‘Shall we sit, my love?’ Venetia was holding Kenelm by the hand, leading him down the corridor to the dining room, where the table was set with game and soppits. ‘He is overcome by your most kind present,’ she said over her shoulder to Van Dyck, in a smile-warmed voice.
‘He was nicknamed “il fiorito” in Siena,’ Van Dyck said to Venetia.
‘Because of the fleur-de-lis on our coat of arms?’
‘And because he wilted in the sun, or turned a rosy pink.’
‘And furthermore because I was tall, and said to be the flower of English manhood,’ retorted Kenelm.
‘Who called you that?’
‘Marie de’ Medici!’ And the men laughed and while Venetia was out of the room seeing to some complaint of the boys’, they repeated the old story of how the Dowager Empress had fallen in love with Sir Kenelm, even though he was twenty-six years her junior.
‘She wanted me for her pet, and made much of me, and had me sit with her in her private garden, and bade me sing to her, and then when she heard me singing, bade me recite verse instead.’
Van Dyck put down his mug in expectation of laughter.
‘The ageing coquette! She was very taken with you.’
‘There was no taking of me, I can assure you.’
‘She had that slavering expression whenever she saw you.’
‘And her chins wobbled with desire.’
‘And her eyes crossed through passion. And she applied more and more paint to her face the deeper in love with you she fell.’
‘And her voice was very shrill when she called to me, “mon petit gentilhomme anglais!” ’
‘Mon concombre!’
‘Mon petit pain!’
‘She sent me a map purporting to lead me to a great library,’ said Kenelm, ‘wherein she said I might read the book of all creation. I followed and it led me only to her silken bedchamber, where she patted the pillow next to her, as if to say, Come!’
Venetia returned to the dining room, and the gentlemen changed the tenor of their conversation.
‘Now she is mother-in-law to your King,’ observed Van Dyck.
‘But ah, I am glad I did not have to paint her likeness twenty-one times for the Louvre.’
‘Marie de’ Medici, twenty-one times! That would have been a terrible misfortune!’
‘Truly, terrible.’
‘Worse than anything.’
They all knew that the commission, which had gone to Rubens, would have been the making of Van Dyck, and that he would have done it gladly.
Van Dyck, meanwhile, was looking at Venetia, anatomising her face. Venetia stared back at him, although her tender self shrivelled within her. She hoped his painter’s eye was kinder at least than William Peake’s, that poor artist whom she had so abruptly sent away. She wondered if he could tell that she was three years older than Kenelm, or if he already knew that. She wondered if his heart sank as he thought: Here is another former beauty I must flatter.
In fact, he was thinking: Umber, mink and charcoal for the hair; orpiment, very watery; bismuth white, perhaps, and lead for reflexion, lead-vole for the eyebrows, chalk-lead and ground seed pearl for the skin . . . He could not stop himself. It was how his mind worked when he saw a noblewoman’s face. He liked the plumpness to her chin, her indolent, almost sickly pallor. The hint of tiredness in her eyes was wonderfully worldly.
‘I would so much rather paint your likeness than any Medicis,’ he said. ‘I hope I will have the pleasure.’
Indeed he would. Sir Kenelm cared not for money, and in consequence he had already disbursed two fortunes. Now as a token of gratitude for his privateering, the King had granted him a third: a monopoly on sealing wax in Wales and the Welsh borders. Anyone wishing to write a personal letter, or sign a document, or seal a contract, needed a melting pool of wax to put their seal upon, and for every stick of sealing wax sold, Sir Kenelm collected a penny piece.
Van Dyck was not convinced this was worthy of Sir Kenelm.
‘Can many read in Wales – or write?’ he asked. Van Dyck had not ventured further than London.
‘Ha!’ laughed Venetia.
‘Indeed some can, and more are learning all the time. You remind me of the Earl of Strafford.’
‘Ah, yes . . .’
‘Who on being given the monopoly on soap by the King, said he feared the kingdom is not given so much to cleanliness as to raise this to a high consideration. No, come: this is why my monopoly is so fortunate. It is a trade that can only increase. The demand for sealing wax has doubled in a generation. I durst say in three, four hundred years, sealing wax will be carried by every man in the land.’
