Louis-Edmond felt the critic was robbing him blind and bared his soul to Jean with unfeigned indignation, forgetting that his listener knew better than anyone where the paintings had really come from.
‘Ponces and crooks, art critics, the lot of them! Sons of Barabbas, selling themselves to both sides, taking from every honest party. That Dugard is the worst, with his high and mighty airs. And tell me, young man, tell me if there’s a single man on earth who has the right to criticise Art? Eh? “Art critic” — it’s so pretentious you could die laughing. All ponces, I tell you. In my day … How old are you, actually?’
‘Twenty-one.’
‘I’m two and a half times your age … I was around when this buggers’ century started … I tell you, they were full of it. It was going to be the triumph of civilisation, humankind delivered out of servitude by machines. And the sum totaclass="underline" two wars … Yes, in my day, Monsieur Arnaud, artists and their public had no need of bribed intermediaries — yes, you heard me, bribed — to reach each other. The spark jumped between them on its own. There were still patrons, truly inspired art lovers then. Now it’s all speculation, percentages — do you hear what I’m saying? Beggars with their hand out! A real racket, as the Americans say.’
He waved his arms like a scarecrow to chase away the predators who wanted to wheel and deal in Art with a capital A. Blanche listened to him starry-eyed. She did love her Louis-Edmond! Especially when he let fly with a good rant, belabouring the middlemen, chasing the moneychangers from the Temple. His honesty would condemn him to poverty for life. But the defence of Art was a long ascent to Calvary, and at its summit one could not even be certain of seeing one’s efforts recognised. She would climb the path of that Calvary with him, bent beneath the world’s opprobrium, stooping to gather up crumbs of genius and the bitter tears of ingratitude.
Jean shrugged his shoulders. What was the point of reminding La Garenne of the truth? Especially as a customer had just arrived, a tall, thin young man whose deep, dark gaze settled on those present with a gentleness that was too earnest to be genuine. Michel du Courseau was honouring Paris with a visit. Blanche thought he looked distinguished, but Louis-Edmond, scenting an artist in the gallery, prudently vanished into the ‘bosom of bosoms’. Michel favoured Jean with a rather formal hug and these words, which seemed to encapsulate an affection of long standing: ‘Dear old Jean!’
‘Steady on, people are going to expect us to start weeping in each other’s arms.’
‘I’ve found you again!’
‘And it’s not over yet.’
‘You’re still my little brother, you know.’
‘Your nephew, you mean.’
‘Ah yes, of course, you know the truth now: Antoinette told you everything.’
‘Antoinette has never kept anything from me.’
He almost added, ‘not even her bottom’, but managed to stop himself, reining in his feelings of aggression in Michel’s presence; his uncle was, after all, his mother’s brother and Antoinette’s.
‘I don’t know that she should have!’ Michel said. ‘I hope you don’t find it painful being Geneviève’s son.’
‘Not a bit. I think she’s wonderful. Oedipus’s dream woman. Every chap would love a mother like her: her beauty, her charm, the pathos of a life threatened by tuberculosis. In short, an awfully modern story, a slightly muddled version of The Lady of the Camellias and The Bread Peddler. It’s a shame that she’s so elusive and maternal feelings aren’t her strong point, but you can’t have everything.’
‘One mustn’t blame her,’ Michel said sententiously. ‘She was left to her own devices. Maman was torn between Geneviève and us. In the end she chose us.’
‘I can’t quite see my mother sitting darning socks by the fire.’
‘Listen,’ Michel said. ‘We’ll talk about it another time. Now’s not the moment. Shall we have dinner this evening?’
‘I can’t. I’m busy.’
‘Tomorrow then?’
‘I’m busy every evening. We can have lunch if you like. The gallery’s closed from midday till two. Will you excuse me for just a moment?’
Two German officers who had just walked in were asking to visit hell. They left swiftly, their choices made, concealing their Alberto Senzacatso prints under their arms. Michel had remained with Blanche de Rocroy, who had naively tried to interest him in a series of horrors: fishing boats against a setting sun, Parisian girls on a swing, flowers in a vase — paintings for innocent tourists.
Seeing her look discouraged, Jean said, ‘There’s no reason you should know, but Michel is a real painter.’
‘Oh … in that case I’ll leave you alone.’
She was not cross; she made mistakes all the time. The name meant nothing to her and all painters were real painters. Some just grabbed their chances better than others.
As might have been imagined, Michel du Courseau’s visit was not without motive. After abandoning a singing career he had returned to Grangeville to devote himself to painting, though without an audience or friendly voice to encourage or guide him.
‘Solitude is very necessary for my work, but I need warmth too, particularly as I’ve started on a risky path: religious inspiration, you see, is the only kind that moves me. Secular subjects leave me cold. Art has lost its faith. I want to give it back …’
‘Listen,’ Jean said, ‘this gallery isn’t really the kind of place you need. I tremble at the thought that you might discover what we have for sale back there …’
‘You mean that old spinster—’
‘She’s not so old … only just forty. And it’s not her who sells the stuff in what we call hell, it’s me. The owner, Louis-Edmond de La Garenne, is a crook. Paris is a cut-throat place. Everyone’s on the fiddle. Only idiots don’t make anything. In this city honesty is an unforgivable sin.’
Michel looked genuinely shocked. He had never come across anything like the situation Jean was describing.
‘I see now the terrible isolation our family has lived in. If I’m honest, all we know is our little Grangeville world, satisfied, happy, hiding its little wounds. If what you tell me is true, and if in coming to Paris I have to fall in with your pessimism, then it’s Maman who is guilty for having made me live too long in a state of innocence. What is so special about this hell of yours?’
Jean supplied a full account, with a vulgarity we shall not venture to repeat. He enjoyed seeing Michel’s reaction.
‘Someone like that Italian,’ Michael said, paling, ‘should be denounced, and arrested instantly. He’s a criminal. He’s contaminating a society that he lives from by perverting it.’
‘This isn’t a time for denunciation.’
What was Jean saying? He was still unaware of what had already started to happen, too rarely among his fellow Frenchmen to grasp the purulent frenzy of denunciation that had erupted in a country still stunned by the blow it had received. It was a shame he had not read Céline, who was hunched over a manuscript that very day, that very moment, writing, all illusions abandoned, with the penetrating acuity of the visionary: ‘Censors and informers are at every corner … France is a pitiful donkey, the Kommandantur stuffed with people who have come to denounce each other.’ He was heedless even of the gnawing unease corrupting a population tempted by an authority known for its prompt reactions; yet Michel’s threatening words chilled him. Denounce? Who to? How?