The Miniaturist(55)
She keeps her eyes on Otto. The chairs clustering the pulpit are mainly empty, save for a single person here or there who perhaps has nowhere else to be. Normally, of course, worship is done communally, people making sure everyone else sees them at prayer as if this will make the prayer more pure. Otto takes a seat, and unseen by him, Nella moves round and watches him from behind a pillar.
His lips move in a fever. This is no serene prayer – this is almost distraught. It’s astonishing that Otto should be here, alone – what has driven him to such a need to be witnessed in the house of God, given who he is, and what might happen? Nella sees the twisting of Otto’s hands, the panic in his body. Something stops her going towards him. It would not be right to interrupt someone in that state.
Nella shivers, her gaze straying over the chairs, along the white walls, up onto the ceiling covered with old Catholic pictures. She wants so much for the miniaturist to reveal herself. Maybe she’s hiding here right now, watching them both?
Behind her the organ starts up, a booming that shakes Nella to her very core. She doesn’t like thundering organs, preferring the lighter pluck of the lute, the recorder’s reedy ease. A cat, who has come in to shelter from the cold, slinks over the graves, its fur standing to a point. Its movement makes Otto look up and Nella ducks behind the pillar. She covers her ears from the booms of the organ and closes her eyes, dizziness taking her.
A hand touches her sleeve. Nella screws her eyes tighter, not daring to look. It is the moment – it is the woman, she has come.
‘Madame Brandt?’ says a voice.
Nella opens her eyes. Agnes Meermans stands before her, looking thinner than last time, her plain face narrowed, glowing white amidst a muffle of rabbit and fox. She retains her grasp on Nella’s sleeve. ‘Madame Brandt?’ she repeats. ‘Are you quite well? You aren’t even wearing a coat. For a moment I thought the Holy Spirit was upon you!’
‘Madame Meermans. I came – to pray.’
Agnes links her arm through Nella’s. ‘Or to keep an eye on your savage?’ she whispers, motioning beyond the pillar where Otto sits. ‘Very wise. You cannot be too careful, Nella. What’s wrong with him that he looks so distracted?’ Agnes emits her dry ha. ‘Come,’ she says, draping one of her foxes around Nella, pulling it too tight. Nella can smell that fruity pomade again. The fur is wetly cold.
‘We have not seen Marin much at church,’ Agnes observes, patting down the fur round Nella’s neck. She cannot seem to keep her fingers still, and Nella notices how blank they are, devoid of rings. Their absence makes Agnes seem half-naked. The organ stops suddenly, and Agnes is uneasy, as if something is cracking deep beneath her well-polished veneer. ‘Nor have we seen Brandt,’ she continues. ‘Nor you.’
‘My husband is travelling.’
Agnes’ nostrils flare. ‘Travelling? Frans didn’t say.’
‘Perhaps he didn’t know. I believe he is working on your behalf, Madame. He has gone to Venice.’ She tries to pull away. ‘I must go back, Madame Meermans. Marin isn’t well.’
Though she wants to escape, Nella immediately regrets her excuse. Agnes’ eyes widen. ‘Why?’ she says. ‘What’s wrong with her?’
‘A winter malady.’
‘But Marin’s never sick,’ Agnes says. ‘I could send round my physician, though Marin never trusts them.’
The organ’s notes begin again, falling one upon the other, to Nella’s ears a crashing anti-harmony. ‘She will be well, Madame. It is the season for colds.’
Agnes places her hand on Nella’s sleeve again. ‘This might spring Marin from her sick bed. You tell her this: my entire inheritance is still in his warehouse on the Eastern Islands.’ She’s almost hissing. ‘Those cane-fields are unreliable, Madame – who knows when the next crop will come? Your husband hasn’t sold a single loaf of what we’ve managed to refine. And now it seems he’s gone to Venice empty-handed? We need that money.’
‘He will dispatch it, I’m sure. His word is enough—’
‘Frans went to the warehouse. He saw with his own eyes. I could barely believe it when he told me. Piled up to the ceiling! It won’t be long, Agnes, he said. It will crystallize. Our money will rot before we’ve even plucked it.’
The organ notes vibrate in Nella’s ribcage as she absorbs Agnes’ growing agitation. She looks around the pillar for Otto, but he is nowhere to be seen. ‘Be assured, Madame—’
‘My husband won’t be taken for a fool!’ Agnes snaps. ‘He wondered whether Johannes Brandt was the best man for the task, but I insisted. Me. The Brandts think they can have it all, but they can’t. Don’t laugh at him, Madame. Or me.’ As quickly as she gripped, Agnes pulls away. Nella watches her hurry up the church, hunched over and unusually graceless. Opening the small side door, Agnes disappears.
Nella decides the best thing is to go home and tell Marin about this unsettling exchange. Yet again, the miniaturist languishes unvisited. I will send Cornelia with my letter, she thinks, her head spinning from Agnes’ fury. She turns out of the church and back towards the Herengracht.
As she approaches the house in a rush to tell Marin, she knows that something is wrong. The front door is wide open, a gaping maw onto the unlit hall. She can hear the sounds of the dogs barking, but no human voices. She hesitates, then moves soundlessly up the steps to the side of the door.