I Am Rembrandt's Daughter Read Online Free PDF

about me that he tossed a secondhand name my way when I was born? Cornelia was the name of his first two daughters by Titus’s mother. Both died young, within days of their birth. Though it is customary to name girls after their grandmother, after the second death, one would begin to think about the luck that name carries. I do.
    The front door opens. I hide my book under my apron. With Titus gone, it could only be Neel. Sure enough, he leans his head into the kitchen.
    A grimace of apology flashes across Neel Suythof’s long face before it resumes its somber appearance. “Hello, Cornelia.”
    It would not put him in the grave to smile once in a while. If he did, the faded marks left on his neck by a childhood case of the pox would be almost unnoticeable. He might never be as handsome as the golden-haired boy at the wedding, but then, who is?
    “Hello, Neel.”
    Tijger strolls over to him to beg a petting. Neel bends down to stroke him. “Have you heard from Titus yet?”
    “No, and I do not expect to.”
    He regards me soberly over Tijger’s loud rumbling. “How was the wedding?”
    I shrug. Maybe it hasn’t gotten around yet how Vader brought bad luck upon his own son’s marriage.
    There is a look of sympathy in Neel’s plain brown eyes. It makes me uncomfortable.
    “You miss Titus,” he says.
    “Why would I miss him? He is a grown man. He is supposed to be wed. And Magdalena was quite the catch.”
    A roar comes again from upstairs: “TITUS!”
    I roll my gaze to the ceiling. “Apparently, someone does miss Titus.” I untie my apron and slip out from under it with my book still hidden, leaving both on my stool. I ladle soup into a cracked bowl. “Here, take him his dinner, would you?”
    “TITUS, LAD!”
    Neel looks up, too, as if he could see Vader through the ceiling. “Does he not know Titus is not here?”
    “The question is, has he ever figured out that I am here?”
    Neel gazes at me.
    I should have never spoken out. Neel Suythof needs not know what goes on in our family. Let him be starry-eyed over his hero. He might be the last person in Amsterdam to admire Rembrandt van Rijn.
    “Just take him his dinner, please.”
    Neel’s hand brushes mine as he takes the tray from me. I rub my hand as he leaves the kitchen, Tijger following after him. Of course Neel’s touch is warm—he is alive, isn’t he?
    A few moments later, Neel plods back down the stairs to the kitchen. “Your vader said the soup needs salt.”
    There was a reason I had skimped on salt—to put a name on it, poverty—but I cannot tell Neel this. If he realized how low Vader’s star has sunk, he might quit his lessons, then where would we be? Neel’s measly stuivers mean bread on the table.
    I hand him the saltcellar. “Be careful not to spill it,” I say, as if I were the adult and he the child.
    “As you wish, madam.”
    I look at him and see a hint of a smile in his eyes. His lightheartedness surprises me. “Vader’s waiting for his salt,” I say gruffly.
    The cheer goes out of his face. “Of course.”
    I frown at my apron on the stool as he goes back upstairs. Why must I always do the wrong thing, like pretending to look at an old lady when the handsome boy caught me staring at him at the wedding? Neel the Serious almost smiled and I struck him down.
    I hear the front door open. Titus bounds into the kitchen.
    “Worry Bird!” He grabs me and swings me around until I knock over my stool. My book flaps to the floor. He beats me to picking it up. “ The Marriage Trap ?”
    “You should read it,” I say, blushing fiercely. “To see what a predicament you are in. What are you doing here, anyway?”
    “Bird, you are harsh. And why would I not be here? This is my home.”
    “Was your home.”
    He puts on a mock-sad face. “I am not welcome here, and apparently, I am trapped in marriage. Whatever am I going to do?”
    The crabbiness in which Neel has left me only deepens. I shall be as much of an ogre as Vader