As Above, So Below Page 19

  On the stage, the women and Strontkop were mostly hidden by the mock confession booth, but the priest’s arm motions were clearly not those of a man drawing. He was pulling himself off. Complications followed, and at the finale, one of the women’s boyfriends showed up in the confession booth and farted in the priest’s face, the fart simulated by a great blast of bagpipe music. The audience became riotous with glee.

  “They’re crazy,” wheezed Floris, wiping his eyes and weakly gesturing towards the Our Lady’s bell tower. “Granvelle’s watching from that window up there.” Anja leaned back and, sure enough, framed in a window halfway up the tower was a red-robed dark-faced figure with two grim priests at his side. For the first time since this morning, Anja remembered the lampoon that she’d stuffed into her bodice. She wondered if Granvelle had seen it yet.

  “It’s time for you and me to get into costume, Frans,” said de Vos. These two painters were members of the Violet Chamber as well. “We’re the play after next.”

  “What’s the Violets’ play called?” asked Helena.

  “The Blind Leading the Blind,” said Floris. “I fear the title’s an apt description of our process of composition. We’re painters, not poets.”

  It was early in the evening by the time the Violets’ play started. The backdrop was lovely, with a city scene on the left half and on the right a landscape with cattle, peaked barns, a little church, and part of a pond. Anja’s spilled paint had been turned into a bush. The painted city was Antwerp, and the frontmost building was the Schilderspand, where the St. Luke’s Guild painters showed and sold their work.

  The first person on stage was Bruegel himself, dressed as a peasant cowherd with a spoon in his hat, glassily staring up into the heavens and moving about uncertainly near the painted pond. He was supposed to be blind. He walked right up to the edge of the stage and a few people shrieked, thinking he would fall off. But at the last minute he stopped and shouted out his line.

  “Lost and afraid am I. Who can lead me hence?”

  Franckert appeared from the right, also dressed as a blind peasant, with his felt hat pulled down to completely cover his eyes. “Poor man, I hear your cry. I’ll help you to your goal.” Like Bruegel he spoke a kind of blank verse.

  “I seek to be a painter,” said Bruegel. “Safe in the Schilderspand.”

  “I saw a painting once,” said Franckert. “Or held it in my hands.”

  “Then be my guide,” said Bruegel. He and Franckert felt around for each other for a minute, making little noises to aid themselves, and then, finding each other, they embraced.

  “Badslow is my name,” said Bruegel.

  “Fatleg to your aid,” replied Franckert. “I’ll come and be a painter too.” He paused, looking confused. “Dear Badslow, is it day or night?”

  “I deem it day,” said Bruegel, throwing his head yet farther back. “I feel God’s sun. Fatleg, you are a blindling too?”

  “As blind as you I’m not, Badslow. Or maybe more.” Franckert groped about in the air. “Which way the Schilderspand?” Receiving no answer, he raised his voice. “Help these blind herdsmen find true art!”

  Jerome Cock and Williblad Cheroo appeared from the city side of the stage, Cheroo in front and Cock following with one hand on Cheroo’s shoulder. They too were blind. Each of them was carrying a stretched canvas.

  “Foppiano I, a daub by craft,” sang Cheroo, using the music of his voice to suggest an Italian accent. He held up his canvas so the audience could see it: a mostly blank rectangle with some fresh clumsy pink paint marks in the curved shape of a naked woman. “What think you of my work, Quickmake?”

  Cock felt around for the other’s canvas, then knelt and sniffed it. “You have employed good paint, my Lord.”

  “You see the Lord?”

  “I see Him in the small.”

  Cheroo squinted sightlessly down at his picture. “Methinks it is a country scene of Venus.”

  Cock stuck out his tongue as if to lick the canvas, then stopped, thinking better of it. “I’ll make a fake,” he said, holding up his own canvas, which was blank.

  Cock pressed his canvas face-to-face with Cheroo’s wet canvas, set the two down on the ground and rolled back and forth on top of them with great kicking of his long legs. He pried the pictures apart and held them up; they were smeared in roughly identical patterns. Offstage a bagpipe made a low hissing sound.

  “I hear some art!” cried Franckert, leading Bruegel over to Cheroo and Cock. “The sound of hue!”

