The Miniaturist(30)
The vague touch of Johannes – pouched and unresponsive, comes back to her. Nella shudders. Watching as Cornelia turns back the painting of the strung-up hare, she feels a resentment prickling on her skin. You have no idea, she wants to say. You try being married.
‘Cornelia,’ she says. ‘Why is Marin so intent on selling Agnes’ sugar? Are we poor?’
Cornelia gapes at her. ‘Madame, don’t be ridiculous. Poor? Women all over the city would give their right arm to be where you are—’
‘I don’t need a lesson, Cornelia. I asked a question—’
‘To have a master who treats you with respect, who takes you to feasts and buys you dresses and three-thousand-guilder cabinets? He feeds us, he asks after us. Otto will tell you the same.’
‘Otto told me that things would spill over.’
‘Well, there is much to admire in the Seigneur,’ Cornelia replies, her words propulsive, urgent. ‘He raised Toot like a son. Who else would do that? A manservant who can speak French and English? Who can plot a map, check the quality in a bolt of Haarlem wool—’
‘But what can Otto do with all of that, Cornelia? What can any of us do?’
Cornelia looks uncomfortable. ‘From where I’m standing, Madame, your life has only just begun. Here.’ The maid reaches in the main pouch of her apron and places a large parcel on Nella’s bed. ‘It was left outside on the step, addressed to you. What’s wrong?’
‘Nothing,’ Nella falters. Inked with the sign of the sun, the uninvited package rests on the coverlet.
‘No herrings today, you’ll be pleased to hear,’ Cornelia goes on, eyeing the parcel. ‘Winter jams and creamed butter. The Seigneur requested supper early.’ She scoops up her errant patten and pushes it back over her shoe.
‘I’m sure he did,’ says Nella. ‘Apparently he finds much of himself in food. I’ll be down soon.’
Once the door is closed, Nella takes the parcel gently in her hands. I didn’t ask for this, she thinks. My letter expressly told the miniaturist to cease. But even as she remembers this, Nella’s fingers rip the paper. Who would not open such a parcel? she reasons. She remembers her letter clearly. As wife of a high-ranking VOC merchant, I shall not be intimidated by an artisan.
A note flutters out, and upon it, the words:
I FIGHT TO EMERGE
‘Oh, do you, Mr Miniaturist?’ Nella says out loud.
She tips up the rest of the package and an array of minuscule domestic items fall out. Irons as long as two barley grains, tiny baskets, woven sacks, a few barrels and a mop, a brazier for drying clothes. There are pots and pans, tiny fish knives and forks, an embroidered cushion, a rolled-up tapestry that reveals a portrait of two women and a man. Nella is convinced that is the same as the stitched story hanging on Johannes’ wall downstairs – Martha and Mary, arguing over Jesus. Fear starts to mingle with her indignation.
In a small gold frame, a vase of flowers has been painted in oils, complete with a crawling caterpillar. It’s a common motif, Nella tells herself, trying to keep calm, looking at the life-size version that Cornelia has just flipped over on the wall. There are a few exquisitely bound books, some no bigger than a stuiver coin, covered in unreadable handwriting. She flicks through their pages, half-expecting to find a love note – but there is none. There are two small maps of the Indies, and a Bible with a big B upon the front.
A separate package catches Nella’s eye, glinting through the cloth. Nestling in the folds she finds a tiny golden key, hanging on a ribbon. She swings it in the cold morning light. It is beautiful, no longer than her little fingernail, intricately wrought with a carved pattern running down its neck. Too small to open any door, Nella thinks. Useless but ornate.
There is nothing else in the package – no note, no explanation, just the strange motto of defiance and this flurry of gifts. Cornelia swore she delivered the letter telling the miniaturist to desist. So why didn’t he obey me?
But as she looks at these pieces – their extraordinary beauty, their unreachable purpose, Nella wonders if she really wants the miniaturist to cease. The miniaturist himself clearly has no desire to do so.
Tenderly, Nella places the new items in the cabinet, one after the other. She feels a fleeting sense of gratitude that takes her by surprise.
‘Where are you going?’ Marin asks as Nella crosses the hallway an hour later.
‘Nowhere,’ Nella replies, her mind already on the sign of the sun, on the explanations which lie behind the miniaturist’s door.
‘I thought so,’ Marin says. ‘Pastor Pellicorne is preaching at the Old Church and I assumed you would want to attend.’
‘Is Johannes coming?’
Johannes is not coming, having claimed the need to be at the bourse, attending the latest figures being bandied on the trading floor. Nella wonders whether it is worship that her husband is avoiding.
Desperate to visit the Kalverstraat, Nella deliberately lags behind Marin, whose feet are pounding the canal paths as if they have done her a personal disservice. Rezeki, never that happy without her master, is at the bourse with Johannes. Not wanting to leave Dhana behind, Nella walks with the second whippet, the dog trotting obediently at her side, wet black nose tipped up towards her new-adopted mistress.
‘Do you usually take dogs to church?’ Nella asks Cornelia.