by H C Turk
“He might have described the events about you with some accuracy, but his depictions of you did not include true understanding. His talk was of murder and evil, whereas you are all sweetness and virtuous living—excluding your starving your husband and raving on about hill land and the like.”
“Sir, I am not distressed by your father’s misconstruing me. But if ever again he applies to his son the hatred he displayed in this flat, I shall slap a sense of Jesus into his sinning mouth.”
“Please, Alba, you speak of my father.”
“Indeed. Make your own plans, sir, for our being received at the Dentons’ household. During this visit, if one befalls us, I shall remain most ladylike, for here I am glib and capable. But presume suffering, for what if we have not waited long enough? What gain in achieving nothing but your weeping, for which the cruel wife shall berate you? Is your life so lacking in excitement that you seek parental agony? Am I not the one bored in this household, whereas you and the pets are ever amused?”
“And how is it you are bored, miss?”
“Missus.”
“How is it you are bored, missus, in that the suffering of your prior life should have provided you with excitement to last for at least one full marriage?”
“I am bored, sir, because women do not ejaculate,” I retorted. But before he could implement his gender’s endless capacity therein, the wife walked her dog for the evening.
• • •
After church one Sunday came a person to our door, most unusual in that the few visitors to our home were salesmen of useless household implements, except for the one so practical as to provide me with an instrument for his castration, in that his wares were razors for shaving. These vital business folk never appeared on the Sabbath for fear of being stricken to death by Jesus, no doubt, though other days were scarcely less provocative considering Elsie’s commendable threats of sending Randolph’s teeth directly into their goods or their guts. But the person coming that Sunday had most durable goods, so it seemed, in that Eric grasped the man with an embrace I rarely allowed him, this entwining followed by glad speaking and happy laughter. And after the husband greeted his guest, the wife had a cackle to see Lord Andrew.
The gent was well set within our home, Elsie fulfilled to be serving tea to so fine an individual. To begin his conversing, Andrew stated his difficulty in finding us.
“For a month, I’ve been asking Edward to describe your location clearly, but for some reason he has been unable. Finally, I contacted Amanda Rathel, who has a better memory than my son. But at my age, this memory of mine is the least reputable of all. Forgive me, Eric, but I can scarcely recall attending the wedding myself, as though I were never present.”
Though Lord Andrew’s disposition was cordial, Eric knew to reply without humor.
“But, sir, could the world’s greatest grandfather miss my life’s only wedding? And how do you find your tea, Grand?”
Since Eric had demonstrated sufficient tact for an entire family, the conversation proceeded with ease. After a certain expected chatting regarding Eric’s business, including Lord Andrew’s pondering why Eric no longer was employed by his father, the guest quit this area of potential discomfort by asking the recently wed couple how their life together proceeded.
“As perfectly as possible, Grand,” Eric replied, “what with the unenvious and utterly gracious lady of the household—we are so fortunate to have Miss Elsie.” And Lord Andrew laughed heartily as I made to throw my tepid tea against the heathen husband’s face.
“In fact,” Eric continued, “Alba herself is exactly descriptive of my life, and that is perfect, though the wife makes implications of boredom, which I can scarcely comprehend.”
Andrew then became nearly agitated as he looked up sharply from his saucer to declare, “But of course, the lass is correct! A lady’s life is one of boredom when her husband works at his employment constantly. And knowing young Eric, he doubtless neglects his wife’s affections.”
After choking on my tea or those words, I introduced Lord Andrew to this man who was certainly not the young Eric he knew, offering next to display all the welts secured directly by Eric’s affection.
“Then surely what you need, Alba,” Lord Andrew replied after the men’s laughter had subsided, “is to rest from this affection, and vacation on the sea. Yes, child, you and Eric must come sailing with me.”
Eric then clapped his hands together as though at an opera’s climax or one of his own, replying to his grandfather, “The idea you present is superlative, Grand, and most thankfully received.”
“I hope you will find it so, Eric, in that a great interval has passed since last you sailed with me. I would also hope that the young wife will appreciate the notion.”
“But of course she does,” delighted Eric promised as he looked to me. “Constant are her expressions of love for the out of doors and wild land. What could be more wild and out than the English Channel?”
“Penstone Place,” I muttered.
“But, Alba, you seem less than enthralled,” Eric noticed. “I have seen you in the water, missus. Have you a specific aversion to the salt variety?”
“Sir, the ocean I well love—when standing at its edge. But I am incapable of being upon its expanse, for I have a great aversion toward drowning.”
“You jest, ma’am,” Eric returned. “I have seen you…swim…most spectacularly.”
“Sir, that swimming you witnessed was each moment a struggle for my life not to be taken by water. With Lord God reading the deepest truths of my heart, I swear that no greater terror inhabits my dreams than the fear of being beneath water forever, and forever there being dead.”
Eric was staring at me, reading my deepest truths, perhaps, staring at me with a neutral visage as he silently, profoundly accepted the latest lesson of his missus.
“Ah, and what a pity I find here, dear Alba,” Andrew responded. “And this is no fear to be overcome?”
