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over Mademoiselle Berthe. That’s why I brought him the painting of her.” He slurs the comment to no one in particular and chuckles.
    The painting that set Madame Manet on edge before dinner? Mon Dieu . I have done nothing to deliberately cause Monsieur Manet misery. Nothing to provoke a wrong message.
    A clap of thunder erupts, as if we’ve angered the Gods.
    In my peripheral vision, I see him still leaning on his elbow, only now his clenched fist has slid to the bridge of his nose, hiding his expression.
    “My dear miserable friend,” Stevens says. “She is right there at your fingertips. Just ask her.”

    Chapter Four ‌

    Our words must seem to be inevitable.
    —William Butler Yeats

Y
    “ ou insult my daughter and offend me with your crass insinuations.” Maman shoves back her chair and stands up
    from the table, wobbling a bit, glaring first at Stevens, then at
    Édouard. “Do you think Berthe a common model? Like your Olympia?”
    Maman does not wait for an answer, but gives a curt nod to Madame Manet. “Merci, Madame. Bonne nuit.”
    Édouard gets to his feet, and I think for a moment he will
    not let her pass. The two square off, Maman glaring, Édouard silently imploring her to stay.
    “Madame, s’il vous plaît, Mademoiselle Berthe is very beautiful. I simply wish to paint her portrait. That is all Monsieur Stevens was trying to say, although very poorly, I must admit. He meant no harm. There was no insult behind his jest. Oui, Stevens?”
    The man, slumps down in his chair like a naughty child ruefully trying to render himself invisible. He shrugs. “Of course. I meant no harm. Please forgive me Madame, Mademoiselle.”

    With all the commotion stirring around me all I can think is Édouard Manet wants to paint me . All I can do is sit leaden in my seat, hands in my lap, trying to breathe. Stevens painted my portrait, yet somehow this is different.
    I do not know whether to hug Monsieur Stevens or strangle him for laying the unmentionable wide open on the table for all see. I steal a glance at Edma, who looks simply captivated by the fiasco.
    Degas frowns and studies his fingernails. “I do not understand the fuss. I certainly don’t see any harm in Manet painting her. She knows she is a painter, not a model, even if she does afford her colleagues the favor of her likeness every so often.”
    Maman gasps. She lets loose a little cry and throws up her hands. “I am now quite sure I regret giving Monsieur Stevens permission to paint my daughter.”
    She storms out of the room. Edma and I follow. As does Édouard.
    “Madame, please. Be reasonable.”
    “Reasonable?” I fear Maman might slap him. Instead, as bold as you please, she strides over and snatches up the gift Stevens presented to Édouard.
    White knuckled and shaking, she grips the gilded frame.
    Instantly, her face turns an unhealthy shade of ash. “Maman?” I murmur.
    Edma and I rush to her side to comfort her. From the look on her face I fear she might faint dead away. Then I see for myself what has offended her so.
    Stevens’s painting. Of me.
    It is not the likeness that is so horrid, it is how he has inscribed it. The words are painted on the canvas bold and black, right above my head.
    To Monsieur Ed. Manet.

    My mother’s face f lashes like the lightning storm outside. “My daughter’s image gifted like chattel to a man whose acquaintance I have just made this evening? A married man at that.” She signals a manservant for our wraps and hats. “Unfor-givable.”
    Madame Manet appears at her side and gently lifts the frame from Maman’s hands and gives it to Eugène who whisks it away.
    “Madame . . .” Her voice, low and discomfited, trails off as if she is at a loss for words.
    Gustave places a tender hand on his mother’s shoulder. All of us, except Degas and Fantin, stand in stony, hot silence.
    It is what Maman did not say that screams loudest: Your son is a man whose radical politics and reputation for a risqué