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Daniel stared at his wife, cocking his head slightly. He glanced at Miguel, who would not meet his gaze. He removed his hat and scratched his head thoughtfully. “Can anyone understand a word that slut speaks?” he asked, carefully replacing the hat. “Her Dutch is the most garbled thing I know, and it is as well for her, for the look on her face was of such impudence, I’m sure I should have struck her if I’d comprehended her rudeness.”

Miguel cast a look at Hannah, who stared at the floor, trying, he suspected, not to weep with the force of relief. “She said she is leaving your service,” he ventured cautiously, still not certain Hannah had escaped. “She tires of working for Jews; she might prefer a Dutch mistress-a widow.”

“Good riddance to her. I hope,” Daniel said to Hannah, “she has not upset you too greatly. There are other girls in the world, and better ones too, I’d venture. You’ll not miss her.”

“I’ll not miss her. Perhaps,” she suggested, “you will let me select the servant next time.”

Later that day Miguel received a message from Geertruid expressing concern that they had not spoken in some time and requesting a meeting as soon as possible. To find some reason for delay, Miguel wrote to his partner that he could not possibly think of meeting until after the Sabbath. His words were so jumbled as to hardly make sense, even to their author, and Miguel moved to tear up his note. Then he thought better of it, deciding he might gain something by being incoherent. Without rereading what he had written, he sent the note.

from

The Factual and Revealing Memoirs of Alonzo Alferonda

There are, of course, a hundred such homes in the Jordaan-hastily built things of three or four stories, cramped rooms, narrow windows, too little light, and too much smoke. This one is owned, as they all seem to be owned, by a pinch-faced widow who sees nothing and judges all. This particular pinch-faced widow had recently rented rooms to a young girl. There were two rooms-one more than the girl had ever paid for on her own, but then she was now being paid better than she had ever been in the past. She had new clothes and some treats too-apples and pears and dried dates.

She had been enjoying these dainties along with the scent of her civet perfume and her new linens and ribbons, when the pinch-faced widow informed her that there was a man-a merchant, it seemed-there to see her. The widow did not like that the girl said to send him up, for she did not enjoy being a woman who allowed young women to receive men in their rooms, but she could hardly prevent that sort of thing, and since some folks will be Christian and some will not, there was not much to be done for it. She sent the man up.

A knock on the door, and the girl answered, wearing a new blue gown, cut just so. Most enticing, I promise you, showing off her shape to full advantage. What man could resist this beauty in that dress? She smiled at her visitor. “Hello, senhor,” she said. “Have you missed me?”

I doubt he smiled back, and he had most likely not missed her. “I want a moment of your time, Annetje.”

He stepped in and closed the door behind him, but he kept his distance from her. Here was a man who knew the dangers of a blue dress.

“What?” she asked. “No kiss for your old friend?”

“I have something to inquire of you.”

“Of course. You may ask me anything you wish.”

“I wish to know if, while you were in my brother’s employ, you were paid by anyone to observe the doings of our household.”

The girl let out a loud titter. “You want to know if I was a spy?”

“If you like, yes.”

“Why should I tell you?” she asked saucily, as she swished her skirts around the room like a little girl at play. Perhaps she enjoyed teasing her visitor. Perhaps she wished him to see what she thought of as her finery: her furniture; her ribbons, scattered about the room as though she had a hundred such things; her ample fruit. She could eat an apple or a pear anytime she liked. She could eat another one. There seemed to be no end to the supply. She lived in these two rooms-two of them!-in the newest part of town, while some folks lived in wet basements on a soggy island in the midst of a foul canal.

“You should tell me,” he answered, his voice hardening, “because I asked it of you, and for no other reason. But if you like, I can pay you for your answers since they seem to require considerable effort.”

“If you pay me,” she observed, “then I might give any answer I think would please you so you will think your coin well spent. I do like to please those who give me money.” She certainly spoke the truth there.

“Then tell me what I ask because I have always been kind to you in the past.”

“Such kindness.” She laughed again. “Such kindness as that may be found in the breeches of any man in this city, but that’s all one, I suppose. You want to know if anyone paid me to spy on you. I will tell you that someone did. It is no betrayal for me to say so-at least I don’t think it is, for I have not been paid as I was promised, and if I am not to have my money then at least I will have my revenge.”

“Who was it that paid you?”

“Why, it was your widow friend,” she said, “the lovely Madam Damhuis. She promised me ten guilders if I but kept an eye on you and that willful bitch, the senhora. Have you been kind to her too?”

The visitor would not be baited. “What did she pay you to do?”

“Only to see how she was discussed in the house. I was to discourage the senhora from speaking of her encounters with madam. She said you were not to suspect anything, but that you would not-so long as I showed you my favors. Then, she said, you would be as stupid as a cow being led to its slaughter.”

“What are her ends?” he asked. “Why did she want you to do these things?”

Annetje shrugged with an exaggerated flair of the shoulders that opened the neck of her gown deliciously. “I could not say, senhor. She never told me. She only gave me a few guilders and promised me more, but those promises have all been lies. In my opinion, the woman is inclined to lies. You ought to be cautious.”

Annetje offered her visitor the bowl of dates. “Would you like to eat one of my dainties?”

The merchant declined. He only thanked the girl and took his leave.

Thus went the final conversation between Miguel Lienzo and his brother’s former servant. It is sad how badly these matters can end. He and the girl knew a fond intimacy for many months, but there was never any real tenderness there. He wanted only her flesh, and she his coin. A poor foundation for any congress between man and woman.

And how does Alferonda know all of this? How can he write of the private words spoken in an obscure boardinghouse in the Jordaan? Alferonda knows because he heard it all-he was in the next room, lying on the girl’s rough mattress.

Not so long ago I had been enjoying some of the dainties she had offered to Miguel. She had told her visitor exactly what I had instructed her to say, in case he came calling. Madam Damhuis, of course, had never paid the girl a stuiver, nor had she ever promised to do so. She had never spoken a word to the girl but once, when she had stopped the senhora on the Hoogstraat.

Annetje had been in my employ at the time, and it had been my design that Senhora Lienzo should not speak of the widow to Miguel. That she had done so, in the end, would prove immaterial.

30

Miguel had been ignoring notes from Isaiah Nunes for weeks, and had been doing so self-righteously since he learned that Nunes was in league with Parido. But then Nunes’s notes began to talk of the Ma’amad, and Miguel wondered if he ought not take these threats more seriously. In all likelihood, Nunes only meant to add verisimilitude to his ruse, but it was also possible that Parido might want to see Miguel brought before the board. It would be difficult to prove the trickery Miguel suspected, and he could not begin to do so without revealing his connection to Geertruid.