Belle Epoque (22 page)

“Here.” She plants her feet firmly. “We’ll take the photograph right here.”

I set up the tripod just as she showed me in the schoolroom; the three wooden stumps unhinge to produce three long legs on which to mount the camera. I fix them in place while she removes the camera from its protective case.

Watching Isabelle so absorbed in her equipment, it strikes me just how curious her interests really are. I reflect for a moment. “Isabelle, what drew you to science in the first place?” I ask. “It seems like another world to most people.”

She stops what she’s doing and looks at me, her camera in her arms. “But that’s why I love it, precisely because it’s all around us—it’s
completely
our world.” There’s a brilliance in her eye and she turns to gaze up at the tower. “That wouldn’t exist without mathematics and the rules of physics.” She taps the wooden housing of the camera. “And we wouldn’t have framed portraits of our families on the mantel if it weren’t for the science of photography. I love the logic and reason, the black-and-whiteness of it all; there is no room for human moods or extremes of fancy. There’s a purity to science—it’s rational.”

A far-off voice catches my attention and I turn to see a workman waving at us, and a couple of his friends laughing. “Eh,
les filles
, this is a work site, not a picnic lawn.”

“Are you sure we should be here, Isabelle?”

“Ignore them.” She is unflappable, all her attention focused on her camera.

The men shake their heads and return to their work. I look back at Isabelle. “Do you think it will be hard being one of the few women at the Sorbonne?”

“More fun than doing the season,” she says, fixing the camera to the stand.

It still doesn’t make sense to me, these two lives she has. “But once you’re married,” I press, “surely you will still have social engagements to juggle as well?”

Isabelle shakes her head. “It’s hard enough to be a woman at the university, but you can’t be a society wife
and
a scholar. Impossible.”

A flood of disquiet swells inside me. “What do you mean?”

Isabelle looks at me as though I’m slow. “If I pass the
bac
, I won’t marry,” she says. She imparts this devastating piece of information as if it goes without saying, then returns to fixing the camera to its stand. I stare, mouth open and speechless.

“What?” I begin. The wind kicks up at the same moment that a surge of panic courses through me. “I didn’t realize that.” I can hear the concern in my own voice. It never occurred to me that Isabelle’s university plans were in direct conflict with marriage; I thought it was just a secret because her mother didn’t approve of higher education for women. I stand still, getting battered by the wind, suddenly realizing that by helping
Isabelle, I’m actively sabotaging the countess’s plans—the whole reason for my employment. The chess piece cannot play for both black and white.

“But surely you don’t want to be a spinster?” It’s a weak argument, but it’s the first thing that comes to mind.

Isabelle merely shrugs as she removes the lens cap and wipes the glass with a cloth.

Think—think of something
, I tell myself. “If it’s freedom you want, married women enjoy more liberty than single women, don’t they? You won’t always need to be chaperoned, or be told you can’t get out of the carriage or be alone in a drawing room with a man. Look at your mother and Madame Vary. They can come and go as they please.”

Isabelle replaces the lens cap and straightens up. “As a married woman, you lose your status, your fortune—everything becomes your husband’s property. Besides, look at me now.” She points in the direction of the tower. “I don’t have anyone’s permission to be here, do I?”

She’s right. I look at the iron lines soaring above me and I feel powerless both at standing next to something this vast and at perceiving my current predicament. I’ve given the countess the impression that the attachment between Isabelle and the duke is deepening, progressing toward a proposal, even, but Isabelle’s narrative of her future couldn’t be more at odds. I stare at the tower for some moments, pondering my situation. The men up top are small, like insects on a large beast, and in the distance I can see the skeletons of new constructions. Can I influence Isabelle or should I tell all to the countess? I’m sure I’ll be let go if she realizes I went behind her back to help
her daughter. But what will it mean for my position if Isabelle refuses a proposal of marriage—will I get sacked for that? I could just do nothing and hope that these clashing plans for Isabelle’s future don’t come to a head any time soon. What a muddle.

“How long will the tower stand before they tear it down?” I say, changing the subject.

“A few years at most.” She ducks down to look through the glass window at the back of the camera.

“Why do Parisians hate it so much?” I wonder aloud.

“Lots of people think it ugly and unrefined.”

Those words sting. The same kind of people who hire repoussoirs by the hour, I suppose. “Perhaps something unrefined can still be beautiful,” I say, more to myself than to Isabelle.

“Take a look, Maude. Tell me what you think of the framing.”

I’m surprised to be asked. “Oh, I wouldn’t know.”

“Just look,” says Isabelle, pointing to the glass.

I bend down to look at the upside-down image. I see the strong geometric patterns of the iron structure contrasting against the pale gray sky. It is an incredible feat to build it—the ambition, the imagination required.

“It looks fine,” I say, straightening up. “To tear it down seems such a shame; all that Herculean effort to make something stand that tall and strong against the elements—only to raze it to the ground. It’s like crushing a dream.”

Isabelle selects a plate. “All the more reason to photograph it now.” She pulls back the glass viewing pane so she can slot the negative housing into the back of the camera. She pulls up the
wooden slide that protects the glass plate from the light. Then she points to the lens cap. “You take the picture.”

I remove the black cap covering the lens, which will let light in, exposing the treated glass to the image before me. If human beings can accomplish the feat of constructing a three-hundred-meter tower, I can manage to pull off this double life for a season.

F
OR ONCE
I
AM NOT
spending an evening with Isabelle and the Duberns. The past couple of weeks I’ve been with them so much it’s almost as though I no longer live in my grimy Montparnasse neighborhood. It’s always a jolt to the eyes, seeing the squalor and run-down buildings, after the wide avenues, large houses and carriage rides of the Right Bank.

