“Jacques, listen to me. You know what I am saying makes sense. Rose will go mad if you continue to coop her up in that apartment. The life you had planned for her, the Parisian artist, it ceased to exist on the day that pheasant flew up from beneath her horse’s hooves. I am offering her a new future. Take the opportunity with both hands, Jacques, because you know if you do not let Rose come with me, her resentment, the pain of losing her liberty, it will be turned back on you. Or worse still, on herself.”

My papa went quiet and then he said. “I cannot bear to look at her, Marianne. My own child and I cannot turn my eyes on her …”

And at the moment my wheelchair rolled forward slightly and I heard the floorboards beneath the wheels give a very loud creak.

I was worried that Papa and Mimi would hear it too, but they must have thought it was just the crackling of the wood in the fireplace because they carried on talking. And I left and continued to my room.

Now, I lie here in the darkness, and I think about what I have been reduced to. My own father admits it! He cannot stand the sight of me now that I am a cripple. I am being sent away to the salt marshes where he no longer has to confront what I have become. Well, that is fine by me. Whatever lies ahead of me, it cannot be worse than this.

Chapter 9: Terror at the Louvre

Rose had resigned herself to leave Paris, but I felt I couldn’t quit now – even though each day Augustin confirmed his lack of faith in my talent. In the weeks that followed, I did all that I could to work on my art – I went to the Célestins almost every day, spending hours drawing Claude. Despite what Augustin believed, I was trying. I listened in class to everything he said and I took it on board. I was improving too. My sketches now had a flow, a gracefulness of line that I hadn’t possessed before. I could see myself maturing as an artist – even if Augustin could not.