The Other Adonis

by Frank Deford

  “‘Oh, how blessed I was. What else would have become of me? There was so little work for a girl, except, perhaps, to go to the Burchtgracht and whore for the sailors and the Spanish soldiers and the other men. Many of my older friends at the Maidens’ House had left for the brothels. They are not sinful by nature, only given no choice, and—’”

  Nina stopped her reading and leaned back, telling Bucky, “This was where Margareta became very emotional. Of course, I had no idea what she was talking about—except I heard her mention a name: Elsa.”

  Nina didn’t reveal to Bucky that Ollie had known Elsa, too, that she was the plump whore who had serviced him for free in order to enjoy the fine accommodations of his house on Hopland Street. But it was only now, as Nina resumed reading Margareta’s account, that she understood why she had become so upset.

  “‘Why, just the other day, one of my old friends from Maidens’ House, Elsa, was murdered. Yes, Elsa was a whore, but she had also become one of Mr. Rubens’s models, and she was so dear, and always so much fun. Why would anyone kill her? Elsa pleased every man who ever paid for her. I know. For she also told me secrets of what men desired, and I used them to better satisfy my husband…and Ollie, too. And yet someone killed my dear Elsa. Not only strangled her, but threw her body into the little canal that runs by Blood Hill.’”

  Nina had to stop, chilled. For she knew, surely, who had killed Elsa. One more woman Ollie had slept with—then murdered. And certainly, Margareta would be next. Luckily, however, Nina’s distraction did not register with Bucky, for something had triggered in his own mind. “Wait…Elsa,” he said.

  “What?”

  “I don’t know. It’s just that she’s back there, somewhere. Margareta must have been very upset.”

  “Yes, she was,” Nina said, turning the page. “But now I asked her how she met her husband, and this is what she told me:

  “‘In that too, I owe blessings to Saint James. You see, not long after the Gansackers took me in as a servant, Mrs. Gansacker promoted me, trusting me to become a nanny for their youngest daughter. And so it was that every Sunday, I would accompany the family to church, and it was there at Saint James on Whitsunday, in the year of Our Lord, 1628, when I, nearly a spinster, already past my eighteenth birthday, was spied by Jan De Gruyter.’”

  Bucky mused, “So that’s who I would marry. I would become Margareta De Gruyter.”

  “Well, let’s see,” Nina said, and she resumed Margareta’s oral autobiography.

  “‘Oh, Jan was most pleasing to look upon, well attired in a fine vest, with gold buttons. He seemed an honest man, and we knew him to be a good Catholic, because he had fled the Netherlands to come south to be amongst true believers. But Jan didn’t know the better women of Antwerp, so when he saw me with the Gansackers—I dressed in much finer clothes than my position called for because Mrs. Gansacker would pass onto me her older dresses—Jan was very impressed. He presented himself to Mr. Gansacker and asked if he might be allowed to see me, and with time, our courtship blossomed. We were married at Saint James the autumn following, on the Sunday prior to All Saints Day. Jan prospered, and soon we moved into our handsome house on Schuttersshofstraat.’”

  Bucky said, “Hey, great story. Little orphan girl breaks into society.”

  Nina agreed. “Then,” she said, “I asked Margareta about her children.”

  “‘Adrien was born first, barely nine months after our marriage. Well—’”

  Nina commented, “I remember the blush here. Now I know why.”

  “‘Well,’ Margareta admitted, ‘really seven months on.’”

  “Naughty me,” said Bucky.

  “‘And two years later came our beautiful daughter, whom I named for Magdalena, my favorite sister at the Maidens’ House. I want no others, for Jan has grown so cruel toward me, and I even pray that I might take my darlings should Ollie ask me to leave Antwerp with him. But then, I fear that he will someday go without me. He is a sailor, and he talks even now of a place called Dunkirk, where he hears there are great riches to be made by brave men.’”

  Nina said, “Next, I asked Margareta: ‘So, when will you be alone with Ollie again?’ And I remember, Bucky, she paused a long time before she decided to answer that. Then she kinda shrugged, a sort of what-the-hell, in-for-a-penny, in-for-a-pound expression, and she answered at great length.”

