I Always Loved You

by Robin Oliveira

  Abigail recovered herself and said, “He’ll introduce you to everyone. I’m a prophet—didn’t I say you ought to meet them?”

  “Will you tell Monsieur Degas how much I admire him?” Louisine said.

  “I’ll probably be too terrified, to tell you the truth. What if I make a fool of myself?”

  “You?” Mary Ellison said. “Never.”

  “You are formidable. Remember that,” Abigail said. “At least I find you formidable.” She smiled and laid her hand on Mary’s forearm. “Aren’t you glad you stayed in Paris?”

  After dinner, when she returned home, Mary studied the portrait of Miss Ellison, which was curing before she shipped it to the girl’s father in Philadelphia. While not masterful, the portrait nonetheless glimmered with change, especially the heightened palette, which she was pleased to see was retaining its vividness in its finished state. In the past few weeks, the transformation she was making in her work had exhausted her. It was as if in trying to paint in the new way, she was rearranging even her muscles and bones. Her right shoulder had grown stiff because of the different way she was holding her brush. Her mind throbbed; she was learning and letting go at the same time, having to unsee everything.

  On Thursday evening, Degas called for her promptly at seven, impeccably dressed in a tailcoat and top hat. She had worn her best dress, as Degas had instructed, a white silk with fringe dangling from the bustle that she hoped wouldn’t be out of place at a house party. Degas helped her with her wrap, then went before her down the spiral stairway, remarking only on the unevenness of the stairs and his gratitude for the candle he carried to illuminate their way. They rode in a hired equipage to the neighborhood that skirted the Gare Saint Lazare, the new Place de l’Europe, with its surrounding streets named after foreign capitals. Tonight it was ablaze with gaslight, a bright contrast to their more humble neighborhood. He warned her to pay homage to Édouard’s mother at some point in the evening because even though she hid herself in the corner, Madame Manet was the true host of the party.

  When she stepped into the flat at 49 Rue de Saint-Pétersbourg, it was only half past seven in the evening and already blue smoke was settling like an ocean fog in the close confines of a parlor populated mostly by men. Degas had led her astray. The few women were attired not for the Opéra but in less showy gowns of muted tones. Mary took off her wrap and handed it to the maid, who took it along with Degas’s top hat, but not before conferring a smirking glance on the splendor of Mary’s dress.

  “Degas! Mother will be furious with you. How rude you are to bring a guest you haven’t warned us about.” A man barreled toward them through a widening path of guests, a glass of champagne aloft in one hand. “And when she is so well dressed, too.”

  “Édouard Manet, may I introduce Mademoiselle Cassatt? She is a painter. She is joining us next year for our exhibition, which, if you weren’t such a bourgeois fool, you would do too. But of course you won’t.” He turned to Mary. “Mademoiselle Cassatt, this is Monsieur Édouard Manet, fearless rebel of the art world and our host for the evening.”

  “It is lovely to meet you, Mademoiselle Cassatt. It’s a shame you are here with Monsieur Degas, but you are very welcome.” Manet’s was a welcoming kind of handsome, all wrapped up in a reddish beard and snapping blue eyes and a gaze of such scrutiny that Mary nearly blushed.

  “Thank you, Monsieur Manet,” Mary said, conscious of the covert glances cast their way. A quiet hum had replaced the cacophony that had greeted them; everyone had lowered their voices to eavesdrop on their conversation. “Monsieur Degas didn’t tell me he had invited me illegally. I would be happy to leave, if that would suit you.”

  Quiet titters filled the room.

  Édouard laughed and said, “Only an American would suggest such an unhappy solution.”

  Relieved that Édouard had understood her joke, she smiled, but there was only one way he could know she was American. “We Americans can’t quite seem to get the French e’s or r’s properly out of our mouths. A fatal flaw, I fear.”

  “I forgive you! Not the rest of your countrymen, but you, certainly. Come in and let me introduce you or at least force Monsieur Degas to do the honors now that he has exceeded the bounds of my hospitality.”

  “Hush, Édouard, or you’ll frighten Mademoiselle Cassatt,” Degas said. “She will think I have no manners.”

  “You don’t have any manners,” Manet said, placing the palm of his hand on the small of Mary’s back and escorting her deeper into the parlor.

