Читать книгу Tennyson’s Gift - Lynne Truss - Страница 8

‘Have some more tea,’ said Tennyson airily, by way of distracted greeting, not glancing up from his book.

Looking around, Ellen was delighted by the idea of refreshment after such a long and dusty journey, but then kicked herself for falling for this terrible old chestnut. It was the usual thing. How could you take more tea, if you had taken no tea already? Yes, the Tennyson table was set for an outdoor repast, with plates and cups and knives, but drat their black-blooded meanness, it was just for show: there was nothing on the board save tableware. Not a sausage for a tired and thirsty theatrical phenomenon to wrap her excellent tonsils around.

Nothing will come of nothing, as any true-bred Shakespearean juvenile will tell you. As she crossed the dappled lawn behind Watts, and surveyed the view of ancient downs beyond, Ellen wanted to jump on the table and render some funny bits from A Midsummer Night’s Dream; it was a marvellous setting for theatricals. But instead she made her formal salutes to the older ladies and Mr Tennyson (who squinted at her rather horribly) and turned her thoughts inward, where at least they were safe.

Yes, nothing will come of nothing; nothing will come of nothing. Wasn’t that a mathematical principle as well? Hadn’t a kindly mathematician once explained it to her? Yes, he had. That was in the days when she was adored, of course; when members of her audience threw flowers at the stage, and ‘came behind’ after. When her face glowed in limelight; when people looked right at her, instead of politely askance. This mathematician – it was all coming back – she had met after her very first performance. As the infant Mamilius in A Winter’s Tale, at the age of only eight.

It all seemed so long ago now, and what was the point of the reminiscence? Oh yes, the mathematician. By means of some pretty, nonsensical example, this Mr Dodgson (for yes, it was he) had proved to her that whichever way you did the sum, the answer was nothing, nothing, nothing, every time.

Ah, Mr Dodgson! Where was he now? If she had chosen to remain on stage, all London would be hers to command, and she would moreover pocket sixty guineas a week to spend independently on food and lodgings and full-priced books without proverbs in them. How mad of her to quit the stage for Old Greybeard here, with his borrowed home and empty flat pockets. And how cruel to her public. Mr Dodgson, for one, would be repining in the aisles. She looked at Watts, and gave him an encouraging smile, but her heart wasn’t in it. For thirty years among patrons and well-wishers this husband of hers had soaked up endless quantities of love, money, praise and time, yet still had none to give in return; did the multiply-by-nothingness principle apply to marriage, too? If it did, her continued love for him was like one of his terrible pictures: the triumph of hope over mathematics.

It was a curious fact, remarked on by many visitors to Farringford, that whatever time you arrived for dinner, you’d missed it. The same, it now appeared, applied to tea. Emily Tennyson had long ago adopted the ‘every other day’ principle of home economics, and found that it suited well. Pragmatically, the poet’s boys hung around other people’s houses at teatime, eyeing the jam tarts – proof enough, surely, that they were not mad. Dimbola Lodge was a good spot for cadging food, which was why the boys were at Dimbola now, in all probability – sucking up to Mary Ann, and telling her how lovely she looked as ‘The Star in the East’ or ‘Maud is Not Seventeen, But She is Tall and Stately’. Hallam and Lionel (but particularly Lionel) had learned quickly that Mrs Cameron rewarded good looks with sweets, so the Tennyson boys spent much of their time away from home, carelessly showing off their charming profiles in her garden, and flicking their girly locks. Lionel was an absolute stunner.

Mrs Cameron was however at Farringford this afternoon, to greet Watts and Ellen in a flurry of shawls and funny smells, and fervent greeting.

‘Il Signor! Il Signor!’

Watts loved this kind of devotion, of course, and acknowledged it with a bow. He felt no obligation to return it.

Though the Wattses were guests at Dimbola, Mrs Cameron had conceived this pleasant notion of meeting them at Farringford after their journey. For one thing, in the garden at Farringford the roses were not all half-dead (and dangerously flammable) from the recent application of paint. Also, Watts and Tennyson were mutual admirers, with matching temples and pontiff beards, and Mrs Cameron loved to witness their hirsute solemn greetings for the aesthetic buzz alone. ‘The brains do not lie in the beard’ was an adage with which she had always argued. And beyond all this was a more pragmatic reason for the Farringford rendezvous: it was an excuse to see Alfred in the afternoon, when he had somehow forgotten to come in the morning.

