Читать книгу The Skull and the Nightingale - Michael Irwin - Страница 12

Having written three times to my godfather I was anxious for a reply. During my years abroad he had sent me no more than occasional acknowledgements of the long letters I had written. He said enough to show that he had read my words attentively, but offered no news of his own. This practice had suited me at the time, but I now looked for something more. I had offered Mr Gilbert several kinds of matter, and needed to know where I had come closest to meeting his expectations. I resolved to send one further message of safely general description and then remain silent until I had received a response:

My dear Godfather,

Here is a brief epistle on a single theme. On Monday last, in the garb of a tradesman, I undertook my longest expedition so far, beyond Tower Hill and the rotting-fish stench of Billingsgate to the docks, wharves and warehouses of Wapping. Hereabouts one sees an astonishing sight: the Thames bristles with the masts of a thousand merchant ships of every size and condition. How the movements of these vessels and the unloading of their cargo are overseen and controlled I cannot conceive. Yet somehow order is derived from this chaos.

The riverside quarter seethes, correspondingly, with activity as relentlessly purposeful as that of bees or ants. To walk and watch here is to apprehend by instant conviction what everyone knows as a general truth – that the Thames is the vital tap-root of our capital city. If the mouth of the river were to be blockaded London would shrivel and decay like a dying tree. Through this channel the city takes in the produce of the whole known world – foodstuffs, fabrics, gold, diamonds, timber and stone – to be adapted and dispersed in accordance with its own needs and practices.

In the country – in your own Worcestershire – there is a familiar annual progress as nature’s energies erupt from the earth – for example in the form of grass to be translated by farm animals into meat, milk, wool and leather. In London such rhythms are half forgotten: an insatiable city gulps down an unending variety of goods from the ends of the earth.

It is a mighty undertaking and a mighty spectacle. However, this trading has a darker side. The river is no longer the silver ribbon of poetry, but a turbid black-brown stream, the water thickened with filth. It is to be hoped, but also to be doubted, that the copious sewage of the city flows out to the open sea as surely and regularly as the merchant ships sail in. When the tide retreats the river-banks are seen to be strewn with every sort of civic detritus from sodden rags, bottles and wood-fragments to animal carcasses.

On shore, in the warehouses and counting-houses, commerce is visible as a living thing. Goods are translated into guineas, and guineas into goods – a reciprocal exchange with the life-sustaining regularity of a heartbeat. Regrettably, however, the corporal metaphor does not end there. The vitalizing activity generates refuse as the river itself does. One sees rats and beggars searching through the rubbish for leavings to devour. But more dangerous creatures haunt these streets and alleys, parasites on trade: smugglers, pilferers and robbers. The district is a world in itself, and a perilous world, where one must be perpetually on guard. But it excited me: I must learn more about it.

Yours, &c.

There intervened an encounter that was for a time to distract my attention from my dealings with Mr Gilbert. I was in Piccadilly, near Hyde Park. Wrapped about in a drab great-coat I could have been taken for a merchant of the middling sort. No doubt it was for that reason that Catherine Kinsey, Sarah’s aunt, was able to pass within two feet of me without so much as a second glance. Pulling my hat over my brows I turned about and followed her at a small distance. If she had been alone I would have greeted her, but she was walking, and conversing, with another woman of similar age and respectability. They turned left, and left again, into Alcott Street, where they parted. Mrs Kinsey’s companion continued on her way; she herself entered the front door of a house on the corner with Margaret Street.

I lingered outside it with a pounding heart: surely I had tracked Sarah down. Yet my exhilaration was tempered by curiosity. This was a fine street of handsome new buildings. If the Kinseys lived here they had dramatically risen in the world. Might they have inherited money? It was perhaps as well that, dressed as I was, I could make no further approach at this time: I needed to present myself to better advantage.

Next morning I came to the house in gentlemanly guise. To the maid who answered my knock I said that an old acquaintance of Mrs Kinsey, Richard Fenwick, newly returned to London, had called to pay his respects. I was left on the doorstep for some little time before a carefully rehearsed reply was brought to me. Mrs Kinsey sent her compliments. She would be very pleased to see Mr Fenwick, but particular circumstances prevented her from doing so that morning. She hoped that I might be able to call at the same time on the following day.

So it came about that I was duly ushered into her presence twenty-four hours later. Even before we spoke I had observed that the interior of the house, its curtains and furnishings, confirmed the impression conveyed by its exterior: it seemed that Mrs Kinsey had prospered extraordinarily since I had last spoken to her.