The opera evening has become a template for many nights out: the count and countess, Isabelle, a different eligible bachelor and me. We have gone to the hippodrome with a marquis, heard chamber music with an English lord and shared a carriage ride in the Bois de Boulogne with an army captain. Xavier de Rochefort has also been a frequent visitor, capitalizing on the duke’s trip abroad. Isabelle looks the part, but that’s about all the countess can control. Her daughter is uniformly tepid toward each gentleman, grilling them on politics and science, quizzing their general knowledge and reading habits
This frustrates the countess no end. Pressure is mounting on me to fix it.

My role in all this has been to try to please both parties, leading the life of double agent, keeping secrets from both mother and daughter. I help Isabelle with her clandestine schoolwork and humor her mother by listening to her pronouncements on Isabelle’s suitors, not to mention her anticipation of the duke’s return from England—the countess is getting as impatient as a pining debutante herself. It’s exhausting, but I’ve become used to contorting myself into what people want me to be.

As for my reception in society, as soon as it’s been established that I’m without fortune or connections, I’m treated with universal disinterest. Sometimes, when I feel strong, I don’t mind being ignored, because it gives me the chance to observe people and guess the secrets of their characters. But other times I feel wretched. The problem with being a professional wallflower is that you have time to reflect on your own inadequacies, you’re constantly reminded of your undesirable status. Just once I’d like a chance to shine.

I unlock the door to my garret room and shake off the cold, then hang up my new coat behind the door. Besides the coat I also bought a pair of fur-trimmed gloves, which match the mantle I took from the countess’s wardrobe. I debated in the shop whether to splurge on the gloves or send some money home to pay back Papa—the gloves won. The mantle is draped over a chair by the dressing table. I promised myself I’d wear it just once and then return it to the agency, but I haven’t been able to bring myself to part with it yet.

When Isabelle and I are not being whisked from event to event, we retreat to her schoolroom, where I’ve been testing her on the
baccalauréat
mock exams. In turn, she’s been showing me how to use her camera and make photographic prints. To be honest, I look forward to this time in the schoolroom more than the splendid events of the Paris season. I still haven’t told Marie-Josée about my non-repoussoir time with Isabelle. When I do run into my mentor in the dressing room, we gossip about agency business and the different events we’ve been to with clients. I disclose as little as I can about Isabelle personally. I get the feeling Marie-Josée will be disappointed if she knows I’ve become friends with her.

I plump down onto my bed and review today’s photography lesson with Isabelle—exposure times and aperture settings. What is a photographer? Is it simply the person operating the camera, focusing the lens and mixing chemicals? Is photography merely the faithful recording of life for postcards and
cartes de visites
, or is it something more? So far I have taken one decent portrait of Isabelle and a candid picture of the scullery maids in the Dubern kitchen. I think that a good portrait reveals a suggestion of the subject’s mind, and not just a representation of how they look. It’s by no means easy; to snatch the right moment can feel impossible, like capturing fairies.

Perhaps I don’t possess the talent of a great painter who could render life through lines of charcoal or washes of color, but I do have the gift of observation. I can see what others miss. As for skills to possess for taking pictures, this seems like the place to start. I regard the art of photography with a surging feeling that I can distill into a single word:
yes
. That first
instant I saw an image I captured in the basin of chemicals, I was hooked. This discovery is pulling me forward.

Isabelle likes to focus on getting the science right. She’s been experimenting with different solutions for toning the prints. But I enjoy it when the process goes awry—that feeling of wonder when a face appears on the treated paper and you don’t know what to expect. I’ve started to question if the flaws on the finished photograph aren’t an integral part of the portrait: soft focus, underexposure, poorly applied emulsion, mysterious lines and distortions … all of these elements can change the character of the photograph and its subject.

I feel suddenly restless, cooped up in my little room. Is this frenzy of excitement what Paul feels when he composes music? I’m eager to tell him about my new passion, but we haven’t crossed paths since the night I found him drunk on my doorstep.

I get up, put on the fur mantle, grab my hat and new gloves and leave my room. Outside the temperature has dropped, and I walk quickly; the chill nips at my nose and makes my eyes water. Café Chez Emile is a likely spot to find Paul. I peer in the window and do an inventory of the faces, but he’s not there. I decide to head to the neighborhood music halls on rue de la Gaîté—I know he plays at one of them on a regular basis.

I hurry along the busy street and walk into the nearest hall—le Palais. I’m shooed out almost immediately. “We don’t open until six, mademoiselle!” the bartender yells at me.

There is another venue about a block down the street on the opposite side. I cross the road, darting between carriages and an omnibus. Bright lights and the smell of tobacco and wine
welcome me as I walk in the door. There’s a barman stocking bottles and a couple of early patrons keeping him company at the bar. I look to the raised stage where the band sits. Next to the piano, leafing through some sheet music, I see him.

“Paul!” I call out, and my stomach does a somersault when I shout his name. I walk briskly toward him.

He looks up and a smile crosses his face. “Maude! Where have you been these days?” When I reach him he kisses me on each cheek, his lips leaving an imaginary brand as my face sizzles. “I thought I saw you the other night on l’avenue de l’Opéra, getting out of a very fine-looking carriage.”

I mask my surprise—he saw me in the Dubern carriage. “Oh, that sounds like the family’s carriage,” I say quickly. “The family I work for.” It took me back to the agency one evening after the Bois de Boulogne outing because Durandeau’s carriage was in use.

I fumble to change the subject of conversation. “Yes, I haven’t seen you since …” I trail off when I realize I have to mention the night I helped him home. I don’t want to say, “Since I found you on my doorstep.”