He is looking at me with such intensity, head cocked again to one side, that finally I can do nothing but laugh myself. The earnestness, mingled with the absurdity of his milk-white feet jutting from his flannel breeches, it is all too much. This is the effect of the Thames running in and out a man’s ears for the better part of a lifetime.
“You try a man’s patience,” the lark continues, and he seems utterly serious.
Which is about all I can stomach of his insolence. “Off with you,” I tell him. Suddenly I stomp my boot on the cobbles, and he flinches, actually bringing a hand up to shield himself, taking a quick step back.
And then, as the mad are wont to do, he becomes suddenly solicitous, as though the heavens were about to come crashing down upon him, and only my advice could save him. He is all but wringing his hands now.
“I should go about my business, then?” he asks plaintively. “Find my place and stick to it?”
“Always good advice,” I answer, resuming my unhurried movement back up Cornhill, “for a young man who would avoid the gallows.”
THE WEATHER HAS turned genuinely vicious by the time I finish the deliberate stroll up the Strand. The wind and the rain now have real bite; although it is late July, one can feel winter teething. Every fourth merchant seems to have shirked his duty to light the street; every fourth cobblestone seems to sink under my shoe, driving up needles of muddy water. But the wet stockings and shoes are nothing, less than nothing.
Within the half hour, I will know precisely what James and Johnson have to say to me, and what they have to say to one another of me.
And these are the only things that matter.
St. Mary’s is entirely dark, not a lamp to be seen inside the looming mass. From the iron fence surrounding the churchyard, one would think it was Somerset House across the way that claimed to be the holy place, the sanctuary for seekers: light pours from the central arch and forms a brilliant semicircular pool there in the street. You could almost dip it with your cupped hands.
And I suppose the Turk’s Head Coffee-House—last in the row of dull brick buildings adjoining the Somerset arch—could be a tiny, subsidiary refuge, for it too sheds light and the voices of men audibly pleased with their situations. The house’s white window frames glow as though newly painted, and from where I stand I can see nearly all of the common room through them, certainly all of the space that could conceal my brother and his now more-or-less tame bear.
To be expected: they are lounging by now in their private room on the second floor, oblivious to all else.
Still, a thick knot of men stands before the fireplace, and I watch them through the window for just a moment to make sure they are all who and what they seem to be, mere idlers and hogs of the fire. Finally, as the woman of the house pushes her bulk through them to tend the coffee pot, they break up and turn and show me their faces and then re-form, never ceasing their empty conversations. They are none of them worth my consideration.
And so when I enter, I look at no one and I speak with no one. A few patrons perk up when the bell atop the door sounds, but seeing only a vague young man of twenty or so, unattractively soaked through, they quickly go back to their coffee and tea and port. I pause only to brush the water from my sleeves and to strip off my hat, and then I walk directly though the place, heels knocking on the planks, as though I have an errand to complete. And of course I do.
Before an instant has passed, I am walking down the dim hallway to the Turk’s Head kitchen, and I would bet a hundred pounds that not one man in the common room could bring my face to mind tomorrow, should he be asked. I have always been less noticeable than my father and brother, but since leaving Plymouth I find I am all but invisible. Light passes through every part of me but the red coat.
Invisible to everyone, that is, but the lady of the house. She is setting down a congealed platter of Welsh rarebits when she catches sight of me, and she all but drops the silver in her haste to come to my side. A boy of eight or nine sweeping beans from the floor looks up at me standing in the doorway, curiously, but the woman pushes his head down to his task as she passes.
She comes up to me, wiping meaty hands on a soiled apron, eyebrows raised knowingly, and a smile playing about her lips. This woman—whose dark glossy hair and sad green eyes were no doubt fetching when she was a slip of twelve—is another of Johnson’s charity cases, of course. He frequents her house and brings all of his acquaintance here because she is a good, civil woman, in his estimation, and needs the custom. He is determined to lift her house single-handedly into profitability.
And for that—because Johnson has offered her his very public attention and concern—I wanted very much to dislike the widow, Mrs. Parry. I was certain she took his aid for granted. But having come twice in the last week to discuss the details of tonight’s festivities with her, I have seen that no creature could be more fawningly grateful, more utterly in awe of the great man. There is more than a little of the pleading spaniel about her, a fat, mooning, greedy spaniel.
And that has allowed me not merely to dislike her, but to go most of the remaining distance to hating her.
“They are here, sir,” she stage-whispers, “settled in above, just as you wished. They called for their favorite room almost to the second when you said they would.” Her eyes are actually crinkling with pleasure, which is understandable. As coffeehouses go, this one is well aired, but yet it is a dull life of boiling grounds and scavenging coppers. Not tonight, though.
Because tonight I have offered her the chance to plan a surprise birthday party.
It isn’t the sort of party she might plan herself, and there are a few aspects of it that she would have otherwise, but in the main she is delighted to be my co-conspirator.
I show my own teeth and raise my own eyebrows. “That is most excellent news, Mrs. Parry. One hates to have a party spoilt. And you’ve reserved the other two rooms, as we discussed?”
