Tracy Chevalier 3-Book Collection: Girl With a Pearl Earring, Remarkable Creatures, Falling Angels. Tracy Chevalier
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The solution to the problem of the colours came unexpectedly from Tanneke. Since Franciscus' birth the nurse had been sleeping in the Crucifixion room with Tanneke. From there she could get easily to the great hall to feed the baby when he woke. Although Catharina was not feeding him herself, she insisted that Franciscus sleep in a cradle next to her. I thought this a strange arrangement, but when I came to know Catharina better I understood that she wanted to hold on to the appearance of motherhood, if not the tasks themselves.
Tanneke was not happy sharing her room with the nurse, complaining that the nurse got up too often to tend to the baby, and when she did remain in bed she snored. She spoke of it to everyone, whether they listened or not. Tanneke began to slacken her work, and blamed it on not getting enough sleep. Maria Thins told her there was nothing they could do, but Tanneke continued to grumble. She often threw black looks at me — before I came to live in the house Tanneke had slept where I did in the cellar whenever a nurse was needed. It was almost as if she blamed me for the nurse's snores.
One evening she even appealed to Catharina. Catharina was preparing herself for an evening at the van Ruijvens', despite the cold. She was in a good mood — wearing her pearls and yellow mantle always made her happy. Over her mantle she had tied a wide linen collar that covered her shoulders and protected the cloth from the powder she was dusting on her face. As Tanneke listed her woes, Catharina continued to powder herself, holding up a mirror to inspect the results. Her hair had been dressed in braids and ribbons, and as long as she kept her happy expression she was very beautiful, the combination of her blonde hair and light brown eyes making her look exotic.
At last she waved the powderbrush at Tanneke. ‘Stop!’ she cried with a laugh. ‘We need the nurse and she must sleep near me. There's no space in the girls' room, but there is in yours, so she is there. There's nothing to be done. Why do you bother me about it?’
‘Perhaps there is one thing that may be done,’ he said. I glanced up from the cupboard where I was searching for an apron for Lisbeth. He was standing in the doorway. Catharina gazed up at her husband in surprise. He rarely showed interest in domestic affairs. ‘Put a bed up in the attic and let someone sleep there. Griet, perhaps.’
‘Griet in the attic? Why?’ Catharina cried.
‘Then Tanneke may sleep in the cellar, as she prefers,’ he explained mildly.
‘But —’ Catharina stopped, confused. She seemed to disapprove of the idea but could not say why.
‘Oh yes, madam,’ Tanneke broke in eagerly. ‘That would certainly help.’ She glanced at me.
I busied myself refolding the children's clothes, though they were already tidy.
‘What about the key to the studio?’ Catharina finally found an argument. There was only one entrance to the attic, by the ladder in the studio's storeroom. To get to my bed I would have to pass through the studio, which was kept locked at night. ‘We can't give a maid the key.’
‘She won't need a key,’ he countered. ‘You may lock the studio door once she has gone to bed. Then in the morning she may clean the studio before you come and unlock the door.’
I paused with my folding. I did not like the idea of being locked into my room at night.
Unfortunately this notion seemed to please Catharina. Perhaps she thought locking me away would keep me both safely in one place and out of her sight. ‘All right, then,’ she decided. She made most decisions quickly. She turned to Tanneke and me. ‘Tomorrow you two move a bed to the attic. This is only temporary,’ she added, ‘until the nurse is no longer needed.’
Temporary as my trips to the butcher and fishmonger were meant to be temporary, I thought.
‘Come with me to the studio for a moment,’ he said. He was looking at her in a way I had begun to recognise — a painter's way.
‘Me?’ Catharina smiled at her husband. Invitations to his studio were rare. She set down her powderbrush with a flourish and began to remove the wide collar, now covered with dust.
He reached out and grasped her hand. ‘Leave that.’
This was almost as surprising as his suggestion to move me to the attic. As he led Catharina upstairs, Tanneke and I exchanged looks.
The next day the baker's daughter began to wear the wide white collar while modelling for the painting.
Maria Thins was not so easily fooled. When she heard from a gleeful Tanneke about her move to the cellar and mine to the attic she puffed on her pipe and frowned. ‘You two could just switch —’ she pointed at us with the pipe — ‘so that Griet sleeps with the nurse and you go in the cellar. Then there is no need for anyone to move to the attic’
Tanneke was not listening — she was too full of her victory to notice the logic in her mistress' words.
‘Mistress has agreed to it,’ I said simply.
Maria Thins gave me a long sideways look.
Sleeping in the attic made it easier for me to work there, but I still had little time to do so. I could get up earlier and go to bed later, but sometimes he gave me so much work that I had to find a way to go up in the afternoons, when I normally sat by the fire and sewed. I began to complain of not being able to see my stitching in the dim kitchen, and needing the light of my bright attic room. Or I said my stomach hurt and I wanted to lie down. Maria Thins gave me that same sideways look each time I made an excuse, but did not comment.
I began to get used to lying.
Once he had suggested that I sleep in the attic he left it to me to arrange my duties so that I could work for him. He never helped by lying for me, or asking me if I had time to spare for him. He gave me instructions in the morning and expected them to be done by the next day.
The colours themselves made up for the troubles I had hiding what I was doing. I came to love grinding the things he brought from the apothecary — bones, white lead, madder, massicot — to see how bright and pure I could get the colours. I learned that the finer the materials were ground, the deeper the colour. From rough, dull grains madder became a fine bright red powder and, mixed with linseed oil, a sparkling paint. Making it and the other colours was magical.
From him I learned too how to wash substances to rid them of impurities and bring out the true colours. I used a series of shells as shallow bowls, and rinsed and rerinsed colours, sometimes thirty times, to get out the chalk or sand or gravel. It was long and tedious work, but very satisfying to see the colour grow cleaner with each wash, and closer to what was needed.
The only colour he did not allow me to handle was ultramarine. Lapis lazuli was so expensive, and the process of extracting a pure blue from the stone so difficult, that he worked with it himself.
I grew used to being around him. Sometimes we stood side by side in the small room, me grinding white lead, him washing lapis or burning ochres in the fire. He said little to me. He was a quiet man. I did not speak either. It was peaceful then, with the light coming in through the window. When we were done we poured water from a pitcher over each other's hands and scrubbed ourselves clean.
It was very cold in the attic — although there was the little fire he used for heating linseed oil or burning colours, I did not dare light it unless he wanted me to. Otherwise I would have to explain to Catharina and Maria Thins why peat and wood were disappearing so fast.
I did not mind the cold so much when he was there. When he stood close to me I could feel the warmth of his body.
I was washing a bit of massicot I had just ground one afternoon when I heard Maria Thins' voice in the studio below. He was working on the painting, the baker's daughter sighing occasionally as she stood.
‘Are you cold, girl?’ Maria Thins asked.
‘A little,’ came the faint reply.
‘Why doesn't she have a footwarmer?’
His voice was so low that I didn't hear his answer.
‘It