Tulip Fever (14 page)

I HAVE POURED her some brandy. She gulps it down.

“I trusted him! I thought he wanted to marry me. He said he wanted to make an honest woman of me.”

“Where is he?”

“I was worried what had happened to him, it’s not like Willem, see—”

“What’s happened to him?”

“He’s gone,” she wails. “I went down to the fish market this morning; I hadn’t seen him for days.” She takes another gulp. “He promised to marry me.”

“Where is he, Maria?”

“I don’t know. He sold up his share in the business—he had this partnership with his friend—a week ago he sold it up and one morning he just didn’t turn up at the market. He’s gone. Nobody knows where.” She bursts into sobs. “He’s left me. I thought he loved me! I don’t know what to do and now I’m going to have his baby.”

The cat opens its pink mouth and yawns. It rises from the crumpled cloak and stalks off.

“How could he do that to you?” I ask. “Did he know you’re . . .”

She shakes her head.

“You don’t know where he has gone? What about his family?”

“They live in Friesland.” Maria’s nose is running; her hair has escaped from its cap and falls around her face. She sits slumped in the chair.

“You must find him and marry him.”

“But I don’t know where to look! He’s left me; he doesn’t want me—”

“But if he knows you’re carrying his child—”

“He has gone! Don’t you understand, miss? He’s gone.”

She looks plain, her face as heavy as dough. I lean down awkwardly and hug her.

“Oh, my poor girl,” I say.

The cat rubs itself against our legs.

I AM ALL DISORDERED. I should be feeling sorry for Maria— I do feel pity for her—but I am also trembling on my own behalf. I myself could fall pregnant—might easily do so. The father could be either of the two men—would I pass the baby off as my husband’s? Maria is carrying the results of my own iniquity. How easily this could be me, and what would be the consequences then? A greater hand is at work, arranging our fates. A greater power has been observing me and has punished my own maid for my sins.

I sit on my bed, trying to sort out my thoughts. I hear Maria’s footsteps on the stairs. They already sound heavier. She should be preparing the evening meal—I should be supervising her—for soon Cornelis will be home and will wonder what has happened. There is a trapped, static atmosphere in the house; he will guess that something is wrong.

Maria enters without tapping on the door. She sits down next to me on the bed. Such familiarity startles me, but then she is upset.

“My poor girl.” I stroke her hand—how chapped it is. “You must go home.”

“Home?” She stares at me. “I cannot go home. The shame!”

“But you must—”

“My father will kill me!”

“Surely not—”

“You don’t know him,” she says sharply.

“My father had a quick temper too—but surely, in the end, he will forgive you?”

“He will kill me.” There’s a dull finality in her voice. “What else do you suggest, madam? That I have the child aborted? That I drown it at birth? That I take to the streets, a disgraced woman, an outcast, that I die of shame and starvation?” Raising her head, she says: “Please let me stay here.”

“You can’t, Maria, you know that’s impossible.”

“Are you going to throw me out?”

“Of course you can stay on here for a few more weeks, but—”

“Just tell me, are you going to throw me out?”

What does one do in these circumstances? I have no idea. “When my husband hears of it you will have no choice. You simply cannot remain here, Maria, you know that.”

She takes a breath and looks at me. Her eyes narrow to slits. “If you throw me out I’ll tell your husband what you have been up to.”

There is a silence.

“What did you say?” I ask.

“You heard.”

I cannot speak. I’m falling—falling through space.

She says: “I’ll tell him, miss. I’ve got nothing to lose.”

My throat has closed. I cannot meet her eye; I stare into the huge mouth of the hearth: the dead grate, the tarred bricks behind. I will it to swallow me up.

At last I say: “How do you know?”

“I’m not stupid.”

“How?”

“That letter you tore up—I read it. Didn’t even need to read it. I could tell, when he was here, you and him.”

“You could tell?” I whisper.

“And I wasn’t asleep that night. I saw you hanging up my cloak; I put two and two together. I wouldn’t have spoken, I’m not that sort, but if you’re going to be like this . . .” She smooths down her apron, setting herself to rights. “So don’t get all lofty with me.” She gets to her feet. “If we sink, we sink together.”

