I Am Rembrandt's Daughter (8 page)

My heart leaps into my throat. The peat merchant has come to cut off our credit. Or perhaps it is that terrible man whose hair, face, and clothes are as oily as if they’d been stewed in butter—the bill collector—and Neel is standing right here. I shall not answer.

But what if the bill collector starts yelling, like last time? Housewives up and down the street came out to stare. Boaters paused on the canal. Everyone was poised for the show, and Vader granted them one, by opening the window and heaving out a maggoty cabbage. The Oily One had no trouble collecting witnesses when he made his report to the constable. Cost us five guilders in fines.

The knocking comes again.

Neel pulls back from the canvas. “I can wait, Cornelia.”

He wipes his brush as I go to the tiny entrance hall and open the door.

Titus jumps at me. “Boo!”

“You horrible brat!” I swat at him. “Why did you do that?” I leave him laughing. “I was modeling,” I call over my shoulder. “Why have you been gone so long?”

He nods to Neel, then grins at me. “Some artist’s model you are, Cornelia, keeping your clothes on.”

Neel’s face hardens. “That is not funny, Titus.”

“Sorry, old man, it was just a stupid jest.” Titus raises his brows at me as if to get my support, but I cannot smile. His remark has wounded me deeply.

Titus laughs uneasily. “Worry Bird, you know I was joking. I’m sorry, it was crude of me.”

I fight off the sick feeling in my stomach. Why am I taking this jest so hard? “It doesn’t matter.”

Neel watches me with concern, making me feel even more unsettled, as Titus leans against the printing press and looks up at the ceiling. “Where is Vader?”

“Guess,” I say stoutly, glad to be on to another subject.

“I heard he took a painting to Gerrit van Uylenburgh the other day.”

“How did you know?” I glance at Neel. It would not do for him to know what a failure that excursion was.

Titus pushes on one of the wooden arms of the press’s crank, causing the printing cylinder to slowly turn. “Gerrit Hendrickszoon came to dinner yesterday,” he says, using van Uylenburgh’s familiar name as if they had been cronies since the cradle. “He said he has a potential buyer.”

“He does?” I remember Neel’s presence and even out the tone of my voice. “Oh, well, I guess I am a little surprised. Van Uylenburgh did not see the painting, but I suppose Vader’s reputation is enough to go on.”

“Gerrit Hendrickszoon said the boy told him about it.” Titus puts his finger to the printing cylinder, then pulls it away, inky. “Nicolaes Bruyningh’s nephew.”

I make my voice light and unconcerned. “His name is Carel, I think.”

Neel looks up.

I am furious to find myself blushing.

“You would not remember Nicolaes Bruyningh,” Titus says, wiping his finger underneath the press, “but I do. He sat for Vader back in the days Vader was friends with the Stadholder. Nicolaes must have been younger than I am now—about Neel’s age, twenty-one, twenty-two. Entertained everyone in the house. Stories? The man was a wit. I worshipped him. His nephew would be lucky if he was anything like him.”

Neel is watching me.

“Where is Magdalena?” I ask Titus.

“Home, interviewing a maid. Her old one left her last week. I never knew it was such a chore to keep a servant—evidently they leave on the slightest whim. Magdalena is always having to replace them.”

I have met Magdalena only twice, once fleetingly on the street when I was out buying bacon with Titus, the other at her wedding, just before the predicant commenced reading the vows, but I cannot help but wonder how much of Magdalena’s maid problem lies with her and how much with the maids. She was not exactly friendly to me, though with my poor pedigree, what person of quality would be? Even though Titus’s moeder was kin to Magdalena’s family, with Vader dirtying the waters, it is a miracle they allowed Titus to marry her—a testament to Titus’s great charm.

“When is she coming here?” I ask.

“Oh, she’ll be along eventually. She is busy just yet, giving trade to every purveyor of fine goods in Amsterdam. Now that there is a new man in the house, it seems there must be a complete collection of new tapestries, linens, and furniture, too.”

“How do you afford—” I break off, glancing at Neel, who is mixing more white into the umber on his palette.

“The van Loos have more money than they know what to do with.” Titus pushes away from the press, his eyes bright. “You wouldn’t believe it, Neeltje. I haven’t slept in the same set of sheets yet. I think they must have hundreds.”

