She said at length: “It’s not an easy situation, but you can manage.”
“Manage!” I cried.
“I don’t know what to do. I could go home, I suppose. Can you imagine what it would be like in a small confined English village.”
“Very much what it would be like in a small confined French one,” she said.
“But of’ course you won’t go back there.”
“How how … where …”
She looked at me and smiled. I had always thought she had a sweet smile.
“Will you let me help … advise?”
“I am in such a state of anxiety that I would welcome any help and advice.”
“Don’t panic,” she said.
“Remember it is not an unusual situation.”
“You mean … rape … and such consequences.”
“I really meant respectable young women finding themselves pregnant.
You are fortunate. You have your work. That must be a great solace.
Moreover, it is a means of livelihood . quite a good livelihood I imagine. “
“It is becoming so.”
“And it will go on getting better and better. You are on the road to fame and fortune. This … matter … must not interfere with that.”
“I don’t see how.”
“I do. Because you are going to let me help.”
“I have no idea what I… or anyone … can do. Here I am a stranger in this city. I shall work while I can. Then I suppose I must go home.
I know my father will help but it will be a great shock for him. He has had one shock. His eyes . you know. “
“Yes, I do know.” She leaned towards me and touched my hand briefly.
“Will you … let me be your friend?”
I looked at her in astonishment.
“It is difficult for me to say all I feel,” she went on.
“You probably regard me as little more than a stranger. I don’t feel we are. You know a good deal about me. I know of you. And we both know the Baron . intimately.”
“Please, I don’t want to talk about that wretched experience.”
“I understand. Listen. I am alone here. You are in this situation.
Please let me help you? “
“How could you?”
“To begin with I could talk to you. It is always a good idea to discuss these matters, to consider what is the best way of tackling them. I know Paris very well. I would know where you could go to have your baby. I have this house. It is large. I don’t use it all. I have thought of letting part of it. At night it seems so quiet here.
Sometimes I give parties. I Lave many acquaintances . people I knew in the past. but very few real friends. I am putting a proposition to you. I know I can help you. Take some rooms in this house. Make one your studio. You need quarters in Paris. You want people to come to you to be painted. You don’t want to go to their houses just when they call you. You have to set yourself up as a great artist . act like a great artist . live like one. Now this would be a good address for you. We are on the Left Bank. that is where the intellectual people are gathering . clerics, professors, students, artists are here . I am talking too much. “
“Of course you are not. Please go on. It is so kind of you. I could see no way out of my problem … I don’t know why you take so much trouble about me.”
She was silent for a moment, then she said.
“In a way we are both .. victims. No, I mustn’t say that. It’s not true.”
“You mean of the Baron de Centeville.”
“It is not fair to say that I am a victim. I’ll explain all that to you some time, but now let us think of you. I realize this is all very sudden and you want time to think about it. But really, Kate … May I call you Kate? … I think we are going to be good friends. You have a great deal of planning to do and the sooner you begin the better.”
“You talk as though everything is so simple.”
“I wouldn’t say that, but most things are not as difficult as one first thought if they are approached in a sensible and realistic way.”
“But I am going to have a child!"
“I always longed for children,” she said.
“I could envy you.”
“This child will be the result of something I want more than anything to forget. If only I could go back in time. If only I had gone straight home instead of making that journey …”
Again she touched my hand.
“Don’t think back. Think forward.”
I contemplated her earnest face. I was a little unsure as I must be of anything connected with the Baron, and I reminded myself that she had been his mistress and probably his confidante. How could I be sure that this was not some fresh plot?
She understood the trend of my thoughts.
“You’ll want to consider this very carefully,” she said.
“Go back now. The concierge will get a cab for you. You have my address. Think about everything. There is an attic right on the rooftops with plenty of glass. It was built for an artist. I will help you … having the child. I can put you in touch with the people you will need. You can make this your home, and let me tell you that in this part of Paris you are not expected to live the conventional life that you would be in the Faubourg Saint-Honore. You could work here. Your patrons could come to be painted. It is a proposition. But I do understand that you will need time to decide.”
“It is very grand,” I said.
“Should I be able to afford it?”
“My dear Kate, you need to be grand to show how successful you are, and if you are successful you will be able to afford it. Come. You need to contemplate all this. Such decisions should not be made lightly.”
“I have a great deal of thinking to do, I know.”
She nodded in agreement.
“Go now,” she said.
“You have my address. You know where to find me.”
“But how can I thank you.”
She saw me into the cab.
“Remember,” she said.
“You are not alone … unless you want to be. I will be your friend if you want me. It is for you to decide.”
