Chapter 18

We made our way through the eerily empty halls of the Louvre, our footsteps echoing on the stone floors. In the sculpture room the morning sun pooled around Michelangelo’s Dying Slave and Rebellious Slave. We took out our notebooks.

‘Look how he has exaggerated the size of the hands and feet – it breaks all the rules I was taught,’ I said.

‘And he’s left the torso of the rebellious slave rough,’ Camille said, ‘while the skin of the dying slave is highly polished. Do you suppose it means he has reached some kind of divine state as he nears death?’

‘More likely the money for the commission ran out before he got around to a final polish.’ Rodin’s voice gave me a start. He came to stand in front of me and planted the walking stick in front of him. He cocked his head to one side and smiled. ‘Well, Mademoiselle Lipscomb, are you with us?’

‘Oui, mon maître.’

Rodin held out his arms and I stepped into them. He pressed me against his chest. His coat smelled of clay and the cigars he smoked.

‘I knew we could rely on you, ma chère élève.’ He released me and became business-like. ‘We must make practical arrangements.’ He beckoned Camille over so we stood together like a trio of conspirators. ‘There is a room at the studio that locks from the inside where we can meet in private. Jessie can stand guard and if someone comes, you can warn us, d’accord?’

He spoke to me as if he were giving orders to the men at his atelier. It rankled that he assumed I would do his bidding unquestioningly, like a good little woman.

‘Not so fast,’ I said. ‘You must allow me to speak.’ Rodin looked surprised, but he nodded. I gripped my sketchpad against my chest and took a breath. ‘Have you thought about the consequences? What will happen to Camille if your affair is discovered? You’re a man, your reputation will recover but Camille would be ruined.’ It took a lot for me to stand up to Rodin, and he was not used to being challenged. He glared at me but I refused to drop my eyes. Camille was too important to me. She may not be able to think clearly, but my mind was not clouded with passion.

Camille broke the tense silence with a laugh. ‘Oh Jessie, you use such bourgeois words – ruined! You know Papa would forgive me anything. And as for my so-called reputation, I couldn’t care that for it.’ She snapped her fingers.

Rodin chewed his lip, as if considering the situation, then smiled at me. ‘Camille, this is important, and Jessie is right to be worried about you. My personal affairs are complicated at present but you, both of you, must trust me when I say they will be resolved. I would never abandon Camille.’

I dropped my shoulders. It was clear they were set on a path and nothing I could say would change it. I had no choice but to fold up my reservations and tuck them away. Camille needed me, and if, God forbid, it all did go wrong, she would need me even more.

I nodded and lowered my eyes. Rodin put his arms around both our shoulders. ‘Très bien. You will not regret your decision, you have my word. Alors, let us see what Michelangelo can teach us about breaking the rules of proportion.’

I moved away from his embrace and put my notebook in my satchel. ‘Excuse me, Maître, but I have to meet William. Perhaps we may come here another day to resume the class.’

‘Certainly we shall – for my two favourite and most gifted pupils there will be many opportunities to look at Michelangelo together. The doors of the Parisian art world have just opened wide for you, Jessie. But I must not keep you from your young man. Be gentle with him – his head may be a little sore after last night.’ Rodin’s laughter was good-natured.

Camille put her arm through mine. ‘I’ll come with you, Jessie. I’ll wait in the cab while you say goodbye.’

The platform was crowded and it took me a while to find William. When he turned to greet me, his face was tinged with green.

‘William, your eyes look as if they’ve been poached.’

‘No need to shout, Jess. Feeling a bit delicate, that’s all, must have eaten a bad oyster.’

‘Oyster, my foot. Do you think I don’t know what a hangover looks like?’ I was still furious with him for rushing off to Montmartre at the first sniff of adventure; too annoyed to admit I would have done exactly the same in his place. ‘What on earth were you drinking, anyway? I’ve never seen you look so ill.’

He put his hand over his eyes. ‘Um, this green stuff, like perfumed syrup, bloody awful. What did Georges call it? A green pixy, I think.’

I rolled my eyes. ‘La Fée Verte? Don’t tell me you’ve been drinking absinthe. It’s supposed to send people mad.’ I suppressed a smile. William looked about the same colour as the Green Fairy, a rather winsome name for this most evil of drinks.

‘Absinthe, that’s the chap.’ He clutched his forehead, turning even greener. He groaned. ‘I think that damned pixy is doing the cancan inside my head.’ He brightened for a second. ‘I say, those French dancing girls can kick their own height; you should take it up, Jess, better than calisthenics any day.’

‘Shut up, you idiot.’ But he was making me laugh, teasing me out of my bad mood, the way he used to when we were little and he left a spider under my water glass at dinner, a trick he was still fond of playing.

He took me in his arms. ‘That’s better, Jess. I love to hear you laugh.’ He tried to kiss me and I pushed him away.

‘Urgh, you smell like rubbing alcohol. Are you still drunk?’

‘As a lord,’ he sighed. ‘But, I do have perfect recall, and I can report that I behaved like a perfect gentleman, despite the many and varied temptations on offer. Do you know, there was one girl who could put her leg behind her…’

I put my hand over his lips and he tried to bite my fingers. ‘Please remember, I’m not one of your chaps. Keep your saucy tales for the men at your club.’ I said.

‘And tales are all they are.’ He grew serious. ‘You do know that you have nothing to worry about on that count, Jess? Nothing could tempt me away from you, my darling.’ He moved his face close to mine and I let him kiss me a little before pushing him away again.

The whistle went and we began to walk towards the train.

‘I wonder how Georges is feeling this morning,’ William said. ‘Now, there’s one with an eye for the ladies.’

I gripped his arm tighter. I wasn’t really worried about William: he was too decent to give into the temptations Montmartre offered. But Georges was different. I’d seen the way the models nudged each other and made excuses to get undressed in front of him, and the way he joked with a couple of them in a manner that made it clear they had been together. I wanted to ask William what he meant, what Georges had done, but he had moved onto Rosa.

‘What a seducer! She was bowling them over with these elaborate compliments, treating the dancers like duchesses. One of them was quite smitten with her and they headed off together into the night. Bet the poor thing got a fright when Rosa’s jodhpurs came off.’

I tried to smile but I was too distracted by the thought of Georges, and what he had been doing. William didn’t seem to notice and he was still laughing when we stopped at the First Class carriage door. He clapped his hand to his head. ‘I nearly forgot to give you this.’ He fished in his pocket and pulled out a scrap of paper. ‘We met this funny little chap, Henri I think his name was, an artist. He gave me one of his sketches and I kept it for you.’ He handed me a crumpled piece of paper.

The signature Toulouse-Lautrec was scrawled under a few pen lines. I’d never heard of him before but the drawing was powerful: a dancer, so alive she seemed to move across the page. I folded it carefully and put it in my purse. A guard blew the whistle again and the train doors began to slam shut. William put his arms around me. Suddenly, I desperately didn’t want him to leave.

‘Can’t you stay a little longer?’ I said. ‘I’ve hardly seen you.’

‘I know Jess, I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have dashed off to Montmartre like that, but you do see how one couldn’t resist? You know that I do love you, don’t you? Enjoy Paris, but remember always come back to me, because no one could love you more than I.’ He stroked my face. ‘We may be two different metals, but together we make a perfect compound.’

The guard blew the final whistle. William kissed me hard on the mouth and jumped onto the train just as it started to move off.

I wiped my eyes and walked to the cab, my heavy heart lifting with every step that took me nearer to Camille.