AS THE CENTURY waned, the Vogts began building a house next to the churchyard in Siljevik. Once it was ready, they would move back to Sweden after almost six years in France. In 1899, Lars returned to Paris after their summer in the archipelago, but Cecilia stayed in Sweden for a few weeks to consult with the builders.
When she returned to Paris, she found Lars working on dozens of oil studies and pencil sketches of a woman on the Place Pigalle. What preoccupied him was the contrast between the yellow-white electric light from a nearby cafe, and the gaslight on the street. The woman, who stood between the two kinds of illumination, wore brilliant crimson—either velvet or the softest merino wool—with a waist-length fur cape that tied at her neck with a big brown satin bow, and a muff. She had a way of holding her head, with a look of triumph and wounded pride, that told Cecilia the woman and Lars had been lovers. And that the affair was over. But perhaps she was wrong, because Lars said the model was a streetwalker. Not one of his usual types.
Absorbed by the technical problems of the different lights—one relentless, flooding every corner, the other muted, soft and focused—Lars wanted to work around the clock. In the evening, when he had an idea, he pressed Cecilia into service as a model. She stood for hours, resting her arm with the muff against a pillar (standing in for a tree), and lifting her skirt with the other hand. Her head had to be inclined to the right, just so. She remembered the expression on the woman’s face, assured and resigned, a touch of bravado that signalled defeat, and imagined it on her own. Although Lars was not interested in her face. Finally, she said no.
“I don’t want to pose any more.”
“But why?”
“I’m not a streetwalker.”
“What are you saying? No one is going to recognize you. I’m keeping the model’s face; I just need you for the twist of the body and the way her skirt folds into two panels when she lifts it out of the mud.”
“I don’t care. I’m not a prostitute.”
“My dear woman, I don’t understand you. Are you becoming such a prude that you can’t help your husband?”
“I would rather help you in other ways,” she said shortly, and walked away.
The house in Siljevik was finished only a little behind schedule, thanks to Cecilia’s management, and they moved to Dalarna in 1900. Siljevik was Lars’s village, but he and Cecilia had never lived together in Sweden, except for summers in the archipelago. Absorbing as their years in Paris had been, it was time to return home. Lars’s career was at a stage where it could flourish in Sweden, and Cecilia looked forward to helping that happen. The ground was prepared: now their real life could begin. She concentrated on adjusting to life in a village, mastering the local dialect and, without trampling on too many sensitive feelings, trying to organize a library and a folk school. An orphanage would come next. She still half-hoped all this effort would make a difference in her marriage.
In her first autumn in Siljevik, feeling sentimental and at loose ends, she went back to Stockholm for the Jewish New Year. Mamma was happy to see her, although she thought travelling so far to go to a service at the synagogue was a curious idea. Afterwards, the family convened for tea at Aunt Bette’s. Cecilia listened as her cousin Lena lamented over a burglary at her house when the family had been away for the summer. There was much shaking of heads and clucking while Lena, the expert on break-ins, chattered on.
The first time, she said, was terrible. You felt violated, and that nothing would ever be the same again. But that turned out not to be true. The second time and, if you were unlucky, the third time, it felt more like a nuisance. There was a sleepy watchman to be fired, and broken glass and lost valuables, but you didn’t feel the wretched vulnerability that came with the first break-in.
Cecilia passed China tea and seed cake, concentrating on the pattern on Aunt Bette’s cake plate, the Rorstrand one with innocent blue cornflowers scattered over a white surface. She wondered if having your marriage broken into was like a break-in at your house. The first time, or the first one she knew of, was an earthquake, a floor she had presumed was solid giving way without warning. She had thought it would never happen again, but even so, nothing would ever be the same. And she had been right that nothing would ever be the same—but right only about that. The second time, was it less or more painful? The second time meant that the first was not an aberration. And the third…What did the third time mean?
Better not to think these thoughts. Better to commiserate with Lena or ask Aunt Bette if she still bought her mille-feuille from the patisserie on Drottninggatan. Her store of hope was diminishing, but she still had flickers that Lars’s escapades might end, or become very rare. She might never again be the centre and the whole of his desire—probably would not be—but in time he would see that no one would ever love him as she did. As she still did, and the panic and anger she felt at each unwelcome revelation only increased that love.
