Little Woman in Blue

by Jeannine Atkins

  “Your mother must be proud to have daughters who wouldn’t give up.”

  May thought she’d been wrong to choose such an intimate subject, and she changed it. “You haven’t told me much about your work.”

  “Our company arranges to ship ore from South America. We supply metals to scientists who want to make a new sort of gas lamp. They seek materials that will glow but not burn out when a current passes through. This electricity is being studied by Thomas Edison, an American. Do you know him?”

  “America is a big country.”

  “Yes. Someday I hope to visit.”

  “You must,” May exclaimed, then she made her voice even. “Please explain. I don’t understand how light can come from—nothing.”

  “The scientists have made clear glass bulbs, and they want to make filaments that will glow with heat, but won’t burn out like wicks. Imagine, no more smoky lampshades to clean.”

  His English was good, but she kept her gaze on his lips in an effort to understand his German accent, sounds that seemed to rise from deep in his throat. She asked, “Then you like your work?”

  “Only an American would ask that.” He laughed. “My job has less science than I hoped. I oversee numbers and correspondence. But I look forward to the evenings.”

  She shook her head again, aware the firelight might catch in her hair. “Do you want to play a game of chess?”

  He nodded, and they set a board on a hassock between their chairs.

  As the evenings grew longer and chillier, more people stayed by the hearth, which they kept feeding with logs. May and Ernst often played chess, a game just for two. When he leaned forward, she could smell the starch of his linen shirt. Sometimes their hands almost touched. It seemed harmless enough, a pleasant way to end long days of work. She sketched London sights and could now fetch sixty or seventy dollars for some Turner copies. She recorded her sale figures and purchases in a small notebook—every bit of lace, each thumbnail-sized block of paint, every sold picture. For the first time, the row of money coming in was more than what she spent. She wrote to her family saying that since she was making enough money to support herself, and wasn’t sure when that could happen again, at least not by selling art, she’d decided to stay through the fall and winter. She hoped they would understand.

  LATE ONE AFTERNOON, MAY RUSHED OUT OF A STORM into the boarding house anteroom, shaking cold rain from her skirt. Making her way around a jumble of drying umbrellas, she looked up to see Ernst, with his lovely mouth slightly open. Behind him, Harry Hammond sat on the stairs, bumping his way down.

  “Hello, my little chipmunk.” May crouched and opened her arms, but Harry didn’t rush toward her. His round face was curiously solemn. “My mum wants you.”

  May looked up to see her coming down the stairs, holding an envelope edged in black. As May tore it, a small, coiled lock of gray hair fell. Tears filled her eyes even before she read the note in Louisa’s hand: “Marmee is at rest.”

  May sank to the carpet, her skirts skimming around her. She threw her arms around Ernst’s knees and kept holding on as if his body held her to the earth. His fingertips lightly touched her head. She tried to stand, and she stumbled. He helped her to a chair, where she bent under the force of her tears. Why hadn’t Louisa or Father sent a telegram, or written more to her sooner? Why hadn’t she paid attention to the warnings?

  She excused herself and went upstairs to her room. She threw herself on her bed and sobbed. She’d never expected this; she should have expected this. Why did her mother have to die now, without May there to brush her hair from her brow? Had the portrait Rose painted reminded her mother of her or just her absence? Had she been glad about what May was doing or simply lonesome?

  In a while, Jane brought up a plate of beef with a roll and a tumbler of sherry sent by another concerned boarder. “Everyone sends their sympathy.”

  “Please thank them, and tell them I’m all right, but don’t want to be disturbed.” May asked her to bring back the food she couldn’t eat, then fell back on her bed. During lulls in her tears, she could hear soft footsteps that paused outside her door as if her sentinel were listening to be sure she breathed. She heard a whisper with a German accent, and the word alone.

