Rembrandt's Mirror Read online

  ‘Come now boy, if I don’t put a stop to this, you’ll soon be clucking like a brooding hen. Give me the flannel. And tell Jan Six: pitch darkness happens in the vault of the mind, even if the sun shines brightly outside. And that can be depicted.’

  Samuel hands him the cloth and for a moment he thinks he can smell paint on him again.

  Summer

  Samuel is at his master’s desk. He’s just heard the clock chime midnight. He had hoped that things would improve more quickly but it’s been almost a month and Rembrandt still refuses to see anyone except him. The pupils are on the verge of moving on to other workshops and since they provide the only remaining source of income he has to keep them occupied, pretending the master has set the tasks. At least Rembrandt now occasionally answers questions, which helps Samuel keep things going. But it is not enough. He needs to show himself soon, or he and his business will be finished. He must speak to him. Chances are he’s still awake, as he mostly sleeps during the day.

  Rembrandt is lying on the bed, staring at the ceiling, but sits up when he sees him. Samuel pulls up a chair and starts stuffing the pipe he has brought with tobacco. He lights it with the flame from the candle, drawing air until he tastes smoke, then gives it to Rembrandt. They pass it between them until the tobacco is spent. The room is thick with smoke, swirling in the light of the candle.

  Samuel says softly, so softly that Rembrandt can pretend he has not heard it, ‘What is it like?’

  ‘What is what like?’ asks Rembrandt.

  ‘Your condition?’

  ‘You make it sound like a disease.’

  Rembrandt’s eyes close and he disappears into thought. Finally he utters, ‘You know how some fools, greedy for a shiny darkness, add bitumen to their paint without sufficient driers and then a few years later the face of a dear friend, rendered in thousands of careful brushstrokes, develops blisters and then . . .’ – he makes a motion with his hands of something flowing apart – ‘. . . it’s ripped apart by ugly crevices.’

  His eyes, behind his closed lids, strain as if trying to focus on something. ‘When I look where my love used to be . . .’

  He shrugs his shoulders and sticks his finger into the spent pipe, scoops out the ash and shows it to Samuel. ‘I don’t want to talk. Talking is . . .’ he sighs, ‘I’m just not interested.’ He rubs the black ash between his thumb and index finger. ‘Funny, to think this used to grow once in a field.’

  To Samuel this does not sound like ordinary grief at all but like a canker of the soul. ‘So how do we make it better?’ he asks.

  ‘Ah, still trying to cure me of my disease?’

  ‘But it’s more than grief, isn’t it?’

  ‘What makes you think it can be cured?’ he says with a defeated smile that isn’t one.

  Samuel feels the urge to drag him to his feet, thrust a pencil into his hand and make him use it. He can’t comprehend this strange apoplexy of feeling. What is the point of loving someone if it results in this incapacity? Samuel touches his arm to get his attention. ‘But before, when the babies died, you did go on with work?’

  With a strange knowing expression in his face, Rembrandt takes Samuel’s hand and studies it. ‘You’ve not been painting either, have you?’

  Has he lost his mind? Of course he hasn’t painted – he’s been running the workshop for him.

  Rembrandt turns his hand over and points at the lines in his palm. ‘The body changes all the time, new lines appear, sometimes in a matter of weeks. But there are inner changes too, the flux of our natural empathies, the movements of the soul. I’ve taught you to see and depict them, remember?’

  Samuel feels something, yes, he is subject to an inner flow, no apoplexy of feeling for him; he is here because of what he feels. How rough the fingers gripping his hand are. He has not noticed this before. Suddenly the window rattles from a draft. The candle splutters and dies. They are in total darkness. Like bitumen, thinks Samuel.

  Rembrandt lets go of his hand and Samuel feels a rising panic. He’s lost all sense of where he is, or the door, the candle or Rembrandt. It is childish but he’s always been afraid of the dark. He can’t help reaching out with his hand, feeling for something to orientate himself. He chances upon Rembrandt’s arm and holds on to it.

