I was a bit uncomfortable, but anything was preferable to turning and seeing Mathieu. I nodded. “Of course.”
“When I was thirteen years old,” Picasso said, “my seven-year-old sister, Conchita, contracted diphtheria. My parents did everything. So did the doctors. But she got worse and worse. So I made a pact with God, because that’s what we Catholics did. We prayed.” He practically spit out the word. “I had been painting since I was very young and was already distinguished by that point. Everyone spoke in reverential tones about my ‘gift.’ And so I offered up that gift in exchange for my sister’s life. I promised God that if he let her live, I would never paint again. When she died, I had to examine my faith, and I concluded that this God was evil. He was my enemy. In my mind, he changed places with Satan. I learned then to question everything. The faith of my parents held no answers for me. But that didn’t mean I could exist without some kind of faith. I began a quest, which I am still on today, to understand different ideas and philosophies.”
I was deeply moved by the story. My brother and I were so close that I’d imagined myself in Picasso’s place. “I’m sorry about your sister.”
He took my hand. Across the table, I felt Mathieu’s stare intensify.
“It was a long time ago,” Picasso said. “We learn to live with sadness, don’t we? I had a long run until I lost anyone again. And then it was my first love.”
I extracted my hand. Love wasn’t a subject I wanted to discuss with a man they said was sexually insatiable. Especially not while Mathieu sat opposite us, listening, I was certain, to our every word.
I leaned back a bit in my chair so I could include Bois in my next question. I was exhausted. Trying to keep the flow of conversation going while avoiding Mathieu was draining every ounce of energy I had.
“And Satie? You knew him well also, Monsieur Bois?”
“Yes, for years. Although lately he’d isolated himself. Satie was a genius,” he said simply. “He didn’t let us say good-bye to him while he was alive. So we are going to do it in another way. In our own way. After dinner. I suppose Emma told you about the séance. But if it frightens you, you don’t need to participate.”
“No, it doesn’t frighten me.”
“Given her maman, how could it, Jules?” Picasso asked.
I knew a little about Jules Bois, from bits and pieces I had picked up over the years. One doesn’t grow up a daughter of La Lune without hearing about others involved in the same study. The novelist had been a member of several secret societies, including the one that had saved my mother’s life when she first came to Paris.
Bois was about to ask me something else when Anna Poulent, who was on his left, asked him a question I couldn’t quite hear.
“Oh, good, you’re all mine again.” Picasso smiled as he leaned closer to me and asked me how my own work was going.
“I haven’t been painting.”
“Still?”
“I guess I’ve become frightened by my work.”
“Spoken as a true Surrealist,” he said.
The conversation had veered too close to the personal again. “But it seems you haven’t accepted any women as part of the Surrealist movement. As your muses, yes. I read a lengthy interview just last week in which you talked about the other artists involved, and not one woman was included.”
He looked wounded. “If you suffer with your brushstrokes and explore your dreams on canvas and if the process makes you come alive like nothing else, you are an artist. No matter what your sex. But there hasn’t been a woman who’s been doing what we’ve been doing. I hadn’t heard of any when I was interviewed for Le Figaro. Do you have some of your work with you?”
“I don’t have any finished paintings. Just some sketches I’ve done since I’ve been here.” I was purposely cryptic. I didn’t know if Madame had told anyone about my reason for being at the chateau. After all, I was searching for secrets; perhaps she didn’t want my mission revealed.
Picasso stood, grabbed my hand, pulled me up. “Let’s go look at them now. If they meet the criteria of our new movement, then I’ll declare you on the spot.”
“Pablo, do sit down. We are in the middle of dinner,” Madame called out from across the table. “Is he bothering you, Delphine, dear? I can make him trade places with someone else.”
“You will not. I would refuse,” Picasso said, as he took his seat again. Then he leaned into me and whispered, hot breath against my ear, “After dinner and the séance, you will show me the sketches, won’t you?”
“So you’ll also be participating in the séance?” I asked.
“I’ve been to quite a few over the years and find them fascinating. Especially when Anna Poulent is officiating. She seems to be a magnet for spirits. And these days, I have more in common with those who practice black masses than their counterparts. The monstrous and uncontrolled and unknown—isn’t that what we are trying to discover when we stand in front of a canvas? If you aren’t, then you aren’t a real artist. Anyone can learn to paint pretty roses like Renoir.”
“You don’t believe that,” I said.
“Which part?”
“The part about anybody painting like Renoir.”
He laughed, and his intelligent black eyes sparkled. “Well, maybe not quite, no. But I do think we have an obligation as artists to push the boundaries and search for the truth. Art,” he said, “is the lie that tells the truth.”
I couldn’t hold back a shudder. Of course, he noticed.
“What is it?” he asked.
“That’s what I do. What I try to do. What I do despite myself. But people don’t all want the truth.”
“That may be, but you must never stop giving it to them. You have to promise me. Because that’s the only way to be real. To create something that has meaning.”
He looked at me intently, waiting. When I didn’t respond, he put his hand on my arm. “You’re at the beginning of your career. If you are serious about this, you have to declare it. I’ve been at it twenty, twenty-five years longer than you; I can steer you in the right direction. Promise.”
“I promise, I do.”
“No matter how difficult it is, yes? Because in the long run, only that which is difficult, only the art you pull from deep inside you, is really worth anything.”
“Yes.”
The maid arrived with our second course and put lovely plates of sole meunière and boiled parsley potatoes in front of us, and we started to eat.