In Monet’s footsteps  - Marie Hutchinson

As is often the case with best friends, Pam and Jane were like chalk and cheese.  Pam had been a happy and uncomplicated baby who had charmed all around her with her wide smile and beautiful blue eyes. She talked early for a young child and then never stopped. On her first day at primary school, she was made to sit next to Jane.  Jane looked onto the world with big brown unblinking eyes, and she was dead serious.  Pam had never met anyone like Jane before and decided there and then they would become best friends. That first day at school, Pam talked and Jane listened. 

   “We have a dog called Nelly; she has just had eight puppies and my Daddy said I could keep one puppy of my own. She was about to launch forth on the next subject when Jane interrupted her, “I haven’t got a Daddy.” Pam didn’t understand, surely everybody had a daddy? She was truly dumbfounded and remained silent for the first time in her life. Thirty years later, she still remembered the shock this pronouncement had made on her.

“I haven’t got a Daddy and my Mummy gets angry when I ask about him.”

   There, she had said the dreaded words.  She felt lighter for it and she also would remember that moment for the rest of her life. This small event sealed their friendship for life. They grew up together closer than sisters, sharing everything like young girls do from clothes, thoughts, giggles and dreams.

Jane’s mum worked in a bakery, running the delicatessen side of the business. She was a reserved woman who seldom smiled. She expected nothing but the best from Jane.

   Pam’s parents had a sheep farm and Jane spent most week-ends with them.  Pam was a determined doer who loved helping her Dad.  He was a hard working, cheerful man who adored his wife and two children.  Her mother worked as a nurse doing night shifts in a nursing home.  While Pam fed orphan lambs and rode her pony, Jane sketched and drew everything she could see around her.  She lived with a sketch book in her hand.  She was very good at it. Jane always watched with envy when Pam’s father ran his fingers through her hair and said with pride “How is my little girl today?”

When she was 14, Jane went to spend a holiday with her mother’s sister in Coventry. One day, she plucked up courage and inquired about her father.   

   “I know very little really, said her aunt.  “I was far too young at the time. Our parents would never discuss these sorts of things in front of me anyway.  All I know is that your mum was madly in love with him. It was love at first sight.   She ran away to London to be with him. He was an artist, a foreigner and penniless of course. Our parents were worried sick, especially Dad. Now, I can understand his concerns. Your mum was only 17, but she was so headstrong.

   "When she returned a few months later, she had changed.  She did not talk for a long time.  When it became plain she was pregnant, Dad made her go away.  She went to stay with our grandmother. She never forgave Dad for throwing her out of the house. That’s why she never allowed them to meet you.  Our Grandma looked after you at first.  When your Mum moved into the flat above the bakery, she took you with her. She always wanted to be independent. That’s all I can tell you.”

   Jane told all this to Pam who was very impressed.  “You must ask your Mum which nationality your father was. Perhaps he is a handsome Italian or French!  How exciting! Surely, you have the right to know, she can’t go on hiding that sort of thing from you."

   Jane confronted her mother that evening.  They argued for a long time.  In the end, her mother blurred out that her father was a Hungarian painter.

   “He was so full of himself, he was different from anybody else I had ever met before,” she added bitterly.  “He was going to be the next Monet.  He was going to be famous.  I believed everything he said. When I told him I was having a baby, he replied he was never going to be a good father and he didn’t want to have anything to do with it. I was devastated.  I left the next morning.  I do not even have his photograph.”

  That night, Jane could not sleep; she had longed to be like everyone else in her class.   “Daddy” is a word I shall never say, she thought. But her mother’s revelations changed her.  I will find him by myself if I can.  I will not bother Mum again.  I shall never marry. I do not wish to have children of my own. She tried to guess what her father looked like.  Where does he live now?  Is he still in England?  Is he married?  Do I have half brothers and sisters?  I have his dark brown eyes, she thought, because Mum has grey eyes and I love to draw.  At least, I have inherited two things from him.

   Jane became ambitious and wanted to go to University, but Pam longed to settle down; she became engaged to Brian her first boyfriend soon after her 18^th birthday. When they married a year later, they rented a small windswept farm in North Wales, and were blissfully happy. In spite of their different life styles, Pam and Jane never lost touch.  Jane got a job as an au pair in Paris for a year.  In the evenings, she earned good money sketching rich Americans and Japanese visiting Montmartre and saved every penny to tour Europe to visit all the major museums.  She spent days in Le Louvres and the Jeux de Paume.  She discovered the Breughels in Vienna, she became transfixed in front of the Nightwatch in the Rijksmuseum, stood gaping in front of the Velasquez and the Goyas in Madrid, but her favourite place was Monet’s Nympheas at the Marmottant.