  Rembrandt whispers as if telling him a secret, ‘We were kin. I was as used to her as to having arms and legs. Of course, it’s possible to lose a limb and get on with some kind of life . . . but Samuel, I did not lose her.’ He pauses. ‘I cut her off.’

  Samuel wants to shake him – what nonsense. He feels Rembrandt’s hand on his upper arm, like a bridge between them, a conduit. ‘I saw that she did not have many days left, so miserable coward that I was I put a gap between us, to make it bearable for myself. Do you hear, Samuel, not for her, but for me.’ Now Rembrandt’s grip loosens to almost nothing. ‘I should have waited till after she was gone but I left her, long before she went.’

  Samuel understands. He too is frightened. He too has thought of leaving rather than watching his master disintegrate. If only he could put his master’s soul at rest about these sins that aren’t sins at all.

  Samuel listens out into the silent darkness for a long time. He places his other hand also on Rembrandt’s sleeve, first softly, then holding on to the arm with both his hands as if to return him to this world and keep him here.

  Rembrandt’s fingers are gripping Samuel’s elbow. ‘Why does God teach me to love, then strip me bare, leaving me with nothing?’

  Then Rembrandt lets go but Samuel doesn’t. He traces the sleeve down to the rough-skinned hand and takes it in both of his. He wants to pour all his own strength into this hand, which is meant to paint. He is glad the dark conceals the moisture in his eyes. Rembrandt sighs and pulls his hand away. He must be trying to lie down, so Samuel helps him and arranges the blanket over him as best he can in the dark. ‘I’ll go and fetch some light,’ he says.

  To his surprise, he finds the door easily despite the dark. He hastens up to the studio which has a stove with some embers in it. What a struggle it is to love and yet how easy, thinks Samuel. He puts a candle to them and the wick bursts into flame at the first touch.

  He carries the light back to Rembrandt’s room and puts it by his bed. His master has already fallen asleep. What a blessing it is to see him look peaceful.

  Geertje can’t do anything quietly, thinks Rembrandt. If it wasn’t for her I’d still be asleep. Can’t she lift the chairs instead of dragging them across the stone floor?

  It is impossible to produce an etching that depicts impenetrable darkness. Who said that? If he is quick he might not see anyone. How ridiculous to be afraid of encountering another person in his own house.

  He reaches the print room unnoticed. Now he’s safe. They know better than to disturb him when he is working. He locks the door, turning the key as many times as it will go.

  He steps towards the container where the lumps of soft ground are usually kept. Hoping that his assistants have maintained a supply of the right consistency. He picks up and sniffs up one of the pieces which are a boiled-down mixture of asphalt, resin and wax. His nose is pleasantly assaulted by the heady smell of asphalt. He inhales the invigorating fumes before wrapping it in gauze and lighting a fire in the chafing dish to heat up the plate.

  Once the copper is warm enough he applies the ground which dissolves, passing through the gauze. When the plate has cooled, he opens the shutters to have more light and takes the etching needle and puts it to the plate. The asphalt yields like butter, satisfying – a coppery trail of exposed metal.

  The outlines of a small chamber have taken shape but the plate is still mostly black. To the right he sketches a small window, beneath it an old man, St Jerome, who sits at a table with an open book. But Jerome pays no attention to it. His elbow rests wearily on the table, his arm and hand propping up his head. The light is not too bright and yet the old man feels it necessary to shade his eyes.

  On the left he draws th
e outline of a spiral staircase, which continues beyond the edge of the plate. Once he has completed this rough outline of the elements of the picture, the rhythm of his work changes. The plate is still almost entirely black, with only the sketch showing in shiny copper. He imagines it as a print: the red lines of copper transformed into black ink. He’ll have to expose much more copper to get the darkness he wants. He thinks of the plate submerged in its bath, the acid eating away at the copper until it has bitten grooves deep enough to retain the ink. He starts a flurry of hatched lines, his fingers and needle a blur. More and more bright copper is exposed. It takes a long time, for it isn’t a uniform darkness he wants to achieve but many shades of grey; even the darkest parts still hint at the existence of walls and furnishings, right on the edge of recognition.

