Cooking for Picasso (39 page)

“Oh,” he said gently. Then he added doubtfully, “And
that's
how you're going to raise the money to save this
mas
as well? On this slim chance of finding some family heirloom?”

“Yes,” I said. “Laugh if you want to. Just get me into that storage area, right now.”

Gil said under his breath, “Well, fuck me, this is just about what I deserve.”

“What other chance have you got?” I pointed out.

Gil pondered this for several seconds, then said, “Not a one. Let's go.”

A
T FIRST,
O
NDINE KEPT HER
Picasso portrait hidden in her bedroom and never showed it to anyone. She focused all her time and energy on making a success of the café and Renard's
mas
in Mougins, which were both starting to look like a good gamble. Because now there were more tourists on the Riviera than ever before, thanks to an actress named Brigitte Bardot, who frolicked on the beach in a scandalous bikini to promote a movie; and Grace Kelly, who married Prince Rainier of Monaco in a glorious, fairy-tale ceremony that was filmed and shown around the world. And so, as the café and
mas
began to flourish, Ondine continued to think of her
Girl-at-a-Window
as a sound investment which, if left alone, would accrue in value and serve as Julie's dowry.

But Julie's prospects for marriage were rapidly diminishing. First, the poor girl fell in love with a local boy who ultimately broke her heart by running off to Toulouse with another woman. If Julie had the confidence of most young ladies in the sassy 1960s, she might have shrugged it off and picked a new boyfriend; but, Ondine observed, Julie seemed to fall in love with being miserable by insistently mourning the boy who got away, and stubbornly avoiding having her heart broken again.

Worse yet, that spring Julie fell ill with a fever of 104 degrees after swimming in a nearby stream. Her condition was so severe that the priest was called in to give her the last rites, and even though she eventually recovered, she lost some of her hair. It came out in sad clumps and took many months to grow back into something that looked presentable.

“She's had so much trauma as it is, and now this,” Ondine worried.

During that time, no boy came courting, and Julie would not have wanted anyone to see her that way. She couldn't wait on tables, so she kept out of sight in the back of the house, helping out in the kitchen. Julie felt that she was doing some kind of penance for a sin she couldn't remember committing. She got so accustomed to hanging her head in shame that even when her new hair grew in and she began to wait on tables again, she forgot to lift her face and smile at people.

And that's how things remained, until one day when a party of businessmen came into the café. Two were German, two French, one English, and one American. The New York accent caught Julie's attention; it shot her right back to her happier childhood days in New Rochelle.

“Bone-jour, ma'am-zelle!” the handsome American called out to her. With his sandy hair, laughing Irish eyes, and astonishingly perfect, small white teeth, he reminded her of those easygoing Hollywood movie stars who were so brave and breezy and cheerful. When Julie leaned over to translate the menu for him, he looked up at her with such gratitude that she felt a warm flush of pleasure. He made a good-natured joke about his bad pronunciation, then he asked her name, and introduced himself: Arthur, a lawyer meeting his colleagues here “in the Frenchie branch” of his firm.

“Say, Julie, wouldja like to go to the movies with me tonight?” he asked. He added coaxingly, “I saw a poster for a great John Wayne film!”

When Julie told her mother where she was going, the girl looked so happy to finally have an escort that Ondine almost wept with relief. Yet at the same time, she felt a peculiar twinge of misgiving.

It was a gentle night, and after the movie Arthur and Julie went for a walk through town where he bought her ice cream. He told her all about his boyhood, and how, for awhile, he'd thought seriously about becoming a priest. When he spoke of his deceased wife, he cast himself as a brave martyr. “But I have two kids, and I think the good Lord wants me to have a new wife to complete my family,” he said, as if he believed that his life was of particularly high value to the Almighty.

He must be a very pious man,
Julie thought admiringly, basking in the warmth of his gaze.

After their first date he showed up every evening at the café to take her out. He was genuinely fond of Julie, and touchingly vulnerable, as if he feared she'd grow tired of him and stop wanting to see him. Every time he called on her he wore a searching, eager look; and he confided that Julie's soft, reassuring touch made him feel truly “connected” with someone for the first time in his life.

There was only one problem for Julie—her mother.

Ondine tried to like Arthur, but she had learned never to ignore reality no matter how much she wished to avert her eyes.

“He's the kind of man who can't bear to hear the sound of any voice but his own,” she told Renard after observing that whenever someone else told a story or a joke, Arthur drummed his fingers on the table, impatiently waiting for his turn to speak again, like a bad actor looking for his next cue. And, the jokes he told were often at someone else's expense—even Julie's. “A man like that would make
any
woman miserable, but for Julie, who'll never fight back, he'd be a disaster for a husband!”

“Oh, let her have some fun,” Renard advised. “It's just a flirtation; this fellow will be gone in a week and she'll have a happy memory, and some confidence! Whereas if you forbid her to see him, she'll imagine you ruined her life, and she'll hold it against you forever.” Ondine could see the wisdom in this.

But one afternoon in the café, Ondine overheard Arthur having dinner with some American colleagues. Julie was dealing with another customer, so one of the busboys who didn't speak English came to deliver the check. Ondine, still unnoticed behind the bar, watched as Arthur broke into an enormous fake smile when he handed the money to the French busboy and said in English, “Here you go, why don't you take this and shove it up your ass?”