  “Probably told you about the green dress.”

  “What?”

  “Oh, I’m sure Margareta told you about the green dress. I can almost see it, Nina. It was by far the most beautiful dress I ever had.” Bucky stopped himself then. For just a second, it didn’t seem as if he was sure who he was. He was still speaking English and his voice and his manner were masculine, but something of his consciousness had drifted back to join with that woman in Antwerp, long ago. But then just as quickly, he returned and gestured for Nina to go on. “I’ll let her tell you about the green dress.”

  “All right,” Nina said, and she picked up the final sheet of Paulette’s translation. “Here’s what Margareta told me: ‘Tomorrow, after Jan and I attend a service in honor of Our Lady’s Assumption, afterwards he will depart for Ghent, and then Liege. He’ll be gone from Antwerp a whole week. So I can be with Ollie every wonderful night!’”

  Nina looked up at Bucky, as if to say: where’s this green dress? He just waved to her confidently to go on. And sure enough, Nina read next:

  “‘I must tell you something else. With the money I’ve made posing, I’ve bought the most magnificent gown.’”

  “What’d I tell you?” Bucky cracked, with a good old buckysmirk.

  Nina just read on: “‘…and I’ve saved it for tomorrow, for Ollie. Oh, if only you could see it. It’s green—’”

  “Bingo!”

  “‘It’s green with gold trim, and it’s cut low, square across my bosom.’” Nina remembered now how Margareta had drawn her hand that way, smiling devilishly. “‘And with it, I’ll wear a pendant Mrs. Gansacker gave me when I left, and the most gorgeous new hat that I just bought in the Grote Markt. It’s also green, but a darker shade, and it has one gold feather flying up from it.’”

  Margareta had seemed so incredibly happy as she explained all this, that Nina had decided it was a good place to conclude the session. Right away, as soon as she told Bucky that, he got up and said, “You gotta hypnotize me again. I gotta find out what happens to her.”

  “In time. When Constance comes back to New York.”

  “All right. But I worry about her.”

  “Constance?”

  “Oh no. Connie can take care of herself. Margareta. I just have this feeling.”

  “What?”

  “I don’t know. Just…something’s gonna happen.” Suddenly then, as he was pacing about, Bucky pulled out his little appointment book. “Look—I thought so.”

  “What?”

  “August 14th. Today. The very day in 1635 when Margareta was talking to you. Remember?” Nina nodded. “Eerie. Tomorrow, she said, tomorrow—Assumption Day—is the day Jan goes away and she shacks up with Ollie. The fifteenth of August. Tomorrow. For Margareta then, for us now. Wow.”

  “You all right, pal?” Nina asked him.

  “Yeah, under the circumstances.” He glanced at his watch. “And also, I can still get out of Antwerp and make the 5:56 to Darien. Better do that.” So, he headed to the door, but just before he got there, he turned back. “Ask you a question?”

  “Personal?”

  “Very.”

  Nina knew what was coming, but she also damn well knew she’d set herself up for this and there was no way she could take refuge behind any doctor’s shield. “Okay.”

  “You were unfaithful once? You didn’t just tell Margareta that?”

  “No, I was.”

  “Feel guilty?”
>
  “I coulda killed myself.”

  “But you kept on going back?”

  “As you can see: I didn’t kill myself.” Bucky just sort of nodded. “Okay?” Nina asked him.

  “Yeah, thanks. It’s good to know we’re alike—you, me, and Margareta.”

  For a long time then, Nina sat alone at her desk, the lights still dim. Finally, without really knowing why, she reached into her bottom drawer and pulled out a forgotten pack of Salems. How long had they been there? Months, maybe a whole year—tossed away by Mr. Grady, one of her patients, in the midst of a session. He said he’d never smoke again. Did he? Anyway, Nina dropped his pack down there with some old photographs, a letter or two patients had given her, various other abandoned accouterments of changing lives.

