Anna didn't mention her stolen handbag. And, ignoring that wisp of desire, that barest feather light trace of something she couldn't put in concrete terms lying at the edge of her consciousness, she didn't mention François. To be honest, she couldn't think how to tell her husband why she was spending time with a stranger whose nephew had stolen his daughter's heart in less time than it took to choose a painting. So she changed the subject.
Ingrid emerged, fresh and fragrant, from the bathroom. "Let me speak with dad a sec," she said.
Anna didn't have much time to think as Ingrid was tapping her wrist and making circular motions indicating she should finish talking. Anna wound up the conversation with both of them mumbling how much they looked forward to being together soon, but as she thrust the phone into Ingrid's outstretched hand, she wondered how they were going to bear each other's company for the rest of the holiday in Biarritz. She hurried into the bathroom listening to Ingrid praise Paris, its culture, lifestyle, and the entire French nation.
Anna wanted to have a serious talk with her daughter about her disappearance with Jean Paul earlier that day, but they took so long to finish primping, there wasn't time or they'd be well past what was considered fashionably late.
In the lift, Anna made it clear there was a midnight curfew in place, and she counted on it being respected. Her daughter eyed her speculatively but didn't argue. Anna decided to give Ingrid 'the talk' later, and, unless Ingrid noticed, she wasn't going to tell her about the handbag incident.
Anna was surprised, and disquieted, at how natural walking as a foursome was becoming part of their new routine. She and François walked ahead: he pointing out places of interest and she nodding her head in agreement, and taking everything in, while Ingrid and Jean Paul walked behind with their heads bent close together. It was a part of their new routine.
They chose a different restaurant where, through a mixture of wheedling and blackmail by Ingrid, and thoughtful ordering by François, the four of them ate another satisfyingly delightful meal of vegetarian food.
"If I feel the need for flesh and blood, watch out!" joked François filling their glasses with red wine as they tucked into couscous, roasted aubergine, potato salad with a Dijon mustard dressing, and garlic bread with the crispiest crust Anna had ever tasted.
"That was marvelous." Anna commented as she sat back.
"Jean Paul and I are going for a walk. Ok?" Ingrid's directness, as usual, got her what she wanted.
Anna, bewitched by Montmartre's night life, felt too replete and contented to voice any objections. "Remember to be back on time," she managed to say as the couple stood to leave.
"I promise," said Jean Paul looking directly at her.
"Thank you." Anna's smile held genuine warmth. She did like the young man. He had a goal in life and enough determination and talent to achieve it, but this wasn't personal. Ingrid was her daughter‒her one remaining child‒and, if needed, she would be fierce in her protection.
François ordered coffee and brandy to finish the meal.
"May I ask you something?" Anna was hesitant.
"Anything. Within reason, of course."
Ignoring what she assumed was an attempt at humor she plunged in with her question, wanting to know what he thought, seeing as how he'd been brought up in a different culture to her.
"Do you believe in re-incarnation?" she asked.
He raised his eyebrows, clearly thrown for an instant by her question. "Ah, do I believe that a soul can take birth again in another body? I'm not sure how that works in practice."
He leaned back. She tried to ignore the way he was studying her. The waiter returned with their drinks, and she waited till the man had deposited their drinks on the table and left.
"Yes, that when the body dies, the soul which is separate from the body—"
"I apologize. You've lost me," he interrupted her.
She sipped the brandy, a smooth, aged liquor hiding a powerful punch, letting it slide down her throat, before replying. "Think of the soul as a driver, and our bodies as the car. The driver directs the car so he can reach whatever destination he wants. He looks after the car, maintains it, checks the wheels, the engine and so on. But when the car gets old and broken and beyond repair, the driver gets out and gets a new car," she continued, earnestly expounding her concept to him.
"Put that way it sounds possible. Of course this won't work if you don't believe people have souls in the first place. Forgive me; I've seen what people do in the name of religion, and I'm a bit of a skeptic."
