Luncheon of the Boating Party (28 page)

lavender.

“Ask me in ten years.”

She was perverse, yes, irritating, yes, but, confound it, he felt himself slipping into her aura.

“You’ve enjoyed leading the conversation, haven’t you?” he said.

She dipped her head in a movement of bashful pride, the practiced gesture of a coquette. Over her shoulder he saw Alphonsine wag her head just enough for him to notice, as if to say,
La-di-dah.
Alphonsine, the hostess of the Maison Fournaise, was the true
fl âneuse,
missing nothing.

Soon Circe clapped her hands like a schoolmarm. “It’s time. Places, everyone.”

At this, Alphonsine glared at her outright. He had to laugh at that.

A sick feeling came over him as he compared his friends to the painting. On the canvas, Circe was an ambiguous mess. Her torso and shoulders faced forward, her head was sketched in to face sideways like an Egyptian queen painted flatly on a wall, and the stripes of her bodice didn’t connect with those on her skirt. And Charles was as stiff and out of place as Circe. Auguste drew his broad-bladed scraping knife across the canvas from Charles’s top hat to his waist until he was only a ghost image.

Seeing him scrape, Jules cried,
“Out, damned spot! Out, I say.”

“The second session of the Convocation of
Flâneurs
and
Flâneuses
is about to begin,” Circe said. “I call on Jules.”

“
Oui,
mademoiselle. To me, modernity consists—”

“Just a minute,” Auguste said. “Charles, I’ve changed my mind. I’m sorry, but I have to have you turn more toward Jules.”

“Whatever you’d like. How far?”

“More. More. That’s good.”

Alphonsine’s beady-eyed look bored into the back of Circe’s head, as if to say,
That’s how a model should behave!

“Go ahead, Jules,” he said.

“To me, modernity consists of new forms in all the arts. I went to Stéphane Mallarmé’s house this week to hear and discuss the new poetry.”

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Alphonsine raised up slightly.

“Were the poems about love?” Circe arched her back and thrust forward her breasts. “All poems should be about love.”

“I can’t rightly say. These were
les Symbolistes.
A mood was more important than a clear meaning. But I can tell you the feeling they gave me. They made me keenly conscious of mystery in life.”

“That’s snobbish of you,” Circe said. “You think we’re not clever enough to understand. It’s easier to say ‘mystery’ than to explain.”

“Well then, I’ll explain as well as I can. It has to do with a concrete thing suggesting an abstract idea to the writer personally. Think of
x
equals
y
and
y
equals
z.
Mallarmé only writes
x
and leaves us to discover the
z.
He said that to name something outright takes away much of the enjoyment of the poem, which comes from guessing the mystery.”

“Give us an example,” said Alphonsine.

“Suppose I’m writing a poem about us here today. Instead of Parisians out in the country, I might speak of animals of various stripes let out of cages, gorging themselves on meat and drink and then licking their paws in the mutual comfort of the pack.”

“That’s not very complimentary,” Circe said.

“There’s nothing wrong with it. Licking their paws suggests the mood of hunger satisfied. The poem would actually be about pleasure.”

“Excuse me,” Alphonsine said. “Can it be this? Those Sunday stroll-ers on the promenade down there with their top hats,
x,
make me think of a hat shop,
y,
and that hat shop puts me in the mood of sadness,
z?
”

“Yes, even though for others it might suggest a happy occasion, buying a new hat. That’s what makes
Symboliste
poets so difficult to follow in their personal associations, but the words and images you use to describe that hat shop will convey the feeling.”

“Then a thing can suggest an idea.” Alphonsine looked at Gustave.

“A rose, brevity.”

Circe let out a noisy breath. “I don’t know where you’re going.
X, y,
paws, roses. It’s all gibberish.”

Her throat tightened in panic, her muscles springing out like wires under her blanched skin. “Circe, turn your head toward Gustave.”

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She did for a few moments, and then turned back to face forward.

Every time she did, the folds in her skirt moved, and that changed the stripes. It was driving him mad. “Circe, you must hold still!”

