(London - November 8, 1543)
The morning light flooded the room, illuminating the dust particles floating in the atmosphere. I couldn't stop writhing in pain in the chair, embarrassed by the tight corset that my dress imposed on me.
"I don't understand how I'm going to stay still for hours with this damn instrument of torture," I complained to myself. A soft and clear voice answered me, surprising me.
"The fashion of our time is terribly restrictive, isn't it princesse? "
I turned my head to find Marin Cheng leaning against the door frame with his arms crossed. He watched me as if he were studying me, with a slight smile at the corner of his mouth.
"It's easy for you to talk," I responded, offended by the amusement that danced in the painter's eyes, "I don't see any damn corset squeezing your ribs under your shirt."
His smile disappeared and a fleeting shadow passed over his face. "Indeed," she replied dryly, taking one last look at me, before walking towards the easel.
"Let's just get started, okay princesse?"
Almost two hours passed in silence, she only gave me a few short orders to ask me to change position or raise my head. In the too-large room you could only hear the crackling of coal on canvas.
"I see that your eyes convey a lot of sadness."
I jumped inadvertently when Marin broke the tense silence between us. I opened my mouth to put the artist in his place, but the words that came out were not what I wanted.
"If you knew what I was suffering, my future would not fill me with joy, sir. "
A few seconds later, the artist's head appeared behind the easel. Look at his long, unkempt hair and his furrowed eyebrows.
"Vous êtes une dame de la haute société. Vous vivaz la vie d'une princesse. "C'est dur pour moi de voir la douleur de this existence" -she expressed herself with very fluent French in a burlesque tone.
I just glared at him, I didn't like anyone making fun of me. "What would you say if your entire life was guided by others? That you felt like a damn puppet, controlled against your will? What if your parents had promised you a man from the moment you were born? What would happen if just because you were born a certain way, they forbade you from following your dreams?" I spat. Overflowing all my anger repressed for too long. "I want to travel, see the world for myself, study, discover. None of this is decent for a woman."
Silence enveloped us again, loaded with meaning. I looked at my trembling hands and tried to hold back the tears that wanted to fall. Little by little the rustling of coal on linen resumed. A few minutes passed, which seemed like hours.
"This life is not as foreign to me as you think, my princesse," exclaimed the artist sweetly.
I looked up, surprised by what I had just heard. "What does it mean?"
I received no response, only a deafening silence.
(Paris -November 16, 1543)
As the days passed, the silence grew greater. I started talking to the painter. I asked him questions about art, about his techniques, telling him anecdotes from my childhood and my life. Marin Cheng was an incorrigible charlatan when the subject of the painting came up, but he remained strangely secretive about his life.
However, he was someone fun and daring. He made me laugh until I forgot all conventions by imitating his most pompous clients. His sweet antics started a small fire in my heart. The strange bond that was forming with the artist did not make me forget my first impression of him. Marin Cheng was hiding something, I was sure of that, but I agreed to let his secrets rest and take advantage of the moments of forgetfulness he offered me.
The painting was advanced. Marin suddenly suggested that I look at myself, but I flatly refused. This painting symbolized my captivity with much more violence than a chain. When I confessed it to him, he only looked at me for a few seconds, with an expression both thoughtful and melancholic on his face, before picking up the brush again.