Who Can Deny Love

Chapter One1802-2

It was a painting also of the Madonna, which he and the Marquis had thought to be an exceptional find the previous year.

Stephan Lochner’s paintings were to be found on the Continent, but none were known in England. However, the Prince had been able to buy one of his ‘fair and gentle’ Madonnas, a delicate, dreamy figure, the contours of which seemed almost to melt into her surroundings.

It had been expensive because his paintings were so rare and the dealer, who had bought it for the Prince, had been able to tell him little of its history except that it had come from a private collection.

The Prince had been in ecstasy over the painting, referring to it continually with a kind of lyricism.

But the Marquis had understood why the Lochner Madonna moved him so much, because he himself felt the same about it.

He was certainly not sentimental as the Prince was and yet, when he was looking at it, it evoked an emotion that made him feel that he was listening to a Mediaeval love ballad sung to the music of a spinet.

“Damn!” he had ejaculated later when he was alone. “I wish I had found that painting myself!”

He had, in fact, found it irresistible and he seldom visited Carlton House, as he invariably did several times a week, without walking into the music room to look at the painting, which they had discovered was called The Virgin of the Lilies.

This had been inscribed in small but elegant writing on the back of the frame and, while they thought it must have been added much later, the name had remained in the Marquis’s mind.

Now, incredibly, so that he felt his eyes must be deceiving him, there was the same face portrayed by Van Dyck.

The composition was, of course, very different and Van Dyck’s painting was not so ethereal or so delicate, but there was no doubt that, seen side by side, the faces of the two Madonnas were identical.

The same large eyes, the same little straight nose, the perfectly curved lips and the same rapt expression, almost one of ecstasy, as if some of the glory of Heaven was within her.

“It’s extraordinary!” the Marquis exclaimed at length.

“That is exactly what I thought,” the Prince remarked, “and yet how could it have happened, unless Van Dyck copied Lochner?”

‘That is very unlikely,” the Marquis replied. “From all we know about him, he was far too proud to think of copying another artist and he always used models for his paintings.”

“It would be impossible for him to use the same model as Lochner,” the Prince suggested.

The Marquis nodded, knowing that when the Councillors of Cologne some seventy years after Lochner’s death had proudly shown his Adoration of the Kings to Albrecht Dürer, a visiting celebrity, they could tell him nothing more about the artist except that he had come from Meersburg on Lake Constance and had died in the poorhouse.

It had been generally accepted, however, that his death occurred sometime between 1451 and 1460.

As if he knew exactly what the Marquis was thinking, the Prince said,

“Van Dyck was born in 1599 and died in London in 1641.”

“Then he must have copied the Lochner painting when he was abroad.”

“I suppose so,” the Prince said, “but it is very strange, since none of his other paintings portrays a face anything like this one nor do they have such a delicate spiritual quality.”

“That is true,” the Marquis agreed. “I suppose it is genuine?”

“Isaacs, who brought it to me, assured me that it is one of the best Van Dycks he has ever seen.”

“Isaacs was selling it!” the Marquis remarked cynically.

He thought for a moment and then he added,

“It was Isaacs who brought you the Lochner.”

“Yes, of course,” the Prince replied. “I realised that.”

“I am just wondering,” the Marquis said, “whether in fact we are being deceived.”

“If we are, then the painter is a genius in his own right,” the Prince answered. “Look at the folds of that robe. Look at the texture of the child’s skin. It is exactly in the Van Dyck tradition.”

The Marquis, however, was looking at the Lochner, realising that there were other similarities besides the face, which a less experienced critic would not have noticed.

The robe in The Virgin of the Lilies was very different from that in Van Dyck’s painting of the Madonna and yet, because he was so knowledgeable about art, the Marquis thought that there were certain brush strokes that were identical in the two paintings and something else too, which he could not put a name to.

He studied both works for a little while and knew that his instinct, which he had always trusted, told him there was something suspicious about both the paintings.

He knew the Prince was waiting for him to speak and at last with a sigh he remarked,

“Strange, very strange – and for the moment I cannot find an explanation. I’ll tell you what I will do, Sire. I will try to find out a little more about where Isaacs obtained these paintings.”

“That’s a good idea!”

“Have you bought much from him before?”

“Only the Lochner,” the Prince replied. “He brought me two or three portraits which were not outstanding, so I did not even bother to show them to you. Then, as you know, we were both captivated by the Lochner.”

His Royal Highness paused before he added,

“I paid more for it than I should have, but I still consider it was worth it.”

“So do I,” the Marquis agreed.

There was a faint smile on his lips as he remembered that, while the Prince fixed the price, the Marquis paid the bill.

“Now let me think,” the Prince said, putting his hand to his head. “Last year Isaacs brought me an El Greco which was too damaged to be interesting and a rather indifferent Van Dyck which I also refused.”

“I remember that one. Anything else?”

“No, I think that is all, until he called today with this Van Dyck.”

“It’s certainly a very fine painting,” the Marquis said. “But if you take my advice, Sire, you will say nothing about its resemblance to the Lochner until I have found out all I can about it.”

“I will leave everything to you, Virgo,” the Prince said. “You know I trust your judgement completely in anything that concerns art.”

