Once Madame Marneffe had gone into the house, the Baron wanted to know what his daughter was doing in the shop. Since he was still looking at Madame Marneffe’s windows as he went in, he nearly bumped into a pale young man with sparkling grey eyes, dressed in a black merino summer coat and coarse twill trousers and with yellow leather gaiters over his shoes, who was dashing out of the shop like a madman. The Baron saw the young man run towards Madame Marneffe’s house and go in.
As she slipped into the shop, Hortense had immediately noticed the famous group prominently placed in the centre and easily visible from the door.
Even apart from the circumstances in which she had learned of it, the girl would probably have been struck by this masterpiece because of what one can only call the brio of great works of art; she, herself, could certainly have posed in Italy for a statue of Brio.
Not all works of genius have to the same degree that brilliant splendour which is apparent to everyone, even the ignorant.
For instance, some of Raphael’s paintings, such as the famous Transfiguration, the Madonna of Foligno, the frescoes of the Stanze in the Vatican, do not instantly arouse admiration like the Violin Player in the Sciarra gallery, the Portraits of the Doni and the Vision of Ezekiel in the Pitti gallery, the Christ carrying the Cross at the Borghese, or the Marriage of the Virgin in the Brera in Milan. The Saint John the Baptist of the Tribune, Saint Luke painting the Virgin in the Academy at Rome, have not the charm of the Portrait of Leo X or the Dresden Virgin. Nevertheless, they are all of equal merit. Yet one can go even further. The Stanze, the Transfiguration, the monochromes, and the three easel pictures in the Vatican are sublime and perfect to the highest degree. But these masterpieces demand from even the most knowledgeable admirer a certain application, a careful study, before they can be completely understood, while the Violinist, the Marriage of the Virgin, and the Vision of Ezekiel enter our hearts spontaneously through the gateway of our two eyes and make a place for themselves there. We enjoy receiving them in this way without any difficulty. It is not the highest art, but it is the most enjoyable.
This fact proves that in the production of works of art there are the same elements of chance as in families, where there are children, fortunate in their gifts, who are born beautiful, without pain to their mothers; the world smiles on them and they are successful in everything they do. In short, there are fruits of genius as there are fruits of love.
This brio, an untranslatable Italian word which we are beginning to use, is a characteristic of youthful artistic works. It is the product of the vitality and boundless enthusiasm of young talent, a vitality which returns later at certain happy moments. But then that brio no longer comes from the artist’s heart. Instead of thrusting it into his works like a volcano emitting flames, he submits to it, he owes it to circumstances, to love, to rivalry, often to hatred, and more often still to the requirements of a reputation to be maintained.
Wenceslas’ group was to his future works what the Marriage of the Virgin is to Raphael’s complete work, the first step of talent, taken with a matchless grace, with the enthusiasm and charming total commitment of childhood, its power concealed under the pink and white flesh whose dimples seem like echoes of the mother’s laughter. It is said that Prince Eugène* paid four hundred thousand francs for this picture, which would be worth a million to a country where there are no Raphaels, but no one would give that amount for the most beautiful of the frescoes, though their value as works of art is much greater.
Hortense restrained her admiration as she calculated the amount of her young girl’s savings. She assumed an air of casual indifference as she asked the dealer:
‘How much is that?’
‘Fifteen hundred francs,’ replied the dealer, with a glance at a young man sitting on a stool in a corner.
The young man was struck dumb on seeing the living masterpiece created by Baron Hulot.
Hortense, alerted by the dealer’s look, then recognized the artist by the flush that came over his face, pale with suffering; in his two grey eyes she saw the gleam of a spark lit by her question. She looked at his face, thin and drawn like that of a monk absorbed in asceticism. She was lost in admiration of the red well-shaped mouth, the small delicate chin, and the silky chestnut hair typical of Slavs.
‘If it were twelve hundred francs,’ she replied, ‘I would tell you to send it me.’
‘It’s an antique, Mademoiselle,’ commented the dealer who, like all his colleagues, thought he had said everything with this nec plus ultra of the antique trade.
‘Excuse me, Monsieur, it was done this year,’ she replied very gently, ‘and I have come for the express purpose of asking you, if you agree to the price I have offered, to send us the artist, for we might be able to secure quite important commissions for him.’
‘If he is to get the twelve hundred francs, what will I get out of it? I am a dealer,’ said the shopkeeper good-naturedly.
‘Oh, that’s true,’ replied the girl with a scornful look.
‘Oh, Mademoiselle, take it! I’ll arrange things with the dealer,’ exclaimed the Livonian, beside himself.
Fascinated by Hortense’s sublime beauty and by her evident love of art, he added:
‘I made the group. For ten days now I have been coming three times a day to see if anyone will recognize its worth and make an offer for it. You are the first to admire it. Take it!’
‘Come with the dealer, Monsieur, in an hour’s time. Here is my father’s card,’ replied Hortense.
Then, when she saw the dealer go into the back shop to wrap up the group in cloth, she added in a low voice, to the great surprise of the artist, who thought he was dreaming:
‘In the interests of your future, Monsieur Wenceslas, don’t show this card or mention your purchaser’s name to Mademoiselle Fischer, for she’s our cousin.’
The words ‘our cousin’ had a dazzling effect on the artist. He had a glimpse of Paradise at the sight of one of the Eves who had fallen from it.
He had been dreaming of the beautiful cousin Lisbeth had talked about as much as Hortense had been dreaming of her cousin’s admirer, and when she came into the shop he had thought, ‘Oh, if she could be like that!’
One can imagine the look the two lovers exchanged; it was like a flame, for virtuous lovers have not a shred of hypocrisy.