Barge
The next day, Cornelia seems reinvigorated. ‘Come, Madame,’ says the maid, bounding in, Marin on her heels. ‘Let me tidy those wisps of hair. Tuck them under, hide them away!’
‘What are you talking about, Cornelia?’
‘Johannes is taking you to a feast at the Guild of Silversmiths tonight,’ Marin says.
‘Was it his idea?’
Marin looks over at the cabinet, its curtains now shut from prying eyes. ‘He loves a feast,’ she replies. ‘He thought it appropriate you should attend.’
Now the adventure is surely to begin, Nella thinks – my husband is launching his little raft into the storm-tossed seas of Amsterdam’s finest society – and he, the best of sailors, will be there as my guide. Putting the miniature whippets and the cradle out of her mind, Nella leans under her bed, takes a smear of lily oil on her fingers, and in full view of Marin, rubs it on her neck.
After Marin has left, Nella asks Cornelia what happened at the Kalverstraat. ‘No one answered again,’ the maid says. ‘So I slipped it underneath the door.’
‘At the sign of the sun? You saw no one?’
‘Not a soul, Madame. But Hanna sends her greetings.’
‘Marin, why aren’t you coming?’ Johannes asks that evening, waiting for their barge. He is wearing an exquisite suit of black velvet, a starched white shirt and collar and a pair of calfskin boots polished to mirrors by Otto, who waits with a clothes-brush in one hand.
‘All things considered, I think you should be seen with your wife,’ Marin replies, fixing him with a stare.
‘What do you mean, “all things considered”?’ Nella asks.
‘Talk to people, Johannes,’ Marin says. ‘Show her off—’
‘I’ll introduce you, Nella,’ Johannes interrupts, frowning at his sister. ‘I think that’s what Marin means.’
‘And speak with Frans Meermans, brother. He’ll be there tonight,’ Marin persists, her expression grim. ‘Invite them both to dine.’
To Nella’s surprise, Johannes nods. Why does he let his sister talk to him like this?
‘Johannes, do you promise—’
‘Marin.’ Johannes finally snaps at the sound of her voice. ‘When have I ever got my business wrong?’
‘You haven’t,’ she sighs. ‘At least, not yet.’
Nella’s mouth feels dry but her stomach is a creel of fish. The boat journey to the Guild of Silversmiths is the first time she and her husband have been alone outside the house. She thinks the silence will drown her, but the voice inside her head is so loud she’s convinced Johannes can hear it too. She wants to ask him about Marin’s room of maps, Otto and his slave-ship – she wants to tell him about the tiny whippets, the cradle, the beautiful miniature lute. She won’t tell him about the woman on the Kalverstraat, staring at her – that feels like something she wants to keep to herself – but at any rate, her mouth won’t move.
Johannes begins cleaning his nails absentmindedly. The discarded crescents of dirt float to the floor of the boat, and he catches her looking.
‘Cardamom,’ he says. ‘It gets caught under the nail. As does salt.’
‘I see.’
Nella inhales the air in the boat, the hint of the places he’s been, the scent of cinnamon stuck in his very pores. He smells vaguely of that musky tang she smelled in his study the night he first came home. Her husband’s brown face and his too-long hair, bleached and toughened by sun and wind, trigger an awkward longing – the desire not necessarily for him, but to know how it will feel when they finally lie together. The gift of the cabinet, and now this trip together to the Guild – perhaps it will happen tonight after the feast? Both of them, wine-flushed – they will get it done.
The water is so smooth and the boatman so expert that it feels as if the houses are moving and not the barge. Nella, more used to riding on a horse, is unsettled by the sedate pace, supposedly tranquil when she feels anything but. She tries to press away her agitation between the palms of her hands. How do I begin to love you? – the question, enormous, impossible to ignore, goes round and round in her head as she stares at him.
She tries to focus on how the silversmiths’ hall will look, a room full of watery light, plates like giant coins, the diners reflected on every surface.
‘What do you know of the guilds?’ Johannes asks, breaking her thoughts.
‘Nothing,’ she replies.
Johannes absorbs her ignorance with a nod, and Nella watches it sink into him, wishing she could sound more clever. ‘The silversmiths’ guild has a lot of money,’ he says. ‘One of the richest. Guilds offer protection in hard times, apprenticeships and a means to sell, but they also determine their workload and control the market. It’s why Marin’s so keen on selling the sugar.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘Well, like chocolate and tobacco – and diamonds, silk and books, the market is open. There’s no guild for them. I can name my price – or Frans and Agnes Meermans can.’
‘So why are we going to the silversmiths’ guild?’
He grins. ‘Free meal. No, I jest. They want me to increase my patronage, and it’s good to be seen doing just that. I’m the crack in the wall that leads to the magic garden.’
Nella wonders how magic his garden is, how much he can truly afford to stretch his purse strings open. Marin seemed so uneasy about his expenditure on the cabinet house, and what was it Otto said? Things will spill over. Don’t be silly, she thinks. You live on the Herengracht now.
