-century of marriage, we were and always would be on opposite sides of the table. I had asked Pauline to come with me. Henri was there at his own insistence as the man (and therefore supposedly the head) of the Dufresnes. I had no illusions about him: he wanted to make sure I inherited well so I could continue to support him when needed.

  In contrast to his customary obsequious air, Monsieur Sorel, the notary, had an unusually nervous manner and found it difficult to look me in the eye. I thought it was because of the unhappy circumstances of Antoine’s death, until he cleared his throat and began to read out loud the terms of the will.

  “What?” I exclaimed, my sharp voice cutting through the lawyer’s hushed tones. “That can’t be right. Read it again!”

  “I assure you, Madame –”

  “Read it again,” I insisted.

  “I, Antoine-Jean Gros, bequeath my entire estate to my ward, Françoise-Cécile Simonier, daughter of the late Françoise Simonier, deceased in March of this year residing at––”

  “No, it’s not possible. I was his wife. He wouldn’t do this to me!”

  “I drew up the will myself, Madame, according to his explicit instructions. Monsieur Gros’s signature was witnessed by two of my clerks. The document is genuine.” The integrity of his conduct defended, he softened and shifted to a tone of professional sympathy. “I understand this is painful for you––”

  “Oh, you do, do you? Then why didn’t you use that understanding to point out its painful nature to Monsieur Gros?”

  “I attempted to do so, Madame. Monsieur Gros was most insistent that the child should be the chief beneficiary of the estate. He has also named you as one of the three executors of the estate, to make sure she receives her due. He said you would understand.”

  I gasped and choked. He leapt to his feet to pour a glass of water from the carafe on the sideboard. Pauline pressed my hand in sympathy while Henri gave me the sort of resounding slap on the back he would give a drinking companion. This crude treatment worked; the coughing spasm stopped. I wiped my eyes and looked up to see Antoine’s sister and nephew shaking with barely suppressed laughter. I glared at them, which only made them laugh outright. A scandalized Monsieur Sorel scolded them.

  “Am I to have nothing, then?” My voice had risen in the excitement of my indignation and took on an edge of panic.

  “You are to retain the one hundred thousand francs you brought into the marriage and all income deriving from it. You may keep all personal effects and any gifts from your husband. Although ownership of the apartment in the rue des Saints-Pères passes to Mademoiselle Simonier, you are entitled to live there rent-free for as long as you wish.” His tone had shifted again and he was using his best conciliatory lawyer voice. It set my teeth on edge.

  “You expect me to be grateful to be allowed to live in my own home and spend my own money and keep my husband’s gifts of twenty-five years of marriage?” I was happy to see him wince. Let him feel some of the pain of the situation!

  I rose. “These terms are unacceptable. You will be hearing from my lawyer.” My new black silk dress rustled as I left the room. The sound of the Amalrics’ renewed laughter followed me.

  Pauline, Henri and I returned to my home for what was to have been a family luncheon, but I had no appetite. In addition, I now had my brother to contend with. “I am the man of the family,” Henri told me. “Let me take care of this.”

  I knew better than that. After twenty-five years of attempted dictation by my husband and mother-in-law, I had little desire to put myself under new direction. Responsibility, I knew, was something he assumed only
when it would be to his advantage, not when it would put him out for the benefit of others. “I will make my own arrangements, thank you,” I said wearily.

  He started to argue with me. Pauline cut him short. She had no illusions about our brother either.

  “Neither of you has ever appreciated me properly!” he fumed.

  “Oh yes, we have!” Pauline responded, with a straight look that let him know she appreciated his worth only too fully.

  Furious, he stormed out – to get drunk, no doubt. Pauline and I looked at each other in mutual sympathy and exhaustion. His attitude was too familiar to us to need any discussion.

  “Would you like me to stay?” she asked.

  “No.” She looked hurt, and I smiled at her to soften the effect of my abrupt refusal. “I really appreciate your offer, but right now I need to take a nap. Then, I’ll need to decide what steps to take next. And I need to start learning how to do it” – I took a shaky breath and my voice quavered – “alone.”