  • • •

  Across the room, Suzanne Manet was hiding behind the half-open door of the kitchen, observing the newly arrived Degas and his guest, a woman of severe posture, whose fashionable dress was cinched at the bustle by an enviable amount of fringe that shimmered in the candlelight. The dress came, to Suzanne’s sharp eye, not from the house of Worth, but instead from one of the eagle-eyed but less expensive seamstresses of the Rue Volney, who did reconnaissance at Worth’s elegant store at 7 Rue de la Paix, committing to memory the shapes of bodices and sleeves.

  “This Mademoiselle Cassatt is very American, isn’t she?” Suzanne said.

  “She is overdressed,” Berthe Morisot said, self-consciously smoothing her pale blue dress, its worn beauty no prize next to the magnificence of the newcomer’s. The two sisters-in-law stood with their heads inclined toward one another, inspecting the woman, agreeing that the blazing candelabras heightened the dark caverns under her cheekbones and emphasized the whites of her rather prominent eyes. They examined, too, the throng crowding the long, narrow room. Claude Monet, who was beginning to resemble a bear with his heavy muff of black beard, was eyeing Mademoiselle Cassatt suspiciously from a corner where he, Pissarro, Renoir, Caillebotte, and Berthe’s husband, Eugène, were suffering an endless rant from Monsieur Zola, the writer and art critic. Monet was sometimes mistaken for Zola on the street and once had had to persuade a fervent fan that he was not the famous writer, an idiocy that had infuriated him. Renoir had already shifted his attention from the querulous Zola to Mademoiselle Cassatt, who was accepting a glass of champagne from the hovering Degas. Pissarro was demanding to know why Zola had devoted only two sentences to him in a recent review. Eugène, catching Berthe’s eye, lifted his chin in invitation, but she made no motion to join him.

  Madame Manet, Édouard’s mother, was presiding over her party from an armchair, a glass of untouched champagne at her elbow. She wore black, as she always did, in perpetual mourning for her husband, dead more than twenty years. Gustave, the youngest of the three Manet brothers, was seated at his mother’s side. His presence could usually mitigate the wide gulf between his two brothers, but he rarely made it to these Thursdays, as his interest in art paled in comparison to his interest in advancing as quickly as possible through the hierarchy of the French bureaucracy, a desire that entailed religious attendance at the Thursday evenings of an influential magistrate. Suzanne’s younger brother, Léon Leenhoff, also kept Madame Manet company, but he appeared as bored as any young man might in the face of family obligation. Though it was rarely said outright, and never discussed in the Manets’ home, everyone believed him to be Édouard’s son, conceived more than a decade before their marriage, even though Édouard had spent the boy’s entire life denying the rumor. It did not help dim suspicion that Édouard and Suzanne had raised him, nor that he looked just like Édouard, with the exception of the ruddy Dutch skin he shared with his “sister.” Neither Madame Manet nor Léon rose to greet any of the guests, though they eyed the door whenever it opened, turning now as the artist Zacharie Astruc and the poet Stéphane Mallarmé entered, sweeping off their capes in a dramatic entrance they hoped would be noticed.

  In short, Berthe thought, the evening was proceeding as usual, with the exception of Degas’s guest.

  Suzanne agreed that Mademoiselle Cassatt was rather finely dressed for so pedestrian an occasion. Recently, the ravages of age had begun to settle in uneven mounds around Suzanne’s belly, somethi
ng she did not want to bring to Berthe’s attention. This very morning she had been mistaken for a fishwife when her mother-in-law had sent her out to execute the errands the maid certainly should have done, a grievance Suzanne added to the long list she kept of her mother-in-law’s serial cruelties. Despite her critical eye Suzanne didn’t go in anymore for fine clothes, not like Degas’s guest or Édouard, who tonight wore a finely cut dinner jacket perfectly tailored to his svelte frame. Shame was the current price of marrying a beautiful man too many years her junior. Well, only two years, but time had been crueler to her. How she envied her husband his stylish aplomb, his good looks, his still youthful face, though no amount of envy could ever diminish her affection. She had loved him since she had first taught him to put fingers to ivory. An indifferent piano student, he had found other, more delicious uses for his deft fingers, ones that Madame Manet never failed to punish her for.