‘Marin seems very keen for you to sell Frans Meermans’ sugar,’ she dares, immediately regretting her decision. There is a long pause, so long, that she believes she would rather die than endure it any longer.
‘It’s Agnes Meermans’ plantation,’ Johannes says eventually. ‘But Frans has taken over the managing of it. Agnes’ father died last year with no sons – though not for want of going at it till his final breath.’ He stops himself on seeing Nella’s blushes. ‘My apologies. I did not mean to be coarse. Her father was an awful man – and yet Agnes inherited his acres of cane fields – a woman’s name on the papers, despite all her father’s best efforts. And now she’s handed them to Frans. Overnight these cones of sugar have made them both quite venal. It’s what they’ve been waiting for.’
‘What have they been waiting for?’
He grimaces. ‘A good opportunity. I’m storing the cones in my warehouse, and have agreed to sell them. My sister constantly doubts I will.’
‘Why?’
‘Because Marin sits indoors and has ideas, but does not understand the nuances involved in actual trade. I’ve been doing this for twenty years – for too long,’ he sighs. ‘One must tread carefully, and yet she crashes like an elephant.’
‘I see,’ Nella says, though she has no idea what an elephant is. It sounds like an elegant flower, but Johannes didn’t seem to be paying his sister a compliment. ‘Johannes, is Marin – friends with Agnes Meermans?’
Johannes laughs. ‘They have known each other a long time, and sometimes it’s hard to love a person you know too well. There’s your answer. Don’t look shocked.’
The observation lodges in Nella like a shard of ice. ‘Do you really think that, Johannes?’
‘When you have truly come to know a person, Nella – when you see beneath the sweeter gestures, the smiles – when you see the rage and the pitiful fear which each of us hide – then forgiveness is everything. We are all in desperate need of it. And Marin is – not so forgiving.’ He pauses. ‘There are – ladders in this society. . . and Agnes loves to climb them. The problem is, she never loves the view.’ His eyes glitter on an invisible joke. ‘Anyway. I’ll bet you a guilder Frans is wearing the biggest hat in the room, and Agnes will have made him wear it.’
‘Do wives often attend these feasts?’
He smiles. ‘Women are usually proibidas, except for special occasions. Though there is a freedom among Amsterdam ladies that the French and English lack.’
‘Freedom?’
‘Ladies can walk alone on the street. Couples can even hold each other’s hands.’ He pauses again, looking through the window. ‘It is not a prison, this city, if you plot your path correctly. The foreigners may tut, with their well-I-nevers and alors, but I’m sure they’re envious.’
‘Of course,’ Nella replies, again not understanding his alien words, not seeing at all. Proibidas. Over her short stay in the house Johannes has often spoken in other languages, and it mesmerizes her when he does it. He doesn’t seem to be showing off – it’s more a reaching for something his own tongue can never achieve. Nella realizes that no man – no person, in fact – has ever talked to her the way he has tonight. Despite the mysterious allusions, Johannes treats her like an equal; he expects her to understand.
‘Come here, Nella,’ he says.
Obediently, with a little fear she moves towards him and he tips her chin gently to lengthen her neck. She stares back at him and they size each other up like slave and master at a market. Taking her face in his hands, he brushes the contour of her young cheek. She leans forward. The tips of his fingers are roughened, but this is what Nella has waited for. Her head thrums at the feel of his touch. She closes her eyes, remembering her mother’s words – the girl wants love. She wants the peaches and the cream.
‘Do you like silver?’Johannes asks.
‘Yes,’ Nella breathes. She will not babble this moment away.
‘There’s nothing more beautiful in the world than silver,’ Johannes says. His hands drop from her face, her eyes snap open and she feels a swoop of embarrassment at her craned position. ‘I’ll have a necklace made for that throat.’
His voice sounds far away from the roar of her thoughts. Nella pulls back, rubbing her gullet as if bringing it back to life. ‘Thank you,’ she hears herself say.
‘You’re a wife now. We’re supposed to dress you up.’
Johannes smiles, but the sentence is brutal to Nella, and a stone of fear hardens in her gut. She finds she has nothing to say.
‘I will not hurt you, Petronella.’
Nella looks through the window towards the unending flow of house-fronts passing by. Closing her legs together tight, she imagines the moment of penetration – is there something in her that will rip, will it feel as painful as she fears? Whatever the sensation, she knows she cannot avoid it, that it must be overcome.
‘I am quite serious,’ Johannes says. ‘Quite serious.’ Now it is his turn to lean towards her. The smell of trapped salt and cardamom, his strange maleness, threatens to overpower her. ‘Nella, Nella, are you listening?’
‘Yes. I am, Johannes. I – you will not hurt me.’
‘Good. You have nothing to fear from me.’
As Johannes says this, he withdraws, staring at the canalside houses. Nella thinks of the picture in Marin’s travel book, the native and the conqueror, acres of misunderstanding between their bodies. Night has fallen fully. She looks at the lights of the smaller boats, and feels completely alone.