Madame Bovary's Daughter (33 page)

“Nothing, I did nothing,” cried Mariette.

“I shall speak to Madame. But I think it's wise if you pack your things immediately.” Mariette threw her apron to the floor and fled the kitchen. She was gone within the hour.

Madame Rappelais was strangely unbothered by the whole incident. If anything, she seemed amused.

“Jealousy is an ugly thing,” she said, rubbing cream into her long white neck. “I know, I speak from experience. It can cause
one to act in very rash ways. I hope you are all right, my dear girl,” she said, turning and grasping Berthe by the hand.

“I'm fine, madame,” Berthe said, pulling her hand away and hiding it behind her back. But she wasn't fine. She knew this woman cared nothing about her. And certainly less about Mariette. And what about her husband? She thought of Monsieur's deaf ear to the plight of his mill workers. It seemed as if this house held as much ugliness and selfishness as it did beauty. But where else would she go?

“Now Madame DuPoix has to find a replacement for Mariette. What a bother,” Madame sighed, dabbing perfume behind her ears.

Berthe suddenly had an inspiration. “Madame, I have a friend whom I worked with in the mill at Lille,” she said. “She's a very hard worker and I know she would love to come to Paris.”

“Is she reliable?”

“Oh, yes, madame.” Berthe firmly believed that if Hélène were given a good job she would learn skills that would enable her to support herself without having to steal. Besides, she longed for a real friend and ally in this place. For a moment she worried about what might happen to Hélène at the Rappelaises', but then she remembered that Hélène, of all people, could certainly take care of herself.

“Well, write to her and tell her she has a position if she wants it.”

And it was as simple as that. Almost before she knew it, Hélène arrived
chez
Rappelais, tattered bag in hand, red hair swept up underneath a ridiculously formal black bonnet. Berthe wondered where she had stolen that from, but she was too thrilled to
see her old friend again to care. She introduced her to Madame DuPoix, who seemed appropriately unimpressed.

“Madame was in such a rush to hire someone she neglected to check your references,” Madame DuPoix said with a sniff. “May I see them, please,” she said, holding out her hand.

“See what?” Hélène asked.

“Your letters of recommendation.”

Hélène laughed. “She is my recommendation, ain't she?” She indicated Berthe with a wave of her hand.

“I see,” Madame DuPoix said dubiously. “Well, you may as well show Mademoiselle Du Croix to her room.”

As Berthe led Hélène up the stairs to the top floor, her friend's eyes darted from the hand-carved oak banister to the crystal chandeliers to the ornately framed portraits on the walls. On the second-floor landing she stopped by an ornate gold inlaid table. On it were a framed miniature painting of Madame Rappelais, a mother-of-pearl vase, a jeweled pillbox, and a small alabaster Cupid. Before Berthe could stop her, Hélène slipped the Cupid into the pocket of her skirt.

“Stop it,” Berthe hissed. “Put it back. You have a roof over your head and a room of your own, the food is plentiful and delicious, and you are to be paid a decent salary. You don't have to steal anymore.”

Hélène looked at her as if she had said “You don't have to breathe anymore.”

She replaced the Cupid and picked up the pillbox instead. She examined the jeweled top with one eye closed as if trying to determine its value.

“Hélène!”

“I'm just looking, ain't I?” she said, smiling a wicked smile. “There's no harm in that. Why else do they have all these lovely
things if they don't want people admirin' them?” She put the pillbox back on the table.

Berthe wondered for a moment if she hadn't made a mistake bringing Hélène to Paris. It was like escorting the fox into the henhouse.

“Hélène, please promise me you'll behave.”

“I promise,” said Hélène, solemnly crossing herself.

B
ERTHE WAS SORTING SWATCHES BY COLOR AND DESIGN WITH
Monsieur Rappelais late one night when there came a loud banging at the front door.

“Who could that be at this hour?” Rappelais asked.

Everyone was asleep. Berthe hurried down the stairs and opened the heavy front door. It was Monsieur Worth. He was in a state of great excitement. His skullcap was perched at an odd angle on his head and, instead of his usual elegance, his clothes looked as though he had been sleeping in them.

