Page 15 of The Velvet Hours
When he lifted the watch’s cover, and saw the engraving inside, she sensed he had grasped its significance.
“How perfect.” He beamed, kissing her on the cheek. “It will remind me of my favorite little bird...”
“It no longer works,” Marthe said, taking the watch from his hand. She glanced at the bronze clock on her fireplace noting the current time. “At least not in the traditional sense...”
She rolled the small dial on the side of the watch so that its hands matched those of her own clock. “I’m setting the watch for this exact hour and minute. It will remain set at this time until I see you next.” She handed it back to him and closed his fingers over the smooth, round casing.
“This way time will stand still until I see you again.”
He took the watch and placed it inside the breast pocket of his coat.
“Then I will keep it close to my heart until we can move the hands of the dial once more.”
***
Marthe no longer simply wanted to collect just shunga prints and Oriental porcelains, she sought to expand her mind during Charles’s absence. She now began to take excursions to Paris’s most fashionable art galleries and museums. As a child, she’d always been intimidated by the Louvre, an imperial stone vault that she imagined was filled with immeasurable treasures. She had felt at odds with the sumptuous surroundings, as if admittance was not possible for a girl of such low social standing. But now, dressed in her finery, she felt she could pass through its doors and wander through its chambers.
For hours, she walked through the museum’s many portrait galleries. She studied the detailed, fine brushwork of the Dutch masters and the celestial-like faces painted by Da Vinci and Botticelli. She marveled at the way the Greeks captured both the contours and thesensuality of a woman’s limbs. The glow of the marble. The use of light and shadow. She saw that it was as relevant in painting and sculpture, as it was in life.
But it was the large canvases filled with life-size re-creations of women through the different centuries that she loved the most. She would stand beneath their ornate, gilded frames and study their faces, looking for clues that might reveal something hidden or locked away. She wondered about their passions, what they were like after their corsets were untied and their gowns fell to the ground.
She did not look nearly as long at the portraits of the Venuses in their nude splendor, or the nymphs who frolicked in meadows of pale green grass. She knew what a beautiful woman’s body looked like. But it was what existed behind the white flesh and flinty blue eyes that captivated her interest. She wondered where they hid their fire and heat.
***
The rooms of her apartment began to grow in complexity. Now it wasn’t just an apartment created for whispers and caresses, it became an extension of Marthe herself. Her collection of Asian ceramics lined the shelves of her parlor, and her secret shunga prints were hidden in the drawers of her bedroom. She was already into her second year of living as a kept woman with Charles when she purchased her first oil painting—a young girl, no older than twelve, dressed all in white.
She did not tell Charles or Giselle, the only two others who ever entered the apartment, why she had chosen this painting above all the ones she had seen for sale. It was because the girl had the same face as Odette. And her dress was almost identical to the one she had watched her mother wash through her tears.
There was no hardship in the girl’s face. And no wisdom either.It was the face of a child, as pure and peaceful as a blanket of freshly fallen snow.
When she had saved enough of her allowance from Charles, she added another piece of artwork for her collection. This time, a small pastel of a dancer. Her body lithe and stretched as tightly as ribbon.
***
“You are becoming a connoisseur,” Charles remarked one day as he settled into the sofa. Marthe had opened the tall shutters to the room, and she could see a small constellation of dust floating in the sunlight, like stardust illuminated in midair.
She pulled up her skirt and settled down beside him. On the side table he had left his gold pocket watch for her to turn the hands once more. How she loved this ritual between them, how they kept their own sense of time.
“It’s interesting to see what you’re drawn to... Most people gravitate to one style or period exclusively. But you’re like a piece of cut crystal. A thousand prisms cast through a single set of eyes.”
She smiled and reached for his hand. “I’m glad you think it’s money well spent.”
“Indeed, I do,” he said, squeezing her fingers.
“I have this memory of you, Marthe, when we were in Venice. I took you to the church of San Giorgio dei Greci... Do you remember? It was pitch dark when we first entered. The place smelled so damp, like an old bank vault.” He closed his eyes, lost briefly in the memory. “But then, suddenly from the shadows the paintings by Carpaccio emerged like a beacon of light. I heard this little gasp escape from your lips... and as I turned to face you, I witnessed your face transform. It was a revelation.
“You brought me so much joy at that moment. Just like the paintings of San Giorgio before us, you illuminated the whole room.”
She was so taken by his words. It wasn’t just the affectionate way Charles had remembered her that afternoon, it was also that he had recalled an intimate moment between them that had occurred beyond the bedroom. And that moved her even more.
For several seconds, both of them remained silent.
“Charles...” She was so touched to hear him speak so sweetly about her, she felt her voice tremble slightly.
“I remember that afternoon perfectly.”
“And the evening, too.” He closed his eyes and smiled. “That night when you took down your hair in that splendid bed. I wouldn’t be much of a man if I failed to mention that, too.”
