by Julia Gray
Lady Gosford is enchanted. ‘But that is a charming idea,’ she says. ‘Livvy, Bella, you are lucky little girls, to have Ada to teach you.’
Mamma also smiles on my proposal, but I can’t help but detect a very slight disbelief in her expression. I remember her telling me at the allotments that I did not have the temperament of a teacher; I never forget such criticisms. Then again, she herself leaves much to be desired as an instructress; every time she took charge of my education, we both suffered for it.
I do not prepare much for the first arithmetic lesson, since I don’t see why I should need to. I possess all the knowledge, and shall merely be imparting it.
‘We will begin with the simple things,’ I tell the girls, as we make ourselves comfortable in an unoccupied corner of the hotel dining room. ‘Addition, subtraction, multiplication, division; and later, some simple trigonometry.’
Their little blonde heads gleam with purpose; they smile and nod and look at me with expectation. I decide that being a teacher is a straightforward business. Puff, who is curled up on the banquette beside me, must find it a curious reversal, since she herself has been present at many lessons – hundreds – in which I was the pupil, not the teacher.
Each girl has her commonplace book, and for each I write ten sums of differing complexity. It takes them far longer than I think that it should to do the work, and at first I make a variety of impatient remarks, unable to stop myself.
‘Goodness, Livvy!’ I exclaim, when that dear girl asserts that seven sixes are forty-eight. ‘How can you think such a thing?’
But I can see at once from the slump of Olivia’s shoulders, her instant dejection, how disheartening my words have been.
‘The sums are hard,’ says Bella, who has as much trouble holding her pencil as I used to have when holding a pen. When I propose that they construct a triangle in their books, neither girl is able to do it. It is as though they have never attempted such a thing before. Soon enough, they are both close to tears, and I am full of remorse.
‘It seems that I have begun with the wrong things,’ I tell them, pointing out that the fault lies with me entirely. ‘Let us start again.’
The girls are young – seven and five – and I decide that I will not expect as much of them as Mamma expected of me, for such expectations are not fair ones. They will not be forced to lie still on a board if they do not complete their work to the highest standard; I will not bribe them with tickets for work well done, either – they should be proud of what they can achieve regardless. I remember Miss Stamp, who always allowed me the time I needed to correct myself, and try to be more like her. I change my tone of voice, making it softer and more encouraging. I simplify the sums, asking them now to count up in twos, say, or in tens. I slow down too, allowing them far more time for the sums. I might pat a sleeve in gentle support, or scribble a useful reminder on a page.
After a quarter of an hour or so, I am transformed – and so are they.
‘That’s very good,’ I say. ‘Perhaps check your work, Bella, here – and here...’
The time passes so quickly that I am surprised when Lady Gosford comes to claim her children.
Later on, a further realisation dawns: in order to be a teacher, I must also be a student. I don’t have many of my arithmetic books with me, but I do have Pasley’s Practical Geometry Method, and Euclid, of course, and I consult them as I prepare my notes for the next day’s lesson with the girls. I have always known, if not admitted, that there are holes in my knowledge – perforations where I have flitted too fast (as Mamma would say) from one idea to another – and a more thorough approach on my part, ensuring that those holes are filled, can only be a good thing. In teaching them, I will teach myself too. All the better for my studies with Mary Somerville – for I sometimes think she is too polite to point out that I have weaknesses, as well as strengths.
In addition to this, I realise, I must be patient – not speak too quickly, nor remonstrate with them if they do not understand. I must be the kind of teacher that I myself would have appreciated – as witty and wise as Mary Montgomery; as passionate and dedicated as Miss Stamp. Yes: I, Ada, can be all those things: patient and witty and passionate and kind.
As I go to sleep, I wonder whether perhaps this is something I can do with my future.
