Six months later
His head thrown back, Nicholas felt the winter sun on his face and smiled for the first time in weeks. Choosing the second option, he hadn’t run but had left Heathrow and gone straight to the nearest police station. There he told them everything. The fallout was spectacular, and when Philip Preston’s body was discovered Nicholas was finally believed. He explained everything and gave the police names and details, and for a while he had police protection. Terrified of what Nicholas might know, Gerrit der Keyser threw his support behind him and Hiram Kaminski also gave evidence to the police. But there was no trial, no sentencing. Sidney Elliott was dead, as was Philip Preston, and the case was complete. For the police anyway.
But not for Nicholas. Stirring himself, he rose from the bench and looked around. Then he walked back up Palace Gardens and rang the intercom of Conrad Voygel’s house. This time he was admitted immediately.
Conrad was sitting in his study, wary, staring at his brother. ‘What d’you want?’
‘Does Honor know who you are?’
‘No.’
‘Good. Keep it that way.’
Unnerved, Conrad repeated the question. ‘What d’you want?’
‘Nothing.’
He frowned. ‘Nothing?’
‘Nothing. Now.’ Nicholas paused, watching the altered face of the brother he had once known, the brother who had terrorised him as a child. The man for whom he had lost his good name and his peace of mind. ‘I just want you to know that at any time I could change my mind. I could expose you, ruin your life. I want you to live with that. You might find sleeping difficult, Henry. I certainly did. You might find yourself sweating at times, unnerved for no reason. I did that too. And if you think of some way to stop me, don’t. I’ve written down everything – your real name, what you did, everything. And if anything ever happens to me, the police will hear about it. And they’ll come for you.’ He paused, watching his brother. ‘It’s illegal to fake your own death. You’d never recover from the scandal if that came out. You’d lose your wife, your daughter, your money.’
‘You wouldn’t dare!’ Henry blustered. ‘I know you. You’re not that kind of person.’
‘I wasn’t that kind of person,’ Nicholas corrected him. ‘But I’ve changed. Remember, Henry, we’re brothers, and treachery runs in the family.’
Back out in the sunshine, Henry walked across Kensington Gardens and paused by the urchin statue of Peter Pan before moving on to the Serpentine, where he stopped and stared into the running water. Nicholas Laverne was no longer an outcast. Indeed, he was now a wealthy man. When Sabine Monette’s will was read it was a private affair, and to his surprise the French country house was left to Nicholas. Also a confidential letter – in which Sabine explained that she was the mother of Eloise Devereux. It was the last piece of the mosaic and it told Nicholas who had murdered Philip Preston. A piece of information he had no inclination to share.
As for Eloise, Nicholas had seen her a few months later. ‘I’m glad my mother left you the country house—’
‘I don’t need it.’
Her eyes had been calm. ‘Yes, you do. In fact, you need it more than anyone. I’ve inherited Sabine’s apartment in Paris and more money than I could possibly ever need. What will I do with my time?’ She had taken Nicholas’s hands and weighed them in her own. ‘Make a life for yourself now. Secrets are only for unhappy people.’
She had been wrong about that.
Winter was starting to shift, the cold letting in a little warmth. Before too long it would be spring. Reaching into his pocket, Nicholas pulled out an envelope and opened it. Inside were two tiny scraps of paper, written in an antique language, in an antique hand.
‘The Pedlar’
After Hieronymus Bosch
The two last papers written and secreted in the Bosch chain. The ones Nicholas had kept back and shown to no one. The papers he had had laboriously translated, word for word, by four different people in four different countries. The papers that revealed the conclusion to the Bosch deception.
The incredible secret papers.
Paper Twenty-Nine
The boy lies in his winding sheet
But feels no earth upon him.
The sacking holds no man.
And then the last:
Paper Thirty
Let no man living know of this. Let chimeras and
his devils keep him company, let angels keep him safe.
I who watched his torment
set him to be a free man.
Soli Deo Gloria.
Hieronymus Bosch had not perished in 1473. This time, his father and the Church had been duped. While believing him dead, he had, in fact, been freed. Nicholas liked to believe it was Goossen, his brother, who had helped him, but he would never know the truth. Just as he would never know where Hieronymus went, what he did, or how he lived. His life was a secret, like so many others’; but unlike others, he had cheated the grave.
Nicholas folded the papers, replaced them in the envelope, and pushed them deep into his pocket. As instructed in writings centuries old, he would keep the secret, as he had kept so many others.
Soli Deo Gloria, he thought, walking on. Yes, Glory be to God alone.
Bibliography
Belting, Hans, Hieronymus Bosch: Garden of Earthly Delights (New York, Prestel, 2002)
Bosing, Walter, Bosch: c. 1450–1516, Basic Art series (Los Angeles, Taschen, 2000)
Devitini Dufour, Alessia, Bosch: Master of the Grotesque – His Life in Paintings (London, DK Publishing, 1999)
Fomin, G., Hieronymus Bosch (Moscow, 1974)
Franger, J., Hieronymus Bosch (Dresden, 1975)
Gibson, Walter S., Hieronymus Bosch (London, Thames & Hudson, 1985)
Harris, Lynda, The Secret Heresy of Hieronymus Bosch (Edinburgh, Floris Books, 2002)
Koldeweij, Jos and Vandenbroeck, Paul, Hieronymus Bosch: The Complete Paintings and Drawings (New York, Harry N. Abrams, 2001)
Linfert, Carl, Masters of Art: Bosch (New York, Harry N. Abrams, 1989)
Zeri, Federico, Bosch: The Garden of Earthly Delights, One Hundred Paintings series (NDE Publishing, 2001)
Painting of Europe, XIII–XX Centuries, Encyclopedic Dictionary (Moscow, Iskusstvo, 1999)
The Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia, 6th edn. Copyright ©2012, Columbia University Press. All rights reserved.
National Gallery information, London
