I Always Loved You (18 page)

“Attempted murder is certainly one way to handle the press,” Robert said, shaking his head, mystified as he always was by the antics of the French. Ernest Nieriker colluded with him in disapproval; they had already agreed that they were out of their element.

“We will smite them all, Robert, just as Édouard did.” Degas shifted his champagne glass and called Édouard over, who had escaped the cloying crowd and lodged himself in the far corner, where he was draining a third glass of champagne. His expression was one of irritation; tonight he had had to explain a dozen times why he wasn't exhibiting with his friends.

“Édouard. Come over here. Tell them what you did to poor Monsieur Duranty.”

Édouard hobbled through the crush of guests toward the knot of Cassatts, enduring the pitying looks of those who had heard that it was now confirmed that he had the Neapolitan disease. It could not have remained secret much longer; he walked now with a cane. It was difficult maneuvering without knocking himself or someone else over, so he took his time, stopping to accept the affectionate kisses of sympathetic admirers, all women, all beautiful.

When he reached their little circle he stood slightly tilted, leaning on his cane. His cheeks had grown ruddy in the stifling apartment. Someone had opened a window, but little of the night's cold breeze penetrated the crowd.

Manet said, “I claim no victory,” though secretly he had loved the excitement of the thing, the harsh clang of the swords, the thrill of fear when he thought for a moment that he might have killed his good friend after all. The police had wanted to arrest them both, but when they learned that Duranty had needed not a single stitch, both of them had been released without even having to pay a bribe. “It was the right thing to do,” Édouard said. “Duranty never wrote a cruel thing about me again. Rather like how you dispatched Monsieur Zola when you first met him, Mademoiselle Cassatt. He'll never write a thing about you now. He wouldn't dare.”

“Have you been arguing with critics too, Mary?” her mother asked. Tonight Katherine, attired in a new gown, looked every inch a well-outfitted Parisian dowager, albeit more trim than most. She and Lydia had embarked on a walking campaign for Lydia's health, abetted by the freedom that their new carriage—a gift from Aleck, who was now more successful than his father had ever been—afforded them. Daily, they strolled the Rue de Rivoli, their arms entwined and parasols unfurled, shopping the windows of dressmakers and bookstores. And Robert, too. Lately, he had been able to give up his cane.

“I merely asked Monsieur Zola some questions and gave him my opinion on one of his books,” Mary said.

“You did?” Abigail said. “When?”

“She chased him away. He lives in Médan now,” Degas said, “in a pile of a house that
L'Assommoir
bought him. He rarely comes to Paris anymore, though he did write me a note, Mademoiselle Cassatt, to beg me to make certain you won't be here next Tuesday, when he plans to come see the exhibit.”

“He did not,” Mary said, laughing and looking about the crowd. Excepting Zola, the cream of Paris intellectual life had crowded into the new apartment on the glittering Avenue de l'Opéra: Alphonse Daudet, the great descriptor of Parisian life; Paul Gachet, the celebrated physician who attended nearly everyone in the room with the exception of Manet and Lydia; Antonin Proust, a member of the Chamber of Deputies who loved fine art; Stéphane Mallarmé, the pursuer of Zola; the art dealer Paul Durand-Ruel, whom Mary hoped might one day represent her; the artist James Tissot, who had abandoned his adopted London to visit Édouard but who was now flirting in the kitchen with Méry Laurent; James Whistler, also in from London; and the writer Edmond de Goncourt. Even Guy de Maupassant was holding forth with Pissarro in the dining room. Anyone who mattered in society was here tonight, but more important, anyone who mattered to Mary was here tonight. Satisfaction flooded through her. Her parents were at ease in the luminous crowd; Lydia was laughing with Edgar; Abigail and Ernest had easily fit in; and Edgar, from time to time, touched the small of Mary's back and smiled quietly at her. But even more gratifying, a thousand compliments had come her way tonight; everyone had sought her out to tell her how much they admired her work. In all her life, no other night had matched this one. The pinnacle had been achieved, everything glorious at once: the promise of love, the promise of recognition, the promise of success.