Chairs from the banqueting hall had been arranged around a table on the wide green lawn, in the shade of the ilex, and if the furniture was a peculiar assortment, this only reflected the odd people sitting in it – Mrs Tennyson silent and gaunt in black, her beady eye alert for gentlemen of the Edinburgh Review lurking in the shrubbery, Watts already asleep with his head on the table, Mrs Cameron hatching benevolent schemes and waving her arms about, and Tennyson preoccupied, in his big hat, speaking in riddles.

Ellen took off her own hat, patted her golden hair and sat down gingerly in a sort of throne at the head of the table. Her real impulse was to kick off her shoes, let her hair down and shout, ‘Bring me some tea, then,’ but in the company of this particular set of grown-ups, who often scolded and belittled her, she found herself too often at fault. They even disapproved of pink tights: she was clueless how to please them. So, her throat rasping for want of refreshment, she played a game of onesided polite conversation she had recently taught herself from a traveller’s handbook left by Mr Ruskin at Little Holland House. And nobody took the slightest notice.

‘My portmanteau has gone directly to Dimbola Lodge,’ she announced (with perfect diction, as though speaking a foreign language). ‘My husband and I will travel there later also. It is only a short walk. My parasol is adequate although the sun is strong. Are you familiar with the Dordogne? Our journey from London was comfortable and very quick.’

No one said anything. Not a breath stirred. In the far distance, childish voices on the beach could be heard mingled with the crash of waves, piping like little birds in a storm. Watts emitted a snore, like a hamster.

‘The bay looks delightful this afternoon,’ she continued. ‘I hope there will not be rain. The Isle of Wight has the great advantage of being near yet far, far yet near. Rainbows are not worth writing odes to.’

Nothing. Bees hummed in the shrubbery, and Watts made a noise in his throat, as though preparing to say something.

At this stirring from the dormant male, Mrs Cameron signalled at Ellen to hush her prattling.

‘Speak, speak, Il Signor!’ urged Mrs Cameron, grandly.

But Watts did not speak, as such. Rather, he intoned. ‘An American gentleman on the boat to Leghorn,’ he said, ‘lent me without being asked eight pounds.’

He resumed his slumber, and Mrs Cameron nodded shrewdly as though a great pronouncement had been made. Tennyson continued to read his own poetry silently, with occasional bird-like tippings of the head, to indicate deep thought.

‘At what time do we arrive at the terminus?’ Ellen persisted, her voice rising a fraction. ‘I have the correct money for the watering can. You dance very well, do you know any quadrilles? No heavy fish is unkind to children. Will you help me with this portmanteau, it is heavy. I require a view with southerly light. Please iron my theatrical costumes. This gammon is still alive. Northamptonshire stands on other men’s legs. Phrenology is a fashionable science. Would you like to feel my bumps?’

It was at this point, when Ellen was just beginning to think she would not survive in this atmosphere for another instant, that she spotted a dapper figure in a dark coat and boater dodge nervously between some trees in the garden. Behind him ran a little girl in a pinafore.

‘That man is behaving very curiously,’ she said aloud. But since this exclamation might have been just a further instalment of her phrasebook speech, no one glanced to see what she was talking about. Ellen, however, burned with curiosity.

Tennyson looked up from his book, but luckily did not notice the intruder. So wary was he of fans and tourists (‘cockneys’) that he had once run away from a flock of sheep in the belief they were intent on acquiring his autograph. In fact, even after the mistake was pointed out, he still maintained that they might have been.

‘George Gilfillan should not have said I was not a great poet,’ he finally announced, in an injured tone.

Emily sighed. She didn’t know who George Gilfillan was – indeed nobody knew who George Gilfillan was – but she had heard this complaint a hundred times. Gilfillan’s opinions of Tennyson’s poetry had somehow eluded her vigilance. Meanwhile, a hundred yards away, between the trees, the curious man had frozen to the spot, gazing at a pocket watch.

