The Velvet Hours (13 page)

Paris 1898

T
wo days later, Marthe received a letter in the midday post with her name in a voluptuous scripted hand. The return address on the envelope was
41 Boulevard Berthier
, Boldini's apartment.

Madame de Florian,

Your beautiful porcelain arrived this afternoon. You cannot imagine my delight when I opened the box. But first, I must tell you how the package itself arrived. Whoever prepared it must be an artist himself. Around the bamboo crate, a wrapping was created not with paper, but with a large silk scarf. The silk itself was extraordinary, a dark aubergine with a motif of pale blue cranes printed across. I was able to unknot the scarf and see the light wood box with the Asian markings. Who could have sent me such a beautiful and mysterious gift? I thought to myself as I
began to remove the top. When I reached in and discovered an exquisite porcelain from the Far East . . . I knew it had to be you!

Madame, it is rare that I am a recipient of a gift so reflective of my personal taste. The glaze is unlike anything I have ever laid eyes on before. Firstly the color . . . it is no ordinary celadon. It reminds me of the jadeite waters of our mutually beloved city, Venice, but captured in a state of thaw. I know this must have been intentional on your part.

This was far too generous a gift, and I cannot imagine the price you must have paid for such a rare piece of pottery. Know that this beautiful vase will be prominently displayed in my studio and will contribute a dose of daily inspiration.

I cannot wait for your next visit, so I can show you the beginning strokes of your portrait.

With great respect and
admiration,

Giovanni Boldini

For several minutes she held the delicate writing paper in her hand. It was not the heavily bonded paper she had for her own personal stationery, or the one with the aristocratic coat-of-arms embossing like Charles's. Boldini's was as thin as rice paper. Nearly translucent, it reminded Marthe of the paper that children used to make kites. If she opened the window, it was so light it could have blown away.

Each time she reread the letter, she could vividly imagine her gift arriving to his door. It felt like a secret indulgence as she envisioned Boldini unknotting the kerchief, peeling away the first layer, and then opening the box carefully to reveal the porcelain. How it delighted her that they both reacted to the vase in the same way.

A thrill ran through her, for her gift had communicated her
thoughts not by the use of words, but through the shades of a potter nearly three hundred years before and a world away. Boldini had seen the waters of Venice in the ancient Korean glaze—just as she had—a glaze that was like a current caught between stillness and imminent fracture.

The new, unexpected discovery that she and Boldini had a unique connection reinvigorated her. Marthe had no intention of betraying Charles, but she also couldn't deny that the artistic language she shared with Boldini boosted her spirits. She couldn't wait until she saw how this added layer might be revealed when he sat in front of his easel and continued her portrait.

*   *   *

In the drawer of her vanity table, tied with pink satin ribbon, Marthe kept the letters Charles had written to her over the years. The ones he wrote when she still danced at the theater, and the ones he penned after they had enjoyed a particularly rapturous session in her butterfly bed. But his letters had grown more infrequent over the years. Lately when he wrote, it was typically only to inform her of his current health or a change in his plans.

Now, she relished the chance to return Boldini's letter, to write more about art, beauty, and the beginning stages of her portrait. She had been unable to see Charles for weeks, ever since his wife had insisted they now take a cure together in the mountains. “She thinks the waters there will help,” Charles had told her as gently as he could. “At this point, I'm not particularly hopeful, but I've promised her I'd try.” At first, she felt a pang of jealousy. But Charles was no longer the robust gentleman he once was, so she did not consider it a betrayal when she sat down to return the artist's letter. After all, it was Charles's wish to see the portrait completed as soon as possible.
I'm only making him more motivated to finish
, she told herself as she took out a leaf of paper from her drawer and withdrew her pen.

Dear Monsieur Boldini,

How delighted I am to hear you enjoyed the gift I sent. I hope it will inspire you for many more years to come. When I saw that particular piece, I knew you would recognize the same beauty that it stirred inside me. The man from whom I bought it told me they call it “a cracked ice” glaze, and that the potter must fire the porcelain several times, each time applying more coats of pigment in order to achieve this effect. How extraordinary is the result . . . to hold something in your hand that looks as though it has shattered, yet it remains firmly intact. I knew you would appreciate this paradox.

I do hope my portrait is coming along and that I'll be able to see how it's progressing. Should you need another sitting, it would be my pleasure to slip again into the same dress and pay you another visit.

With deepest respect,

Marthe de Florian

She couldn't admit to being surprised when two days later she received another letter. On the thin, translucent paper Boldini had written:

Madame de Florian,

As usual, you anticipate my own thoughts even before they have registered inside me. Yes, if possible, it would be wonderful to see you for another sitting. May I be so bold as to suggest tomorrow, at three o'clock? And, yes, please wear the rose-colored dress. It is perfection.

With great anticipation,

G. Boldini

*   *   *

Charles had been away with his wife for several weeks. And although she still kept part of her mind engaged in thoughts of what he might be doing with Émilienne, Marthe was grateful for her burgeoning friendship with Boldini.

The dress now became almost a uniform to her. No longer did Marthe see it as an example of the Callot Soeurs' masterful dressmaking skills, or a testimony to feminine extravagance. Instead, the pink confection was firmly connected to her portrait. Marthe reached for the gown and began to get ready.

