by Heather Webb
“I know the perfect piece for you,” Auguste replied. “It possesses la tendresse de l’amour, forgiveness, adoration, and is crafted by an expert hand, but it is not one of mine. It’s called Shakuntala, by a Mademoiselle Camille Claudel. It’s brilliant. I assure you, you will not be disappointed.”
“The prizewinner at Salon last year?”
“That’s the one.”
“I would like to see it again.”
“Morhardt, Mirbeau, and Geffroy sing her praises. Her work has become quite popular.” A bit of a stretch, but he must help Camille in any way he could. If he struggled against the blasted école and the expectations of a fickle society a thousand times, she struggled ten thousand. His chest tightened at the thought of his ferocious one.
Yet she wasn’t his at all.
“Monsieur?” Madame Barder covered his hand with hers. “Are you all right?”
Auguste removed his hand from the table and placed it in his lap. “I am well, thank you.”
God, he missed Camille. The reprieve of happiness dissipated as melancholy clutched him once more.
A hand broke loose and fell to the floor with a crash. Camille walked to where the appendage lay, kicked at the severed fingers, and crunched the terra-cotta palm beneath her boot. She hated this piece anyway. It had done nothing but give her trouble. She had wrestled with all of her works since her split with Auguste. She could think of nothing but him. Had he moved on? Forgotten their love and fawned over another young student? Those stupid women who flocked to him didn’t understand him. They did not know his heart. Rage surged through her veins. With a violent shove, she pushed the broken statue over. She stomped on the piece, a tide of anguish, fear, and the sting of rejection pouring from her. The release of her hopes and disappointments trickled down her spine and into the soles of her boots. She smashed until only a rusty powder and shards of dried clay remained.
Out of breath, she flopped down in a chair. She needed to get hold of her emotions. Auguste would move on and so would she, eventually. She glanced at a statuette of a young girl in a sheath. It nestled beside her bust of a slave. Both pieces had evoked such excitement in Auguste, she had reveled in his praise for days. How proud she had been! Now they sat, alive, with no one to see them.
Still agitated, she rustled through a stack of envelopes on the table. One was a bill from her landlord; the other showed an address from Aisne, the département in northern France where she was born. Curious, since she knew no one in Aisne. She snatched a chisel from her worktable and slit the envelope open.
Étienne Moreau-Nélaton, minister in Aisne, thought her works inspired and had written to the town council on her behalf. He believed he could secure a commission for her—a noble piece to represent the republic to be set in bronze for the town center.
Camille leapt to her feet, excitement pulsing through her. It would be her first public commission! She did not need Auguste’s help! Shakuntala really had bolstered her career. Her monument would stand in the town square for posterity!
She wanted to tell someone. She looked around at the myriad of tables, pails of clay, and tools scattered throughout her work space. No sounds of a fellow artist shaping her work emanated in the silent space—no laughter, no cursing over an unruly block of marble. Even Minou emitted not a sound, sleeping in a shaft of pale sunlight. The furball had not even roused when she destroyed the piece.
Suddenly the space grew to a yawning hole, echoing her solitude.
Jessie had left for England and probably hated her for her behavior when they last met. Giganti had abandoned her and now she had lost Auguste. Better not to love anyone at all, lest they leave her—and they always left her.
Camille picked up a pointed shard of dried clay and crushed it in her hands. Blood seeped from a fresh cut in her palm. But she did not need them. She needed her art, only her art.
Chapter 27
The coach sat in congested traffic as they approached the Exposition Universelle. Their guiding beacon beamed electric red, white, and blue lights across the evening sky.
“Eiffel’s tower,” Claude Debussy mused. “Three hundred meters of iron. I think it’s hideous.”
“You and half of Paris.” Camille leaned forward and pushed the coach door open. “We should have taken the train. Let’s go. We can walk the remainder of the way.”
