Becoming Lisette: A Novel (The Queen's Painter an Historical Romance Book 1)

by Rebecca Glenn

  “That’s not even the best part. Me, I like the branding,” his friend said.

  “Who is that next to the counterfeiter? What was her crime?” the first man asked. Evidently he couldn’t read. He had a head full of blond hair and a dirty face, like he hadn’t washed himself in months. He didn’t look much older than Lisette.

  His companion said, “She is a heretic, convicted of going against the Church.” Lisette noticed that this man spoke with a lisp because he was missing most of his teeth.

  “I bet she’ll squeal like a pig when they brand her.” The blond-haired man rubbed his hands together in anticipation.

  “What about that man there?” the toothless one asked, pointing to a third criminal on the far edge of the square. For some reason he had been separated from the others. He wasn’t wearing a placard, so Lisette was unsure of his crime.

  “Burglar. After they whip and brand him, he’ll be put to death − broken on the wheel. See over there?”

  Lisette looked in the direction that the blond-haired man was pointing toward. She saw a wheel at the far edge of the square. She knew that the burglar must have committed a violent burglary if he was going to be killed on the wheel. Lisette had to leave. She had no interest in watching them break his legs, arms and back on the sinister device.

  “Ooh, I can’t wait to see that. We’ll be here a while,” the toothless man said. The two men went on discussing their other favorite forms of punishment and torture.

  Lisette left the square. It took some force, but she was able to make her way back out and away from the Place de Grève. Once she was past the crowd, she picked up her pace. She wanted to leave the branding, whipping and especially the wheel safely behind her.

  Lisette shivered. Snow had not yet fallen, but the low temperatures signaled that winter was coming soon. A new season was beginning, yet another reminder of how long her papa had been gone.

  Today, Lisette was headed toward Le Brun’s shop. Le Brun’s agent had visited her papa’s studio just days after the funeral, but Lisette had heard nothing from Le Brun. Out on an errand for her mother, Lisette had missed the agent. When she had returned, everything was gone from the studio. To Lisette’s immense pleasure, Le Brun’s agent had taken every canvas, both hers and her papa’s. Her only regret was that she had been safekeeping her Death of Caesar painting in her bedroom. It hadn’t been taken along with the others.

  This afternoon, she would ask Le Brun to sell her painting of Caesar’s death. She was also expecting to receive some money from the paintings that Le Brun’s agent had taken. Le Brun had held his auction weeks ago, more than enough time for him to have collected on the sales. Mother won’t have to get married, Lisette thought. If her mother needed money for their family, then Lisette would provide it. She knew her paintings could support them. She hoped to convince her mother to call off the engagement. The wedding was to take place in three weeks. It will be enough, she reassured herself.

  It felt right to Lisette to be thinking about painting again. In the months after her papa had died, Lisette couldn’t bring herself to paint. The studio had felt too empty without him. Several of her papa’s friends had come to visit her and had shared encouraging words.

  Lisette could hear Monsieur Doyen’s advice: Lisette, return to your drawing and painting. It will bring you solace and help you to get through life’s greatest misfortunes, including this one you are experiencing right now. Your papa would want you to continue to paint. He was so proud of you.

  After Jeanne had made her announcement about marrying Le Sèvre, Lisette knew it was time to paint again. Besides her Death of Caesar, Lisette had no other finished paintings to give Le Brun, but she would collect what was owed to her. At the very least, she could give her mother some money.

  Lisette turned onto the Pont Notre-Dame. Like many of the bridges in Paris, it was crowded with houses and merchants’ shops. She thought of her mother’s words as she entered the bridge, One can never be too careful on the Pont Notre-Dame. Jeanne didn’t like using the Pont Notre-Dame to cross the Seine, for fear that it would collapse as it had in the past under the weight of all of the houses built on it. Lisette thought that her mother’s fear was unfounded. The last time the bridge had collapsed was over 200 years before and since then the bridge had been rebuilt with stone to replace the wood. Recently, a number of houses had been demolished to preserve the structural integrity of the bridge.

