“No, Madame. My…a friend painted it.”
“Lots of artists in the
quartier
, and soon there’ll be more. Monsieur François, who owns that building across the way”—she waved toward the other side of the
place
—“just turned it into studios. That’ll change things round here, more
mecs
looking for easy girls.” She sighed, and I flushed again.
“Jacques!” Madame Fouillet bellowed, and a long-legged youth scampered out. “Help Monsieur Pierrot with the young lady’s trunk. Room ten. My son Jacques, Mademoiselle, he’ll help you with things if I’m not around. My daughter Amélie works with me in the kitchen and does the cleaning.”
Madame Fouillet prattled like a magpie as I followed her up three flights of stairs to my room. “There’s a washroom at the end of the hall. Call down the stairs if you need hot water at a special time, otherwise one of us will bring you some at seven each morning. I’ll bring you some now after we get you settled, I’m sure you’d like a wash. There’s good drinking water out in the
place
at the
fontaine Wallace
—”
“Excuse me, the what?”
“That iron contraption with the women on it. Clean linens once a week, but you make your own bed,
d’accord?
Dinner’s at seven sharp each evening, breakfast at seven-thirty each morning. I’ll leave you to your unpacking.”
I had barely sputtered a
merci
and given her twenty-one francs for the first week when she was gone. The room was simply furnished with an iron bed, chest of drawers, desk, and washstand, but I opened the shutters to find a spectacular view across the housetops of Montmartre, down into Paris. Back in Arles I liked climbing the tower of the Roman arena to look across the countryside; it was easy to see where the town began and ended. But Paris didn’t seem to end at all. Vast and intimidating, it went on and on, to the very horizon. Would it ever feel like home? Or would I tire of it as Vincent had?
I unwrapped Vincent’s painting and set it on the desk. Madame Fouillet hadn’t brought the hot water yet, so I decided to take off my hat and make the bed. I tried to be cheerful as I shook out the sheets and tucked them into place, stealing glances out the window, but the topsy-turvy day overwhelmed me. I sank onto the mattress, sobbing and clasping the pillow to my chest.
I didn’t hear Madame Fouillet’s tap on the door, and I didn’t hear her open it. “Now, honey,” she said as she poured hot water into the pitcher on the washstand, “you’re not the first girl to be homesick, and you won’t be the last. Where you from?”
“Arles, down south in Provence.”
“Bless your heart, you’re tired, that’s all. Have a wash and a nap, then come down for a good dinner. Everything will feel better in the morning. My word, would you look at those colors!” She’d spotted Vincent’s painting. “Your friend painted that? What’s his name?”
“Vincent van Gogh. He used to live here, on Rue Lepic.”
“Don’t know him. Where’s he live now?”
I stared at the floor. “He died a few weeks ago.”
“Oh, honey, I’m sorry.” She patted me on the shoulder like Françoise would have done, or Madame Roulin. “I’ll light a candle for him in Saint-Pierre. You and he had an understanding?”
“We were going to be married.”
“I’m sorry,” she repeated with a long sigh. “I lost a man twenty years ago during the Commune. Shot by the soldiers. Oh, in time I married someone else, had children, but…” Her eyes returned to the Place Lamartine garden. “Did he paint a lot of pictures, your fiancé?”
It was the first time anyone had called him my fiancé. I looked at her and smiled. “More than you could imagine.”
8, Cité Pigalle
It is a sadness which will weigh upon me for a long time and will certainly not leave my thoughts as long as I live.
—Theo to his mother, 1 August 1890
A
t four o’clock the next afternoon, a respectable hour for visiting, I hired a carriage in the Place des Abbesses to take me down the
butte Montmartre
to the Cité Pigalle. The driver offered to drop me at Theo’s front door, but I descended where the Cité met the Rue Pigalle, figuring the few minutes’ walk would help me gather my thoughts. As I picked my way over the paving-bricks and looked over each door for number 8, I became less conscious of the noise of the Rue Pigalle behind me and more conscious that I was being watched by several pairs of eyes from behind lace curtains. The Cité Pigalle didn’t seem like a street that saw many strangers.
