The Painting (30 page)

Under the harsh hallway light, Jorgen sees that Daniel’s face is heavily lined and pale. His tall frame stooped. He wears a white shirt with small yellow stains near the pocket.

What has happened? Jorgen wonders, but doesn’t ask, not wanting to be the vessel for Daniel’s story. Daniel is clinging to his arm, pulling at it, as if he can’t wait to tell. Jorgen pretends he dropped a coin so he is released from Daniel’s desperate grip.

I’ve got one of everything for you, says Jorgen, slowly rising, postponing another view of Daniel’s face.

Wonderful, says Daniel. Can you sit a minute?

Jorgen clenches his hands. For a moment. Then I must get back.

They walk down the long hallway and into Daniel’s office. Daniel’s heavy demeanor has stained everything in the house. Even the flowery wallpaper along the hallway walls, the large daisies mixed with roses, seems to be drooping and fading. The smell is the odor of sickness. In the office, a fine layer of dust coats the top of tables. A cigarette mark punctures the green velvet chair; cigarette ashes are everywhere on the rug.

Through the window, there’s the dormant garden, and the spindly tree, now leafless. Isn’t she beautiful? says Daniel, following his gaze. An apple tree. She is my joy. My one true joy. I think I must have the only fruit tree left in the entire city. In the spring, if all goes well, it will bear red apples the size of a man’s fist.

They stand side by side at the window, admiring the one living thing in his yard, and Jorgen wonders if the tree in the painting—if there is such a tree in the Orient—is now shorn of its leaves.

Jorgen opens the bag and retrieves a bottle of wine, canned corn and meat, a garnet bracelet, cheese, and special truffles. He sets them out on the desktop in neat lines, hoping all the colorful and shiny objects will distract Daniel from his sad, lugubrious mood.

Daniel fondles the bottle of red wine. Shall we have a drink? Celebrate that we are still alive? And before Jorgen can protest, Daniel scurries off to the kitchen and returns with glasses. Jorgen stands by the window, watching Daniel pour the wine, Daniel’s lips puckering. No, he won’t sell the painting to Daniel. He’ll triple the price for everything else.

Daniel sinks into his chair behind the desk and swirls the wine round and round, watching the dark red liquid ripple down the sides. They drink and Daniel closes his eyes, savoring the flavor.

It’s been so long, says Daniel.

I’m offering a good price, says Jorgen. Now that Daniel has settled in, he can see the story coming. It’s tucked in Daniel’s eyes, and his pallor is coming back. He clears his throat.

Sit with me.

Jorgen hesitates, then takes the chair across from him.

Something horrible has happened, says Daniel, pulling on his bottom lip with his top teeth. Just this morning, I got word that a very dear friend was killed in the war. He was so young, like you. He loved the opera. A pleasant fellow. Daniel shakes his head. A whole life in front of him. Now he’s gone.

There is a long silence. Fix yourself something, says Jorgen. It feels worse when you are famished.

Daniel takes out his pocketknife and slices off a big chunk of cheddar cheese. He closes his eyes and chews. Daniel opens his eyes and looks at Jorgen with a steady gaze. My dear, dear friend is gone, murmurs Daniel. So young. One moment alive, the next, gone. We are sparks so easily extinguished.

Jorgen coughs.

Daniel stares at his row of books on the shelf. What happens to the heart when it doesn’t feel safe?

I must leave, thinks Jorgen. Must get out of Daniel’s home. He feels his throat tighten, as if hands are choking him. He must leave this house, and not just here, but Paris, and if he sells the painting, he’s certain to have enough money, more than enough to buy himself a new gun and whatever other provisions he will need. And he won’t have the painting to stir up his feelings. He’ll sell it, along with everything else.

How can you stand Paris? Daniel asks. But where would you go? Surely not Denmark, where it gets dark so early in the winter and that endless snow. The horrible pickled herring. And what do Danes have in terms of romance? That tale of the mermaid who loses her lovely voice and tail for love. That’s the beautiful part, but the prince marries someone else, and she dies.

No, says Jorgen. She lives.

But something happens to her.

She can’t speak and turns into thin air.

How morbid.

It’s just a children’s story, says Jorgen. We hear it when we’re young and then we forget it.

