Sacré Bleu

“No, we have to find that woman in the Spanish lace. She’ll do it. I mean, she seemed open to the idea.” A great, joyous grin bisected his beard. “A modern moment in time, caught on an enormous canvas. I shall stop time for a luncheon on the grass!” He turned and strode into the crowd with such purpose that people moved out of his way without his asking.

“But you have no money for a canvas that size,” said Bazille, following his friends into the next gallery. “No money for paint or brushes.”

“You do,” said Monet.

Renoir looked over his shoulder and nodded. “Be sure to ask your father for enough for the whore, too.”

“I’m not asking my father for money to hire a whore for you to paint,” said Bazille.

“Yes you are,” said Monet.

“Her name is Jo Hiffernan,” said Whistler. “An Irish hellcat—skin like milk. Quick-witted for a woman, and a soul as deep as a well.” Symphony in White #1—James McNeill Whistler, 1863

AS HE ENTERED THE “W” SALON, MANET WAS IMMEDIATELY STRUCK BY A VERY tall canvas of a redheaded woman dressed all in white. There was a quality to her gaze, as if she were not only looking at you but into you and knew too much about you, owned you. His bather had the same quality, and seeing it in another painting took the edge from the criticisms he’d been enduring all day. Then he spotted the painter, holding forth in lecture to a small gathering of admirers in front of the painting.

“Whistler,” Manet called. “How’s your mother?”

The American bowed to the group and turned to greet his friend. He was a gaunt, dark-haired fellow about the same age as Manet, with an outrageous gondola of a mustache riding his lip and a monocle screwed into his eye like the brass porthole of a warship. He looked weaker, more pale than when they had last traded quips at Café Molière a year ago, and he was actually leaning on his walking stick as if lame, rather than wielding it as an accoutrement of fashion.

Whistler often joked about his puritanical mother, who reminded him with weekly letters that he was frittering away his life and the good family name by trying to live as a painter in London.

“Ah, Mother,” said Whistler in English. “She’s an arrangement in gray and black; her disapproval falls like a shadow across the ocean. And yours?”

Manet laughed. “Hiding in shame and praying for one of her sons to take up the law like our father.”

“Our mothers should share tea and disappointment together,” said Whistler.

Manet released his friend’s hand and turned his attention to the painting. “The Salon rejected this? She is so bold. So real.” The girl, in a long white gown, stood barefoot on the white fur of a polar bear rug, but beneath that was an Oriental carpet with a woven pattern of bright blue.

“My White Girl. She was turned down by the Salon and the London Academy. Her name is Jo Hiffernan,” said Whistler. “An Irish hellcat—skin like milk. Quick-witted for a woman, and a soul as deep as a well.”

“Oh, poor Jemmie,” said Manet, “must you fall in love with every woman you paint?”

“Nothing like that. The wench poisoned me and right there is the evidence.” Whistler waved up and down the painting. “I must have scraped the canvas a hundred times—started over. All that lead white soaks right through your skin. I still see rings around every point of light. My doctor says it will take months for my vision to return to normal. I’ve been in Biarritz by the sea, recovering.”

That explained it. Lead poisoning. Manet breathed a little easier. “The limp, then? Also lead poisoning?”

“No, last week I was painting on the beach and I was swept out to sea by a rogue wave—pounded in the surf. I would have drowned if some fishermen hadn’t rescued me.”

She glided between them like a petite storm, black lace trailing behind her. “Should have stayed in London and continued to shag the redhead on the bear rug, then?” she said in English, an Irish accent.

The little color Whistler had drained out of his face. “Beg pardon, mademoiselle—”

“A bear rug’s a sight more comfortable than the riverbank, eh, Édouard?” she said to Manet in French, squeezing his biceps. “At least she didn’t give him syphilis, non?”

Manet felt his mouth moving, but no words were coming out. The two painters, both notorious raconteurs, looked at each other, speechless.

“You two look like you’ve seen a ghost. Oh, there’s my uncle again. Have to go. Ta!”

She hurried off through the crowd. Whistler’s monocle dropped out of his eye and swung from the end of its silk cord. “Who was that woman?”

“How would I know?” said Manet. “Don’t you know her?”

“No. Never seen her before.”

“Me either,” Manet lied.

“She knew your name.”