The girl in the frame

Paris, France, 1877

The irony that she would learn of the child that grew in her belly on a Wednesday afternoon was not lost to her. The news had made her steps heavy and her pace slow. She knew she was late.

The door to his studio was unlocked, just as it had been every Wednesday afternoon for the past five years. On that particular Wednesday afternoon, Adaline hesitated. She had never hesitated before. Every Wednesday afternoon for the past three years Adaline had practically skipped through the doorway and into his embrace. But on that particular Wednesday afternoon, Adaline looked down at the small, pale hand that gripped the brass handle and wondered if she should just turn away. She wondered whether her heart would be able to say goodbye.

With a breath she decided she deserved that Wednesday afternoon.

“You are two minutes late,” he stood expectantly at the top of the stairs brush in one hand and his pocket watch in the other.

“Edger,” his name was a breath on her lips. No matter how often she saw him, she was rendered speechless by him. Just yesterday he had been at the opera house observing one of their rehearsals for an upcoming performance, and yet, the moment she laid eyes on him she was breathless. Never would she have dreamed that a man could have such an effect on her. Yesterday he had been dressed finely in a pressed coat and pristinely tied cravat, but the way he dressed when she saw him on Wednesday was her favorite. It was his artistic uniform. His shirt was untucked and smattered in wonderous colors from where he would wipe his brushes along his chest. The sleeves had been rolled up and he was barefoot where he stood, waiting for her.

“Did you not hear me?” He had always been impatient, but she loved that about him. “I’ve got much to do with this piece. I’m thinking of adding a girl stretching with her back to me beside the...” his voice faded as he walked deeper into the studio.

Adeline smiled. She gripped her skirts and climbed the stairs behind him, and with her other hand, she removed the pins that kept her hat in place. At the top of the stairs, she placed it on the same hat rack she had placed it on every Wednesday afternoon for the past five years. The fire curls bounded out as she worked them from their confinement of the latest French fashion. It took her but a moment to slip behind the screen Edgar had set up for her in the corner of his studio and change into her costume. Five years ago, she had been wary of her modesty, but as their relationship had grown, she had been less concerned for propriety.

But today was not like every Wednesday afternoon for the past five years, today she knew for certain that she was carrying a child. Would he be able to tell with his keen artistic eye? Adaline assessed her profile in the long mirror and worked to pull the strings of her corset slightly tighter, then bent to pull on her slippers, the corset and swollen belly making it slightly difficult.

“Darling, do hurry.”

Adeline jumped when he stuck his head behind the curtain. Edgar picked up the black ribbon and slipped it around her neck before placing a feather-light kiss there. She sucked in a breath. For a moment they just looked at each other in the mirror. Dancer and artist. Her eyes were the color of the deepest valley and sparkled in the light from the hundreds of candles that littered the room. She prayed that Edgar would not notice the increased shine from the glistening tears that wet her eyes.

He didn’t see the pain that lay beneath the striking color of her eyes, he just nuzzled his long, pointed nose on her cheek and pulled her into the heart of his studio. The ballet barre was no more than five feet long and stood as the single feature in the middle of the room. Around the barre stood numerous easels. Edgar never stood in one place when he sketched, rather he moved from angle to angle in order to perfectly portray movement in one single frame. He was exquisite as it. It was his ability to capture a live scene into the boundaries of a piece of canvas.

Edgar moved to the barre and explained how he wished for her to stand. They had been through this routine every Wednesday afternoon for the past five years. He would have her stand in one position for hours and then during the rest of the week he would transfer those sketches from his note pads onto masterpieces. She was his muse, his model for every dancer in every one of his pieces. Those treasures hung in the homes of some of the wealthiest lords in the city, yet, none of them knew it was she who had stood for him.

“I want you to paint me,” Adeline allowed the words to spill from her mouth before taking a moment to think about the implications of what that statement meant.

Edgar turned and stared at her. He was as completely surprised as she was that the words had slipped from her mouth. She hadn’t even allowed him to paint a likeness of her for himself, and now she was giving him permission to paint her in full form for the world. “My dove, are you certain?” He moved to stand in front of her and brushed a loose lock of hair off of her forehead. For a moment she thought to take back the request, to shove it down and pretend like that day was no different from the Wednesday afternoons before. But she saw the joy that emanated from his expression and felt the looming weight that that day held. She wanted him to have something to remember her by should she leave.

She nodded and moved to the center on the floor.

Although he was the artist and not the dancer, Adeline could not help but notice the choreographed movements he made as he prepared to paint. Normally, his steps were precisely placed, the rhythm unmistakable, but on that Wednesday afternoon she watched Edgar trip over himself he moved so quickly. It took him far longer to place her in the precise position he wanted her in. Adeline smiled as she watched him begin a sketch, twist his face in the way he always did when he concentrated, then throw the sketch pad across the room.

