Part 28 (1/2)

He grinned lazily. ”I used to visit you.”

”But that was before your involvement in French affairs.” She traced a forefinger over his shoulder. ”It's like old times again. Nothing has changed, has it?” She wanted to hear confirmation from him. Now that they had both established themselves away from all that lay in their past and with Amalia dead, the future had opened up for them again. Naturally she did not love him blindly now as she had when he had first come into her life. Certainly some of his ways, which she had once endured in a devoted and submissive haze, wanting only to please him, would be intolerable to her now. Perhaps in truth she no longer loved him at all, but he was what she had wanted then, and what she still wanted and had always been determined to have when the time was right. It was not right yet, but when France had gained control of Holland and Ludolf was raised to a high ministerial post she would do him credit as his wife. All subterfuge and dreariness would be a thing of the past. She would be able to extend her not inconsiderable intelligence and educated taste in literature by holding salons in the French style.

He was giving her waist an absentminded squeeze, his thoughts moving rapidly away from her as he considered the important matter that had brought him to Delft, her question only just lodging with him. ”We've known each other too long now for anything to change.”

He threw back the quilt and left the bed to start dressing. She watched him luxuriously. He still wore red silk underwear. After the pa.s.sage of time she might have expected him to look faintly ludicrous in it, but he was still a formidable man with nothing about him to raise the slightest ridicule. His hair, which he wore cropped for convenience under his periwig, had receded slightly and had some wings of gray in it, but baldness was still far from him.

”You still haven't told me why you've come to Delft,” she said, hoping it was simply to see her, although she did not expect that to be the reason. There was not a grain of sentiment in him. His reply confirmed it.

”It's time you and I talked about branching out on a new tack of getting to know what the defenses are at Muiden and other places where the sluices control the sea water. There was deliberate flooding to keep the enemy at bay during the Spanish war and it's a method of defense likely to be used again. However, I have a legitimate reason for being here in your house, if not in your bed! Being the patron of the artist whose daughter is staying with you, it would be expected that I should inquire after her welfare from you in order to report back to her father.”

She sat up, holding the quilt to her. ”I believe in caution and still more caution. Of course we need to talk this time and you can't be here too often for me, but we were wise before and must continue to be. Although the minimum period of mourning for Amalia is over for you, there can be no question of us marrying until your spying for France and my involvement in it has achieved its purpose.”

He was arranging his collar in front of a mirror, his back to her, and he was thankful she could not see his s.h.i.+ft of expression. Marry her! Did she still expect that after all this time? It was she, more than he, who had always spoken of it. If she had inherited her old husband's wealth, as they had both expected and had been the major factor in their getting rid of the old man, he would have made her his wife instead of Amalia. It had been his full intention, for he had seen how they might mold their future together, but when he had returned from the sea to discover she had been left almost nothing, he had looked elsewhere for a bride. Geetruyd was still pleasurable to bed, and was extremely useful to him as the kingpin of a house where information could be received and dispatched under perfect cover, but that was all. She would come to terms with his marrying someone else as she had done before. He had never found her difficult to manage and he did not expect any complications now. He turned and smiled at her approvingly.

”Tell me about Francesca,” he said, sitting down to pull on his knee hose. ”As I said before, her father will want to know how she is behaving and whether she sees much of her sister.”

”I've had no trouble with her after the first day or two. I find her agreeable and quite like her company, but whether she is conducting any correspondence against her father's wishes is impossible for me to say. There is a limit to how much control I can exercise. At least I know no such letters addressed to her have arrived in Delft and frankly I don't believe she is receiving them by any other means. She acknowledges my rules for a peaceful existence, totally unlike so many girls I've had here, but then she has her painting to absorb her. I've heard from Master Vermeer himself how hard she works. Whenever she goes out with Aletta I always insist that Clara go with them. In all, I've had nothing serious with which to upbraid Francesca. She always asks my permission before visiting with the Vermeers or seeing Vrouw Thin.”

Ludolf was dressed, even to his periwig, and he jerked his cuffs into place. ”Surely you've had to keep a few young men at bay?” he queried casually.

