Leaving Van Gogh (14 page)

I was apprehensive, I will admit. This was my first midnight call, and I did not know what to expect. As the orderly led me to the ward, I listened for disturbance, but there was none—merely our footsteps, treading quickly down the long stone corridors. “Here we are,” he said, finally, turning a corner.

I was surprised. There was no crisis. We were at the door of the principal dormitory of Falret’s division, where the most capable women were assigned. The two women at the door were the wardress, a capable woman known as Madame Boguet, and Marie-Claude. They stood side by side, apparently awaiting my intervention. They were not speaking. I looked for recognition in Marie-Claude’s expression, thinking that my presence might reassure her. There was none.

The orderly turned and took his ancient lantern down another corridor, while Madame Boguet began to explain the situation in a whisper. That must have been why the orderly did not speak aloud to me; he had carried his whispered instructions the length of the building and delivered them as he received them.

“Marie-Claude is unwell,” she said. She glanced at our patient in an unfriendly way. “She claims she needs to be confined in a
gilet de force
. You know that I need the approval of a doctor for this, and she insisted that you be roused. So here we are. In the middle of the night. With two dozen women awake on the other side of this door, and a fine time we’ll have settling them down!”

I glanced around. It seemed to me that my first step should be to separate Marie-Claude from this forceful and angry woman. I would have liked to find a little room where we could speak calmly. The corridor, of course, was dark as pitch, and Madame Boguet had the only lantern. There was a window a few meters away, a deep indentation in the thick walls, through which the hazy moonlight seeped.

“May I speak to Marie-Claude?” I asked Madame Boguet. “I would like to step over to that window, so that we might not further disturb your patients.”

She looked at the window, at me, at Marie-Claude, then nodded. “I must check on them. I will come out in a few moments,” she said and whisked herself through the heavy oak door to the dormitory. I took Marie-Claude by the elbow and led her to the window, positioning her so that the light fell on her face. It was not much help. Her expression was closed.

“Can you tell me, Marie-Claude, why you want the
gilet?”
I asked. I hated to see the women bundled into those coarse strappings of canvas, shuffling along with their balance impaired, lost without the use of their hands. I saw it as a punishment, and a return to the old days of chains. Surely we had made progress beyond this.

She took a deep breath, but it was not steady, and she closed her eyes. Then she shook her head.

“Are you hearing voices?”

Another shake of the head. I stood still for a moment. I could not think what to do. “May I take your pulse?” I finally asked, thinking that I might receive some information in that way. She did not answer but did not object when I took hold of her wrist. Her pulse was fast, but not alarming. I considered taking out my stethoscope—I was grasping at straws—but Madame Boguet came shuffling out of the dormitory, closing the door behind her.

“Well, Doctor,” she hissed, approaching us. “Will you put Marie-Claude in the jacket?”

“Can you tell me something more of the circumstances?” I asked. “Has Marie-Claude felt unwell before today? Is there … has she been weak, or had headaches?”

Madame Boguet looked at me with manifest impatience. “Marie-Claude is a lunatic, Doctor, like the rest of the women here. There is no telling, ever, what any of them will do. When we find a patient sensible enough to ask for constraint, normally we put her in the jacket. I don’t hold with the doctors interfering, we do very well on our own and we know what’s what. Marie-Claude is a good girl, but she’s done some harm in her bad moments.” Here she put a reassuring hand on the patient’s arm. I found this confusing.

Who was right? I was the doctor. I was the one with the training, the seven years of medical school. I was the one wearing the black coat and carrying the bag full of diagnostic tools. The wardress, it seemed to me, was harsh. She could know nothing of what we doctors were trying to achieve. Yet her comforting touch told me she had Marie-Claude’s well-being at heart.

Clearly, there would be no help from Marie-Claude herself. If anything, she seemed to have withdrawn further.

It seemed so wrong. The
gilet
was humiliating. Nevertheless, the patient had requested it. I had regarded her as practically sane, even ready for freedom, but now she wanted to be confined. She had warned me of precisely this turn of events; that even she could not judge her own condition.