  Alone. Had she ever really chosen that? What she felt that night, and through the following days, was less a longing to be by herself than finding she didn’t want to talk. She had no words for her exhaustion from all the things she hadn’t done. She couldn’t complain that she’d been sent away, for she’d made that choice herself. She reread Louisa’s letters and put the lock of hair on her mantelpiece, along with the note it had been folded between: “A talisman for you. All the silver Marmee left.”

  It took an effort to get out of bed in the morning and open her sketchbook. Even as she lifted her pencil, tears blurred her vision. She heard Harry race up and down the hall, then bounce a ball against her door, which she finally opened. He bolted in and announced that his mother didn’t feel well and he had nobody to play with. She helped him name the colors in her paint box and wound the crank on her music box so he could dance.

  That evening, she came down for supper. Afterward, she sat with Ernst in the common room. Her throat felt scraped as she said, “I was wrong. I don’t want to be alone.”

  “Of course not. Will you tell me about your dear mother?”

  “She was elderly, but she’d endured so much that I supposed she’d live at least ten more years. Still, I should have been there, making gingerbread. Such things gave her a little pleasure.”

  “She must have been glad her daughter saw lands she could not.”

  “I hope so. She was forgiving and strong. She loved music. I wish she could have heard you play the violin.”

  “She would have liked Mr. Edison’s invention. You turn a crank, like on a music box, but the phonograph is bigger. You can hear many kinds of music, not just one tune.”

  “Yes, she might have enjoyed that. She should have gone to more concerts. There was always so much plain sewing to do that she never had time for fancy work. She tended to potatoes and carrots, but she never grew roses. Did she really prefer lilies of the valley, or did she think she had no choice? At least she knew I’d had a picture in the Salon. But now that I’ve finally done something she can be proud of, she’s gone. Every painting I ever made, I wanted her to see.”

  “Miss Hughes told me you haven’t yet been to your studio. It was your work that kept you here. It would be wrong to stop.”

  “I don’t know what’s right or wrong.”

  But as the December days grew long and dark, she supposed it was foolish to stay upstairs, adding sticks to the fire, when she could sit by a shared hearth. Ernst read to her or played his violin while she sewed. The slightest motion of his slim, pale hands brought out deep and wildly varied notes, vibrations that soothed an ache inside her. He sang German lullabies in a low voice that seemed to tremble through her body. She looked up from her mending to his chiseled chin, his nose with its little dent near the top.

  Many people at the boarding house left for Christmas and New Year’s, but May arranged pine boughs around the picture of Mother on her mantel and was pleased that Ernst stayed in London, too. They often sat in the common room, where he talked about his seven sisters and one brother, who he deeply missed. At this time of year, his mother made star-shaped cookies or rolled ones filled with chopped nuts. He told May that he was becoming more frustrated with his job and was looking for one that might make better use of his talents.

  “My father runs a shop, where I used to help, and thinks I should be grateful for my good position. I could not be contented as he is selling cigars. The way of the future is with big stores, like Harrods, where busy modern women can buy clothing, medicine, perfume, fruits, and vegetables. Some ladies enjoy going from shop to shop, but working women like you want everything in one place.”

  “And don’t forget your music.”

  “I won’t. And you must promise me y
ou’ll paint.”

  The next day, May went to the studio, which seemed filled with so many memories and regrets that it was all she could do to stand still. She left after twenty minutes. But day by day, her breathing grew more even, and she stayed longer. Loneliness may have sharpened her vision, but her wrist and elbow didn’t move with its former verve or conviction. Nothing felt worthwhile, though she worked on another painting of the stuffed owl she’d brought from Paris, brushing on layers of oil paint and shellac to make the canvas darker and shinier. She planned to submit it to the Ladies Exhibition and perhaps the Salon, which would be accepting entries again soon.

  One evening, not for the first time, Ernst asked to see some of her work. She brought her old sketchbooks from France and Switzerland to the common room.

  “I have never seen the mountains as you’ve drawn them. And what charming chalets. And the goats!” He turned the pages enthusiastically, then stopped and frowned at one. “Who is this young man?”

