Wings over Delft

by Aubrey Flegg

  ‘The Master’s given me the Turkey carpet!’ he explained.

  ‘Really? What do you want a carpet for?’

  ‘No, Miss Louise …’ sometimes he still called her that, ‘I am to paint it! Look at it – what detail – what combinations of colours: blue, red, green. It should be all wrong, but it pulses. That red is a challenge in itself. The Master says cinnabar red, but we don’t have any. He says that Master Fabritius has a recipe, and that I should ask him for it, but I’m not sure if he’ll be happy to give it to me – as an apprentice I mean.’

  ‘Oh yes, he will,’ said Louise confidently, ‘He’s a neighbour of ours. I will shame him into giving it to you. Annie doesn’t approve of him, but he has always been polite to me.’

  ‘Why does Miss Annie not approve?’

  ‘Because,’ said Louise matter of factly, ‘he has hair on his chest.’

  ‘He has what!’ Pieter exclaimed.

  ‘Hair … on his chest.’

  ‘But how does Miss Annie, your respectable nurse, come to know this shocking detail?’ Suddenly Louise saw the funny side of what she’d said. Her Annie, with some dreadful skeleton in her cupboard, she hadn’t thought of that. Pieter was looking at her in amused horror. She began to explain, but could feel a bubble of laughter rising inside her.

  ‘He painted a portrait of himself. Father borrowed it when he was thinking of having my portrait done. In it his shirt is open, and his chest is …’ The bubble was dangerously near the surface now. ‘Annie saw the portrait and was scandalised. Either it goes, or I go, she said.’ For a split second Louise thought that Pieter was scandalised, too. Then, with a bray like a donkey, Pieter put his head back and laughed till the tears flowed. It was the most infectious laugh Louise had ever heard, so it was some time before they felt able to venture downstairs.

  Louise still felt sore from laughing as they stood in the street outside the house of master painter Fabritius. She dared not look at Pieter, who was still fighting back suppressed little brays. He knocked, and then stepped back, leaving Louise to make the introduction. The door was opened by the artist himself.

  ‘Miss Eeden?’ he said with interest, recognising a neighbour. Then his eyes moved to Pieter, standing behind her. Louise began her introduction.

  ‘Master, this is Pieter Kunst … apprentice to Master Haitink. He –’

  ‘Oh, I know of Mr Kunst.’ He smiled. ‘Pleased to meet you, Pieter, I have heard well of you, and seen some of your work … perhaps more than Master Haitink would admit to.’ He chuckled. Louise stepped back, and while Pieter explained his needs, she took the opportunity to examine the famous artist on the step above them. Up to now she had only seen him on formal occasions. They had interrupted him at his work. He had on a painter’s gown, similar to the Master’s, though it looked better on him. His shoulder-length hair was unkempt and his shirt hung open. With some difficulty, she kept her eyes away from his chest and looked at his face. He had a full mouth, set over a strong jaw. Thought-lines crossed his forehead. He must have felt her eyes on him because he looked straight at her; she felt the artist’s quick appraising glance and his eyes kept coming back to her while he talked to Pieter. There was something animal, exciting and not unpleasing in his stare. Suddenly she realised that he was talking to her. ‘You must excuse me, I was working, but the light is gone now. Come in and I will give Mr Kunst the recipe he needs.’

  She followed him into the house. The parlour door was open, and Louise wondered if she should stay there, but he seemed to expect her to follow. They passed down a passage and into an artist’s studio in the return at the back of the house. Louise walked discreetly about the studio, looking at, but not touching, the now familiar objects. On an easel was a painting of a goldfinch. Louise was entranced; the paintwork was smudgy but this in itself seemed to bring the little bird to life. She gazed at it for a long time. Pieter and the painter were deep in conversation. She wanted to listen, they were talking of quicksilver and sulphur, but she decided it would be tactful to leave them alone.

  An open door led into a small brick-paved courtyard at the back of the house. Evening light filled the yard and with it came the liquid trill and twitter as some small bird celebrated evening. Louise stepped cautiously into the courtyard; the song stopped in mid-bar. She looked around but saw nothing. Then a sharp tweet drew her eye up to where a small but indignant bird, head on one side, challenged her from its perch high on the whitewashed wall. It was the goldfinch, the subject of the portrait on the easel, a slender chain attached it to its perch. She pursed her mouth to whistle at it. Annie did not approve of her whistling; neither did the bird.