  Lisette made her way down the bridge. I must be close now, she thought, surely Le Brun’s shop can’t be far. Lisette had heard her papa’s friends talk about how the picture-dealers’ shops were clustered on the Pont Notre-Dame. I’ll simply ask until someone directs me, Lisette decided.

  She stood in front of the first shop on the street. Lisette searched for a sign, but couldn’t find one. She noticed the wrought iron brackets protruding from the façade that had once held a hanging sign, but were now empty. Hanging shop signs had been banned by the city more than ten years ago, but some merchants had not replaced them with any other signage.

  When Lisette walked inside, she saw a stocky, well-dressed older man standing behind a long oak counter. He was returning a drawer to its place along the back wall of the shop. The counter was L-shaped, running parallel to the side and back walls. There was a small gap, just big enough for a person to pass through, at the end of the front portion of the counter where it neared the left wall. The drawers covered the back wall, from floor to ceiling. Lisette approached the counter. There were several drawers sitting on the counter, all full of ribbons. Each drawer held a different fabric or different color of ribbon.

  The man greeted her. “Bonjour, Mademoiselle.” He was friendly and welcoming. “Can I take out some ribbons to show you?”

  “Monsieur, can you tell me where I can find Monsieur Le Brun?”

  Immediately, the man’s demeanor changed. He squinted at Lisette and said, “I am a respectable marchand de rubans. I do not have anything to do with that man.” He came close to Lisette. “And you shouldn’t either.”

  Lisette bowed politely to him and abruptly left. She walked a short distance to the next shop and went inside. She was in such a hurry to get away from the marchand de rubans, Lisette didn’t look for a sign outside, but the moment she entered the shop, she knew it was a grocer-druggist. She was immediately struck by the powerful, strange mix of smells found only in this type of shop.

  Lisette often frequented their grocer-druggist, Monsieur Goban, to buy her art supplies and foodstuffs for her mother. This shop looked very similar to Monsieur Goban’s, but was gaudier. The mahogany boiserie had a tulipwood veneer and decorative arabesque inlay designs. The carved wood paneling in her local grocer-druggist was not as elaborate or made out of such expensive wood. An enormous, silver-framed mirror covered the side wall. On either side of the mirror were gilt-bronze bras de lumières large enough to hold three candles each. The wall sconces in her Monsieur Goban’s were of a simple, pewter, two-candle design. All along the back wall were shelves lined with bottles full of cinnamon, oil, pigments, sugar, arsenic, brandy, jam and cheese. As she looked at the jam and cheese, Lisette felt her stomach grumble. When was the last time I ate? she wondered.

  A stocky woman wearing an apron peered up from behind the counter. “What would you like?” she asked curtly.

  “Madame, can you tell me where I might find Monsieur Le Brun’s shop?”

  The woman scrunched up her face and pointed her finger wildly at Lisette. “Get out! I will not have that scoundrel’s name uttered in here!”

  Lisette quickly ran out of the grocer-druggist. Le Brun must be close, she thought. If all of these shopkeepers knew who he was, his shop couldn’t be far.

  Before she had moved away from the grocer-druggist’s storefront, a young girl came out of the store.

  “Mademoiselle, I apologize for my mother. I believe the proprietor you are seeking is farther down, toward the middle of the bridge,” the girl said and scurried back inside the shop.
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  Lisette started walking again. Her search for Le Brun was taking much longer than she had expected. She tightened her cloak once more.

  When she had reached the middle of the bridge, Lisette stopped and searched the buildings for Le Brun’s shop sign. Not seeing it, she decided to look in the windows of each building. She began with the one in front of her. Lisette peered through the shop’s front windows and saw that it was crammed floor to ceiling with paintings. This must be it, she thought.

  Lisette went inside. She was immediately struck by the grandness of the space. The ceilings were very high and the walls were covered with intricate boiserie, which was difficult to see because the profusion of paintings covered the beautiful wood paneling. It reminded her of the galleries inside the Louvre. Lisette craned her neck to see the paintings hung at the intersection of the ceiling and the wall. As she looked up, she noticed how the paintings were illuminated from above. Remarkable, she thought. In all of the artists’ exhibitions she had frequented at the Louvre, she had never seen paintings displayed in this manner. There was a narrow wooden shelf just below the ceiling that surrounded the room. The light coming off of the candles on the shelf lit each painting. It was incredible.

