The large,old-fashioned room was silent,and,with the exception of himself,quite deserted by its usual inmates.An hour had passed--nearly two--without any improved result.Daylight had already declined,and twilight was fast giving way to the darkness of night.The patience of the young man was exhausted,and he stood before his unfinished production,absorbed in no very pleasing ruminations,one hand buried in the folds of his long dark hair,and the other holding the piece of charcoal which had so ill executed its office,and which he now rubbed,without much regard to the sable streaks which it produced,with irritable pressure upon his ample Flemish inexpressibles.
'Pshaw!'said the young man aloud,'would that picture,devils,saint,and all,were where they should be--in hell!'
A short,sudden laugh,uttered start lingly close to his ear,instantly responded to the ejaculation.
The artist turned sharply round,and now for the first time became aware that his labours had been overlooked by a stranger.
Within about a yard and a half,and rather behind him,there stood what was,or appeared to be,the figure of an elderly man:he wore a short cloak,and broad-brimmed hat with a conical crown,and in his hand,which was protected with a heavy,gauntlet-shaped glove,he carried a long ebony walking-stick,surmounted with what appeared,as it glittered dimly in the twilight,to be a massive head of gold,and upon his breast,through the folds of the cloak,there shone what appeared to be the links of a rich chain of the same metal.
The room was so obscure that nothing further of the appearance of the figure could be ascertained,and the face was altogether overshadowed by the heavy flap of the beaver which overhung it,so that not a feature could be discerned.Aquantity of dark hair escaped from beneath this sombre hat,a circumstance which,connected with the firm,upright carriage of the intruder,proved that his years could not yet exceed threescore or thereabouts.
There was an air of gravity and importance about the garb of this person,and something indescribably odd,I might say awful,in the perfect,stone-like movelessness of the figure,that effectually checked the testy comment which had at once risen to the lips of the irritated artist.
He therefore,as soon as he had suf-ficiently recovered the surprise,asked the stranger,civilly,to be seated,and desired to know if he had any message to leave for his master.
'Tell Gerard Douw,'said the unknown,without altering his attitude in the smallest degree,'that Mynher Vanderhauseny of Rotterdam,desires to speak with him to-morrow evening at this hour,and,if he please,in this room,upon matters of weight--that is all.Good-night.'
The stranger,having finished this message,turned abruptly,and,with a quick but silent step,quitted the room,before Schalken had time to say a word in reply.
The young man felt a curiosity to see in what direction the burgher of Rotterdam would turn on quitting the studio,and for that purpose he went directly to the window which commanded the door.
A lobby of considerable extent intervened between the inner door of the painter's room and the street entrance,so that Schalken occupied the post of observation before the old man could possibly have reached the street.
He watched in vain,however.There was no other mode of exit.
Had the old man vanished,or was he lurking about the recesses of the lobby for some bad purpose?This last suggestion filled the mind of Schalken with a vague horror,which was so unaccountably intense as to make him alike afraid to remain in the room alone and reluctant to pass through the lobby.
However,with an effort which ap-
peared very disproportioned to the occasion,he summoned resolution to leave the room,and,having double-locked the door and thrust the key in his pocket,without looking to the right or left,he traversed the passage which had so recently,perhaps still,contained the person of his mysterious visitant,scarcely venturing to breathe till he had arrived in the open street.
'Mynher Vanderhausen,'said Gerard Douw within himself,as the appointed hour approached,'Mynher Vanderhausen of Rotterdam!I never heard of the man till yesterday.What can he want of me?
A portrait,perhaps,to be painted;or a younger son or a poor relation to be apprenticed;or a collection to be valued;or --pshaw I there's no one in Rotterdam to leave me a legacy.Well,whatever the business may be,we shall soon know it all.'
It was now the close of day,and every easel,except that of Schalken,was deserted.Gerard Douw was pacing the apartment with the restless step of impatient expectation,every now and then humming a passage from a piece of music which he was himself composing;for,though no great proficient,he admired the art;sometimes pausing to glance over the work of one of his absent pupils,but more frequently placing himself at the window,from whence he might observe the passengers who threaded the obscure by-street in which his studio was placed.
'Said you not,Godfrey,'exclaimed Douw,after a long and fruitless gaze from his post of observation,and turning to Schalken--'said you not the hour of ap-pointment was at about seven by the clock of the Stadhouse?'
'It had just told seven when I first saw him,sir,'answered the student.
'The hour is close at hand,then,'said the master,consulting a horologe as large and as round as a full-grown orange.
'Mynher Vanderhausen,from Rotterdam --is it not so?'
'Such was the name.'
'And an elderly man,richly clad?'
continued Douw.
'As well as I might see,'replied his pupil;'he could not be young,nor yet very old neither,and his dress was rich and grave,as might become a citizen of wealth and consideration.'