“It’s the ladies’ turn now,” Circe said. “Ellen, what did you observe?”

“Auguste, may I lower my arm so I don’t have to speak into the

glass?”

“Yes. I won’t paint you while you’re talking.”

“Since I work at the Folies, my story comes from there,” Ellen said.

“The impresario, Léon Sari, is trying out a new trapeze artist, a young Russian with inventive new tricks. Novelty is everything, and the regular act had become stale. Marcel and Marcelline just swing from two trapezes over the audience horseshoe, and Marcelline flies into Marcel’s outstretched arms. To enliven it for the summer revue, they added a rubber baby. Marcelline swings it by its feet, Marcel by its arms. They’re so high up it looks real, even from the balcony, and they fling that baby back and forth when their trapezes swing them toward each other.

“Last night they couldn’t find the rubber baby. Accusations fl ew down the corridor that the Russian stole it to cripple their act. They searched his dressing room and the prop room. The prop master was frantic. The impresario said they couldn’t go on without it. He’d advertised their act, The Flying Family. Their picture with their real baby was on the posters. The audience expected it. They’d be booed without it. He threatened to put the Russian in their place.

“Their real baby is nearly two. Last night Marcel grabbed him and ran down the hallway when the caller came for him. Marcelline ran after him, shouting, ‘No, No!’ All the performers crammed the wings to see. Marcel mounted the hanging ladder carrying that babe just like the rubber one, and the show went on. They flung their child in the air like he was stuffed with straw, his squeals silencing the audience, and at the end of the act, Marcel swung himself onto a rope and lowered himself down onto the stage, carrying the baby. When the child touched the boards, he toddled in circles, dazed, to thunderous applause. People whistled, stamped their feet, stood up and cheered. Monsieur Sari was wild with excitement. Now he demands that they forget the rubber baby and use the child from now on. Petit Marcel. ‘Step right up. Two

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francs for the chance to see catastrophe. An extraordinary pleasure.’

That’s
la vie moderne
for you.”

He had stopped painting. Everyone was silent, even Circe. Her game had fallen apart. Their lively expressions changed to sullen staring.

Circe said in a flat voice, “Angèle, it’s your turn. I’m sure you have something to tell.”

“Next week. I’ll tell it next week.”

Some meditative minutes went by before Jules said, “It seems to me that each of you is a prism through which the light of city life has passed.”

“You mean we’re dead?” Circe shot back.

“Quite the contrary,” Jules said. “The mark of the true
fl âneur
or
fl âneuse
is detachment, the observer who disdains emotional involve-ment in reporting the shallowness and anonymity of city life. Ellen has given names and faces and feeling to her observations. That’s different than being a
fl âneuse.
It’s being a poet.”

That didn’t make them any more animated. He couldn’t paint a lifeless scene. “Enough for today,” he said, rubbing the knuckle on his index fi nger.

He drew Ellen aside and paid her first. “You have a good heart,” he said. She left immediately. He paid the others and they went downstairs.

Circe swiveled her hips getting out of the chair and stood before the painting. “I don’t look like that,” she shrieked. “I’m not a smudge!”

Auguste ground his teeth. “If you held your pose like all the other models for more than a few seconds at a time, I could get more done, and then you’d see yourself, which I know is all you care about.”

Her eyes aimed daggers at him. “What are we on? A barge or a ship?

Is that why Alphonsine is leaning over the railing? She’s seasick?”

She was stretching his nerves like piano wire. “It—is—a—terrace.

If you spoke less, you wouldn’t show your ignorance.”

He paid her but left her there and went downstairs to fi nd Fournaise. At the base of the stairs, Jules was waiting for him.
“Trust her as
you would adders fang’d,”
Jules whispered.

Auguste nodded.

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The lower terrace was filled with people, but he found Fournaise on the bank.

“How is it going?” Fournaise asked.

“Never again, this many people. My next painting will be one person I love, in my studio, alone. Or a vase of flowers. They don’t talk back.”

He took out his wallet.

“Put that away. It’s been taken care of.”

“By whom?”

“The new fellow in the top hat.”