That encounter changed everything. I could see before me an avenue of escape, however bizarre it seemed. I occupied myself during the next few days thinking about it. It was a mercy that while I worked I was able to shut out everything else but the portrait.
The more I thought of Nicole’s suggestion, the more possible it appeared. It seemed the only possibility. I went to see Nicole again.
She was delighted that I had come and I fancied that my predicament had given her a new interest in life which she badly needed at this time. True, I was a little suspicious. Surely anyone who had been treated as I had would be. This was chiefly because of her past connection with the Baron. Everyone who had been near to him could be polluted.
On my second visit, she said: “I want you to come, Kate. I want to help you. I’m feeling very lonely .. lately.”
“Because of… him?”
“I was with him for eight years. It’s a long time. You don’t speak. I can see that you do not understand.”
“I understand perfectly. We were both used by him. You happened to agree and I did not.”
“Yes, I suppose you could say that. But don’t waste your sympathy on me. I knew this would happen eventually. He would marry and that would be the time for me to disappear. It was understood from the first.”
“Do you mean it was a sort of contract?”
“Not in the usual understanding of such a term. My mother was … well, not exactly a courtesan. Shall we say a demimondaine She was the mistress of a great nobleman. He provided for her and looked after her when her services were no longer required. It was a life she was bred to. So was I. I was married when I was seventeen to Jacques St. Giles.
He was a respectable young man who worked in one of our banks. We lived together for a year, but it was never meant to last. My mother wanted me to marry.
I would then have a right to call myself Madame which, she always said, gentlemen preferred to Mademoiselle. A young girl could make demands which a married woman could not so marriage made the situation so much more comfortable. “
“It all seems rather cynical.”
“Call it realistic. Then I was introduced to the Baron by my mother, who hoped that I would please him. I did. I had been well educated, brought up to appreciate art and to be what is called a cultivated woman. I was taught how to carry myself, how to dress, how to converse with grace. That was the theme of my education … to please. Well, it is what I did. And here I am. Thirty years of age, with my own house and a comfortable settlement. I need never work again as long as I live. You might say I was brought up in a rewarding profession, one which brings good returns and security. Better, I was always taught, than becoming a drudge and mother of many children. Do you understand?”
“I still think it very mercenary and, I must confess, immoral.”
“Oh, you will never understand. I don’t suppose this sort of thing would happen in England. It’s part of French life the life of the demimondaine I was born into it. I found a generous lover … and here I am. I see you are more than a little shocked. Please don’t be and don’t be sorry for me. It was a very pleasant life.”
“With that man!”
“Let me tell you I became quite fond of him. I began to learn something about him.”
“And that made you fond of him?”
“It made me see why he was the man he was.”
“And you could really be fond of such a man?”
“Kate, what he did to you was unforgivable. Don’t think I
don’t realize that. If it had happened to me . and I had been like you . I should have felt the same. “
“It was monstrous,” I said fiercely.
“It is treating people about him as though they are of no importance beyond the use they can be to him.
It is picking them up . exploiting them . and then throwing them aside. “
“I know. It was his upbringing. His father and his grandfather were like that. He was brought up to believe that that was the way men such as they were behaved.”
“It is time someone taught them differently.”
“No one will ever do that. You see how it is now. A word from the Baron and-everyone acclaims you. He has power … even in these days he has it.”
“You mean money! Position!”
“Yes, but more than that. It is something in his personality. If you could understand you would realize why he is the way he is.”
“I don’t care why. It is because he is that way that he maddens me. He should be punished, taken to law.”
“Would you be prepared to go to law, to accuse him of rape? Would you stand up in a court? Think of the questions they would ask. Why did you not complain at the time? That is what they would ask. You would hurt yourself more than you could hurt him. Be practical. Don’t go on brooding on what has happened. Think of what you are going to do now.”
I said: “I shall soon have finished Francoise’s portrait. There is to be a ball. The miniatures will be shown there.”
“What the Baron does today the world does tomorrow. Madame Dupont is slavishly copying the style he sets. Never mind. It’s all to the good.
It may well bring in fresh business. From that ball I’ll swear you get two more definite commissions at least and perhaps many more. “
“After that I leave for the house of Monsieur Villefranche for his wife’s picture.”
“And then?”
“I should go home and see my father.”
“And tell him?”
“I don’t know whether I could do that. Perhaps when I come face to face with him I shall know whether or not I can tell him.”
“And if you could not?”
I turned to her.
“You have been so kind to me... so helpful.”
“I hope I shall be your friend.”
“I can tell you that since our meeting I have felt so much better. You have made me realize that I have to stop looking back. I have to plan.
I am afraid I shall hate this child. “
She shook her head.
