She seemed so earnest, I found it impossible to refuse. Although aware of the mounting time pressure, I pushed through the beaded curtain and entered the small antechamber I’d seen earlier from the other side of the room where Maja’s skeletal remains were housed in the oblong box. The lighting was different here. The clinical glare of white-tinted halogen globes showed up every pore and freckle on the face of the figure positioned at the centre of the room. If it weren’t for the uncanny stillness, the mannequin could have been a real person. Crinkled blonde hair plaited into two braids hung either side of her face and her cheeks and nose were florid, as if burned by the wind or sun. Her blue gaze held me captive, burning with a fiery intensity. There was a certain wisdom in those eyes that seemed to be at odds with her extreme youth and reminded me strongly of Anneke.

A white, keloid scar over her left eyebrow was the only outward indication of any physical damage, but the story of her fate echoed inside my head. If I lifted her woollen tunic, would I find her celluloid skin peeled back, the soft flesh ruptured by the deadly tip of a spear? When she ran out onto that muddy battlefield for the last time, did she have any inkling what the future might bring? Did she pray to some higher power to grant her immortality, sensing that her remains would one day inspire this modern curio of plastic skin and teeth? Maja’s bones had lain hidden for a thousand years until a team of people prised them out of the earth and set about piecing together the clues of her life and death. Anna Tesseltje and Catharina van Shurman died so long ago, their bones were nothing but dust. A silk dress was all that connected them to each other and to the world of 17th-century Holland. Liam might be happy with a premature media announcement, but Anna and Catharina deserved better. I was not ready to relinquish control of the project just to soothe Liam’s wounded ego. We would simply have to keep digging for the truth.

9

Anna

An hour before Maarten Horst and his wife are due to arrive for the first portrait sitting, Crispijn stands up from the breakfast table and announces he is leaving.

‘Where are you going? When will you return?’ Catharina demands to know. She flicks back the bell-shaped sleeves of her painter’s smock and rotates her wrists impatiently, peering through the open doorway of the breakfast room into the entrance corridor as if she can already hear voices.

‘I’m destined for Amsterdam,’ Crispijn says, pulling on his riding gloves. He turns to Anna. ‘You may contact me there, if you need me. I’ll be staying with my good friend Doctor Wijck. He is the night-sky enthusiast I told you about.’