The Painting (11 page)

He sounds like an ideal worker. How fortunate for you.

Why are you so happy? he asks, his permanently dissatisfied mouth tightening. You look like something marvelous has happened. Did you save someone’s life today? Did you finally become a saint?

I’m just happy. Every day is a blessing.

He waves his hand in front of him. Please. No sermons. When I have a thousand francs in my sweaty hands from this vase, I will be very happy, and not before then.

She shakes her head and walks down the hallway, then stops. Before I forget, she says, I must ask for some extra blankets.

Pierre is about to protest.

Not for me. For Edmond.

He hesitates.

Pierre.

He sighs heavily and tells her there is a stack in the back office. He relents further and tells her to take as many as Edmond needs. And for her, too. But don’t bother my new employee. I want every last franc out of him, which is my God-given right as his employer, so don’t tell me otherwise.

She’s almost to the inventory room, when she stops again. You know, Edmond would love to see you. Why does she insist? she wonders. Pierre will never go again. Too busy, too self-absorbed, selfish, really. After he went his one and only time, he said the stench was overwhelming, the misery too great. How stupid this war. Any war. Such a pathetic waste of lives, he said, and she held her tongue, almost lashing back, Your pathetic life, Pierre.

Pierre looks at her squarely with flat eyes and strides away.

She’s about to say more, but turns and walks to Jorgen’s office.

Hello, she says. Oh, don’t get up. No, please.

Hello, says Jorgen.

She asks how he is doing.

He gestures weakly toward the tall stack of books; the pencil in his hand is perfectly still.

Oh, look at those terrible books. My brother must have had the work pile up before you arrived. And now he has you. What a blessing.

He perches above his carefully written numbers, each neatly situated in its column. He looks horrible, she thinks. A trace of a man. Almost as ill as the men in the hospital, and she wonders if his leg might be infected and when
did he last eat? His face has become more gaunt; his sallow skin presses against his high cheekbones and his eyes appear feverish and sunken.

She wasn’t planning to tell anyone what she has done. Not even Edmond, who would most likely try to stop her. Her secret, this new deed, but she feels she must do something; why, look at the way his head droops, as if struck by an insoluble, deathly question.

You mustn’t tell anyone. Please, swear that you won’t. She comes and stands by his desk.

He sets down his pencil.

She leans over. There’s a group of women. We’re training to be soldiers, and we’re going to fight for France.

He shifts in his chair and strains to understand what she just said.

She leans closer and says in a hushed tone, Yesterday, two soldiers met with us and they’re teaching us how to shoot. If I learn quickly, I may get to join the fighting in a week or two. She doesn’t tell him how a group of National Guardsmen stood by mocking them, pretending to be hit by a stray bullet.

Her eyes are watery bright, and she tells him when she fired the gun it threw her back three feet, nearly knocking her against a stone wall, and though it was terrifying, she felt a tremendous surge of energy rip through her body. The air smelled of smoke and bitterness. Her hands, blackened from the powder.

Look, she says, extending her hands. Some of the black marks still smudge her cuticles.

He looks from her hands to her blue eyes, wide and childlike, void of life experiences.

One of the women gave her a pistol; she pulls it out of her bag and hands it to him. He turns it over and over, studies the barrel, the trigger. It does what she hoped; his eyes flicker and dart. Now he holds the gun in his palm, as if he might caress it. The hard-edged lines of his face evaporate, and his rigidly held jaw relaxes. He puts his other hand on top of it, and she can’t help but smile; of course he would react this way; he is a soldier who is principled and strong, who is aching to fight again for France.

He runs his hands over the pistol, his fingertips tingling as he recalls his first pistol, a single-shot cap-and-ball pocket pistol, a gift from his father. Engraved scrollwork was etched on the barrel, a silver inlay on the finished walnut stock. When he cocked the gun, the sound was precise and final. Holding that pistol, he felt bigger and more powerful, as if he could shape things, as if he could turn and shift the world the way he wanted to, as the pistol is making him feel right now. His heartbeat quickens and he extends the gun in front of him, aiming at a box of books. He sets the pistol down, picks it up again. Maybe I can help you, he says. I can teach you.