“Women like you never hate their children. As soon as this baby arrives you will love it and forget the way it came.”
“If it should look like him …”
“I will make a wager. You will love this child more because of the problems of its birth.”
“You are a very worldly woman, Nicole,” I said.
She smiled at me and said softly: “It is the best way to survive.”
Madame Dupont gave her ball, which was to launch Emilie into society.
There were many guests and I was treated with great respect. My work was admired and Nicole was right. Two people gave me definite invitations to visit their houses and paint portraits.
I was effusively complimented on the miniatures. Madame Dupont had had them set in frames embellished with diamonds and rubies. She could hardly copy the Baron so blatantly as to choose sapphires, but I felt sure she would have liked to.
However, it was very satisfactory and I could see that I was really being projected into a successful career.
How gratifying it would have been but for the part the
Baron had played in my life. if only I had never met him! But then all this would not have happened if I had not.
I was meeting Nicole regularly and getting to like her more and more.
She was frank about herself. She told me she was lonely and wanted friendship. Perhaps she felt a little resentful about being cast off by the Baron (although she always insisted that he was not to blame and that the position had been understood from the first), perhaps she felt that we who had both known him would understand each other; however, the friendship between us nourished, and the more I thought of her proposition the more it seemed that it was the only road open to me.
I left the Duponts and went to the Villefranche house. Madame Villefranche was a pretty little woman with a happy temperament and very contented with her lot. She gave me little difficulty and I was able to produce a very beautiful picture other.
I was feeling more calm now and no longer awoke in a cloud of horror.
Nicole had convinced me that with a little careful planning, I could come through the ordeal which lay before me. Moreover, I was beginning to feel something for the child, and I realized that if I were to discover it were all a mistake after all, my feelings would be very mixed.
Nicole was right. I should love the child when it came, and the thought of its coming gave me a strange sense of fulfilment.
By the time I had finished the Villefranche portrait I had made up my mind that I would go to see my father immediately. I would stay at home for a week and then come back to carry out my next commission.
During that time I would definitely decide what I was going to do.
Nicole said that was a wise procedure.
It was the beginning of October when I went back. I felt emotional as the train carried me across the Kentish country. I noticed that the hops had been gathered in. They would be storing them in the oast houses scattered across this part of the country; and now was the time for the fruit to be gathered in.
Ladders were propped against the trees and rosy apples and russety pears were being packed into baskets.
Home! I thought. I shall miss it. But it is not so very far away. I can come back sometimes. Nicole will think of something.
So much would depend on what happened within the next week. If I could bring myself to tell my father, he might have some plan. Perhaps he and I could go away together. No, that would not do. Besides, how could we live? I knew he had saved enough to live on in a modest way, but that would not include travelling and how could he live away from Collison House, and how could I live there with my child? It would be in the minds of everyone in the village even if they were kind as I knew my friends would be that my child was a bastard
.
A warm welcome was awaiting me. How comfortable it was! More homely than in Evie’s day. A little untidy perhaps, but I could only repeat myself homely. That was Clare’s influence.
She came out with my father when I arrived and they both hugged me tightly.
“It is wonderful to see you,” said my father, and Clare echoed:
“Wonderful, wonderful. Your room is all ready. I have made sure the bed has had a good airing.”
“Clare is always fussing about airing.” said my father fondly.
“She coddles us, in fact.”
Clare tried to look severe, which was impossible.
“It is something I insist on,” she said.
I felt more grateful to her than ever. Having someone like Clare to look after everything at Collison House made my decision so much easier.
My father wanted to know all that had happened. I told him about the portraits I had done and the new commissions I had. , He was completely delighted.
“Splendid! Splendid!” he cried.
“It’s like a miracle. Who would have thought on the day we received that letter from France all this would grow out of it.”
Who indeed? I thought. And if only he knew what had grown out of it!
“It’s the most wonderful thing that could have happened to you, Kate,” he said.
“But for this you would have stayed here with me. Nobody would have given you credit for the work for years. It’s changed you, Kate. You even look different.”
“How different?” I asked.
“Ready to face the world. Ready to take all it offers you.”
“Can you see a difference then?”
“I know you so well, my dear. You now look and talk like the assured artist you are .. I wish I could have seen those portraits.”
“I knew they were good,” I said.
“You have been doing fine work for a long time now.”
“And what of you, Father? What have you been doing?”
“I do a little painting. I have taken up landscapes and can manage quite well. One doesn’t have to produce exactly what one sees. If you miss something you say, ” That’s art. This is not copying”.”
“And you enjoy this landscape painting? I must see some of it.”
The Demon Lover Page 20