On the contrary, he took his world up there with him. The voice of Godelieve was Godelieve herself. She had followed him to the glass chamber. She was there beside him, invisible but present and murmuring. They said the kind of things to each other that we only say at the tops of towers or of mountains, things that belong on the threshold of infinity and that God can hear.
It was for her that Joris played the carillon. He used the bells to illustrate their story. It was like an encounter between misfortune and joy: at first a lamentation among the basses, a
surge of deep sounds, black water pouring from inexhaustible urns, a flood of sound telling of disaster and endless despair; then the pure white ascent of a fragile little bell, soaring persistently, growing, the silvery fluttering of a dove come to announce salvation and the rainbow in the sky. Everything within the carillonneur took flight from the tower.
He himself was not always aware of what he was playing, of the way the bells rang out his very soul. This time, however, he was and he admitted to himself that Godelieve was the dove of the Flood, the little bell lighting up the disaster. Because of the words, which no longer left him and had climbed the tower with him, he gradually succumbed to the spell. He was no longer in a hurry to come back down since he had taken his world up with him.
Godelieve was his world and her voice was up there with him. Now they were together. Joris lingered for hours, answering the voice, anticipating a better future. What it would be he did not know. At first he was entirely taken up with the inner turmoil caused by the fact that tender words had come into his life. But gradually his dream took shape. In the carillon the little bell sang louder, came closer, pecking at his heart. At the same time the outpouring of deep sounds, the black water of the large bells, dwindled and soon dried up completely. All that was left was an immense joy with the fluttering wings of the dove, the little bell that was the words of Godelieve become her own soul.
Yes, the soul of Godelieve enveloped him, came to put itself round him.
Joris felt himself entirely bathed in a new light, the brightness, like a new dawn, of love starting again. The return of life to the world after the flood that had seemed final. The sweetness of a second love.
And this one so chaste, principally of the mind! Joris thought of Godelieve as he would have thought of a sister who had disappeared as a child, was believed dead, and was now found again, an additional, unhoped-for affection.
When he imagined her watching over him, consoling him, it was not so much as a real woman, more as a guardian angel. This kind of second love, a love of our middle years, is so different from the first, especially for those who have suffered. It is like a refuge, the balm of trust, of one soul speaking to another. At first the flesh had little part in it. Joris avoided even the merest hint of a thought about Godelieve that was not full of respect. She was so chaste, enclosed in her decorous gowns, mystical, pious even, with a deep, personal faith. How different from his former passion for Barbara! Here, in the belfry, he was in a good position to compare, for it was here, because of the Bell of Lust, that he had conceived his violent desire. His senses on fire, his face feverish, he had pictured that love as one might picture a crime. He had sought her body, imagined her orgasm, in the obscene bell. Now that his whole being was flooded with an immense affection for Godelieve, he was afraid of the
Bell of Lust. He no longer ventured onto the upper platform where it hung, beside the bell that rings the hours. He avoided it, he detested it like a bowl full of sins, like a fiendish image that would have defiled and degraded his pure vision. Godelieve, being for him only a soul, was embodied in the little bell whose pure song at that time was soaring, dominating every piece on the carillon, music of dispersing clouds, of a brightening sky which, once more, represented his life.
IV
Since Godelieve’s half avowal, her elegiac sigh, Borluut felt suffused with an indescribable sweetness. In the great disaster that was his life, someone had taken pity on him, someone loved him a little.
Henceforward what did Barbara’s harshness matter, the miseries, the scenes, the unpredictable days, the loveless nights?
Godelieve was present, attentive, loving, already a lover, perhaps… Yes, she had revealed herself in those words which from now on lived within him, growing, like letters carved on a tree.
Godelieve had loved him, still loved him. The thought sent Borluut into a quiver of agitation and expectancy. Of regret, as well. They had both let happiness slip away without stopping it.
How could they have been so blind? What mirage had dazzled them?
Suddenly they could see clearly, could see each other, as if in bright daylight. But it was too late. Happiness is for two to be as one. It was a dream that was now impossible.
