The Painting (13 page)

Have you been to the Parisian cafés? The women. Geez. They come right up to you. Sit right in your lap.

How about a drink? asks Jorgen.

Sure.

Jorgen pushes himself up from the bench, clutches his crutches, and sees Svensk wince. As he heads toward his room, he feels irritable, not wanting to reminisce, to walk through the stinking old hallways of his life. He steps into his room and nervously glances around, seeing it with fresh eyes, with Svensk’s eyes, who looked at him with pity when he saw his leg missing, could not stop staring at him, as if he were a monster. The room is a goddamn cell. No bigger than that, and his unmade bed, dust everywhere, nothing on the walls, a balled-up pile of dirty clothes, his rifle propped up in the corner. He opens the closet door, pulls out a bottle of wine, finds a corkscrew and two glasses. He steps outside, hands Svensk a glass, and tells him he’s got to get back to work soon.

Svensk says he met Pierre downstairs. Looks like a real son of a bitch. That pointy nose and those beady little eyes. Svensk tells him he came to Paris to join the war; there was nothing but farmwork—milking dairy cows or plowing cornfields—and he was sick of that. And he wasn’t about to go back to that fucking fishery.

Thought I’d join the war, he says, but I met a real good-looking woman and she had some money. She paid for damn near everything, rent, food. She even bought me three new shirts. A good deal, until she kicked me out, but I keep finding women at these fancy French parties. Rich women. You should come with me.

Jorgen nods.

Svensk struts one of his furtive, charming smiles. I didn’t even know you were here, says Svensk. You just disappeared. One day you were in Copenhagen. At the university, right? The next, vanished. Even your mother, she didn’t know nothing about where you went off to. Just up and gone, that’s what you did. Did you rob a bank or something? Svensk drinks deeply and smiles, not waiting for an answer. Best thing I did was leave Denmark. You wouldn’t know a war is going on in some parts of this town. You should come with me. These parties, he says, shaking his head, as if he can’t believe what he’s done and seen. What do they call them? Soirees? Lot of rich people who get together and eat and get drunk and sleep together.

Jorgen drinks his wine. You said there’s a lot of rich people?

Sure. You should see the gowns and jewelry on these women. And the food. Some of the best wine I’ve ever had. I’ll bring you to the next one. You’ll see.

All right.

They sit for a while, and Svensk shifts uncomfortably. Jorgen watches the trees sway and bend in the wind. Pierre has kept a big backyard with squat bushes lining the periphery. Two trees are still standing, though the lower branches have been chopped off for firewood.

Whatever happened between you and that girl? asks Svensk. He leans forward and places an elbow on his knee.

Jorgen sits motionless for a moment. Which one?

Which one, he echoes, laughing. You know. The one. The one you swore me to secrecy. The beautiful one. Young, if I remember right. Real young.

Jorgen sits still.

She was a real beauty.

Jorgen gathers into himself and barely breathes. Oh. She wanted too much. Jorgen does not move.

Oh, says Svensk.

Jorgen says he should get back to work. Pierre, he says, gesturing toward the house.

Svensk tips his head back and finishes his wine. Jorgen rises and walks him down the hallway to the staircase. Svensk leans his weight onto the railing and turns to go. Jorgen feels words catch in his throat. He looks briefly at Svensk then down to the bottom of the staircase to the darkly lit foyer.

What happened to her? Jorgen asks, feigning casual interest.

Who?

That girl.

Svensk shrugs and lets a light smile glide over his lips. I think she might have married. I’m not sure.

Jorgen grips the banister to steady himself. She married? Who?

Not sure. No, wait. I think maybe that old minister in town. That old guy with the wart on his cheek and the white spittle at the sides of his lips. She got pregnant. That was the scandal of the town. Her parents threw her out
and the minister let her stay in that small cottage behind the church. I think he ended up marrying her.

Svensk slaps him on the back. We’ll go to one of those fancy parties. You’ll see what I mean about the women. He turns and leaps down the stairs.

