Midnight Blue

by Simone van der Vlugt

  A good while later, I’m placing a supply of fresh herring in my basket. As I walk back along the quay, a figure emerges from the shade of the inn wall. The man walks up to me and I quicken my pace without meeting his eye. Then he grabs my arm and I look up at him in shock.

  ‘Hello, Catrin, don’t you know me any more?’ he says.

  12

  For a moment I don’t recognise him without his farmer’s smock, but then I see it’s my former farmhand.

  ‘Jacob? What are you doing here?’ A stab of anxiety goes through me. ‘Nothing’s happened to my family, has it?’

  ‘Do you think I’d come to Amsterdam to tell you something had happened to your family?’ Jacob raises his eyebrows.

  ‘Probably not, no. But what are you doing here?’ Something tells me it’s no coincidence that we’ve run into each other. He had walked up to me with too much intention for that, as if he had been there waiting.

  ‘I need to talk to you.’ He shoves his hands in his pockets and fixes me with his gaze.

  Anxiety rushes through me again. The look on his face tells me Jacob is not here for a cosy chat and I have a fearful suspicion that I know what this conversation is going to be about.

  ‘I can’t take you to the house where I work,’ I say.

  ‘There’s no need for that anyway. We can talk in the tavern here.’ He gestures to the building he has been leaning against.

  I agree with a relieved nod. We go inside and sit at a table in the corner of the taproom.

  ‘How are my parents and my brothers?’ I ask, before Jacob has time to start talking.

  ‘Good.’

  ‘Is that all you have to say?’

  ‘What do you expect me to say? Everything’s fine with them. The usual.’ He waves to the innkeeper, points to the two empty beer mugs on our table and the man nods. A while later he comes over with two full mugs.

  ‘The question you should be asking is: how is everything with me?’ says Jacob after taking a hefty swig.

  ‘That would have been my next question.’

  Jacob eyes me narrowly. ‘So you do care.’

  ‘Yes, of course. What’s going on? If you need to tell me something then spit it out.’

  ‘The point is …’ Jacob says, ‘that it’s not going so well. I have debts and no job.’

  ‘How awful for you.’

  ‘Yes, awful. It’s strange, isn’t it? The way your life can change from one moment to the next. Then there’s nothing to be found in your village, then you have to leave. But you know all about that, of course.’

  ‘Have you left De Rijp for good?’

  ‘That’s what I’m saying. I tried my luck in other villages but no one needed a farmhand. So in the end I came to Amsterdam.’

  ‘And? Can you find a job here?’

  ‘Maybe, but I’d prefer to go into business for myself.’

  I don’t like the way he says this, eyeing me over the rim of his mug. ‘Good idea,’ I say, and leave it at that.

  ‘It is, isn’t it? That’s what I thought too. The only problem is, I’ve got no money.’

  We look at each other in silence.

  ‘That is a problem.’

  ‘It doesn’t have to be. You and I both know whose fault it is that I lost my job, and that you were left with a big pile of money, while I had to fend for myself.’

  ‘I assumed you’d find something else.’

  Jacob laughs a rough, humourless laugh. ‘You should never assume anything, Catrin. It’s not smart. Never assume that everything is going to work out.’

  I take a sip of beer in an attempt to wash away my unpleasant sense of foreboding.

  ‘You thought you were alone, didn’t you?’ Jacob leans closer to me. His voice is soft but his eyes are like flints. ‘You should have checked that no one was by the door or outside the window. Because I saw you.’

  In the silence that falls, the only thing I hear is the frantic beating of my own heart. The chatter of the other customers has become a distant murmur. It becomes so quiet that I am even aware of Jacob’s breathing, but then he is very close. His arms are on the table and he leans so far forward that I pull back slightly. His eyes stay glued to my face. I realise he’s studying my reaction and that my first words are of crucial importance.

  ‘What are you talking about? I thought you had something to tell me. If you’re going to sit there speaking in riddles, then I’m leaving, I’ve got enough to do as it is.’ I set my mug down on the table, slightly too hard. The foam slops over the rim.

  He laughs again. ‘Don’t be afraid, I’m not going to tell on you. We’ll find a way out of this together.’