Berthe and Eugène arrived and made their way toward them through the tight assemblage. Eugène towered above Berthe and scowled at anyone who bumped into her. Not quite wan, but not quite well, Berthe exuded fragility. It was her first outing in practically a year, having been released only a week ago from her confinement.

Édouard kissed Berthe on the cheek and greeted Eugène with another. “You look glorious, Berthe. Doesn't she look well, everyone?”

She didn't look well, but everyone exclaimed over her robust health and general beauty and asked about the baby. Introductions were made, Abigail quietly elbowing Mary when she learned that it was Berthe Morisot she was meeting.

“It's as if everything we said that day at that exhibition has come true,” Abigail whispered to Mary. “And you owe me an explanation of just what was taking place in that room.”

“I don't know what was taking place,” Mary whispered back.

“I think I know,” Abigail said, a teasing smile playing across her lips.

“Tell them what you told me the other day, Madame Morisot,” Degas said when the chatter died down. “Tell them what you said about Bibi.” Bibi was the nickname Berthe had given to her daughter, and everyone had adopted it.

“I beg your pardon?” Berthe said.

“You remember. You said that Bibi looked just like her uncle.”

Berthe blanched. Édouard looked away, out the window, over the heads of the crowd, as if he were stifling a second urge to duel.

“What did Degas say, Mame?” Robert said. “I didn't hear.”

Lydia, too, looked to Mary for an explanation, as did, for some reason, everyone, including Berthe, whose doleful gaze fixed on Mary. The noise of the room fell away as Mary sought her footing. A moment ago, Edgar had been nothing but charm, and before that, nothing but intoxication.

“I think what Monsieur Degas meant is that Eugène and Édouard look so much alike that Eugène's daughter could not fail to look like a Manet. Her father and uncle have such similar countenances. Really, Father, don't you think they look alike?”

The brothers, weary of the scrutiny that had been foisted on them since they were children, nonetheless struck a pose on opposing sides of the circle: chin up, shoulders back. Evidence in court.

“Yes, they are quite similar,” Robert conceded.

“Yes, they are,” the Nierikers agreed.

Berthe, unsteady, said, “They overwhelm all the Morisot in my Bibi. There is nothing of me.”

But Berthe had made a second mistake. She should have said
Eugène
overwhelms all the Morisot in her Bibi, and she knew it. Her pale face blushed a bright vermillion.

Mary said, “Berthe, will you indulge me and let me show you my work? Excuse us, everyone.” Before Berthe could answer, Mary took her hand and plowed through the tightly knit crowd clogging the hallway to the bedroom where her canvases hung. She shooed everyone out and shut the door.

“Degas is terrible,” Berthe said.

“Yes.”

“You're not going to defend him?”

“Of course not,” Mary said. “Why would I?”

“Aren't you—?”

A chill ran through Mary. “No, we are not,” she said in a flat voice, shuddering to think what she would have said an hour ago.
We might.
Or,
Soon.

“Ah. Then the gossip is wrong.”

“There is gossip?”

“Of course. This is Paris. You didn't think his attentions to you would go unnoticed, did you?”

“But why would you listen, Berthe?” Mary said.
You, of all people
, she wanted to say
.

“I'm sorry. I've been cooped up with the maids too long.” Berthe's hands flew to her flushed face. “Why does he persist in making me miserable?”

“I don't think it's you he's teasing. I expect it's Édouard. They might be outside killing one another right now.”

“Sometimes, I think I should never show myself in society again. All that time at home, in bed, isolated, waiting for Bibi . . . it was a less exposed life.”

Mary hesitated, but tonight had altered any intention of restraint she might have exercised even a few hours ago. She feared that Berthe might consider what she was about to ask her cruel, perhaps as cruel as Degas's jest had been, but Berthe had tried to warn her a long time ago. In fact so many people had warned her not only to take care, but that Degas was not as he seemed, that now the kiss, in all its splendid beauty, seemed an act of immense folly.

“Tell me, Berthe, do you regret anything? I'm sorry to ask. I mean no harm, truly. But has it been worth it?”

Rain and wind lashed at the window glass
.
Berthe looked around the empty room as if searching for an anchor in the deluge.