When Giselle pulled the laces of her corset tight against her back, Marthe instructed her to pull harder.

“It's as tight as I can make it,” Giselle told her.

“Tighter,” Marthe insisted. “I want him to feel as though my waist is as small as a wren in his hands.”

She could feel all of Giselle's strength tugging to bring the laces toward her.

Against Marthe's torso, the whalebones of her corset felt like knives.

“But how can madame breathe?” Giselle shook her head as she next helped Marthe get into her dress.

When the girl bent down to retrieve Marthe's kidskin boots, she noticed Giselle's hands were red from the exertion of tying her corset.

“I'm afraid I've made you suffer as much as I do for the sake of this portrait.”

“What is that saying? ‘
Il faut souffrir pour être belle.
' ‘It hurts to be beautiful.'”

Marthe smiled. “Yes, my mother used to say that when she tugged a comb through my hair.”

“Mine, too,” said Giselle wistfully, as if touched by the intimate moment between them.

Marthe wondered if Giselle suspected that they had more in common with their childhoods. She always tried to be kind to Giselle, never taking on any airs of superiority when it was just the two of them alone in the apartment.

The girl was pretty. Straw-colored hair. Wide blue eyes. Her only shortcoming was her figure, which was as straight as a ruler and lacked any natural feminine curves.

“The pain of beauty,” Marthe mused as she looked at her reflection in the full-length mirror. “Every woman suffers in her own way . . . ,” she said as she fluffed up the ruffles of her sleeves. The faces of the two women floated in the glass like a portrait within an oval frame. “But to be born ugly . . . ,” Marthe said more to herself than to Giselle.

“Can you imagine how wretched that would be?”

Paris 1898

T
he first thing she noticed when she entered his studio for the second time was not the scent of varnish and paint, nor the sight of his other paintings. It was the vase she had given him. Boldini had prominently displayed it on a pedestal table near his desk.

The vase shone with a beautiful intensity as the light streamed in through the tall windows behind it. It reminded her of one of those small Dutch paintings she had seen on her occasional trips to the Louvre.

He had been watching to see her reaction, and she could feel his eyes on her.

“How wonderful you've placed the vase in such a position of honor,” she said, turning to him.

“I wanted to be able to see it from every corner of the room . . . and the light there strikes it just perfectly.” He extended his arm toward the wall of floor-to-ceiling windows.

She smiled. “I can see the effect immediately . . . the beauty in which the sunlight bathes it half in light, half in shadow.”

“Exactly.” He beamed.

As she moved through the room, Marthe caught sight of a small watercolor study on his desk. It was of the vase. Three small renderings were done on the same piece of paper. She could see how delicately he had applied the soft touches of pale blue and green to the sketches.

She walked over and touched the edge of the paper. “I'm so pleased to see it's inspired you . . .”

“You didn't see the other sheets, which ended up in the fire. It's impossible to re-create that glaze! It's pure madness to even try!”

She let out a small laugh. “I wasn't intending to send you to the madhouse.”

“Then perhaps you should have worn another dress today . . .”

She laughed again. He was flirting with her, and it amused her.

“But I wore the dress for the portrait's sake, not yours . . .”

This time, he laughed.

“Yes, Madame de Florian, I suppose you did. Then let's get started for the portrait's sake.”

*   *   *

In the corner that faced the settee where she had sat during her last visit, now stood a tall wooden easel with a canvas set on top. The canvas was primed, but not a single brushstroke had been applied to it. It was as blank as a new sheet of paper.

“But, monsieur, there's nothing on it.” She could hardly hide her disappointment.

“Underneath that coat of gesso are about a hundred brushstrokes that couldn't do justice to you. Just like that vase you sent me . . .” He shook his head. “It's easy to recognize the surface of beauty. To
see it with your two eyes. But the challenge to the artist is conveying the many layers underneath.”

She stood there bewitched by his words.

“If you only show one top layer of beauty, it remains flat and two-dimensional.” He walked toward the blank canvas and pinched the corner.

“With some models, I can work directly from my preliminary sketches . . . but with you, I simply cannot.”

He took her hand and ushered her to the love seat.

“I want to begin with you in front of me.”

She watched as he returned to his easel and took his bladders of paint pigment and applied them to his palette, blending them with a knife.

“Now, show me how you want to be seen for the next one hundred years,” he said when he had prepared his paints.

She laughed, and one of her ruffled sleeves fell over her shoulder. She reached to pull it up, while she placed her other elbow on the arm of the settee.

“Don't move,” he quickly instructed her. She was still in profile as she had been the last time he had sketched her, but now her chest was precariously revealed. She could feel the tension between her body pushing forth from the dress and the contrast of her tight skirt and her cloudlike sleeves.

“Charles will want it to be inspired . . . ,” she whispered, afraid to let go of the pose.

“Charles will be delighted,” he insisted. She could hear the rapid application of paint. The swirl of his brush. The energy that erupted between his imagination and his mind.

The heat inside her was unbearable. “I feel like I'm coming out of my dress. The only thing keeping me in place is my bodice and the corset beneath.”

“Such tension is a good thing . . . ,” he said, a brush gripped between his teeth. “There cannot be pleasure, without knowing the sensation of pain.”

She knew this all too well in her own life. A woman of the demimonde, the half-world. Caught between beauty and darkness. In some ways trapped, but in other ways completely free.