  “Instruct us in the painter’s skills,” said Bruegel.

  Cheroo began gabbling a complicated theory of painting in his fake Italian accent; it sounded like a passage he’d memorized from a book, but it was coming out cadenced like the rest of the play. In the audience, Anja and Helena looked at each other and laughed. The four blind men began marching around on the stage, each with his hand on the shoulder of the man in front. Foppiano first, followed by Quickmake, Fatleg and Badslow last, the four of them walking and talking ever faster, repeatedly on the point of falling off the edge of the stage, finally coming to a stop before the city side of the backdrop.

  “Are we at the Schilderspand?” asked Bruegel.

  “I think perhaps,” said Cheroo, groping around until his hand fell upon Bruegel’s face. “Though this piece be indifferently flat.” He gave Bruegel’s nose a vicious tweak, and Bruegel kicked at him.

  There was a flourish of pompous bagpipe music and Floris and de Vos appeared from the left, with Floris dressed like a bishop and de Vos dressed like a gentleman’s servant. Both characters were, once again, blind. De Vos was leading Floris by the hand. Floris was staggering as if from drink. Anja had seen Floris finish off his flask of gin, so she couldn’t be sure if his unsteadiness was real or part of the act.

  “I robbed his church, my eyes were slit in two,” said de Vos to the audience. “And now I lead the Primate.”

  “I’m Greatstink, patron of fine art,” said Floris. “Ho, Sliteye, see what the new men do.”

  “His Worship needs a portrait limned,” said de Vos to the four blind artists. “Who can agreeably oblige?”

  “I show the inner man,” said Franckert, feeling his way over to the backdrop and producing a stick of charcoal from his clothes. With a few quick motions, he sketched something upon a blank area of the Schilderspand wall. It was a fat face with horns.

  Floris reeled over and pressed his nose against the backdrop. “You draw Beelzebub?” he cried in rage.

  “Oh no, Your Worship,” said Franckert. “It is a cow.”

  “Let’s try another man,” said de Vos. “You there, Foppiano, canst paint a mythic scene?”

  “A chemist knows that gold is meet to make more gold,” said Cheroo, holding out his hand. Floris presented him with two large, gold-painted paper disks. Cheroo stuck one to the wet paint of his pink-smeared canvas and held it up. “Behold Danaë with Zeus’s shower.”

  “A mate to this fine work I’ll make,” said Cock, snatching the second gold disk from Cheroo and sticking it to his own canvas. “Your Worship has a diptych.”

  “Blind fools,” thundered Floris after feeling the pictures. “Show me the life of Christ! You, Badslow, canst paint me that?”

  Bruegel held out his arms. “The living God is with us now. Paint Him I would, Greatstink, could I but see.” Bruegel knelt in prayer, and there was a sudden rippling in the backdrop, accompanied by a trill of flutes.

  A radiantly clad woman appeared though a gap: Hennie van Mander holding an Earth globe from Plantin’s shop. “Wisdom arrives!” she declaimed in a high, clear voice. Greatstink and Sliteye recoiled, but the other blind men reached out towards Wisdom. The backdrop rippled again. A second woman appeared, a thin blonde with her hair in a mass of braids, clothed in garments of floating white gauze. “Here’s Truth at your side!” she sang. The blind men’s faces were wreathed in smiles. They rubbed wonderingly at their eyes.

  Out in the audience, Anja’s own vision grew
red with anger. The second woman was none other than Mayken Coecke, the snippy little daughter of Peter’s old master. The one he’d done his Children’s Games painting for. What was Mayken doing here? She lived in Brussels now, so what business did she have poking around Antwerp, worming her way in!

  Bruegel was the first of the blind men to get to his feet.

  “O Truth!” he cried. “You make me whole!” He stumped across the stage and embraced Mayken, who—let it be said—tried to wriggle away before Peter was ready to release her. He clung to her like a beggar after a merchant, the slobbering zot.

  Mayken was the reason Peter had left Anja! For her precious estate! Anja’s rage grew to a fever pitch. She had to do something! Looking frantically around the crowd, she spotted Mayken Verhulst, the little Mayken’s big-nosed mother, smiling and applauding. Go and yank the old bitch’s hair out?

