The Swan Thieves

The Swan Thieves Page 21

Kate had set her coffee cup, with its ring of glazed blackberries, on a table at her elbow. She made a little gesture, as if asking me to let her stop talking. I nodded and sat back at once; I wondered if there were tears gathering in her eyes. "Let's take a break," she said, although it seemed to me we were already taking one. I hoped she'd be willing to continue at all. "Would you like to see Robert's studio?"

"Did he work much at home?" I tried not to accept too eagerly. "Well, at home and at school," she told me. "Mainly at school, of course."

Upstairs, the central hall doubled as a small library, with a faded carpet and windows that looked over that spreading lawn. More novels, collections of short stories, encyclopedias. At one end there was a table equipped with drawing materials, pencils standing in a jar, a large open pad--someone's sketch of windows, apparently. Was this finally a glimpse of Robert? But Kate saw me looking. "My work spot," she said shortly.

"You must be a great reader," I hazarded.

"Yes. Robert always thought I spent too much time reading, in fact. And a lot of these books belonged to my parents."

So they were her books, not his. I noted entrances to various rooms, some with their doors shut, some open to views of carefully made beds. In one of these--at last--I saw the children's toys, scattered joyfully on the floor. Kate opened a closed door and let me in.

The aroma of mineral spirits lingered here still, as well as the smell of oils--I wondered how such a careful housekeeper as she seemed to be (even neater than my mother) could possibly have tolerated that smell in the upstairs of the house. Perhaps, as I did, she actually found it pleasing. We entered without speaking; I had at once a funereal feeling about this room. The artist who had worked here only a short time before was not dead, but now he lay in a bed far away, staring at the ceiling of a psychiatric center. Kate went to the big windows and folded back a series of wooden shutters, and the sunlight for which Robert Oliver must have chosen this room came sweeping in. It fell on the walls, on canvases stacked backward in one corner, a long table, cans full of brushes. And it fell on a handsome adjustable easel with a painting still on it, nearly finished, a painting that electrified my senses.

In addition, the walls were littered with images of paintings-- mainly postcards from museums and from every era of Western art. I saw dozens of works I knew and many I didn't. Every inch of space leapt with faces, meadows, dresses, mountains, swans, haystacks, fruit, ships, dogs, hands, breasts, geese, vases, houses, dead pheasants, Madonnas, windows, hats, trees, horses, roads, saints, windmills, soldiers, children. The Impressionists dominated; I could easily pick out masses of Renoir, Degas, Monet, Morisot, Sisley, and Pissarro, although there were other images that were clearly Impressionist but new to me.

The room itself looked as if its occupant had left it on impulse: a heap of paint-hardened brushes--good brushes, wasted--and a stained rag rested on the table. He had not even finished cleaning up, my patient who showered and shaved daily in the heart of an institution. His former wife stood in the middle of the room, the sun touching her sand-dune hair. She glowed with sunlight, with young beauty beginning to ebb, and--I thought--with anger.

Keeping one eye on her, I stepped up to the easel. Robert's familiar subject gazed out of it, the woman with the dark curls, the red lips, and the brilliant eyes. She wore a gown that might have been an old-fashioned nightdress or robe, a garment ruffled and pale blue and barely held in place by her white hand. It was a vivid, romantic portrait, highly sensual--saved from sentimentality, in fact, by a frank eroticism, one curve of the woman's breast pressed roundly under her forearm as she reached up to gather her robe together. To my surprise, the hand that gripped the gown also held a paintbrush, its tip smeared with cobalt as if she herself had been caught in midstroke, working on some canvas of her own. The background seemed to be a sunny window, a window with stone framing and diamond-shaped glass panes, filled in the distance with slate-blue water and ocean clouds. The rest of the background--the room where the woman stood--was unfinished, trailing away into bare canvas in the top right corner.

That face was familiar enough to me, and the wonderfully curling, living dark hair, but two aspects of this portrait were different from the images Robert was constantly painting in his room at Goldengrove. One was the style of the work, the brushwork, the heightened realism; he had abandoned his occasionally rough handling, his modern version of Impressionism, for this painting. It was highly realistic, in places nearly photographic--the texture of her skin, for example, had the smoothness of the late medieval period, the attention to fine surfaces. It reminded me, in fact, of the Pre-Raphaelites and their detailed portraits of women; it had that mythical quality, too, with the loose robe, the woman's broad-shouldered height and splendor. A few fine black curls had escaped to brush her cheek and neck. I wondered if he'd actually painted it from a photograph; but was he a painter who would use photographs at all?

