The Serpent Garden - Judith Merkle Riley

by The Serpent Garden (epub)

  So I waited on the corner where Bladder Lane is, pretending I wasn’t interested in Master Ailwin’s apothecary shop at all. Two large dogs had come but Nan hadn’t had time to shoo them when that strange man came by, walking fast right out of the door and practically squashing me by almost running into me. His face made my heart stand still. His eyes were pale green and seemed to freeze me through. Above them were strange, bushy eyebrows sprinkled with long gray hairs like insects’ antennae that looked as if they belonged on a devil. Just where horns should be growing, his hair had two wide, curling streaks of white that stood up before they mixed with the rest of the dark hair almost as if they really were horns. His face, pale under his square-cut beard, looked as if he stayed up nights doing unspeakable things. His wide, almost lipless mouth gave me a stretched-out smile, but his icy eyes were insane. “I know you,” he said. “Aren’t you Rowland Dallet’s widow?” I wanted to turn and run, but I knew I must not show any weakness. I answered.

  “I am, sir, but since I do not know you, our acquaintance will have to wait until we are properly introduced. Good day.” I started to pass on, but not in the direction of Master Ailwin’s because I did not want him to know where I was going. Nan followed, and also the dogs, who growled. But he moved quite fast and pushed one huge arm in front of me where it blocked my way.

  “Why, Mistress Dallet, don’t run away so soon. It is so good to see you up and well,” he said, pressing his black-gloved hand against the wall so I couldn’t pass. Then he leaned so close it seemed to stop my air. I couldn’t smell anything but the heavy, rotten scent of him, like something long buried. I didn’t want his breath on me. “Did not your late husband ever mention his friend and patron, Sir Septimus Crouch? He was very dear to me; almost like a son. A delightful man, a man of wit, a terrible loss.”

  “I am afraid he never mentioned your name, sir. Now please let me pass.”

  “Oh, my, no. Not until I let you know that I am your true friend. For your husband’s sake, I stand prepared to look after your interests, to be your protector. Did no one tell you that I offered to make provision for your poor, unfortunate child?” The thought flashed through my mind; could he have known, could he have guessed, what it was? He looked pleased when he spied the horrified look on my face. He smiled, and moved so close that he was only an inch or two from me. I could feel his body heat, but the wall stopped me from backing away farther. “There will come a time when you deny me nothing,” he said, his mouth close to my ear and his voice almost at a whisper.

  “I think not, sir,” I quavered. “I may have to make my own way, but I do not give up my will to strangers on the street.” He backed away, his smile mocking.

  “Then good day to you, Mistress Dallet,” he said, pretending to remember his manners and sweeping off his jeweled hat in a satirical manner. “Next time we speak, I shall make sure we have been properly introduced.” He turned, and I could feel my heart pounding with fear as he walked away.

  “That will be a cold day in hell,” said Nan. We watched him walk down the street and were sure he was gone before we circled back to the apothecary’s. But it seemed as if a dark cloud had come over my day.

  “Why, it’s little Susanna Maartens, I do believe. I’d know those blue eyes anywhere! Come in, come in. What can an old man do for a charming—oh, widow it is. My, that’s too bad. Your father set such store by that Master Dalbert, was it? ‘A brilliant young man,’ he said. Yes, such store. Your esteemed father, an artificer of great niceness and precision, but so opinionated! But that other young man—ever so much better manners than your father—too bad, too bad. Whatever makes you come here by yourself? Would you like a little something to help you catch another man? Or perhaps a money powder—you look perfectly able to catch another man by yourself.”

  He began to poke around the shelves he had in the front of the shop that were all full of curious boxes and bundles, some with alchemical labels that no one could read. On his counter there was a marble slab for cutting and measuring powders on and a balance for weighing things out. Past the open door into the back of his shop, I could see his apprentice busy sweeping the floor in the long, cluttered room. Dried bats, bunches of plants that looked like weeds, and other curious things were hanging from the ceiling in that back room, and there was a cupboard full of curious glassware.