Well, I could see why a young man like you would come to France. To the great city of Paris. What kind of tale of romance is that mermaid? Here there are lovely French women. But now Paris is dreary and sad. My good friend. He was only twenty-two, he sighs, letting out a flood of grief. A brilliant lad. Dead. This city is no longer home for me, but where do I go? What do I do?

I should get back, says Jorgen. I’m sorry to be in a rush. He can’t sell the painting, he thinks. To leave it in Daniel’s hands, to let them touch it seems obscene.

Daniel steps to his safe, turns the knob, and pulls out his wallet. Jorgen stands near the desk and watches the colorful bills come out of the leather fold. He gathers the money with shy haste.

No, the wine is twice that price, says Jorgen quickly.

Oh, my, says Daniel. We must be fair.

More money comes out of Daniel’s wallet, and still it isn’t enough. Natalia said a new leg costs twice that amount.

The canned meat, I’m sorry, says Jorgen. I’m sorry, I’ve had to raise the price for that.

My dear Dane. You are cleaning me out.

Jorgen wipes the sweat from his forehead. Daniel pulls out more money, and still, Jorgen counts, it is not enough. To have the new leg and the rifle and some extra for a new life. He must do it or lose his chance. And this is his opportunity to leave this house, leave Pierre, Paris, to leave all of it.

There is one more thing, he says.

I don’t know, says Daniel. You’ve taken just about everything.

Jorgen slides the painting from his leather satchel. He lays it out on the desktop. The two men stand side by side. Neither one says a word, and in the growing stillness, Jorgen grips the edge of the desk as he falls into the painting. I will never see it again, he thinks, sinking farther into the smooth skin of the woman’s face, her hands, and the blue dots are both flowers and tears, not one or the other, but intermingled, sadness and beauty all at once. What else hasn’t he seen? He touches the edge of the paper. What is this paper? This paper, like skin.

I’ve never seen anything like it, stutters Daniel. It’s simply exquisite.

Jorgen clasps his shaking hands together and swallows hard. Daniel gently picks up the painting and walks slowly over to the window to the light. Jorgen follows behind him unable to let it leave his sight. Daniel puts his face next to the image as Jorgen has done so many times.

How much? Daniel asks after a long while.

Nothing stirs. The house tilts and settles. The air vibrates, as if more life entered the room. Daniel’s breathing turns rapid and short.

How much?

Jorgen gazes at the bare tree outside. He knows what to say, how much he needs, and he’s about to speak, but can’t. His chest tightens and his throat feels wrapped in taut wire. He pulls a handkerchief from his trouser pocket and tries to relieve his throat with coughing. With a bowed head, he looks only at the painting. He’ll always see it, always be able to imagine it. If he must, he could visit Daniel, couldn’t he? But why must he lose everything? What is the meaning of so much loss? To have something of beauty. Isn’t that what everyone should have? But he can’t. If he wants to leave Paris. … He drops his gaze to the floor and pushes down whatever rose up. Without looking at Daniel, he gives his price. Daniel walks to the safe, fiddles with the combination, and removes a black tin box. He wordlessly inserts a key into the lock, takes a wad of cash, and sets it on the table. Jorgen snatches up the money and shoves it in his pocket. He feels sick. Gathering his empty bags, he turns to the hallway.

Daniel walks him to the front door. It’s simply astonishing, he says.

Yes, says Jorgen, pulling on his coat sleeve. He turns and leaves without saying another word.

JAPAN

W
HERE IS HIS FAVORITE
? Hayashi wonders, staring at the swirling fish. The fish seem dull, as if the water leached their colors. There, over at the edge, the younger ones are crowding him out. He walks over to his old friend and tosses him a handful of food.

Something doesn’t look right. The old fish’s eyes are coated with a white film, a spot of dark green on its side. Hayashi crouches down, but the discovery is the same. The fish is sick. It’s never been ill. He should go to town and buy special food, but when he thinks of town, there is the rice shopkeeper, weeping on the steps of his store. How could he have rushed by without helping the poor man? And still, he hasn’t found the nerve to speak to the monk about the meeting and how badly it went.

In the distance, he hears the hammer. The teahouse is nearly complete, but the monk cautioned him the final touches take the longest. Please don’t rush, he told the monk, and the monk smiled in a way that reminded Hayashi of the cherry-bark man, as if his whole being lit up from within.