  ‘Tweet!’ it demanded, fixing her with an eye as black as a bead of jet. She pursed her mouth to whistle again. ‘Tweet!’

  ‘I beg your pardon,’ Louise said curtsying, realising that this was not a proper form of address. ‘I’m Louise Eeden, I should have introduced myself.’ The little bird considered her, as if wondering if her apology was sufficient. He settled for haughty disdain. His face was scarlet, and when he turned, there was a bar of brilliant gold down each wing. She’d seen goldfinches before, but just in twittering flocks that blew through the garden like the thistledown they fed on. He began to work, bending down to lift the chain with his beak. He secured it with a claw while he lifted another section. When he reached the ring at the end of the chain, he dropped it in disgust. Louise felt a hand on her shoulder.

  ‘He did that for you, Miss Eeden – a sign of respect.’ Louise did not turn around. ‘When he is in my studio he has a little bucket that he can lower into his water supply when he is thirsty. He draws the bucket up like that. He would have offered you a drink.’

  ‘I wish he’d sing again.’

  ‘Oh, he will, but in his own good time.’

  Louise, feeling just a little disturbed by the hand on her shoulder, turned to go in. ‘I love his portrait,’ she said.

  ‘I’d give it to you, but alas, it has been sold. The captain of the watch bought it.’ The artist bowed gallantly and followed Louise inside.

  Pieter had just finished transcribing the recipe. ‘I should melt the sulphur and quicksilver together first, you say?’ he asked.

  ‘Yes. And remember to crush it before firing it.’

  ‘It sounds like alchemy to me,’ said Louise. ‘I hope I may watch.’ The older artist chuckled. He spoke to Pieter, but looked at her. ‘I am beginning to think, Pieter, that you may have found the philosopher’s stone already. The question is – is it bespoke?’

  As Louise made her way to the door she was only partly aware of the sound of Pieter knocking over a chair, and the painter’s rich laugh as he stood above them on the step. Was it she who was bespoke? She had not thought of Reynier for weeks. Soon it would be autumn, time was running out, and she wasn’t ready to be sacrificed. Not yet.

  The door closed and they stood quietly for a moment, each absorbed in their own thoughts and their own confusions. Then, high over the house came the liquid trilling of the goldfinch from its perch in the yard.

  ‘Listen, Pieter!’ Louise said, and she took Pieter’s arm and held it tight.

  Louise stepped back from the window into the darkness of her bedroom to observe the two men. Their figures stood out like black paper silhouettes against the soft luminescence of the star-glow outside. Father, his beard as sharp as a scimitar, was watching as Pieter crouched, all elbows, gazing up into the telescope.

  ‘Saturn…’ she heard Pieter breathe in awe.

  ‘You see how it appears to have arms out on each side?’ Father asked.

  ‘Yes … yes I do, I see them.’ He gazed. Then he looked around, his nose knocking the telescope out of line. ‘Louise! Oh, excuse me … Miss Eeden. You remember my empty glass? How I drew it with a halo? These arms of Saturn, they look like my halo, only it has dropped down over the planet’s eyes.’ He chuckled and turned back. ‘Oh, excuse me sir, I seem to have lost it.’

  ‘Don’t worry, I’ll find it ag
ain.’ Father crouched gracefully while Pieter scrambled away like a spider. Father swept the sky, murmuring, ‘Where are you now, old man … where… Got you!’ Silence, then Father chuckled. ‘Well, well! You could be right, my boy. You could just be right. We will write a paper together: ‘New evidence of a Slipped Halo about the head of Saturn.’ That would set them arguing, eh? ‘Evidence of pre-Christian sanctity.’ On second thoughts, we had better not mention a halo or someone will burn us at the stake.’ He scratched his head, ‘Why do we always have to end up fighting over religion? Catholic versus dissenter, dissenter versus freethinker. What are religions other than creation stories? I love a good story, but out there, Pieter, where we are looking now, that really is the truth.’