  “But money,” Master Ailwin went on, “ah, money—that’s something else again. Who can catch money these days without a little help from the other world?” The apprentice looked up and spied me in the front. He pretended to be sweeping closer and closer so he could approach the open door to listen in. Then he leaned on his broom and stared at me. “It’s the fault of the currency, you know, which is no good—no good at all, thanks to those criminals at the mint. What currency is good these days? All adulterated, all. Now in the days of the old king, when there were ministers of virtue—” The tip of Master Ailwin’s beard was singed-looking, and he had on a ruin of a cap and a leather doublet so stained and old it could have been from King Richard’s time. I could hear him getting ready to let loose one of his long discourses. I felt like fleeing.

  “I’m in need of some things; colors, mostly. But I need them from someone discreet, like yourself—”

  “It’s the corruption, you know. Corruption! Bribe taking. The selling of high office. But then what can you expect with the kind of example set by the church, simony—”

  “I need to buy verdegris and white lead today, Master Ailwin.” The apprentice boy had just started his first growth. He was all bony and knobby and nothing fit together quite right. I noticed he kept staring at me with the oddest look. He had an old, stained apron over his clothes, and his hose were all patched. I thought, what is it that’s wrong with me, anyway? Now apprentice boys are following, too.

  “Whatever for?” Master Ailwin seemed suddenly suspicious. “Are you keeping house for some other painter? Remember this, my girl, there’s a fine line between decency and the gutter. Never cross it. A woman’s virtue. It is her crown—”

  “I’m painting for myself, Master Ailwin.”

  “For yourself? Now there’s a curiosity. In cuckooland, where the hens crow and the roosters lay, and frogs sing ‘hey, ring-a-ding donny,’ I suppose the women paint—”

  “I’m making good money, and I need a supplier.”

  “Making good money? Now there is cuckooland. Just how do you propose to evade the guild?”

  “By buying my colors from you and paying you to keep quiet, that’s how,” I said, completely exasperated.

  “You propose to bribe me to disrupt the proper order of the world?” he asked, tipping his head to one side and scratching beneath his shapeless old felt hat.

  “That’s what I had in mind.”

  “Young woman, you should be seethed in oil for that. Do you understand what you are asking from me? In the world of decency, of virtue—”

  “In that world, Master Ailwin, any person who needs to should be able to get bread with their own hands. Would you rather I be a beggar? I deserve to earn what I need.” I was so irritated, I shouted at him. He looked at me a long time, as if he saw someone new instead of me.

  “You are almost one of us,” he said. Then he leaned on the counter and looked very closely at my face. “Have you ever read the words written by God?” he asked.

  “I have never had that good fortune,” I answered.

  “It is written in the Bible that in the Christian Church, before its great corruption, all goods were held in common. In common! That means that all riches now held by the great, even the Church itself, have been stolen from the common. Those were the old days of virtue, when all men lived by the sweat of their brows—”

  “And women—”

  “Oh, and women—”

  “Painters especially—”

  “Why, I suppose painters, if they had them—”

  “Of course they had them. And they needed colors.”

  “We should rise up and take it
back. Plant the estates with turnips for all, cut firewood for the cold, trap rabbits for the hungry—”

  “And sell paint to women painters. I’m sure that’s part of it.”

  “Why, yes, of course! A small act, but one richly symbolic.”

  “Exactly. In fact, it would be more symbolic if you sold me those colors at the same price the selfish lords and corrupt liverymen of the guilds paid for them.”

  “I always gouge them!” he cried. “Less! For Susanna Dillard, I will charge less!”

  “It’s an important gesture,” I said.

  “Significant. No more shall the widows go widowless, the orphans orphanless—”

  “You’ve stirred my blood,” I said. “I will paint with new vigor, knowing I oppose the corrupt lords of the earth with every brushstroke.”

  “Every brush a sword,” he cried.

  “Two ounces of white lead,” I cried back again. And, with fire in his eye, he began to weigh out what I needed on his balance.

  “What on earth was all that about?” asked Nan, as we left with everything we needed.

  “Oh, he’s crazy,” I answered. “It’s all that stuff in the back room he breathes. Mercury fumes, orpiment, God knows what. It rises to the brain. It’s gotten worse since I last saw him.”