She had read so much in the months after Jeremy's death, seeking answers, and not finding them. Certainly no religion had been able to explain why a God, who was said to be the embodiment of perfection, punished good human beings. But in a book on Hindu beliefs she read that if two people had strong enough links, there existed the possibility of renewing the connection when the departed soul was reborn. She'd latched on to this.
Anna was determined to make her point. "You're reincarnating right this second, aren't you? The cells in your body are renewed every seven years? Right? So in theory, it's possible to say that the soul, that awareness we have of being an individual, of being you, has already incarnated several times in this lifetime." She laughed triumphant at her logic. "See. It's not so difficult is it?"
"Well since you put it so scientifically," he teased, "but how do you recognize the people you love? If they have another body, or another car, as you so eloquently phrase it, how do you recognize them? Did your book, by the way what's the name, tell you that? And if they're in a different body, they wouldn't have the personality of the person you loved, would they?"
"Oh, François, I don't know the answer. The book was called the Bhagavad Gita‒it means The Song of God‒but it didn't say anything regarding that aspect of it. Perhaps there'd be a sense of familiarity, of déjà vu, with the person. It's possible you might have an immediate bond. I mean, don't you wish you could see Lucie?"
She realized loss and desperation had driven her to latch on to this belief, but if, if, a person did have a soul, and if the soul did change bodies, in the same way we change clothes the book said, there was a possibility that she might meet her beloved son once more. To her way of thinking, when, or if, she met Jeremy, it was irrelevant that he wouldn't be her beloved son anymore. Sometimes her mind went around and around in circles, knotting itself up in an effort to figure it out, but she couldn't relinquish the idea.
"Everyone deals with loss in separate ways, chérie." François took hold of her hand and squeezed gently. "What I have learned is that when you lose someone you love, it hurts for a long time. But what they say is true. Life does go on."
Neither spoke; both too caught up in their separate thoughts. She felt the heat from his hand as it gripped hers until he let go. She felt the absence of his touch.
"Here's to loved ones, present and past." He held up his brandy glass. Anna looked at him, raising hers. He understood her pain as well as her need to talk about her son. She touched her glass to his, and they chimed like tiny bells.
Ingrid came in ten minutes late.
Anna had tried not to notice midnight approaching—and passing. She'd relaxed, forgetting the trauma of the early afternoon, and had been writing up notes on Luc Marteille after seeing his paintings. She'd decided to give Ingrid an extra fifteen minutes before freaking out.
"Sorry," Ingrid said plonking down on her mother's bed.
"I missed you today." Anna put her notebook down and reached out, smoothing Ingrid's wild curls.
"You knew where I was." Ingrid's voice turned sullen.
"No, Ingrid. I knew who you were with but not where you had gone."
Ingrid went over to the wardrobe, raking through her clothes, mumbling under her breath as several fell off their hangers.
"Please, Ingrid. Don't ignore me."
"Look, mum. After this summer I'm off to Exeter. You won't know where I am or who I'm with. And you won't be able to keep tabs on me e
ither."
"I will know where you are, more or less. And I will know what you're doing, more or less. Ok, I won't have the details." Ingrid made a snorting sound which Anna ignored, "but today you were in a city you're unfamiliar with, traipsing around with a young man who seems okay, but...."
"Well, I'm delighted he has your approval."
"I was worried. And naturally so."
Ingrid took a deep breath before answering, the resentment on her face giving way to stubborn determination. "No, Mum. It's because Jeremy died, and you're so worried that something will happen to me that you obsess about where I am all the time. Remember Jenny's party? The school dance? The camping weekend? Shall I go on? You're driving me nuts. Stop being such a control freak!"
Anna sat unmoving as the blood drained from her face. How had their relationship degenerated to this squabbling? Her heart was thumping so loud she was surprised Ingrid couldn't hear it.
But Ingrid continued to open and bang shut the drawers ignoring Anna.
Anna looked at her daughter. Had she been so caught up with Jeremy and Greg that she'd not noticed her sweet girl turning into this willful young woman?