In the second autumn they lived in Siljevik, Lars acquired a new dealer, and he and Cecilia went to Stockholm so that Lars could talk with him. By now Cecilia sat in on many of his business meetings, but Lars liked to have his first one with a dealer alone. That left her free for a few hours, so she headed for the National Museum. There was usually something interesting at the Salon. Making her way through the crowded galleries, she ran into Hanna Pauli and Sofie Olsson, who had come to see the work of a Danish woman they had studied with in Grez.
“Mrs. Vogt,” Sofie said, looking awkward for just a minute. Cecilia felt a twinge. The Olssons had visited Siljevik in the spring, but she and Lars had not yet managed a return excursion to Askebo. She really must organize that.
“Please,” Cecilia said, “it’s time we went to first names.”
Sofie smiled and agreed.
After they had toured the Salon, Cecilia sat in a cafe between Hanna, whom she had known since they were schoolgirls, and Sofie, whom she was just beginning to know. She liked looking at Sofie’s rounded features and the yoke of her blue dress, embroidered with honeysuckle and ladybugs—no doubt her own design. Hanna and Sofie were telling her a story about Dorotea, their Danish friend, whose teacher had advised her to set her paintbox sailing on the river when she was about to marry.
“How did Dorotea react?”
“Probably more politely than she should have,” Hanna answered. “We were brought up to turn the other cheek.”
Hanna had jumped in, as usual, but it was Sofie’s response that Cecilia wanted to hear. She looked at her inquiringly. Sofie’s expression was wary.
“Until we went to art school,” she said slowly, “most of us had never met another woman who wanted to paint. So we were easily discouraged.”
But, she corrected herself, Dorotea had not been discouraged. “And the dishes the teacher sent for his wedding present are probably broken by now.”
Cecilia thought of the Rorstrand china Mamma had given them for their wedding present, a pattern called Flow Blue that was a little old-fashioned even then. She remembered setting off on the train with Lars for married life in France, with a few place settings of the china carefully packed in a crate to use in their tiny Paris flat. She had been so blithe that day. The path to the wedding had been arduous, and it seemed as if they had reached the happy ending at last. She had looked forward to a union as devoted as her parents’ but more passionate, to children, to growing old as Lars’s one true love.
“Yes,” Cecilia said. “China breaks, but dreams should not.”
How sure the future had seemed as they travelled to Paris—really, not like a dream at all. She had never imagined its fragility. The china had fared better: few pieces had been broken, as she was strict with the maids about the proper way to wash it.
Now Hanna, typically blunt past the point of insensitivity, was telling a nasty story about how Nils Olsson had boasted to Georg that the greatest thing he had ever done was to end Sofie’s painting career. Did Hanna just say the first thing that crossed her mind, without considering its effect on her listeners? It was more than embarrassing, it was painful. Blushing and obviously wounded, Sofie changed the subject to Georg—who worked hard to encourage Hanna’s painting—rather than concentrate on her husband’s disloyalty to her. Cecilia wondered, Is she really such a good wife? Or does she do that to save face?
When I was single I wore a plaid shawl
Now that I’m married I’ve nothing at all.
After a short, uncomfortable pause, Cecilia diverted the conversation to David Copperfield, which she was reading. Nervously, she fell into criticizing David’s silly child-wife Dora before realizing this was a mistake. Wives of any kind were not an ideal topic after Hanna’s story. But Sofie surprised her by mounting a robust criticism of David’s second wife, the saintly Agnes. Sofie might have seen Agnes as a kindred spirit—except obviously she didn’t. Well, Sofie Olsson is inscrutable, Cecilia thought. Then: And I wish I understood her better.
Hanna, who did not read novels, had nothing to contribute. The trio passed the rest of their time in half-hearted news of friends and acquaintances, until finally the cheque came and Sofie left for the train.
That night, in the Stockholm hotel, Lars said little about his meeting with his new dealer. Cecilia did not take much notice, still preoccupied with her lunch. Briefly, she considered which was worse: a wandering husband or one who forbade you to paint? She had no experience of the second, but it sounded important. When they got home, she would sit down with Lars and a calendar and fix a date to visit the Olssons at Askebo.