The Marquis accepted this compliment as his right and did not dispute the Prince’s good judgement.

Instead he said,

“You have certainly aroused my interest, Sire, and I assure you I shall start work immediately in trying to discover where Isaacs obtained both these paintings. Now I think we were somewhat remiss in allowing him to be so vague about the Lochner.”

“You are right! Of course you are right!” the Prince agreed.

He gave an almost boyish smile as he said,

“I think we were both so delighted with it that we were eager to have it at any price without asking too many questions.”

“It did cross my mind that it might be stolen,” the Marquis said.

“And mine!” the Prince ejaculated.

“Now, if you will excuse me, Sire – ” the Marquis began, only to be interrupted as the Prince cried,

“You are not leaving, Virgo? If you are, come back and dine with me. I want to go on talking about paintings and a great many other subjects of mutual interest.”

He was obviously disappointed. He often found it difficult to persuade the Marquis to be his guest, although he enjoyed his company perhaps more than any of his other friends.

‘There is nothing I would have liked more, Sire, had I known about it earlier, but you will understand that it would be extremely rude if I cancelled my dinner engagement at the very last moment.”

The Prince smiled.

“I can guess that you are dining with some ‘fair charmer’.

His eyes twinkled as he wagged his finger at the Marquis.

“Be careful, Virgo! You know as well as I do that your reputation is as bad as mine, if not worse, and we cannot afford to add to our list of crimes!”

The Marquis smiled.

“Whatever we do or do not do, Sire, there will be endless people to talk about us, to exaggerate our every action, and if that fails, to invent what they do not know.”

The Marquis made an expressive gesture with his hands as he continued,

“Personally, if I have to be verbally hanged, I prefer to have had the pleasure of committing the crime in question!”

The Prince threw back his head and laughed.

“That’s good, Virgo, and very reassuring. I feel the same, so we will walk to the gallows together. Let’s hope that we will find that exercise worthwhile.”

“I think that is likely, Sire,” the Marquis replied, “and yet so often one is disillusioned.”

“My dear Virgo,” the Prince said, “you must not become a cynic – ”

“I am certainly not that where paintings and horses are concerned,” the Marquis answered.

“Only with women,” the Prince parried, then he added,

“Don’t give up hope. Perhaps one day we shall find The Virgin of the Lilies and she will be as lovely as Lochner portrayed her.”

“I have a feeling that that would be impossible,” the Marquis remarked. “At the same time it does not cost anything to go on hoping.”

Again the Prince laughed and the Marquis made his farewells and walked down the stairs.

As he was driving up St. James’s Street on his way home, he found himself quite unexpectedly regretting that he had not accepted the Prince’s invitation to stay and dine at Carlton House.

The conversation would be amusing, as it always was and the food and wine excellent, but that was not the reason.

It was because quite suddenly the slanting green eyes of Lady Abbott did not, in retrospect, seem so attractive as they had earlier in the day.

Intruding on his memory of her Ladyship’s face was the delicacy of the Madonna in The Virgin of the Lilies.

Her eyes, dreamy and wistful, looked out on the world as if they saw an enchantment that was part of herself and seemed to emanate from the grace of her figure, holding a bunch of lilies in her arms and surrounded by them.

Her hair was fair and drawn back beneath the conventional crown, not one of jewels but of flowers and there were at the corners of the painting small angels with pointed wings peeping down at her.

It was a face that the Marquis could not erase from his mind and there was an expression in her eyes which he had not only never seen in any other painting but certainly in no living woman.

‘If only I had known her,’ he found himself thinking.

Then, as he turned his horses from Piccadilly into Berkeley Square, he told himself that he was being ridiculous and becoming obsessed with a painting in a manner that he would have found laughable in any of his contemporaries.

Lady Abbott would doubtless be amusing, as he expected and, if she at least put up a few defences and a little opposition to his advances, the evening would not be wasted.

He hoped the inevitable conquest would not be too easy or too soon.

*

Cyrilla opened the shabby unpainted door of the house and carried her basket in carefully, putting it down on the floor before she closed the door behind her.

Picking it up again, she walked along the narrow passage and into a small kitchen at the back.

A woman with grey hair, who stood stirring a pot over the stove, looked round to say,

“There’s no sign of the doctor.”

“He promised he would come,” Cyrilla said in an anxious little voice, “but I am afraid he suspects we have no money to pay him.”

“I don’t doubt it,” Hannah replied. “You bought everything I asked you to?”

“Yes, Hannah, and it took our last penny. We have nothing left unless Mr. Isaacs comes today with the money for the painting.”

“He should have been here before now,” Hannah said abruptly. “I don’t trust that man and that’s a fact!”

“He is the only dealer who has been kind since Papa has been so ill, but I was thinking, Hannah, that we shall either have to sell something soon or starve!”

“What can we sell now that there’s not a picture left in the place?” Hannah asked sharply.

Cyrilla said nothing. She only took off the cloak she wore, thinking, as she did so, that she felt curiously tired and knowing that it was due to lack of nourishing food.

Everything they could afford went to buy the medicines the doctor had prescribed for Frans Wyntack, while she and Hannah lived on vegetables and an occasional egg, having no money left to buy anything else for themselves.