“Titus?” It is Vader, at the top of the stairs. “Do I hear your voice? Titus?” Vader tramps down the stairs. Though it has been only seventeen days since Titus’s last visit, Vader clamps Titus to him now has as if Titus were the prodigal son, fresh from the pigpen.

“Vader,” Titus gasps when he can get a breath. “How are you?”

“Good, son,” Vader says in his throaty voice. “Good.”

We are as packed in the room as herring in a jar. I open the window again just to breathe. In floats a ridiculously jaunty tune from the carillon of the Westerkerk, marking a damp gray noon.

“Vader,” Titus says, “I heard you took a picture to Gerrit Hendrickszoon.”

Vader lets him go. “How did you know?” He frowns at me as if I have revealed our failed mission.

“He came to dinner,” Titus says. “But that is not my news. Vader—he has a possible buyer.”

Vader’s white brows draw together. “How can the van Uylenburgh whelp have a buyer? He did not even see the painting.”

“The Bruyningh boy told him about the picture.”

“Bruyningh,” Vader says. He looks as if he’s trying to decide something, then notices me. “Cornelia, quit peeping outside like a mouse from its hole and shut that window. That damned tune is killing me.”

“You are famous enough that people do not have to see your work,” Titus says to Vader as I pull inside with a shamed glance at Neel, though he is gazing intently at his canvas as if he had not heard Vader treat me like a child. “If they learn that something of yours is new on the market, they are interested.”

I wish to roll my eyes. This load of ox manure about Vader’s fame grows smellier with each telling.

“Well,” Vader says, “I am no longer interested in selling it.”

“Vader!” Titus exclaims.

Vader shuffles around the printing press, shoves open the curtains to my bed, and eases himself down. I am thankful that I had the foresight to hide my new book under my pillow. “The painting does not say what I meant for it to say. It needs further work.”

“Oh, Vader,” Titus says, “that painting was perfectly fine. If someone wants it, sell it. You can paint others.”

Vader winces.

I study Titus to see if he catches Vader’s veiled look of hurt. I notice Neel watching Titus, too.

“Forget about that for now,” Titus says. “Look what I brought.” From the deep pockets of his new cassock, he pulls two green-waxed balls of Edam and sets them on the table. “Herbed. Your favorite, Vader.”

“Oh.” Vader sighs, then smiles.

Titus digs again and brings out a set of silver candlestick holders. The dim light coming through the window is enough to set off the delicate flowers etched into the shining metal. “Come here, Cornelia.”

I slip past the clutter to his side. “Whose are those?”

Titus holds them out to me. “Yours.”

“Candlestick holders?”

“Magdalena’s vader was the head of the silversmiths’ guild. They have this sort of thing sitting around all over their house.”

“But aren’t they Magdalena’s?”

Titus laughs. “They’re mine to give. Everything of Magdalena’s is mine to give. Here, take them.”

The candlestick holders are heavy—much silver must be in them. How many guilders could a fine pair such as these fetch? Like the maid in the tale who dreams on the way to the market of the things she can buy with her eggs, my brain races with plans. I could purchase bread to make me look less gaunt and young; a lilac satin bodice to attract a suitor; pearl earrings to hint at my wealth, so when I did attract a suitor, he’d be good and rich. We have not resorted yet to stealing, at least not that I know of, but stranger things have happened in the house of van Rijn.

“Give them back, Cornelia,” Vader says.

“But they’re my gift to her, Vader.”

“Give them back, Cornelia. Believe me,” he says pointedly, “take things that aren’t yours, and it always comes back to haunt you.”

Titus takes back the candlestick holders with a frown. “Get dressed, Vader. I am taking us to the inn for a bite.”

Vader shakes his head. “Too expensive.”

“No trouble.” Titus jingles his pockets. “You come, too, Neel.”

“Thank you,” Neel says, “but I should be going. You go on, Cornelia. I will clean up my brushes.”

“Vader,” Titus says, “run to the back room and change into your cassock. You cannot wear that old paint-spattered dressing gown out on the street.”

He usually does, I think.

Vader reaches under my pillow. He holds up my book. “What is this?”

Titus squints at the cover as I rush around the furniture. “I believe,” he says, “it is a book called
Maidenly Virtues: The Young Woman’s Guide to Comportment
.”

