Page 70 of The Seven Sisters

‘And Mademoiselle Izabela, it seems that fate has conspired to bring us together. I hope the next time it can be for longer.’ Laurent kissed her hand, shooting her a glance from under his lashes as he did so. Naive as she was, she instantly understood what his look contained.

*

Luckily, when Bel arrived back at the apartment, Maria Georgiana was taking her afternoon nap. Maria Elisa, however, was reading a book in the drawing room.

‘How was it?’ she asked as Bel came in.

‘It was wonderful!’ Bel threw herself down in a chair, exhausted from nervous excitement, but still elated from her encounter with Laurent.

‘Good. So, what did you learn?’

‘Oh, all about the tools needed for stone sculpting,’ she said airily, her alcohol-infused brain preventing her lips from moving in the way they usually did.

‘For six hours, you were learning about the tools needed for sculpting?’ questioned Maria Elisa, glancing at her suspiciously.

‘Yes, for most of it, and then we went for lunch and . . .’ Bel stood up abruptly. ‘I think the day has exhausted me. I will go and take a nap before dinner.’

‘Bel?’

‘Yes?’

‘Have you been drinking?’

‘No . . . well, only a glass of wine with lunch. After all, everyone in Paris does the same.’

Bel walked towards the door, vowing that in future she would refrain from whatever she was offered on the rustic tables of La Closerie des Lilas.

21

Apartment 4

48, Avenue de Marigny

Paris

France

27th June 1928

Dearest Pai and Mãe,

I can hardly believe that I have been away from Rio for four months; the time has flown by so fast. I am still loving the lessons I take with Margarida de Lopes Almeida at the Beaux-Arts school. Although I know I will never be a great artist like some of my classmates, my lessons have given me a far deeper appreciation of painting and sculpture and I feel this will benefit me greatly in my future life as Gustavo’s wife.

Summer has really arrived in Paris now, and the city has become even more alive with the turn of the season. I am beginning to feel like a true Parisienne!

I hope that some day you can both see foryourselves the magic I’m lucky enough to behold every day.

My dearest love to both of you,

Izabela

Bel folded the page neatly and placed it in the envelope to be posted. She sat back in the chair, wishing she could share with her parents her true feelings about the city she was growing to love, about the new freedoms she was enjoying and the people she was meeting. But she knew they would not understand. More than that, they would worry that they had made the wrong decision in allowing her to go.

The only person she felt she could truly confide in was Loen. Taking a sheet of paper, she penned a very different letter, pouring out her true emotions, telling her of Montparnasse and, of course, of Laurent Brouilly, the young assistant who wished to sculpt her . . .

*

Thanks to Margarida, Bel woke up with a wonderful sense of anticipation every morning. The classes she attended were indeed informative, but it was the lunches at La Closerie des Lilas afterwards that she looked forward to most.