“A gift.”
“This one is,” he said. His voice carried a trace of wonder. He stood by the barricade he had built between the world and his dancer. As far as Mary knew, he had never made a large sculpture before. The studio was littered with small forms he had crafted from wax, dancers and horses, but neither he nor anyone, to Mary’s knowledge, had ever tried to sculpt a wax statue as large as the one Degas was attempting.
“You’ll tell no one?”
His problem, Mary thought, was that he was in love with the thing he was about to create. And there was nothing like love to terrify a person.
“Edgar,” she said, kissing his cheek. “What a silly thing to say to me.” And she gathered her things, and he his, and they walked out into the night.
Chapter Thirty-Seven
The plaster in the Manet family’s new apartment at 39 Rue de Saint-Pétersbourg still had not dried, as it had not in many of the buildings so recently erected in the Quartier de l’Europe. A heavy dampness hung over the dining table. Though the pastry had already been served and consumed, they were still at table: the Manet sons, their mother, Suzanne, Berthe, and Bibi, who had been retrieved from the nurse’s care and was cruising from lap to lap to be petted and kissed. Édouard was painting watercolors, inking pictures of women’s legs peeking out from underneath taffeta skirts, his brush occasionally flipping out of the saucer of colored rinse water and rolling among the coffee cups and dessert plates. His mother suffered his antics and did not even complain when his tray of watercolors clattered to the floor and the overworked maid had to be called in to mop up. Tonight, as always, he carried all the sparkle, despite the ravages of illness on his gaunt face.
At dinner, Édouard would speak only of his upcoming solo exhibition, fending off all attempts to get him to discuss the summer. The Charpentiers, who seemed not at all alarmed by his sudden affection for Madame Charpentier’s younger sister, had offered Édouard a show at their new gallery on the Boulevard des Italiens. Édouard hoped the Charpentiers’ influence might even extend to persuading the Salon jury to award him a medal this year. The thought now occurred to Berthe that Édouard might have been paying attention to Isabelle not to court her, but to inveigle her older sister and brother-in-law to offer him this exhibition. But that kind of subterfuge seemed too underhanded for Édouard. He was careless in love, but not treacherous. It was more likely that the young Isabelle had entranced him of her own accord, unaware of her affect on him.
Édouard, in a celebratory mood, had spent the past few minutes teasing Berthe about the fifth impressionist exhibition, set to begin in a few weeks, on April 1, timing that would coincide with his own opening.
“We’ll be competing, dear Berthe. Who will win? I predict that hundreds—nay, thousands—will flow through the doors.” Which doors, he wouldn’t say. “The streets will not be able to handle the surge of traffic. A parade will ensue.”
Berthe didn’t want to deny Édouard his ebullience. He deserved his own show, and not one financed by himself, as he had done so long ago for the World Exhibition. The excitement was also serving, for better or worse, to distract him from his ailment, and she wondered if it might not be an even better strategy than the hydrotherapy his mother wanted him to take.
“Have no doubt, there will be a parade for you, Édouard,” Gustave said. “Especially after they see the portrait you’re painting of that little Isabelle.”
Gustave seemed to have forgotten that he was here to serve as ballast for the family’s argument that Édouard should take the treatment the doctor was prescribing. He had left his office early that afternoon to pay a visit to Édouard’s studio, and he was now full of drunken praise. “Not that anyone would deny our darling Berthe her due. Her exhibition will no doubt be a triumph.” He raised his glass to Berthe, but then said, “But that Isabelle, she shines. What is this now? Your third, fourth picture of her?”
“She does shine, doesn’t she?” Édouard said. “Quite an excellent little model. I’ll submit that picture to the Salon.”
“Couldn’t you give me the painting?” Gustave said.
“If I give it to anyone, I will give it to Isabelle, if she will allow the gift.”
Berthe looked across the table at Suzanne, who had made not even the slightest remark of unhappiness at Édouard’s proclamations. If Berthe had been married to Édouard, she would have thrown a plate at him by now, but Suzanne instead seemed to be preoccupied by the maid’s coming and going, handing her plates to clear and brushing crumbs from the table.