“Live without having loved? I don't know if I would have wanted that. Sometimes, though, the shame is too much to bear. I can hardly believe I allowed it to happen. And Édouard has been so cavalier. So many women, while I . . .” She looked away, her gaze running over the pictures her mind was not yet registering. “But for me, he was the only one. And I can't help that I love him. I wish that I could, but no amount of wishing has made it so.” In her despair, she was very still. “I can't help you, Mary. I thought once that I could, but I know what it is to be lost. I am no model, no seer, no lighthouse. Nothing I can say will get you home, except that at least Degas is not married.”

Yes, Mary thought, at least there was that. But he was cruel and facetious. She wasn't sure she wanted to be with a man who would break someone's heart for the fun of it, especially someone he claimed to love, as he said he loved Berthe.

“Do you still have time?” Berthe said. “To reconsider?”

Mary nodded.

Berthe took Mary's elbow. “Good. Then let's forget our sadness tonight. Show me everything. Show me what you have done.”

Shaking off her confusion, Mary introduced each canvas, telling Berthe the problems she had had with each, the challenges she had overcome, her terror at how they would be received. They were all there: Eloise in the blue chair, the portraits of her family and a second one of Mary Ellison, a series of pictures of women at the Opéra, two commissioned portraits. At some point, a knock came at the door and Eugène, his cravat askew, stepped inside and listened too. He followed them about the room, taking time in front of each of the canvases to study them.

When Mary finished, Berthe said, “They are all beautiful. Every one of them.”

“Mademoiselle Cassatt paints just like you, doesn't she, darling?” Eugène said, directing his conversation to his wife, as he often did. “Your touch is a little lighter, Berthe, but Mary's impasto is brilliant.”

“What a lovely compliment, Monsieur Manet,” Mary said, thinking that Eugène might be too dim to be able to silence Degas and too in love with Berthe to believe anything bad of her, but that he was entirely adept at kindness. “Tell me, how is your darling baby? Is she wonderful?”

“Yes, she is. I've gone mad with love—haven't I, Berthe?”

Berthe smiled a vague, far-off smile and said, “Yes. Mad.”

“Are you tired, darling?” Eugène said.

Berthe smiled a weak assent and Eugène took her by the elbow and guided her out the door into the party. As Mary watched them go, Eugène attentive and careful, Mary thought that the art of love might just be blindness: the willingness not to see the truth of anything, to blur life's sharp edges and drift on an impression of one's own making, to act as if the life you lived was the life you wanted.

•   •   •

Later, after the harried ticket taker had finished wiping up the spilled champagne and lugged the empty bottles to the dumbwaiter, she held out the keys to the apartment to Edgar and Mary, who were the last to leave. It was past midnight. Mary's family and the Nierikers had taken their leave an hour ago. Caillebotte, exhausted, had left in anticipation of the next day's ordeal, as had Portier. Degas snatched the keys from the girl and pocketed them, promising that he would lock up and return in the morning in time to open the door. “Now, off with you.”

“Monsieur Portier will not be happy with me if something goes wrong. You promise you'll be here?” the girl said.

Apparently, she had noticed whose pictures were still missing and had drawn her own conclusions as to Edgar's reliability.

“Yes, yes,” he said.

The sound of the front door shutting echoed in the empty apartment. The girl's retreating footsteps clattered on the marble stairs, the only sound penetrating the apartment turned gallery. Mary and Edgar had been arguing when the girl had interrupted them. They began again now.

“If you wanted to have your little joke, you could have just said something to Édouard alone. You put me in a terrible position, having to make up an explanation that anyone could see was a wild concoction.”

“I didn't put you in that position; your father did.”

“But it was you who brought it up.”

“It isn't a secret, is it, what's been going on between them? Berthe certainly knows. And God knows Édouard does. You Americans are too prudish when it comes to such things.”

“My point is that you were thoughtless. It was not a small thing for Berthe. She was devastated.”

Now that the party was over, the apartment had grown cold. Edgar would admit no weakness, but his hand traveled to his watering eyes, naked tonight of their glasses. “This meddling of yours comes from my unbridled affection for you. Obviously it caused too much liberty of opinion. Now you think you can say anything to me.”