Monet's Angels

by Jennifer Pulling

  Michel looks impatient as if he would like to be allowed to finish this job. ‘They are resigned, m’sieur. At least I bring in a wage. It has been difficult to persuade them but I think they realise I like this work.’

  ‘So you have decided to settle down?’

  The young man sighs. ‘Yes m’sieur, I suppose I have.’

  ‘No more wanderlust?’

  ‘That is for the wealthy, I have realised that.’

  ‘You need a companion, it can be a lonely job if you are on your own.’

  Michel frowns.

  ‘You don’t want to be living with your parents for the rest of your life.’

  ‘Oh la la, never that.’

  ‘Find yourself a good wife, that’s my advice. Have some children, they give you roots.’

  Here am I handing out advice I never thought I’d take myself, he muses. ‘You’ll have someone to look after you in your old age.’ As I have poor old Blanche, he thinks. ‘But of course, your turn will come before that.’

  Michel shrugs. ‘My sisters will do that job.’

  Thank God for women, Claude tells himself. And thank God, I wasn’t born one. I’d never have done what I have, otherwise.

  He leaves Michel to his work and turns back to the house. His eye is caught by the brilliant scarlet of a group of field poppies, which he happily allows to mingle with his cultivated varieties. Beautiful, delicate poppies that only last a few days before their silky petals scatter. He thinks of the old wives’ tale: place a poppy petal in the palm of your hand and strike it with the fist. If it produces a snapping sound then the loved one is faithful. Poppies were Alice’s favourite flower, there was no need to test for faithfulness in her, nor all those other women in his life: Aunt Marie-Jeanne, Camille and Blanche, especially Blanche: angels, all of them, supporting his moods, watching over his inspiration. But what of Judith, where does she come in all this? Seductive Judith enticing him out of his old age to make him believe new things are possible; he cannot put her out of his mind, whatever Blanche might say.

  – THIRTY-EIGHT –

  JUDITH

  R

  ain fell throughout the night in a persistent drizzle. Each time Judith awoke, she lay and listened to the gentle, steady downpour. When she finally got out of bed, it had slackened and, as she sat at her bedroom window, the sun broke through and across the sky arched a rainbow. She gazed and gazed at the colour spectrum and was sorry when it faded and the rain stopped. She dressed quickly, glanced at the opened letter lying on the bedside table and decided against breakfast. As she stepped out of the hotel into the street, she saw the sun’s growing heat had already drawn moisture from the surface of the road and the air smelled sweet. She had only gone a few yards when she saw, ahead of her, Dorothy’s bobbing parasol and hurried to catch up with her.

  Dorothy gave her a wry smile. ‘Oh my, look who’s here.’

  ‘How are you, Dorothy?’

  ‘Fine and dandy, thank you, but where have you been hiding yourself?’

  Judith apologised. She felt absurdly relieved to be speaking to someone, anyone, but Dorothy was still eyeing her quizzically.

  ‘I thought I might have upset you,’ she said at last. ‘I did send a message by Mr Harrison, inviting you for tea but I never heard anything back.’

  Judith shook her head. ‘He never told me.’ She felt tears welling up and tried to blink them away. ‘I wish he had.’

  Dorothy patted Judith’s arm. ‘Honey, what is it?’

  She couldn’t speak, the events of these past days flooding over her: Robert, Michel, Blanche and now the letter. It was just too much. The tears ran down her face and she sniffed and fumbled in her bag for a handkerchief.

  ‘Here, have mine.’

  A lacy one was thrust into her hand, it smelled quite strongly of Dorothy’s perfume. She dabbed her face and blew her nose, but the tears kept coming. ‘It’s all just too awful,’ she muttered.

  Dorothy took her arm. ‘Oh dearie, come along. We’ll go back to the house and have some coffee. You can tell me all about it.’

  Judith allowed herself to be led along the street. They were in the picture hung parlour once more. As the door closed behind them, she felt she had stepped into a haven. She gazed around her, seeming to see the room with a fresh eye. The somewhat worn and threadbare carpet, the cheap material of the flowery upholstery were homely and welcoming. She sank into one of the rosewood chairs, catching the scent of lilies in a vase nearby. Nothing awful, she felt, might happen to her here, no cruel words or rejection, only the sense of being safe and protected.