“I am in a renovation,” he said in his usual battered French. “I must make words with Monsieur Rappelais. Is he up?”

“My dear friend, what's the matter?” asked Monsieur, rushing down the staircase, his silk robe flapping about him.

“I have the good hour,” said Worth, collapsing on the chaise longue. “Please, a touch of brandy.” Berthe poured drinks for both of the men. “I have finally made my proposal to Gagelin.” Maison Gagelin was the fabric and dress accessories shop that had employed Worth since he first arrived in Paris. It was there
that he'd met his wife, Marie Vernet, one of the young women who modeled shawls and cloaks for Gagelin's clients. “I thought he would love the idea of a partnership but he turned me down, the ugly radish.”

“Oh, I am so sorry,” said Rappelais.

“Don't be desolated. He is an idiot. The future is in ready-made dresses. You know that, and I know that, but Gagelin is too blind to see it. He has the stupidity of a mutton. He sees only the need to sell fabric and accessories. My brilliance is wasted there. It is not enough that I make beautiful dresses, that my
chère
Marie models them, and that the customers are clamoring for me to make more and more. No, he sees no reason to change. He doesn't see my genius as important. He thinks he can go on stealing my ideas, my soul. Can you imagine? He has refused me. Me, the heart and soul of his stupid rag business. Well, I thank him for giving me the foot in the bottom. I have decided this very night I will take my designs and open up my own shop.” He fell back on the sofa, exhausted from his long speech.

“But, dear Charles,” said Monsieur Rappelais, sitting down next to him and clasping his hand, “can you afford to do this?”

“Of course not. I am as poor as a church mousse. But I have been planning this for some time. I already have a partner lined up. My dear and very rich friend Monsieur Otto Bobergh has money coming out of his pince-nez. He has been begging me to allow him to invest a small fortune in my business. And you, Rappelais, you will give me an exclusive on all your most beautiful fabrics. We will leave Gagelin nothing but the ugliest scraps. And we will all live happily and wealthily ever after.” He leaned forward and kissed the older man on both cheeks.

Berthe watched as Monsieur Rappelais gazed upon his friend with a look of utter adoration. She suddenly realized that, in his own peculiar way, he was in love with Charles Worth. “More
brandy?” she asked. The two men nodded their heads and lifted their empty glasses.

“Just think,” said Monsieur Worth, “all I have to do is design and make my dresses and then sit back. Women will come from all over France, from Europe, from the world. They will flock to my atelier for the honor of purchasing one of my creations. I will be famous. I will be ravished. Women will boast to their friends of owning an original Worth.”

“Ah, my dear friend, indeed you are an artist. But permit me to remind you that as brilliant as you may be you are nothing without my fabrics. Textiles, as you know, are what determine fashion, not the other way around. It has always been this way.”

“Dear Rappelais, what was always the way as you call it, will no longer be the way. Wake up, my dear strawberry. I can design several hundred dresses at a time and have them ready-made in my workshop. So my fashions and the demand for them will necessarily determine what fabrics you will, by necessity, weave.”

“Dear Charles, fashions do change, but the fabric stays the same. A dress falls apart, falls out of fashion, but the fabric, the beauty of the design, the colors—those endure.”

Berthe thought the two men would go on “dearing” each other to death until the sun came up. But finally, they seemed to reach a standoff.

Both men looked at each other. “Why are we arguing,
chèr
Rappelais? It is the old question: Which came first, the chicken or the olive? Fashion dictates fabric; fabric dictates fashion. Who cares? We are geniuses living in the fashion center of the universe. Which makes us …”

“… the most powerful men in the world!” they said simultaneously. They tipped their glasses and drank the brandy down as if it were water. Berthe felt her eyes closing. It was almost two in the morning and she was exhausted.

“Is there anything else I can get you gentlemen before I retire?” she asked.

“Stay,” commanded Monsieur Worth. “This is a hysteric moment. We are creating the future of fashion here. And we need a witness to our great ideas. Please, take notes.” And so Berthe picked up pen and paper and jotted down their increasingly drunken ideas. Hours passed while they talked and drank and argued. She longed for her bed. She still had to get up at the crack of dawn to prepare her mistress for the day.