  ‘Jacob, for the last time, what are you talking about?’

  ‘It all happened so fast.’ He leans back and stares into the distance as if he’s reliving the moment. ‘I wondered why he didn’t fight back. Maybe he was too far gone. He did react, though; his arms and legs were moving, and his head. But you put a stop to that pretty fast.’

  I sit frozen and stare at the face across the table, at the mouth speaking words that turn my future to rubble.

  ‘I don’t know what you think you saw, but I found my husband dead in bed. I panicked and shook him as hard as I could.’

  ‘With a pillow in your hands? No, Catrin, that’s not what happened. I don’t blame you, you know. Govert was a bastard. To women, at any rate. I had no problem with him, but I wasn’t the one he was kicking the stuffing out of. So I do understand and I’ll do my best to keep my mouth shut. But then I have lost my job. Everyone is better off, apart from me. How is that fair?’

  ‘What do you want?’

  ‘Fifty guilders.’

  ‘That’s half of what I own!’

  ‘I know. And it’s enough for me to make a new start. I could have asked for the lot, but I’m not like that. And when you think about it, isn’t fifty guilders a small price to pay? What good would money do you when you’re dangling from the gallows?’

  Our eyes meet: his challenging, mine cold. Or so I hope. Perhaps he can see the fear I’m trying to hide.

  ‘I’m not saying you saw what you think you saw, Jacob. As I said, I was shaking Govert, nothing more. But I don’t want you spreading this nonsense about me around the village. You can have twenty guilders.’

  ‘Fifty,’ says Jacob. ‘I know what I saw, you know it too. I don’t like having to ask you this, but I have to think about my own future. You probably had no other choice when you did what you did, and now I have no other choice.’

  I close my eyes and consider his proposition, even though I’ve known all along that I’ll have to accept it. ‘So if you get fifty guilders you’ll keep your mouth shut?’

  ‘I swear it.’

  ‘And you won’t come back for more?’

  ‘No, that’s enough for me. I know that you think I’m a scoundrel, but I’m not that bad. I’m leaving you something.’

  ‘How noble of you.’

  He grins at me. ‘I’m glad you see it that way. Now, shall we go to the house where you work? Then you can give me the money and I’ll be off.’

  I could spend more time thinking about it, but in the end I have little choice. ‘Fine,’ I say.

  13

  The short walk to Keizersgracht seems to take twice as long as usual. With each step I’m aware of Jacob’s presence and my mind keeps on searching for a way out. As the loss of half my fortune draws nearer, Jacob talks animatedly about the latest news from the village. I don’t hear a single word of it and when we reach the house, I cut him dead.

  ‘I’ll go and get the money, you wait here. If I come back and we’re not alone, pretend you’re collecting payment for a bill.’ I turn my back on him and go inside.

  I hear the voices of Matthias and Brigitta coming from the back of the house. I rush upstairs to my room in the attic. With shaking hands, I fetch my purse from the drawer under my bed and count out fifty coins. Fifty! I could cry. But I really am getting off lightly. As he said, Ja
cob could have asked for the lot.

  With the coins in a piece of cloth with the corners knotted, I rush back outside. Jacob is standing with his back to me further up the canal, watching the barges go by. At that moment he turns around, as if he can feel my presence. ‘Have you got it?’ I hold out the little bundle to him without saying anything. He opens it and counts the contents. ‘Great, then I’ll be off.’

  ‘I never want to see you again.’

  ‘Don’t worry about that. Goodbye, Catrin, all the best.’ He doffs his cap and walks away whistling.

  I watch him go. There’s something about the greedy way he counted the coins that makes me uneasy. Jacob has never been any good with money. He always ran through his wages as soon as he got them, he thought saving was a waste of time. He’ll be back for more.

  Over the preceding weeks, I had often wondered whether I would make the same decision as I did back then, when I stood over Govert with a split lip, a couple of fresh bruises and a pillow in my hands. I don’t know. Despair takes over, switches off your mind and clouds the consequences of your actions. The life I would have led if I’d had second thoughts doesn’t appeal to me, but at least I would have had a life. Now I might be free from the blows and kicks, but the internal turmoil that has come in their stead, the spectre of the gallows, make for a poor exchange. As long as I’d still believed no one else knew about my crime, it had been different. Now everything has changed.

