The Sculptress by V.S. Alexander (best books to read for women TXT) 📕

any indiscretion. At first, I believed the young man was part of the Livingston circle, but then I discovered he is a protégé of Singer Sargent’s and is probably poorer than I am in bank account. Apparently, he is studying to be a painter, a questionable profession at best, as we both know.

It is difficult for me to express my true feelings in this letter. I’ve avoided them long enough by writing about Anne, her friend, and Lazarus, but I am acutely aware, as you have always claimed, that your first devotion is to your husband.

But dare I say it, in our recent correspondence, I detected a change. You’ve written only of your work and the soldiers who have come to your studio. I get the sense, even across the miles of ocean that separate us, a chasm has developed between you and Tom. I wonder if his injuries have somehow come between you, or if there is an emotional wound as well, which you alluded to in your last letter.

And that, my dear Emma, is the purpose of my writing on this glorious July day. The sun is bright enough I can see as clearly as I could ever hope to, and the sea breeze has swept away the heat from my door. I sit in front of the open window, grateful for the light and wish I could touch your face. What comfort that would give me since the pleasures of paint and canvas have begun to fail me. I wonder how you spend your days. Do you ever pine for me, as I long for you? But whenever our next meeting, you understand I am always here for you and always will be despite what happens between now and that glorious reunion.

I pray that our meeting will come soon—that this war will end and you and your husband and the soldiers will return safely to our soil. I write these words with my heart and no regard for the censors. Let them think what they will.

I’ve gone on for too long and the strain of writing has tired my eyes. I must rest and say good-bye. As it is, there will be no painting today, and tomorrow is questionable.

My thoughts are with you always.

Your dearest friend,

Linton Bower

Sometime after ten that night, the bedroom door opened. Virginie, who had spent the evening with a friend, said hello and sat on her bed. Emma was surprised to find she had dozed off while dreaming of meeting Linton again in Boston. The pages of his letter were scattered across the sheet.

* * *

The face of Private Darser took shape as Emma molded clay into the cavity left by the wound. She worked on the cast without assistance—a strange feeling coming over her as she sculpted. Across the studio, Hassan smoothed fresh plaster on another cast while Virginie stippled paint on a mask.

“This reconstruction is one of the most difficult I’ve worked on,” Emma said to Virginie and Hassan as she worked clay into the chin, “because there is so little left of Private Darser’s jaw and mouth. There is no mirror, no left and right, to gauge the reflection. I don’t know whether to make the chin with a cleft, or whether to make it weak or strong.”

“A man always likes a strong chin,” Virginie said.

Hassan nodded in agreement.

“Yes, but I will ask him,” Emma said. “I can picture his chin in my mind. . . .” Emma put the wooden sculpting tool down.

Madame Clement appeared at the door. “Private Darser is here for his appointment,” she said, her English coated with her usual French accent.

“Show him in,” Emma tugged at her jacket and took a quick glance at her own reflection before she pulled the studio curtains. Rather than put on a dress, she had opted for attire similar to a woman’s Army uniform. The jacket was severe and matriarchal, and she preferred to work in a dress, but Private Darser, in his formality, had influenced her, and she had come to realize how much of an effect, subtle at first, he had on her. Her choice of clothing was a result from their meetings, but she found herself, of late, thinking of him more and more because he was an American. When the sun flashed upon trees a certain way, or the air carried a damp sweetness, he entered her mind at the most unusual times and reminded her of New England.

He appeared without Madame Clement, stopping for a moment in the doorway, standing motionless, his starched shirt and scarf wrapped high and loose about his neck and face, covering the greater part of his injury. The light in the alcove behind him framed him in a diffuse glow.

“Please come in,” Emma said, struck by his austere and commanding presence.

As if energized by her words, the soldier strode toward her, withdrawing a pad and pencil from his pocket, handing her the pad on which he had written: There is no need to draw the curtains. I love the sunlight and summer is almost over. We should enjoy the beautiful weather while we can.

Emma looked at the note. “I understand your wishes, however—”

He waved his hand in front of her and wrote: I know of your unfortunate suicide. I have no wish to die. Please open the curtains.

Emma acquiesced to his request. Light flooded the room. “Better?”

He nodded.

Virginie patted the soldier on the arm. “We admire your courage.”

He wrote, Thank you, and added, Can we begin?

“I’d like to make another cast today. The first wasn’t to my liking.” She held up the form she had been working on. “Can you tell me if this chin is similar . . . ?” Emma paused, somewhat embarrassed by the indelicacy of her statement.

You want to know if it looks like my face?

“Yes, does it look like your face? I have no way of knowing.”

Private Darser looked at the cast, but wrote nothing.

“No opinion?”

Make my chin, my face, any way you