Paris Kiss (11 page)

Chapter 19

Paris

1929

After I left Louise in Villeneuve, it didn't take me long to track down Georges. In Paris, I asked around a few of the galleries and one of the owners recognised his name.

‘You show his work here?' I said.

‘No, Madame, but he is one of our best customers. Monsieur Duchamp has an excellent eye. He comes to all the openings with his wife.'

His wife. Of course he had a wife. I spent a long time wondering what to wear. In the end I went to Chanel and bought one of the new jersey dresses that had been so elegant on Louise. It was flattering but as I fixed my stockings, I realised Georges had never seen me in a short skirt. The last time he'd seen me I'd been in my twenties. I turned from the mirror in disgust: I was an old fool.

Georges sent a car for me. The uniformed chauffeur drove me to a wide boulevard in the Embassy district and a starched maid showed me into a smart apartment. I couldn't move for chairs encrusted with ormolu and porcelain figurines of shepherdesses. The air was sweet with the scent of roses – vase after vase of flowers too perfect to have grown in any garden. My reflection looked back at me over and over from mirrors lining the walls: a faded tabby cat, out of place in all this opulence. It was so vulgar; I couldn't understand why he lived here, how he could bear it. The answer walked into the room. She was breathtaking, and around forty years younger than me.

‘Charlotte Duchamp, but you can call me Lotta, everyone does.' She had dimples. The clear forehead and look of a stunned hare pointed to a brain untroubled by deep thought. Georges had snared himself a fat little rabbit: diamonds dripped from her ears and encircled her unlined neck, and there were diamond clips in her glossy black hair. It was sickening – not even the hint of grey. But there were creases at the corners of her eyes. She must be about twenty-nine or thirty: jumped off the shelf just in time. This one must have been embroiled in a scandal for her parents to have married her off to an older man. I looked at the ostentatious wall hangings and gilded furniture, so obviously not Georges' taste, and realised it was she who had brought the wealth into the marriage. Georges had been bought off, unable to resist a much younger woman with a fat dowry.

‘I'm afraid Georges is, um, getting dressed.' She tittered and coyly glanced at a hideous onyx and gilt clock disgracing the mantelpiece. It was four o'clock, the time Parisians reserve for making love.

Charlotte – I couldn't bring myself to call her Lotta – made unending small talk while I smiled and thought desperately: ‘How could he? How could he?' By the time Georges walked in, cheeks still pink from his bath and smelling of lemon verbena, I had decided to leave. He was a little heavier in the jowl and his waist was thicker, but Georges was still a handsome man with a head of thick silver hair, and the same way of pushing his hand through it and letting it drop into his eyes. I didn't care about the lines in his face; he was still my Georges.

‘Jessie! It's wonderful to see you.' He kissed me three times, and whispered: ‘Please don't go. I haven't had a decent conversation in a year.'

I wanted to hold onto him, for him to lead me away into a bedroom and make love to me again and again. I closed my eyes and brushed my lips against his earlobe, remembered the first time we'd danced together, a clearing in the woods, his hands in my hair. We must have embraced too long because there was a small cough. I stepped out of his arms and turned back to the rabbit. She looked put out. I sat down on a hard chaise longue and she made sure she sat next to me so Georges had to sit across from us. I didn't listen to a word as she twittered away about people I didn't know; all I wanted to do was be alone with Georges and talk about the past, our past. We looked at each other in agony, murmuring politely as the rabbit nibbled away at one of those dainty biscuits so beloved of the French, a
langue du chat
, and sipped her coffee. Finally, after what seemed like an age, she excused herself and reappeared in a blonde mink coat and a cloche hat. A Pekingese peered out glumly from her arms.

‘
Je m'excuse
, Madame, I have so much to do today, you have no idea! A fitting, then the hairdresser's and a manicure, all before
cocktails at six. Now Georges, remember you have to take our little baby for walkies.' She kissed the Pekingese and it licked her mouth. I suppressed a shudder. ‘Now, don't keep your old friend too long, she looks tired.'

Cheeky little bitch.