  I can’t rely on Jacob keeping his mouth shut, I have to leave. God wasn’t looking the other way when I gave in to my baser instincts and smothered my husband. Now he’s punishing me.

  Later that same afternoon, I make a decision. I wait for Adriaan to come back from a meeting in the VOC building and ask to speak to him. He nods, leads me into his office and closes the door behind us.

  ‘Sit down.’ He gestures to a chair and sits down without waiting for me. ‘What do you need to talk to me about? I hope you like it here because I’m very pleased with your work.’

  I sit down and straighten my back. ‘Thank you. I do like it here, and I’d really like to stay but unfortunately I need to give notice.’

  ‘You want to give notice? Why?’

  ‘Something has happened.’

  ‘It can’t be so bad that you need to leave. Although …’ He studies me with knitted brows. ‘It doesn’t have anything to do with my brother, does it?’

  ‘With Mister Matthias? No, not at all.’

  ‘Oh good. I was afraid …’ He makes a gesture. ‘But that isn’t it. Tell me, perhaps I can help.’

  I know that I owe him an explanation. One that will convince him it’s better for me to leave. I take a deep breath and tell him the truth about the painting. That I painted it in Brigitta’s studio, that I used her canvas and paints and replaced them later, that I got myself into an impossible position now that Doctor Geelvinck wants to buy the painting.

  Adriaan listens to me with an expression of growing astonishment. ‘I wouldn’t have expected that of you,’ he says finally. ‘You hear of servants who wear their mistress’s clothes, put on her jewellery or try out her bed. All highly objectionable. I never thought you’d take the liberty of painting in my wife’s studio while she lay sick in bed.’

  ‘I’m so sorry. I should have bought my own materials and sat in the kitchen. It’s only that then I’d have to use the table where we prepare food and there are poisonous substances in paint so—’

  ‘Enough.’ Adriaan holds up his hand. ‘I don’t like it, but I don’t see any reason to dismiss you. Certainly not now that you’ve confessed of your own volition. I’ll make sure everything is resolved with Brigitta’s painting. I’ll have someone buy it and tell Geelvinck that there was a higher bidder. It’s not an issue.’

  ‘There’s something else.’

  Adriaan’s eyes narrow to slits.

  ‘I’m being threatened by someone from my village. He’s tracked me here and I ran into him this morning.’

  ‘Why is he threatening you?’

  A silence falls in which I cast down my eyes. ‘I’d rather not say, sir.’

  ‘Is it someone who you promised to marry or something? Has he come to fetch you home?’

  I nod.

  ‘So you left your village to escape a marriage. But hadn’t you recently been widowed?’

  ‘It’s a complicated story, sir.’

  Adriaan heaves a sigh. ‘Say no more then. It’s a pity you want to leave. Brigitta is happy with you and she doesn’t warm to people easily. I understand you’ve been helping her make paint. She said you were very quick and deft, and now I see why.’ He pauses before adding: ‘I’d like to take a look at that painting of yours.’

  ‘It’s in the drawer under my bed.’

  ‘Go and fetch it.’

  I hesitate. ‘Is it a good idea to walk through the house with it, sir?’

  ‘You’re right, that isn’t a good idea. I’ll come with you.’

  We leave the office and go upstairs to my room. The little window doesn’t let in much light. I pull out the painting and take it onto the landing where Adriaan is waiting. I hold up the canvas without saying anything.

  For a long time, Adriaan studies the half-finished vase while I wait, nervously. Maybe he’ll get angry after all and throw me out without my final wages.

  ‘Do you know what you’re going to do?’ he asks finally.

  ‘No, sir. The one thing I’m certain of is that I’m not going home, whatever happens.’

  ‘Do you want to leave Amsterdam?’

  ‘Yes, I think that would be best.’

  ‘The further the better, I assume.’

  I nod.

  ‘What do you think of going to Delft?’

