Read Online Pictures at an Exhibition by Sara Houghteling - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Sara Houghteling
Ads: Link
I awoke the next morning, I took my breakfast alone.
“Mademoiselle Clément is already at the hospital,” my hostesstold me. Somehow the whole town knew of her mother's illness. I went out in search of Rose.
It was Bastille Day, and the infirmary managed to have a quietly festive air. The doctors wore carnations in their buttonholes. Several people greeted me by name. I could only smile, confused.
Rose appeared at my elbow as I walked through the hospital herb nursery, which was robust and tidy in daylight. “Mother's not well enough to see you,” she said. “They say she's out of danger but too tired to spend more than a few minutes, even with me. Still, I'm to send her regards and her thanks.” She slipped her hand into mine. “I've a surprise for you,” she said, brightening.
Despite the holiday, Rose had procured a picnic. To my relief and chagrin, the young doctor and his father had fixed the Delage overnight. We drove the car for thirty minutes along uneven roads, past another small farming village and its fields of alfalfa and artichokes and up into the mountains to a meadow.
“This is beautiful,” I said.
“No,” Rose said. “You've saved me from this place.”
“How?” I asked. “I'd love to say I did, but you're the more capable one of our duo, don't you think?”
“It's the promise of you,” she said, and my heart swelled so much I could ignore her next words. “You're a good boy, Max. Better than I deserve.” I was nearly twenty, and I was no longer a boy, except in one regard.
The tarte tatin and the wine made me giddy and drunk. Bees and flies buzzed above us and even the sun seemed honeyed. Eventually, Rose fell asleep, and I must have, too. When I awoke it was the gray of a midsummer's night. Rose was rattling a box of firecrackers.
“Let's go to the quarry,” she said.
Ahead, the torch in her hand lit the way. I followed down the sloping meadow and over a path in the woods. In Rose's voice, I sensed a certain deliberation, as I often did, though usually it was with regard to art, not affection. I sensed that she was trying on a role: that of a normal young woman in love. Where I stood in relation to this role, I did not know. I thought of Manet's women, and of the nude in his Luncheon on the Grass. The scattered picnic at the sitters’feet and the men's relaxed poses are meant to suggest spontaneity, and yet the role of the central figure, the naked woman, was always uncertain and unsettling. I, at least, no matter how long I looked, could never read it. Like Rose. Like all of Manet's women—on balconies, in Argenteuil beside a canotier , tending bar, at a picnic, lying in bed—all places where one's purposes become obscure and the women, for matters of self-protection or modernity—could I ever understand?—became unreadable.
At best, I wondered, I would be asked to play the lover. I consoled myself with the hope that Rose would find the role fitting and that in real life she would follow.
We stopped abruptly at a rock ledge. The water beneath us was as still and silver as mercury. Rose began lighting the firecrackers, which burst into showers of red and white over the water, and I saw the night clouds reflected in the surface while the firecrackers burned. Our laughter echoed back at us from the rocks.
“I want to go swimming,” Rose said.
“Down there?” I said. Sheer rock encircled the quarry. “It's like jumping out of an airplane.” I blew out the torch and waited for my eyes to adjust. “You won't dare.”
“I won't?” she asked, taunting me. She sounded girlish, even mean. The night regained its contours, with the pale woman beside me in the half darkness, knees bent to her chest, as mine were, our corresponding limbs touching. Her skirt fell back from her knees. I slid my hand across them, urgent now. Rose shifted, settled with her back against my ribs. I ran my hand over the buttons and frills of her blouse, then under it. “May I?” I asked her
“Mademoiselle Clément is already at the hospital,” my hostesstold me. Somehow the whole town knew of her mother's illness. I went out in search of Rose.
It was Bastille Day, and the infirmary managed to have a quietly festive air. The doctors wore carnations in their buttonholes. Several people greeted me by name. I could only smile, confused.
Rose appeared at my elbow as I walked through the hospital herb nursery, which was robust and tidy in daylight. “Mother's not well enough to see you,” she said. “They say she's out of danger but too tired to spend more than a few minutes, even with me. Still, I'm to send her regards and her thanks.” She slipped her hand into mine. “I've a surprise for you,” she said, brightening.
Despite the holiday, Rose had procured a picnic. To my relief and chagrin, the young doctor and his father had fixed the Delage overnight. We drove the car for thirty minutes along uneven roads, past another small farming village and its fields of alfalfa and artichokes and up into the mountains to a meadow.
“This is beautiful,” I said.
“No,” Rose said. “You've saved me from this place.”
“How?” I asked. “I'd love to say I did, but you're the more capable one of our duo, don't you think?”
“It's the promise of you,” she said, and my heart swelled so much I could ignore her next words. “You're a good boy, Max. Better than I deserve.” I was nearly twenty, and I was no longer a boy, except in one regard.
The tarte tatin and the wine made me giddy and drunk. Bees and flies buzzed above us and even the sun seemed honeyed. Eventually, Rose fell asleep, and I must have, too. When I awoke it was the gray of a midsummer's night. Rose was rattling a box of firecrackers.
“Let's go to the quarry,” she said.
Ahead, the torch in her hand lit the way. I followed down the sloping meadow and over a path in the woods. In Rose's voice, I sensed a certain deliberation, as I often did, though usually it was with regard to art, not affection. I sensed that she was trying on a role: that of a normal young woman in love. Where I stood in relation to this role, I did not know. I thought of Manet's women, and of the nude in his Luncheon on the Grass. The scattered picnic at the sitters’feet and the men's relaxed poses are meant to suggest spontaneity, and yet the role of the central figure, the naked woman, was always uncertain and unsettling. I, at least, no matter how long I looked, could never read it. Like Rose. Like all of Manet's women—on balconies, in Argenteuil beside a canotier , tending bar, at a picnic, lying in bed—all places where one's purposes become obscure and the women, for matters of self-protection or modernity—could I ever understand?—became unreadable.
At best, I wondered, I would be asked to play the lover. I consoled myself with the hope that Rose would find the role fitting and that in real life she would follow.
We stopped abruptly at a rock ledge. The water beneath us was as still and silver as mercury. Rose began lighting the firecrackers, which burst into showers of red and white over the water, and I saw the night clouds reflected in the surface while the firecrackers burned. Our laughter echoed back at us from the rocks.
“I want to go swimming,” Rose said.
“Down there?” I said. Sheer rock encircled the quarry. “It's like jumping out of an airplane.” I blew out the torch and waited for my eyes to adjust. “You won't dare.”
“I won't?” she asked, taunting me. She sounded girlish, even mean. The night regained its contours, with the pale woman beside me in the half darkness, knees bent to her chest, as mine were, our corresponding limbs touching. Her skirt fell back from her knees. I slid my hand across them, urgent now. Rose shifted, settled with her back against my ribs. I ran my hand over the buttons and frills of her blouse, then under it. “May I?” I asked her
Similar Books
