‘I am glad you feel that,’ Bel ventured. ‘Having met him and been to his atelier, I liked his realistic approach. And his technical skill is obvious to anyone.’

‘Well, it’s not obvious to someone who has never seen it,’ grumbled Maria Georgiana, as she sat at Heitor’s side. ‘Perhaps you will allow me too to meet the man who will design the outer vision of your precious Cristo?’

‘Of course, my dear,’ Heitor agreed swiftly. ‘If that is what I finally decide.’

‘I thought his assistant was very accomplished too,’ said Bel, desperately trying to prompt Heitor’s memory.

‘Yes,’ he agreed. ‘And now, you must excuse me, for I am truly exhausted from my travels.’

Disappointed, Bel watched Heitor as he left the room, and noted the grim expression on Maria Georgiana’s face.

‘Well, it seems your father, yet again, is retiring for the night with the Cristo rather than his family. No matter,’ she said to the children as she picked up her spoon to finish her dessert, ‘we will play a game of cards together after supper.’

Later that night in bed, Bel mused on the state of the da Silva Costas’ marriage. And on that of her own parents. In a few short months, she would find herself wedded as they were. And it seemed more and more to her that marriage was simply about tolerance, and acceptance of the other’s faults. Maria Georgiana clearly felt sidelined and ignored as her husband poured all his energy and attention into his project. And her own mother, against her wishes, had moved from her beloved fazenda to Rio to accommodate her husband’s lust for upward social mobility.

Bel turned restlessly on her pillows, wondering whether this was all she too had ahead of her. And if it was, it made it all the more imperative that she should meet with Laurent Brouilly again as soon as possible.

By the time Bel awoke the following morning, Heitor had already left for a meeting. She sighed with frustration that she’d missed her opportunity to remind him of Laurent’s request.

Her growing agitation over the situation didn’t go unnoticed by Maria Elisa that day, as they took lunch at the Ritz with Maria Georgiana, strolled down the Champs-Élysées and later attended Bel’s wedding dress fitting at the elegant salon of Jeanne Lanvin.

‘What is wrong with you, Bel? You’re acting as if you’re a tiger trapped in a snare,’ she complained. ‘You barely even took an interest in the drawings or the fabrics for your beautiful wedding gown, when most young ladies would give their eye teeth to have Madame Lanvin herself designing for them! Aren’t you enjoying Paris at all?’

‘Yes, yes, but . . .’

‘But what?’ asked Maria Elisa.

‘I just feel . . .’ Bel walked to the window in the drawing room as she tried to explain. ‘That there’s a world out there we’re not seeing.’