She had always been an affable lady. Our exchanges were warm but brief, speedily resolving into the very situation for which I had scarcely dared to hope. Mrs Kinsey informed me that she was unexpectedly called away, but was sure that I would be pleased to meet her niece once more. After bows and courtesies the lady departed, and Sarah came in.

I felt an instant sense of shock. Here was the Sarah I had known, but changed in every way for the better. She was more expensively and elegantly dressed, she moved more gracefully. What seemed to be a slight thinning of the cheeks and an enhanced brightness of the eyes elevated her face from its former prettiness into positive beauty. Above all there was a confidence in her manner that lent her a striking animation. In the past she had been subject to an instinctive diffidence, although capable of sudden directness and rebellious wit. Now these underlying traits were in the ascendancy. As we exchanged greetings and sat down she looked me in the eye and seemed to be suppressing a smile.

I had some airy opening remarks prepared: ‘… regretted loss of contact … my own fault … warm memories … would hope to renew …’

Her reply was concise: ‘I am pleased to see you again, Mr Fenwick. I was here yesterday when you called, but the circumstances were a little awkward. So I arranged to visit again this morning when I knew you would be here.’

‘To visit?’

‘Why yes. This is my aunt’s house.’

‘Then you—?’

‘I live in Margaret Street. I am married, Mr Fenwick.’

‘Married?’ I was trapped in the interrogative mode.

‘I was married last September to Mr Walter Ogden.’

She was easy and terse, in full command. It was necessary to rally a little: ‘I have known you well enough to forego formalities. How did this come about?’

‘I met Mr Ogden last July, through the merest chance.’

I tried, with indifferent success, to sound quizzical rather than sour: ‘A swift courtship. Mr Ogden must be a man of considerable charm.’

‘Determination was the decisive quality. Mr Ogden is a man of strong will.’

‘Would I like him?’

‘I hardly think so. Two men could hardly be more different.’

‘In what respect?’

‘In most respects. He is a particularly serious man.’

‘A solemn one?’ I ventured.

She considered the suggestion serenely, and then smiled.

‘Perhaps a little.’

‘Are you laughing at him?’

‘I do laugh at him sometimes – but only behind his back. I do not care to vex him.’

‘You make him sound formidable.’

‘And so he is.’ She paused, before adding lightly: ‘He deals in diamonds. For that reason he was untroubled by my own lack of means.’

‘Indeed.’ I sought a new direction: ‘Did you ever mention me to him?’

‘I mentioned that I had been visited at one time by a genteel young man of uncertain prospects.’

‘Did that disclosure disturb him?’

‘Not the least in the world.’

Disappointed and obscurely resentful in several ways at once I could find nothing further to say. It was left to Sarah to resume the conversation: ‘Since we are being so unfashionably plain with one another, may I ask about your own situation. I take it that your Grand Tour is at an end?’

‘It is. I returned last month. Thanks to the generosity of my godfather I am now a licensed man about town – at least for a year or two.’

‘Then it would seem that we are both provided for.’

Was there a hint of bitterness in her voice – the faintest of hints?

It was my turn to look her in the eyes. ‘This has become a particularly candid conversation.’

She held my gaze. ‘Each of us now knows how the other is placed.’

‘You have been able to marry into prosperity. Perhaps it was as well that our correspondence had lapsed.’

‘It must be in some such way that most friendships fade.’

I stood up. ‘I must congratulate you on your good fortune – and leave you.’

She rose in her turn, with a slight flush, and spoke in an altered voice: ‘I should not like us to part in this vein.’

‘In what vein, Mrs Ogden?’

‘Cold, bright, false. I would not wish to seem unfeeling. We have been close, you and I …’ Her voice quickened: ‘But we were both left ill-provided for, and so have had to make our way in the world as best we can.’

On the way home, and indeed for several days following, I found myself discomposed. Who could have foreseen that Sarah would already have a husband, and a rich one, and that marriage would have given her such assurance. My feelings were oddly diverse. It had been disconcerting to be thrown on to the defence by a woman I had once patronized. I was stung by the instant dissolution of what had become a gratifying fantasy compounding tender feeling and ruthless seduction. And I felt that I had undervalued this handsome, cool young lady. Mr Ogden had shown himself a shrewd judge, and captured a wife who would do him credit, even if, as I was determined must be the case, she had married him merely to secure her future. Common sense told me that Sarah must be happier as the wife of a wealthy man than as the lover of an adventurer with uncertain prospects, but I was unwilling to be persuaded. The best bargain I could make with myself was to see this lost chance as a source of half-pleasing melancholy. I made shift with this notion since I had much else to occupy me, but it was clouded with resentment and unease: I had lost a point of moral anchorage.