  “He was the son of our landlady in Brittany.”

  “What odd clothing.” He flipped to the next page in her sketchbook, his mouth relaxing as his gaze fell on poppies in a churchyard. “These are as fine as anything done by Rembrandt. By Raphael!”

  “Such different artists.” May spoke quickly, to hide her pleasure in the compliment, though she thought she’d labored too long over the flowers, rendered too much detail, when the blossoms might be more recognizable as dabs of red. “One man is Dutch and shows some flaws in his portraits. The other is Italian and paints everything rosier than it can be.”

  “I’m afraid I know little about art. I haven’t been to Holland or Italy.”

  “There are paintings by Rembrandt and Raphael right here in the National Gallery.”

  “I’ve never been there either.”

  “When you’ve lived in London for months?”

  “Perhaps I’ve been waiting for the right guide. Will you show me around?”

  An outing seemed inappropriate while she was in mourning, but how could she refuse, when he’d been so kind? She put on a dress that was a brighter blue than those she’d recently worn, with a skirt gathered in puffs and rouches. She couldn’t help enjoying walking beside a man who was almost as tall as she was, whose cravat was almost the same plum color as his mouth, and whose shirt was probably from Charvet. He took her arm and kept it within his as they maneuvered down a crowded sidewalk to Bedford Square, where an old woman sold hot potatoes from a barrow. A one-man band held pipes under his chin, while beating his elbow on a drum worn on his back, clanging cymbals by tugging a string tied to his foot, and ringing a triangle. Ernst listened to a musician with a torn, baggy coat. He nodded in appreciation and dropped a few shillings into his open fiddle case. May stopped to watch a little girl raise her arm to toss a stone onto a hopscotch square drawn in chalk on the sidewalk. Her petticoat peeked from under her coat as she lifted one leg and hopped on the other. Landing on the last square, she triumphantly lifted her sharp chin.

  “See the sunlight caught in her hair?” May said.

  Ernst gently pushed her forward, so she wouldn’t block pedestrians. “Did your mother think twice before sending you on errands? You must have been gone for hours.”

  “I did get scolded for dawdling, but Louisa wasn’t any better. She’d come home with stories. Father often forgot altogether why he’d been sent out, and Beth was too shy to go. My poor mother had to rely on Anna.” She looked back at the girl who hopped over the chalked squares. She was about the age May had been when she’d handed out flyers for her father’s talk. She couldn’t explain how the sky had seemed to lift, but she told him about being mistaken for a beggar.

  “I hate to think of you as being sad.” His soft forehead wrinkled, and his hand moved toward hers, though they didn’t touch.

  At the National Gallery, she showed him paintings by Turner and Constable, artists who could say so much with clouds. Then, remembering why they’d come, she led him past blue-robed angels in a room of Italian paintings. She pointed to a Madonna with a round-headed baby sprawled across her lap. “That’s by Raphael.”

  “What woman could look at that and not long to have a child?” His eyes returned to her hand, which she dropped.

  “I believe we’re supposed to think of the Nativity.” She stepped over to Raphael’s Vision of a Knight for a look at a man seeming to have just woken up on the ground. He’d raised himself on an elbow to peer at a fair-haired woman holding a lily. Beside her, a woman with brown hair raised a sword and a book. May said, “He’s supposed to be choosing between Aphrodite and Athena, goddess of wisdom.”

  “Of course he will choose the goddess of love.”

  May smiled as if he’d meant this as a joke, then led him to a room of Dutch paintings. She pointed out Vermeer’s honey-colored light and said, “It’s better to look at Rembrandt in the morning, when this room gets more sun.”

  “Once incandescent lights are perfected, the museums should be the first places to get them.”

  “I wish I understood more about this electricity. I’m afraid science didn’t have much place in my father’s curriculum. Nor business practices, not once we’d learned our sums.”

  “Who would have expected the daughter of a philosopher and the son of a businessman to become friends?”