Ingrid snatched up her nightclothes, and before entering the bathroom, turned around staring straight at her mother. "What I want to ask," she said, "is why didn't you mention François when you were on the phone to Dad this afternoon?"
Chapter Twelve
When people go for a walk, they have a destination, a purpose, in mind. Dancing on the other hand is an action which has no goal, other than joy in the activity for its own sake. And so after the dreary defeat of a war with Prussia, people from Paris would rush off to Montmartre in droves to the Moulin de la Galette for entertainment and dancing.
Paris, July 1873
Hélène studied her reflection in the full-length mirror kept in Louise's bedroom. The dress was gorgeous: a confection of pink and white striped organza with rows of white lace trimmings at the ruffled neck, wrists and hem. It was a perfect fit around the bust with yards of material flaring out from the waist, underpinned with layers of snowy petticoat. Hélène had protested when Louise started taking her measurements, but Louise would hear none of it. She insisted on taking the dress in to fit Hélène's more slender figure, declaring she couldn't wear a lot of her clothes because she'd put on too much weight carrying Benoît. Hélène could consider it an early wedding gift.
"No more country bumpkin, for you," Louise said smoothing a few escaped hairs back into the elaborate coil of hair at the nape of Hélène's neck. "There." She pulled out and curled a few tendrils to frame Hélène's face. "What do you think?"
Her cousin was right. Yes, she did recognize herself, but she was looking at a more grown up sophisticated version. She was surprised at how elegant she appeared. A lady. That's what she looked like—a young lady from Paris.
Tomorrow, though, she would be on her way home. Louise was up and about, back to full health, and her help was no longer needed. Benoît had recovered from his fever and the sittings for Luc ended yesterday. She'd written Claude and her family about arrangements for her return and received a reply. Claude would meet her in Bordeaux.
She attempted to ignore the loud knocking of her heart against her ribs at the possibility of seeing Luc this afternoon unless he was spending the day at the studio. It was hard to believe, but soon she'd be home, and this interlude as a Parisian artist's model would be a dream in the past; nothing more than a memory. As new experiences came her way, perhaps this one would fade, and she'd occasionally take it out and dust it off, seeing it not as a path she could ever have taken, but merely to look back and know that she'd experienced something different from her parents and those around her; something other than what was expected of her. "Thank you! Thank you!" Hélène hugged Louise and gave her a resounding kiss on the cheek.
Louise dragged Hélène into the living room where Pierre dozed on the couch, one hand on Benoit's back as he slumbered on his father's chest.
"Look!"
Pierre opened his eyes at the disturbance, watching Louise spin Hélène around, before putting a finger to his mouth and shushing them.
"Ah, if the love-struck Claude could see you how beautiful you look. He'd die from wanting you," Louise teased with a smile. "Do you remember how you used to follow me around everywhere? Who'd have thought that a scrawny little brat like you would grow into such a charming creature? Oh, the women will envy you and the men will admire you!"
Hélène blushed.
Louise had been babbling about the Moulin de la Galette for days. It had become her sole topic of conversation since she decided she'd made a good recovery from childbirth for an outing. Before falling pregnant, she, Pierre and their friends had gone dancing regularly at the Moulin on a Sunday afternoon; she was dying for Hélène to see this aspect of Paris life before she went home.
Louise tenderly lifted Benoit off her husband's chest, settling him on her shoulder, patting and soothing his back. Hélène marveled at the ease with which Louise had taken to motherhood. She bloomed with love.
Pierre stretched. He adored his wife and son and felt utterly content with life. He smiled up at the two women. "Well, many a man will be jealous of me with you two beauties by my side," he laughed.
"It's good you're leaving tomorrow because if you stayed in Paris any longer, well, M'sieur Marteille would have to fight the other artists off," said Louise dotting the baby's head with kisses.
Hélène reached out and took Benoît in to her arms to hide the heat in her face. The tension between her and Luc had eased since the night of Benoit's illness, and he'd shown her nothing but the utmost respect, yet echoes of his previous outburst lingered between them, a faint pale ghost refusing to leave.