  Tonight Suzanne would play the piano as she always did, grateful that she had something to offer, because one could disappear in this group of gifted misfits, though she supposed since she helped to feed them she could say that she was at least saving them from starvation. Monsieur Renoir had practically disappeared before their eyes for several years, turning more gaunt with every passing day, and she’d heard that even now Claude Monet and his family were living on such extended credit that no one would lend him another centime. She knew why, of course. The fools gave up food to buy paint. Claude and Camille had had to move to the country so that they could feed their little son out of their garden, and Renoir was so poor he begged for money from all his friends, living with the Monets off and on for years. Everyone knew he was besotted with Camille, a transgression Claude somehow forgave, though lately it appeared that their friendship was cooling. Earlier, she’d overheard Claude whisper travel plans to Édouard that he didn’t want mentioned to Renoir, who still had the look of the starveling about him, though perhaps it was his great height that gave that impression.

  Having abandoned Zola’s conversational circle, Renoir now occupied the blue chair in the darkest corner of the room, his long spider legs thrust before him, his narrow face and shock of red beard, clipped to a rectangle, lending him the appearance of a hunted scholar. Catching Suzanne’s eye, he smiled in his benign way, no doubt making something beautiful in his mind of her face. Suzanne often wished that he would paint her. Degas had savaged her—as he savaged all women he painted—in that portrait Édouard had destroyed in a fit of spousal loyalty. She would ask Renoir if he would oblige her. Just once, she would like to look like the adored Camille, a plain woman if there ever was one, but who glowed in his canvases like a radiant flower. Of course, he loved her. That was why he made her look so beautiful, but she would ask Renoir anyway, hoping for the same treatment. And she would make Édouard pay him so the poor man could eat. It would be revenge for all those portraits of Berthe, her dark beauty smoldering off the canvas.

  Suzanne said, “It is a beautiful dress. But taste doesn’t make up for her face. Too thin at the chin, eyes too prominent, and the proportion of her cheek to her forehead is too steep. Édouard would never paint her.” Suzanne realized that she had paid Berthe a veiled compliment, but she was nothing if not resigned to the enviable truth that no woman could hold a candle to her sister-in-law.

  “It’s curious, though, isn’t it?” Berthe said, skirting the danger of Suzanne’s largesse. “Degas treats this one as if she is made of china. Have you ever seen him dote on anyone with such singular attention before? Why, he’s even brought her a drink. Look how he takes her by the elbow. Look how he makes Édouard pay attention to her.”

  “Do go see to her, would you, Berthe? Who knows how she’ll fare once the men get going. I’ll deal with the maid. Degas will bite off my head if I don’t have food on the table soon. One would think the man hardly eats, the way he pretends to faint from starvation when he doesn’t consume his dinner by seven.”

  Berthe crossed the room to join Édouard and Degas and to welcome his guest. Eugène joined them. As his arm encircled her waist, Berthe greeted the gesture with a slight shudder.

  “Ah. Madame and Monsieur Manet,” Degas said. “May I introduce the lovely Mademoiselle Cassatt? I should warn you, Mademoiselle Cassatt, that this Madame Manet is best known as Madame Morisot. There are far too many Madame Manets in this family. And we wouldn’t want Mademoiselle Cassatt to mistake Berthe for your wife, would we, Édouard?”

  Mary, who had spent the last few minutes listening to Édouard Manet and Degas good-naturedly insult one another, noticed that Berthe flinched slightly.

  Édouard said, “Tell me, Degas, weren’t you recently raving to me about a woman in the Salon so impressive that you went hunting for her? I believe you said you made a fool of yourself over her, didn’t you?”

  Degas gaped at Édouard and stated that he had no idea what Édouard was talking about.

  “Welcome to our unruly Thursdays, Mademoiselle Cassatt,” Berthe said. “Monsieur Degas, you’ve been remiss. You must introduce her to everyone or I will do it for you.”

  Degas placed his hand on Mary’s back, and in the crowded parlor, this possessive movement of Degas’s caught everyone’s attention.

  “Messieurs et mesdames, I present Mademoiselle Cassatt. I have invited her to exhibit with us next year. May you all abandon your bad manners to welcome someone whose talent exceeds all of yours. Especially you, Édouard; see if you can be hospitable to a woman who draws better than you ever will.”

