Paris: The Novel
she asked him.
“Most are studio models, or people he happened to meet. They tend not to have names. The commissioned works are nearly all in private collections, though there are sketches for many of them. He has more work that he keeps himself. I could always ask him. Would you like to meet him?”
“No,” she said. “That won’t be necessary.”
One picture in particular intrigued her. It was a nude. A young girl with a very pretty body and long hair. It seemed to Louise that she looked a little like herself.
Was she looking at her mother?
“Again,” said Jacob, “no name.”
“I should like to come and look at some of these again,” said Louise. “If you can find out the names of some of the sitters, that would also interest me.” She smiled. “It would be a present for my husband. He likes to put names to people.”
“And your own name, if I may ask, madame?” said Jacob.
She reached into the little bag she was carrying, as if to take out a visiting card, and frowned. “I have left my cards at home. I am Madame Louise. I shall call in again in two or three weeks.”
She wondered whether it would turn out that any of the models was named Corinne.
The note from Roland de Cygne early in October was profuse in its apologies, and rather touching. During August, down at the château, his son had become ill—so much so that at one point the doctor had feared for his life.
All was well now, however. Father and son were safely back in Paris, where the boy was to convalesce for a month.
Sure enough, a few days later, he telephoned to ask if she would like to go to the opera. As it happened, she could not go on the evening he suggested. But wanting to be friendly, especially after his troubles with his son, she made a countersuggestion.
“I met the manager of the Gobelins factory the other day, and he offered to give me a private tour of the place. On the last Monday of October, in the morning. I wonder if you and your son would like to join me. Perhaps it might amuse him.”
The offer was accepted at once.
Why was it, Marie would sometimes ask herself in later years, that of all the many discussions she had, during two turbulent decades, about the destiny, even the survival, of the world she knew, the one she most remembered was a short and unplanned conversation with a boy?
The Gobelins factory was in the Thirteenth Arrondissement, about half a mile south of the Jardin des Plantes. The manager gave them a delightful tour of the collection of buildings.
“As you see, we have returned to making tapestries, just as we did in the time of Louis XIV,” he explained, and showed young Charlie de Cygne the working of the looms. “Some of these are the original seventeenth-century buildings. They were set up beside the little River Bièvre, which runs into the Seine near the Île de la Cité, so that the river could provide water power when it was needed. But do you know what else was made here?”
“You made furniture for quite a while,” said Roland.
“Indeed, monsieur, that is correct. But we also made statues.” He pointed to a couple of buildings. “They were foundries. We supplied most of the bronze statues in the gardens of Versailles.”
“Has the works been going continuously since Louis XIV?” young Charlie de Cygne asked.
“Almost. As you may know, the wars of the Roi Soleil were so expensive that he ran out of money once or twice. We briefly had to close in the 1690s, then for about a decade after the Revolution. And then, unfortunately, during the Commune of 1871, the Communards burned part of the factory down, which interrupted our work for some time.”
It was clear that the manager was no lover of the Communards, and he glanced at de Cygne, clearly hoping that the aristocrat would express his distaste for them, but Roland said nothing.
The visit was a success. After they came out, it being almost the lunch hour, Roland asked if Marie would like to eat something.
“Why don’t we just go into a bistro?” she suggested.
It seemed to Marie that Charlie de Cygne was a nice fourteen-year-old, rather shy, who resembled his father and had manners of respectful politeness that only someone like Roland de Cygne could have taught him. It also seemed to her that he was perfectly well and ready to go back to school again. His father, however, was still showing lines of worry. He’d lost weight. She felt a strong maternal urge to feed him.
“You’ll have a steak with
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