  ‘Lord knows what’s happened but you sure do look washed out.’ Dorothy stood over her, an anxious expression on her face. ‘Slip your shoes off, honey, and rest your feet on this little stool.’

  Judith obeyed and lay back in the chair, feet propped up while Dorothy fussed about her, drawing up a little side table.

  ‘Coffee will be ready in just one moment, then we can have a nice little talk.’

  Soon there came the rich scent of good coffee and a plate of almond biscuits was set on the table beside her. Judith sipped and felt her body relax. She didn’t want to talk but just be, after all these days of tension and striving, but Dorothy was curious.

  ‘Aren’t you going to tell me what’s been going on?’ she asked. ‘The last time I saw you, I’d say everything was hunky dory.’

  ‘It was,’ Judith set down her cup. ‘Absolutely.’

  ‘Then what happened?’

  She sighed. ‘It just did.’

  ‘So tell me about it.’

  ‘I really don’t know where to begin.’ The almond biscuits were nutty and sweet, they tasted like those long ago favourites of her childhood.

  ‘Shall we start with your beau? Your young gardener?’

  ‘Michel.’ Judith dabbed the handkerchief to her eyes as fresh tears threatened. She saw in her mind’s eye his intent gaze, the gleam of dark hair in the sunlight. She heard his whispered words as he made love to her, ‘mon amour.’ ‘Oh Dorothy, I did what you said, I flirted, I led him on.’

  ‘How do you mean?’ Dorothy took yet another almond biscuit. ‘How far did you go? Was it just a bit of spooning or…?’

  ‘More than that. Much more.’

  There came a silence in the room and Judith wondered again if she could possibly be pregnant. Aunt Flo had not arrived but that was not unusual, especially if she were anxious.

  ‘So, you had fun?’ Dorothy rose and refilled their cups.

  ‘Well, yes, at first, but then he got so serious. He thought I’d take him to America.’

  Dorothy frowned. ‘Oh, Judith, honey.’

  ‘I just got carried away. Of course, I didn’t mean it but he thought I did. He talked about introducing me to his parents.’

  ‘You, to his parents?’

  ‘I know and I tried to explain.’

  ‘You should never have let it go that far,’ Dorothy patted Judith’s cheek. ‘But I forget, you’re so young, so inexperienced.’ She sighed, ‘Maybe I shouldn’t have encouraged you.’

  Surprised by her reaction, Judith shook her head. ‘No, I was foolish, that’s all. Foolish and cruel and I used him. I just hope he goes back to that girl of his and forgets all about me.’

  Dorothy sighed. ‘Lordy, lordy! Tell you something, I don’t do it often but I think this calls for a cigarette. I’ll just creep into Paul’s studio and steal his.’

  They drank coffee and smoked. Judith spoke and Dorothy listened. She told of the meetings at Hotel Baudy, ‘so romantic, he said I was his little love.’

  ‘But then he became so possessive, questioning my every movement, ogling me all the time. I couldn’t stand it any longer so I just told him, plain and simple, it had to end.’

  ‘Poor, misguided young man,’ Dorothy murmured.

  ‘Don’t say that.’

  ‘Why not?’ Dorothy set her cup back on the tray. ‘Seems like
he had really fallen for you and believed love could conquer all.’

  At that moment, Judith had the sensation of awakening from a dream, as if only now was she seeing things as they really were.

  ‘It was my fault,’ she said. ‘I led him on. I offered him champagne and talked about travel and America. I flirted. He’s never been outside Normandy. It must have seemed very glamorous, so different from his everyday life. But I never dreamed he’d imagine we had a future together.’

  She saw herself wearing the slinky frock with the low neck, urging Michel to have another cocktail, walk in the garden, alone with her. She remembered how awkward he had looked on the evening he first arrived at the hotel, dressed in the ill-fitting suit. They came from two different worlds, how could he have ever imagined it could be more than a fling?