She was still talking while she fiddled with her hat and pouted at her reflection in one of the ridiculous mirrors. ‘Now don't forget Plon-Plon, will you?' She made kissing noises in the air at Georges and disappeared in a cloud of
Je Reviens
.

I stood up from the chaise longue and fought my way through the forest of occasional tables to stand over Georges. ‘Plon-Plon? Is that you or the dog?' I said. Poor Georges – how could I stay angry at him?

‘You kick me when I'm down – how cruel you are, and how I've missed you.' He pulled me onto the overstuffed sofa and I disappeared into a mass of feather cushions. ‘It's not funny!'

‘But it is!' I said, hitting him back. ‘This place, and the young, wealthy wife, it's like a Feydeau farce. Should I jump into a wardrobe when she comes back?'

He groaned. ‘Don't, Jessie.'

Georges looked so miserable I stopped teasing him and told him why I'd come.

‘You found Camille? But this is impossible! Last I heard she was ill, had had some kind of nervous breakdown and been hospitalised. It was before the War, and then, you know, that terrible time, it damaged us all.' He held up his right hand. ‘I can't move the fingers. The nerves were severed.'

I hadn't noticed. I took his paralysed hand in mine and stroked it. I had laughed at him only a few moments before and now I wanted to cry for him.

He took back his hand and put it in his jacket pocket. ‘I can't sculpt, or paint, or draw, but what the hell – I have all this, don't I?' He gestured with the other hand. I looked at him and we both started to laugh again, leaning against each other, tears rolling down our cheeks in a crazed outpouring of all our emotions: the sadness of what we had lost and the barbarous cruelty of this brave new era that had been scarred by a war terrible beyond our worst nightmares. It wasn't our century; we belonged in the last one.

When we were calm once more, Georges poured us brandy and sodas. ‘Tell me more about Camille. How is she?'

I hesitated. I didn't want him to imagine her the way I'd seen her. ‘She hasn't been well, but the doctors say she'll be better soon once she's had a rest. The thing is, Georges, I want to find out about her, about her work. There's so much I don't know about her life. We lost touch when I went back to England.'

He looked into his glass. ‘I remember when you left.'

‘Yes.' I moved away from him slightly so we were no longer touching.

‘I'm sorry,' he said.

‘Never mind all that now. Tell me about Camille's work after I left; did she have the success she so deserved?'

‘Oh yes, for a while, before she fell out with everyone. You know what she was like, so hot-headed. After Rodin, she broke off her friendships one by one. There was always some reason – we were all in cahoots with Rodin, trying to steal her ideas, some nonsense or other. Rosa stuck it out the longest, but even she gave up eventually. It's a shame; she could have been one of the greats.' Georges went to the mantelpiece and took down a small bronze piece hidden among all the shepherdesses. He put it into my hands. ‘
La Valse
, she called it.'

A man and a woman, naked, clutched each other in ecstasy as they danced, intoxicated with passion, swooning against each other to a silent waltz. I traced the lines and imagined the imprint of the artist's hand in mine.

‘Camille's?'

Georges nodded. ‘It's quite rare, one of the originals. The Government refused her a marble commission unless she dressed the figures. She did it, reluctantly, and then they refused the commission anyway.' He sighed. ‘Camille never did understand the rules of the game. She should have known those stuffed shirts would never commission such a piece by a woman. She showed me the letter, which complained about the “closeness of the sexual organs”, its “surprising sensuality”. Camille was furious, but Rodin talked her down, persuaded her to dress the woman, and he made sure it was shown. Even so, the critics sneered, said the couple looked as if they were about to jump into bed together. Poor Camille, she couldn't win. I knew she'd never make it. She had some spirit, though. So do you, Jessie.'

He put his good hand on mine and our fingers intertwined, as if they had a will of their own.

‘Do you remember your first day at Rodin's studio? How you and Camille stood your ground against all those men?'

I smiled. ‘How could I forget?' I squeezed his hand. ‘You were a good friend, Georges.'

‘Don't say that; it only makes me feel worse.'