  The church bell happened to toll just then, drawing Anja’s attention upwards. Granvelle and his two priests were still in the window of the bell tower. How would Peter and his Maykens like it if Peter were burned at the stake, eh? Anja thrust her hand into her bodice, pulled out the lampoon, and elbowed her way through the crowd, heading for the church, not letting herself think about what she was doing.

  A young priest was guarding the tower stairs, but Anja was able to convince him that she had something important for Cardinal Granvelle. The priest led her up the stone steps and stayed to listen.

  Granvelle was sitting on a chair by the window, his expression calm and insolent. “What is it?” he asked after looking Anja up and down. He had more of a French accent than Anja had expected. His teeth were black and his breath smelled bad.

  “Have you seen this, Your Worship?” asked Anja, handing him the lampoon. Though she was all in a turmoil, her voice came out fluently. She was bound and determined to finish what she’d begun. Peter had scorned her for a silly little sixteen-year-old with a four-story brick house. He was going to pay. “I know who drew it.”

  Granvelle looked at the picture for quite some time, with the three priests goggling at it over his shoulder. “ ‘Behold, this is my son with whom I am well pleased,’ ” he read from the inscription above Satan’s head. He gave a short laugh. “At least someone likes me.” He gazed up at Anja, his face big and calm, waiting for the name.

  “Peter Bruegel,” said Anja. In her mind she heard the thud of a hanging, the crackling roar of immolating flames. “What will you do to him?”

  Granvelle raised his eyebrows, his expression showing mild mockery. “You wish to see him punished? I wonder why?”

  “He lived with me and he won’t marry me,” said Anja. “He’s left me for another woman and he’s put me out into the street.”

  Granvelle only smiled. So Anja played her trump card. “The thing is, Your Worship, we were raised as brother and sister. Peter told me it was all right, but I’m afraid it’s incest, eh?”

  “How do you mean ‘raised as brother and sister’?” asked Granvelle in a weary tone. “Under ecclesiastical law, incest means that you have one or more parents or grandparents in common. Is that the case, my child?”

  “No, Your Worship,” said Anja, partly disappointed and partly relieved. For the first time since seeing Peter embrace young Mayken, she wondered about the wisdom of what she was doing.

  “Peter Bruegel,” mused Granvelle, studying the lampoon once more. He glanced up at the three priests and pointed out the window. “That’s Bruegel at the left end of the stage with the young blond woman. The one who played Badslow. Go fetch him for me. Do it publicly and with force. It can be a sign to the citizens that they’ve gone far enough.”

  Anja turned to leave with the priests, but Granvelle stopped her. “Wait here and see what happens. Perhaps you’ll be surprised.”

  “I—I don’t want Peter to know it was me,” said Anja softly. She was starting to feel more and more uncertain about informing on him.

  “A little schemer, aren’t you? When he comes, go a few steps higher up the stairs. You can eavesdrop from there. I’m sure you know how. Meanwhile let’s watch out the window.”

  As the actors left the stage, the three priests appeared and seized Bruegel. In his drunkenness, Floris swung at one of them, so they knocked Floris to the ground and kicked him till he lay still. And then they dragged Bruegel through the angrily grumbling crowd. Peter looked anxious, bewildered, and sick to his stomach. By now Anja was truly regretting what she’d done. She crept up around the next turn of the tower stairs as Peter’s footsteps approached.

  “Mijnheer Bruegel,” said Granvelle’s voice. “We meet again. I was disappointed by the painting of the manger that you sold King Philip. But I see you are a man of diverse talents.” Anja heard a rustle of paper. “An angry little sparrow tells me that you drew this lampoon.”

  Bruegel mumbled something indistinct.

  “Oh yes, you did. Now that it’s pointed out to me, I recognize the style. I’ve seen your engravings of the Seven Sins, of course. Fine work, that, quite collectible. Some might think it an honor to be lampooned by the new Bosch. Perhaps I’ll spare you. But don’t waste my time by having the Inquisitors torture you. Admit that you drew this.”

  “Very well,” said Bruegel, his voice clear and strong. “I did.”

  “And your friend Jerome Cock was the printer, no?” said Granvelle. “Or was it Plantin?”