Digby was invariably wrong about business matters. He was unusual because many of his judgements were mistaken, yet many others were right, so his insight and blindness flourished side-by-side, and were even part of the same plant, like a flower putting forth a dark and a white bloom on the same stem. Most people develop a habit of being right or wrong, and stick to it, but Digby’s character was to be everything, at once.
‘So we will indeed sit for you, Antoon.’
‘Anthony. I shall be English in England, I hope.’
There were a handful of skilled Dutch painters already in London, and Van Dyck did not wish to become another of them, an exile. He wanted to be at home amongst the English cavaliers, to become the King’s own painter-in-ordinary. He did not know he would become ill in England, spleen-aching at Blackfriars, his golden chain broken for the King’s war chest, his funeral rites read the same day as his baby daughter’s baptism.
‘Once you are finished with the King’s portrait, we shall be next to call on you at your studio. Blackfriars, by the river, no? I have in mind the idea that we should sit for you in a family grouping very like the King’s,’ said Kenelm. ‘True likenesses, very au courant, but composed just so, in harmonious alignment, with my zodiacal armillary sphere sitting beside us, to indicate the assent of the heavens. We shall form a tableau of living beings. As if you might see, if you but peeped a little closer, the blue blood under our skin, the pulse of it at our temples, the rise and fall of our chests. To be painted by my friend with my love and our sons, during England’s not unhappy years of peace. I think that will be the very pinnacle of my life!’
Venetia laughed at Kenelm, and kissed his hand, and Van Dyck felt their happiness enclose him also, so they made a sufficient little trio. He was glad to be in London, out of the long war that raged through Hungary, Saxony, Bohemia, Prussia, the Palatinate . . . It was hard for him to know which court to attend next.
‘The Thirty Years War,’ Kenelm called it, which made them all look at him askance.
‘If you say it will last so long . . .’ said Van Dyck, shrugging.
The three of them made a merry dinner, although the elegant tiredness never left Venetia’s eyes, as Van Dyck noticed. She was remote, preoccupied.
Once she had been a pert young miniature, painted by Peter Oliver on the back of a playing card. Van Dyck saw Digby’s copy years ago, in Italy. There was no modesty in her gaze. Shamelessly she challenged you to breathe upon her, take her in your hand and lift her close to your face. He disparaged the copyist’s technique – it was apparent here, and here, that the painter had dragged the stoat’s tooth through the paint to make her hair – but there were magnets in her eyes. No wonder the Lords had all sought to pop her in their pocket.
Now, she would make a full-grown, stately portrait, large as life-size – and never looking at the painter, or the reader of the painting, but always obliquely past, beyond, her mind on higher matters.
Venetia knew she came across as grand, but in truth she avoided Van Dyck’s eye because to look at him was to be seen by him, and she was too tired for that.
That evening, Kenelm felt his cheek aflame and realised he had caught the sun during their three hours’ conference outside. It was never any nobleman’s habit to wear his cheeks ruddied, and yet he felt this was a good omen: the sun-planet was fitt
ing him for worldly power and advancement. Pray Lord its rays might advance his suit for naval comptroller, and bless his conception of their family portrait. It was, indeed, a Sun-day, and he had been wearing yellow, and his golden signet ring: these were all conditions favourable to the sun, and in return the sun had coloured and blessed him, and left its ambitious heat tingling within him. Nothing could begin without the sun’s ignition – not a fire, not a burning glass, not a man’s career. Just as an ear of corn was ripened by the sun, so man was brought to full advancement by sun-bathing, till he shone with burnished glamour. In time, everyone would know this.
The Queen’s private chambers were all a-brabbling confusion of floating featherdown, clouds of new white wool and bits of paper scrunched and cherry-blossoms made of silk. White streamers hung from the rafters, and the floor was covered with white cloth, pale straw, clary flowers and young maidens, tumbling about. That morning, the room had been dressed to resemble a sweet white fairy bower. A tray of milk cakes had been knocked over and a few squashed. One or two girls were singing, out-of-tune, and thumping a stringed pandora, while another poured a fat white rabbit into her friend’s lap.
