“At the end of three months,” said the Reverend Pietersen, “we will give you an appointment somewhere in Belgium.”
“Providing he qualifies,” said the Reverend de Jong heavily, turning to Pietersen. De Jong had lost a thumb in mechanical labour while a young man, and that had turned him to theology.
“What is wanted in evangelical work, Monsieur Van Gogh,” said the Reverend van den Brink, “is the talent to give popular and attractive lectures to the people.”
The Reverend Pietersen accompanied him out of the church in which the meeting had been held, and took Vincent’s arm as they stepped into the glaring Brussels sunshine. “I am glad to have you with us, my boy,” he said. “There is a great deal of fine work to be done in Belgium, and from your enthusiasm I should say that you are highly qualified to carry it on.”
Vincent did not know which warmed him more, the hot sun or the man’s unexpected kindness. They walked down the street between precipices of six-storey stone buildings, while Vincent struggled to find something to reply. The Reverend Pietersen stopped.
“This is where I turn off,” he said. “Here, take my card, and when you have a spare evening, come to see me. I shall be happy to chat with you.”
There were only three pupils including Vincent at the evangelical school. They were put in charge of Master Bokma, a small, wiry man with a concave face; a plumb line dropped from his brow to his chin would not have touched his nose or lips.
Vincent’s two companions were country boys of nineteen. These two immediately became good friends, and to cement their friendship turned their ridicule on Vincent.
“My aim,” he told one of them in an early, unguarded moment, “is to humble myself, mourir à moi-même.” Whenever they found him struggling to memorize a lecture in French, or agonizing over some academic book, they would ask, “What are you doing, Van Gogh, dying within yourself?”
It was with Master Bokma that Vincent had his most difficult time. The master wished to teach them to be good speakers; each night at home they had to prepare a lecture to deliver the following day in class. The two boys concocted smooth, juvenile messages and recited them glibly. Vincent worked slowly over his sermons, pouring his whole heart into every line. He felt deeply what he had to say and when he rose in class the words would not come with any degree of ease.
“How can you hope to be an evangelist, Van Gogh,” demanded Bokma, “when you cannot even speak? Who will listen to you?”
The climax of Bokma’s wrath broke when Vincent flatly refused to deliver his lectures extempore. He laboured far into the night to make his compositions meaningful, writing out every word in painstaking, precise French. In class the following day the two boys spoke airily about Jesus Christ and salvation, glancing at their notes once or twice while Bokma nodded approval. Then it came Vincent’s turn. He spread his lecture before him and began to read. Bokma would not even listen.
“Is that the way they teach you in Amsterdam? Van Gogh, no man has ever left my class who could not speak extempore at a moment’s notice and move his audience!”
Vincent tried, but he could not remember in the proper sequence all the things he had written down the night before. His classmates laughed outright at his stumbling attempts and Bokma joined their merriment. Vincent’s nerves were worn to a biting edge from the year in Amsterdam.
“Master Bokma,” he declared, “I will deliver my sermons as I see fit. My work is good, and I refuse to submit to your insults!”
Bokma was outraged. “You will do as I tell you,” he shouted, “or I will not allow you in my classroom!”
From then on it was open warfare between the two men. Vincent produced four times as many sermons as was demanded of him, for he could not sleep at night and there was little use in his going to bed. His appetite left him and he became thin and jumpy.
In November he was summoned to the church to meet with the Committee and get his appointment. At last all the obstacles in his way had been removed and he felt a tired gratification. His two classmates were already there when he arrived. The Reverend Pietersen did not look at him when he came in, but Bokma did, and with a glint in his eye.
The Reverend de Jong congratulated the boys on their successful work and gave them appointments to Hoogstraeten and Etiehove. The classmates left the room arm in arm.
“Monsieur Van Gogh,” said De Jong, “the Committee has not been able to persuade itself that you are ready to bring God’s work to the people. I regret to say that we have no appointment for you.”
After what seemed a long time Vincent asked, “What was wrong with my work?”
“You refused to submit to authority. The first rule of our Church is absolute obedience. Further, you did not succeed in learning how to speak extempore. Your master feels you are not qualified to preach.”
Vincent looked at the Reverend Pietersen but his friend was staring out the window. “What am I to do?” he asked of no one in particular.
“You may return to the school for another six months if you wish,” replied van den Brink. “Perhaps at the end of that time. . .”
Vincent stared down at his rough, square-toed boots and noticed that the leather was cracking. Then, because he could think of absolutely no word to say, he turned and walked out in silence.
He passed quickly through the city streets and found himself in Laeken. Without knowing why he was walking, he struck out along the towpath with its busily humming workshops. Soon he left the houses behind and came to an open field. An old white horse, lean, emaciated, and tired to death by a life of hard labour, was standing there. The spot was lonely and desolate. On the ground lay a skull and at a distance in the background the bleached skeleton of a horse lying near the hut of a man who skinned horses.
Some little feeling returned to flood out the numbness, and Vincent reached forlornly for his pipe. He applied a match to the tobacco but it tasted strangely bitter. He sat down on a log in the field. The old white horse came over and rubbed his nose against Vincent’s back. He turned and stroked the emaciated neck of the animal.
After a time there rose in his mind the thought of God, and he was comforted. “Jesus was calm in the storm,” he said to himself. “I am not alone, for God has not forsaken me. Someday, somehow, I will find a way to serve Him.”
When he returned to his room he found the Reverend Pietersen waiting for him. “I came to ask you to have dinner at my home, Vincent,” he said.
They walked along streets thronged with working people on their way to the evening meal. Pietersen chatted of casual things as though nothing had happened. Vincent heard every word he said with a terrible clarity. Pietersen led him into the front room, which had been turned into a studio. There were a few water-colours on the walls and an easel in one corner.
“Oh,” said Vincent, “you paint. I didn’t know.”
Pietersen was embarrassed. “I’m just an amateur,” he replied. “I draw a bit in my spare time for relaxation. But I shouldn’t mention it to my confrères if I were you.”
They sat down to dinner. Pietersen had a daughter, a shy, reserved girl of fifteen who never once lifted her eyes from the plate. Pietersen went on speaking of inconsequential things while Vincent forced himself, for politeness sake, to eat a little. Suddenly his mind became riveted to what Pietersen was saying; he had no idea how the Reverend had worked into the subject.
“The Borinage,” his host said, “is a coal mining region. Practically every man in the district goes down into the charbonnages. They work in the midst of thousands of ever-recurring dangers, and their wage is hardly enough to keep body and soul together. Their homes are tumble-down shacks where their wives and children spend most of the year shivering with cold, fever, and hunger.”