Emily tried to recruit Julia to her cause.

‘Really, Alfred, you must forget Mr Gilfillan, he is of no consequence. And besides, to repeat bad criticism of yourself shows no wisdom. Yet you do it perpetually. What of the many fine words written in your praise? What of the kindness and approbation of the monarch? It is too vexing. The Chinese say that the wise forget insults as the ungrateful a kindness.’

Julia murmured her approval. ‘And apart from all that, you should be a man, Alfred, big fellow like you,’ she said. ‘People will say there’s no smoke without fire, if the cap fits!’

She tried to think of more suitable clichés. Watts beat her to it.

He opened one eye. ‘The more you tramp on a turd, the broader it grows,’ he remarked.

Julia patted his hand. ‘Thank you for that, Il Signor,’ she said. ‘There never was a man more apt with a vivid precept. We shall have dinner at Dimbola later,’ she added, in a comforting whisper. ‘With food.’

‘Kill not the goose that lays the golden egg,’ he said, and closed his eye again.

To Tennyson in full flow, however, all this talk of broadened turds was mere interruption.

‘He should not have said I am not a great poet,’ he continued. ‘And I shall prove it to you. Listen to this:

With blackest moss the flower-plots

[note the way “moss” and “plots” suggest the rhyme; a lovely effect, do you think you could do it?]

Were thickly crusted, one and all:

[“crusted” is a fine word here]

The rusted nails fell from the knots

[“knots” rhymes with “plots”, you see; “crusted” with “rusted”]

That held the pear to the garden wall –

‘Peach,’ interjected Mrs Cameron, dreamily.

‘I beg your pardon.’

‘Did I speak? Yes, I do apologize, Alfred, I did speak without meaning to. It’s just that the line is, That held the peach to the garden wall.’

‘No, it isn’t.’

‘I ought to know, Alfred! It’s your Mariana. I recite your Mariana to myself every day of my life! I make a point of it!’

‘You do?’ asked Emily, quickly. Julia gulped. She suddenly realized what she’d said.

‘Well, perhaps not every day,’ she laughed, hoping to make light of it. ‘And not because it means anything, of course.’

Tennyson huffed. He wanted to press on with the recital. But Emily was not to be put off.

‘But that’s very curious, Julia. Why do you recite Mariana? I can hardly think of anybody less like Alfred’s Mariana than yourself, my dear. She is all passivity and tranquillity. You do not die for love, surely, Julia? For whom do you wait, aweary, aweary, wishing you were dead? It is quite the antithesis of your lively character!’

Julia pulled a shawl tighter, and stirred a cup furiously, which was an odd thing to do, because there was nothing in it.

‘Well –’ she began, but Alfred huffed again. He had no idea what was going on.

‘She recites Mariana, my dear, because it’s a very fine poem, of course! What an absurdly simple question! I am surprised you could not guess it!’

And he flung himself back in his chair, quite satisfied. ‘Now, where was I?’ he said, and resumed his book. ‘At peach,’ insisted Julia, spiritedly. ‘Pear,’ he rejoined.

‘Peach.’

‘Pear.’

‘Peach.’

‘Stop!’ snapped Emily. ‘You must explain yourself, Alfred.’

Tennyson shut the book.

‘You are right, Julia. The word was “peach”. I changed it.’

‘You did? When?’

‘I don’t know. Recently. “Pear” sounds better, as I think you will agree.’

Emily silently practised peach-pear-peach-pear, and then pear-peach-pear-peach.

‘But you wrote Mariana in 1830, Alfred,’ exclaimed Julia. ‘That’s thirty-four years ago. Why don’t you leave it alone? Thousands of people have learned it as “peach”.’

‘She’s right,’ mumbled Watts, his contribution so unexpected that the others jumped. Tennyson blinked in confusion and looked behind him. He clearly had no idea where the noise had come from.

‘It is still my poem, Julia. I can do what I like. You might say that I like what I do, and I do what I like.’

‘But you gave Mariana to the world –’

‘I did no such thing.’

‘You published it, Alfred.’

‘That’s quite different.’

Tennyson scowled, and changed the subject. He looked away from the table altogether.