Buxton, Derbyshire
August 1834
A few days later, I discover a harp in a dusty corner of the hotel’s music room. It doesn’t seem to belong to anyone, so I sit down with it for a half-hour or so, exploring the sounds that it makes, though I don’t know how to use the pedals. It’s an old harp, not very well cared for. But there’s something about it that attracts me – a romance. I like the way the grain of the curved wood feels in my hands. The harp has magical potential; I’m sure of it. Beauty could be coaxed from it, like pearls from oysters, if only one knew how to play...
A poem comes into my head; one of my father’s. It begins like this:
The Harp the Monarch Minstrel swept
The King of men, the loved of Heaven!
Which Music hallow’d while she wept
O’er tones her heart of hearts had given—
Redoubled be her tears, its chords are riven!
I do not know all my father’s verses perfectly, but near-enough, and I recite this one now, for the benefit of no one. I have never forgotten that he wanted me to be musical.
The web-like glitter of an idea holds me suddenly captive: I, Ada, will become a harpist.
Another passion is ignited, just so: I ask Mamma to find me a harp teacher and she obliges at once (pleased, no doubt, that I have transferred my thoughts from Babbage and his designs). Before long, I am working with a Miss Smith for an hour each morning, and then practising alone for a further hour each afternoon. I train myself to sit correctly on the low chair, positioning myself with all the elegance of a dancer; I stretch out each hand to the strings, plucking at them with a precision that reminds me so much of the way I worked so hard, once upon a time, at my shorthand. I make progress; Miss Smith is pleased, and so is Mamma. I learn scales, and then songs; after a week, I find that if I concentrate very carefully, I can sing and play at the same time: an achievement I never thought that I would master.
The semi-somnolent Buxton days acquire shape and purpose; and I realise that I am quite content. Arithmetic lessons with Bella and Livvy form a pleasant portion of each morning, before my own lesson on the harp with Miss Smith. It’s an arrangement that suits everyone, and although it is hard to be consistently patient – with the girls, and with myself – I find that with practice I am able to be far more patient than I have ever been before.
I listen to Livvy and Bella’s pretty, lisping voices as they recite their multiplication tables; I work out which sums and operations each girl finds particularly hard, and make a point of helping with those problems especially. I teach them to use a ruler properly.
‘General William Pasley first wrote this book to help engineers,’ I explain to them as I open that good soldier’s treatise, Practical Geometry Method. ‘Just think, Livvy and Bella – if you study hard, you could use your knowledge to build bridges, or railways... or even in warfare!’
Bella wrinkles her freckled nose. ‘Ada, how could you suggest that?’
‘Why would we want to do any of those things?’ chimes in Livvy.
‘Well,’ I counter, ‘why wouldn’t you?’
More nose-wrinkling and feminine disgust. I can see that they are, in spite of their protestations, rather amused that I have suggested these outrageous possibilities. ‘Because we’re girls,’ they chorus.
I am only teasing them, but the thought lingers, long after the lesson is over. Why should we women limit ourselves, simply because of our sex? Why should we say: this is not for us, nor this, nor this... when there are so many things that could be done? If Jacquard had been brought up to believe that
he was not capable of designing a loom that would revolutionise the factory system; if Stephenson had never dared to dream of steam engines; if Babbage hadn’t broken things apart under the benevolent eye of his mother to see how they worked... then none of those inventions would exist today. (Mamma may have warned me against spending too much time considering Mr Babbage’s work, but I have just read an article about the Difference Engine in the Edinburgh Review by a Mr Lardner, who feels very much as I do: that the Difference Engine has much to offer everyone.)
The thought sparks oddities in my Ada-brain: all the magical potential that would have gone to waste, and all the magical potential that must, surely, be lost every day because little girls like Bella and Livvy Gosford do not believe that a bridge would be theirs to build.
One night I have a curious dream: I am playing the harp on a lonely beach covered in round white stones, a little like soup plates. The sky is purple and swollen, as though rain is about to fall. The weather doesn’t deter me, though, and I play on, even as the rain comes down, soaking through my clothes. Never have I summoned such exquisite music from the strings; it is almost worthy of the angels themselves. The rain gets heavier and heavier, blanketing the beach, and then, suddenly, it stops, and the sun tiptoes out.
