poisoning. Can you enlarge on that for me?’
‘Oh . . . yes, of course. That is rather strange, isn’t it, in the light of what’s happened?’ He paused, as if debating how to go on. ‘She was studying the Pre-Raphaelites for her PhD. How much do you know about them?’
‘They were a group of nineteenth-century English painters, weren’t they?’
‘And poets, yes. The 1840s and ’50s, the first avant-garde movement in art, something of a sensation at the time—young men breaking the mould, that kind of thing. Their program was to reform art by going back to the fifteenth century, before it was corrupted, hence their name.’ He was interrupted by his phone ringing. ‘Excuse me.’ He picked it up. ‘Hello? Colin, hi, we were just talking about you. I’m sitting here with Inspector Kolla now . . . Yes, sure . . . You still on for tonight? . . . Great. I’ll call you back later. Bye.’
He smiled at Kathy. ‘Sorry about that. Where were we?’
‘The Pre-Raphaelites.’
‘Oh yes. Well, they and their circle—wives, lovers, models—were a fairly sickly lot. I don’t know if they were more so than the average Londoners of that period, but it’s a striking feature of their story. Dante Gabriel Rossetti’s wife Lizzie Siddal was a chronic invalid; she died of an overdose of the laudanum she was medicating herself with. His lover Janey, William Morris’s wife, was also sickly, and Rossetti himself eventually went barking mad, sharing his house in Chelsea with a menagerie of kangaroos, wombats and armadillos.’
He was more relaxed now, slipping into the familiar account he might have entertained students or dinner guests with many times before.
‘Now, it’s conceivable that arsenic had something to do with all that. One of the revolutionary things about the Pre-Raphaelite painters—Rossetti, Millais, Holman Hunt and the others—was their use of the vivid new pigments that the chemical industry had recently developed, especially a brilliant green called Emerald Green, or Paris Green, made from arsenic. People were shocked by the blazing colour of their paintings, made possible by these new pigments—later the Impressionists used the same colours to achieve their dazzling effects—but they were quite dangerous. The painters absorbed the pigment through their skin, they breathed its fumes and held paintbrushes loaded with it in their mouths. It’s said that arsenic poisoning from Emerald Green was the cause of Monet’s blindness and Van Gogh’s madness. It was Cézanne’s favourite colour, and he developed severe diabetes, a symptom of chronic arsenic poisoning.’
It was developing into a lecture, and Kathy interrupted. ‘How does Marion fit in?’
‘Ah, well, yes. Marion found all this rather fascinating. Too fascinating, really.’
‘How do you mean?’
‘It seems a little churlish to criticise her scholarship at a time like this.’
‘I’d appreciate a frank opinion; I believe you’re the world expert on this subject.’
Da Silva chuckled, letting her know he recognised outrageous flattery when he heard it, and didn’t mind in the least.
‘Marion was one of the brightest doctoral students I’ve ever had. She was extremely serious about her work, applied herself very diligently. She was quite passionate about her ideas. Rather too much so. It is a classic trap for a scholar to become too attached to a pet theory before all the evidence is in. Marion could be quite headstrong, and ambitious too, desperate to break new ground,achieve new insights. It sometimes made her rather extravagant in her formulations. I had to keep trying to rein her in.’
‘Can you tell me what her particular ideas about arsenic were?’
‘Oh . . .’ He flapped a hand, his sigh almost a groan. ‘She tried to extend what was probably just their ignorance about the dangers of paint pigments into a whole philosophy. She speculated that the Pre-Raphaelites cultivated a fascination with death,
‘Oh . . . yes, of course. That is rather strange, isn’t it, in the light of what’s happened?’ He paused, as if debating how to go on. ‘She was studying the Pre-Raphaelites for her PhD. How much do you know about them?’
‘They were a group of nineteenth-century English painters, weren’t they?’
‘And poets, yes. The 1840s and ’50s, the first avant-garde movement in art, something of a sensation at the time—young men breaking the mould, that kind of thing. Their program was to reform art by going back to the fifteenth century, before it was corrupted, hence their name.’ He was interrupted by his phone ringing. ‘Excuse me.’ He picked it up. ‘Hello? Colin, hi, we were just talking about you. I’m sitting here with Inspector Kolla now . . . Yes, sure . . . You still on for tonight? . . . Great. I’ll call you back later. Bye.’
He smiled at Kathy. ‘Sorry about that. Where were we?’
‘The Pre-Raphaelites.’
‘Oh yes. Well, they and their circle—wives, lovers, models—were a fairly sickly lot. I don’t know if they were more so than the average Londoners of that period, but it’s a striking feature of their story. Dante Gabriel Rossetti’s wife Lizzie Siddal was a chronic invalid; she died of an overdose of the laudanum she was medicating herself with. His lover Janey, William Morris’s wife, was also sickly, and Rossetti himself eventually went barking mad, sharing his house in Chelsea with a menagerie of kangaroos, wombats and armadillos.’
He was more relaxed now, slipping into the familiar account he might have entertained students or dinner guests with many times before.
‘Now, it’s conceivable that arsenic had something to do with all that. One of the revolutionary things about the Pre-Raphaelite painters—Rossetti, Millais, Holman Hunt and the others—was their use of the vivid new pigments that the chemical industry had recently developed, especially a brilliant green called Emerald Green, or Paris Green, made from arsenic. People were shocked by the blazing colour of their paintings, made possible by these new pigments—later the Impressionists used the same colours to achieve their dazzling effects—but they were quite dangerous. The painters absorbed the pigment through their skin, they breathed its fumes and held paintbrushes loaded with it in their mouths. It’s said that arsenic poisoning from Emerald Green was the cause of Monet’s blindness and Van Gogh’s madness. It was Cézanne’s favourite colour, and he developed severe diabetes, a symptom of chronic arsenic poisoning.’
It was developing into a lecture, and Kathy interrupted. ‘How does Marion fit in?’
‘Ah, well, yes. Marion found all this rather fascinating. Too fascinating, really.’
‘How do you mean?’
‘It seems a little churlish to criticise her scholarship at a time like this.’
‘I’d appreciate a frank opinion; I believe you’re the world expert on this subject.’
Da Silva chuckled, letting her know he recognised outrageous flattery when he heard it, and didn’t mind in the least.
‘Marion was one of the brightest doctoral students I’ve ever had. She was extremely serious about her work, applied herself very diligently. She was quite passionate about her ideas. Rather too much so. It is a classic trap for a scholar to become too attached to a pet theory before all the evidence is in. Marion could be quite headstrong, and ambitious too, desperate to break new ground,achieve new insights. It sometimes made her rather extravagant in her formulations. I had to keep trying to rein her in.’
‘Can you tell me what her particular ideas about arsenic were?’
‘Oh . . .’ He flapped a hand, his sigh almost a groan. ‘She tried to extend what was probably just their ignorance about the dangers of paint pigments into a whole philosophy. She speculated that the Pre-Raphaelites cultivated a fascination with death,
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