She is nodding before I’ve finished my sentence, so eager is she to demonstrate compliance. “Everything up the stairs is your own, sir, all the three rooms together. I’ve never understood why the gentlemen prefer the room to the back rather than the room over the street, which has a lovely lookout over the Strand. But I suppose it’s the carriage wheels and the dust. I’ve placed the roast hen and the other things in the empty room, as you wished, and I’ll be taking the gentlemen their meal directly.
“And I’ve just ten minutes ago taken them the bottle of port. Their first bottle was standing just half empty on the table, just as you wished, sir. They were surprised to see the second, for they hadn’t rung, but says I, it comes from an admirer of Mr. Johnson’s, and he did look so very pleased. Most evenings the gentleman drink just the one bottle of port, and then maybe a pint more if they’ve a mind to set to it. Mr. Johnson looked as if he might send it away,” the mooning green eyes widened, as though Johnson’s displeasure were the worst of all possible worlds, “but when he knew it was a gift, from a man who admires all his books and wonderful writings, well, sir. You could see he looked so very pleased.”
A thought occurs to me looking down at her, the plump face shining with sweat. “Have you read Mr. Johnson’s work, Mrs. Parry? Any of his wonderful writings?”
She actually drops her head. “No, sir. I haven’t, to speak truth. Oh, I am terrible, sir.” Her thoughts move slowly enough from one side of her mind to the other, before reaching her lips, that one can almost track their shambling progress beneath the brunette coils. “I can read, though, as could my husband, and I will read the Good Book of a morning. And my husband would read his Bunyan, whilst he lived.”
“Do you not know, then, for what particular book it is that Johnson is renowned above all others?”
A pause. “No, sir.”
“Truly? You’ve never once heard it mentioned?”
The eyes are wide now. But she shakes her head.
I cannot keep the disbelief out of my voice. “It is the Dictionary, Mrs. Parry.”
I can tell that my words will elicit a long, stumbling apology— for her careless reading, for her faulty education, for who and what she is—and it is something I can certainly do without. And so I move things along. “But let us talk literature another day. You will remember, madam, that we will have guests this evening, a goodly number, though I cannot say at the moment precisely how many.” A significant pause then, my eye directly on hers. “And as I indicated when last we spoke, some of those guests will be women, and some of those may be women with whom Mr. Johnson would not wish publicly to be associated. We understand one another, madam.”
As I say, she does not like this particular aspect of the surprise party—has not since I mentioned it in passing last week—but for all her protestations of moral rectitude, Mrs. Parry understands that in addition to paying her well last week, I will pay a good deal more this evening, and Johnson will pay well over the long term.
And no doubt these women of ill repute would not be the first in her private rooms, if we were in fact to entertain any this evening.
In any event, she nods, lips a little tight. So much for the decency that Johnson lauds in her. But then, if she has been lowered in my eyes, Johnson has been lowered in hers. We are all in good company, then.
“Excellent. To review, as you serve the gentlemen their meal, I shall come up the stairs behind you and slip into the empty room beside their own. Once you’ve satisfied them and they have no further commands, you will exit, leaving the key with me, and I will lock the oak door to the stair as you go down. My guests will be coming up the back stair, which you showed me and which seems entirely private and suited to the purpose.
“Should we need anything more than the food and drink already upon the table, I will come downstairs personally to request it. Otherwise, we are to be left strictly to ourselves. No prying eyes or peeping toms. Mr. Johnson will be highly displeased if his very uncharacteristic night of revelry becomes the subject of public sport.”
She is shaking her head, eyes on the floor. “Never, sir. Not in my house. I’ve told my other waiter, and young Michael, that they mustn’t venture up the stair. Private party, I’ve told ’em both. Private is private, I’ve told ’em.”
I put my hand on her shoulder, and I can feel the heat of the big body beneath it, like the lathered flank of a Shire workhorse. “But think, Mrs. Parry,” I go on, in the most soothing voice I can manage, “do think how grateful Mr. Johnson will be when I tell him tonight, on our walk home, the clever way you managed the details of the affair with me. Nothing so moves a man as an attention paid upon his birthday. You shall have his heart forever.”
She is pleased enough to forget the nymphs up the back stair, and a genuinely lovely rose blush steals over her features. “We do try our best here, sir. And thank you for your kindness to him. God love you for it, sir, truly.”
She reaches out very hesitantly, to touch my sleeve, which I allow.
“Not at all, Mrs. Parry. After all, a man is fifty but once.”
Which is true, with the notable exception of Samuel Johnson, who actually turned fifty just shy of four years ago, but who—in the mind of Mrs. Parry, and the Lord God willing—will turn that momentous corner once again tonight.
As I a m closing the door to the stair behind her, Mrs. Parry spins unexpectedly about and looks up at me, in order to exchange one last secret wink, and it is all I can manage to wink back at her. But then she is gone, her big hams and feet working the flaking staircase like a concertina as she goes.