Claude scrambled out behind her and they strolled along the boulevard to the Champ de Mars. Camille had spent a lot of time with Monsieur Debussy in the past few months. He was a good friend—and could be more if she allowed it. If only. Thoughts of Auguste tormented her. Dieu, she craved him. Yet each time she would surrender to her heart and set out to throw herself at his feet, the Voice would return to deride her.
She looped her arm through Monsieur Debussy’s as a gust of autumn wind sent a whirling funnel of dead leaves into the air around them. They walked past buildings constructed in styles native to the countries they represented—Bolivia, Russia, Japan, and many others. Debussy smiled and his thin mustache twitched at the corners.
“You can’t wait for the performance,” Camille said, stretching her own frozen face into a smile. The unseasonal chill bit at her earlobes and fingertips.
“Of course, but I am looking forward to the sculpture exhibit as well,” he said, almost as an apology.
“You don’t have to pretend to enjoy it. I am perfectly happy on my own. You can sit at the bar or visit another exhibit while I’m there.”
“Of course not,” Monsieur Debussy said. “You know I love art as well. But I’d like to go there first.” He pointed to a massive pavilion. “It’s the largest vaulted building ever built.”
When they entered the pavilion, Camille gazed at the hinged iron archways supporting the ceiling. “Incredible!” she said.
They stopped to admire the indigo ceramic tiles and paintings of Byzantine life of le dôme central. The edifice was an astonishing work of iron and glass. Tourists milled about in their native Oriental silks, African robes, and South American headdresses. Many languages swirled around them; foreigners had traveled far to witness the latest world’s fair, in the grand city of Paris.
“I wouldn’t have guessed so many would come from so far away.”
“Remarkable, isn’t it?” Monsieur Debussy led her to the massive Galerie des Machines, a hall packed with hundreds of steel and iron machines hitched with rubber and wood contraptions, fueled by steam or powered by electricity.
Despite the impressive display, after an hour of touring Camille grew anxious to see the Palais des Beaux-Arts. She knew Auguste would show at least one piece there, and suddenly she needed to see it. Now.
“I’m ready to move on.” She tugged Debussy’s arm. “There are some pieces I really need to see.”
He raised an eyebrow at the urgency in her voice. “Very well. Let’s go.”
Without a second thought, Camille pulled him through the crowd to the exit. Somehow, seeing Auguste’s work would soothe her spirits. An image of him laboring over a swath of clothing or the bulge of fleshy lips flitted through her mind. A need filled her chest until it squeezed her lungs and she could hardly breathe.
Once outdoors, she moved faster, dodging pedestrians as she went.
“Mademoiselle, slow down.” Debussy raced after her. “Is something wrong?”
“I need to see him now.”
“Who? I thought we were going to see the art.”
Camille stopped in her tracks. Monsieur Debussy smacked into her, sending his hat tumbling to the pavement. “Dieu, what is that?” she asked.
Within a large fenced area, several families of South Americans roamed about in their tribal dress, their silken black hair free-flowing over bronzed shoulders. Strings of shells ringed their necks and wrists and vivid white teeth stood out against copper skin. One woman scratched her bared, sagging breast. Another rolled a stone cylind
er against a rock to crush what looked to be corn kernels. A ring of males sat around a fire and passed a pipe between them. The smoke did little to cover the scent of livestock and human waste.
Debussy fetched his top hat and placed it on his head. “It’s a human zoo. Have you not read about it? There are more of them here. Africans, peoples from the Orient. Apparently they are one of the more popular exhibits at the Exposition.”
Camille stared at the natives in shock. Who would devise such a thing? “How horrifying,” she said at last. “Can you imagine being gaped at all day? I’m sure they are heckled.”
Amusement played across his features. “I presume they have been paid handsomely.”
Laughter came from somewhere ahead of them on the path. Camille turned from the odd display to find the source of such a jovial sound. A broad-shouldered man with a burnt orange beard walked with a cluster of male companions.