Finally, with her right leg supporting her in an arabesque, balanced with the bar, and extending her right arm, he was satisfied with the way she posed. Breathing steadily, she looked off into the distance of the room at the playful shadows on the wall. They cascaded around each other rolling and tumbling as if a litter of puppies finding their barring in a pile of hay. Would her child play like that one day?

The position was difficult and she often had to rest and rest. Each time she moved Edgar scowled.

“You really musn’t move,” he had grown angry.

Adeline looked at the clock mounted over his shoulder; she had been there for almost three hours. “Edgar,” she breathed allowing her entrancing eyes to plead with him in the way she knew he couldn’t resist. “May I see?” she stepped forward, but he jerked his pad away from her.

“No,” he stood. “Let us take a break,” he placed the sketchbook face down on the stool beside him, “I will fetch us something to eat, and then we will continue.”

A few of the candelabras had been burning so long large puddles of wax pooled underneath the candles. He really must have someone clean his studio. It had become difficult to even get Edgar to leave the dreary space, he was so enthralled with the creation of his masterpieces. With the light of the sun painting him, he worked tirelessly, as if time itself was against him. It was a race he had allowed no other to be part of, not even Adeline. Edgar waged war against the natural progression of age in order to complete his works, his treasures, but in doing so he had secluded himself from everything else in the world. Time and paint had become his only companions.

From the moment the doctor had confirmed what she dreaded she had thought of nothing else but whether to tell Edgar about the baby. By keeping this secret, would she be denying him the knowledge of fatherhood or releasing him from the loss of his painting?

Edgar returned with a plate of cheese and cold meats. “You seem upset my dear. What is bothering you?”

The trance was broken. He saw beyond the canvas. Finally, he wasn’t looking at his muse but at her. Adeline had grown used to this mirror shattering, though she’d hoped it would not happen on that particular day. “I was just thinking about what it might be like to never leave this studio. To stay with you always.”

“I would get nothing done. You would be too much of a distraction.” He meant the words kindly, she knew that, but as he said them, she knew that if she told him about the baby, it would mean he would give up painting forever. He was not a man to place his attention in multiple places, for Edgar, it was impertinent that he be fully focused on what meant most to him. Adeline knew from the moment he first kissed her that it would never be her as much as she’d watched his love for her grow, the way he looked at her was never as longingly as his looked upon his finished works.

The only option she had would be to leave without him ever knowing about their child. Even if he knew about the baby, he would never acknowledge it as his own. Though he caressed her with loving hands his only true love was the creations he brought to life on canvas. She and her child would only ever be the second to that.

New York, New York, 1927

“Miss, we are close’n up.”

Christopher slowed his long stride when he heard Henry, the museum’s night guard, speaking to a patron who still, mingled in the exhibit. When he heard her voice, he stopped.

“Oh, I’ll be just a few more minutes, please, I’m almost finished,” her voice held a slight accent and there was a pleading note in her tone.

He couldn’t say what made him do it, but Christopher stepped into the gallery, “It’s alright Henry, I’ll walk the lady out.” Without protesting the aged security guard nodded and went to finish his rounds.

From where he stood at the entrance to the gallery, he could see the back of the woman who had spoken. It wasn’t what he had expected, in fact, he did not think he had ever seen a woman in such a state as the woman before him right then. The lady sat on the floor of the gallery with her legs tucked under her in front of one of the pieces on loan from a private collection. Her long trench coat was pooled around her and a hat, that could have belonged to no one else, was thrown to the side. Pencils and pages of sketchbooks had toppled across the floor from an oversized purse. She didn’t notice.

Christopher walked cautiously closer not wanting to scare her from the focused state she had quickly fallen back into. She was a pensive doe standing in a meadow and he knew that if he made any sudden moves, she would run. It was as if she had no relocation of the room around her, only the painting that hung resolutely in front of her and the sketchbook that was in her lap. He watched as her gaze moved from the painting down to the sketchbook in rapid movements. Her pencil flew faster than her constantly moving focus.

Aware that it was completely inappropriate that he studied her so intently he tried to look away. Christopher only managed a quick glance at his watch but noted nothing more than the overlapping hands on the face before he looked back up at the woman. He could not remove his eyes from her alluring figure. She was exquisite. From her perfectly straight posture to the way her bobbed haircut bounced as she looked up and down. When he first saw her, he thought her hair was brown but as the light moved through each strand touching each piece showcasing the pieces of fire that were mixed into the brown The movement that should have been sudden and jerking was smooth the way her entire body seemed to move with her eyes. The effect of the movement made her hair look like a flame dancing against a sandy beach.

