Rodin's Lover (34 page)

All he wanted was the buzzards to leave him in peace. And her. God he still wished for
her
. But Camille was no more attainable than the minister’s approval—or pleasing anyone beyond himself.

Mathias sighed and opened the door to go.

“Wait.” Auguste stood. “Camille . . . She’s in desperate need of money. I’ve sent a student her way for tutoring, but she refused her. Can we find a way to secure a commission for her? Even a bronzing?”

“I will do all I can.”

He shook Mathias’s hand and gripped his arm with the other. “You are a good friend.”

March 1913

D
rip, drip, drip.

A trickle, unbearable in tenor, beat against the empty sound. A leak in the ceiling, perhaps? Or a rivulet of poison Auguste had dispensed to rid his world of her. Shredded paper curled from the vast plains of wall and disintegrated in the puddle-soaked floor in the apartment at the Quai de Bourbon. The smell of rotting garbage hung in the air, thick as a coastal fog.

Camille kicked aside a pile of rubble and swung the mallet again. It connected with a terra-cotta bust, cracking it in two. She cared nothing for the pieces she had smashed.

Drip, drip, drip.

“Again!” she shouted, her voice hoarse. She pulverized the bust and its orange dust rained to the floor. The shattered sculpture would join the other worthless pieces, an array of busted heads and nymphs, shattered bodies, and children’s faces.

Drip, drip, drip.

Camille panted; her breath billowed from her lips in little clouds. She hadn’t enough wood to heat the place more than a few days at a time. She looked around her atelier at a broken armchair, the dozens of empty wine bottles. But those did not pose a threat to her livelihood. No, it was the maquettes, all emblems of her precious ideas—
she must smash them all before Rodin stole them away. He was a thief and a liar, a man absorbed only in his own fame, and he would stop at nothing to ruin her. She had seen his band of spies, waiting in the dark corners of the street to nab her and poison her. She shivered at the thought, suddenly glad she had barred her door with plywood. Yet the dripping—would it poison her? Her eyes darted from one leak in the ceiling to the next. She gripped her mallet in her hands once more.

The Dawn
, the portrait of a young girl’s face full of promise, caught her attention. The girl’s inquisitive eyes implored her to cease the destruction. Camille dropped her mallet and ran her hands over the smooth planes of the face and hair. The piece was too beautiful to destroy.

“You must outlast me,” she whispered to the little girl. “Show them your beauty when I am gone.”

In a sudden burst of energy, Camille jumped to her feet and raced around the room, sweeping dirt off of all her remaining pieces. “All of you. You will remain when I am dust. You must show them! Show them the power of your beauty.”

It was true, and her heart was glad. Part of her would remain behind in this world, always. She could not be defeated!

When Camille had cleaned the last sculpture, Minou—a new cat named after the first and just as beloved—stole out from behind her cover and butted her head against Camille’s leg. She scooped the cat up and snuggled her in the crook of her neck.

“Are you hungry again? Maybe I can take you to Villeneuve to catch a bird or a mole. You’d like that, wouldn’t you, girl?” Her cats were the only ones who understood Camille, who had stayed with her through it all. The cat’s throat whirred in its comforting way. She licked Camille’s hand.

Though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I fear no evil, for you are with me; your rod and your staff, they comfort me.

Camille did not fight the Voice any longer. It came and went as it pleased, in time to torture her, and disappeared again. But she could not suppress it.

Drip, drip, drip.

Her eyes fell upon a tear-stained letter on the desk. A wave of grief hit her with force. Papa was dead and in the cold ground. Mother had
not informed her of his funeral, nor had Paul or Louise, and the ceremony had gone on without her. That was the day her destruction had commenced.

A memory came, vivid as the day it had happened. Louise, Paul, and she had taken bread from the kitchen to feed the neighbor’s chickens.

Paul slipped his hand into Camille’s, and Louise skipped after them. The brittle wind of Villeneuve pushed against their faces, yet they did not care. They ripped their hunks of bread into pieces and scattered it on the ground. The hens’ bobbing heads made them laugh as they raced toward the food. Their clucking and cooing was so satisfying.

Young Camille tossed a ball of clay in the air and caught it, then launched it high again. The final time she caught the ball, she stopped to inhale its earthy scent.

“Why do you love the dirt so much?” Louise asked her.

Camille smiled. “I can shape it into something pretty and let it dry so it will last forever.”

“The flowers don’t last forever,” Paul said in his little boy voice. “They die.”

Papa joined them in the garden. “Are you going to make me something, Camille?” He gestured to the clay in her hand.

“Yes,” she said. “A bird family. So they can peck at each other.”

“Like we do.” Papa laughed and kissed her on the head. “You are very good at making things,
chérie
.”

A pang coursed through Camille’s body. She would never forget the sound of Papa’s laughter. She leaned her weary head against the wall in defeat. She couldn’t do it. Not this, not anymore. She needed help from someone—anyone willing to care for her, to show her the way out of this oblivion. But she had no one at all.

An odd and distant thud resounded in the cluttered room. Someone was at the door?

“Camille!” Paul’s voice cut into her consciousness. “Open the door! It’s me, Paul.”