The other thing that startled me--no, shocked me, really--was the subject's expression. In most of the sketches of her at the hospital, Robert's woman was serious, even somber, at least thoughtful--sometimes, as I've mentioned, angry. Here, on a canvas that apparently sat most of the time in shuttered darkness, she was laughing. I had never seen her laugh before. Despite her dishabille, it was not a wanton laugh but a joyful, intelligent mirth, a witty love of life, a natural movement of her lovely mouth, a glimpse of teeth, eyes sparkling. She was utterly, almost terribly, alive on the canvas; she seemed about to move. To see her was to want to reach out and touch her living skin--yes, to long to bring her close and hear her laugh in your ear. The sunlight fell across her in streams. I'll admit it: I desired her. It was a masterpiece, one of the most splendidly conceived and executed contemporary portraits I'd ever seen in the flesh. Unfinished as she was, she had taken--I knew at a glance--weeks or months of work. Months.

When I turned back to Kate, I couldn't help reading her disdain. "You like her, too, I see," she said, and I heard coldness in her tone. She seemed small and worn, even pinched, next to the lady on the canvas. "Do you think my ex-husband is gifted?"

"Without question," I said. I felt myself lowering my voice, as if he might be just behind us, listening--I remembered the contempt I'd so often seen on his face when I spoke to him about his drawings and paintings. This once-married couple might be divided now by their difficult history, but they both knew how to look bitterly disdainful, that was certain. I wondered if they'd sometimes faced each other with that expression. Kate stood staring at the brighter-than-life woman on the easel, who gazed radiantly past us. I had the sudden sense that the portrait was searching for Robert Oliver, her creator, that she, too, saw him standing behind us. I almost turned around to check. It was unnerving, and I wasn't entirely sorry when Kate closed the shutters and the lady was laughing in dusk again. We went out and Kate shut the door. When would I have the courage to ask her the identity of the woman in the portrait? Who had been its model? I had missed the moment; I was afraid that if I asked this, she would stop talking with me altogether.

"You've left his studio as it was," I observed as casually as I could.

"Yes, I have," she admitted. "I keep meaning to do something about it, but I guess I'm never quite sure what to do. I don't want to just put everything in storage or throw it all away. When Robert settles down somewhere, I might pack up these things and send them all to him so he can start a new studio. If he ever settles down anywhere." She avoided my gaze. "The children ought to have separate bedrooms soon. Or maybe I'll finally make a studio for myself. I never had one. I always just took my easel outside, but that meant working in good weather, and then we had the kids--" She broke off. "Sometimes Robert offered me a corner of his studio, or said he could work at school and give me this room, but I didn't want a corner. And I certainly didn't want him at school even more of the time."

Something in her tone made me feel I shouldn't ask why not. So I stayed silent, following her down the stairs. Her back in the golden shirt was small and straight, her body firmly controlled, as if she dared me to feel any longing or even curiosity, as if she would turn that ladylike hostility on me in an instant if I let my eyes travel over her. I glanced out the window instead, at a beech tree that threw rosy light into the staircase. She led me to the living room and sat down on her sofa with a purposeful look. I understood that she wanted to get on with our task, and I sat down opposite her and tried to collect myself.

Mon cher oncle:

We did have a bit of social life last night, and I regretted you could not come to enjoy it with us; in addition to the usual friends, Yves brought home with him Gilbert Thomas, a painter of excellent family who they say is talented-- although he was refused at the Salon last year and took it hard. M. Thomas must be about ten years older than I--perhaps in his late thirties. He is charming and intelligent, but there is something angry in him at moments that I do not quite like, especially when he speaks of other painters. He was gracious about asking to see my work, and I believe Yves had the idea that he, like you, might help me. He seemed genuinely struck by my portrait of little Marguerite, the new maid I told you about, who has such white skin and gold hair, and I confess it was flattering to hear it praised. He said he thought I could do great things, given my talent, and complimented my rendering of the figure. I did find him kind then, if a little sure of himself (I won't quite say pompous, so that you will not scold me later for snobbery). He and his brother intend to establish a large new sales gallery, and I daresay he would like to show your work there. He promised Yves to come back one day and bring his brother along, and you must come, too, if that is the case.

There was also a delightful man in the party, a M. Dupre, another artist, one who works for the illustrated papers. He has been in the country of Bulgaria, where they have recently had a revolution. I heard him tell Yves that he knew of your work. He brought us some of his prints, which are very detailed and show all kinds of skirmishes and battles, with cavalry, magnificent uniforms-- and sometimes quieter scenes with villagers in their native costumes. He says it is a mountainous country, rather unsafe at the moment for journalists but full of dramatic views. He is doing a series he calls "Les Balkans Illustres." In fact, he has married a Bulgarian girl with the lovely name of Yanka Georgieva and brought her to Paris to learn French --she was unwell and could not attend this evening, but he wrote down her name for me. I found myself wishing I could go to such places and see them for myself. In fact, we are pretty dull with Yves working so much these days, and I was glad to have a dinner party under my own roof. I do hope you will join us the next time.

I must go now, but I will look forward to whatever lines you can send your devoted.

Beatrice de Clerval