Chapter 20

Rodin's Studio, Paris

July 1884

Camille and I hovered at the door until I spotted Georges standing over a table of sketches with his sleeves rolled up. When he looked up, I waved, but he only frowned and bent his head again.

‘Don't worry,' Camille said to me. ‘His pride has been hurt after seeing you with William, that's all. Watch this.' She called across the room to him: ‘
Salut
, Georges!'

He put his hands in his pockets and came over. ‘
Bonjour, ma belle
Camille.' He gave me the briefest nod. ‘Mademoiselle Lipscomb.'

Georges was being absurd. He had no right to be sulky with me. After all, it wasn't as if I had promised him anything. I made to walk away, but Camille caught at my arm and smiled at him. When she wanted to, she could always turn on the charm and now she looked up at Georges through her fringe.

‘Won't you help us, dear friend? We need you to show us around on our first day of school. Please?'

He rolled his eyes but his expression softened. ‘Camille, you are irresistible. Only, I thought Jessie already had a champion – why don't you get William to show you around the studio?' He looked so like a truculent schoolboy that I wanted to laugh. Besides, I was secretly flattered by his jealousy.

‘Don't let's quarrel,' I said, touching him lightly on the arm, ‘it's a bore to fall out when we have such fun together.' He took my hand, turned it over and traced a finger down my lifeline. I closed my hand and trapped his finger. Georges grinned.

‘Well, all right, since you'll both be eaten alive otherwise. It would be an act of cruelty to throw two dumb animals to the wolves.'

I pinched his finger and Camille rounded on him, fists on her hips. ‘Who are you calling dumb animals?' she cried and I added: ‘The only dumb animal around here is…' He put up his arms as if fending off a couple of street thugs and begged for mercy. Suddenly he was the Georges we knew again, our ally and friend.

‘A truce, I beg of you vixens! Come on, I'll show you where to leave your hats and coats. It's not much, I'm afraid, but it's relatively private, it's where the models change.' He led us to a dressing screen in a corner of the vast room. Georges pulled the screen back to reveal a packing case and two enormous coats hanging from a couple of nails. ‘The only dustcoats we have are for men,' he said. ‘We're not used to women in this
atelier
– no Turkish rugs and cups of tea here. You'll have to rough it with the rest of us. This is where the real work begins.'

I didn't like the way he was talking down to us as if we were simpering debutantes and was about to tell him exactly what he could do with his dustcoats when Camille pressed my side in warning.

‘Georges, we know you are the senior assistant here and we the lowly newcomers, but we also know you've never roughed it in your life. I'll bet you have a secret supply of luxuries stashed away somewhere. Confess!'

He pushed a hand through his hair. ‘Am I being a pompous imbecile? Don't answer that – I can tell by Jessie's face.'

I made myself calm down. I would have to learn Camille's trick of charming a man into treating her as an equal; it seemed to work better than confronting them shrilly as I and other firebrands had done in England to such little effect.

Georges sat down on a crate and tapped its side. ‘Camille, you know me too well. There's a bottle of cognac, English water biscuits and coffee in here, and, of course, a tin of caviar from my Cossack friend.' Georges winked at me and I widened my eyes in warning; he'd already nearly given the game away like that once before. He gave me a lazy smile. Now that he had stopped being so bombastic, I allowed myself to smile back at him. Like Camille, he wielded charm like a weapon.

‘Georges, I'm disappointed in you,' I said. ‘No champagne?'

‘Ah, for that we have to go out. But don't worry, I know…'

‘A charming little bistro around the corner,' we chorused.

‘Am I so predictable?'

‘Thankfully, yes,' I said. I sat next down next to him. He casually slipped his arm behind my back and I leaned surreptitiously into him. Georges groaned when Camille began to take off her hat.

‘Camille! Not that awful straw boater again. If you want to learn how to wear a hat with style, only look at Jessie's, how it tips over one eye and there's the mink trim that frames her face.' He unpinned my hat and smoothed a strand of hair behind my ear. ‘And it's perfect with the little cape she is wearing.' He ran his hand down the embroidered peacock feathers on the sleeve of my dolman and let his hand rest in the swansdown cuff. ‘Exquisite,' he murmured.