During her recent sittings, the two of them appeared to have reached a tacit agreement; both behaving with perfect decorum, as if nothing had happened, as if he'd never spoken of his feelings, or stared at her with eyes of burning intensity. But he had revealed himself to her. As she sat facing him each day, she compared her memory of those looks to the clinical expression he wore as he painted her during the current sittings.
Hélène tried not to admit it, but his declaration had played havoc with her feelings. She waited, tight with anticipation, for those brief seconds when he touched her skin as he arranged her hair. Sometimes it was a brief brushing of his fingers on her shoulder, at other times, his hand rested, unmoving, longer than necessary. At those moments she held her breath, sitting motionless with her eyes closed.
Lately when she tried to picture Claude, she couldn't remember his face clearly. The image which came to mind was of a tall, fair-haired, open-faced young man, standing in the distance, his features unclear as he waved at her. More and more often images of Luc, the way he stood, the way his lips lifted as if about to smile, the ritual dropping of coins into her hand at the end of the session, came unbidden into her mind. Afterwards, on the way home, she'd go over and over their little exchanges, examining, weighing up the details to see if there were any hidden meanings.
"I can guarantee you that there's nowhere outside of Paris to compare with the Moulin, and, believe me, you will turn heads. Mmm… maybe it is better Claude isn't here." Louise chattered on, her irrepressible volubility more than compensating for the quieter natures of the other two.
Hélène envied Louise the new rhythms the baby had created in her life. She frequently took Benoit out into the fresh air, saying how important it was, but what she enjoyed, alongside the health benefits, was showing him off and lapping up the admiration over her darling from the neighbors and local shopkeepers. Yes, Hélène thought, she and Claude would have lots of babies.
Walking up the hill of Montmartre that afternoon, turned out to be a most delightful experience. The trees were in leaf, apples were rounding under the summer sun into balls of red and green, and colorful wild flowers in full bloom bordered the lanes. Above, the sky was blue and the air, a soft sigh on the skin.
They me
rged into the many groups heading towards the Moulin. Some visitors came by train, but the poorer people walked the hour's journey from Paris, decked out in their Sunday finery. Hélène took everything in: the families with young children skipping along; couples in love with eyes only for each other; young dandies showing off the latest fashion to the admiring eyes of the equally bedazzling young ladies, whose eyes slid sideways when they espied someone who caught their fancy: the atmosphere was infectious as laughter and good humored bantering spilled out along the lanes on the sun filled summer afternoon.
As they approached the top of the hill, Hélène stopped, taking in the sight that greeted her. Louise hadn't exaggerated. They had nothing to match this in Bordeaux. The mill housed a restaurant on the ground floor, with a large area in front for dancing. Trees bordered the dancing space providing plenty of shade. Several decorative chandeliers, swaying in the breeze glistened as stray shafts of sunshine bounced off them, catching her eye. Later, as evening drew in, the chandeliers would be lit.
The crowd thickened nearer the entrance, and she caught the strains of dance music over the chatter of conversations and brief glimpses of couples twirling.
"Come on," Louise called from ahead. "Are you going to stand and watch or join in the fun?"
As they entered the Moulin de la Galette, Hélène tried not to gawk at the dancing couples or at the crowded benches, tables and chairs where fashionably dressed people were talking, laughing, eating and drinking. She scanned the crowd, and, despite a rising wave of excitement at being in this exotic environment, felt an undercurrent of disappointment that Luc was nowhere to be seen.
Luc lay slumped on the back veranda of his house, staring bleakly out at the garden. The summer heat encouraged the burgeoning lush growth; the buzz of insects and birds chirping from the trees, their wings making tiny flapping sounds as they flitted from tree to tree completed the idyllic picture.
Since Émilie and the children had left for her father's country estate, he hardly spent any time at home. He disliked the empty feel of the house and couldn't stand to be there without Guy and Giselle's chatter and laughter. While they were away he preferred to stay at the studio, where he put everything out of his mind but his painting. Unfortunately, he'd run out of clean clothes.
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