”No doubt if Francesca had encouraged them there would have been plenty, but that hasn't happened. The first letter I made her write as soon as she came here was to that young man, van Doorne, putting an end to any possible visits from him. She wrote it was only friends.h.i.+p between them and now I'm sure that was so.”

”Good.” Then he added, almost as an afterthought, ”Her father will be pleased.”

”Where are you going now?”

”To pay a call on Master Vermeer. It is on Hendrick Visser's behalf. When it is over I'll walk Francesca back here. There'll be no need to send Clara today. Then this evening I think we should all go out for some entertainment-a musico or a concert, maybe a play. What is on in the town?”

”There's usually a musico at the Mechelin, but I couldn't be seen there.”

”But such evenings of music and dancing are always in a room separate from the taprooms.”

”Nevertheless, it would do my reputation no good with my fellow regents and regentesses to be seen anywhere near a tavern. They are narrow-minded beyond belief!”

He accepted her argument, for although wine and ale were to be had in every household, it was the drunkenness that took place in taverns that was condemned and kept many away, not the alcohol itself.

”Where else could we go?” he asked.

”There's a concert at the Town Hall.”

”Excellent. That's what we'll do, then. Francesca might like Aletta to come too.”

”I'm sure she would.”

When Ludolf opened the entrance door into the gallery at Mechelin Huis he was surprised by the length of the room and how well lit it was by the windows on each side of the door that reached to a high ceiling. He presumed that the man setting a painting into a frame was the one he had come to see.

”Master Vermeer?”

Jan put down his work and came forward, interested to see a prospective customer who was new to him. ”That is I.”

”Allow me to present myself, Ludolf van Deventer.”

The name meant nothing to Jan, for Francesca had never mentioned Ludolf to him or his wife. ”In what may I interest you, mijnheer? Do you wish to look at what is on the walls here or have you a special kind of picture in mind?”

”It's not a work of art that I require,” Ludolf said, although he glanced with mild interest at what was on the wall nearest him. ”I have other business with you.”

Jan's immediate and decidedly gloomy thought was that this well-dressed stranger was a lawyer sent by one of those to whom he owed money. ”What might that be?”

”You have a pupil. Francesca Visser.”

”Indeed I have.”

”I'll come straight to the point. I'm here to buy her out of her apprentices.h.i.+p. She is to be placed in another studio in Amsterdam.”

Jan perched his weight against the end of the long table and folded his arms. ”I've heard nothing of this from Francesca,” he said coolly, thoroughly offended.

”She doesn't know yet. It is to be a surprise for her.”

”Is that so? And on whose authority do you act?”

”Her father's. I saw him only yesterday before I left the city.” Ludolf was glancing at more paintings as he strolled leisurely down the gallery. Then he paused to take a folded paper from his pocket and toss it across the table for Jan to pick up. ”Read his wishes for yourself.”

A few steps farther along Ludolf halted before a painting. It was a riotous tavern scene and the laughing, red-faced man raising his tankard was not unlike Hendrick. Yet the artist had had anything but a merry face when summoned to Heerengracht the previous day.

”Francesca won't like your interference,” Hendrick had said, glowering, ”and the same amount of money already paid will have to be returned to the source from which it came.”

”That is no problem. Just put your signature to this doc.u.ment, giving me the necessary authority to take the matter in hand. My clerk has drawn it up for you.”

”What if I refuse to sign?”

Ludolf had not bothered to answer and after a second or two Hendrick had picked up the pen. Once again the artist had taken warning.

Jan spoke. ”Whom does Heer Visser have in mind as a new master for Francesca?”

Ludolf turned and took up the paper that had been replaced on the table. ”Pieter de Hooch.”

”Ah. I knew him well when he lived in Delft. His work was remarkable then for his harmonious, rich colors and the tranquillity of his domestic scenes.”

”I was told that your style influenced him.”

”That's as may be. Is he willing to take her?”

”Only with your agreement.”

”That was to be expected. Neither he, as an old friend and fellow artist, nor any other painter of repute would filch an apprentice from another studio, whether that pupil was almost fully trained, as Francesca is, or simply a beginner. Have you found out if she is willing to make such a change?”

Ludolf scoffed smilingly. ”One doesn't consult a woman. She will accept whatever is arranged for her.”

”You think so? What made her father decide on de Hooch?”