Deliver Us From Evil (A. Shaw 2)

“Pretty grim,” he said to Reggie as a sad tune filled their ears.

“That’s The Third of May 1808,” she said, gesturing to the painting depicting French soldiers firing on defenseless Spaniards. “It commemorates Spanish resistance to Napoleon’s invasion of their country.”

“Were you an art history major?”

She shook her head. “No, just interested in it.”

Reggie stared at the man in the white shirt in the portrait, his

arms raised in either surrender or, more likely, defiance. His eyes captured the full horror of his situation. He and everyone around him were about to die. “When I told Waller that Goya was hardly an uplifting artist he said something strange.”

“What was that?”

“Though he agreed the paintings were bleak, he said they were also powerful insights into the human soul. And he said something that really gave me a chill.” She hesitated, as though she simply wanted to drop this thread of conversation.

“What did he say, Janie?” Shaw prompted.

“He said that the potential for evil lurks in everyone.” She turned to Shaw. “I told him I didn’t believe that. Do you?”

When Shaw didn’t answer right away, she said, “Never mind. It doesn’t matter.” She looked over at the painting again. “This piece actually inspired later works by Manet and Picasso. People slaughtering other people. What an inspiration.” Reggie wrapped her arms around herself and shivered. The temperature had dropped thirty degrees as soon as they passed through the entrance to the quarry and stepped inside the Cathédrale d’Images, as it was known.

The next section of the exhibition was from when an older Goya had become deaf and ill, reportedly suffering from a disease that was destroying his mind. The so-called Black Paintings were nightmarish in scope. A set of aquatint prints titled The Disasters of War were equally horrifying. After that came the piece titled Saturn Devouring His Son. It showed a monstrous, disfigured creature eating a headless, bloodied torso.

“I wonder if they give out free Valium when you exit this place,” said Shaw, only half-jokingly.

“It’s important to see this, Bill,” said Reggie.

“Why’s that?”

“If we don’t we’ll just keep repeating the same mistakes over and over. War, violent death, misery, all man-made and preventable.”

“Well, we seem to keep making the same mistakes anyway.”

“Were you ever in the military?” she asked suddenly.

“No.” With a completely straight face he added, “The closest I ever came to battle was being in paintball fights in college.”

“Lucky you.”

“Yep, lucky me.”

The last painting was Courtyard with Lunatics. As Reggie explained it, the piece portrayed the unfortunate inmates in a sixteenth-century asylum. She stood stock-still staring at the images. When Shaw glanced over at her, he saw a tear rolling down her cheek.

“Hey, Janie, maybe we should get back to daylight and have that nice lunch in Saint-Rémy.”

She didn’t appear to have heard him. When he touched her on the shoulder, though, she jumped and turned to him. Her eyes were reddened and moist.

Choosing his words carefully he said, “Do you know someone—I mean not in a place like that, of course—but someone who had some… issues?”

She didn’t answer him, but turned and walked back through the space. After a moment he hurried after her. She stopped in front of the first painting on exhibit, The Nude Maja. The naked brunette was lounging on a chaise, her hands clasped behind her head.

“I have to say, that’s more my taste in paintings,” said Shaw. “At least over the flesh-eating monster back there.”

“It’s amazing how they’re able to display these images on the walls.” Reggie’s eyes had dried and her voice had returned to normal.

“Well, they probably just use basic projection equipment, maybe even like a computer PowerPoint thing.”

“So, pretty easy to do, actually?”