  ‘Well, you did what was probably best,’ Dorothy put in. ‘No good feeling guilty about it, honey.’ She held out the box of cigarettes. ‘Go on, take another, Paul won’t mind.’

  Judith took up the lighter.

  ‘It’s not only that, as if it wasn’t bad enough, then there has been Robert. Almost as soon as I came here, he was going on and on at me about returning to America. I thought he was being so unfair, considering he does as he pleases.’

  Dorothy blew a perfect circle of smoke into the air and regarded it proudly. ‘That old queen,’ she said.

  There was a pause while Judith took this in. ‘So you know?’

  ‘Of course I know. Him and that Adonis blond, all muscle and no brain.’

  ‘Robert told me no-one knew here.’

  Dorothy laughed. ‘Not the locals, maybe, but I didn’t live in Paris for nothing, except that they carry it off a damn sight better there. Robert! Jumpy as a Mexican bean, always afraid someone is going to find out, and yet he has the cheek to disapprove of me. Oh, I know he does, looking down that long nose of his. At least I’m normal.’

  ‘You surprise me.’

  ‘Little Judith, there is a lot that would surprise you once you’d been here as long as I have. It is amazing what people get up to, the tricks they can play. That’s what I meant when I said a vacation is fine but it doesn’t do to live here. Things get messy and life isn’t such fun, any more.’

  Judith realised she was paying attention as never before, listening intently to what Dorothy said.

  ‘I know you thought I was a spoil sport.’ She bit on an almond biscuit, ‘or even jealous because you are young and pretty.’ She paused. ‘Isn’t that what you thought?’

  Judith examined her nails. ‘Maybe,’ she said.

  ‘I suppose I was just trying to save you heartache. But I guess in the end, one can’t pass on experience, we all have to go through it for ourselves.’

  Another hour passed while they talked. Judith produced the letter she had received the day before, from America.

  ‘They want me to go home. Mother says they have indulged me enough and it is time I knuckled under.’

  ‘She means marry your fiancé, what was his name… Charlie? Is that such a bad thing? He sounds like a nice young man.’

  ‘Oh he is, very nice, but I’m not at all sure I love him.’

  Dorothy stretched out her arms and laughed. ‘Oh, love! Look where it’s got me: looking for amusement because I am often so bored. Soon I’ll lose my looks and who’s going to be interested in me then? America’s waiting for you, you’ll have a good life there and, as I keep on saying, it’s more important the man loves you. Judith, you’ve had these beautiful months in Giverny, short but sweet I know, but it really is best you keep it that way.’

  She felt Dorothy might be right but she had had such dreams.

  ‘I know, honey, and it’s hard to accept things don’t turn out the way we’d like them to. But I promise you, you’ll be fine.’

  It was early afternoon by the time Judith left Dorothy. She stepped out into the sun, almost surprised to find herself there. During the last few hours, her world had shifted and decisions had been made. She hesitated, at a loss of what to do, then started to walk towards the river. Here she sat, staring at the perfect mirror image of poplar trees in the water, as if they inhabited that second, watery world. Then a small row boat appeared with a man at the oars and the water quivered and fragmented the reflection. Judith thought back over the past weeks. It had been a magical time when everything seemed to contrive for her happiness, as if fate were truly on her side. And now, seeing it in retrospect, she thought how foolish she had been, ignoring everything that was said to her. Voices came into her mind, words that reasoned but were also hostile. There had been Robert on the day they had gone into the countryside to paint. ‘It is called being accountable for your actions, Judith, of being aware of their repercussion on others. That is why you would never fit in.’

  He had tried to warn her that her behaviour was causing problems, that such things were not ‘done here’.

  Then Dorothy: ‘Live here for some time and the attraction wanes. You realise the differences in culture, the fact that the locals don’t accept you, will never accept you.’

  Michel had asked: ‘why did you make love to me if you didn’t feel anything? Why did you treat me like a dog? You’re not a virgin anymore. I wonder how that would go down with your smart friends, with Madame Blanche, the old man.’

  That stepdaughter of Monet’s, Blanche, had been the most outspoken.