Her face lights up, as if she’s just won something grand and is proud of her effort.

Yes, she says, her bright voice insists, yes, that would be wonderful.

He nods severely.

She tells him rumors are flying that if the Prussians win, they will destroy everything in the city, all the beautiful buildings, the precious statues, and the French people will be turned into servants, she says, her voice urgent. The Prussians want to take over the world.

I don’t know about any of that, he says. Dark hints of despair settle again on his brow.

Let’s begin today, she says, clapping her hands together.

With blurry eyes, he stares angrily at the stack of books and puckers his lips in disgust.

She looks toward the entrance of his office, listening for Pierre. We’ll get back before he notices you’re gone.

He can’t lose this job. Not yet. He looks again at the books, then thinks about the sound of a gun firing.

We’ll sneak out. Pierre is too busy with other things.

He reaches behind his chair and fumbles around for his crutches. She grabs them for him. He hooks them under his arms, hands her the pistol, and says he’ll fetch his rifle.

Wait here, she says, and, removing her shoes, walks into the hallway in her stockings. She comes back and says Pierre has gone downstairs or perhaps to the café for lunch.

Hurry, she says. She hands him his coat. He retrieves his rifle from his room, and they slip out the back door.

T
HE SUNLIGHT SHOCKS HIS
eyes; it has been so long since he’s been outside. The warm air strokes his face, and it feels as if he’s been in a deep fog. They walk down the sidewalk to Burty’s, behind the horse market. Soldiers and people throng the streets. They turn right at the first corner. An old woman cranes out the window and yells to a man down below, Come up, but only if you have a pastry or a bottle of wine.

I don’t want to be a servant to the Prussians or to anyone, says Natalia. She is babbling, she knows, but she is excited and thrilled he offered to help her.

I wouldn’t believe everything you hear.

She is walking beside him, her pace slowed to match his. If you don’t think the Prussians are bad—

I’m not saying bad or good. I’m saying don’t believe everything.

But why did you leave your country to fight for France? It must be because you love France and all that she stands for.

He directs his gaze at his black boot, scarred from wear. She glances at him, waiting for him to respond, but he’s tipping his face to the sun and there are the smells in the warm air, the horses, the grass, the bakery, and the fires, always the smoke. The shutters on most shops are nailed shut, signs announcing their closure. They pass by the butcher’s shop and overhear one woman in the long line say the only thing available today is horse meat. She heard they killed the tiger in the zoo. Down on the street corner, a woman sings, Vive le guerre. A carriage goes by carrying more wounded soldiers and Natalia crosses herself.

She bends down, picks a lone, shimmering buttercup, and tucks it behind her ear. She feels almost giddy and he looks so much better, the grip of whatever held him loosening, and he is looking around, engaged in something other than numbers and boxes. Who cares if Pierre finds him gone? If her brother had his way, he’d chain Jorgen to the desk and give him one dull errand after another.

They walk by a group of soldiers in dirty red trousers and filthy blue
overcoats. She studies them, the way they hold their guns and wear their hats, pressed down, covering half their foreheads. One of them has a Prussian epaulette at the end of his bayonet. Oh, she says, pointing it out to Jorgen. She is happy to be alive, and she looks over at him and smiles. With his help, she will soon be able to stand up for something she believes in. Her life already feels bigger, more grand.

I can’t thank you enough for doing this.

He nods.

She tells him the other day at the hospital, one of the nurses asked about him. She hoped you were doing better and said for you to come by if you needed anything. She gave me this to give to you. Natalia hands him a business card. A doctor named Whitbread, who is supposed to be very good at making artificial limbs. She tells him he’s from England. He came to Paris to help and his office is across town.

He glances at the card and puts it in his pocket. This Dr. Whitbread, how much do you think he charges?

Natalia tells him what the nurse said.

That’s what the nurse said?

Yes, says Natalia. She’s the one with the light brown hair.

That’s a hell of a lot of money.

Do you remember her?

No.

She felt bad for you because had the doctors treated you earlier, she says they could have saved your leg.

His expression remains blank.

Why did they wait so long to bring you in?

