Tracy Chevalier 3-Book Collection: Girl With a Pearl Earring, Remarkable Creatures, Falling Angels. Tracy Chevalier

near your parents, isn't it? You may stop in and visit them.’

      Maria Thins had never allowed me to see my parents apart from Sundays. Then I guessed. ‘Is van Ruijven coming today, madam?’

      ‘Don't let him see you,’ she answered grimly. ‘It's best if you're not here at all. Then if he asks for you we can say you're out.’

      For a moment I wanted to laugh. Van Ruijven had us all — even Maria Thins — running like rabbits before dogs.

      My mother was surprised to see me that afternoon. Luckily a neighbour was visiting and she could not question me closely. My father was not so interested. He had changed much since I'd left home, since Agnes had died. He was no longer so curious about the world outside his street, rarely asking me about the goings-on at the Oude Langendijck or in the market. Only the paintings still interested him.

      ‘Mother,’ I announced as we sat by the fire, ‘my master is beginning the painting that you were asking about. Van Ruijven has come over and he is setting it up today. Everyone who is to be in the painting is there now.’

      Our neighbour, a bright-eyed old woman who loved market talk, gazed at me as if I had just set a roast capon in front of her. My mother frowned — she knew what I was doing.

      There, I thought. That will take care of the rumours.

      He was not himself that evening. I heard him snap at Maria Thins at supper, and he went out later and came back smelling of the tavern. I was climbing the stairs to bed when he came in. He looked up at me, his face tired and red. His expression was not angry, but weary, as of a man who has just seen all the wood he must chop, or a maid faced with a mountain of laundry.

      The next morning the studio gave few clues about what had happened the afternoon before. Two chairs had been placed, one at the harpsichord, the other with its back to the painter. There was a lute on the chair, and a violin on the table to the left. The bass viol still lay in the shadows under the table. It was hard to tell from the arrangement how many people were to be in the painting.

      Later Maertge told me that van Ruijven had come with his sister and one of his daughters.

      ‘How old is the daughter?’ I could not help asking.

      ‘Seventeen, I think.’

      My age.

      They came around again a few days later. Maria Thins sent me on more errands and told me to amuse myself elsewhere for the morning. I wanted to remind her that I could not stay away every day they came to be painted — it was getting too cold to idle in the streets, and there was too much work to do. But I did not say anything. I could not explain it, but I felt something was to change soon. I just did not know how.

      I could not go to my parents again — they would think something was wrong, and explaining otherwise would make them believe even worse things were happening. Instead I went to Frans' factory. I had not seen him since he had asked me about the valuables in the house. His questions had angered me and I had made no effort to visit him.

      The woman at the gate did not recognise me. When I asked to see Frans she shrugged and stepped aside, disappearing without showing me where to go. I walked into a low building where boys Frans' age sat on benches at long tables, painting tiles. They were working on simple designs, with nothing of the graceful style of my father's tiles. Many were not even painting the main figures, but only the flourishes in the corners of the tiles, the leaves and curlicues, leaving a blank centre for a more skilled master to fill.

      When they saw me a chorus of high whistles erupted that made me want to stop my ears. I went up to the nearest boy and asked him where my brother was. He turned red and ducked his head. Though I was a welcome distraction, no one would answer my question.

      I found another building, smaller and hotter, housing the kiln. Frans was there alone, with his shirt off and the sweat pouring from him and a grim look on his face. The muscles in his arms and chest had grown. He was becoming a man.

      He had tied quilted material around his forearms and hands that made him look clumsy, but when he pulled trays full of tiles in and out of the kiln, he skilfully wielded the flat sheets so that he did not burn himself. I was afraid to call to him because he would be startled and might drop a tray. But he saw me before I spoke, and immediately set down the tray he held.

      ‘Griet, what are you doing here? Is something wrong with Mother or Father?’

      ‘No, no, they're fine. I've just come to visit.’

      ‘Oh.’ Frans pulled the cloths from his arms, wiped his face with a rag and gulped beer from a mug. He leaned against the wall and rolled his shoulders the way men do who have finished unloading cargo from a canal boat and are easing and stretching their muscles. I had never seen him make such a gesture before.

      ‘Are you still working the kiln? They have not moved you to something else? Glazing, or painting like those boys in the other building?’

      Frans shrugged.

      ‘But those boys are the same age as you. Shouldn't you be—’ I could not finish my sentence when I saw the look on his face.

      ‘It's punishment,’ he said in a low voice.

      ‘Why? Punishment for what?’

      Frans did not answer.

      ‘Frans, you must tell me or I'll tell our parents you're in trouble.’

      ‘I'm not in trouble,’ he said quickly. ‘I made the owner angry, is all.’

      ‘How?’

      ‘I did something his wife didn't like.’

      ‘What did you do?’

      Frans hesitated. ‘It was she who started it,’ he said softly. ‘She showed her interest, you see. But when I showed mine she told her husband. He didn't throw me out because he's a friend of Father's. So I'm on the kiln until his humour improves.’

      ‘Frans! How could you be so stupid? You know she's not for the likes of you. To endanger your place here for something like that!’

      ‘You don't understand what it's like,’ Frans muttered. ‘Working here, it's exhausting, it's boring. It was something to think about, that's all. You have no right to judge, you with your butcher you'll marry and have a fine life with. Easy for you to say what my life should be like when all I can see are endless tiles and long days. Why shouldn't I admire a pretty face when I see one?’

      I wanted to protest, to tell him that I understood. At night I sometimes dreamed of piles of laundry that never got smaller no matter how much I scrubbed and boiled and ironed.

      ‘Was she the woman at the gate?’ I asked instead.

      Frans shrugged and drank more beer. I pictured her sour expression and wondered how such a face could ever tempt him.

      ‘Why are you here, anyway?’ he asked. ‘Shouldn't you be at Papists' Corner?’

      I had prepared an excuse for why I had come, that an errand had taken me to that part of the Delft. But I felt so sorry for my brother that I found myself telling him about van Ruijven and the painting. It was a relief to confide in him.

      He listened carefully. When I finished he declared, ‘You see, we're not so different, with the attentions we've had from those above us.’

      ‘But I haven't responded to van Ruijven, and have no intention to.’

      ‘I didn't mean van Ruijven,’ Frans said, his look suddenly sly. ‘No, not him. I meant your master.’

      ‘What about my master?’ I cried.

      Frans smiled. ‘Now, Griet, don't work yourself into a state.’

      ‘Stop that! What are you suggesting? He has never—’

      ‘He doesn't have to. It's clear from your face. You want him. You can hide it from our parents and your butcher man, but you can't hide it from me. I know you better