Nevertheless Joris was elated, glowing with the revival which had set his heart alight. Since Godelieve had spoken those words, he felt something unforeseen and delightful within him, something that was not music, yet sang, a brightness that did not come from the sun, yet shone. The miracle of the springtime of love! Yes, love had sprung up inside him once more, for he suddenly felt he had a new heart and new eyes. Life which, but yesterday, had been old, faded, worn down by strain, by the centuries, now seemed new-born, as if it too were emerging from a flood with fresh faces and green shoots.
New love gives birth to a new universe.
Borluut’s wonderment was combined with a feeling of convalescence. Imagine an invalid who has long been prey to fits and torments, debilitated by the half-light, the sickly smells, the insipid diet, the feverish fluttering of the nightlight, his mind fixed on dying; then the sudden reversal, recovery, the sick-nurse immediately becoming his lover.
Thus Joris went straight from death to love. For he was in love.
What at first had been merely a tremor, a frisson at the presence of a young woman in his house, soon became an obsession, love, the intoxication of a shared passion.
The fact that he was living with her under the same roof fostered his imagination. They were living together, day and night, in the same house, like a couple that had overcome desire. It is true that they were frustrated by the presence of Barbara, but their souls spoke to each other in that spiritual union the sole aim of which was mutual consolation and mutual regret. Their eyes would meet, would touch. Oh, the caress of eye on eye, resembling that of lip on lip and already with a thrill of sensual pleasure!
Something carnal was born between them.
Through living together under the same roof they continually unveiled a little of their intimate person to each other.
Godelieve, so utterly chaste, did not think of the danger of appearing in a simple morning gown. Her figure showed through such rudimentary attire. Joris could see her better behind the few folds, the more yielding material. There were fewer veils between them. Sometimes too, her hair, only perfunctorily dressed in the morning, suggested hair dishevelled during lovemaking.
Thus, little by little, Godelieve came to seem for Joris a woman he had possessed and who no longer had any secrets from him. It was the result of their life together in which they revealed a little more of their selves every day.
Joris went over the rapid development: at first, when he had learnt that Godelieve still loved him, he had felt an infinitely grateful affection for her gentleness, for the care with which she surrounded him; then came the bitter regret for the happiness they had missed, the growing desire to correct the double error.
Since the very beginning their will had been to love one another, Fate alone had prevented them. Why should they now not accomplish their will and love one another? They should have been man and wife and had not been. They could still become that.
And was it not as if Fate had repented, chance bringing the two of them together under the same roof, appearing to let them follow their own destiny?
They yielded: furtive glances, hands lingering when they met on the same object, all the stratagems of seeking, avoiding, finding each other. Brushing ag
ainst each other, touching lightly, as if by chance, each fearful of the other, of themselves, and above all of the Witness, the tragic figure of Barbara, who had not yet noticed any signs. Moments of infinity, fleeting thrills, joys that were over in a flash, dewdrops which contained a taste of heaven. For a long time they savoured their hidden love. It even seemed to taste better for being hidden, more intense for being intermittent. Words tossed in the air, caught on the wing, half kisses, hands squeezed in passing – all the beginnings, all that is best in the Eternal Adventure. And with no consummation possible, nor yet desired. It was delightful to hope for everything and attain nothing, to spend their time on the constant lookout for a propitious moment, to harvest the corn ear by ear.
Their happiness was precious to them, as if it had been saved up, put away for a rainy day, and already amounted to a considerable sum.
Joris felt fulfilled. He was without further desire, without further ambition. His work was neglected. He did not finish the projects which were in train. In his study the files, the compasses lay scattered around and his plans, his drawings remained uncompleted on the paper, like buildings halfway up in the air. He had stopped working, stopped accepting commissions.
He was no longer interested in his restorations. He was bored by all those old buildings, those ageing façades to be rejuvenated.
They were surly old dames, their cracks like the wrinkles of old age, their ancient leaden windows like sad eyes that had looked on the dying. He no longer wanted to live with the past.