I become aware of an audience – someone is watching me, from just over a sand dune (although, this being a dream, it is not covered in sand but rather those round, white stones). My fingers falter; I lift my hands from the instrument and look up as the visitor draws near. He is only a shadow at first; then, as he comes closer, and a rainbow suddenly illuminates that strange, stone-strewn beach, I see who he is. He is dressed the same as in Thomas Phillips’ portrait – the one that is always hidden behind the green curtain. He looks a little older, but not much.
‘Father,’ I say.
‘Little Ada,’ he says. He reaches out a hand and touches my chin – a gesture that copies precisely that of Aunt Augusta, a year or so ago, when I saw her in the street. ‘Can it really be you?’
‘I am musical, you know,’ I tell him. (Of all the things to say to my father, I don’t know why this is the first thing I choose, but, as I have explained, it is a dream.)
‘So you are.’
‘You wanted me to be musical.’
‘I wanted you to be all kinds of things. And you are all kinds of things.’
‘Why did you not want me to turn out poetical?’ I say.
It is one of those dreams in which I really do know that I am dreaming. Even so, I am deeply immersed in it, wanting it never to end. But at the same time, I am very near to waking, and I know this too.
‘There is more than one kind of poetical, Ada.’
‘What... what does that mean?’
‘There is more than one kind of bridge too. Remember that.’
‘But I—’
‘I must away, Ada. They’re waiting for me on the other side of the lake.’
‘Father, please...’
But he is fading as he walks away, lighter and more translucent with every step, and before long he is gone, before I can say anything else. I am alone again on the flat white beach. I look for the harp; it has fallen on its side, and I kneel down next to it.
The harp is no longer a harp, I see, but a Jacquard loom.
Buxton, Derbyshire
August 1834
I rise earlier than I usually do the following morning, sharply awake for no particular reason. The hotel is quiet. I can hear a horse neighing; a man unloading coal from a wagon in the street below. Footsteps somewhere overhead suggest that the chambermaids have risen.
It’s too early to go downstairs. The harp is next to my bed, occupying an entire corner of the room (I have taken possession of it while we are here, and no one seems to mind) and for a few minutes I practise the sonata that I have been learning, enjoying the way the music seems to kindle my brain into being; each note awakens another filament of thought, and then another... until I am fully focused, my body correctly positioned, delighted by the music that I am learning to make. But something is weighing on me – a kind of shadow at the edge of my thoughts – and suddenly – it’s a suddenness that shocks me – I remember my dream. I do not often dream of my father, and the recollection is enough to quicken my heartbeat and slow my fingers to a standstill.
Abandoning the sonata, I reach for my commonplace book, sit on the edge of the bed and scribble down all that I remember of our conversation. Oh, I know that it was not ‘real’; I know that I was not speaking to some kind of cloud-swaddled angel... but there was something in that conversation that I cannot bear to dismiss – something that sent through me a channel of pure emotion, not unlike what I experienced when I stood in the Bifrons gallery and felt his presence beside me.
I wanted you to be all kinds of things. And you are all kinds of things...
There is more than one kind of poetical...
There is more than one kind of bridge too.
I sit there, chewing on the end of my pencil until I feel soft-splintered wood on my tongue. What does this all mean? I think about the word ‘poetical’ and all that it might signify, writing a short list:
1. Adjective pertaining to a poet, or to the poetry the poet writes
2. Adjective pertaining to the sort of life a poet might lead
Is that what my father meant? Or is there something else, some other, more codified, meaning contained in his words? I have not done a lot of Greek, but I am fairly convinced that the word poet derives from the Greek verb that means ‘to make’. Could my father somehow have been trying to tell me that there is more than one way that I could make things?
What kind of bridge is there, other than a real bridge?