Camille was watching us closely, a smile threatening. ‘Jessie has a weakness for fine things.'

Georges lit a Turkish cigarette and eyed me through coils of aromatic tobacco. ‘As do I,' he said.

This was getting out of hand. Georges was maddeningly used to seducing women, but I was not one of his easy conquests, an impressionable
grisette
who would give in to him after a clutch of compliments. I stood up and briskly pulled on a dustcoat, folding back the sleeves.

‘Right,' I said. ‘Let's get to work.'

I nearly laughed again when I glanced at Georges. He looked like a fox that has just seen a plump hen disappear into the safety of the chicken coop.

He sighed. ‘I'll show you what Rodin wants you to do.'

We stood among
The Burghers of Calais
;
the six larger-than-life figures loomed over us.

Georges was all business again. ‘The hands and feet are unfinished – that's where you come in, Camille. Rodin believes the hands and feet are the most expressive parts of the body. There are some examples in here that will start you off.' He pulled open a drawer, compartmentalised like those used for storing butterfly collections. It held rows and rows of clay hands and feet, tiny and minutely detailed, modelled from men, women and infants. Camille picked up a baby's hand, chubby fingers outstretched as if reaching for its mother. She cradled it in her own palm, as if it were an injured bird, before carefully replacing it.

Georges glanced at me. ‘Rodin says you have an eye for drapery, so you are our wardrobe mistress. The technique here is to sculpt the bodies naked and then dress them. Rodin believes it breathes life and movement into the sculptures. Here are the designs.' He handed me some papers and held onto them a fraction too long, so I had to pull them out of his hands. We looked at each for a long moment before he released the papers and walked away.

Camille laughed and started to climb the ladder to work on a burgher whose hands were meant to clutch at his head. ‘Watch out, Jessie, I think Georges is getting to you.'

‘Oh please, he's behaving like a child.'

She smirked and I flicked some clay at her.

I stood with my hands resting on a mound of cold clay, studying the Burghers. They stood in different attitudes: one stared resolutely outwards; another bowed his head, as if filled with dread. It felt wrong to cover up their bodies, their muscles tense with life, as if they were about to break into a walk. At first I worked tentatively, but my confidence grew as the sculpture began to take shape. I was working on a particularly tricky fold of cloth when I became aware of someone watching me. I turned around to see Rodin.

‘Don't stop what you are doing, Mademoiselle, I like to observe my assistants as they work. But do not expect praise – I have no time for such niceties. If I say nothing, you are doing well.' He circled his stick in the air. ‘Please, continue. While you work, I'll tell you the story behind the sculpture.'

Rodin leaned on his stick. ‘It is 1347, the Hundred Years' War. The English have Calais under siege, its people are broken, starving. Mothers have no milk to feed their babies and children are dying, their bodies lying in the streets like so much rubbish. Fires rage outside the city walls and missiles rain down on the citizens. Finally, exhausted Calais surrenders to the English king.'

He laid a hand on one of the clay giants' backs. ‘These men have come forward to hand over the keys of the city to Edward, willing to sacrifice themselves to spare the lives of their fellow citizens. They walk in a slow procession towards certain death, each man facing his fate in his own way.' I had grown still as I listened to Rodin, whose arms traced the events in the air. ‘A year after Calais fell,' he went on, ‘the Black Death swept into England, killing a third of the people. God must have been on our side.'

Rodin considered me. I could see why Camille had been drawn to him. He could train his entire attention on you as if you were the only person that mattered to him and the effect was mesmerising.

He looked up at Camille, whose dark eyes were watching us from the top of the ladder. ‘You have both worked hard this morning and made a good start. Pack up your tools now and come to lunch.'

Camille came down and stood beside me, wiping her hands on a rag as we watched Rodin walk out of the studio into the courtyard. We held hands briefly.

‘Are you ready?' Camille said to me. ‘Let's go and meet our colleagues.'

