The Kiss by Joan Lingard

opened and they’d had the place to themselves for the first quarter of an hour and been able to see the walls unimpeded. The water lilies had scored a hundred per cent with the pupils. Tomorrow they would go to Giverny to see Monet’s garden.
    ‘I’m dying to see it!’ said Clarinda.
    It was so agreeable to sit at a Parisian pavement café, with all the echoes that that evoked, and talk about painting. The vision it conjured up seemed almost to be a cliché, he observed to Clarinda, but she did notcomprehend. Clichés came from over-use. She had not lived long enough yet. She enjoyed each thing for what it was, which was one of the things that he had learnt about her on this trip and, of course, liked. Her reactions were fresh.
    ‘I love pavement cafés,’ she cried gaily. ‘I love Paris!’
    ‘It’s easy to love it,’ he agreed. Their table was sitting in a pool of sunlight.
    ‘I can understand Gwen John wanting to live and work here, even though she did have a difficult time with money and had to pose for other artists. She didn’t mind posing for Rodin though, she said she loved that. He must have been a very charismatic man.’
    ‘What did you make of her letters?’
    Clarinda was not ready to answer straight away; she needed to take time to consider.
    ‘Do you think Rodin made her happy?’ prompted Cormac.
    ‘At times. But not all the time. My mother says you can’t expect someone to make you happy all the time but if they make you happy some of the time then that’s a bonus. Gwen wasn’t happy when she’d swept and cleaned her room and was waiting for Rodin to come and he didn’t come. And of course she wrote the letters when she was alone so often they wouldn’t have been her best times.’
    ‘She did a lot of waiting, I think?’
    ‘Yes, but sometimes waiting is not all that bad. Not if you’re waiting for someone.’
    ‘Only if you are sure they will come.’
    She nodded. She opened her bag and took out her notebook. ‘She refers to him as Mon Maître always. Here she says nothing else matters after an embrace from her … amant .’ Clarinda’s cheeks looked hot. Her head was inclined over the book. ‘All her previous disappointments were then effaced. She speaks quite openly about … things. His hands. Her body. How she felt when they made love. It must have been a grand passion.’
    ‘Or a fantasy?’
    ‘A fantasy?’ Clarinda looked up. ‘Oh, no, I don’t think so. If you read these letters you wouldn’t say that. She pours out her heart to him, without shame. And there are so many of them and they went on for a long time. For years.’
    ‘Perhaps it’s not possible to know.’ He smiled. ‘So, do you fancy coming to live in Paris and being an artist?’
    ‘Yes, I do, after I’ve been to college. I’ll rent a room and paint.’
    ‘And starve.’
    ‘Don’t be cynical! Don’t you have any faith in me? Don’t you think I’ll be any good?’ She removed herdark glasses and he saw that there were sparks in her eyes. She really cared about her work. That was not so very extraordinary. He had cared, too, when he was her age. He had been single-minded.
    ‘I think you could be good,’ he answered cautiously. She did have talent though she would need to work at it, like all of them on the trip.
    ‘Didn’t you ever dream of coming here to live?’
    She had touched a nerve that still had the power to jangle. Of course he’d had his dreams, like every other young person.
    ‘I got married and had children. I had to make a living.’
    ‘That was your choice, then.’
    It was easy to see things simply, at her age, he wanted to tell her, but did not, for it would only sound patronising. But her passion made him feel wistful.
    ‘I like your work,’ she said. ‘I liked your wire sculptures in particular. I liked the humour in them.’ He was pleased at her perception. He had had an exhibition in the summer and some of his fifth-and sixth-year students had visited it. They