Since April showers were frequent I was often indoors, where I did a good deal of writing. In addition to drafting of letters I was keeping a new journal as a quarry of possible epistolary material. Sometimes I would sing, and sometimes write facetious verses – a diversion I had enjoyed during my travels. I remained on friendly but formal terms with my landlady. Only gradually had I learned that her husband had been Mr Gilbert’s tailor, and had died of a fever when she was expecting their first child, her daughter, Charlotte. Through the agency of Mr Ward my godfather had intervened on her behalf, securing the house in which she lived on condition that he could make use of it from time to time.

I had regular conversations with her, and found her agreeable company. If I asked a blunt question she would give a direct reply. When I inquired, perhaps impertinently: ‘What are your pleasures, Mrs Deacon – what do you live for?’ she thought for a moment before saying: ‘Charlotte; reading; thinking; friends; coffee; and conversation.’ She had a quietly assured manner, and would sometimes quiz me in her turn: ‘If circumstances had been different, Mr Fenwick, what profession would have suited you?’ ‘Are you of my opinion, that men can be as vain as women?’ ‘Could you make shift on a desert island, like Robinson Crusoe?’

I had scarcely noticed Charlotte during my previous stay in the house; she was now some twelve years of age, a shy girl with dark hair. I cannot recall how it came about, but one wet afternoon I played chess with her. Knowing myself to be a moderately skilful performer, and thinking to be indulgent, I was so negligent that she defeated me with ease. By way of compliment to her prowess I was more serious in a return match, only to be a second time defeated. We had yet one more game. By now on my mettle I tried my hardest, but was beaten yet a third time. Charlotte showed no exultation at these triumphs, but thanked me for playing with her, and retired. Despite the humiliation I was glad to have stumbled upon this unexpected show of talent: it had always pleased me to find people unpredictable. Mrs Deacon later told me that, although an indifferent player herself, she had taught Charlotte the game and had been astonished by her aptitude for it.

It occurred to me that I could simply spend more time in Cathcart Street, inventing stories for my godfather – spinning a false life from my own brain – rather than walking the streets to grub out scraps of entertainment for him. But physical restlessness denied me that possibility. Although my rooms were well enough the ceilings were low, causing me to feel large and caged. It was a relief to go out.

My nether limbs were well exercised by these prowlings. When indoors I would at intervals strengthen my arms by lifting my desk or pulling myself up to a beam. The room must so often have been shaken by these exertions that I wondered whether Mrs Deacon might not feel some apprehension – perhaps even pleasurable apprehension – at being reminded of the presence of a vigorous male beast in her respectable house. She was still a handsome woman, and had manifestly lain with at least one man.

One evening, on impulse, I again went to dine at Keeble’s steakhouse. The talking fraternity being absent on this occasion, I was glad to sit at an empty table and think in peace. It was with slight irritation, therefore, that I became aware of another solitary fellow taking a seat opposite my own. To postpone conversation I kept my eyes on my plate. When I at last looked up it was to find myself confronted by the grinning face of Matt Cullen.

My immediate reaction was to burst into an immoderate fit of laughter, in which Matt joined me. Our fellow-diners looked around, puzzled and smiling, at the spectacle of two young gentlemen unaccountably helpless with mirth. I was delighted to encounter Matt once more, and to find him just as I remembered, long-limbed, an awkward mover, with an expression of sleepy good-nature, always on the brink of a smile.

‘I am the more surprised to see you,’ said I, ‘because Latimer told me that you had retreated to the country to undergo marriage.’

‘There was that possibility.’ He drew a slow sigh. ‘Both families favoured the union. But there was a fatal flaw in the scheme.’

‘That being?’

‘That being the absence of any spark of animal inclination in either of the parties principally concerned. Each could see the lack of desire so heartily reciprocated that we retreated by mutual consent, leaving our families incensed.’

‘Then what fresh hope has brought you back to town?’

‘A forlorn one. You see in Cullen a farcical parody of our old companion Ralph Latimer. I seek the patronage of the Duke of Dorset.’

‘On what grounds?’

‘On the grounds that I am a distant cousin and that I have played cricket with his son.’