   As always, Monet made her think of her father. “Surely, he must know this place," she thought, "Perhaps he is in the room now..."   One day, as she was sitting in front of one of the paintings, she closed her eyes and imagined for an instant her father coming to sit next to her and putting his hand on hers.  But, when she opened her eyes, there was no one, she was alone.

   She read History of Art at St Andrews University.   She never had a boyfriend.  Boys were slightly unnerved by her.  They found her cold and rather boring. Pressed by Pam, she did loose her virginity to a Polish student in her second year, but she kept her distance thereafter and soon she lost touch with him. Pam was in despair; she on the other hand had two children by now.  Upon graduating, Jane found a job as a trainee for Sotheby's in London.   After five years, she became one of the assistant curators for the Dulwich Gallery.  It was a fantastic work opportunity and an exiting leap in her career.  She lived for her job.   She travelled quite extensively and mixed with fascinating people. She had stopped looking for her father.  "Fate will intervene; one never knows," she thought.   

One evening, Pam rang her from rainy Wales.  They were going to have the christening of their third child.  Would Jane be the godmother?  Jane accepted with pleasure.

   “I need a dose of Welsh air,” she told Pam, "I could even stay for a few days.”

   On her way down, as she had just driven past a sign for an un-pronounceable Welsh town, she decided to pull up in the market square for a quick break. She got out of her car and noticed the sign saying 'EXHIBITION, LOCAL ARTISTS,   FREE  ENTRY'.  Curious, she went in to have a look.  Two very large ladies greeted her like a long lost friend and offered her a cup of tea and a cup cake for a small donation. The building was probably the local W.I. hall. All the paintings were hanging on screens in the middle of the large room and on the walls.

   Jane started walking up and down the aisles, cup of tea in hand, and discovered a world of clumsy but very touching attempts in water colours, acrylics and oils by the local art class students of the area.  She found herself a million miles away from the art world she  knew so well. There was a sort of naivety and a refreshing simplicity about the subjects depicted; there were the inevitable still lives, the local landscapes, generally with a river in the middle, children and dog walking through a wood, the usual portrait of a favourite pet; but all were oozing pride and love.

   “Where will all these paintings end up?   “What’s the point?” She thought to herself. She turned the corner by the last screen, and stopped dead. She uttered a faint cry of surprise.  In her shock, she almost dropped her cup.  There, in front of her, propped up on a table, was the most exquisite portrait of a young girl. Her trained eyes had rarely seen anything so well executed.    She stood in front of it for a long while; there was something vaguely familiar about it; something about the eyes of the young girl who must have been in her late teens. She felt her cheeks become bright red.  She put the cup on the table; she felt such turmoil and mixed emotions that she couldn’t focus on anything.  She tried to compose herself and walked slowly back to the entrance. The two ladies inquired if she had enjoyed the exhibition. She asked after number 198.

    “Can you tell me something about the artist?  Is the painting for sale?”

   As far as she was concerned, there was no possible hesitation, she must acquire this painting, it must be hers at all cost.  She could not let it go.   She had been looking all these years for such a gem. The two ladies were only too happy to help her.

   "The artist is the teacher of the art class. He came to live in the town many years ago, but he is not Welsh” said one lady.

   Upon being pressed further, she added that he only lived round the corner in the small house with the pale blue door.

   “Which nationality is he?” asked Jane.

   “I think, they said he is Bulgarian” said the lady.

   “Bulgarian?" cried Jane, "Are you sure? Isn’t he Hungarian?”

   “Oh, you know him, do you?”

   “No, no I don’t know him at all. Please excuse me, I don’t know what came over me. I am so sorry.”

  Jane thanked them again and with a trembling hand paid for the painting with a cheque.  The price was ridiculously low.  She made arrangements with the two ladies to collect the painting at the beginning of the following week.  She walked outside and shivered.  She followed the instructions the lady gave her and had no difficulty in locating the small house with the blue front door.  She stood outside the door for a while. She rang the bell.  A dog barked inside.  She heard footsteps approaching.  Her heart was about to burst. The door opened.  They stood looking at each other for a long time. But of course, she knew. After all these years, how could she make a mistake?  It was the eyes, the dark brown unblinking eyes.  It was as if she had just woken up from a long and deep sleep.   She smiled the first smile of her life; the most radiant and beautiful smile and very slowly she said

   “Hello Dad, I have just bought one of your paintings. Mum’s portrait, I believe.”