Margot suffered in the days that followed. The first snow fell and Vincent was forced to work in his studio. The Begemans would not allow Margot to visit him. From the moment she got out of bed in the morning until she was permitted to feign sleep, she was forced to listen to tirades against Vincent. She had lived with her family for forty years; she had known Vincent only a few months. She hated her sisters, for she knew they had destroyed her life, but hatred is one of the more obscure forms of love and sometimes breeds a stronger sense of duty.
“I don’t understand why you won’t come away with me,’ Vincent told her, “or at least marry me here without their consent.”
“They wouldn’t let me.”
“Your mother?”
“My sisters. Mother merely sits back and agrees.”
“Does it matter what your sisters say?”
“Do you remember I told you that when I was young I almost fell in love with a boy?”
“Yes.”
“They stopped that. My sisters. I don’t know why. All my life they’ve stopped the things I wanted to do. When I decided to visit relatives in the city, they wouldn’t let me go. When I wished to read, they wouldn’t allow the better books in the house. Every time I invited a man to the house, they would rip him to pieces after he left so that I could never look at him again. I wanted to do something with my life; become a nurse, or study music. But no, I had to think the same things they thought, and live exactly as they lived.”
“And now?”
“Now they won’t let me marry you.”
Much of the newly acquired life had gone out of her voice and carriage. Her lips were dry, and the tiny flesh freckles under her eyes stood out.
“Don’t worry about them, Margot. We will marry and that will be the end of it. My brother has often suggested that I come to Paris. We could live there.”
She did not answer. She sat on the edge of the bed and stared down at the floor planking. Her shoulders turned in a crescent. He sat beside her and took her hand.
“Are you afraid to marry me without their consent?”
“No.” Her voice was without strength or conviction. “I’ll kill myself, Vincent, if they take me away from you. I couldn’t stand it. Not after having loved you. I’ll kill myself, that’s all.”
“They wouldn’t have to know. Do it first and tell them afterwards.”
“I can’t go against them. They’re too many for me. I can’t fight them all.”
“Well, don’t bother fighting them. Just marry me and that will be the end of it.”
“It wouldn’t be the end. It would be the beginning. You don’t know my sisters.”
“Nor do I want to! But I’ll have another try at them tonight.”
He knew it was futile, the moment he entered the parlour. He had forgotten the chilling air of the place.
“We’ve heard all that before, Mijnheer Van Gogh,” said the sister, “and it neither convinces nor impresses us. We have made up our minds about this matter. We want to see Margot happy, but we don’t want her to throw her life away. We have decided that if at the end of two years you still want to marry, we will withdraw our objections.”
“Two years!” said Vincent.
“I won’t be here in two years,” said Margot quietly.
“Where will you be?”
“I’ll be dead. I’ll kill myself if you don’t let me marry him.”
During the flood of, “How dare you say such things!” and “You see the sort of influence he’s had on her!” Vincent escaped. There was nothing more he could do.
The years of maladjustment had told on Margot. She was not nervously strong, nor was her health of the best. Under the frontal attack of the five determined women, her spirits sank lower and lower with each passing day. A girl of twenty might have fought her way out unscathed, but Margot had had all the resistance and will beaten out of her. The wrinkles showed on her face, the old melancholy returned to her eyes, her skin went sallow and rough. The line on the right side of her mouth deepened.
The affection Vincent had felt for Margot evaporated with her beauty. He never really loved her or wanted to marry her; now he wanted to less than ever. He was ashamed of his callousness; that made him all the more ardent in his love making. He did not know whether she divined his true feelings.
“Do you love them more than you do me, Margot?” he asked one day when she managed to escape to his studio for a few minutes.
She shot him a look of surprise and reproach. “Oh, Vincent!”
“Then why are you willing to give me up?”
She cuddled into his arms like a tired child. Her voice was low and lost. “If I thought you loved me as I love you, I would go against the whole world. But it means so little to you . . . and so much to them . . .”
“Margot, you’re mistaken, I love you . . .”
She laid her finger gently on his lips. “No, dear, you would like to . . . but you don’t. You mustn’t feel badly about it. I want to be the one who loves the most.”
“Why don’t you break away from them and be your own master?”