“Hm. That’s a surprise. I owe you for my room, and my own meals.

I’m hoping for an advance from a collector, Paul Bérard, the man in Normandy—”

“Pay me with a painting.”

“Again? It may never be worth anything.”

“That makes no difference to me. Paint a pretty one of Alphonsine.

She’s the reason many people come here. I’ll hang it in the dining room.”

Auguste thanked him and noticed Circe taking Charles’s arm to

step onto the bridge. Now, didn’t that beat all.

He went upstairs and looked at the painting.
Merde!
Even Circe could see the anchoring problem. He wrestled the thing into his room and flopped on the bed, exhausted. Zola equals gauntlet equals masterpiece.
Merde!
He had a long way to go.

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In the Time of Cherries

Auguste took his empty coffee cup into the kitchen, thinking of the relief and pleasure of painting a compliant model today.

Alphonsine.

“You didn’t have to bring that in here,” Louise said. “Do you want something else?”

“No.”

“You know, the one who calls herself Circe? She came fl ouncing in here on Sunday right when I was cooking for a full restaurant, asking for a bowl of ice water. Ice water! As though we have ice to spare.”

“What for?”

Louise wiggled her fingers. “To dip her hands in to make them

white.”

He groaned. “Don’t let her have any flour. She’ll be flouring her face next. She’ll see, though, when my painting is finished, how lovely she’d be with a little sun on her cheeks.”

“Like Alphonsine’s?” Louise’s eyebrows lifted.

“Yes, like Alphonsine’s.”

Louise gave him a quizzical look. “Have you noticed? Alphonsine has been a different woman since you started this painting. So much happier. She sings in her bedroom in the morning.”

“She’s been a delight.”

“She gives more than she takes. That’s her way. A pure soul, she is.”

“Yes.”

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She wiped her wet hands on her apron and stepped toward him,

lowering her voice. “Can’t you find someone for her, Auguste? One of your fi ne friends? The only men she meets out here are those looking for a lusty afternoon with an easy
grenouille.
She’ll have none of that.

She hangs on to the memory of Louis. It’s honorable, yes, but so sad for her to be alone. She has to let go.”

“True.”

She folded down his shirt collar like his own mother often did.

“Have you ever thought of her tenderly? It seems at times you do.

She’s a faithful woman, Auguste, and she adores you. Can’t you tell?”

He nodded, looking at the fl oor.

“She’d be furious if she knew I was talking like this. I shouldn’t have said a word.” She flicked her hands at him. “Go on about your business.”

“My business today is to paint her.”

Louise’s eyes widened. “Oh! Then go, right this minute.”

“May I have a table setting and a white linen napkin?”

“So that’s what you came in here for.” She gave him what he needed and hustled him out.

On the terrace, Alphonsine was having a
café
with her father. A bowl of cherries sat on the table. Perfect.

“Where do you want me?” she asked.

“Sitting next to the railing, facing me but showing some of the chair.”

Auguste set out a plate and tableware and handed her the napkin. “Will you fold this to make it stand up like a sail?”

She took great care and set it on the plate, adjusting it until she was satisfied. He positioned her with her left elbow bent and resting on the table, her left hand at her cheek.

“This won’t hold you up on the big painting, will it?” Alphonse asked.

“No. I’d go mad if I didn’t have something to do between Sundays.”

“You’ll finish it on time, won’t you?”

“Close enough.” He hoped Fournaise didn’t detect doubt in his

voice.

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Auguste put a cherry in his mouth, licked its smooth skin, and bit down, the juice exploding, the sweetness. He placed the bowl closer to Alphonsine. “Eat one.”

She lifted two by the joined stems and tried to catch one in her mouth. Her little mauve tongue curled like a cat’s in search for it. She giggled, caught one, and pulled off the stem. He loved watching her roll it around in her mouth, and bite it to taste its succulence. He cupped his hand under her chin. She hesitated, making a soft purring sound as she chewed, then squeezed the pit out of her mouth and it dropped into his palm. Its wetness, where her tongue had been, an intimate thing.