And yet where was the harm in granting her wishes? I could feel my mind changing. If I granted Marie-Claude’s request, threaded her arms through the long sleeves, tied the knots up her back—what then? She would sleep poorly, perhaps. If I denied the request, the risk was much greater—Marie-Claude might rise from her bed and attack one of the other patients. Her records proved the potential for violence; she had once come close to throttling a woman much larger than she.

So I gave in. I agreed that Marie-Claude should spend the night confined, and further ordered a series of cold baths over the next few days. Many women found that these restored them to normalcy. I returned to my cot and lay down with my boots on, running over the sequence of events in my mind. I should have stood firm, I thought. I had submitted to the authority of a madwoman and an uneducated wardress who, for all I knew, had done her own time as a patient. Could they possibly know more than I, the physician?

N
ine

T
HE NEXT DAY BEGAN
peacefully enough. My daughter was under the housekeeper’s eye: Madame Chevalier set Marguerite to the task of checking over all the fruit preserves and washing the empty jars, in preparation for the next batch. I proposed that Paul help me organize the studio; I had recently brought a substantial order of paints and supplies down from Paris, and the space is so small that everything must be carefully stowed, as on a boat. I thought if Paul’s enthusiasm for art persisted, we might need to store the paintings on the second floor to give us more space to work.

But Paul was surly that morning, careless and inattentive. He took little interest in my suggestions. He picked things up and put them down aimlessly, he tossed brushes into a drawer, all jumbled. I asked him to show me what he had done that week, and he told me he had destroyed all of his drawings.

“They were useless,” he said, looking out the window.

“Nothing is useless if you learn from it,” I told him. “Would you like to sketch in the garden after luncheon?”

“What use is sketching, anyway? Vincent never sketches.”

“Drawing is the foundation of painting,” I instructed. “If you do not draw …” I had to pause to consider my argument. Paul was right, in a way: Vincent rarely used drawing to prepare a canvas. “Drawing helps you understand what things really look like,” I said slowly, as I attempted to make my thoughts clear. “Vincent draws all the time, you’ve seen his notebook. There is a difference between the way we know things to be and the way they appear to the eye. And of course,” I added, on surer ground, “artists make sketches to plan canvases. You remember that Vincent did that for his portrait of Marguerite.”

“But usually he just heaps paint onto the canvas,” Paul countered. “And you think he is brilliant.”

I looked at Paul’s slightly rigid back. He had found something on the windowsill to occupy his hands, a leaf blown in from the garden perhaps. “Yes,” I said. “The way Vincent paints is unusual, but he
is
brilliant.” There was silence. I turned back to the box of paints I was transferring to drawers.

“Anyway I don’t want to draw today, Papa,” Paul said. “I’m going to fish.”

“Now?” I replied, surprised. It was a bright, hot morning, the kind of weather that drives fish deep into the cool, silty depths of the Oise.

Paul only shrugged and left the studio. My thoughts that morning were not pleasant. I had a heavy feeling, a sense of something ominous but unnamed. The house in Auvers had always been a refuge for me, but now it seemed full of worry.

We were very quiet at the luncheon table that day, each occupied by his or her own thoughts. I half-expected to hear the bell ring, and Vincent to appear with a blank canvas and his portable easel, but he did not come, which added to my unease. Even the dogs, whose behavior at mealtimes could be intrusive, had dispersed to shady corners. Only Nero barked from time to time, in a hoarse series of cries, then left off. Finally, as she got up to clear the salad plates, Marguerite broke the silence to say, “Paul, what is the matter with Nero?”

“Nothing,” Paul said, looking down at his plate. “He got wet down at the river, and I tied him up so he wouldn’t disturb us at the table.”

“Well, he must have dried off by now, it’s so hot,” said Madame Chevalier. “Why don’t you go untie him? The noise is unpleasant.”

“No, he got some slime on him,” Paul said. “He smells terrible. I was going to wash him after we finished.”

At that moment, though, the dog revealed him to be a liar. Nero had somehow slipped free from his tether and came galloping up to the table, barking with joy at every bound. We all turned to look at him and, as one, stood up, ready to escape. Nero was of an indeterminate breed, though I always thought Newfoundland predominated. He was large and black, shaggy and irrepressible. I found his boundless affection endearing, but the women complained about his size, his exuberance, and the impossibility of controlling him. Paul, who was fifteen the summer Nero joined us, worked hard to civilize him and was the only member of the family who could exert any influence on his behavior.