  “What about all that property-in-common talk? Why that’s positively indecent,” she said, sniffing. “Heretical, too, I imagine. I mean, lords are lords and common people common because God wills it. If He willed all our goods to be the same, they would be.”

  “It’s all too deep for me,” I said. “I’d rather just paint and let other people argue. I’m happier that way. Goodness, I hope he remembers that promise to give us good prices.” We had already passed into the main street when we heard someone running and a breathless voice calling us.

  “Mistress, mistress!” It was the apprentice boy. Yes, definitely it had happened. Now I was going to be followed by them, too. I was sure of it. He pushed his way past the dogs and spoke to us, still puffing. “Mistress, the master can be sometimes forgetful. His cares, you know, and his work. But if you send a note to the shop, I can make sure what you want is made up correctly and deliver it to you. You’ll find it very convenient, I’m sure. Surely, a lady like you should be spared the necessity of going out in foul weather.”

  “That is most generous of you—ah—”

  “Tom, mistress. Tom Whitley, and your servant, mistress.”

  “Why then, that’s just what I’ll do,” I answered, but as we passed on I saw he stood watching until we had disappeared around a corner.

  “Well, goodness, I do believe he’s in love with you,” said Nan.

  “Puppy love,” I answered. First dogs and cats. Now apprentice boys. What’s next?

  “Well, let him down gently,” said Nan. “After all, he’ll make sure you get good measure as long as his heart’s pounding, and if he’s angry, he’ll be sure you’re cheated.”

  “Oh, don’t worry, Nan. There’s something about him that reminds me of Felix.”

  “You mean he can’t draw, either?”

  “Oh, that, too. But he means so well, and it probably mostly goes awry. Felix was always my favorite, you know. He would have looked after me if he’d lived.”

  “A lot of things would be different if that were so,” said Nan, her mouth all grim as she kicked a stone out of her way in the gutter.

  We entered the shop below our rooms to find Mistress Hull deep in the sale of a painting to a broad-shouldered man in muddy boots, a flat, brimmed hat pulled down low, and black cloak. His cloak was splashed with bits of mud, too, and he looked as if he had been traveling far. His back was to us and obscured my view of Mistress Hull and of the picture in front of him. He didn’t seem like the usual sort of customer, not being a priest. He was wearing a shortsword. Maybe he’s a foreign priest, and they dress like that when they travel, I thought. I watched as he nodded politely every sentence or so to the flow of words from the widow’s mouth.

  “So appropriate for your private meditations on sin and redemption—” Nod. Obviously a priest. Was she finally selling one of the green Christs?

  “The color—the brushwork, too, is unlike the others, surely it is not by the same hand?” His voice sounded curious, but not puzzled. An agreeable voice. Intelligent sounding. It was clear he knew something about painting. And, oh dear, it must be an Adam and Eve he was looking at. I don’t need anyone clever looking too closely at my Adam and Eves, I worried.

  “My, you are a rare judge of fine painting. No, this is one of the few—the very last—left by the great court painter Rowland Dallet, to his widow. Poor dear, she had been ill with grief, so I have undertaken to sell this along with a few of her other household effects.” Oh, clever Mistress Hull, I thought. I should never underestimate her glib tongue. The man nodded. Good, he’ll never suspect. “I noticed you looked at the inkhorn as you entered. That’s how I knew you were a deep thinker, a man of judgement.” I could see the man’s hat brim nod again. How odd. There was something familiar about the back of his neck. But there was Mistress Hull’s hand right next to the inkhorn. I stiffened. Don’t you dare try to throw in an inkhorn with my Adam and Eve, I sent the thought to her like an arrow, as if my mind could pierce her brain. Get top price.

  “The concept is unusual. The snake…” The shrewd voice sounded amused.

  “Master Dallet was a painter of great distinction.”

  “I am aware of that. I met the man, you know. It was I who arranged an important commission for him once, on behalf of my master.”