Around her neck a black ribbon was tied—Christopher sucked in a breath finally seeing what he should have noticed the moment he laid eyes on her. “It’s you,” he breathed.

His voice shattered the trance she had been working under. She smiled shyly, not looking at him, instead staring at the almost perfect likeness of her frozen in the frame on the wall. “My Grandmother, actually”

“But,” he stammered, “Degas never married...” Degas was the reason he had worked so hard for his position of curator of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City. He had studied Degas at university and visited his work across the globe. It was his connections that had made the very gallery they stood in possible.

“No, but he did love. He loved deeply,” she looked down at the sketchbook in her hand, and Christopher could hear the smile in her voice.

He crouched down beside her and finally peered into her eyes. They were the color of the grass in Central Park after heavy rainfall, full of life and warmth. “For my entire career, I have been trying to discover the name of at least one of his models...” he trailed off.

“Well, you have now discovered the name of all of his models,” the woman told him.

“What do you mean?”

“The moment Degas laid eyes on my grandmother he begged her to allow him to paint her. She agreed, so long as he used her as a template but never produced a painting of her likeness.” The woman adjusted her position on the floor and looked up at the painting. “It was scandalous enough that she was a dancer, but to be portrayed as a model as well, she would have been run right off the stage. Each dancer had a secret, but the skill of it was keeping that secret out of earshot of others, there was no line a dancer wouldn’t cross if it gave them an advantage on the stage.”

Christopher looked up at the painting as well. The painting was a side profile of a dancer, her right hand extended in front of her and her left leg out behind. She was dainty, hair pinned up and a black ribbon around her neck. The girl on the floor was an exact replica of the dancer.

“Degas sketched this the day my grandmother left.” Her tone was dream-like. She had heard the words a thousand times and had committed them to memory. “She had just found out that she was pregnant with my mother, and had told him that he could paint her image instead of a replica. My grandmother left before he finished and though he had spent five years using her as a muse he could not paint her image.” The girl shook her head. She smiled and licked her lips before continuing, “I think that proves more than anything that he loved the paint more than the image.”

As she paused for breath again Christopher looked down at her sketchbook. She was a talented artist. “You have your grandfather’s skills,” he told her before she could fold the book and slide it into her bag. He had scared her. Christopher moved to help collect some of her scatter tools, “I’m Christopher.”

“Adeline,” she replied once she had gathered her things. Adeline took a moment to stare at the painting once more. The look in her eye displayed her thoughts. She was seeing the tale her grandmother had told her. She was seeing the strokes of Degas’s brush move over her slim form. The intense study he had done of her grandmother before attempting to capture her beauty. If her Degas had looked at Adeline then Christopher believed he had missed completely when trying to capture the stunning image that stood before him.

“Degas spent his whole life trying to remember her face, the way she smiled.” Her eyes connected with his and he felt the spark of energy pass between them. Adeline became flustered and she looked at her watch awkwardly. “Oh my, I’m going to be late.” She looked back up at him, unspoken words hung between them. Questions beyond her name sat unasked. “I have a flight home...” she trailed off.

He gestured to the door of the gallery and led her to the entrance of the museum. He decided the only conversation that would be safe was the painting itself. “He was blind by the end of his life, it’s why he switched to sculpting—”

Adeline cut him off, “No, he transitioned to sculpting because he realized that he knew my grandmother more by touch than by image. He had painted so many variations of her that he never trusted his eyes again.”

Christopher was baffled. Everything he knew was being challenged by this woman.

“My grandmother believed she made the right choice when she left him and hid my mother. It wasn’t until he died and his work was displayed all around the world that my grandmother realized that the day she left she took with her his passion behind the paints.”

Christopher wanted nothing more than to ask her everything she knew about Degas, but the depth of pain in her eyes was a warning that he needed to be careful. The last few patrons were being ushered out by the other employees of the museum. He pushed the door open for her and they stepped into the buzzing streets of the city.

“I can’t promise access to that particular piece again, but if you are ever back in the city,” he handed her his card. She took it with a smile and while he watched her tuck it into her pocket, Christopher knew he would never see her again. The secrets that Adeline held deep in her memory about the pieces which hung on the walls in his museum would continue to be hidden away in the dark.

There would always be secrets to the art that hung on the walls, but Christopher decided maybe that was the point of art. If they held no secrets there would be no mystery, no intrigue around the passion beneath every stroke of the brush. For the time being, Christopher needed to reevaluate the idea that Degas loved something other than art.

That fact, how small it might be, changed his perspective on everything he knew about the art he looked at every day. He wondered what other secrets lay beneath the canvas.