Her pulse quickened. Was it he? The shoulders, the beard, his gait. She resumed her rapid pace toward him. It had to be her dear Auguste. No one resembled him. The cool air stung her nose and cheeks; the clack of her heels on pavement thundered in her ears.
“Mademoiselle, wait!” Debussy trailed her.
Her breath came in uneven spasms. “Rodin! Monsieur Rodin!” Too engrossed in his companion’s story, he did not turn, despite her calling after him. She broke into a run, ignoring those who stared, until she reached the gentleman’s side. “Auguste,” she breathed, placing her hand on his shoulder.
The gentleman turned. “What’s that ye say, miss? Are ye looking for someone?” His thick Irish accent did not match his voice—the voice of her precious one, her tormentor.
A crush of disappointment took her breath away. The gentleman’s orange beard and barrel chest, his cane with brass knob had fooled her. Her unbidden hope deflated.
“Do ye need an escort, lass?” the Irishman asked. He glanced at his friends with a knowing look. “We was headin’ to see the wild west show.”
“Oh, rats. I didn’t bring my chaps,” she said. The gentleman frowned. He did not understand her French. He tipped his hat and went on his way.
“Is something the matter?” Debussy said, catching up to her.
She blinked rapidly to contain her tears. “I thought I saw someone I knew.”
He searched her face. “Is everything all right? Should we leave?”
A need throbbed inside her. To see Auguste—despite the Voice, the critics, her brother—was the only cure. She turned to the entrance of the Palais des Beaux-Arts. She shook her head. “Let’s go.”
Debussy grasped her hand and placed it on his forearm. They entered the building, carefully constructed in iron with thousands of glass panes similar to those in the Galerie des Machines, set to illuminate the hundreds of paintings, sculptures, and lithography works inside.
Camille inhaled a breath to steady her nerves. She would go to Auguste tonight. She must. But what would she say? Did he still love her? Perhaps he had moved on to another fresh-faced young artist to fill his inspirational well. No, she could not do it—go to him to find he had moved on, or worse, to see him still in Rose’s clutches.
As Debussy led her through the halls, Camille noted a few well-made sculptures, but most displayed inferior execution and inspiration compared with those she had seen in Rodin’s atelier. And then she saw them—her Young Girl with a Sheaf, but it was called Galatée, and her Slave bust was now Tête de Rieur. She froze.
Auguste had stolen her ideas and created his own exact replicas.
She skipped from one piece to the next, heart thudding against her ribs, searching out her works labeled with his name. How could he, without telling her?
“Mademoiselle?” Debussy said. “Is everything all right?”
Camille combed the entire section, but found no others that were hers. She inhaled a deep breath. They had, in truth, worked on the pieces together. She reminded herself of the many works he had inspired, and their give-and-take in the atelier. They learned from one another. Right? Yet she deserved to have her pieces shown in this space, with her name on them. And she would, one day soon, she reminded herself.
“Let’s move along,” she said, suddenly ready to be somewhere else. Seeing Auguste’s works had not calmed her yearning for him, or her nerves, as she had hoped.
Debussy nodded and led her to an allée of paintings.
Camille stopped to study a tableau titled Maternity. A woman traveled through a barren landscape of brush holding a baby, with a young son at her side. Where was the woman going? The tableau, flushed in grays and blues, emphasized the woman’s hopeless state of poverty, or at the very least her loneliness. Camille could feel the crackling grass against her legs and the sandy path underfoot, the desolation of the landscape as raw as the woman’s in the painting. She would never have a child. The thought at once relieved and depressed her. She would be an awful mother. To re-create her family’s home would be the worst thing she could do to another human being. And to be as poor and alone as this woman.
“What do you think of this?” Debussy stood before A Rajah of Jodhpur, a scene of the Indian king atop his elephant cavalry. “The saturation of light and color is brilliant.”
“It’s the desert. Of course there’s light,” Camille said, ever sarcastic. “It’s nice, though it’s not inspired. It lacks emotion.” She moved to the next painting.