“Isabelle would shine at the Salon,” Gustave went on, awash in memories of the enchanting pictures of her.
“The Salon is the only place for her,” Édouard said.
“I don’t see why you continue to care about the Salon, Édouard, when they hate you so much,” Berthe said. Her tone was sharp, and everyone at the table turned to look at her.
“They don’t hate me.” Édouard dipped his pen into the ink bottle and drew, in quick succession, a series of booted feet, ankles and calves exposed, raised skirts above. Never had Berthe seen him execute anything so charming so quickly. “They just don’t love me yet.”
“Perhaps you ought to stop courting everyone, Édouard.”
“Are we still speaking of the Salon?” Eugène said.
Berthe made a quick, shameful glance at her husband.
Édouard said, “Not to worry, Eugène. Berthe is only worrying about my legacy. She fears I will die having misjudged who and what is right for me. Don’t you, Berthe? You fear for me, don’t you?”
Bibi had made her way around the table, and was now pulling herself to standing on Berthe’s lap. Berthe straightened her daughter’s dress and was about to say that yes, she did fear for him, when Eugène answered Édouard instead.
“My wife only wishes to ensure that you don’t tire yourself by overwork. Isn’t that right, darling? That is all that matters to us. How well you are, Édouard.”
“Yes,” Berthe said. “You must watch your health. As your mother and Suzanne have been trying to say all night.”
“Is that what you are worrying about, Berthe? My health?” Édouard asked. “You oughtn’t, you know. I’ll be well by Christmas if I go to Meudon for the summer.”
“You’ll go, then?” Suzanne said.
“I don’t know.”
“But you must.” Suzanne reached her hand through the remaining china and crystal to take his, but Édouard, engrossed in his drawings, either didn’t or chose not to see her gesture.
“Yes, Édouard, you must,” his mother said.
“What I love about Isabelle is that she demands nothing. She lets me amuse her. She makes me forget.” Édouard laid down his brush and looked at Berthe.
Berthe knew she ought to be quiet, to let Eugène answer for her again, but she couldn’t help herself. “That girl, at seventeen, is hardly the salvation you want her to be,” Berthe said. “What does she know of the needs of a man who is ill and is behaving as if he isn’t? If you do not go to Meudon because you do not want to be separated from this girl, then you are making a very silly mistake, Édouard. One none of us will ever forgive you for.”
Suzanne stared. Madame Manet brought her napkin to her mouth and waved the maid away. Bibi began to cry and Berthe hugged her daughter to her chest. Berthe knew she had revealed herself, but she couldn’t help it. The man would flirt himself into an early death and everyone would let him. Distraction due to ambition was one thing, but distraction due to infatuation was another thing entirely.
Eugène’s voice broke into the hollow that had followed her outburst, his voice rising above his daughter’s whimpering. “Berthe is right, Édouard. All any of us at this table care about is your well-being. You require health more than you require the company of a charming innocent. Of that, you have had plenty in your life.”
On the way home in the carriage, Eugène said, “One day, sooner rather than later, Édouard is going to die. You should prepare yourself, darl
ing.”
It was crueler than she had expected, but it was far kinder than she had a right to. In the hazy light of the foggy evening, Eugène looked like Édouard when she had first met him, when he was healthy and knowing, willing to wait, willing to convince her.
Chapter Thirty-Eight
The soft light and warmth of the March morning was a much needed respite from the Parisian drear that had cooped the Cassatts inside their flat during one of the worst winters any of them could remember. After several months of rising good health, Lydia had been afflicted with a stomach neuralgia so fierce that she expressed a fear that she might die. It was unlike her to give in to the same alarm the others guarded so stealthily, and for days, the doctor had come and gone, his prediction of recovery careening between doubtful and optimistic.