I turn the key in the lock and place it in my vest pocket. And in the sudden quiet I can hear them, talking. Or, rather, it is Johnson I can hear, the insistent bass vibrations of the voice working their way through the thin walls.
Wrapping my fist about the door’s knob, I give it a silent experimental pull. I have already tested it earlier in the week, when I inspected the upstairs rooms with Mrs. Parry, but there is no shame in reassuring oneself. It is a good door, this, solid oak, newly fitted up. A man might batter his way through it with the proper tools, but it is thick enough to defeat even the largest and most determined shoulder.
Treading lightly, I turn and make my way along the narrow passage. It is decently lit by a single lamp midway down. A thread-bare green carpet snakes down the heart of the passage, tacked pragmatically to the floor, and I can move all but noiselessly.
Not that I worry overly much about noise. For all James and his guest know, the other chambers on this floor will be occupied with other drinkers, as are they ordinarily. They have no idea that I’ve taken possession of the rooms surrounding them, of the entire floor. It is a surprise party, after all.
Before me lie four doors. First on my right, the door to my own empty chamber; then on my left, a smaller, colder room for which I have no use this evening; and then, finally, the room containing James and Johnson, their bottles of port, their fire, their beefsteaks, the culmination of their lovely day’s excursion together.
And away beyond their chamber—directly opposite me—the door leading to the house’s back staircase. This door gives me not nearly the satisfaction of the first: it is a paneled door, thinner, and rattles a bit in its frame. Still, it has a lock, and I have the key, and once I’ve used it I retrace my steps down the passage with decent confidence.
My own chamber is prepared as specified: the meal sits cooling upon the board, a bottle of wine stands open, a second unopened but at the ready, and a pretty range of glasses has been laid out for my guests. A tidy fire plays in the grate.
It would be an admirable little welcome for guests, if any were expected; but even so, here are all my needs of the next half hour very adequately met. I have not eaten for hours, and only the Lord knows how long it will be before I have the chance again. So I must sup. And of course the curiosity to hear their conversation as I do so is overwhelming. Fortunately, no amanuensis is necessary here—I have had the table placed near the wall connecting this chamber to James’s. And as I sit down to my meal, I can hear their voices clearly enough to follow their conversation.
James is speaking of our family—bragging of it, that is to say, and of the family seat at Auchinleck, the newly built house and the Old. His voice is a bit higher in pitch and lower in volume than Johnson’s, and so I merely manage to follow the drift. But I have heard him speak at length many times of those he invariably refers to as our “venerable ancestors,” and I would guess that he has been speaking now for the better part of half an hour on the subject.
But when Johnson’s voice booms, I hear every word.
“I must be there, sir,” Johnson insists, “and we will live in the Old Castle; and if there is no room remaining, why then we will build one.” And then the two of them go about the business of planning the inconceivable: a trip together to Scotland, which Johnson claims to detest, and particularly the family’s Auchinleck estate, which James claims to love.
It is a thing I could not have imagined. As I listen, I can feel the anger suddenly stirring its limbs inside me again. It makes my breath come short and the blood suddenly charge in my veins.
I have an impulse to pick up the chair next to me and dash it against the wall, to throw the two of them into a panic, to let them know their words have immediate consequences.
Still, it won’t do to approach the most delicate part of the evening in a rage. Too much planning has gone into the day, and too much may still be gained.
I take off my coat and force myself instead to begin eating the meal laid out for me, tearing into the chicken and wolfing it silently down, but without a trace of satisfacti
on as I do so. The meat seems to drop into my stomach and away from me somehow, without ever lessening or reaching the hunger. Of the wine I drink little, a sip here or there, nothing to dull the senses or the reflexes.
And I cannot help but brood and simmer. It is not enough that they would claim the Town as their own and publicly deny me any share in its more exquisite pleasures. It is not enough that the two of them have thrown me only private scraps of friendship, never acknowledging me in the light of day to one another, or to their host of powerful friends. Not enough that of the entire city of London, they have left me the run of a single room beside a damp, stinking stable.
Now they are laying plans to work the same neat trick at Auchinleck, my own home. To make me a stranger there as well.
I listen to Johnson’s voice filling the room next door, and I cannot help but wonder: Can there be two Samuel Johnsons, in fact, stalking the streets, haunting the coffeehouses? Two rough citizens, twins for all the world, yet one so ferocious and unreachable, the other so very present and kind and near?
WE MET FIRST on London Bridge, yes, but after that he knew where to find me, and that he might find me, when he would.
Up Fish Street Hill, through the disheveled courtyard of the Starr Inn, and past the stable he would come, every week or so, late at night, once he had laid his own domestic menagerie to sleep, salved his conscience with a visit to the blind Mrs. Williams—then would Johnson come and knock softly.
And I would open the door to him, for reasons not so different from those motivating my brother: Johnson and I were also necessary to one another. We were also two fractions who had somehow stumbled onto the secret of the whole number, though another number entirely, of course.
The Brothers Boswell Page 19