  Louise sat on the floor, her skirts tucked about her knees, and watched their contrasting profiles as Father held forth and Pieter listened. The telescope, forgotten for the moment, pointed to heaven. This was familiar territory for her; they were absorbed, as she and Father had so often been absorbed. Now she was the observer, the third point in their triangle. Father was telling Pieter about his visit to Baruch Spinoza, the lens grinder, with his strange and beautiful philosophy. How could anybody long for heaven, Louise wondered, when it was all here, a universe to see and a newer, wider world to discover? When just to hold a flower or clasp a hand, was to gentle the hand of God. Who was it had spoken of the music of the orbs? Poor old Aristotle, surely. Tonight the stars were singing for her. She wanted to hold on to this moment forever. The night watchman passed, calling out that all was well, and Pieter stirred.

  ‘I must ask you to excuse me, sir. I have told the mistress that I will be in tonight. You see, I am also the night watchman; she won’t sleep easy till I return.’

  ‘Of course, of course, but you must come again. Louise has told me some of your ideas about the artist’s eye – fascinating. I would like to hear more.’ They were all struggling to their feet. ‘I must ask you to be as quiet as possible, my wife is … is not well.’ Then Father whispered as he moved across the room. ‘Next time it will be Jupiter, you have yet to see his moons.’

  He opened the door on to the landing, where a night-light glowed. Pieter went out and started to tiptoe down the stairs. Father turned to Louise and held out his hands to her. She could feel his eyes searching her face, questing in the pale lamp-glow. There was no way that she could conceal her delight at the success of their evening. He took her hands in his and said in a low whisper. ‘Louise…are you sure?’ She looked at him in startled wonder. Could he really fathom her thoughts? Know what she was feeling? All she could see was the dark glitter of his eyes. ‘Reynier – you know what I mean?’ She opened her mouth. He was asking her, she would have to reply. At that moment a manic scream of fury rang through the house.

  ‘How dare you! Call the watch! I knew you were up there. Viper! Snake! Antichrist.’ The words were punctuated by the sound of blows. Father leapt to the door.

  ‘Annie!’ he exclaimed. Louise could hear Pieter protesting in a low voice from the landing below. But Annie was on a rising crest, screaming of Sodom and Gomorrah. Louise heard Father’s voice, deep and urgent, join with Pieter’s.

  ‘You too!’ was Annie’s rejoinder and there followed a resounding whack, though whether it fell on Pieter or Father, she could not tell. At last she managed to move. The scene on the landing resembled a street fight. Annie, in night attire, had the two men at bay. Above her head swung the walking stick that she used when she wanted to appear frail. Both men were trying to protect themselves from the blows that she was aiming at them. Louise advanced cautiously, knowing that she would be the next target for Annie’s rage. At that moment Mother’s door opened, and there she stood in the doorway, a beautiful spectre momentarily restored to the woman she had once been. Her hair, tossed from restless sleep, seemed to Louise to be blowing in a wind remembered from their last walk together.

  ‘Mother!’ she whispered.

  ‘Annie! Enough!’ Mother commanded, and Annie stared at her, aghast. Her stick sank slowly to the floor. Mother turned with dignity, the door of her room closed behind her with a click.

  In the stunned silence that followed, Louise steered Annie back into her room while the men retreated downstairs like chastised schoolboys.

  ‘Hussy… harlot,’ accused Annie as the steam of her indignation died away in short bursts. Gently but firmly, Louise helped her old nurse back into bed. But the sadness of disillusion settled over her as she did so. If Annie really had thought that Pieter was alone in her room, she had done nothing to protect her from his supposed evil ways. But Annie would never expose her to any real harm; therefore she must have known that Father was there too, looking after her. So why this outburst, why attack Father of all people? Whose interests was Annie protecting? Or was Annie the hand of God intervening at Louise’s moment of weakness. And she had been weakening. In another minute she would have sacrificed Father’s needs for her own. If Mother died, as surely she would, all Father would have would be his work. The potteries must merge. Mother must have the knowledge that his dreams would be fulfilled. The decision was hers, let this be her source of happiness.

  Louise climbed wearily to her attic, closed the door, and pressed her back against it, blocking out the stolen joy of that evening. When she felt she had control of her feelings, she got ready for bed, moving stiffly, keeping herself in check, and fell into an uneasy sleep.

