“You can always work in our back room if you’d like. I’m sure my father won’t mind. As you can see, we have almost no customer traffic these days.”
I looked around. It was true. Since I had come into the store, there hadn’t been a single customer.
“How will you manage, if no one is selling or buying rare books?”
“Oh they’re selling. My father just went to look at a private collection outside the city. Everyone is selling because they need funds. Everyone is nervous because of the war... It’s the lack of people who are buying that’s the problem for us.”
I felt a sudden flicker of pain in my heart. I hated to think of Alex and his family struggling to make ends meet.
“But we are not your responsibility to worry about... How sweet you look with that expression of concern.”
I flushed.
“I’ve embarrassed you. I’m so sorry.” He stood up and began to clear the dishes and put them back on the tray. “I’m not an expert in conversation, as you can see...”
“Oh, not at all.” I rose to my feet and tried to help him with the cups and saucers. “I’m really the one who’s clumsy and poor with small talk.” A wisp of hair fell over my eye and I pushed it behind my ear.
“It’s so much easier when you’re writing,” I said. “You can rewrite the sentences a hundred times until your character says just the right words...”
He stood only inches away from me now, his hands holding the handles of the tray. “What would my character say if he knew a beautiful young girl was about to bid him good-bye?”
“He’d say something hopeful, I’d think...” I smiled. “Perhaps something like... ‘It would make me so happy if you’d visit me again.’”
“Well, then,” he said as he walked toward the door. “Solange, I hope one day I’m able to hold the novel you’ve written in my hands.” He stopped and pulled the door open. “But until then, I hope you’ll visit me again.”
20.
Marthe
Paris 1898
Two days later, Marthe received a letter in the midday post with her name in a voluptuous scripted hand. The return address on the envelope was41 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 Ibegan 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 herthoughts 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.
***
