The Miniaturist(31)
The maid nods. ‘Madame Marin says they can’t be trusted on their own.’
‘I could bring Peebo.’
‘Don’t be ridiculous,’ says Marin from over her shoulder, and Nella marvels at her ability to eavesdrop.
It is a brilliant day, the terracotta rooftops almost vermilion, the temperature cold enough to dilute any stench from the canal. Carriages clatter by, the waterways full of vessels loaded with men, women, bundles of goods, even a few sheep. They walk up the Herengracht, up Vijzelstraat and over the bridge onto the Turf Market leading towards the Old Church. Nella looks longingly towards her original destination, before Cornelia reminds her that unless Madame looks in the direction she is going, Madame will trip upon the cobbles.
From the boats, from their windows, from the canal path, the people stare. With every step they take past the tall and slender silk merchants’ houses on the Warmoestraat, past the shop windows selling Italian maiolica, Lyons silk, Spanish taffeta, porcelain from Nuremburg and Haarlem linen, the Amsterdammers impress upon them a selection of looks. For a moment, Nella wonders what it is they have done, then she sees the muscles tense in the back of Otto’s neck. He calls to Dhana to put her on the lead. ‘It speaks!’ Nella hears someone say to a peal of laughter.
When Otto passes there’s hardly a face that doesn’t open in surprise to see him walking with these women. Some expressions curdle to suspicion, others to disdain or outright fear. Some are blankly fascinated, others seem unbothered, but it doesn’t make up for the rest. As the party drops down off the Warmoestraat approaching the back of the Old Church, a man with smallpox scars, sitting on a low bench at a door, calls out as Otto passes by. ‘I can’t find work, and you give that animal a job?’
Marin wavers but Cornelia stops walking. She strides back and raises her fist inches from his cratered skin. ‘This is Amsterdam, Hole-Face,’ she says. ‘The best man wins.’
Nella makes a strangled, nervous laugh which dies as the man lifts his own fist to Cornelia’s face. ‘This is Amsterdam, bitch. The best man knows the right friends.’
‘Cornelia, hold your tongue,’ calls Marin. ‘Come away.’
‘He should have his cut out!’
‘Cornelia! Sweet Jesu, are we all of us animals?’
‘Ten years Toot’s been here, and nothing’s changed,’ the maid mutters, coming back to her mistress. ‘You think they’d be used to it.’
‘Hole-Face, Cornelia. How could you?’ Marin says, but Nella hears a distinct note of approval in her voice.
Otto gazes towards a horizon far beyond the buildings of Amsterdam. He does not look at Hole-Face. ‘Dhana,’ he calls. The dog finally stops, perks her head up and trots towards him. ‘Don’t go too far, girl,’ he says.
‘Me, or the dog?’ Cornelia sighs.
Though people continue to goggle, no one else offers their commentary. Nella notices how they look at Marin too. Unusually tall for a woman, with her long neck and head held high, Marin is like the figurehead on the bow of a ship, leaving waves of turning faces in her wake. Nella sees her through their eyes, the perfect Dutchwoman, immaculate, handsome and walking with a purpose. The only thing missing is a husband.
‘How it looks, that Johannes does not come to church,’ Nella hears Marin observing to Otto. In the face of his silence, Marin turns back to the girls. ‘Did he invite the Meermanses to dinner?’ she asks Nella.
Nella hesitates, on the cusp of a lie. ‘Not yet,’ she replies.
Marin stops, unable to hide her fury, her mouth held in an undignified O of shock as she accuses Nella with a flash of her grey eyes.
‘Well, I couldn’t make him invite them,’ says Nella.
‘My God,’ Marin cries, stepping in a puddle of slop. She strides ahead, leaving the other three behind. ‘Must I do it all?’
Boom and Bloom
Nella has never been in the Old Church before. ‘Who’s Pellicorne?’ she whispers to Cornelia. ‘Don’t we have enough of the Bible at home?’
Cornelia grimaces, for Marin has overheard. ‘One must also worship in public, Petronella,’ Marin says.
‘Whatever you have to endure?’ mutters Otto.
Marin pretends not to have heard. ‘Pellicorne,’ she breathes, as if referring to a particularly favourite actor. ‘And the civitas is watching.’
They have a smaller church in Assendelft and this building is enormous in comparison. Soaring white stone columns divide the arches around and up the middle of the nave. Painted scenes from the Bible are in several of the windows, and through their stained-glass saints the sunlight floods the floor in watery red and gold, pale indigo and green. Nella feels she could dive in, but the names of the dead embedded in the floor remind her that the water is actually stone.
The church is busy; the living are staking their claim. Nella is surprised by the permitted level of noise, the fathers and mothers, the gossip and pleasantry, the unleashed dogs and little children. Barks and infant chatter scale the whitewashed walls, the sounds only lightly absorbed by the wood above. One dog is relieving itself nearby, its leg cocked jauntily against a pillar. There is light everywhere Nella looks, as if for one hour, God has turned his sole attention to this soaring chamber and the hearts that beat within it.