Number 8 was last on the right, tucked behind an iron fence woven with green ivy. No sooner had I approached the gate than the
gardienne
pounced. “
Vous cherchez quelqu’un?
” she asked in the thickest Parisian accent I’d heard yet.
I almost said “No, thank you,” and hurried back the way I’d come, but I squared my shoulders. “Monsieur and Madame van Gogh, please.”
“Troisième étage, numéro six,”
she said brusquely and opened the gate.
I crossed a little garden planted with lilacs, heaved open the front door, then mounted the twisting stairs to the third floor. With each step I grew more nervous. Maybe it was bad manners to appear like this without sending a note. Maybe Theo and Johanna had no interest in Vincent’s Arlésienne
amoureuse
. Maybe they wouldn’t even be home.
A small woman with short dark hair, enormous dark eyes, and a black dress answered the door of apartment number six. “
Bonjour
, Madame, I’m sorry to disturb you,” I said, my breath coming fast from the climb. “I’m looking for Monsieur and Madame van Gogh.”
“I am Madame van Gogh,” she replied with a smile. “May I help you?”
“My name is Rachel Courteau. I was a friend of Vincent’s in Arles, and I’ve come to pay my respects to your family.”
She recognized my name, I could see it in her eyes. Her smile evaporated, then returned just as quickly. “Come in—won’t you please join me for tea?” She stood aside to let me pass into the corridor. “I’m afraid my husband will not be home until later this evening.” Her French was not as correct as Vincent’s; a strong Dutch accent flavored her words, and she spoke with some hesitation.
“Thank you, that would be lovely.”
She led me into a small
salon
, where the sight of Vincent’s paintings made me gasp. A harvest scene of the plains of La Crau shone rich with yellows above the fireplace, while above the piano hung a painting of an almond tree, delicately blossoming against a blue sky. Pink and peach blossoming orchards of Arles on another wall, and above the settee, the starry night over the Rhône. It had been over a year since I’d laid eyes on it.
I could feel Johanna studying me as I studied the paintings, not with contempt, with curiosity. A lady like her would see prostitutes from a distance, from the safety of a carriage seat if at all, and she certainly would never have spoken to one before. How much did she know about me—how much had Vincent told Theo, how much had Theo seen fit to tell his wife? God forbid, did she think I’d come to Paris to ask Theo for more money?
“May I take your hat, Mademoiselle?” Johanna asked with another smile. I unpinned the demure black bonnet I’d bought in Arles, handed it to her, then turned back to the starry night. “That one was shown at the Salon des Indépendants last September,” she said. “The almond tree over the piano he painted when the baby was born. Now please make yourself comfortable”—she gracefully indicated an armchair—“and I’ll return soon with our tea.”
I settled myself and gazed around the
salon
. Shelves of books lined the walls, mostly literary and art books from the titles I could see, and sheet music stood ready at the piano. The furniture was handsome but not extravagant. Even Vincent’s paintings weren’t in fussy gilded frames, but plain white ones that showed the colors to their best advantage.
“Your husband works at the gallery of Boussod & Valadon,
n’est-ce pas?
” I asked as Johanna returned with a tray and set it on a low table.
“Vincent must have told you. Messrs. Boussod and Valadon actually have three galleries here in Paris, and others abroad. My husband manages the Boulevard Montmartre branch, and he’s been in that position for nine years. He works very hard. Too hard.” A shadow passed over her face.
So I was right in thinking Theo hadn’t left his employers; the letter he’d written me had been on Boussod and Valadon’s notepaper. Had they given him the raise he’d asked for, or had he proven too anxious about the future to quit? As of the last letter he’d sent, Vincent hadn’t known. Had he ever found out? I couldn’t ask Johanna, so I simply said, “You have a lovely apartment, Madame.”