  “Then, of course, you would understand the tragedy of it all.” Mistress Hull’s voice sank to a dramatic whisper. “To tell you, and only you, the truth, I don’t think she knows the value of it. She’s set the price too low, in my opinion. But who am I to go against the wishes of such a pious woman in her grief? Selfless she is, absolutely selfless…it would be a great help to her….”

  Nan and I tried to tiptoe quietly behind the stranger to make our escape up the staircase. But a floorboard creaked, and the man turned suddenly. His eyes fixed me to my place. I recognized those eyes right away. Hazel, translucent with thought, and cleverer than I like to see in a man—especially one who spies out my paintings. An odd smile of recognition crossed his face. My heart beat fast. There was no mistaking who it was, standing there looking bulky and out of place in Mistress Hull’s narrow, cluttered little shop. It was that man of Wolsey’s that I had laughed at. Oh, Susanna, you are in a lot of trouble and had better run fast, I thought. I hurried the last few steps to the stair.

  “Stay there, Mistress Dallet,” he said, in a commanding voice. I stood, paralyzed, with one foot on the stair. Somehow he seemed larger than I remembered. The way he filled up the little shop suddenly looked quite menacing to me. My breath came hard. I wanted to run away, but my feet wouldn’t work.

  “Come here, come here. I don’t bite,” he said, and his voice was suspiciously mild. But still I couldn’t move. Silently, he turned the wooden panel he held in his hands so that I could see the painting on it. The Temptation of Eve, complete with wallowing snake. He looked at me, his eyes intent, trying to read my confusion. I could feel my own eyes open wide and my knees tremble. The corner of his mouth twitched. Something glittered in the back of those hazel eyes. He had made up his mind about something, and I feared what it was. “Come here,” he said, his voice coaxing. “You and I have something to talk about.” Unwillingly, I took a step forward. “You’ve turned quite pale, Mistress Dallet. Do you need to sit down?” I shook my head silently. My stomach hurt and my hands were cold.

  “You sent me on quite a wild-goose chase, you know,” he went on. “Master Dallet had no apprentice, as I found out the hard way. Now tell me, was that kind?” I couldn’t speak a word in answer. He pushed back his flat brimmed hat, and his unruly brown curls popped up like badly trained dogs. He tilted his head and lifted that crooked eyebrow while he looked at me up and down, his eyes quietly calc
ulating. “The look on your face tells me that my conclusions are correct,” he said.

  “I don’t know what you mean,” I answered, my voice faint.

  “You counted on the ignorance of men, didn’t you?” There was a glint of recognition in his gaze. I turned away my face.

  “I—I don’t know what you mean.”

  “Just answer me this, Mistress Dallet. Why did you put your husband’s face on the serpent?”

  The Fourth Portrait

  Artist unknown. Mid-sixteenth century. Girl with a Doll. 3½”-diameter. Victoria and Albert Museum.

  While dolls used in sacred ritual practices have been preserved from earliest times, the very nature of the doll as toy signifies that few will survive the period of childhood intact. This unusual miniature of the English Renaissance, painted with great sensitivity by the unknown artist, depicts a girl of six or seven with her doll, a specimen of the wood “paddle” type with painted features, simply dressed in a straight gown, without arms or sleeves.

  —Fig. 142. Caption. N. Boyle.

  A PICTURE HISTORY OF TOYS THROUGH THE AGES

  This IS THE FIRST LIKENESS THAT I TOOK IN THE SERVICE OF BISHOP WOLSEY, WHICH IS A PORTRAIT OF HIS NIECE THAT HE SET SUCH STORE BY. It was also a test, because children are hardest to do right. You would think that the problem with painting children is that they are so wigglesome you cannot take a likeness, but the real problem is that they don’t have much in the way of features except big eyes and foreheads and round cheeks. If you look at a baby’s profile all you will see is two half circles on top of each other with hardly even a nose at all, so you should always paint them three-quarters or full on because otherwise it’s hopeless. Some painters just give up and paint them like little adults, but they are usually men who don’t have children themselves. When you are taking the likeness, if there is any doubt, always paint children to look like the mother’s husband, especially since he is usually the one who’s paying. I did not start out with this idea, but came to it the hard way.