Jorgen limps to his room, unlocks the closet door, and lifts the blanket from the bag. There, the stolen canned food, a string of pearls, a block of hard cheddar cheese. He picks up a carved belt buckle made from the tusk of a walrus and runs his finger over the intricate carving: an emaciated man scooping water from a river with clawlike hands. Such detailed work, he thinks. Such precision. He holds it up to the light. The sunlight turns it golden. That gold, the gold of her hair.

You said the name Agneta. Who is that?

Agneta, Agneta, Agneta, he says.

He smells her honeysuckle scent. Afterward the residue of flowers all over him. He sets the carved buckle down in the box and looks at the dusty corner of the room. Don’t think about her; not going to think about her; and he covers the box with the blanket and locks the closet door. But she’s found him and now he must leave Paris. Who can he sell his stolen goods to? Maybe these rich people at these parties.

He steps over to the bed and pulls out the painting. The sunlight brightens the colors, it hurts his eyes, and the woman, she is more brilliant now in her vivid clothing, her black hair, silk gloss. He puts his hands up to his face and weeps. He feels the young girl from Denmark, Agneta, says her name in a room where he thought she’d never find him, where he thought he’d escaped, traveled far enough that those lithe arms would never again wrap around his neck, her lips never find his, her bright green eyes never stare into his, never, never, because that life, he didn’t want that life. He pushes the painting underneath the bed, snatches up his crutches, and walks down the hallway to the dark office, hunting for order and routine.

JAPAN

M
ORNING, MORNING, SAYS
S
ATO
, his voice staccato as he charges into the eating area. What shall we do today?

Ayoshi taps her fingertips on the windowpane impatiently. She is not going to plan his day for him, not going to entertain him. Nor is there any desire, absolutely none, to argue with him. Always bringing up her husband. Why must he harp on something he knows nothing about? He’s never married, nor will he, and look at him, chewing on his fingernails.

Sato plops himself at the table and covers his face with his hands. The smell of opium drifts across to Ayoshi. He spreads his fingers and grins at her through the spaces. Well, he says.

She sits at the table and hands him some paper. Make something, she says, swallowing her annoyance. She folds a piece of paper in half. Sato watches her run the side of her hand along the paper. She glances up. Don’t you know how to make anything at all?

No. He tosses the paper at her. You’re the artist, he says, standing and pacing around the room, and I’m the merchant. Even with the feudal walls crumbling, you will most likely remain who you are. You’ve shown a certain stubborn affection for it so far.

As have you, she says. If her husband stays too long in the studio, she will
go into their bedroom and paint. She will close the door and push a stone against it.

He slides next to her at the table, flattens both palms on the tabletop, and places his face a foot away from hers. Certainly you don’t intend to stay locked up in that damn studio today. It’s not good for your health.

She sets her paper down and sighs. There are herbs and teas that could help you, she says. They remove the longing for opium.

Does it work for past loves?

She returns to her creased paper, thinking she despises him right now.

He picks up a piece of paper, crumples it into a ball, and bats it in the air. His wild, frenetic energy lashes like flash lightning in a summer storm. His volatility frightens and excites her, as if that lightning might sear through her life, burning a hole, letting in an entirely new life. What would it look like, this new life? What would she like it to be? She closes her eyes to imagine.

He pinches her arm. Am I putting you to sleep?

She snaps open her eyes and glares at him. Why do you do it? she asks. It can’t be good for you.

His face lights up into a broad smile and he thrusts his hands in front of him, waving them as he talks. Think of your most pleasurable moment. Think of it extended through time, perhaps eight, ten hours. Perhaps longer.

She sets down her half-formed lantern. Your life doesn’t give you that?

He drops his arms to his side. Does yours? He looks at Ayoshi, her small, bony, birdlike frame. Those eyes, he thinks. Dark tunnels that burrow down to a damaged heart.

Your husband wants to take you on a vacation, he says.

She sits motionless for a moment.

He told me so, but he said you wouldn’t go.

Strange.

Why?

He’s never asked.

Gazing out the window, he imagines Hayashi hobbling up that hill alone,
as he did the other morning, and that nearly impermeable aloneness that surrounds him like thick, gray smoke. And Ayoshi. Look at her now with her little colored squares of paper, quietly tucking herself away.

What did you do with that painting? he asks.

She twists in her seat. The paper falls from her hands. What?