25

Cornelis

If man is the head, then the woman is the neck upon which it rests.

—17TH-CENTURY HOUSEHOLD MANUAL

On Sundays Cornelis enjoys fetching his wife from her place of worship. Our Lord in the Attic, a private Catholic dwelling near the Oude Kerk. He likes to walk home through the streets of his fair city—such beauty, such prosperity!—with Sophia on his arm. After a week’s hard work, it is his reward. Men gaze at him with envy; he swells with pride. Acquaintances stop to greet him. It is a public display of his miraculous good fortune.

On a sunny day like this the whole population seems to be on the streets—respectable burghers and their wives, tradespeople in their Sunday best. Churchgoing has purified them; they have repented their sins and been made whole; they have been saved from eternal damnation. They move like a black wave through the streets. Their souls are as scrubbed clean as the doorsteps along the way; their faith is as shiny as the door knockers. How clean is his nation, scoured both within and without! Foreigners marvel at the polish.

On Sundays Cornelis feels his past more keenly. This morning, as always, he prayed for the souls of his sons, Frans and Pieter, and his first wife. On weekdays, at home, Sophia kneels at his side; he feels constrained by her presence. On Sundays, however, their faiths separate them; kneeling alone, he feels freer to commune with his lost family. Jesus has gathered up his sons to His bosom; they are in heaven, preserved forever as infants sprouting wings.

This is what he tells himself. Recently, however, he has felt a disturbing sensation. His sons are simply small corpses, senselessly snuffed out. That is all. Beyond that is emptiness. Sometimes, sitting in his hard pew—
I believe in
God the Father
—sometimes, sitting there, Cornelis is gripped by terror. There is no heaven, only a spilled deck of cards. Life is a gamble; it is nothing but a handful of tulip bulbs, a brace of kings. Even the righteous can draw the joker from the pack.

He can tell nobody this—certainly not Sophia. It would disturb her, to voice these demons of doubt. His wife is an innocent young woman, steadfast in her faith. It would be as unthinkable as telling her about Grietje lifting her skirts. For it was God’s will that his sons were taken from him, and to question this is blasphemy.

Cornelis has a new life now and a new young wife. She is younger than his sons would be, had they survived. Their ghosts walk beside him. Their unlived years have made them tall and strong. Their unmet spouses and unborn children are somewhere here, at the edges of his vision. The air echoes, like the silence after bells have ceased tolling—it echoes with stopped possibilities. His sons are speaking to him, their faces sorrowful with pity, and they are telling him the truth although he tries to block his ears.
There is nothing there, believe us
. Sophia must not hear. All Cornelis’s dreams are packed into her, like flower petals packed into a bud. She is his only hope now, for his future simply lies here, on this temporal earth.

The question is—when will the bud burst into blossom? For despite all his efforts Sophia still does not conceive. The night before, when he returned from the banquet, he labored between her legs. She lay there mutely, holding him as he shuddered. Silently he implored God to make his seed fruitful. Afterward, however, he heard her sobbing— noiseless sobs, deep in the pillow when she had presumed he was sleeping. She, too, wanted a child.
My God, my God,
why hast Thou forsaken me?

The streets are full of children today, walking home from church. A boy, holding his mother’s hand, turns to gaze at a pigeon. Twin girls, sucking twin thumbs, look down at their feet and try to walk in step. Amsterdam is filled with families—his ghost family within his head and real families in rude health. They taunt him with their happiness.

Cornelis is a man of routine. Every Sunday he buys Sophia a pancake, dusted with sugar, at the stall in the Dam. They stop there; he breathes the aroma of vanilla and almonds. A small boy pulls at his father’s arm, urging him to buy. He has flaxen curls, like a cherub, and ruddy cheeks painted by Rubens. Cornelis’s heart shifts beneath his ribs.

Sophia has not said a word. She has been quiet all day. Maybe she is thinking the same thing. Cornelis passes her a pancake, wrapped in a twist of paper. He gestures round at the sunlit scene. “What a beautiful day. I seek only one thing to make my happiness complete.”

Sophia, the pancake halfway to her mouth, stares at him. She looks as if she has woken from a dream.

She pauses for a moment, then she takes a bite.

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