But this morning Lydia had risen from bed and nested herself in the parlor, declaring herself completely well and insisting that she wouldn’t tolerate anyone wasting the glorious Saturday on her account; everyone had to go out or suffer her severe disapproval. It took Lydia an hour to convince her mother that a brief sojourn would not be a breach of parental vigilance. Giving in, Katherine decided to roam the sandy paths of the Tuileries and admire the children sailing their wooden boats in the fountains; Robert and Degas were to meet, as previously planned, at the races at Longchamp in the Bois de Boulogne, having recently forged a tight kinship over horseflesh; Mary, also a lover of horseflesh, was also going to the bois, but to ride rather than to watch the races. Since leaving Pennsylvania, she had not been able to afford a riding horse, but the new monthly stipend from Aleck meant that in addition to the family’s carriage, she could rent a horse from the livery stable on the Champs-Élysées and ride in the bois on the trails through the linden and oak forests as often as she liked.
It was a week away from the exhibition and Mary was looking forward to some exercise. She had exhausted herself putting together the journal, but it was at the printers now and there was little else to be done. At the livery stable, she rented her favorite mount, a dappled gray mare, and trotted in a long train of carriages of race-goers and other pleasure-seekers to the gates of the reserve, where she skirted the traffic and headed for the riding paths. For two hours she rode through the forests and meadows, the spring mud flying up and splattering her skirt. When the horse was spent, she angled toward the water troughs on one of the lakeshores. The park was crowded and it took a moment before she recognized Gustave Caillebotte trotting toward her. His handsome, austere figure was well seated on his Arabian, and he was impeccably attired in his fastidious, almost militaristic riding clothes.
“Mademoiselle Cassatt.” He dismounted and led his horse beside hers to the trough. “What a pleasure.”
“The pleasure is all mine,” she said, pulling off her gloves. “Why aren’t you at the races this morning?”
“I prefer to ride rather than watch someone else have all the fun.”
“Edgar and my father are in the stands. They’ll come home poorer, I fear. At least my father will.”
He pulled off his gloves too, and stood beside her, ill at ease. He was always in control, and his nervousness surprised her. “Monsieur?”
“You must forgive me, Mademoiselle Cassatt, but I feel I must say something to you. I want you to know that I tried to persuade Edgar, but he wouldn’t listen. Of course he never listens, at least not to me, but I did try very hard to dissuade him. At first, I was so shocked, I didn’t know what to say, but then I found my tongue. I even scolded him, if you can believe that, which he didn’t take all that well. But I’d already given the printer a deposit, which he now refuses to return. The balance was due yesterday. That is how I found out. Can you imagine? I was at the printer, ready to write a bank note, when the man told me. Edgar hadn’t even the consideration to write me a letter to save me the trip. Of course I went over to his studio immediately. I couldn’t believe what he had done, but he confirmed it. That blasted man always does exactly as he pleases, no matter what it means for anyone else.”
“Forgive me, Monsieur Caillebotte,” Mary said, “but I don’t know what you are talking about.”
A cloud passed over the sun, casting a cool shadow over the lake, dulling the reflection of the trees in the water. Mary knew the answer Gustave would give before he gave it, but something inside her forced her to ask for the details, to wait for them and to hear them in this awkward way, pushing poor Gustave beyond apology to merciless message bearer.
“Edgar didn’t tell you. Of course he didn’t. I thought for certain you knew. Edgar has called off the publication of Le Jour et la Nuit. I don’t know whether or not Monsieur Pissarro knows, but it would be just like Edgar not to tell him, either.”
Heat blossomed in Mary’s face. In the telling, the news was somehow worse. She was embarrassed she had coerced him, but that did not stop her from extracting more. “Exactly what did Edgar tell you? Can you remember?” she said.
“That he wasn’t ready.”
The last time she had seen Edgar was on Wednesday, when she had run a final plate through his press, an etching of a young toddler wearing a wide-brimmed hat. It was to be the last print to go into the journal. Innocence, Edgar had said. The picture of it. His kiss bidding her farewell had betrayed nothing other than preoccupation. He was terribly sorry, he said, but he had to leave right away. He escorted her out of his studio, saying that he was awfully busy with a commission but that he would see her on Saturday, and then again on Monday for the hanging of the exhibition. He had pressed her hand into his on the street and disappeared.
