Margot Bisset had finally wrangled, coaxed, and cajoled her way into the upper echelons of ballerinas at the Dancing Company of Saint Celeste. It had not been talent alone that had finally secured her place among the leads of the company (the mere thought was ludicrous!): it had been sweat. She had put in her time, hour after hour, into practicing, perfecting, and maintaining her postures, and she had embodied the discipline and exactitude required of her vocation with alacrity.
And, of course, she had put in her fair share of time sweating underneath the sheets with wealthy patrons. It was the 1860s, after all, and purity nowadays would get you nowhere as a ballerina. Either drop your drawers or go home-that's what the general mentality seemed to be, and Margot had no intention of going home.
First there had been Etienne. Margot had been only eighteen years old when she'd met him, fresh out of dancing school and into the company. An old man with a proclivity for young ladies, he had taken his time deflowering her, teaching her first how to offer him pleasure with her hand, then her mouth, then finally how to receive his member within her most intimate aperture. Margot had taken to the lessons readily out of a sense of pragmatism. It was the open secret of the trade, one to which she knew she must accustom herself if she were to get anywhere as a dancer. But there had been another part of Margot, a secret part, that had taken its own perverse pleasure in the deflowering. Etienne had been gentle, firm, and precise as he molded her body to his will, and Margot had felt an unearthly thrill coursing through her when she submitted to him.
Over four years, Margot had accrued a steady supply of lovers. After Etienne there had been Marcel, a shipping magnate with an inflated but fragile ego. Next had come Bruno, with his doll's face and nervous smile, then Maurice, with his slimy graces and sumptuous gifts. Just as she perfected dancing the ballet by day, Margot learned the dance of flirtation by night. She learned how to intuit what a man wanted from her and to exploit his desire for her own benefit. Each man had been instrumental in Margot's advancement in the dance school, gifting the ballet generous donations at precipitous moments that offered her strategic opportunities for promotion. Margot was a worldly woman, and she learned quickly that her best chance at success was to take these opportunities as they were given to her.
Was it an honorable life? Certainly not. Honor was for the upper classes, to whom Margot, the daughter of a lowly washerwoman, did not belong. But it was, Margot believed, a beautiful one. To embody the pinnacle of grace and beauty onstage, to mold one's own being into a work of art for the pleasure of an audience of hundreds: the art of dance was well worth the indignities that went on behind the curtains.
The trouble that Margot was now facing was that her most recent suitor, Maurice, had just gotten married. Having turned his attentions and lavish gifts to his new wife, he began seeking out Margot's services less and less frequently. He wrote to her at last that he was leaving Paris to travel to Italy with his bride. Margot understood that if she were to keep her tenuous position as a lead dancer of the company, she would need to find a new suitor forthwith.
And so it was with caution and determination that she entered that ballet's green room that night, suppressing a cough as the thick perfume of cigar smoke inundated her senses. Gentlemen abounded, seated on velvet chairs, drinking and smoking and watching the ballerinas undress after the night's performance. Some joked that this room was the most high end brothel in Paris, a caricature of the base and lusty undercurrent of haute culture. Margot scanned the room, searching for a man who looked like he might be liberal enough with his wallet to ensure that Margot's position within the dance company could be sustained. In the center of the room sat Colonel Hugo Villiers, a huge man with an impressive moustache, drinking an ice water with an air of smug sobriety. He was wealthy alright, but Margot deemed him too uptight to be particularly forthcoming with his donations. Then there was August Redon, who sat next to him. He was young, beautiful and rich, but he seemed to be paying more attention to the Colonel than to any of the ladies in the room. Margot's eyes passed over the familiar faces of the men who frequented the ballerinas' green room. Jean Guerin? Too poor. Yves Courbet? Too shy.
Her eyes alighted on the countenance of a man she had not seen before. He sat apart from the other gentlemen in a corner of the room, a cigar cradled in his long fingers. He was slight-figured and somewhat sallow-skinned, with a nose that was disproportionately small for his face. But he wore an expression on his strange, asymmetrical face that made Margot look twice. His eyes were trained on her, almost unblinking, observing her with a cool, captivated curiosity. He seemed to be drinking in every detail of her figure, sequestering the image of her body into the deep recesses of his mind. Margot looked away. She scanned the room again, looking for other men to approach, but she found herself drawn back into the stranger's gaze. He beckoned Margot over to him with a subtle motion of his hand.
Margot decided to approach him. But how? Her years at the dancing company had taught her that there were many different guises she could take on when she first approached a man. Would this man appreciate an innocent personality or a lustful one? Submissive or dominant? Margot had trouble reading him, but her instinct told her that directness was the best route. She put on her most winning smile, sat down in the chair next to him, and crossed her legs so as to show off her thighs underneath her tutu.
"I don't know if I've seen your face here before, Monsieur," she said.
The man's eyes flicked downward toward Margot's exposed leg, then upward again toward her face. Margot had been around this room long enough to know what postures men wanted to see, what glimpses would set their hearts racing. This man, however, seemed unphased by Margot's brash display of her availability. He smiled knowingly, as if he had anticipated every move Margot had made.
"Margot Bisset," he said. "I asked the choreographer what your name was."
"You did?" Margot found that, while the man across from her seemed utterly impassive, her own heart had begun to flutter.
"Your dancing was impeccable." It was not a compliment but an observation. "Your posture was unwavering and the athleticism behind your movements was evident."
"Thank you!" Who was this man? "Are you a choreographer yourself?"
"No," he replied. Margot waited for him to introduce himself, but he seemed content to take his time. He examined her with that sly, knowing smile, then he placed his hand on Margot's upper thigh, carefully, almost daintily. This was the move Margot had expected. Access to women's legs made most men swell with pleasure, and she knew how to navigate their arousal to get what she was looking for. But this touch exhibited a different kind of arousal than Margot had encountered before-not hot and impulsive but cool and removed. The stranger touched her leg as if appraising it, administering pressure as if to ascertain its density. Far from rendering him hot and breathless, the interaction quickened Margot's own breath.
"What is you name?" Margot asked at last, when it was evident that it was her turn to speak.
"Edgar Degas," he replied. "I am a painter."
A painter! That would explain his obvious eye for detail and knack for observation. "Are you a good one?" she teased.
"Yes," he replied, without a trace of irony. "I would like to paint you. Come to the rehearsal hall at noon tomorrow. Wear your dancing gown and shoes."
With that, he stood up and left the room. It had not been a request-it had been an order. Margot knew that she was free not to obey. He had not flashed his wallet at her, nor had he made any offer of sponsorship. She owed him nothing. But there was something about him, about the effortless way he had established his dominance, that made Margot want to obey him. Against her better judgment, Margot decided to meet this mysterious painter at the rehearsal hall the next day.
***
Degas sat in the middle of the empty rehearsal hall on a wooden stool, an easel set up before him. The mirrored walls of the space reflected his visage into infinity on either side. As Margot entered the room, the door clanged shut, echoing in the cavernous space. She approached the painter shyly. She had done up her hair and decorated her face with stage makeup in preparation for the painting.
"Your lips are rouged," observed Degas. There was no discernable inflection in his tone. Was the comment meant as a compliment or an insult?