Associating with old things makes your heart old. He wanted to be young, to enjoy the present. And his only occupation was with Godelieve’s face.
Alone with her face, he strolled round the town, climbed the bell-tower, mingled with the passers-by, idle and contented. He was no longer bitter, no longer sought solitude; he would have liked to have friends, to take part in public festivities.
Sometimes he went to the Society of Saint Sebastian. It was his duty as Guildmaster and he had long neglected it. He watched the archers, admiring their skill as they drew their longbows, aiming at the targets or the feathered birds on the tall pole, so tiny in the distance that it needed a sure arrow to dislodge them. He liked being in the ancient and picturesque premises with the slender turret, its masonry tinged with warm, pink skin tones, amid the bustle of games, where people spoke their minds and took long draughts of the free-flowing, foaming Flemish beer. It was a corner that preserved the life of the people, intact, flavoursome, a coloured picture of the past, saved by chance. He mixed with men again, in a familiar and friendly manner which made him popular. He soon had a devoted following who admired him, loved him.
Lacking occupation, Joris started going to see Bartholomeus again, whom he had neglected for a while. Incapable of working himself, obsessed by Godelieve and his love for her, he spent whole afternoons in the painter’s studio, talking about art, smoking, daydreaming. He had not seen his friend for a long time.
Bartholomeus had shut himself away, cloistered himself completely, the better to devote himself to his work, to have solitude and silence to carry out the series of large-scale paintings which he wanted to make his masterpiece, the realisation of his great dream of glory.
‘Well, then’ Joris asked, ‘how far have you got?’
‘I’m making progress. I’m still doing studies and I need some research for certain parts, but the overall design is complete.’
‘Show me.’
Borluut made as if to stand up to go over to where some canvasses were stacked, but turned to the walls, mysterious, the wooden stretcher a sign of the cross. Bartholomeus immediately shot up, protecting them with a nervous gesture. He did not like to be caught in the middle of his labours, to show his canvases before they were finished.
‘Don’t! They’re just roughed out, not much more than sketches.
But I know what I’m going to do. Listen. Since it’s a decoration for the Town Hall, that is a building that belongs to us all, it will be a dream evoking the town itself, what makes its soul. It will be enough to take a few distinctive features, a few symbols.
Bruges is the great Grey Town. That is what I must paint. Now, grey is made up of black and white, as is the grey of Bruges.
What needs to be done is to choose the blacks and the whites that go to make it up. On the one hand – for the whites – there are the swans and the Beguines. The swans will form one panel, setting off along a canal with one of them in a flurry, pressing its wings down onto the water, trying to rise from it, just as a dying man tries to rise from his bed; for it is indeed dying, and singing, to symbolise the town which is becoming a work of art because it is in its death throes. Then, forming a second panel and still for the whites, the Beguines, who are also swans; they displace a little silence as they walk, just as the swans displace a little water as they swim; and I will paint them just the way they pass, down below, framed by my window as they cross the close after mass or vespers. For the blacks, on the other hand, there are the bells and the cloaks, which will form another pair of panels. The bells, the colour of night, will be seen making their way through the air, meeting, going from this tower to that to see each other, little old women stumbling along in their worn dresses of bronze. Then the cloaks, which are not so much the garment worn by the women of the people as other bells, large bells of cloth swinging in the streets, bells down below whose rhythm is parallel to that of the bells up above. There you have it. In short: the white of the swans and the Beguines, the black of the bells and the cloaks; black and white mixed, that is the grey of the Grey Town.’
Bartholomeus had spoken passionately, his look elsewhere, a gleam burning in his eyes like the reflection of an invisible sun with which he was communicating. His handsome monkish head with its pale complexion and fine black beard recalled the painters of the Italian monasteries who recounted their dreams on the white of the walls. Bartholomeus had sketched out his own dream as if he, too, were in a cloister, living a chaste, solitary life in this nuns’ enclosure, surrounded by the sound of hymns, the freshly whitewashed houses, a paradisal light in which even the shadows of the clouds took on a silvery luminescence. His appeared to be a complex temperament. That was because he was close to the infinite. He naturally found mystical analogies, the eternal connections between things.