“Paul!” He was here! “Paul!” she screamed. Camille picked up her mallet once more and beat at the wood hammered tightly across the door. Her brother was here. He was really here! He had come for her.
He had promised to be by her side, always, and he was here! At long last. He would rescue her from Rodin and his band.

Another whack with the mallet and the wood cracked and split. She yanked at the splintered wood and unlocked the door.

Paul burst inside. “God in heaven, Camille. What was all that noise?” His eyes grew round at the sight of the wreckage, and of her. “My dear sister, you are emaciated.” He stroked her bony cheek.

Camille could not understand how she had come this far—how her life had sunk into despair. If only she hadn’t been so stubborn, so foolish.

“It will be all right,” Paul said. “I am here to take care of you. I’m going to take you away.”

She looked at him, confused.

“Come.” He wrapped her in his coat and led her by the hand to the doorway.

“Where are we going?” She pulled out of his grasp. “I can’t go out there. Rodin’s band will kidnap me.”

Paul watched her closely. Finally, he said, “Monsieur Rodin has been shipped out to America. He won’t bother you now. You’re safe.” He squeezed her shoulders. “I’m going to bring you to a hospital, to make sure you are properly fed.”

“No. His spies are everywhere. I won’t go.” Camille ran to the window and peered out, searching out the wicked men who watched her. But she did not see Rodin’s followers or the Devil himself. Perhaps she was safe with Paul at her side. Still, she must talk quickly and nail the door closed before Rodin returned.

“You’ll only go to the hospital for a little while.” Paul cajoled her with a soft tone. “Until you’ve regained your strength and made your penance.”

“Made my penance?” she asked, whirling around to face him.

He pressed his lips together. “You have sinned against God, Camille, and now he punishes you.”

“What are you talking about? Really, brother, sometimes I wonder if you have lost your mind.” Her harsh laughter split the air.

The
douceur
left his voice and his blue eyes turned cold. “The abortion, of course. You have taken a life and now God has taken yours. You have lost your faculties. Some recovery time, some prayer, and you may yet be forgiven.”

“God punishes me for being a woman!” Camille snarled.

A team of horses pulling an enclosed wagon rounded the corner and pulled into the drive. Camille made out the words:
L’Hôpital de Ville-Évrard
.

Paul pulled on her hand. “It is time.”

“No! I’m not going with you! He will find me,” she hissed. “He will steal my work.”

“Please, Camille, I’m trying to help you.” He gripped her arms. “Have I ever let you down?”

She stared at him with incredulity. “Yes! The day you left for America, then China. The day you buried my father and didn’t tell me!” Her shrill voice echoed in the ceiling.

“I have her,” Paul shouted to the men who had descended from the enclosed wagon. They filled the doorway with their dark coats and sullen faces. Rodin’s band—it was they! They had come for her!

“No!” She stomped on Paul’s foot.

He cursed and pulled her against him. “This is what is best for you. You will thank me one day. I will write to you, I promise.”

Camille sank her teeth into the tender flesh between Paul’s thumb and forefinger and fled to the opposite side of the room. She ducked behind a partially dismantled armature fashioned in the likeness of a man. Minou jumped into her arms once more.

“She’s there,” Paul said, motioning to her feeble hiding place.

Paul was in on it! He worked with Rodin to lock her away. The pain of that realization ripped through her and filled her legs with lead. She sagged against the wood base of the armature. She could not escape him—Rodin would travel to the ends of the earth to find her. And with Paul in on it . . . with his God, she could not hide.

A man with gray whiskers lunged at Camille from one side of the armature base. She shrieked and fled to the other side—into the arms of the other man. “Let me go!” she screamed.

“Calm yourself,” Paul said. “We are here to help you.”

As the men pushed Camille toward the door, Minou squirmed in her arms. A feral scream split the air. “Not through the door!” she screamed. “He’s there! He’s waiting for me in the alley.”

Both men held her fast on either side.

“Through the window,” she panted. “Please! You must sneak me out. Rodin will not see me if we are clever.”

The Dark Men looked at each other and then to Paul. Her brother nodded and rushed to the window to unlatch it and swing the panes open. “I’ll help catch her on the other side.” He ran around the building to the front window.

“Hurry!” Her eyes darted to the door. “He will be here soon.”

The Dark Men lowered her over the edge of the windowsill and into Paul’s waiting arms. He clutched her tightly around the middle until the others joined him.

Camille looked up at the rooftops of the neighboring building. A flock of ravens peered down at her.
Les corbeaux
—the keepers of secrets—smiled their vicious smiles. What did they know? Did they know when Rodin would come? Were the Dark Men here to help, or to take her straight to him? She glanced from one face to the other, her panic arising once more.

“Come with us, mademoiselle.” One of the men held out his hand.

They couldn’t make her go, could they? She glanced at the open window of her studio and an oppressive cloud suffocated her.

“All will be well, sister,” Paul said. “You will find safety there, away from
him
. God will take care of you.”

She nodded numbly. She didn’t know what she needed, but she could no longer face the days in the studio, alone.

“Will you take care of her?” Camille asked, still clutching Minou to her chest. “While I am gone?”