  Mollified, she kissed my cheek and took her leave.

  Once again alone in the home that I had shared with Antoine for so long, I burst into tears. The manner of his death and the terms of his will had exposed so much about our lives that was difficult to admit to myself, never mind to the world: his unhappiness, his mental instability, the unhappy truth about our marriage, my barrenness, and the fact of his daughter, who was the real object of his love. When I was not burning with humiliation, I was seething with rage. How could Antoine do this to me? Afternoon gave way to evening and evening to night, and still my thoughts centered on the horrible scene in the notary’s office.

  When dawn at long last began to edge around the curtains into the house, I rose from the chair where I had spent the night and went to wash my face. Looking in the dressing-table mirror afterward, I was appalled. The strands of grey hair I usually kept carefully tucked beneath the brown were all too plainly in evidence, standing out as if I had touched Monsieur Lavoisier’s electrical cage. The angry fixedness in my eyes and the grim set of my mouth were like Antoine’s in his last years. Were these, too, part of his legacy for me? I shuddered and made the sign of the Cross. Grabbing the shawl that hung over the back of the dressing chair, I threw it over the mirror, as though doing so would erase the look on my face and not merely its reflection. My heart was beating wildly.

  My maid appeared at the door of the room. “Are you all right, Madame? Shall I bring your morning café?”

  “No, I am going out.” I needed air.

  “Let me help you change your dress, and I’ll take this one away to press.”

  “No, it doesn’t matter. I need to leave now.” I could not bear to stay in that room another minute. I needed to escape from that house and its ghosts. As always in a crisis, my first thought was to talk to Josée. She would know how to bring me back to my right self.

  Josée had recently moved to a smart studio on the Boulevard Saint-Germain, a short distance away. A few minutes’ walk brought me there. It was hot and sunny, with little breeze. Housemaids and shopkeepers armed with pails of soapy water cleaned windows and scrubbed doorsteps. Street sweepers were busy collecting the horse droppings that had accumulated overnight; the air was pungent with that and other more pleasant early morning smells: baking bread, roasting coffee, fresh cheese at a dairy shop. When I arrived at Josée’s address, number 11, the concierge, yawning and brushing crumbs off her dress, let me in and waved a hand in the direction of the studio. “She is still at home, Madame.”

  I thanked her and apologized for the early hour. Belatedly, I wondered whether Josée might be awake yet, although I knew she habitually arose early, the better to catch the effects of morning light. I was relieved to smell coffee brewing as I approached her door.

  When Josée opened the door, her smile of welcome quickly faded to a look of dismay. I realized how frightful must be my appearance. The concierge hadn’t appeared to notice, or perhaps she was accustomed to the peculiarities of her tenants’ visitors.

  “Augustine! What has happened? Should I send for the doctor?”

  “Do I look that bad?”

  Josée looked me over critically. “In a word, yes. If I were to paint you now, I would call the canvas La Malade, the sick woman.”

  I gave her a wry smile. “No, I’m not ill – not physically, anyway.”

  “Oh, my dear – is it – about Antoine?”

  I nodded, my eyes filling with tears. As I had so often before, I sank down on her sofa and burst into tears, burying my face in the handkerchief she held out to me.

  She sat next to me and put her arm around my shoulders. “You must not blame yourself. His actions were entirely of his own choosing. You have nothing to reproach—”

  I shook my head and turned to face her. “It’s not that. It’s––” I took a deep breath to steady myself. “Yesterday was the reading of the will. He has left everything to Cécile, and made me an executor, to see the terms are carried out.”

  Josée’s draw dropped. She stared at me in disbelief. I nodded to confirm what I had told her. When she could speak again, she asked, “Everything?”

  “Oh, I’m allowed to keep my dowry and its income, and the gifts he has given me personally. But the apartment, its contents, the contents of the studio, the money in the bank – it all goes to Cécile.” Tears spilled down my cheeks. “After twenty-six years of marriage. Could he really have hated me that much, Josée?”

