And so we all went together, Dorian pushing my wheelchair and Chantal, Mimi and my papa side by side behind us.

“I don’t think it is worth all this fuss you are making,” I told them as we walked.

“It had better be worth a week-long carriage ride from Paris is all I can say,” Dorian teased me.

Had they really come just to see my painting?

When we entered the room and stood in front of it my father said nothing. He stared long and hard and rubbed his beard in mannered consideration. Then he walked back and forth, along the complete length of the work. Finally, he stepped back to the furthest point of the room and looked at the painting in its entirety at a distance, so that he could take it all in at once. And all this time he said nothing! And I sat in my chair and felt my heart pounding in my head and my mouth turn dry with anxiety.

And then, when he did speak at last, his voice had a tremor to it, as if he were about to choke on his own words.

“I should like to be alone with my daughter,” he said.

Mimi sighed, and said, “Oh, very well, Jacques, but you don’t need to be so dramatic!” And they walked out and left us there.

So I expected the worst now. That my father was disappointed by the work, that he was going to spare me the humiliation of telling me this with everyone watching. Then he spoke, and his words were quite unexpected.

“Mimi tells me that you believe I sent you away because I couldn’t stand to look at you crippled in a wheelchair.”

I was taken aback. “What?”

“That is what she said to me,” my papa said. “Is that true, Rose?”

I began to tremble now. “You tell me,” I said. “Is it true?”

My father, reached down, took my hand and clasped it in his own. “No, Rose,” he said firmly. “It was because I couldn’t stand there and watch helplessly while your very spirit was dying. I didn’t want to let you go, but Mimi convinced me that here in the Camargue you would find your strength once more, that your joie de vivre – your joy of life would return.” He gave a wry smile. “And I see now, looking at this work you have made, that my sister, as usual, was right.”

He smiled and looked from me to the painting. “You come from a long line of artists, Rose, but you were always destined to be the greatest of all of us. This painting marks your elevation. With it, you will become the toast of the Paris art world …”