  He wants the onlooker to see into a special kind of darkness, one that swallows not only ordinary light but the inner light of the eyes, the light of attention. He’ll lead the viewer there with his needle, up the dark staircase to the upper room beyond the edge of the plate, where no thought, or light, or glimmer of anything exists, until the onlooker even forgets about himself.

  What of Jerome? His head is being disgorged by darkness, but not the rest of him. He remains half-born in a mute world. The shadows are eating him and yet he cannot see them.

  Rembrandt turns his attention to the window, the lightest part of the image. It is big enough to allow ample light into the room. But despite his seat by the window, it’s as if Jerome exists in darkness, because the light can never penetrate the darkness of his mind.

  The boy is terribly pleased when he discovers the etching in the print room. He believes that he brought about a change in Rembrandt but really there is none.

  A terrifying noise. It’s coming from his chest. A devil’s trombone, pummelling him from the inside. And the malevolent thing is vying for control of his breath. It’s only with the greatest effort that he gets the bellows of his chest to rise. Air, he needs more air. The drone surges to a deafening roar. His bowels slacken, frightened by his own helplessness. He thrashes the air but there is nothing he can do against the amorphous attacker, except to flee. He gets out of bed, but his knees buckle and he hits the floor.

  Another change in pitch – for the better, allowing a breath. But not for long; the pitch changes again. His lungs are paralysed. Breathe, breathe – his lungs don’t listen. No heave to suck in air. The door, he has to reach the door. But limbs won’t obey. He’ll die. He forces out the last bit of air to produce a scream. Pain, but different, on the outside, sharp. Something has hit the side of his face. He opens his eyes: light, white cloth, his bedroom, Geertje. Silence, apart from his own breathing. A dream, he’s had a dream. He is on the floor, panting like a dog. Air so fresh and sweet. She’s standing over him. His cheek still stings. She must have hit him, to wake him. He’s filled with gratitude. She takes a step back. With her long nightshirt and candle in hand she looks like an angel of either deliverance or doom.

  He hauls himself up, at last awake enough to feel embarrassed. He must have screamed, but at least he did not soil himself. Why is she staring at him like this? Ah. She probably fears his wrath because she’s struck him. He nearly laughs out loud at the idea. A gust of air sweeps through the open door from behind her, cooling his sweaty arms and bringing her smell to his nose. Unlike her wrinkled brow, it is enticing. He wants more but the air is still.

  Maybe he is still asleep; there are no rules in dreams. He moves towards her, eyes half closed. His hands reach out and touch coarse fabric and a hint of warmth beyond. His nose finds the nook of her neck. He inhales the scent. Divine. He sniffs along her neckline, with each breath more and more awake. Wait. She has not stopped him. And if she has not stopped him, she might let him go further.

  He pushes aside the obstructing collar and buries his mouth and nose in the nape of her neck, steals a taste of her skin with a lick of his tongue, disguised as a kiss. Her neck arches. He disbelieves his luck, but goes on. Neck, collarbone, shoulder. Her.

  He remembers he has hands. They grab and rumple the linen, finding flesh through fabric. Hips, clutched and possessed. And there, the fat roundness of her breasts. He seizes them, such malleable softness. No matter how he sculpts and holds them, they resolutely resume their wondrous shape.

  How lithe she has become. He never would have thought it. Her thighs pressing against him. A message in that. She wants you, you fool. But he still cannot trust this new world; the nightmare still too real to him. He reaches for her, blindly pulling her towards him. They stumble on to the bed or has she pushed him there? Her skin, so warm. Something else makes itself known: Yes, he’s feeling good; and his pain . . . ? He can’t locate it anywhere. He is capable of feeling good. Perhaps he can have a life, some kind of life.

  He pushes up the cloth of her nightshirt and lets his fingers dwell on her upper thighs, trying to discern their secret workings, the bones inside and the strands of muscles. Yes, they carry, they bear up and now they tremble softly where he’s touching them. He wants to do more – merely to worship is not enough. He runs his hands up from knee to hip, over and over again, to where the shock of thick hair beckons him.

  Just as he is thinking of laying his fingertips at her entrance, her hand folds around his cock, and he is lost in her frenzied touch.