The sensation of being watched sent a chill down her spine. Her heart pumped faster. That sentiment had come more often of late, and it made her already poor sleeping habits worse. God, she did not understand what was happening to her. And whom could she tell who wouldn’t call her . . . the word she refused to say? She rubbed her thumb and forefinger together. But it was there, the burning of two eyes into her back. She turned to locate the source of her discomfort.
Auguste, face contorted in pain, stood opposite her in the aisle.
Chapter 28
A couple linked arm in arm pushed past Auguste while he stood motionless in the walkway. The air had left his lungs. How had Camille managed to come the same day at the exact same time? The exposition had been open for months. The cauterized wound in his heart ripped open and emotion poured from the gaping hole. Her skin, the wicked blue of her eyes. Dieu, his love for her was like a sickness.
Camille walked toward him, cautiously. A man he vaguely recognized trailed behind her. Her escort? His heart seized in his chest. He couldn’t bear to know that she had moved on. He would rather drown in his misery than learn she did not love him. He turned on his heel to flee.
“Auguste.” Camille’s voice rang out across the space like bells in a fog. “How are you?”
He turned to face her. “I am surviving. God, Camille. To see you again.” He looked away, afraid he had revealed too much. But why hold back now? He had already lost her. He met her gaze once more. “Each day without you has been hell. I am a lowly man writhing outside your gates, longing to enter, to hold you again. I—”
Camille closed the distance and wrapped herself around him. The indomitable force that bound them tightened its hold.
Auguste did not understand it, but the draw to her, the strength of their affection filled him once again with awe and foreboding. He would never be free.
“Pour toujours, mon amour.” He held her against him, oblivious to the crowds swarming around them. “Always.”
Breathless, she rested her forehead against his chin. “You have cursed me.”
“And you have crucified me.” He cupped her face in his hands.
She laid her head against his chest. “I have been in a wretched state without you, no matter how hard I fight it.”
“Mademoiselle Claudel?” Her escort cleared his throat. “Would you care to introduce me?”
Rodin took in the man’s scraggly mustache, his thin black hair and angular head. He had an interesting profile; his face r
eflected a deep melancholy that had settled into his bone structure.
Camille turned, surprised she had forgotten the gentleman. “Monsieur Debussy! Yes, of course. May I present Auguste Rodin, the sculptor.”
Recognition flickered in Debussy’s eyes. “Ah, yes. Monsieur, you create beautiful works. I am honored to make your acquaintance.”
“Likewise.” Rodin shook his hand. “You are a composer.”
“Indeed.” Debussy looked at Camille.
“If you will excuse us a moment, Monsieur Rodin.” Camille pulled Debussy to the side.
Auguste strained to decipher their fierce whispers, but could not. Monsieur Debussy kissed her hand. Surely the man did not think to woo Camille after witnessing their reunion? Auguste clenched his jaw.
“It’s a pleasure to meet you, monsieur, but I must be off,” Debussy said. “There’s a musical performance I am anxious to see. Something from the Orient.”
Relief surged through Auguste. “I hope you enjoy the show,” he said with a polite nod.
Camille kissed the man’s cheeks and threw herself in Auguste’s arms once more.
“I have a reservation at the Restaurant Russe in Eiffel’s tower.” He placed tender kisses on the tip of her nose and her eyelids. Each contact with her skin sent a river of warmth through him. “Come with me.”
Hesitation perched on her features; she warred within, still.
Auguste held her eyes. “Come for the succulent beef and a spectacular view of the city. I cannot share it with anyone but you, amour.”
The last of her doubts evaporated from her face. “Take me with you. Take all of me.”
Smoke filled the back room at the Café Américain. The Société Nationale des Beaux-Arts had convened officially for the first time two hours before and now a few remaining members enjoyed dinner and a round of drinks. The conversation had, thankfully, steered clear of the topic of Auguste’s Légion d’Honneur. Since Camille had come back to him, he had been content, though overworked, and had no desire to stir up controversy at his acceptance of the award.