“No, sir, not within my allotted lifetime. Nonetheless, I truly thank you for the offer, and hope my incompatibility with water will not erode our felicitous bond.”
“Never, Alba, for no decent man would fail to appreciate so comely and authentic a lass, no more than a poorly remembering elder could forget her.”
Into the sea of his tea Eric was staring, and did he find me in this ocean? Was I the lemon slice perilous on the cup’s edge, in some future to slide down the porcelain beach and be lost in the pekoe?
“Please, Lord Andrew, continue your warm and welcome conversing by speaking of those boats with which you are familiar.”
“Familiar, missus,” Eric responded, forging a new trail in our talking. “Why, this gentleman owns them.”
“But a few,” came Lord Andrew’s modest reply.
His interest in this conversation improving, Eric mentioned a veritable fleet, boats small and large, including the grand Queen’s Flight.
“This Queen’s Flight might be especially what, sir?” I inquired of Lord Andrew.
“The Queen’s Flight is a vessel of proportion, Alba. A ship of twelve masts and great grace in the water, of thousands of tons and many more thousands of knots of experience on the seas.”
“The boat is very large, Alba, one rigged for sailing the deepest oceans,” Eric added; and I could sense his desire to speak with Grand and me, though only now was he regaining the ability, so moved had he been by my…swimming.
“To what end, might I ask?”
“Most recently to supply the American colonies with further populace and items for their living,” Andrew replied.
“I have heard mention of this region, Lord Andrew,” I continued, “but know not its nature.”
“The politics might interest you,” Andrew ventured.
“Preferably I would learn of the area’s exotic animals and wild lands rather than be inundated with social implications, if you please. Have you lived there, sir?”
“I have not, Alba, in that the Americas are lan
ds for younger folk—especially you. Since the societies there lack the sophistication and elegance of England, so virtuous and thinking a lady could only benefit their culture. There are cities and towns in the colonies, but none as great as London. As for wilds, why, there are more wild lands and more wondrously varied than all of England and the European continent. America is a land of deserts and forests, of mountains and tremendous lakes, of endless fields and infinite canyons.”
Then I turned to Eric and ordered, “We depart tomorrow.”
“Very well, missus,” he replied, “but you will have to walk, in that you’ll not allow yourself on shipboard.”
“You’d best wait, my child, until you gain your sea legs,” Andrew offered, “for walking those thousands of miles through the ocean might be most wearisome.”
“I can well imagine,” I said, then had to set my tea down because the liquid there bade me drown, a sea in my own home containing Marybelle and Mother. Too much of Eric’s concern with…swimming…had emigrated to the colony of his wife.
The visit concluded with less weighty emotions, Lord Andrew’s departure a privation to our family. I later asked Eric of the expense of this Queen’s Flight type of vessel, and whether the impoverished might own one. Utterly not, in their great costliness, he replied. Then I inquired why we had not sought funds from Grand instead of Rathel, and whether potential existed for our procuring additional moneys if required from him. No, Eric answered, for then my father would hate both me and Grand.
Not until that evening and our own bed came mention of that conversation, an early segment to have set the husband toward lasting distress.
I had tightly wrapped my dressing gown around me as we lay in the dark, an abnormal state of attire in that usually Eric set at my corpus with his own while I was yet in waking clothes. The source of Eric’s restraint soon become evident.
“Of all the blatant torments you have calmly described from your past, I had insufficient notion that your being in water was near their equal.”
“I would rather move through water than lose another body part. The greatest horror for me is not the experience, but past experiences of myself and my family that foretell a wet end I cannot contemplate.”
“But when your dreams are nightmares, is the water not torture within that realm? Yes, it is, I know without your answering. Well have I come to understand this Alba, by your change of voice and the difference in your eyes. And if you had not abolished tears from me, I would now be weeping against you; for you are my wife and my love, and no pain is worthy of the one I hold most dear. So if in my sleep you notice me weep, understand I shall attempt to control this weakness, but moreover understand that my thoughts and love are all for you.”
Eric then rolled onto his side to face away from me. But within this marriage, Eric was not alone in connubial comprehension, for I as well had knowledge of my spouse. Eric, in his intended generosity, would not be having sex with me that night.
Not easily did I achieve sleep, in that my routine was disrupted because my buttocks were not. But eventually I arrived at slumber, well pleased to have sensed no tears from Eric.
And dream I did. Having tea with Edward, I often fell into my cup, and how delighted was Eric’s father to see me nearly drown. But the cup seldom had enough liquid to submerge me, and when the tea tide was high, I always landed upon the lemon rind, which floated and conveyed me near the colonies, as near as Eric, who did his best not to weep because the sour fruit burned my skin, he knew, and never before had he understood the torment of my life of eating no meat. Disembarking the rind, I found myself upon a bed with twelve posts that rocked to and fro, for not enough sails had I to protect me from a hot wind that cut through me from head to groin, stabbed me like a corn cob, an arm with bark, a…
God alone could know the dream Eric was snatched from by my hearty beating upon his shoulder, having pulled my baby slot away from his ready man-stick, which had entered me normally but most unacceptably. And when Eric awakened enough to see and gasp and cower, I told the fool that I had not become his mother and thus could have no man named Eric inside my cunt without killing him, and finding oneself dead was no way to wake in the morning. Shake him I did most harshly until he acknowledged my words, that the loss from his taking me so would not be his pleasure, but his blood, literally his bleeding life; and did the beggar understand? Yes, missus, yes he did; anything to end the shouting and bruising, good evening to you, over he rolled and to sleep.