  At last he knows it. She is his. She has given him back the world and by God he would fill it. And then he enters her with all the languor of certainty, almost laughing when she claws at him for more.

  Their encounter becomes dedicated to only one thing. It’s a smithy of joy. They forge their pleasure, this way and that, folding it like steel, strengthening it, until it is sharp and bright – so all consuming it at last expunges who they are.

  And so the sword comes down and cuts them loose.

  PART II

  Five years later

  Winter

  Bredevoort, Gelderland, Dutch Republic, January 1647

  ‘Hendrikje,’ my mother shouted through several closed doors, ‘the sheets are frozen solid on the line!’

  The morning had been so bright and sunny that I’d forgotten it was freezing. I imagined her taking them down and folding them with a crunching sound, angry that I was not rushing out to help.

  My hands carried on with the lacework. I felt the bellied bobbins, the wood worn smooth by generations. My fingers crossed two pearly threads in a twirl around one another and then placed them on the side. Twirling, placing, picking up a new pair. The lace on the black cushion on my lap grew like an ice crystal on a window.

  My back ached. I’d been resisting the impulse to stop but at last I put the cushion on the chair next to me and let my gaze drift out of the window. I wanted to put my palms on the cool glass. How happy the children sounded outside. They loved the snow. They’d been shouting and laughing all morning. I heard the noise of wagon wheels rattling on bumpy cobbles in the distance and I listened to them until they melted into silence – but still I thought I heard them. From my seat I could see only a small framed rectangle of sky, the colour of dirty snow.

  I picked up the cushion again and returned it to my lap. Why not get up, relieve the strain on my back and readjust the waistband of my skirt? The clock in the corner continued its rhythm – tick, pause, tock, pause – as if it had to inhale before every tick and tock. I glanced at the long pendulum as it swung along its prescribed path. It would never stop; it was wound each day by my mother.

  My fingers started again. I watched them. Left, right, left, right, in time with the stupefying ticking of the clock. The timepiece had been my father’s pride. It was a rare thing. Everyone else lived by the clock on the church tower. How many more ticks until the collar would be finished? Never; the lace would go on as long as the clock. Tock, inhale, tick, exhale, tock, inhale . . .

  My hands continued blind, as my eyes moved away from the sprawling lace. Those pale blue curtains, I’d hidden behind them as a child. They were still there, ready to shut the wo
rld out but no longer capable of concealing me. Why could I never get comfortable? It was always there, the pressure of the waistband, the tightness of my bodice and the hardness of the chair. As a child I’d garnered the nickname Mistress Too-Tight for my complaining.

  But I’d adapted to my home like a hermit crab to its borrowed shell. I placed my feet on top of the foot stove and arranged my skirt around and soon felt the warmth rise up my legs. Anything could be endured as long as one’s feet were warm.

  The light suddenly lifted, causing the silver-threaded cloth on the side chair to sparkle. I rested my hands. The sun was blazing through the windows so strongly that it made the glass glow; perhaps it would simply melt, flow away and the room would flood with fresh air. I put the heavy cushion aside and got up, enjoying each step that took me to the window.

  I inspected the glass. Many tiny flecks of dirt had accumulated there. And the morning sun caused each of them to light up with their own corona, as if they themselves emitted light. Perhaps they did; perhaps it was the dirt that made the world light up. Still, the windows needed a clean and I wanted to clean them, so I fetched a bucket, climbed on to a footstool and rubbed away at the dirt with a cloth, water and vinegar.

  After a while my mother came in. I knew her step. I did not bother to turn or stop; we often talked while we worked. I pushed the cloth right into a grubby corner, determined to remove all the grime.

  ‘Our neighbour, Jacob van Dorsten, has asked for my hand in marriage and I have accepted,’ she said.

  The clock did not miss a beat, but I was left behind, caught in the moment before the incomprehensible news. My father was barely six months dead; how had she and van Dorsten arranged this? I let my arm drop, and looked beyond the glass as if for the first time: ranks of ice-encrusted cobbles, wild-looking children and a bird’s nest that must have fallen out of the tree on to the frozen ground.