The Flanders Panel

“Bearing in mind that we’re walking a tightrope of five centuries, I agree with Cesar. It’s very likely that the key does lie in the chess game. As for ‘necavit’ meaning ‘took’ as well as ‘killed’, that never occurred to me.” She looked at Cesar. “What do you think?”

Cesar sat down at the other end of the sofa, and, after taking a small sip of gin, crossed his legs.

“I think the same as you, love. I think that by directing our attention from the human knight to the chess knight, the painter is giving us the first clue.” He delicately drank the contents of his glass and placed it, tinkling with ice, on the small table at his side. “By asking who took the knight, he forces us to study the game. That devious old man, Van Huys, who I’m beginning to think had a distinctly odd sense of humour, is inviting us to play chess.”

Julia’s eyes lit up.

“Let’s play, then,” she exclaimed, turning to the painting. Those words elicited another sigh from Cesar.

“I’d love to, but I’m afraid that’s beyond my capabilities.”

“Come on, Cesar, you must know how to play chess.”

“A frivolous supposition on your part, my dear. Have you ever actually seen me play?”

“Never. But everyone has a vague idea how to play.”

“In this case, you need something more than a vague idea about how to move the pieces. Have you had a good look at the board? The positions are very complicated.” He sat back melodramatically, as if exhausted. “Even I have certain rather irritating limitations, love. No one’s perfect.”

At that moment someone rang her bell.

“It must be Alvaro,” said Julia, and ran to the door.

It wasn’t Alvaro. She came back with an envelope delivered by a messenger. It contained several photocopies and a typed chronology.

“Look. It seems he’s decided not to come, but he’s sent us this.”

“As rude as ever,” mumbled Cesar, scornfully. “He could have phoned to make his excuses, the rat.” He shrugged. “Mind you, deep down, I’m glad. What’s the rotter sent us?”

“Don’t be nasty about him,” Julia said. “It took a lot of work to put this information together.”

And she started reading out loud.

Pieter Van Huys and the Characters Portrayed in “The Game of Chess”:

A BIOGRAPHICAL CHRONOLOGY

1415: Pieter Van Huys born in Bruges, Flanders, present-day Belgium.

1431: Roger de Arras born in the castle of Bellesang, in Ostenburg. His father, Fulk de Arras, is a vassal of the King of France and is related to the reigning dynasty of the Valois. His mother, whose name is not known, belonged to the ducal family of Ostenburg, the Altenhoffens.

1435: Burgundy and Ostenburg break their vassalage to France. Ferdinand Altenhoffen is born, future Duke of Ostenburg.

1437: Roger de Arras brought up at the Ostenburg court as companion in play and studies to the future Duke Ferdinand. When he turns seventeen, he accompanies his father, Fulk de Arras, to the war that Charles VII of France is waging against England.

1441: Beatrice, niece of Philip the Good, Duke of Burgundy, is born.

1442: Around this time Pieter Van Huys painted his first works after having been apprenticed to the Van Eyck brothers in Bruges and Robert Campin in Tournai. No work by him from this period remains extant until…

1448: Van Huys paints Portrait of the Goldsmith Guillermo Walhuus.

1449: Roger de Arras distinguishes himself in battle against the English during the conquest of Normandy and Guyenne.

1450: Roger de Arras fights in the battle of Formigny.

1452: Van Huys paints The Family of Lucas Bremer. (His finest surviving work.)

1453: Roger de Arras fights in the battle of Castillon. The same year he publishes his Poem of the Rose and the Knight in Nuremberg. (A copy can be found in the Bibliotheque National in Paris.)

1455: Van Huys paints Virgin of the Chapel. (Undated, but experts place it at around this period.)

1457: Wilhelmus Altenhoffen, Duke of Ostenburg, dies. He is succeeded by his son Ferdinand, who has just turned twenty-two. One of his first acts would have been to call Roger de Arras to his side. The latter is probably still at the court of France, bound to King Charles VII by an oath of fealty.

1457: Van Huys paints The Money Changer of Louvain.

1458: Van Huys paints Portrait of the Merchant Matteo Conzini and His Wife.

1461: Death of Charles VII of France.

Presumably freed from his oath to the French monarch, Roger de Arras returns to Ostenburg. Around the same time, Pieter Van Huys finishes the Antwerp retable and settles in the Ostenburg court.

1462: Van Huys paints The Knight and the Devil. Photographs of the original (in the Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam) suggest that the knight who posed for this portrait could have been Roger de Arras, although the resemblance between the character in this painting and that in The Game of Chess is not particularly marked.