The next day, I invented a new type of clothing, an inelegant rag to be wrapped around me before each night’s sleeping, tied so as not to be removed without my knowledge. As for inconvenience, the husband would simply have to eject all the lust from his system before the wife settled to slumber, lest he eject all his blood instead. Before I awoke to become a seamstress to Elsie’s great curiosity, I dreamed again.
Insufficient clothes had I in my floating armoire to prevent sailors from populating my colony with their mizzenmasts, though I repelled most with the loudest tea in the wilds, that region settled by the one successful sailor being a new land less social than England, for he jibed me from the stern, not the sternum.
• • •
In this manner, my life proceeded. Few thoughts had I of any past existence, preferring to wish for some superior life beyond the drudgery of London. But I could think of none, for what wild land would fit me now that I had a family? Would Elsie revert to eating lizards? Could Eric build so fine a timber cave as Marybelle? How long would Randolph last before drowning in a bog? Neither could I abandon these friends, for so authentic was my love for them that truly they formed with me a family; and this witch would accept no life, not even in Paradise, in which she was alone.
So bored I became that I nearly entered the contest of needlework. Grandly satisfying herself by being too much of a servant for this household, Elsie walked through her chores as though a witch through a forest. Unlike the latter type of human, however, Elsie in any empty interval would settle with metal shard and thread to manufacture doilies and other flat constructions that the mistress insisted she well loved draped all over her home. I soon observed, however, that part of this activity was stabbing oneself occasionally in the finger—and was this not as bad as shaving?
So bored I became as to look forward to Eric’s daily return so that we could torment each other with jest. But all my felicity was ruined the day I looked through the front window to see Eric on the street with his arms about another woman. Eric was embracing her absolutely, in a manner not allowed with me, and with equal intensity were they weeping, weeping and fruitlessly attempting to converse. Perhaps their failed speaking was not due to tears, but sourced from their foreignness; for were they not different types of persons, as though sinner and witch? Finally, Eric with gentility pressed the woman away, and with tears she departed, Eric turning to the steps and waiting, waiting until his face was dry before moving up to his tenement; for tears were not allowed with his wife as they were with his mother.
Poorly he concealed his distress, but I made no notice, attempting to respond to him normally. No explanation was given by the husband nor questions asked by the missus. And we retired that evening with none of that man smell from Eric and no penetration, for the first day in our wedded life Eric not making love with me, not even in his dreams.
• • •
“Surely, madam, you are neither so wealthy nor unkind as to refrain from granting this minor request.”
“But I cannot contemplate why a lady such as yours would be seeing herself upon a rough and common wagon as mine.”
“As previously explained, I have need of conveyance; yet despite my apparent social position, mine is a state of financial stress. Therefore, I offer you this coin to allow me to ride with you on your return journey from London.”
“But, ma’am, I am taking to my farm these bad fish behind to help in growing things, and they are smelling now and will be doing it worse. And to ride beside me on this coa
rse seat of wood you might rip your fine dress, or worse, be seen by your social friends or minister.”
“Enough discussion,” I told this woman near ugly enough to be a witch, though none of our smell had she, and witches are never fat, as was she, extremely, in that we do not eat to excess, nor smoke, as did she, extremely. “Are we a pair of politicians going at each other’s ears with inconsequential and repetitious words of scant content?” And up I clambered beside her. “Or are we but womenfolk about our affairs, you returning to your home, and I to Gravesbury Reach? The latter we are, and here is my coin and my words of thanks for your conveyance.” Then, after pressing the money into her palm, I settled beside her, staring firmly ahead as though we were underway. With a tremendous sigh as though releasing all the pressure from the fat within her, this woman with word and gentle strap encouraged her elder horse to proceed.
As though animals, we went without speaking, the driver soon proving herself accurate in assessing my position. After a length of Hollet Street and a turn at Missingmile Avenue, we passed a person who well stared at me, for there was Theodosia rendered static by my sight. Though she seemed prepared for speech, with that wide opening of her mouth, the servant had no verbal response, as though weakened by the sight of an angel, barely managing to lift her hand toward me as I waved and heartily smiled.
And a fine ride it was, up in the air and open to all sensations, the rich smell of decaying fish following along as though a friendly pet traipsing after master. As though never before in London, I gained an unusual awareness of the society around me, understanding that these lovers and those businessmen all had families of their own, and when not on the streets, they were in their homes as though alternate worlds. Even the drunkards living in shrubs had families, though surely lost. Despite proceeding out of the city, I had no feeling of quitting, for how could I forsake these families when one was mine? My intent was no more than respite, for I was on a holiday. But abandoning London remained my true desire: not the physical means, but the emotional logistics.