Oscar Wilde and the Dead Man's Smile

by Gyles Brandreth

  I was at a loss. ‘Does it?’ I mumbled. ‘It does!’ she said. And it did. At my mother’s suggestion, I wired James Russell Lowell, the United States Minister in London. He agreed to meet me within the hour. He is a poet and critic as well as an ambassador, but, above all else, he is a great and a good man. I told him my story and — at once, without a moment’s hesitation — he promised to provide my late, lamented valet with secure custody to the United States of America. Washington Traquair is to be conveyed to his homeland in complete safety: he will be travelling inside the minister’s diplomatic bag! Yes, Robert, Washington will be laid to rest in Washington; his ashes will be scattered in the cooling waters of the Potomac River. It is James Russell Lowell, I think, who wrote: ‘All the beautiful sentiments in the world weigh less than a single lovely action.’ I had forgotten the line until just now.

  It was yesterday that I met with the good ambassador. This morning, at twelve, he accompanied me to Victoria Station and, together, we retrieved my handbag and the biscuit tin. I handed Lowell the tin at once, without ceremony, and as he took it he said, simply, ‘Your friend is in safe hands, I promise you.’

  From Victoria we were driven in the ambassadorial coach and pair to Grosvenor Square where my friend George W. Palmer gave us lunch. George W. is the son of George Palmer of Huntley & Palmers, biscuit manufacturers of Reading, the largest biscuit manufacturers in the world. They have a work force of five thousand men and women and George and his father — who is also the mayor of Reading and represents the borough in parliament — claim to know every one of the workers by sight and many by name. The Palmers are good people and George W., while a Quaker, is nonetheless a generous host. Lunch in Grosvenor Square did not rival breakfast at Pharamond, but, given the circumstances, it was exactly comme il faut: pea soup and turbot followed by Welsh lamb, with the consolation of rice pudding for dessert. Lowell, being a diplomat, expressed a desire for cheese and biscuits as well —not for the cheese, of course, but for the biscuits.

  There was a fourth gentleman making up the party — a clergyman, the Reverend Paul White, an old friend of the Palmer family, and it is he, according to George W., who holds my meeting with the assassin Maclean in his gift. George W. had thought to invite him in case, before we ate, we thought it appropriate to stand and remember Washington Traquair. We did so. I said a few words: I told Traquair’s history such as I knew it and spoke of his gentle ways and of the sweetness of his nature. I said nothing about the manner of his passing. I implied that his death had been a tragic accident, no more. The Reverend White then said a prayer in Latin and recited the twenty-third Psalm. Finally, James Russell Lowell spoke some lines from a poem of his own:

  Death is delightful. Death is dawn,

  The waking from a weary night

  Of fevers unto truth and light …

  That these good men, who had never known Traquair, should speak so affectingly in his memory was profoundly moving. Traquair is at rest now — God be thanked — but I will not rest, Robert, until I know how he met his death and who it is who is responsible.

  Once we had stood to remember Traquair, the Reverend White said Grace and we sat down to luncheon. It was a very jolly affair. Lowell shared with us his favourite beatitude: ‘Blessed are they who have nothing to say and who cannot be persuaded to say it.’ He had much to say and said it with felicity. In a different vein (less felicity —more fire and brimstone!), Reverend White was equally loquacious. He and Lowell are of an age —mid-sixties or thereabouts — but there the similarity ends. The ambassador is tall and bearded and wears his hair long, in the manner of an Old Testament prophet; the cleric is of medium height and bald and cleanly shaven. He is an Anglican convert, an abstainer and a vegetarian, with decided views on sin in general and the immorality of French theatre in particular. When I told him that I was working with the great Edmond La Grange, he promised to pray for me. When I said that I considered La Grange a great actor, he replied: ‘And a notorious debauchee.’ When I asked him how he knew this, he responded: ‘The man is an actor, Mr Wilde, and living in Paris. What more does one need to know?’