He shrugs.

It seems a pity. A terrible pity.

He stops and turns to her. I don’t need anyone’s pity.

I didn’t mean—

That’s the last thing I want. Pity. Goddamn pity. Everything that’s happened, I deserve.

You deserve? she echoes, her lips pulled inward, frightened.

I deserve, he says again, feeling sorry for himself as he looks down at his empty trouser leg. Anyone who pities me is a goddamn idiot.

Red nudges up her cheeks and her eyes tear. It came out wrong, she says. I didn’t mean it that way. She pulls out a handkerchief and dabs her eyes.

And now look what I’ve done, he thinks. She’s a good-hearted woman, the least you can do is not make her cry. She is quivering now, her shoulders shaking, and tears are about to run down her face. Don’t, Natalia. Please don’t. His ghost leg sears with pain and he feels the blood rush to his face, thinking of his callousness. You let me in on your secret, he says, and now I’ll tell you one.

She looks at him with tear-hung lashes. He tells her he was hit by a Prussian bullet. But the French officers who found him thought he was a spy. They questioned him for hours and hours before transporting him to the hospital.

She flinches and nods, as if both frightened and comprehending.

He watches her expression. It isn’t true, what he just told her, but she stopped crying, and he briefly swells with pride at reassuring her. Her chestnut hair looks lighter, he thinks, almost golden red in the sunlight. Then he recalls the truth of what happened, which is so humiliating, he’d never admit it to anyone.

The truth is he got hungry one night. The others in the camp were asleep, and he wandered alone into the woods, hunting for a rabbit or a squirrel. His empty stomach drove his legs underneath him. Such an idiot to walk so far from the other men, he thinks now. He didn’t know how far he hiked away from camp, driven by how good the rabbit would taste roasted over a small fire, so much better than the horrible mixture of sawdust added to the bread dough or the days with nothing. Surely he’d see a small jackrabbit just around the next turn. As he crossed into a small valley, he stumbled and fell. A shot rang out in the night air. His leg felt as if he stepped into a trap, the jaws of it clamped around his calf, ripping off the lower part of his leg. His fall had fired his gun and the bullet drove through his knee. No one found him for nearly two days.

Are you a spy? she asks, peering up at him.

What do you think?

She touches him lightly on the elbow. No, she says, laughing anxiously. No, of course not.

And she is convinced, for the most part, but why did he hesitate revealing his name? And Edmond’s voice haunts her; he has always watched out for her. She feels a small part of herself receding, pulling back from the man beside her, watching him, though she wants to trust him, wants to trust and believe in the goodness of everyone—it is what she’s been taught by the nuns. But some people fall too far from the goodness, she knows this, too. This man, though he is not Prussian, he has such a gloomy nature, his edges dark and mysterious, his disposition solemn and guarded. She wants to tell him he should only think about the highest, brightest, and most noble of things. He should feel blessed that he is alive.

He points to a park bench and says he needs to rest.

They sit and she watches a group of soldiers practice formations, and alongside, children imitate them, armed with broomsticks and mops. She turns to him. He looks down at his empty pant leg folded against the park bench.

Tell me what happened, she says. These French officers. What did they think you’d done?

He says nothing for a while. I can’t remember all the things they asked. But when they finished, they threw me on a stretcher, dumped me in a cart with a bunch of other injured soldiers, and hauled me back to Paris. By then, I’d lost so much blood, I was delirious. He hesitates only a moment, then nods, marveling at his ability to lie.

I’m so sorry, Jorgen.

She reaches for his arm and he slides out of her grasp, walking. She sidles up to him. A horrible idea, she thinks, to ask him to do anything for her. Everything she says and does is wrong; he doesn’t enjoy her company, and look at his long, solemn face.

They arrive at an empty lot. Along the back fence, soldiers have painted targets for shooting practice. Not far away, there is an open-air restaurant with the tricolor flags tied to the trees. Men and women are eating at small tables with white tablecloths. The smell of roasted chicken fills the air.
A woman laughs, the shrillness quivers in the air, along with the clink of a wine glass, a fork against a plate. Cannon and gunfire periodically rupture the idyllic scene.