Alex Van Helsing The Triumph of Death - By Jason Henderson Page 0,51
again.
“While you were out, we got more from Madrid.” Sangster indicated the image of the painting on the screen. “Remember how the painting was tampered with? There were at least two other places in the painting where colors had been changed. One in the bottom corner—the blue skirts of the lover. And two more—a red cloak made blue around the center, and another cloak made blue in the upper right.”
“So a lot of cloaks altered to be blue,” Alex said.
“Exactly.” Sangster looked at Alex, watching him. He hit a button on the table and said, “I’m sharing an image with you guys.” At once a quarter of the screen filled with another painting, this one a strange, colorful image of countless figures in a medieval courtyard. Alex read the caption underneath. “Netherlandish Proverbs.”
“Same painter as The Triumph of Death: Pieter Bruegel, 1562. But this painting has another name besides Netherlandish Proverbs.”
Alex read the smaller text underneath the name. “The Blue Cloak.” Alex searched the painting. There had to be thirty or forty characters, walking, trading, talking, taking care of animals. It was a busy street scene. “Why is it called The Blue Cloak?”
Amanda, who had taught art history as recently as last year, spoke up from her side of the room. “The painting is a visual collection of famous sayings. For instance there’s a guy petting a chicken, and that stands for ‘being a hen feeler,’ which was another phrase for ‘Don’t count your chickens before they hatch.’”
“There’s your cloak,” Alex said, finding the image of a woman standing behind a man, putting a blue cloak over his head.
“To put the cloak over someone was to deceive them, to pull the wool over their eyes,” said Amanda.
“Okay.” Alex had given up trying to argue that their faith in the riddle-makers might be misplaced. It was all they had for now. “So the alterations the Strangers made to The Triumph of Death lead us to The Blue Cloak. Is this clue telling us something about deception?”
“Well, The Blue Cloak is about deception.” Sangster swiped his hand and brought up The Blue Cloak, aka Netherlandish Proverbs on the main screen. “But that’s not the mystery.”
“And there is a mystery?”
“There is indeed. Art historians have identified no fewer than forty different sayings in the painting. Every detail—every animal and every prop means something in this painting. Except that there is one strange item that doesn’t seem to fit. This hoe.” Sangster zoomed the image to the center right area, until an image of a garden hoe without a handle lying on a table came into view.
Alex mused. “What good is a hoe without a handle? Isn’t that what it means?”
“Sure, if you want to guess, but the rest of these are all extremely deliberate. There isn’t any Netherlandish proverb about a hoe without a handle.”
“And there’s more,” Armstrong offered.
“What is it?” Alex asked. “I mean, forty actual sayings and you’re focusing on the non-saying?”
Mother Laura nodded. “What did Byron tell you about the curse?”
Alex searched through what they had learned from Byron before he got Alex’s goat and managed to escape. He closed his eyes, shifting everything back, bringing the problem to the front. “‘Only love can conquer death.’ He said if I were casting the spell he could stop me because he knew who I loved.”
Laura said, “The one the user loves best is the best weapon against him.”
“Well,” Alex said, “Claire loved Byron. And she’s going to get him back, because we just set him free.”
“And of course”—Laura nodded toward the image of the child—“there is another, greater love.”
“When Claire traveled to Russia and secretly joined Hexen,” Astrid said, “she remained convinced that her daughter could be restored to her. She was obsessed with the idea that Byron had maybe even secreted away the little girl.”
“We have letters,” Sangster went on, “from the embalmer to Byron, demanding to be paid. He thought Byron was a complete jackass who wasn’t even willing to come visit his daughter. The body was sent back without Byron even looking at it.”
“So the Triumph is really Claire’s way to raise her daughter from the dead,” Alex said.
Sangster countered, “And it also means her daughter is the best weapon against her.”
“So we can stop Claire by using someone who Claire loves—we can make a weapon, maybe. Maybe with DNA,” Alex said excitedly. “From the bones of Allegra.”
“You mean a weapon like this?” Armstrong set down something on the table that looked like a starter gun with a