  Nina hadn’t smoked in—what?—twenty years. So long, she’d stopped being proud of herself. But now she hauled out one of Mr. Grady’s stale old Salems and lit it. To help the thought process. Isn’t that what everyone used to think cigarettes did? Nina didn’t dare inhale, though. She knew that would leave her dizzy. Instead, she just drew the smoke into her mouth and whooshed it out, leaning back, watching it rise above her. And maybe it did help the thought process. There, daydreaming, just watching the smoke, Nina imagined seeing Margareta coming through the swirls.

  It was tomorrow, Assumption Day, August the fifteenth, but it was 1635. Nina saw her clearly now, going to Saint James with her husband and her two children, knowing all the while that, as soon as she finished praying, she would bid Jan good-bye, leave the children at home, put on her fetching green dress, and rush off to fall into the arms of her lover.

  Nina blew more gusts of smoke, then laid the cigarette down in a forgotten old ashtray. She watched the smoke swirl higher, and now she saw Margareta again, only now she was in the green dress—and the green hat with the tall gold feather—and she was rushing along by the side of the Wapper Canal toward Hopland. And her face. Nina could see her so clearly—that precious, wholesome countenance she knows so well from the Madonna in gallery twenty-seven. But now, where that gentle peacefulness had rested, there is a sparkle to the eyes, a tension of anticipation. There is even, yes, a passion evident in the Madonna’s expression. She steps faster. For now Margareta has spied Ollie.

  Nina looks to see what Ollie’s wearing. Well, surely, exactly what gentlemen wear in Rubens’s portraits. Ollie is a dandy. Yes. The fashionable flared sleeves, of course, slashed with cuts, lace at the wrists, with knickers for pants, so that his high socks bulge above his magnificent calves. Hmm, Nina thinks, what a delicious package.

  And he whistles at Margareta, and they rush faster toward one another down Hopland Street—and never mind that someone might see them together in public. No, surely Margareta won’t kiss him there. She must show some discretion. But she can’t stop herself from staring into that impossibly handsome face with the dark button eyes. Nina knows she will kiss him as soon as they enter the house. The door closes.

  Quick, quick. The smoke is gone. Nina picks up the Salem, blows some more. It is swirling again, all around, and once again she can see Nina and Ollie in the middle of the cloud. Now, they’re entering the bedroom—the slaapkamer, Paulette had told her it was called. Silly word. But Nina is a voyeur now, and she is inside the slaapkamer, unashamedly watching Ollie and Margareta together upon the bed. The feathered hat has been tossed aside, way over in the corner, the gorgeous green dress crumpled in disarray on the floor, so all she sees is that fabulous body upon Margareta, rising and falling.

  Nina turns away, ashamed, waiting for all the smoke to fade. She cannot bear to see them together anymore. She knows he will kill her. Probably this very night, of Assumption Day, 1635. Doesn’t Ollie grow angry and kill all his women? What will Margareta say that will set him to violence against her? Maybe nothing. Maybe it will just be his whim.

  Nina must close her eyes. But she still smells the smoke, and then one more terrible time, she hears Margareta scream out: “…owwwllllleeeeeee…” That awful, keening sound.

  And already she wishes she had not let Bucky leave. She should have hypnotized him again, this evening. She must hypnotize him again. She must find out. Sometimes, in fact, Nina doesn’t even care about Hugh anymore. All she wants is to be with Ollie and Margareta in Antwerp. That is all that matters in her world now.

  That world.

  34

  At the Hilton, Constance awoke to the bells from the Cathedral of Our Lady on Our Lady’s very own Assumption Day. All today, even more than usual, the bells would ring over Antwerp. Their sound stirred Constance. The whole city did. She knew she belonged here. She was so glad she had come to Antwerp, even if she had had to come alone, without Bucky. There were so many places to go today, so much to see. The Rubens Fair, to start with. Then back to Rubenshuis—and today she would go inside, even up to Mr. Rubens’s private studio where Ollie had posed for him. Where Ollie had been with Margareta.

  But also, she would go to Saint James, where the master lay in eternal rest. Ollie himself had never been there, but the place meant so much to Margareta. Such a grand day this would be! Constance even liked it that the skies were gray, the air heavy, for in a way, that kind of misty atmosphere made it all the more evocative. Oh, if only Bucky were here to relive all this with her!

  So Constance dressed quickly, then went directly to the Rubens Fair in the Grote Markt. Hardly had she stepped out of her room, though, when her phone started ringing.