Borluut listened to him talk of the themes of his painting with interest, with admiration. Then, at the thought of their profound and mysterious beauty, but also of their inaccessibility to those who had commissioned them, he could not help commenting:
‘That’s superb! But what are they going to say?’
‘Ah! They’ll be astonished, that’s for sure. They’ve already given me some advice. What they would like are episodes from Flanders’s past, historical painting, of course. The usual things: the Matins of Bruges and Breydel and Koninck and the commune’s fight for autonomy. It’s all become a carnival, a play with the heroes in costume, the props, the hand-medowns of the centuries, which provide a living for our bad painters, our bad musicians, all the charlatans who produce large-scale canvases and cantatas. Deeds should be left where they belong. All that could be made in that way would be a vulgar daub with the scene at the Battle of the Golden Spurs, sublime in itself, where the guilds and corporations take a handful of earth, eating the earth for which they are going to die.
This led Joris and Bartholomeus to talk of the Flemish Movement, for which they had shown such enthusiasm in the past, when van Hulle had still been alive. They confessed that the impetus had gone, their efforts had come to nothing.
The painter had turned his mind away from the town and other people to devote it entirely to his work which, henceforward, was the only thing that mattered to him. He spoke of his art as a man might speak of his beloved.
He described the obsession with an idea, which would suddenly appear, like a chance encounter, like a passion taking over your life; and the intimacy of living with the idea, the silent conversations in which it unveils itself
or refuses to give itself to you. At times forthcoming, at others cold, as if sulking. Are you going to prevail over it? Now it appears naked on the canvas. The caresses of the soft brush, slow or feverish!
No respite any more. You dream of it at night, see it ever more beautiful, adored down the centuries.
As he spoke, Joris listened, compared. Was that not the way he loved Godelieve, the way he was haunted by her, held conversations with her in his head, was visited by her even in his sleep? Did the love of art truly give one the same ecstasies as the love of a woman? Joris had assessed the painter’s happiness: it was more serene, more certain, even more noble, perhaps. He felt some concern, the beginnings of regret. He too, in years gone by, had loved his art, had striven for a great and lasting work, had dreamt of the restoration and resurrection of Bruges. Now he was about to sacrifice his love of the town to his love for Godelieve.
For the first time he was visited by doubt, stood back from his passion, felt some hesitation at the prospect of the affair.
His feeling of unease remained as he made his way home, not daring to look at the old façades, the stagnant water, the enclosed convents, everything which counselled the renunciation of the world, the cult of death. In a low voice he repeated to himself. ‘Live! I must live in the world.’ And, as he approached his home, Godelieve’s face appeared once more, shining on him in triumph, rising within him like the moon in the canals.
V
Barbara’s nervous disorder was getting worse. She had lost weight, her complexion was pale. At the least annoyance – a breakage, a servant leaving, a remark that was made – she would immediately get worked up, lose her temper. The storm-clouds never cleared from the house, Joris and Godelieve lived in constant expectation of the next thunderclap. They had to keep a constant watch on themselves and exercise limitless patience, yielding to her humours like the harvest before the wind. It was easy for Godelieve; already as a child she had become accustomed to them, bending before her sister’s ungovernable outbursts. Her innate gentleness remained calm, serene, unruffled, always the same, as smooth as a frozen pool that neither the breeze nor the violent north wind can disturb with the least ripple. Joris found it less easy to resign himself to all these whims, these shifts in the wind, these contradictory impulses, never being sure what was coming next. Moreover nervous irritation is contagious. At times he himself was at the end of his tether and rebelled, reasserted himself in his male pride. But he did not keep it up for long. Barbara, used to meeting no resistance from anyone, quickly flew into a wild fury, hurled abuse at him, became aggressive, went towards him. One day, beside herself with rage, she flung a horrible threat at him, in a hoarse voice it was painful to hear: ‘I’ll kill you.’
The Bells of Bruges Page 13