  I gawp at him, dumbfounded. ‘Delft?’

  ‘Is that far enough away?’

  ‘Yes, I think it would be. But if that man comes here and asks where I am—’

  ‘Then I’ll tell him I have no idea,’ Adriaan says.

  14

  That night I’m troubled by a dream that’s been haunting me for weeks. I’m standing over Govert with a pillow in my hands. He’s sleeping it off, mouth open, stinking of booze. I count to three and press the pillow down hard on his face. He wakes up, moves, but he’s too drunk to realise what’s happening. By the time he realises, suffocation has robbed him of his strength.

  I press the pillow to his face until he’s still. Only when I’m sure he’s dead do I remove it. I look down at him, not daring to breathe. When my eyes meet his vacant gaze, I scream.

  I thought Amsterdam was far away, now I’m headed even further south. If someone had told me four months ago I’d be doing this, I would have stared at them in disbelief. Back then my life had still been simple and predictable, now everything has been turned upside down.

  Adriaan tells me his other brother Evert, a widower, is in desperate need of help and asks whether I would like to go into his service. ‘Just think about it,’ he says.

  Later that day he comes to find me. ‘You can travel with Matthias. He has a cargo that needs to be taken to Delfshaven. You could leave next week – if you want the job, that is.’

  At first I can only nod, then I say, ‘Yes, I would like that very much. Thank you.’

  Feeling a little lightheaded, I walk to the kitchen and pull out a chair. I flop down onto it and stare out of the window. In other circumstances I would have looked forward to travelling with Matthias. But now I’m preoccupied with other things. All I want is to leave here as soon as possible.

  Saying farewell a week later isn’t difficult, I’ve not been in the house on Keizersgracht long enough for that. It’s a windless, sunny day. We aren’t taking the water coach, which only carries passengers, but instead are travelling on a cargo ship full of freight going to Delfshaven. The boat has a closed deck house where passengers can make themselves comfortable. We aren’t the only ones using it, several merchants are travelling with us, but after Haarlem it gets much quieter. I kill time dar
ning while Matthias spends most of the morning talking to the captain and keeping an eye on the cargo.

  It’s not until we are crossing Haarlem Lake, where the wind picks up and it gets colder, that he comes to keep me company.

  ‘Goods have disappeared a couple of times,’ he says. ‘Sometimes they get unloaded at the wrong port by accident, but people do steal things too. So whenever we put in anywhere, I stay with the load.’

  ‘Sensible,’ I reply. ‘How do you do that when we stop overnight in Leiden?’

  ‘The boat’s kept under guard then.’

  I nod and a silence stretches out between us. I have often fantasised about what it would be like to spend time alone with Matthias, but now that it’s happening, I don’t quite know what to say. Matthias does. The two merchants we’re sharing the boat with are up on deck so straightaway he brings up the very subject I’d been hoping to avoid.

  ‘Now you must tell me why you quit. Adriaan refused to give me any details. I thought you liked it with us.’ He adopts a tortured expression and I realise I’m not going to get away without offering an explanation. Luckily the story of the painting is a plausible reason for me to leave, so I tell him that. To my surprise, Matthias ends up laughing.

  ‘So Geelvinck wanted to buy the painting! Hearing that must have given you a fright.’

  ‘It isn’t funny. I thought it was a shame for Brigitta.’

  ‘Why? Everything she makes is hideous. It’s high time she realised that. My brother always protects her, pays others to buy her work, but is he making her happy by doing that? This way she keeps on believing she can paint.’

  ‘What’s so bad about that? She enjoys it.’

  ‘And that’s all well and good, as long as you don’t lose sight of reality. Brigitta lives in a fantasy world, which Adriaan maintains. I’m forever telling him that he has to stop. But he’s afraid she’ll become despondent again. She nearly took her own life once.’

  ‘Really? How awful. Why did she do that?’

  ‘She thought her life was meaningless. She can’t have children and she didn’t know what to do with herself. It was only when she started painting that she rediscovered her lust for life. That was wonderful, of course, but she loses herself in it. As if there was nothing more to life than painting. I don’t understand. There’s so much to discover and enjoy.’