  It was Jocelyn, calling from her room at the Alfa. She let it ring again and again before she finally hung it up. Well, Jocelyn decided, she would try Constance one more time before she left her room to start her own day at Rockoxhuis.

  Constance, though, was herself already at the Fair having a roll and coffee. Oh, but the bells were ringing and the stalls were thronged, all the salespeople faithfully dressed in their colorful Rubens attire. Constance began to move about, enthralled. She thought of Bucky. Or, even more, she began to think of Margareta. Especially, she thought of Margareta when she saw a woman in a candy stall wearing a green and white dress with a green cap that had a tall gold feather. Constance stopped dead at the sight. It was too vivid. She must leave the Rubens Fair. She must go straight to Rubenshuis.

  She walked down Kaasrui toward Wingaardsstraat. The streets not only bent and twisted, but often enough, they would arbitrarily take on new names every few blocks. Constance hadn’t even brought a map with her, but how easily, how intuitively, she moved along.

  And once again, Jocelyn and Constance almost crossed paths. They were both on the Keizerstraat, but Jocelyn had ducked into Rockoxhuis and Constance had visited there yesterday, so she walked by.

  Jocelyn had just stepped inside and paid for her admission ticket. She looked around. Nicholas Rockox had not only been a prominent politician of Antwerp—even, for a time, the burgomeister— but he was also another great friend of Rubens’s. And, like Rubenshuis and the Plantin-Moretus House, Rockox’s own magnificent home had been restored. Jocelyn studied the two original Rubens there. One of them was of the Madonna, the model almost surely Isabella, his first wife. “Our own Virgin, by the master, on Assumption Day itself,” said the guard.

  “Yes, how perfect,” Jocelyn replied. And then she wandered through the interior redbrick courtyard with the baby box bushes. But she was distracted. She kept thinking how she really must go to the Hilton and leave a note there for Constance. She couldn’t wait any longer. She had to make contact.

  So it was, that wrapped up in these thoughts, Jocelyn at first didn’t even notice the guest book. But as soon as she saw it, she rushed to it. Didn’t even bother to sign her own name. Instead, only searched the pages for—yes, yes, there it was. The same blue felt pin. The same handwriting. But wait. Jocelyn read it again, in shock. It did not say, “Constance Rawlings, Lake Forest, Illinois.” But now, instead:

  August 14th

  Constance Buckingham

/>   New York City,

  U.S.

  How memorable! I must return with my husband

  Meanwhile, Constance: just now she was herself entering Rubenshuis again. But no, no thank you, she did not want to rent an audiocassette. “It’ll all come back to me,” she declared almost dismissively, entering into Rubens’s main studio. This time, Constance took a seat, looking around, breathing in the place, feeling at home again.

  She closed her eyes in reverie. And suddenly, she could hear Cornelis reading the classics to Rubens as he painted. Probably something from Seneca. Rubens preferred most to hear Seneca. In the original Latin, of course. So Ollie had been told. Oh well, Constance thought, opening her eyes, it wouldn’t be a whole lot different from some painter today, listening to Rush Limbaugh or NPR as he worked.

  She looked around the room. She studied Adam and Eve, an early Rubens. But then, far across the way, her eyes lit on another painting. She knew this one wasn’t a Rubens, but she did like it. It reminded her of something. So Constance stood up and stepped as close to it as she could—blocked by a rope barrier. She squinted. It was a picnic scene, men and women drinking and cozying up. Pastorale, the card said. The name didn’t mean anything. But the painting. She leaned closer to see who had done it. Jan Wildens and Frans Woulters. Oh yes. Wildens didn’t register, but Woulters….

  Constance closed her eyes again, and yes, the vision of a stout young painter began to form. Frans, with his hearty laugh. And now Constance can also hear a voice. “Frans did the figures,” it says. “You like them?”

  She knows, right away, the voice belongs to Mr. Rubens, speaking in English. And now, in her mind, Pastorale is not on the wall. It is not even quite finished yet, but sitting on an easel. And it is Ollie standing there, admiring it, as Mr. Rubens comes up beside him.