“Oh, no. I’ve been here for years. My father’s a doctor, and during the war he came over to oversee the American hospitals here. My mother had died a few years before, and he needed someone to run the house and act as his hostess when he entertained. That kind of thing.”
“I see,” said Helena, thinking that Daisy would have been awfully young for such responsibilities, at least when they first came to France.
“Daddy’s retiring at the end of the year—they asked him to stay on after the war, which is why we’re still here—so I suppose we’ll be going home then.”
“Why are you taking the course?” Mathilde asked. “Have you studied art before?”
“No, not really. After the war, I worked in a studio for a while, helping with the supplies and some preparatory work. I learned a little while I was there, and then, after the studio closed, I bought some instruction books and tried to learn that way. Daddy wasn’t very keen on my going out to school, you see. But I convinced him, finally, that I should have some lessons. So here I am, although it may not be for long . . .”
“For someone who’s never had an art class in her life, you are very good, you know,” Helena reassured her. And it was true. Ma?tre Czerny had been wrong to dismiss Daisy’s work so cruelly, for several of her sketches had been competently executed.
étienne reached across the table to pat Daisy’s arm. “Here we say le chien qui aboie ne mord pas. The barking dog does not bite, I think? He is a loud man, and a rude man, but you must not be afraid of him.”
“And you, Hélène?” Mathilde asked. “Why are you here?”
“Just after Christmas last year, I came down with scarlet fever, and I nearly died. Even after the worst was over, I was bedridden for ages. Once I was a little better, I told my parents that I wished to come to Paris and learn how to paint properly.”
“They let you come to Paris all on your own?” asked Daisy, her mouth agape in wonder.
“Heavens, no. My aunt lives here, otherwise I’m sure they’d have made a huge fuss. And I think the only reason they did agree is because they felt so badly for me.”
“Shall you return home when the course ends?” étienne asked.
“I think so. Although if Ma?tre Czerny keeps making faces when he looks at my work I may be home before Christmas!”
“No, no,” étienne said, shaking his head. “You will be fine, and so will you, Daisy. Now—it is time for lunch. Shall we order something?”
“Désolée, étienne, but I cannot stay,” Mathilde said. Something passed between them—a look of understanding, something that hinted of shared hardships? It made her very curious to learn more about her new friends.
“I’m sorry, too, but I must go as well,” Helena said, gathering her things. “It was lovely meeting all of you. à demain?”
“à demain.”
She had done it. She had made it through the first day of classes, her dignity more or less intact, and she had made three new friends who knew her as Helena Parr, an art student like themselves. Just the thought of it made her so happy she could hug herself, for with friends at her side, she knew, she could weather any storm—even the unpredictable gale of the ma?tre’s ire.
Chapter 10
10 October 1924
Dearest Amalia,
I hope this letter finds you well and happy, and that Peter and the children are also in fine form.
Today marked the end of my first month of classes—four weeks of dessin, dessin, dessin, and yet more dessin, all with Ma?tre Czerny. There are days when I feel as worn-down as the stub of charcoal I use for sketching, but there are good days, too, when everything suddenly makes sense and the drawing I produce comes close to matching the one in my head.
Although the ma?tre is a difficult man, I can’t say I regret my decision to attend his academy and not another school. Our focus here is limited—there are no classes in sculpture, for instance, as the ma?tre says it bores him. He doesn’t much care for watercolors or pastels, either, and so those classes, which began last week, are being taught by others. But he is a very good drawing master, and I know I have made progress, even if he has yet to tell me so.
I am rather nervous about his class in oil painting techniques. Each year he chooses only twelve students for the class, and I have a terrible feeling I won’t be one of them. It’s not that the ma?tre dislikes me or my work—the problem is that he doesn’t seem to notice that I exist.
But that, I must admit, is a small problem set against the joys of my life here. Auntie A is a delight, as ever, and I’ve made some wonderful friends, all of them students at the academy. My health is even better than it was before my illness—all that swimming in the Med, and now the long walks I take each day from home to school and back again.