A tear slid down Paul’s face. He wiped it quickly and held out his hands. “Of course.”

“I will rest and be well. I’ll come back for you soon.” She kissed the soft fur on Minou’s head. “And Paul? Will you take care of them, too? My sculptures?”

More tears fell from his eyes. “Nothing would make me happier.” He brushed a matted lock of hair off her forehead and kissed her cheeks.

Camille handed Minou to her brother, and glanced at her studio one last time. She did not regret her suffering or the perception it had brought; it had taught her everything—it was a gift, even, allowing her
to know, to
absorb
the emotions of others in all their intimacy, so she might depict their joys or exquisite pain. The beauty—that which she left behind—would transcend the tragedy of her life. This truth tingled in the depths of her soul and somewhere within she was proud.

Camille gathered her courage and blew Paul a last kiss.

The Dark Men half-carried, half-dragged her to the wagon. She looked over her shoulder at her brother and cat, and the single bird with jet feathers that alighted in the courtyard.

This bird knew her, her dark companion since the very beginning.

“It is done,” she whispered.

Epilogue

“I
visited our friend two days ago.” Mathias frowned, an unusual expression on his jovial face.

Auguste felt a familiar pang. It had been years since he had laid eyes on Camille, yet a day did not pass without a reminder of her, even if in some small way. “Was she at home?” he asked. “I arranged another commission for her, but that was months ago now. I never heard a thing about it.”

“Her studio looked abandoned,” Mathias said quietly. He paused, as if weighing his words carefully. “I peeked in the windows and the place appeared as if it had been ransacked by thieves. Something didn’t feel quite right so I inquired with mademoiselle’s family.”

Auguste’s chest tightened. “Go on.”

“She has been committed. To the asylum at Ville-Évrard by her brother Paul and her mother.”

He sat very still as a tide of pain, then pity rolled through him. After a long moment he stood. “I have to go.”

“But our dinner should arrive any minute,” Mathias said, placing his hand on his distended abdomen.

“I’ll pay you for mine later.”

Mathias sighed. “You still care for her.”

“I do not exist a single moment without loving her.” Auguste’s words came out strangled. He stuffed his hands into the sleeves of his coat and left the restaurant. He knew Camille had been ill. Still, he
could not wrap his mind around its truth. She was gone—locked in a facility where no one loved her, and that crazed brother of hers condemned her as if he knew better than God.

Cane in hand, he climbed into a hackney and rode across town to the Quai de Bourbon. Camille’s apartment on the bottom floor sat dark and lifeless. Spring rain fell steadily, wetting his hair and coat. He sucked in a breath of damp air, gathered his courage, and peered inside. Heaps of garbage and puddles of water, wine bottles, and smashed maquettes filled the apartment. He could imagine her there, bent over a piece, oblivious to the rest of the world. She would look up from time to time, say something funny and irreverent, then kiss him with force before ignoring him completely again. A lump lodged in his throat.

Auguste remained there, clutching her windowsill, until nightfall.

When the sky blackened, the ravens in the courtyard dispersed, and his coat was soaked through, Auguste turned to go. Later, he arrived home in Meudon and changed into his chemise. Rose had fallen asleep hours earlier. He lit a lamp and climbed the stairs to his office. His brave,
féroce amie
had gnashed her teeth at convention. She had been an outlaw as he had, creating only for herself. And when he had fallen into the trap of pleasing others, she had set him on track once more.

The golden glow of lamplight bathed his paper. He dipped a steel-tip pen into its inkwell and paused. Was she truly mad, or too impassioned to contain her emotions? He did not know. Didn’t they all possess some degree of madness? He, for his work—and for her. They all toiled in their humanity, and for what? Love did not conquer all; it only made life more bearable for a short time before it consumed its victims. They had both striven to capture love’s essence in marble and clay, to shape it and perfect it.

To leave a mark of beauty on the soul of humanity.

Black ink seeped into the paper as Auguste wrote a letter:

Ma Chère Camille,

Where do I begin? My heart is crowded with words unspoken and regret. I have failed you. I could not leave Rose—I did not have the strength. She is my family, a confidant, and yes, a woman I have
loved. I do not desert those in my heart, as I have not deserted you. I will take care of you, forever, in any way I can. I always have.

I wrote to Paul to discuss your collection of works. Upon my death, my art will be bequeathed to the French state and will reside at the Hôtel Biron, a property I hope to make my museum. It is spacious and beautiful—a place befitting for us. I say us, because, you see, I have requested that rooms be reserved for your work as well, for all to admire. You will be known as I have known you, loved as I have loved you, your Eternal Idol. We will reside, side by side, and never be parted. I will fulfill that promise to you in death, as you deserved all along.

This is my confession and my plea for your forgiveness.

I will never stop loving you.

Yours,

Auguste

When he finished, he hobbled across the room and tossed the letter on the fire. He watched as the flames devoured it. Paul would help him gather what had not been destroyed. Her brother would do this for her—he must. And the eternal struggle of the artist, of one great love, would never be forgotten. His eyes blurred with age and unshed tears.

Auguste sat at his desk once more and opened his sketchbook.