The Flanders Panel

As you see, Master Van Huys, there is no possible vengeance. I put my faith in your hands and in your genius, and no one will ever pay you the price I will pay you for this painting. I want justice, even if it is only for me, even if it is only so that she knows that I know, and so that when we too are gone to ashes, like Roger de Arras, someone else other than God might also know it. So paint the picture, Master Van Huys, for God’s sake, paint it. I want you to leave out nothing, and let it be your best, your most terrible work. Paint it, and then may the Devil, whom you once painted riding at his side, carry us off.

And finally, she saw the knight. Both his slashed tunic and his hose were the colour of amaranth; he wore a gold chain round his neck and a useless dagger hanging from his belt. He was walking through the twilight along the moat at the East Gate, alone, no page with him to interrupt his thoughts. She saw him raise his eyes to the lancet window and saw him smile. It was barely the suggestion of a smile, distant and melancholy, the sort of smile that speaks of memories, of past loves and dangers, and seems to have some inkling of its own fate. And perhaps Roger de Arras senses, on the other side of the crumbling battlements, from between whose stones gnarled bushes spring, the presence of the hidden crossbowman, who pulls the string of his bow taut and aims at his victim. Suddenly he understands that his whole life, the long road walked, the battles he fought, hoarse and sweating, in creaking armour, the women’s bodies he has known, the thirty-eight years he carries on his back like a heavy burden, all will end here, in this precise place and at this precise moment, and that after he feels the blow there will be nothing more. He is filled by a profound sense of grief, because it seems to him unjust that he should die like this at twilight, pierced by an arrow like a wild boar. And he raises one delicate, beautiful hand, a manly hand, the kind of hand that immediately brings to mind the sword it must once have wielded, the reins it held, the skin it caressed, the quill it dipped into an inkwell before scratching words on parchment, he raises that hand by way of protest, though he knows it is in vain, for, amongst other things, he is not even sure to whom he should protest. He wants to shout out, but remembers the decorum he owes himself. So he reaches with his other hand for his dagger, thinking that at least with a steel blade in his hand, even if it is only that dagger, his death will be one more suited to a knight. He hears the thump of the crossbow and thinks fleetingly that he should move out of the path of the arrow, but he knows that an arrow moves faster than any man. He feels his soul slowly dissolving in a bitter lament for itself, whilst he searches desperately in his memory for a God to whom to offer up his repentance. And he discovers with surprise that he repents of nothing, although it is not clear either, as night closes in, that there is any God prepared to hear him. Then he feels the blow. He has suffered other blows, where now he bears the scars, but he knows that this will leave no scars. It does not even hurt, his soul seems simply to slip out of his mouth. Endless night falls, but before finally plunging into it, he understands that this time it will be for ever. And when Roger de Arras cries out, he can longer hear his own voice.

VIII The Fourth Player

The chess pieces were merciless. They held and absorbed him. There was horror in this, but in this also was the sole harmony. Because what else exists in the world besides chess?

Vladimir Nabokov

Munoz half-smiled, in that mechanical, distant way that seemed to commit him to nothing, not even to an attempt to inspire sympathy.

“So that’s what it was all about,” he said in a low voice, matching his step to Julia’s.

“Yes.” She was walking along with her head bent, absorbed in thought. Taking her hand out of the pocket of her leather jacket she brushed her hair from her face. “Now you know the whole story. You have every right to, I suppose. You’ve earned it.”

He looked straight ahead, reflecting on that recently acquired right.

“I see,” he murmured.

They walked unhurriedly, side by side. It was cold. The narrower, more enclosed streets still lay in darkness and the light from the street lamps illuminated only segments of the wet asphalt, making it gleam like fresh varnish. Gradually the shadows grew less intense as a leaden dawn broke slowly at the far end of the avenue where the outlines of the buildings, silhouetted against the light, were shading from black into grey.

“Is there any particular reason,” asked Munoz, “why you’ve kept this part of the story from me until now?”