  Perversely, the less I agreed with the reverend gentleman the more I found that I liked the man. Of course, he is the victim of that terrible blindness that passion brings upon its servants, but I was moved by his zeal and had a palpable sense of his fundamental goodness. ‘Where is your ministry, Father?’ I asked him. ‘Among the fallen, ‘he replied. ‘I am the chaplain of Reading Gaol. I understand that you are to visit us, Mr Wilde.’ ‘Am I?’ I asked. ‘You are,’ he answered, ‘on Monday week, 5 March. Roderick Maclean, the man who tried to kill Queen Victoria, arrives at the gaol that day and Palmer tells me that you are anxious to make his acquaintance.’

  It seems that in spite of our disagreements over the morality of the theatrical profession, I have in some way passed muster with the good reverend and indeed I shall be interested to visit the prison. But first I shall return to Paris. I need to know the truth about the death of poor Traquair. And I need to see you, dear friend. I want to hear your news. How is life among the debauchees?

  Ever affectionately yours,

  Oscar

  12

  The Flavour of Absinthe

  Oscar had added a postscript to his letter:

  PS: I shall not return to Paris for a day or two. Tomorrow I am to take tea with Miss Constance Lloyd. She is as pretty as a picture — and the artist is Botticelli. She has the colour and bearing of his Madonna of the Magnificat in the Uffizi in Florence. She has an intelligent eye, an amiable disposition, a graceful figure and a name that promises much. And, take note, Robert: she is three years my junior. Beware of older women — they are not to be tamed. Beware of actresses —they are not to be trusted!

  And below the first postscript, he had added a second:

  ‘In the ocean of baseness, the deeper we get, the easier the sinking.’ Ambassador Lowell said this at lunch. (Or was it the Reverend White who said it? Either way, I felt I should share the thought with you.)

  And below the second, a third:

  Please advise my hotel to expect me on Friday or Saturday, at the latest. I am hoping for an untroubled crossing; for certain, I shall have nothing to declare at customs.

  In the event, Oscar returned to Paris on Saturday, 24 February 1883. He came directly to the Théâtre La Grange from the Gare du Nord. He arrived at around six o’clock, during the dead hour that comes between the matinée and the evening performance, and found me in La Grange’s dressing room, alone, cleaning the great actor’s shoes. My friend looked wonderfully well. There was a sparkle in his eye and a pale yellow carnation in his buttonhole. We shook hands warmly. ‘How are you?’ I asked. I was so pleased to see him.

  ‘Exhausted!’ he cried, not sounding it in the least.

  ‘Railway stations are a nightmare. Everyone seems in such a hurry to catch a train — a state of affairs favourable to neither poetry nor romance.’ He glanced about the dressing room and lowered his voice. ‘Are we alone? Where is the master?’

  ‘Upstairs, in the apartment. ‘‘Asleep?’

  ‘With his daughter. She is not well.’

  His brow furrowed. ‘Agnès is ill?’ I hesitated. ‘She is mad,’ I said.

  ‘Mad!’ he exclaimed. The sparkle in his eye turned to a glint. ‘Tell me more.’ I had expected the news to perturb him. Instead, he appeared suddenly exhilarated. He dropped his bag on the floor and clapped his hands together with relish. He produced a silver cigarette case from the pocket of his grey frock-coat. He took out a Turkish cigarette and rolled it this way and that between his thumb and forefinger. He placed the cigarette lightly between his lips and, con brio, threw himself onto Molière’s chaise longue. He lay back on the couch and crossed his legs. With an ostentatious flourish he lit a match and, wide-eyed, gazed at me above the flame. ‘Tell me everything, Robert. I want detail. What exactly has been going on while I’ve been away? What has brought about the madness of Mademoiselle La
Grange?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ I said.

  Oscar raised an admonishing eyebrow. ‘That’s not very helpful, Robert. How does this “madness” manifest itself? Are there tears and tantrums?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Wild looks and frothing at the mouth?’