  Louise woke with a scream on her lips.

  She and Annie had gone to Hell. Annie was the guide, like the pensioner who acted as a guide for visitors to the Prinsenhof and who took such relish in pointing out the bullet holes on the stairs, where Prince William the Silent had been shot.

  ‘This is the Roman Catholic room,’ she explained, as Louise put up an arm to shield her face from the heat of the furnace. ‘With the Inquisition it has become most economical. As you see, there are equal numbers of devils and sinners so they can run the place themselves.’ The scene was certainly crowded, but Louise was uneasy; a leering devil was watching her. He was part human, part beetle, and he held a bucket full of naked bodies. ‘Sinners,’ Annie whispered unnecessarily in her ear. From time to the devil would pick one up and throw it into the furnace, where it would sizzle and pop. Not surprisingly, the sinners were trying to escape, slipping and sliding over each other like frogs, trying desperately to get out of the bucket. She watched out of the corner of her eye while a woman slipped over the side of the bucket and ran for freedom. It was a futile attempt; a fox-headed gentleman, who Louise hadn’t noticed, neatly spiked her on a skewer, and ate her head.

  ‘I want to go!’ said Louise, turning away.

  ‘But they do it to each other!’ Annie sounded surprised. ‘Look, the gentleman devil has a present for you.’ Louise turned back. It was the beetle. He picked up the bucket of sinners and threw the whole wriggling mass into Louise’s face.

  Her scream and her dream died as she sat up, staring about the room in terror, wiping at her face with her sheet. It was an old dream. Years ago the family had gone for a trip to The Hague. Mother and Father had business with a lawyer there, so Annie had taken Louise to an old church that had once been Catholic. Louise had recently been challenging Annie’s views; asking her what was really so wrong with the Catholics. After much muttering, the caretaker of the church agreed to let them into a room where statues, carvings and paintings that had been taken out of the church were stored.

  ‘There, that’s what the Catholics are really like,’ Annie had whispered, pointing at a large painting. Later, when Louise questioned Father about the picture with the devils, beetles, naked sinners and fox-headed gentlemen in it, he had seemed unaccountably angry and asked her where she had seen it. All he would say was that it was a great piece of art by Hieronimus Bosch; he then went off to talk to Annie. Louise decided to call him Horribilis Bosch, and she also made up her mind that she would never, ever, have anything to do with Catholics. Now she sat shivering in bed, too numb and tired to wond
er what had triggered that dream tonight. Was it something Annie had said? She looked over towards the window, where the telescope, on its tripod, still searched the sky where Saturn had been a few hours before. It had all been so wonderful then. Her eyes began to prick. She lay back and in a little time fell asleep, crying for what might have been. She dreamed again, this time it was a dream of star music, but she didn’t remember it.

  A day or two later, Louise noticed a packet on the hall table addressed to ‘The Agent of Cornelis DeVries in Le Havre’. She presumed that this was from Father – part of his on-going negotiations with Reynier’s father. But then she looked again. Surely that was Annie’s hand?

  Father had not asked her about Reynier since that night; perhaps he felt he had said enough. He had brought Louise up to think and speak for herself. But at breakfast he mentioned, as if in passing, that Reynier’s ship was not expected until the end of October as it would be held in Le Havre for cargo.

  ‘Cornelis says that Reynier has done a splendid job, by the way,’ he added.

  Job?, thought Louise indignantly, he wasn’t doing a job, he was swanning about the Mediterranean, even if it was for the best of motives. But she couldn’t help doing a quick calculation. She had six weeks. A lot could be packed into six weeks.

  The Alchemists

  Chapter 12

  To Louise’s surprise, Annie seemed to wash her hands of her after the outburst on the stairs. Perhaps Mother had had a quiet word with her. Whenever she was near, Annie would sniff, and when she and Father were together, the sniff included them both. Father and Louise exchanged glances like two truants. One day, when doing a message down by the potteries, Louise was surprised to see Annie, walking along close to the wall of the DeVries works, deeply bonneted, and leaning on her stick. It was only a momentary glimpse, and in a second she had disappeared. Where could she be going, and why was her manner so furtive?