The absurdity of it set us laughing again.

‘But what of your own case?’ asked Matt, as we resumed eating. ‘What have you been doing?’

‘I wrote to you from abroad.’

‘Two letters only, concerned with the exertions of a single bodily member. And here you are in London, apparently embarking on a new life.’

‘So my godfather has decreed.’

‘You may recollect that I know the gentleman’s name, having been brought up within forty miles of his estate. Mr Gilbert, is it not?’

‘It is.’

Suddenly feeling easy and reckless I cast aside my scruples.

‘You shall hear my story,’ said I, ‘and you will be only the second person to do so.’

I broached it along with a second bottle of wine. Matt leaned forward to listen, his face as nearly serious as I had ever seen it. I traversed the whole ground, from my first meeting with Mr Gilbert, following the death of my mother, through the years when I had divided my time between boarding school and my aunt’s house in York; thence to Oxford, my Grand Tour and the arrangement now agreed. When I had finished Matt shook his head.

‘A singular history,’ he said. ‘Mr Gilbert has been generous, yet you seem to describe a benefactor devoid of warmth.’

‘That is how he strikes me. He is studiously guarded in all he does. He sips at life.’

‘Has he no vices to make him human?’

‘None that I have observed. His daily life is as smooth as an egg. It affords the Evil One no hand-hold.’

‘Has he always been so cool? Did he never think of marriage?’

‘Not that I have heard. But I know little of his past.’

‘He must care for you to have done as much as he has.’

‘I would like to think so. But his kindness may derive solely from his friendship with my parents. I cannot tell. This is my problem, Matt: I must divert a man whose disposition I do not understand. I am locked into a strange game.’

Cullen washed down these observations with a gulp of wine, and pondered them for a moment or two, his features pursed up around his half-smile.

‘Might not this be a game with no loser? Mr Gilbert is pleased to give money to a promising young gentleman, and the young gentleman is pleased to receive it.’

‘I hope it may prove so simple. My godfather fancied that we might be led into “dark territory”. That was his phrase. Should I feel concerned?’

Matt smirked.

‘How gladly, Dick, I would take the same risks for the same money.’

My dear Richard,

I have read with interest the experiences you have described and your observations thereon. You have plainly been to no small trouble to record a variety of activities that might entertain me. I was surprised, however, to notice that you have apparently encountered no members of the opposite sex since your return to London.

Your general strategy I am happy to endorse. Indeed I will go further. I suspect that your account of polite society is likely to hold few surprises for me. To speak in general, I would rather hear more of Mr Crocker, who would appear to be something of an original, than of Lord Vincent and his coterie. It has become a matter of regret to me that, through some pressure of chance or temperament, my own youthful years in the capital were passed largely at that more respectable, and less entertaining, social level. For that reason I will tend to have a greater interest in the excesses, the follies, and even the shady underside of the town. Without leaving my comfortable country estate I look forward to being escorted to regions of experience that I could never have visited on my own. I hope that I will soon be hearing from you again.

I remain, &c.

I studied this letter with minute attention. Surely it was not merely confirming, but modifying, what amounted to my contract of employment? My respectable godfather wanted spicier tales than I had so far offered him. And was there not a hint that my role should be that of participant rather than mere observer?

Here was an appealing invitation to hedonism. Perhaps I should have warmed him with an account of my visit to Mrs Traill … But I was immediately aware that the fat worm that had been proffered might contain a fatal hook. It was scarcely to be expected that at some future date Mr Gilbert would say: ‘You have been so wholeheartedly lewd and dissolute that I am resolved to leave you every penny I possess.’ I needed a clearer understanding as to how far I might safely venture. But my general plan had been approved: there was some reassurance in that. And as it happened I was enabled to respond to my godfather’s fresh challenge almost immediately.

My dear Godfather,

I was very pleased to receive your letter. Your mention of Mr Crocker came opportunely: it is not two days since I learned more about that gentleman from Horn and Latimer, who have been acquainted with him for some little time.

He comes from the west of England. His late father, comparably huge, was a wealthy landowner. While a boy, Crocker was kept at home because of his unusual appearance, and was educated by private tutors. However he showed intelligence and spirit. When his father died, the young heir to the estate introduced a number of surprising features, including an aviary and an outdoor theatre. He hosted parties which became legendary in the county. Soon he was making sorties to London, where his wit and physical strength forestalled any attempt to treat him as an object of ridicule.