Her expression brightened. “Would you believe my husband did the decorating? I lived in Amsterdam until we married, so Theo found the apartment and got it ready. The letters we exchanged with such exciting discussions as the colors of the curtains and wallpaper!” She laughed as she poured our tea into Japanese-style cups. “When I came here, it seemed everything I admired the most was chosen by Vincent when he and Theo lived together. That vase on the mantelpiece, for example, or this jug on the tea table. ‘Vincent found that,’ Theo would say, or ‘Vincent thought that was so pretty.’” Her smile faded once more. “Hardly a day passed that we did not speak of him. Even still.”
I walked to the mantelpiece to see more closely the vase she’d mentioned, a delicate, rounded shape with a little foot, blue as a robin’s egg. It wasn’t difficult to imagine Vincent at a
marché aux puces
or some dingy Montmartre shop, smiling at his discovery as he pulled the vase from a shelf. Proud of his prize, he probably filled it with flowers and painted a picture. When I picked it up and turned it over in my hands, I noticed a chip on the rim that looked like it had been there a long time. Vincent wouldn’t have minded. Its flaws would only have made him love it more.
I felt Johanna studying me again, her unasked questions floating between us. We both had things we wanted to know, but etiquette required us to speak in harmless pleasantries. “Vincent said it was agreeable to have family so near while he was in Auvers,” I said as I replaced the vase and came back to the table. “Did he visit you often?”
“Only twice. The first time for three days when he came up from Saint-Rémy. I’d never met him before, and I was surprised how cheerful and healthy he seemed after a year in the—He looked more healthy than Theo. He was so pleased to see us and visit his friends. The morning after he arrived, Theo and I found Vincent roaming the apartment in his shirtsleeves, pulling out all his paintings to look at them. Some of them he hadn’t seen for years.”
“Like a father gone too long from his children,” I said and had to smile, thinking of that day when he’d returned to the yellow house after his first
crise
.
Johanna smiled in return. “
Exactement
. We went to see him in Auvers one Sunday, to have lunch with Dr. Gachet and his family. When Vincent met us at the train, he brought a bird’s nest for the baby.” A bird’s nest. Like the one he’d given me. “He refused to eat until he showed
le petit
all the animals the doctor had: cats, dogs, rabbits, chickens, even ducks. Vincent wanted us to join him in Auvers for our vacation, but we needed to go to Holland instead to see my parents. We planned to visit him later on, but…” Her smile became a frown.
“Vincent wrote me that he painted a portrait of Dr. Gachet.”
“Yes,” she said, “and it’s very fine. Theo has it somewhere.” She extended a plate with little cakes. “We owe a great deal to Dr. Gachet. He was the one who sent word to Theo when…” She frowned and stopped herself again.
I wanted to hear what had happened, but not yet. I glanced toward the piano. “Vincent also said he painted Mademoiselle Gachet.”
“Marguerite? Yes, but he gave that one to her father. I’ve never seen it.” Johanna paused and crinkled her forehead. How I’d said the name must have given me away. “There was nothing between them, Mademoiselle,” she said gently.
She knew exactly who I was. She couldn’t tell me she did—ladies didn’t discuss such things—but she knew that I wasn’t just another whore, that I’d meant something. She continued, “Marguerite may have been infatuated, Theo thought she was, but Vincent certainly was not interested in her. She’s a well brought-up girl, very innocent. Not his sort of woman.” She flushed when she realized what she’d said. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean—”
“It’s nothing,” I reassured her. “You said Vincent visited you twice…?”
“He came at the beginning of July but stayed less than a day. It was not a good visit.” She pursed her lips and stared at her teacup. “You knew him a long time, didn’t you?”
“For two years.”
“Then you know how he could act sometimes,” she said wryly, “how stubborn he could be.” She sighed. “I wish I could have seen him one more time, to tell him how sorry I was for being impatient. It was not a good visit.”
Johanna sipped her tea, and her face reflected some turmoil inside her head. Had Theo and Vincent quarreled about Theo’s desire to leave the gallery? Had Johanna quarreled with Vincent, said things about his dependence on Theo to upset him?