But Paul’s influence had evidently failed in the recent past, for Nero’s coat was matted with paint. It was mostly yellow, with areas of dark blue and green and flecks of white clumped in streaks and blobs on his side. There were smears on his muzzle, as if he had made an attempt to lick off the colors. The tip of his joyously wagging tail was frosted with orange. On top of it all, he was wet and smelled of turpentine.

In a flash I understood the reasons for both Vincent’s absence and Paul’s strange behavior that morning. I could imagine it now: Paul, importunate, tracking Vincent around Auvers. Vincent, unhappy at the interruption, the dog creating havoc. How could Paul have been so stupid?

Paul froze for a moment, but before Nero could reach us, he leapt from the table and planted himself a few feet away. “Sit!” he commanded. Nero obeyed, tail thumping the ground. “Stay,” Paul added. “Marguerite,” he said, using the same tone of command, “go get the rope, would you? It’s tied near Henriette.”

Marguerite, leaving a wide berth around the dog, trotted off toward the far end of the garden, where the goat’s bell clanked behind the trees. The rest of us stood still, unwilling to attract Nero’s attention and an affectionate, paint-streaked canine embrace. In a minute Marguerite returned, rope in hand. She flung it to Paul, who fashioned a kind of collar that he slipped over the dog’s head. The tail wagging instantly ceased, and Nero lowered his forequarters to the ground. Paul looked at him and sighed. He did not even glance toward me, but seemed quite frozen, as if braced for a flurry of blows or a tirade. His shame and fear cooled my anger.

“Paul and I will chance drinking our coffee out here,” I told Madame Chevalier. “If you and Marguerite wish to protect your dresses, you should stay indoors.”

“I should think so,” Madame Chevalier agreed, picking up the wine carafe and the water pitcher. “We’ll just be a moment, Doctor. Shall I get you an old blanket? Your smock?”

“Yes, what a good idea.” I turned to my daughter. “Marguerite, would you go up to the studio to see what you can find to protect Paul and me from Nero’s paint?”

When the women had gone inside, I asked, “Would I be correct in thinking that the two of you had an encounter with Monsieur van Gogh?”

Paul merely nodded, looking down at Nero. The dog gazed back at him.

“I hope all that paint came off a palette?”

Paul winced. “No. A finished canvas.”

“A finished painting!” I exclaimed, hands to my head in agitation. “This horrid creature destroyed a painting? I have a mind to drown him!” I shouted, glaring down at the dog.

“I should not have brought him,” Paul said in the dog’s defense. “How could he know? Monsieur van Gogh was shouting, and Nero tried to get away from him. It was awful! Nero knocked over the easel, and then I think he fell on the picture, and Monsieur van Gogh was
terrifying
, Papa, he was screaming and ranting …” He turned away from me and dashed his hand across his face, trying to hide his tears.

It is a terrible thing for a young man of seventeen to cry before his father. My outrage diminished. I bent down, quite awkwardly, and held out a hand to Nero’s bright-spotted head. He nuzzled me, and I took his soft ears into both hands, gently twisting them in the way he loved. He rolled onto his side, all worries forgotten.

“When did this happen?” I asked Paul, without looking up. There were bits of gravel stuck in the clots of paint on Nero’s fur.

“Yesterday, late in the afternoon.”

“Where has Nero been?”

“I closed him in a shed up on the plateau.” His voice was becoming steadier. “Nobody uses it. I took him some food and water. This morning I tried to get the paint off with turpentine and a rag. That was where I went. And it didn’t work, so I tried the river.”

“Oil paint is not water-soluble,” I commented, unthinking.

“No. And there was too much for the turpentine.”

Madame Chevalier appeared on the steps with the tray of coffee cups. Marguerite followed her, carrying an ancient blanket and my studio coat. “This will only cover you to your knees, Papa,” she said, “but I could not find anything else.”

“Thank you,” I said to both of them. “Marguerite, do you have a very large pair of scissors? Perhaps for cutting fabric?”

“I do,” said Madame Chevalier. “I’ll bring them.” She set down the tray. “You’ll pour?”