  May blushed and turned to A Woman Bathing in a Stream. The woman who lifted her chemise above her thighs to wade in green, golden, and red water wasn’t young or slender, but the light made her bare skin glow. “Rembrandt usually painted on commission, but they say he painted this one only for himself.”

  “The lady was his lover?”

  “She might have been.” May’s face grew still warmer. “It’s not as finished as his other work. See the left shoulder and the shadow under her chemise? Scraping away can have as much effect as a stroke of paint. But you look like you might have had enough art for one day.”

  They walked through a park, then warmed up in a tea shop where footmen hovered behind ladies, watching their umbrellas and shopping baskets, and where silver sugar tongs, tiered trays, dishes of marmalade, and teapots glistened. They ate small sandwiches filled with watercress or cucumbers sliced as thin as leaves. May bit into a scone smeared with clotted cream that spread deliciously to every inner surface of her mouth. She said, “We don’t have such cream in Massachusetts. I suppose our cows work too hard.”

  As winter passed, they began walking every weekend. On a Saturday in March, they strolled on a pathway near the Thames. Massive brownstone breweries, smokestacks, and turrets cast reflections on the water. They saw canal boats tugged by old horses and lumber boats with yellow sails, but it was still too chilly for pleasure barges to be out. May told Ernst about the Concord River. “It’s narrower and slower, but I suppose that’s why more can grow in it. Pickerelweed has pretty blue flowers. Once I rowed before dawn to see water lilies open.”

  “Rowing so early in the morning? By yourself?” His forehead wrinkled.

  She didn’t want to talk about Julian. She’d only remembered folding her hand around the slick stem, the closed petals that fit in her palm. She said, “I went with a friend.”

  “Did you have many friends?”

  “Not so very many.”

  “Who could not adore you?”

  Her chest grew warm, though she told herself he was being kind, not romantic.

  “Darling,” he said, and he entwined his fingers with hers.

  She didn’t pull away her hand. She longed to unbutton her glove and feel his skin on hers, keep hearing the river lap and Ernst’s breath not far from her neck. As he linked her arm through his, he tugged her close enough to feel the heat through their clothing. She said, “We’ll go rowing one day.”

  “When the water gets warmer. But May, I won’t be here long. I wrote to my father that I am not so happy in my work, as you’ve said I must be. He contacted a friend who helps manage one of the grands magasins, the big stores that sell most everything in P
aris. There could be a job for me there.”

  “You’re leaving?” She pushed her lips into a fragile smile, reminding herself that she had expected this, or she should have. Her throat felt cool again, her breath short as she understood his endearment had been casual. She’d been foolish to allow herself to think he could be expecting they might have more than this afternoon.

  “May, I haven’t spoken because I don’t know what to do. My office also offered me a position in Russia.”

  “Choose Paris! If I knew what would happen to my mother, I never would have left.”

  “Then we would not have met! I’d like to see Paris through your eyes. But each asks that I work for at least a year. How could I leave you for that long?”

  “Ernst, I mustn’t keep you from your future.”

  “My future! May, it’s nothing without you. Would you be sorry if I left?” The green flecks in his eyes darkened.

  “Of course I would.”

  “But would it be dreadful? Would you wait for me? I must reply to these offers, but how can I leave when your heart hurts?”

  “I’ll go back to Massachusetts after the danger of spring storms is past. And you must follow the work that brings you happiness.”

  “All my joy comes from you. Even in your time of grief, you bring me more than I thought possible. May …”

  “You mustn’t say such things.” She pulled out her lace-edged handkerchief and shook her head. “I thought I was over my crying.”

  “You must not apologize for tears.”

  “Sometimes it seems as if my mother died just days ago. Sometimes it seems like years.”

  “You’re mourning.”

  “And Louisa would be horrified if she knew I was out strolling.”

  “You haven’t written to your family about me? Why, I’ve written pages about you to my mother and brother!”

  “Of course I’ve written about you.”

  “And what did you say?”