  She did not reply but crossed the room to pour a bowl of black coffee, tempering it with a little cold water so I could drink it straight down. She looked on as I did so and took back the bowl with a nod of approval.

  As usual, she was right. I started to feel better at once, even more so after I had eaten the brioche she brought me. She refilled her own coffee bowl and drank it slowly, deep in thought, and set it down with a decisive click when she had finished.

  “What you need to do is consult a lawyer of your own, who will look out for your interests.”

  “But I don’t know any,” I started to say.

  “Oh, but I do. I have several among my clientele. And I think I know just the man to help you.”

  That very afternoon, freshly bathed and dressed in a different black gown, I went to see Maître Derville, a frequent visitor to her studio. Josée recommended him as a man of sharp intelligence, fearless in argument, who would look out for my interests. Only Josée came with me, at my request. Henri might be furious about being excluded when he learned about this meeting, but Pauline, I suspected, would be relieved.

  We were early and had to wait in the anteroom. As Josée crossed the room to examine several framed caricatures of lawyers and judges, I admired her dress. It was dark blue, in deference to Antoine, but the fabric had a subtle sheen and it was cut in the latest fashion, with a short cape over wide sleeves. The cape was fastened at the neck with one of her Roman cameos; smaller cameos hung from her ears. Her fiery red hair was now shot with grey, but she carried off that and the other signs of aging – a few lines in her face and hands – with a nonchalance that gave her an air of youth. There was only six months’ difference in our ages, but beside her I felt old and dull in my mourning dress of an appropriately restrained style.

  After a few minutes, we were admitted. I was becoming all too familiar with the purposeful bustle, the rustle of papers and the scratching of pens of lawyers’ offices. Derville scanned the copy of the will I had brought with me and asked a series of penetrating questions.

  I answered them as honestly as I could. Yes, I had met Cécile; yes, I brought her to our home when my husband was ill. Yes, my husband and mother-in-law had admitted to me, verbally, that she was his daughter, although I did not believe it was written in any legal document. In his will, Antoine had referred to her simply as his ward. His sister and her family had accepted the girl as a blood relation and she was a visitor to their home. Amongst Françoise Simonier’s acquaintance, too, Cécile was spoken of as Antoine’s daughter – here I repeate
d my conversation with the neighbor, Madame Mauvre. Yes, Antoine had wanted us to adopt her or at least take her in after her mother’s death, but I had put my foot down. There were limits, after all. Antoine had known how I felt, yet he had made her his heir and, to add insult to injury, had made me one of the executors of his estate, with the responsibility of seeing that our marital assets were handed over to her. It was humiliating! My eyes filled with tears.

  Josée handed me a handkerchief and patted my arm sympathetically. Maître Derville looked on impassively.

  “Courage, Madame. No tears! Let those memories fuel your anger instead. You will need it.”

  I wiped my eyes and faced him calmly again. “That’s better,” he said. Uncharacteristically, he hesitated. “In addition to challenging the rights of Mademoiselle Simonier, there is another tactic we can pursue in breaking the will. Forgive me for asking this, Madame Gros – but – was your husband of sound mind at the end of his life?”

  My stomach lurched. It was inevitable that this question should come up. Certainly, he had been disturbed. Privately I admitted that he could have taken his own life; publicly I had invested much effort in denying it. To appear to reverse myself now merely to gain hold of his estate would put me in a most unflattering light. I could not do that. As I was mulling over how to respond, Josée spoke up.

  “Maître Derville, I knew Monsieur Gros for almost twenty years, so perhaps I can shed light on this subject so painful for Madame Gros. After decades of magnificent contributions to the artistic legacy of France, he found himself maligned and ignored by the current administration. Of course this upset a man of his sensibilities, and not even the support of a loving wife could entirely counter the effects of this unjust treatment. It contributed to his bodily infirmity, the aneurysm that killed him, but it would not have affected his writing of the will.” She spoke calmly and clearly, with every appearance of candor.