  This must be where Le Brun displays the works in his collection, she thought. Lisette knew that individuals could buy paintings from Le Brun at any time, but the majority of his sales took place during his bi-annual auctions. Lisette tried to examine all of the paintings, but there was too much to see. As she scanned the paintings high up on the walls, she found herself drawn to a series of four small portraits whose sitters looked familiar to her. She squinted to see their faces better.

  “Mademoiselle, how can I help you?” a man’s voice said from behind her.

  Lisette jumped. She had been so busy looking at the portraits that she hadn’t noticed anyone walk into the front room. She turned to look at the man. He was very short and carried himself with a distinct pompousness.

  “I need to speak with Monsieur Le Brun.” Lisette stood up as straight and tall as she could.

  “He is indisposed at the moment,” the man said, barely looking at her.

  Lisette continued undeterred. “I will speak only with Monsieur Le Brun. When will he be available?”

  The man’s eyes darted around. “Mademoiselle, where is your escort? Are you here with your husband or father?”

  “Will Monsieur Le Brun be available soon?” Lisette asked again.

  Before the little man had a chance to reply, Le Brun emerged from the back. Lisette could see there was a heavy, dark red curtain separating the front of the gallery from the back area. He must have been watching, or at least listening, Lisette thought. She suspected Le Brun’s usual business practice was to screen his visitors before he made himself known to them.

  “Ah, Mademoiselle Vigée,” Le Brun said. He approached Lisette and kissed her hand. “It is always a pleasure to have such a beautiful young woman in my gallery.”

  Lisette was confused by his use of the word gallery. She had never heard a picture-dealer call his shop a gallery. Galleries were the spaces in grand houses and palaces like the Louvre where a nobleman’s paintings were displayed. They weren’t places for commerce.

  When she didn’t say anything to him, he spoke again, “How can I help you?”

  Lisette bowed politely. “Monsieur Le Brun, I’m here for the money owed to my mother from the sale of the paintings your agent collected from my papa’s studio.”

  A knowing look came over Le Brun’s face. “Yes, of course.”

  Le Brun went into the back again, but only briefly. When he returned, he had a wide grin on his face. He handed Lisette a large sack of coins. Being much heavier than she expected, her arm dropped from the weight of it.

  “You are a clever girl.” Le Brun smiled at her. “Slipping your own canvases in with those of your father…you knew I would take notice of the superior works.”

  To Lisette, it was bittersweet for Le Brun to describe her works as superior to her papa’s. She didn’t like hearing that her papa was an inferior painter, but at the same time she couldn’t believe that she had actually sold a painting.

  “You’ve sold my work at auction?” she asked.

  “No, not at auction. I sold them to one of my most discerning collectors.”

  “What about my papa’s paintings?”

  “Many were unfinished, so they were worthless. But the ones that he managed to finish were presented at auction, as Louis and I had agreed upon before his death. I’m afraid they did not sell.”

  Papa would be very upset, Lisette thought. He had worked tirelessly on the paintings before he had died. Lisette pictured her papa hunched over his easel, coughing while he painted.

  “But yours did sell.” Le Brun gestured toward the sack Lisette held in her hand.

  She gently shook the bag of coins. Lisette tried to guess the coins’ worth. She moved her arm up and down to better judge.

  “It is 700 livres,” Le Brun said.

  Lisette considered this number. She remembered that her papa’s friends had been willing to pay her at least 150 livres for her painting, The Death of Caesar. Le Brun’s agent had taken exactly six of Lisette’s paintings from her papa’s studio. She quickly computed the amounts in her head.

  “I think my canvases are worth more than that, Monsieur Le Brun.”

  “I do too. I sold them for 300 livres each,” Le Brun said plainly.

  “300 livres each?” Lisette knew that her papa had rarely commanded that great of a sum for a single canvas. She wasn’t sure she heard him correctly.