“I saw Edgar on Wednesday. He said nothing to me.” He should have come to the house, to the studio, should have sent a note, should have told her before he told anyone else.
“It’s inexcusable. It’s just like Edgar to be so careless of other people. It is as if he believes he is the only person affected by these decisions of his.” Gustave went on complaining about Edgar’s cruelties, but Mary hardly heard him. She was looking at her ink-stained fingers, thinking of the hours she and Edgar had spent together, the backbreaking work of the press, their long discussions about which prose should accompany which print. There had been not the slightest indication he was wavering from their plan.
“I must be getting home,” Mary said.
“I shouldn’t have told you. Not here. I’ve ruined your ride, ruined your morning.”
“It’s not your fault,” Mary said. She pulled on her gloves, mounted and clicked to the horse, and trotted out to the road. She wanted to gallop back to the stables, but the slightest misalignment in the cobbles, the least fright from a carriage, and the horse would stumble. She disciplined herself to keep to a walk and finally reached the stables, where she handed the reins to a groom and hired a hack for home.
• • •
“What is the matter, Mary?” her mother said. “You’ve been restless since you got back from your ride. I thought the exercise would have calmed you.”
For an hour, Mary had been pacing in the parlor, stopping at the window on every round to look down onto the Avenue Trudaine.
“Mary?” Katherine said.
Mary turned from the window. “Pardon?”
Katherine exchanged a look with Lydia.
“You’ve been pacing like a caged lion,” Lydia said.
“Have I?” she said. She pulled back the curtain and looked out onto the street. “Here they are. They’re coming.”
Katherine called to Anna to prepare coffee as the sound of footsteps echoed up the stairwell. The two men, after climbing the five sets of stairs, paused at the doorway to catch their breath and remove their hats. Robert headed straight to his club chair, where his papers awaited him in a neat pile. Edgar hovered at the doorway, holding the brim of his hat.
“Oh, Robert, where are your manners? Do invite Monsieur Degas in,” Katherine said.
Robert sank into the chair. “I’m exhausted, Katherine. You can’t expect a man to remember all the societal niceties wh
en he is tired.”
“I apologize for my husband, Monsieur Degas. You’ll come in, won’t you?” Katherine said. “Anna is bringing coffee and we have a lovely dinner planned. We would love to have you stay.”
“That is very kind of you, madame, but I cannot. I have an engagement, and I am already late.” Degas raised his hand and edged out of the doorway, barely meeting Mary’s eyes as Anna bustled in with the promised coffee.
“But Edgar,” Mary called. “Lydia wants to show you the print you gave her. She’s had it framed. Haven’t you, Lyddy? It’s all she could talk about all afternoon.”
“It was?” Lydia said.
“She’s very eager to show you how lovely your print looks,” Mary said, feeling no compunction about using her sister as bait. “She won’t even share it with us but has hung it in her bedroom. Go get it, darling.”
Obediently, Lydia rose and disappeared down the hallway to her bedroom.
“Do have a cup, Monsieur Degas,” Katherine said.
“Yes, have one, have one,” Robert said. “You’ve been tiresome and distracted all day. A little coffee will do you good.”
After a moment’s hesitation, Edgar offered his hat to Anna, who set it on the entry table. He sat in a chair next to Katherine, nodding at Mary as if they were mere acquaintances. He crossed and uncrossed his legs and then accepted the proffered coffee cup, set it on the table, and folded his hands in his lap.
Mary said, “I met Monsieur Caillebotte today when I was riding in the bois.”
“Now, there’s a young man who understands money,” Robert said, dropping a lump of sugar into his coffee. “Even if he is French.”
“Mary, you didn’t tell us that you met Monsieur Caillebotte,” Lydia said, returning, the prized print cradled in her arms. “I like him so much, don’t you, Mother?”
“Gustave is a fine young man,” Katherine said, passing Mary coffee. “We should invite him to dinner.”
I Always Loved You Page 24