He stays down by the lake a while longer, hoping by the time he walks up the hill she will have left the studio. Perhaps this morning she will join him for breakfast. If he had the courage, he’d tell the maid not to bring her meal to the studio, but insist that she come inside.

A
WHOOPER SWAN RISES
and engulfs the whole painting. The bird’s black eye, the lacy edge of its wing, the yellow and black beak, its perfectly white body, its rubbery feet. She smiles, a tentative, hopeful smile. The swans’ nesting grounds were not far from where she used to meet Urashi. Suddenly the hammering begins. She won’t look up. Not yet. It is nothing, she whispers to her painting, trying to coax Urashi out from behind the bird. The monk means nothing to me. But as she listens to herself, she hears betrayal. The monk will leave soon, like the wind, she thinks, and what stain does the wind leave? She holds her brush poised for Urashi’s face. It never would have happened if you’d come for me, she pleads. So lonely, why haven’t you come?

Their last winter together, Urashi told her he could not live without her. She bit into his shoulder and said, There, you will always bear my mark.

He said he loved the way she would leap from her horse and rush toward him, as if compelled by a strong force that sent her hurling straight into his arms. His hand rested on her neck, the pulse of her ringing through his fingertips. When they lay together, she traced the long scar on the side of his body. A brown bear, he said. A mother and her cubs. I wandered too close to the den. She must have thought I was a threat. The scar felt like silk, a long ribbon underneath her finger. Strange, she thought, how such an injury could leave something so soft.

Finally she sets her brush down.

The hammering sounds as if it’s right outside her window, beyond the fluttering bamboo. She feels his gaze on her, like a steady heat source.

She leaves her painting and walks to the window. The teahouse has four walls, and the black tiles for the roof lie in stacks on the ground. The monk is pacing back and forth, his head bowed. He’s nearly finished, she thinks, feeling a sense of relief and panic. His neck, a long, lovely line. He is pulling on his knuckles, cracking them.

I
F
I
WALKED INTO
her studio and interrupted her work, what would she think of me? He feels the tremendous urge to ask her, Did it really happen? He can barely think the words, barely tell himself that he kissed her. At
the same time, he is jumpy, his breathing quick, as if his body is preparing to do it again. He picks up the hammer and pounds in a nail. If he ignores her today, what then? He sets the hammer down, stares at it, and puts his hand to his forehead. He feels as if he has a fever.

There is the top of her head. She is painting. He picks up a tile and wants to slam it on his hand. If he were unable to work, the teahouse would come to a standstill. He’d have to rest; maybe she would take care of him. Step out of the studio and sit beside him for the day, make him laugh like she did in the tea shop in the big city.

He walks over to the porch, dips the ladle in the bucket, and drinks, all the while looking at the top of her head. How can she go about her day as if everything is the same? As if nothing happened? She tempted him, didn’t she? Her leg against his in the carriage. Her warmth, her scent. Yes, she seduced him, he decides, feeling better about himself. But as he sets the ladle down, he can’t push aside the image of his leg pressing against hers. In the cool corner of that shop, he was the one who leaned over and kissed her.

No, he won’t go to her. Won’t find some pretext to knock on the studio door. Won’t pretend he needs her help holding a board while he remeasures the door frame. He will concentrate on the hammer and nail. He’ll even say his midday prayers. How long has it been? His hand is trembling. Perhaps he does have a fever.

S
HE WALKS OVER TO
her husband’s side of the work space. Dried clay chips lie on the floor. Moist, bluish black clay rises up to the rim of a bucket. The smell, it is earth and water and something ancient, tucked away and forgotten. A beautiful color, she thinks, this midnight blue, the heart of night, the depth of still water. She’s never touched it before. Taking a bit between her fingers, she rubs and stretches it. Still curious, she plunges her hand into a bucket, up to her elbow, and is astounded by how alive it is, like a body, shifting and moving with her.

As she walks back to her desk, cleaning the clay from her hand, she looks at the floor. A folded piece of white paper, the kanji, beautifully and perfectly designed.

Your thousand colors

a warm coat

on this winter day
.

A rush of blood bounds to her face. She stands again and looks out the window. He’s carrying a board from the stack of new wood. How gracefully he moves, she thinks. His face, a beautiful calm. When they were in the capital together, he laughed with such ease and honesty. She crumples up the paper, then opens it again. She rereads the poem, and now she cannot focus at all.