Outside in the corridor, Venetia could hear laughter and noise. Why was she so often in corridors now, looking in? She used to be always in the midst of things. Today at the Queen’s morning prayers, she had mentioned to Olive that she would come and find her before she left the palace of Westminster, but it now seemed evident Olive was busy playing with the younger ladies at court. Henrietta-Maria was at the Star Chamber with the King, but here her ladies were disporting themselves. Venetia considered going home and leaving the new clique to their play, since they seemed so happy without her, but a deep, social homing instinct pressed her on.
A maid carrying a tray of white sack went into the room, and Venetia caught a glimpse of Olive, being fed a sweetmeat by a girl she did not recognise. Venetia threw open the door and sailed inside.
‘Ladies, I come from the Queen,’ she said, off the top of her head. ‘She has news for you.’
Lucy Bright sat up. ‘What?’
‘She says to tell you that you are her angels of Platonic love,’ said Venetia.
Lucy lay down again and carried on singing.
‘Philomel with melody / Sing in our sweet lullabye . . .’ With these words the ladies on the floor rolled over, singing, ‘Lulla, lulla, lullabye, Lulla lulla lullabye . . . So, goodnight, so goodnight with lullabye.’
‘What sport, girls, is this?’
But no one answered her, in the giggling and commotion.
‘Oh no, my fairy wings are crushed.’
‘Sweet pea, you are sitting on my foot.’
She noticed that young Lettice was there, in the middle of them, still wearing that unbecoming red dress but quite happy tickling Lady Mary Somerset’s face with a sprig of blossom. How pleased she ought to feel to see Lettice so at home.
‘Venetia, we are to be fairies at the Queen’s new masque,’ said Lucy Bright, while the other fairies continued tumbling in soft heaps. They were meant to be rehearsing for the masque by arranging themselves into the initials HM, for Henrietta-Maria, but they were too giddy for that.
‘We would very much like you to help us,’ said Lucy. ‘You are such a brilliant actress. We know you can do it.’ She said the shocking word ‘actress’ casually, because the game was always to refer to the court masques as if they were the theatre. ‘Will you, will you help us?’
Pleased – and yet a little doubtful – Venetia sat on the floor, beside her, and said she would.
‘Oh wonder. Here’s the thing, darling. We are to represent a chorus of fairies, but we need someone to take on a bigger role. Someone with Experience. You see, it is really quite a demanding part. We need someone to play the Spider Ariadne.’
Lily, Lady Hutchinson, snort-sniggered at these words, but in a bid to pretend she was laughing at something else, rolled over onto little Marion Cavendish, tickling her fiercely. Their combined years did not make Venetia’s.
The high tide, the rushing ebb, and then the low, low sand. Later, Venetia could not remember how she managed to hold herself together. When she was a child she had always made people laugh, playing the pretty noodle. When she was beautiful she was famous for her irony. It was the grain of salt that made her beauty taste. She was still ironical, but people seemed not to notice; no one listened hard enough. And so the time for clowning was come again. It was no longer the time to be Helen of Troy. Now she was Thersites. She must play with these girls as she played with her sons, making them laugh by snapping her teeth and blowing out her cheeks. It was time to make her body serve a new purpose. She looked Lucy deep in the eyes, as if to say, I will not forget this – and then she laughed, shrill, gurgling, chesty, hoo hoo hews, haa haa haas, and she made a show of trying to stop herself laughing, and then finally she collected herself. ‘But who will play my flies?’ And she opened and closed her lips in smacking parps of pantomime menace. Lucy loved her from then on.