The busboy, reacting only to the smile without comprehending the insulting words, nodded and said,
“Merci.”
Arthur howled with laughter while his friends just shook their heads.

“Here comes my girlfriend,” Arthur boasted to them as Julie approached him now. “She's French, too, but I've already got her obedience-trained.” To Julie he called out, “Grab your hat and coat, honey. We're going dancing tonight. Hurry!” Julie quickly removed her apron and went to get her coat.

Ondine said sharply, “Julie, I need to talk to you.”

But Julie sensed from her mother's tone that it was something she didn't want to hear, and for the first time in her entire life, the meek little mouse put her foot down. “We're late for the dance,
Maman,
” she called out cheerfully as she put on her hat. “Let's talk when I get home.” Her newfound stubbornness felt like strength, and she flounced defiantly out of the café, giddy with her own daring.

Watching them go, Ondine had a queer feeling; and sure enough, when Julie and Arthur returned to the café later that night, Arthur dramatically announced that Julie had agreed to become his wife. Beaming, Julie held out her left hand, so everyone could admire the sizeable diamond ring there.

The staff and diners applauded—even tightfisted Monsieur Renard poured champagne to toast Julie and her fiancé. Ondine couldn't believe how foolishly sentimental Renard was, knowing how she felt. Perhaps it was a displaced fatherly urge; and, he seemed intimidated by this aggressive American.

Arthur was a sly one, she thought, announcing his proposal so publicly, just to make it difficult for Ondine to object without humiliating Julie in front of everyone she knew.
He wouldn't dare use this tactic if Luc were alive. Well, he'll marry Julie over my dead body!
she decided.

When Arthur finally left, and Julie climbed the stairs to the bedroom she shared with her mother, Ondine said firmly, “Julie. This egoist is not the man for you.”

Fearful that her mother would put a stop to it, Julie shrieked, “You don't know him as I do!”

For Arthur had confided many things to her. He'd confessed that he was not such a popular man with the ladies back home; his first wife, he felt sure, had been more interested in his money and success than in making him happy. “People can be rotten,” he'd said, adding that he'd “just about given up hope” until he met Julie. And when he proposed to her, he'd actually had tears in his eyes.

He'd taken her hand and held it against his cheek, adding in all sincerity, “You're the sweetest human being I've ever met, and I'll raise heaven and earth to make sure you live the good life, because you deserve so much more than this life you've had.”

It had been such a personal moment that Julie couldn't explain it to her mother. And Ondine, although she knew that this was a troubled man, also sensed that there might be something genuine between her daughter and Arthur. So now Ondine asked, “How is he when you are alone? Does he ever ask what
you
want? Is he gentle? Has he said you're beautiful, and that he loves you,
ma chérie
?”

Julie was momentarily thrown by her mother's prescience, for although Arthur had been affectionate, holding hands, smiling at her indulgently, eager to see her again, she could not honestly quote him saying anything about love. Surely he had, once? But some men didn't like to have to say the actual word. Then she thought she understood what her mother really wanted to know.

“Oh, don't worry, he only kissed me. Nothing more.” Julie gaily waved her sparkling engagement ring. “He wouldn't ask to marry me if he didn't love me! Arthur is just like Papa Luc, only richer,” she boasted. “He says no wife of his will
ever
have to work!”

Ondine said carefully, “I'm glad he's good with money. But a woman should earn and handle money, too. If you rely entirely on him, you will be forever at his mercy. Even when a husband is loving, you don't want him to know that he has so much power over you. Not that much.”

But Julie felt only a strange thrill at the idea of total surrender to a husband. After all, that was what all the movies and fairy tales and operas said love was all about. Like throwing yourself off a cliff, trusting that the sea below would catch you—and ready to die if it didn't.

T
HAT NIGHT, AS
Ondine lay awake listening to her slumbering daughter's measured breathing, she suddenly knew what she must do. She crept out of bed to retrieve her portrait from the wardrobe drawer, and tiptoed into the kitchen to lay it on the table.

“Maybe it was a mistake to hold on to my Picasso! If I'd sold it, we could have moved away from Juan-les-Pins and sent Julie to university. Then she'd never have met this awful man,” Ondine fretted. “Well, I could
still
sell it and use the money to travel with Julie, so she'll meet someone better.”

Guiltily she thought of what Picasso said about never selling a gift. But why should he care if she sold one painting? He had so many more than he could count, sitting up there like a king in his castle.

“It's easy for Picasso to talk about not selling it—when was the last time he had to work for peanuts to keep from starving? He's forgotten how hard it can be,” Ondine reasoned. “I wonder how much it's worth,” she mused, staring at her
Girl-at-a-Window
. “But what if Picasso told all the dealers that this painting is stolen goods? If I try to sell it, they'll catch me and put me in jail!” Well, that was a chance she'd just have to take. She recalled that the elderly lawyer she'd cooked for in Vallauris had a nephew who'd just recently opened an art gallery in Antibes. “I'll get him to appraise it for me tomorrow,” she decided, wrapping it in brown paper and string, and replacing it in the armoire.

She rose early the next morning to do all her cooking for the café, so she could leave Julie in charge of the breakfast and lunch service. Then, under the pretext of going to the market, Ondine slipped out while everyone at the café was too busy to notice the package under her arm. She paid for a taxi to carry her precious cargo to the gallery.