The painting. The one with you and your lover.

Her mind seizes. She fixes on a small drop of soy sauce staining the table. He saw it? How did he see it? No one sees those paintings. She wraps them around her husband’s bowls, shuttles them onto a ship, and with that sends them out of her mind. They are scattered around the world. A stranger may see them, but that’s different. What did Sato see? Yes, of course, he was in the Western room with her. His body contains the image, tucked inside, next to who knows what else. How could she have been so careless?

You look worried, he says. Your secret is safe with me.

We need to go to town today, she says, her voice forcefully measured. Perhaps there is fresh yellowtail.

I still see the woman floating in the river, he says, standing. Is she drowning? I think she’s drowning.

She sits there stonily.

Or maybe she’s stuck in the river and can’t get out. Sato jumps onto the edge of the counter, his legs swinging. But she doesn’t want to get out, does she? She wants to soak in that river and stay floating, unable to move, unable to do anything else with her life. Only dream. Dream a perfect life, a perfect love, while her real life, the life happening now, is rushing by her.

With a trembling hand, she tries to balance the finished paper lantern on the table. It falls and falls again.

He comes straight at her. I am one of your oldest friends, he says. I am devoted to you, to your happiness. Why are you making yourself miserable? Do you really think he’s coming for you? Let me tell you, he’s not coming. It’s been over a year, isn’t that right? He’s not coming.

She holds her face still. He is relentless and cold, she thinks, blaming her for everything, her life, the way it has turned out. She picks up a chopstick and stabs at her hand, watching the small pricks turn red and then fade. What
do you know about it? she says. What do you know? Why won’t he leave her alone? Her eyes turn teary and she stabs her hand harder.

I’ve something for you, he says, his voice soft and urgent.

I don’t want anything from you, she says.

Please, he says, gently taking the chopstick from her hand. I have a gift for you.

You’re here to make my life miserable, that’s all you’re doing. Bullying and badgering me.

No, he says. No. It’s not true. Is it true? Oh, no. Please, then, let me make it up to you. Come and let me give you my gift.

After more coaxing, she reluctantly relents. They walk to the Western room. He pulls from one of his bags tubes of paints. She twists off the top and spreads a little blue on her finger.

So bright, she says, mesmerized.

He tells her they come from Europe. Aniline dye.

I must paint now. I don’t care what you say.

And I’ll sit here and dream alongside you, he says.

She pulls out a sheet of paper and her brushes. He sits in a chair over by the window where he can see the garden. She dabs small spots of the new paint onto a palette.

They are vibrating, she says.

And so am I, he says.

The haze from this morning is lifting. Already she is leaving this drab, ordinary existence behind, feeling the strong pulp of a beginning. The white paper, the first dot of new paint. She whirls off the couch, away from the humming Sato, let him say anything now, she doesn’t care. She is traveling to her heartbeat, falling into his image.

S
HE WAITED FOR HIM
underneath the red arch of the Shinto shrine dedicated to the god for traveling. A hundred or more pairs of geta and wooden shoes lay scattered on the ground, flung up into the tree branches, past offerings for a safe trip. The sun flared and a charge rang through the air, as if the world tilted, poised for something tremendous to happen.

When he arrived, his eyes were bright. He said he had a surprise. Today
they would walk beyond the river and into the nearby nesting fields. At that moment, they heard a high-pitched sound and saw a V of whooper swans flying overhead.

Her brush stops.

Ayoshi searches the Western room. Is that the way it happened? Or did they see the swans on another day? She said, Look! White ribbons tossed up against the blue sky—was that what she said? Her paintbrush hovers in the air. There was something in the sky, wasn’t there? A configuration of the white, puffy clouds? Or maybe the branches of the pine tree, their curves and sculpted shapes? She pointed out shapes to him, or did he show them to her?

A blob of paint falls from her brush and splatters the painting, destroying his kimono and the bottom of his face. What happened on that day? Panic surges through her, tightening her shoulders. Her brush sways precariously and another drop of paint drips on his figure, turning the bright colors garish and harsh. She can’t remember. What else can’t she remember about him? She sets down her brush and crunches her painting into a ball.