‘Nothing could give me greater pleasure than to spin a little web for you,’ said Venetia, though what she was really thinking was, I must drink that Viper Wine, as soon as I can, so help me God. But she continued: ‘Am I to play in the masque or anti-masque?’ Meaning: Am I alive or dead to society? The anti-masque was disgraceful. Lords and ladies appeared in the masque; only hired actors, mummers and professional grotesques performed in the anti-masque, playing parts like ‘a runaway chicken drumstick’. For Venetia to be in the anti-masque was impossible, and they both knew it. An idea struck Venetia before Lucy had time to reply. ‘Perhaps I should play the harp? A very spider-like instrument, I have always thought.’
As she heard more of the plans for the masque – Ben Jonson was to write the speeches, and an actor from the Globe would come and help some of the women to speak them aloud – it became clear to Venetia that even if she had to play a scuttling, spinning arachnid, she would at least be at the very centre of things. And everything was reversed in a good masque. Ladies played boys; kings played gardeners; pale dames blacked their faces, and Moors lost their colour; the moon danced and flowers sang. It could have been worse. She could have been asked to play Medusa, with a nest of real snakes in her hair. That was the headpiece that Queen Anne had insisted the least beautiful of her ladies-in-waiting wore when Venetia played the Grand Canal at Tethys Festival, the Masque of Rivers, twenty years ago.
That afternoon they sang roundels, and Venetia sat by Olive, the new, smooth-faced, baby-ish Olive – and Lettice sat loyally at Venetia’s feet, because Venetia would not move over so she could sit beside her on the bench, and as the singing master drew them into time together, Venetia’s voice secretly choked at the sound of the young unmarried ones’ high pure notes.
As they were singing, two persons slipped into the room: a little hooded couple holding hands, their faces obscured. Next came a scratching at the door, and a pair of spaniels bounded in, anxious to be with their master and mistress. Then Lord Arundel came discreetly into the room, and the game was up. The little couple pulled off their hoods revealing the smiling faces of their Majesties, and the ladies managed to carry on singing, although some faltered and laughed excitedly, as if they were children performing at a concert recognising their parents in the audience. After a minute or so a clanking sound echoed in the corridor, and the King’s guard of a dozen pikemen came into the room, trying to move quietly, although they were much encumbered by weaponry. ‘Oh,’ said the King, dejectedly. ‘They have all discovered us, Mary,’ he said to the Queen, pulling a faux-sad face.
After the madrigals were finished, the girls went up to their Majesties in little groups, curtseying. Venetia and Lucy Bright were both determined not to let one another take precedence in this, and Lucy actually linked arms with Venetia, so as to hold her back from reaching the King and Queen first. And so it happened that Lettice, Venetia and Lucy Bright all came before the King and Queen together.
‘Are you the mother
of these two, then?’ the King gamely asked Venetia.
The Queen nudged him with her fan. She was no great speaker of English, but she had a ready understanding.
Venetia decided, with an effort of will, to take no offence. The King was famously tactless, and a king’s kick hurts less than a beggar’s. She could grieve for his comment later, when she was alone.
‘I am a riddle, if you will, sir – I am the state vanquished by mine own husband,’ said Venetia, because she knew the King loved a puzzle, especially one he could solve. Charles liked to be the clever one: his elder brother Prince Henry, who should have been king but died at eighteen, was bold and easy in himself and good at jousting, but little Charles was known as the scholar. Besides, she meant to remind him of Kenelm’s victory.
‘Every woman is vanquished by her own husband,’ he said, stroking his chin, enjoying the game. Lucy Bright was unable to summon any of her quick speeches, and she could barely take her eyes off Venetia.
‘My husband defeated me at Scanderoon,’ said Venetia.
‘Oh, ho ho,’ said the King. Now he knew who she was. She used to be the sweet bird Venetia Stanley. He recollected his elder brother, Prince Henry, talking about how he she made his mouth to melt, and how he had a will to stir her pudding, and various other drolleries, sincerely meant. Things had changed since then, to be sure, but she was still a sniff of heaven. The King was about to make a clever saw about the passing of time being cruel to us all, but his wife, sensing this, interrupted.
‘Venetia, whose husband has defeated the Venetians!’ cried Henrietta-Maria, and the King looked genuinely cross she had got there first.
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