I lean over Vader and grab it. My face burns as I stuff it back under my pillow.

“Oh ho,” says Titus, “which virtues do you wish to acquire, Bird?”

Even Neel smiles. I shall murder them all.

Vader pushes himself up slowly from the bed. “Leave the girl alone,” he says, then totters out of the room.

“Cornelia,” Titus whispers as soon as Vader is gone, “if Vader will not bring that picture to Gerrit Hendrickszoon, you must. Gerrit Hendrickszoon said this is a buyer with a deep purse.”

I jerk my bed curtains closed. He makes sport of me, then expects me to risk making a fool of myself before Carel? “You cannot be serious,” I say with heat.

“Oh, yes, Bird, I can, and the sooner the better, while the buyer is interested. You must go tomorrow.”

“Tomorrow!” Panic erases my pique. “How?” I know little of the business end of art. It is the painting I have always wished to do, not the dealing.

Titus pats me on the head. “You are a resourceful girl. You will think of a way.”

“But—but Vader has already taken it off the stretchers.”

“All the easier for you to carry it.”

Neel looks at us over his shoulder as he wipes his brush with a rag. I think of the Christ in Vader’s
Peter Denying Christ
, gazing over his shoulder at Peter, disappointed acceptance writ all over his face. Neel wears the same expression.

“Very well,” I say firmly, startling even myself. “I shall do it.” Titus and I don’t need Neel’s acceptance. Who is he to judge us? He has not lived his life in the shadow of Vader’s instability.

Vader comes back in his cassock, grinning. “Are we ready, then?”

“As soon as I shave you, Vader,” says Titus with a wink at me. “You are as furry as a fox.”

“I should be glad for you to shave me. Cornelia shaved me last time.”

Titus raises his sleek brows. “You shaved him?”

“Not willingly,” I grumble.

“I cannot imagine this. Did she leave you as nicked up as an executioner’s block?”

I wait for Vader to complain but all he says is, “You can shave me, son.”

He missed an opportunity to compare me unfavorably to Titus? Perhaps the old man is failing after all.

But soon his sagging cheeks are freshly naked and we leave for the inn. For the moment, the thought of tucking into a glistening joint of meat after weeks of nothing but dry cheese and watery soup outweighs all cares about Neel’s possible disappointment in me and the risk of exposing myself before Carel if I peddle Vader’s picture. Still, my watering mouth does not chase away one last question: just what things had Vader taken that were not his?

Chapter
10

The Anatomy Lesson of Dr. Jan Deyman
.
1656. Canvas.

My legs are tired. If you step on a crack, you break your moeder’s back, but Moeder is walking fast and I can hardly hop quickly enough from brick to brick in my clompen. It is November and my breath comes out in clouds in the cold air
.

“Are we almost there, Moeder?” I know it is silly for an eight-year-old to jump cracks, but I do it anyhow. You have to be nimble to do it in clompen because they slip on the bricks. I have not stepped on a crack since we left home
.

“Two more canals to cross,” she says
.

My hop sends me into the empty basket that swings on Moeder’s arm
.

“Careful, puss.”

I can see her breath, too, and her nose and cheeks are red from the cold. It is freezing outside but it is better than staying at home, where the picture of Mijnheer Gootman still lies on the front-room floor though it has been a week since the men brought it back from the Town Hall
.

“Why do we have to go to this baker?” I ask. “I like our baker on the Rozengracht. Mijnheer Frankrijk puts extra sugar on the buns if you ask him.”

“This baker is much better,” Moeder says
.

I keep hopping but my tiptoes hurt. Finally Moeder turns into a shop. I jump inside the door onto the smooth black and white tiles on the floor. I can walk anywhere I want in here. Cracks between tiles don’t count
.

Moeder twists the red beads hidden under her gauze neckcloth and orders two loaves of bread from the baker, who is covered with flour from his frizzy white hair to his round-toed shoes. I push my cape off my arms. It is hot in here after the cold outside, but it smells good, like baking bread. I look on the shelves for the fancy iced cakes shaped like lambs or ducks or rabbits, but there are none. Someone must have already bought them
.

The baker gives Moeder the bread. She fits it into her basket. “And a dozen currant buns, please.”

I look at her in surprise. Has Vader sold a painting? We are going to eat like kings!