“We appreciate you and we believe you have a bright future as a businesswoman.”
Her words echo in my mind as I walk back to the train to return to Bussum. They’re followed by Marie-Celeste’s advice telling me to enjoy my life while it is going well. Who would have ever thought that would be such a challenge? I find myself wandering, not in the straight path to the station, but just meandering along the canals I have come to love, the arteries of this strange little city.
That’s when I find myself on Jo’s doorstep. I hadn’t evenrealized this was my destination, but of course it was. Where else would I have been going? This was inevitable.
I am taken aback when she is the one who answers, and clearly so is she because she physically recoils at the sight of me.
“Jo,” I say, taking a step forward to clutch her shoulder and kiss her cheeks, even though I feel her entire body tensing at my touch.
“Claire,” she says politely, recovering her cool demeanor. “This is unexpected.”
“I have been writing,” I say.
“It’s been so busy. I am sorry I have not responded,” she says, making no move to invite me in.
“Could we take some time now?”
“I’m afraid not.” She glances behind her. Perhaps Isaac hasn’t been in Paris at all. “I have an appointment this evening. And I need to prepare.”
“Could we make a plan? To have a meal or even tea.” Desperation creeps into my voice, and I despise myself for it.
She glances behind her again and I peer into the darkness of her home, expecting him to be lurking in the shadows. I now have no doubt whatsoever that he has turned her against me.
“Claire, I truly have been meaning to write, but I didn’t want to put all of this to paper, for both of our sakes.”
I want to stop her, or perhaps delay the inevitable. I try to speak first, but she beats me to it.
“I do not think we can see one another any longer. There are too many secrets between us. I think you know of what I speak.” I can’t respond. I can’t even move a muscle. I look up at one of the spionnetjes on the house next to us and remember that someone is always watching and perhaps that is why Jo did not invite me in, because she knows I will not make a scene out here. So instead of defending myself, instead of trying to ascertain what she does and doesn’t know, I simply nod, because she is right. Myfate could be so much worse than her slicing me from her life after everything I have done.
“Please know how much I appreciate you and our time together, but I simply cannot…” At this her voice finally cracks with emotion and she steps even further into the hallway beyond her door.
“I understand,” I manage, a tacit admission, but a large one, nonetheless. “I wanted to tell you I’ve been offered a job. In America.” I don’t know why I want her to know this, but it feels important that she does. Her expression remains stony.
“You should take it.” Her tone is flat and ominous. “It is best for you to go to America.”
I stumble backward off her spotless stoop and pull my coat tightly around me. I won’t let the tears fall here, or the weight of what is finally happening reduce me to a puddle on her narrow street.
“Goodbye, Madame van Gogh.”
“Good luck, Claire.”
35
Emma
I will diein this box.
I can scream all I want. I can try to kick down the bolted door. I can claw at the thick stone walls and the bulletproof glass. None of it will be of any use.
Until they threw me in here, no one had been in this climate-controlled chamber for at least a decade. It could be ten more years before anyone returns.
I know I’m not the first person they’ve made disappear…and I certainly won’t be the last.
At least the view is nice.
There’s a panel of what I assume is bulletproof glass between me and the next chamber. In it there are about two dozen paintings that I can see and more that appear to be in crates. Stella once told me that keeping paintings in crates, or even just hidden away, for long periods of time can deteriorate the canvas nomatter how much you control the climate. Some of it is unexplainable scientifically.
“I think they just want to breathe,” she’d said. I picture them all gasping for air, same as me.