“And perhaps one day Mademoiselle Berthe will come and work for me. She can model my dresses, along with my darling Marie.” Berthe stirred in her seat. She felt a thrill of excitement. Could she be a model? To think of actually wearing the beautiful fabrics she loved. And then perhaps she could even begin to design a little … She shook herself to stop that sort of dreaming. It seemed every time she fantasized about her future something would happen to dash her hopes.

“She is not going anywhere. I need her here,” answered Rappelais, almost as if reading Berthe's mind.

“Isn't it wonderful to be fought over by two talented and soon-to-be-world-famous gentlemen?” said Worth.

Almost as wonderful as it would be to be fast asleep in her own bed, Berthe thought.

A
S THE WEEKS PASSED
, R
APPELAIS AND
W
ORTH CAME TO RELY
on Berthe more and more. At the same time, to no small relief, Madame Rappelais seemed to lose all interest in her as a bed-mate. And Hélène, remarkably, seemed to take to her new position. But with her light-fingered friend in the house, Berthe knew not to relax her guard entirely. Still, she had begun to experience an unfamiliar sense of contentment.

Madame arrived home late one morning, her face flushed with excitement, carrying a small flat package about fifteen by eighteen inches in size. It was carefully wrapped in brown paper and secured by twine. Without removing her cape she instructed Berthe to follow her up to her bedroom. She shut the door and turned to Berthe.

“Close your eyes,” she said. “I have a wonderful, wonderful surprise.” Berthe did as she was told. She heard the ripping of paper. And then: “You may open them now.”

Berthe gasped. Madame Rappelais held in front of her a
lovely painting of rich browns and greens. In the background one could see a gaggle of white geese making their way through the trees to a small stream. And in the foreground was a figure clearly recognizable as Berthe, wearing … 
nothing but a blue kerchief on her head
. She sat with one leg bent and the other held straight out, her white foot dipping into the slowly swirling water. The sun shone warmly on her back and shoulders, and on her budding breasts. Berthe felt her cheeks turn hot. How had Madame managed to find the one thing that could so publicly shame her?

“Where did you get this?” she croaked, barely able to get the words out.

“At Monsieur Jean-François Millet's studio, where else?” Madame laughed with delight. “You can imagine my surprise when, upon viewing some of his work, I suddenly recognized my very own Mademoiselle Bovary as naked as a newborn baby. I, of course, insisted he sell it to me. Poor man had no choice. I do think this is one of his better pieces, and not just because I know the subject so well. Most of his work is so relentlessly rural and peasantlike. Why didn't you tell me you modeled for the great Millet?”

“I didn't think it was of any importance,” Berthe said through gritted teeth.

“Well, Monsieur Millet certainly thought a great deal of it. This painting cost me a bloody fortune. Aren't you the lucky one? To be immortalized by a famous artist. Now, where do you think I should hang it?” Berthe felt a growing panic.
She couldn't. She wouldn't
.

“Oh, no, madame. Please, please don't hang it.”

“It's art, my dear. That's what it's for. To be hung and admired. Let's see, should I put it downstairs in the gallery or on
the wall going up the stairs where all the Rappelais ancestors hang? That would liven up the relatives a bit, I think.”

She held the small painting out at arm's length and peered at it through half-closed eyes. “No, you certainly don't belong with all of Monsieur Rappelais's ugly ancestors. I think I shall put you here, right over my dressing table, where we can both appreciate it. I'm not sure I like the frame but that can be easily changed.” She placed the painting on the floor next to the dressing table. “By the way, I told Monsieur Millet that you were in my employ. He was so pleased to hear that you were in Paris. I have invited him to dinner next week. The two of you shall have a grand reunion. Do you own a dinner dress?”

Berthe wanted to strangle her. “Madame, I am your maid! I can't possibly attend your dinner party.”

“Of course you can. If I say you are invited then you will be there. Besides, we don't want to disappoint Monsieur Millet. It will be a small, intimate affair. Just us art lovers.”