“I fear more than ever that I am a burden to Theo, that I stand between their family and true happiness,”
Vincent had written after that day.
A loud wail from another room broke our silence. “Oh, gracious, please excuse me,” Johanna said before bustling out and returning with the baby. Vincent’s nephew. His flesh and blood. “This is little Vincent, hungry and ready for his supper. Would you mind holding him while I warm a bottle?”
To my relief,
le petit Vincent
didn’t complain as I walked him around the
salon
, didn’t mind a stranger’s arms. He had red hair like his uncle, light wisps against his pale skin, and his blue-green eyes regarded me solemnly. In front of the blossoming orchard paintings, I’d have sworn he tilted his head to study the colors. I crooned a Provençal cradle song under my breath and was rewarded with a crooked grin that made me both happy and sad.
A voice like Vincent’s in the hallway startled me. “Jo?”
“Hello, dear,” Johanna answered from the kitchen. “You’re home early.”
“Monsieur Valadon vexed my patience today. I couldn’t wait to leave.” Slow, deliberate footsteps, not quick and restless like his brother’s. “I’m trying to convince him to let me do another one-man show of old Pissarro’s work. He kept saying the Raffäelli show wasn’t reviewed by
Le Figaro
, so what’s the point. He misses the point—no vision at all. I’m not going to bother asking him to show Vincent’s work. Durand-Ruel remains my best hope.”
“I’m sorry you didn’t have a good day, dear,” Johanna broke in, and her cheeriness sounded forced. “You’re home now, just forget about it.”
“You’re right, my love, as always. Where’s my little man?”
“In the
salon
. We have a guest.”
Johanna and Theo entered the
salon
, and Johanna introduced me before returning to the kitchen. Theo had the same reddish hair as Vincent, more auburn than coppery blond, as if he seldom saw the sun. The same eyes, piercing and curious. But he was taller and more lanky, certainly more tidy with his neatly clipped moustache, carefully pressed suit, and shiny polished shoes without a speck of dirt. The perfect portrait of a successful businessman, until I noticed how loosely his jacket hung on his hunched shoulders, and how haunted his eyes were.
“
Bonjour
, Mademoiselle,” he said, and I extended my hand, still clutching the baby in my arms. “Welcome to our home, I am pleased to make your acquaintance. I see you’ve met the most important member of the household already.” He smiled at the baby, who held out his arms and cooed for papa. I passed little Vincent to Theo, and for a second the haunted look disappeared. “Please, let’s sit down.”
I felt shy in the presence of this man who’d been so central in Vincent’s life. “I am pleased to meet you as well, Monsieur van Gogh. I came to pay my respects, first to tell you how sorry I am for your loss, and secondly to thank you for the help you provided me.”
He kept gazing at me with those eyes so much like Vincent’s. Was he surprised at the look of me, surprised I had good manners and was nothing like Sien Hoornik? “Thank you for your condolences. I am aware it is your loss too, so please accept mine in return.” I inclined my head gratefully. “As for my helping you, it is my honor to fulfill one of my brother’s final wishes. When did you arrive in Paris?”
“Yesterday.”
“Where are you staying?”
“The Hôtel du Poirier on the corner of Rue de Ravignan, in Montmartre.”
“A good choice. You came all this way to see me?”
“No, Monsieur. I’ve decided to leave Arles and start over.”
His brow furrowed. “What will you do?”
“Find work, to begin with, Monsieur. This morning I saw a lovely flower shop near the auberge with a sign looking for a salesgirl. I thought I’d inquire there first.”
“Not the
fleuriste
on the Place des Abbesses?”
“Why yes, that very one.”
Theo smiled nostalgically. “That shop’s not far from where Vincent and I used to live. He went there most afternoons to look at the flowers. The owner, Madame Hortense, always felt sorry for him not having any extra money, so she gave him the leftover bouquets to paint, the ones nobody wanted to buy. She’s a kind woman, and would be a fair and just employer.”
The coincidence struck me mute. A warmth passed through me, and I suddenly felt as if I was being looked after. As if I wasn’t alone after all.