“I’ll pour,” I agreed, taking the blanket from Marguerite. “Paul, my boy, perhaps if you put this on like some kind of toga, you may yet salvage your trousers. We are going to give Nero a dramatic clipping.”

It took us most of the afternoon, and we did not entirely escape being smirched, but our appearances at the end were less alarming than Nero’s. He looked like a newly shorn military recruit. At first we just removed the fur that was matted with paint, but he was so piebald that we had to clip the rest of his coat simply to restore his natural symmetry. Paul seemed relieved when we finished our task.

“I am very sorry, Papa. I should have kept Nero under control.” It was a handsome apology.

“Yes,” I said mildly. “But it’s Monsieur van Gogh you need to speak to.”

“Must I?” he asked, stepping back in alarm. “He was so frightening!”

“Yes, you must,” I insisted, annoyed. “He has nothing to live for, Paul, except his painting. Do you understand that? Think of how he exists, how lonely he is, among strangers.”

“But he has us,” Paul protested. “He seems to like us; to like you, at least.”

“All the more reason why we should not destroy his work, don’t you think?”

“Yes, all right,” Paul conceded, scuffing the gravel with one foot.

I looked at the sorry pile of black hair at our feet. “We need to replace the paint that Nero wasted. That, at least, we can do. The finished canvas is beyond restitution. Why don’t you go get tubes of cobalt, malachite green, lead white, and yellow ocher. A large tube of the ocher, if we have one. Make them into a package. If you take them to the inn after dinner, he’ll be there.”

Paul looked at me with an appeal: “You wouldn’t come with me?”

I considered. Going with Paul could give the boy courage as well as provide me with an opportunity to check on Vincent. “Yes, I will,” I told him. He flushed, and tears again started in his eyes.

Paul was silent as we walked to the inn after dinner. We carried lanterns, though the last rays of the sun still diluted the dusk. Our steps were silent on the dusty road, and we heard only the sounds of a summer night: rustling and peeping in the trees, a far-off dog’s bark. The lights from Ravoux’s glowed at some distance, and the tables set out in front of the
mairie
were occupied with drinkers. We crossed in front of them, and I nodded to those I knew—the carpenter, the stationmaster, and the eldest son of the town’s biggest farmer. We turned down the alley beyond the inn, going directly to the back door, for Vincent would most likely be found in the shed where his paintings were stored. But he was neither there nor in the stuffy garret where he slept. Trying to quell my alarm, I turned to Paul. “I think you may know more of Vincent’s movements than I do,” I said. “Can you imagine where he might be?”

“We can try inside the café,” he said. “I can’t think what else to do.”

“He’s not drinking too much, is he?”

“Why do you think I would know these things, Papa?” Paul asked, annoyed.

I sighed and opened the back door to the café. “Never mind,” I told him.

Ravoux had had gas put in, so the room was bright with that pitiless, cold glow that I have never liked. I suppose it was more cheerful than the dim yellow halo from a solitary oil lamp—certainly the marble tabletops and the mirrors gleamed. But gaslight casts harsh shadows, and Vincent’s face, when he looked up at us, had the hollow-eyed look of a skull. He was sitting in front of a small glass of brandy and an empty coffee cup, elbows on the table, shoulders hunched. When he recognized us, he merely lifted one of his hands a few inches from the marble, to acknowledge our presence. “May we sit down?” I asked, and he nodded, gazing into his cup.

Paul set the brown-paper parcel of paint tubes on the table and pulled a chair from the next table to sit. I caught Ravoux’s eye and gestured to Vincent’s brandy. We would join him. Before the glasses arrived, Paul nudged the package toward Vincent with his fingertips. “I am very, very sorry about yesterday,” he said hurriedly. “I regret the loss of your painting. Here are some paints, to replace those that the dog …” He paused. “I know they are not the same as replacing a painting. I know that is a terrible loss.”

At this moment Ravoux brought our brandy and Paul gratefully seized his, burying as much of his face as he could in the small glass.

Vincent laid a hand on the paints and looked at me. “Thank you,” he addressed Paul. “Thank you.” He fell silent. A few moments passed, but he did not add anything. Paul looked at me, a question in his eyes. Vincent seemed to have withdrawn, retracted himself, as it were.