  “I printed them myself,” said Bruegel quietly. “I live above the Four Winds gallery. I crept down and pulled the prints last night. Jerome knows nothing of it. It’s my crime alone.”

  “Hmm,” said Granvelle. “A loyal man. Too bad you don’t have loyal companions. I wonder—if I were to spare Cock, what might you do for me?”

  “Burn at the stake, I suppose,” said Bruegel in a flat, melancholy tone. “Life’s a foolish jape. I’ll be well out of it.” It crushed Anja to hear him brought so low. Peter was a man of delicate humors, too easily brought to despair. A fine and sensitive man, an artist. How could she have handed him over to this torturer? She fought back a little wail of woe. Peter mustn’t know that she was here.

  “Despair is a mortal sin, my son,” Granvelle was saying. “Don’t consign yourself to Hell.” He fell silent so long that finally one of his priests spoke up.

  “Shall I take him to the dungeon, Your Worship?”

  “I think not, Father,” said Granvelle. “Our Bruegel is a valuable man. King Philip and his court love Bosch’s pictures exceedingly well. Now that I have this Bosch-bird in my net, why not pluck him for the court? Could you paint for me, Peter?”

  “Paint what?”

  “Scenes of Hell, of course. Death, torture, and destruction. Things to the Spanish taste.”

  “I could do that,” said Bruegel. “Although it’s a style I grow weary of. I’m the first Bruegel, not the second Bosch.” Anja smiled a bit to hear her Peter arguing his case. When it came to art, he’d press his views till Judgment Day.

  “Don’t quibble,” said Granvelle. “Painting Hell is better than going there.”

  “Agreed,” said Bruegel, readily enough. “But how much would you pay me?”

  “Listen to the man,” said Granvelle with a hard chuckle. “He’s spared from execution and he wants to talk terms! I’ll provide the very best in painting supplies, pay you something reasonable, and you’ll have—free room and board.” Granvelle chuckled again. It wasn’t a pleasant sound.

  “Do you mean a dungeon, Your Worship?”

  “An artist needs light,” said Granvelle. “And a bit of comfort. No, my fine fowl, you’ll have a gilded cage. I’ll give you a room at the Regent Margaret’s provincial palace in Mechelen, halfway between Antwerp and Brussels. I’m there regularly to visit the Regent. I’ll keep a close eye on your progress.”

  “I’m to leave Antwerp?” This seemed to disturb Bruegel more than anything that Granvelle had said so far. Anja knew him as a creature of habit who hated to break his rituals of work. “For how long?”

  “Let�
��s try something like a year to start with,” said Granvelle. “And then—who knows. We might send you into exile, or keep you on as Margaret’s court painter, or mayhap hang you by the neck until dead. It depends on your actions.”

  “I’ll be quite alone,” said Bruegel, musingly. To Anja’s ears, he didn’t sound all that sad about it.

  “You made your last woman very angry with you,” said Granvelle. Anja cringed and crept a step higher up the stairs. “Anger’s a terrible sin,” said the Bishop, raising his voice. “Come down here, little sparrow, and atone,” he cried sarcastically. “Tell your Bosch-bird that he’s forgiven.”

  Anja would have run up the stairs to the top of the tower, but one of Granvelle’s priests darted after her, caught her, and dragged her down to the landing. Peter’s expression when he saw her was unforgettable. Solemn and wounded and sad.

  “I’m sorry!” shrieked Anja, and clattered down the stairs.

  Eight

  Dulle Griet

  Mechelan, April 1562

  Bruegel leaned close to the great oak panel, highlighting the ribs of another killer skeleton. Zack, zack, zack. This one was holding up a sword, getting ready to cut off the head of a kneeling man. Beside the man a long pole rose up into the smoky sky, topped by a headless corpse set out for the crows. Bruegel drew his lips back into a cruel death’s-head smile, imitating the skeleton the better to depict it.

  He picked up a scrap of eggshell with a bit of umber pigment in it and added the color to his little brush. His expression changed to one of prayerful resignation as he brushed a spiky shock of hair onto the condemned man’s head. Bruegel always merged with the subject at the other end of his brush, be it a skeleton of Death’s army, a pig, or even a tree.