  ‘It is time you woke up and saw yourself as you really are. You have no idea of this culture, you don’t belong here. You are just a parasite, a nouveau riche. You lie, you have told both my stepfather and me a pack of lies, pretending you were a painter, that you admired my work. I don’t know why you came here, not for any artistic reason that’s for sure. What you have succeeded in doing is upset people.’

  She realised that all of them had sent the same message, telling her she could never realise her dream. There was nothing left but to go home but, before she did, she would try to make amends.

  In her room, she wrote a letter to Blanche and gave it to the boy to take to Le Pressoir. Now the person she had to see was Robert.

  – THIRTY-NINE –

  BLANCHE

  B

  lanche was dismayed to notice a long tear on the right sleeve of her favourite blouse. She had been wearing it when she picked roses for the house, yesterday, but did not remember snagging it on the thorns. As she went to the window to examine it, she caught sight of Michel and Lilli in the early morning garden and lingered, watching them. They seemed to be in serious conversation and there was a moment when the young gardener took Lilli’s hand. Then they parted, he down the garden, she presumably back into the house. What was all that about? Blanche was intrigued.

  The dining room was empty. Papa had obviously breakfasted and gone to his studio. She sat and waited, thinking yet again that the room was decidedly too yellow, until Annette stomped in with the coffee pot. She appeared to be in a bad mood, dumping a basket of bread and dishes of butter and jam onto the table.

  Blanche smiled at her. ‘Just eggs, this morning please, Annette, I am not very hungry.’

  ‘Yes, madame.’ Annette’s expression was grim.

  After rather a long pause, the girl returned with a tray on which were a plate of fried eggs and also a letter.

  ‘Come just now, madame,’ she muttered.

  There was only one person who wrote to her on Hotel Baudy stationery. She slit the envelope and drew out a sheet of notepaper. In the now familiar calligraphy, Judith wrote:

  Dear Madame Blanche,

  Please accept my sincere apologies for any problems I may have caused you or M. Monet during my stay in Giverny. Since our conversation, I have been thinking over all you said and I realise I had not understood the French way of life, nor your position in the household. You must believe that I did not come here with the intention of harming anyone. I suppose all I wanted was to be happy, but that should not have meant at the expense of other people’s happ
iness. I have now decided it is best that I return to America and I have written to my parents to arrange a passage on the Mauritania. You have been very generous towards me, madame. Please would you grant me one last favour? Would you allow me to say goodbye to M. Monet?

  Yours sincerely,

  Judith Goldstein

  Blanche laid the letter down and stared at the cooling eggs. She buttered bread and sipped some coffee, scarcely noticing what she did. Judith’s words sounded sincere and it was a well-crafted letter over which she had evidently given thought. Perhaps Lilli had been wrong in suspecting an involvement with Michel. The question was, what should she do about it? On the one hand, the young woman was going away so what harm could there be in granting such a simple request but… Blanche wished she could be more decisive. She was always able to see the other person’s point of view.

  Throughout the morning, she went about her tasks with Judith’s words murmuring in her head. While she discussed the day’s menus with Marie and tried to concentrate on household accounts, her mind was busy elsewhere. Had she been wrong in her judgement of the situation, taking out on Judith what was truly within herself? Had she just become a bitter, middle-aged spinster, jealous of youth, terrified of losing any power she had?

  Trout with almonds for luncheon with some very good spinach and pommes frites; her stepfather ate heartily, she with little appetite. She enquired, without really caring, whether he had had a fruitful morning and he replied that he had.

  Over dessert, a pear tart with a slightly too sweet frangipane base, he suddenly said, ‘I am thinking of paying a visit to Paris to see another specialist.’

  He glanced expectantly at Blanche and she thought, I am not going to lose my temper, nor try to warn him off. I am sick and tired of taking responsibility. ‘Very well, Papa,’ was all she said. ‘You must do as you think best.’

  ‘I want to ask his opinion of the success rate with cataract operations in America,’ he continued, pouring extra cream over his tart. ‘Mademoiselle Judith has been most encouraging. She told me of several experiences of her father’s friends.’