  In the silence that followed, while everyone appeared to assess what she thought of his bad manners, Mary fought not to betray the chagrin that flooded through her. The performance at the door, it seemed, had not been enough; she would be forever judged by what she said next. This was the way of intellectuals—Philadelphian or French, no matter: You had a moment, no more, to establish yourself. And Mary had been in Paris long enough to understand the clannish nature of Parisians, their intolerance of foreigners, their disdain of the Americans invading their boulevards and museums, clutching their Baedeker guides and immolating the French language. Nor did it matter that she was an artist. In this crowd, there would be no easy acceptance.

  “You must ignore Monsieur Degas,” she began, “who seems tonight to possess the tongue of the devil. I claim neither talent nor pride, only honor at being here tonight. My thanks to Madame Manet”—ignoring Berthe Morisot, Mary looked about the room until she spied the figure of the older woman, seated in a chair, who nodded in reply—“for forgiving my cheek in accepting Monsieur Degas’s invitation. I am most grateful to be in your home tonight.”

  This crowd adored cheek. Combined with the false humility, of which everyone approved, her cheek turned out to be irresistible, apart from the abominable accent that they collectively decided to ignore, choosing instead to embrace her Americanism with a generosity they extended to no one else, except James Whistler, whom they all knew from his early days studying at the atelier Gleyre, and who, when over from England visiting, was beloved because he traded witty barbs with Degas all night, thus freeing the rest of them of the burden of sparring with him, if only for an evening.

  No one noticed when dinner sailed out on the tarnished silver trays. All the guests surrounded Mary, though Claude Monet held back. Of the many things he disliked about Degas, he especially didn’t like him always dragging new artists into their midst in an attempt to balance out the landscapists. An American? Degas, he decided, was going out of his mind. She probably painted teacups or something, by the look of her. Renoir stepped forward and kissed her hand. Lately Monet had been snubbing him, and tonight Renoir decided to show his old friend what it was to be a gentleman in the presence of a lady, as this woman undoubtedly was, since the silk alone in her dress had probably cost her a fortune. Renoir was an expert on anything to do with silk. Édouard, stung by Degas’ comment, was challenging everyone to a drawing duel, declaring that he would run to his studio to get them all lead and paper, though he moved only enough to
admit Mary’s new admirers into the fold. Émile Zola merely bowed in Mary’s direction. Gustave Caillebotte, tidy and handsome, smiled and kissed her hand. Zacharie Astruc and Stéphane Mallarmé made chivalrous comments and promptly turned away. But Monsieur Pissarro took Mary’s hand in his and smiled without reserve. Next to the extravagant black beauty of Berthe Morisot, who had extracted herself from her husband’s arm and taken Pissarro’s elbow, he seemed like light itself.

  “Mademoiselle Cassatt, as you have discovered, our dear friend Monsieur Degas, while a genius, is not always kind. To say nothing of his arrogance and presumption,” Pissarro said.

  “It’s true. Monsieur Degas has abandoned me in public several times,” Berthe said.

  “Though you are never without an escort, my pet,” Eugène said. “Not if you want one.”

  Everyone waited for Berthe to reply, but she didn’t. It was easy, Mary thought, to overlook Berthe’s husband. He looked a great deal like his brother, but there was something of the shade about him. His features failed to compel and his voice had a petulant quality.

  Into the void Degas said, “I resent your comment, Pissarro. I am never presumptuous and rarely arrogant. And I am very fond of you, Berthe, as you well know.”

  “You are always arrogant, Degas,” Pissarro said. “I apologize for him, Mademoiselle Cassatt. Mostly, we men forget that we are not in a café and therefore behave abominably.”

  “Monsieur Pissarro never behaves abominably, do you?” Berthe said. “Madame Pissarro won’t mind if I steal you, will she?”

  “I would mind,” Eugène said, but everyone ignored him.

  “I’m terribly afraid she will mind,” Pissarro said. “I’ve left her behind for the week in Pontoise with the children, and when I return home, I’ll be made to repent my abandonment. Perhaps I am as unkind to her as Monsieur Degas was to you.”