In the courtyard, the hammering had stopped. The
practiciens
, their arms and backs strong from carving marble, were pushing trestle tables together to make one long banqueting table. They lifted oak benches into place while an army of assistants emerged, wiping the sweat from their necks, laughing and calling to each other. Barefoot boys ran in and out with baskets of bread and tureens of soup. The men sat down and began tearing off chunks of bread and dunking it into the thick soup. Camille and I stood together and some of the men nudged each other and pointed. Soon forty faces turned to stare at us.

‘The little dark one would be pretty if she cracked a smile.'

A big man with a black beard and a red kerchief tied around his thick neck waved his hand. ‘Are you blind, Henri? Can't you see the other one has a better body? Hey, gorgeous, show us your titties.'

At first I'd been paralysed, but now I was enraged. I marched to the table, my eyes on the steaming soup tureen, ready to throw it over Black Beard; he would regret he'd ever opened his mouth.

Camille caught up with me and whispered, ‘Don't do it, Jessie. You'll play into their hands. It's what they want – if you do something foolish, it's you who Jules Desbois will fire.'

She was right. They were waiting for me to take the bait.

‘Let me handle this,' Camille said.

One of the younger men giggled and Camille walked over to stand behind him. She put her hands on his shoulders and he looked uncertainly at the other men.

‘This one is a handsome specimen,' she said. ‘What do you think, Jessie? Shall we sit either side of him? That way we can both get a feel of these magnificent arms.' She pinched his biceps as if she was at an agricultural show viewing a prize bull.

The young boy, who looked about sixteen, blushed to the roots of his blond hair and muttered a response. The rest of the men roared with laughter and his companions slapped him on the back.

The
practicien
with the beard shuffled up the bench and patted the space next to him with a beefy arm. ‘Sit next to me,
chérie
. I like a girl with a bit of spirit,' he leered at Camille. She hesitated and I could see her courage wavering. I didn't know if we were going to pull this off. Where was Georges? I could see now why Camille had been so eager to enlist him as our ally. With a surge of relief I saw him sauntering out of the studio.

Georges stood a moment, taking in our plight, and beckoned to us. ‘There's plenty of room down here.' Black Beard stood up. He must have been about six foot three, nearly as tall as Giganti.

‘Butt out Duchamp, they've already got seats, next to me.'

‘Not a chance, Rodolphe. Camille and Jessie don't want to be bored to death by you droning on about chiselling techniques. Rodin will be along shortly to check on the progress of his new assistants and he won't want to find them asleep in their soup.' There was laughter and groans of recognition from the other men.

Rodolphe glared at them. ‘What are you idiots laughing about? Everyone knows I'm the finest
practicien
with the best technique in the whole of Paris.' A noisy argument erupted and we took the opportunity to slip onto the bench on either side of Georges.

‘You took your time,' Camille said to him. ‘I thought we were going to be eaten alive.'

‘Nonsense, they're quite harmless,' he said, beginning to eat his soup. ‘You're both quite capable of looking after yourselves. Look at you, Camille, a rough country girl, who grew up scrapping with the village boys. I don't believe you could be afraid of a mere
practicien
, a lumbering brute of a stone carver.' He turned to me. ‘Then there's the formidable Jessie, a daughter of the British Empire. I can just see her cycling single-handedly across the Gobi desert or scaling the Himalayas with only an umbrella for protection. Ouch! No punching my arms, girls, or I shall put you next to the charming Rodolphe.'

As Georges talked on, giving us snippets of gossip about the
practiciens
– who were highly respected for their skills but also arrogant and fiercely competitive – his dark eyes sought mine and I nodded in gratitude. My heartbeat slowed and I grew calm enough to look around. That disgusting pig Rodolphe was watching us. He'd been put in his place and couldn't hurt us now, or so I thought. I shouldn't have underestimated him: he would take the first chance he could to pay us back for his public humiliation.

With Georges sitting between us, I began to enjoy the busy hum from the
atelier
workers. They talked with their mouths full, drawing on the table with nubs of pencils fished from their pockets. Sitting on my other side was a
metteur-au-point
, whose job it was to do the first rough cut of stone. He
was shouting across the table at a
practicien
who was
anxious to take over and complete the piece.