Latimer remains a little wary of him. ‘He is so much a physical oddity,’ said he, ‘as to have no clear place in society. His eccentricity may overflow into some excess of a dangerous kind. To know him is very well; but it would not do to be implicated in folly. There is tattle wherever he goes.’

Horn’s observations were more physical: ‘That great belly is a fantastical depository: they say he can piss a quart at a single discharge. Concerning the operation of his bowels I prefer not to speculate.’

‘That is a rare show of delicacy, Mr Horn,’ said Latimer. ‘I do know for a fact that he rarely stands upright for long – the strain is too great. If he falls he cannot easily rise without aid. Nor can he so much as pull on his own stockings, being unable to reach his feet. If one of them itches he must scratch it with the other.’

‘Worse than that,’ cries Horn. ‘I hear the poor devil has been unable to see his own pintle these five years, unless by means of a mirror. Yet it is known that he has appetites in that region also. He purchases the attentions of discreet and adept ladies.’

That night, at Latimer’s instigation, I attended Drury Lane Theatre. Our interest was less in the main piece, an insipid comedy, than in an accompanying pastoral interlude. The part of Ceres was taken by the actress Jane Page, whom Latimer has lately been cultivating. He invited my compliments, which were duly vouchsafed, for she is a stately creature, who can command the stage. To be frank, however, I had found my attention elsewhere engaged. The young lady who played the part of Celia, a shepherdess, was so graceful in her movements, so artless in her manner that I was quite transported by her. My imagination could even accommodate the absurd notion of serenading this rustic maiden on a green hillside in some lost world of innocence.

Afterwards Latimer played host to several of the performers, in hope of furthering his friendship with the goddess of plenty. It seemed to me that he enjoyed only moderate success in this enterprise. Miss Page acknowledged his compliments prettily, but conceded no more than trifling hints of encouragement. Also present, however, was Celia, the shepherdess, in the person of a young actress named Kitty Brindley. I enjoyed some decorous conversation with her. The air of pastoral innocence was now, of course, largely dissipated, but something of the illusion survived, because she proved to be indeed a young country girl, new to London and the stage. Might she have been artlessly enacting no other role than that of herself? I was so beguiled by the simultaneous claims of poetical imaginings and eager warmth below the waist, that I happily prolonged the self-deception. Indeed I came to feel that our encounter might be the prelude to others of a more-intimate kind. If this proves to be the case, you will receive a full account of what ensues.

I was lately cheered by a chance reunion with Matt Cullen, an Oxford friend. You may recall that I mentioned him, as coming from Malvern. In his company I can be comfortable.

Yours &c

Everything I had written was true: there had been no need for embellishment. The attractions of Kitty Brindley now served a double purpose: they distracted me from my regrets concerning Sarah and they promised to provide the kind of entertainment that Mr Gilbert seemed to have in mind.

I was enjoying my survey of London independently of its possible usefulness to my correspondence with Mr Gilbert. I was glad to have an occupation, instead of trifling away the time in the mode of Horn and Latimer. Already I knew far more of the town than they did. Everywhere I found fresh cause for curiosity. New houses, new shops, whole new streets, were coming into being. I would linger to watch builders at work and see houses rise from the earth with the slow persistence of plants. Properly considered, I told myself, the exertions involved were extraordinary. Ground plans were marked out with pegs and string. Cartload upon cartload of new-minted bricks were hauled in from distant manufactories by straining horses. Somehow a team of illiterate labourers, under minimal supervision, could raise walls straight and true, accommodating door or window, portico or chimney, as the architect had ordained. Everywhere I looked innumerable skills were collaboratively in operation – carpentry, tiling, plastering, the mixing of mortar, the laying of bricks, the cutting of glass – of which no Gentleman could claim the smallest knowledge.

The case was the same whatever professional activity I considered. From somewhere there came an endless supply of young men who could climb a mast, furl a sail, carve the corpses of sheep or pigs, forge metal, shape a carriage-wheel, bind a book, make a chair, a greatcoat or a wig. The class of Gentleman, in which I maintained a tenuous foothold, was dependent on all these skills yet serenely ignorant of them. How would I be placed if I should suddenly find myself penniless? My reassurance was that if the uneducated and often stunted labourers whom I had seen could learn a craft or a trade then no doubt I myself could do as much, if compelled by necessity. Perhaps there lurked within my still unformed personality a potential carpenter, architect or sea-captain. Although I hoped never to be put to the test, it was agreeable to fancy myself Protean.