Twelve

After breakfast, during which Bridget said not a word, she told Merle to go up to her room, and to play with her hare, until she came home again.

Merle obeyed, her eyes wide with wild imagination.

*   *   *

Bridget walked up and down the hill, to the western side, and straight around to the side door of Eric’s church.

She found him, still sitting in the chair, in front of the painting.

She put her hand to his cheek, gently, and then snatched it away. He was cold.

There was no sign of violence, or other harm, and she knew that he had died from grief.

In his hand, was a thin, worn, well-loved paintbrush.

*   *   *

She gently reached back again, and closed his eyelids, shutting their final dead view of his masterpiece, the masterpiece for which he had given everything.

For which he had sacrificed himself.

*   *   *

Suddenly there were footsteps, and Merle ran into the room.

“You didn’t make me promise,” she said.

“Oh, darling, come here,” Bridget said, and they rushed into each other’s arms, the small girl understanding some of what was going on, and feeling the rest.

They stayed that way, for a long time, and then Bridget straightened.

“Well, we’ll have to try and sort things out,” she said, but Merle wasn’t listening.

Then Bridget looked at the paintbrush in Eric’s hand, and now she saw what she had missed before.

The brush was still wet.

“Look, Mommy,” Merle said, pointing at the picture.

Bridget looked toward where Merle had spotted something.

Something had changed.

*   *   *

The vast splendid horror of the painting remains, but there, in the background, is a new figure. Standing on the gallery, just behind the king, leaning around a pillar, only half visible, is the face, the shoulder, and the arm of a small girl. She’s holding an apple out toward the king, placing it on the balustrade of the gallery.

She looks toward the king, smiling.

Her face is unmistakable.

It is Merle.