(A rainbow flickers across my consciousness, burning with the intensity of fireworks... )
Is there more than one way that I could make something of myself?
But no. I am trying to find things that are not really there, like an astronomer whose view through the telescope is sadly occluded by poor workmanship, or an unforgiving smog-filled sky.
There are to be no arithmetic lessons today; the Gosfords have gone out for the day. Mamma is in her room; I linger downstairs, wanting to read for a while before lunch. As I scan the library shelves for something new to read, I notice a rather beautiful elderly lady with tightly-curled white hair. She is looking at me, as people often do; but I do not feel that skin-tingling sense of being whispered about and pointed at that I so often feel. I smile at her encouragingly, and she bows her head, draws nearer, and says in a surprisingly girlish voice how much she admired my father’s poetry.
‘Oh!’ I say. ‘Thank you. That is most gratifying to hear.’
The old lady looks at me quizzically for a moment and says: ‘I am an acquaintance of dear Mrs Leigh. She speaks of you with such fondness, Ada.’
That is all she has time to say; she is swept away then by a tall man who must be her son, or son-in-law, perhaps. I remain on the couch, my book unopened, wondering who on earth Mrs Leigh might be. Then I remember: that is the name of Aunt Augusta.
‘A lady came to talk to me just now,’ I say to Mamma over lunch. ‘She wanted to tell me how much she admired my father’s poetry.’
Mamma smiles at this. ‘How nice,’ she says. There is a smudge of artichoke soup on her upper lip.
‘She also mentioned that she knew my Aunt Augusta,’ I add.
If I was hoping for a favourable reaction, I do not get one. Mamma stops smiling at the mention of the name. More: she looks anxious, as though she fears what I am about to say next.
Persisting nonetheless, I say: ‘Why can I not make the acquaintance of Mrs Leigh?’
‘Because... she is not a suitable person for you to know.’
‘Is she a gambler?’
Mamma sniffs. ‘She is a liar.’
I’ve never heard such a word on my
mother’s lips; truly, it has all the novelty of the word scientist.
Throughout the rest of our stay, I look for the elderly white-haired lady, but do not see her again. I find myself nonetheless returning, over and over, to the question of my Aunt Augusta Leigh. If she really is a liar, as Mamma claims, then it must be proved or disproved. Somehow.
Mary Montgomery, I know, would advise me to think no more of this matter. But – as much as I love Mary, and respect her advice – I don’t know if I can do that. Why is it so important to discover the truth, if I can? Firstly, because I do not know the truth. Wanting to know should be justification enough. (After all, this is what scientists do.) I have thought, over and over, about what might have taken place between my parents, and for a long time my theories have concerned the actions of my mother. I suspect her of wrongdoing of some kind – though I cannot imagine what – that she will not admit to. Somehow – through her coldness of manner, most likely – she alienated my father and drove him away. About this, and about many other matters, she has not told me the truth – and has counselled others to reveal nothing – because she is embarrassed and ashamed; she does not want the truth to be known by anyone. Those lapses into nostalgic sorrow and affection and her refusal to speak ill of him are markers of her guilt – easier, of course, now that he is dead.
So: it is more important than ever to discover whether Aunt Augusta is truly a liar, or whether she is something else – another victim, perhaps, of my mother’s behaviour. Remembering that encounter, long ago now, on the Strand – the plump, kindly, almost stupid expression on the woman’s face – I struggle to imagine her as a liar. On the contrary, she seemed well-meaning and gentle. She said something to me, but what was it?
‘I sent a prayer-book to you for your birthday – two or three years ago. Did you never get it?’
Yes; it was something like that.
Buxton, Derbyshire
August 1834
The last morning in Buxton brings a letter from Mary Somerville. My heart leaps at the sight of her writing – but it’s Mamma’s name, not mine, on the folded writing paper. Over honey cakes and butter-rich brioches (the hotel breakfasts are awfully good) I wait for Mamma to finish reading the letter, and then ask her what the letter contains.