  “Yes,” Le Brun said.

  Once Lisette let herself accept this fact, she did some more computations. She could feel her face get hot. “How much did you take for yourself?”

  “Fifty percent, plus the 200 livres that I advanced your father before he died.”

  “Fifty percent?” Lisette was stunned.

  “It is standard,” Le Brun said flatly.

  Lisette didn’t know what was “standard,” but she strongly suspected that it wasn’t half. She would never be able to support her family if Le Brun continued to take half of her earnings. Lisette put the sack of coins into her pocket bag beneath her dress. She narrowed her eyes at him.

  “That is what your father and I settled on. He agreed to fifty percent,” Le Brun said.

  Lisette thought about her papa working furiously to finish the paintings right up until he died. Papa must have been desperate, she realized. Lisette wasn’t eager to follow in her papa’s footsteps.

  Le Brun glanced over to the canvas in her hand.

  “Do you have another canvas for me to sell?” he asked her.

  Not at a fifty percent commission, she thought. Lisette put it behind her back.

  She moved two steps closer to Le Brun. “Monsieur Le Brun, if we are going to do business together you will take ten percent for yourself, not fifty.”

  Monsieur Faucher snickered. Le Brun looked like he wanted to laugh too, but managed to stop himself. Then he tapped Faucher on the arm to urge him to gain control.

  “Ten percent, you say?” Le Brun asked. His tone indicated that he was mocking her.

  “Yes,” Lisette replied firmly.

  Monsieur Faucher interrupted before Le Brun could speak again, “Monsieur, we have a very busy afternoon. We don’t have time for this…this girl. I hardly think she is worth our time. We need to get back to business. Our next appointment is in a few minutes. Come.”

  Ignoring Faucher, Le Brun grinned at Lisette. “I see you aren’t afraid to speak your mind…very unusual for a girl. Of course I would expect it from a man.” Le Brun seemed pleased at her boldness.

  Lisette stood tall. She didn’t know if she could remain dauntless for very much longer. She wanted to crumble inside. Please agree, she thought.

  “Confidence is very becoming. It is the mark of every great artist.” Le Brun’s face became serious again. “Forty percent.”

 
Lisette was tempted to agree, but she wasn’t sure. She had never negotiated anything before. Her intuition told her not to give in too quickly. Besides, she knew that earning sixty percent would not be enough to stop her mother’s marriage.

  “Twenty percent and that is my final offer,” Lisette said. Why won’t he just agree? she thought.

  Le Brun replied without hesitation. “Mademoiselle, I am out of time. I have an appointment elsewhere. I must leave.”

  Monsieur Le Brun turned to go. Lisette didn’t want to lose this opportunity. She might not get it again.

  “Twenty-five percent,” she said hastily.

  “If you will excuse me.” Le Brun started toward the back of the shop.

  Before he could disappear behind the curtain, Lisette moved to block his path. “Monsieur Le Brun, please, can’t we agree on a number today?”

  “Mademoiselle Vigée, you are charming. You are also a very talented painter whose paintings I would be happy to sell. But at a forty percent commission. I would be pleased to meet with you again, but I do not have time for this today. Good afternoon.” Le Brun motioned to Faucher. “Monsieur Faucher will show you out.”

  Monsieur Faucher held open the front door. “Good day,” he said to Lisette as he glared at her. Faucher looked like he wanted to push her out with both hands. Lisette moved slowly out of the door. Saying nothing, she met his eyes and walked out.

  As she left Le Brun’s and started walking back home, she wondered if she had missed her only chance to establish a business relationship with Le Brun. She gripped her Death of Caesar painting, still in her possession. She couldn’t give it to Le Brun to sell if they couldn’t reach an agreement on his commission.

  She reached into her pocket bag and felt the heavy sack of coins safely hidden from any prying eyes. Although it was more than she had anticipated, now that the money was in her possession, she instinctively knew it was not enough to prevent the impending nuptials. Lisette’s stomach cramped as she thought of her mother marrying Le Sèvre.