  ‘Wild looks, certainly …’

  He drew on his cigarette. ‘You have witnessed this yourself?’

  ‘We have all witnessed it. There have been rehearsals for Hamlet every day this week and every day, at some point during the rehearsals, Agnès has broken down.’

  Oscar narrowed his eyes. ‘When she breaks down, what happens — precisely?’

  ‘She begins to sob, at first quietly and then the sobbing grows. It is shocking — terrible and pathetic.’

  ‘Does this happen when she is on stage, in the middle of a scene?’

  ‘Yes. But it also happens during the breaks. Or when she’s sitting on her own at the side of the stage, watching the others.’

  ‘And when she begins to weep, who comes to her aid?’

  ‘Whoever’s closest,’ I said.

  Oscar looked at me earnestly. ‘Think, Robert. Please. Think carefully. When Agnès breaks down, who is it who rushes first to offer comfort and consolation? Her father? Her brother? Her grandmother? Carlos Branco?’

  ‘All of them,’ I said. ‘And Gabrielle, naturally. Gabrielle is wonderful.’ Oscar smiled at me. ‘Carlos Branco is very caring, too,’ I added. ‘Agnès is playing his daughter in the play, of course. I think he finds her sudden outbursts particularly distressing. They often occur during their scenes together. This morning, when Agnès burst into tears, Branco followed suit.’

  Oscar laughed. ‘Actors!’ he exclaimed. ‘Did they fall into each other’s arms as they wept?’

  ‘Branco put his arms around her and said, “I understand, my child.” But Agnès pushed him away and shrieked, “You don’t! You don’t understand — any of you!”‘

  Oscar held his cigarette out before him and gazed with hooded eyes upon the glowing ash. ‘And, from what you’ve observed, mon ami, which of poor, mad Agnès’s several comforters does she find the most comforting? Who calms her most? Who restores her to herself? Think carefully.’

  I reflected for a moment. ‘Her father,’ I said eventually.

  ‘Are you sure?’ asked Oscar.

  ‘Yes. Her father. And her brother.’

  ‘Thank you.’

  Oscar drew languidly on his cigarette. ‘And now, Robert,’ he said, turning his head towards me and smiling, ‘if you’d be so kind, go back to the beginning. ‘He blew a plume of purple smoke into the air and followed its path with admiring eyes. ‘Go back to last Saturday, if you would; go back to the afternoon of Traquair’s demise. Agnès and Bernard La Grange: where were they that afternoon? Did you ask them?’

  ‘I did, the moment that I received your telegram.’

  ‘And?’ He looked at me in anticipation.

  ‘And …’ I hesitated.

  ‘Well?’ His eyes widened.

  ‘Agnès couldn’t remember and Bernard wouldn’t say.’

  Oscar swung his feet onto the floor and buried his face in his hands. ‘Dear God, Robert! You are supposed to be my eyes and ears!’

  ‘I’m sorry,’ I mumbled with a nervous laugh. ‘I made the enquiries as you requested, but I drew a blank.’ I felt a fool. I blew my nose and straightened my back. ‘Oscar,’ I said, ‘you don’t seriously think that Agnès or Bernard La Grange could be implicated in Traquair’s death, do you?’

  My friend looked up at me and shrugged his broad shoulders. ‘Now it is my turn to say, “I don’t know!”‘ he responded, with a sigh. ‘It is unlikely, I grant you. I have an intuition that the deaths of Madame La Grange’s dog and Monsieur La Grange’s dresser must be in some way connected. As yet I don’t know why — or how — but if they are, I believe it puts Agnès and Bernard in the clear. The twins were not on board the SS Bothnia when the unfortunate Marie Antoinette was buried alive, so it is unlikely, in my estimation, that they had anything to do with the death of Traquair. It is unlikely, but not impossible. I was simply hoping to eliminate them from the field of suspects. It is a crowded field at present since it includes everyone who happened to be in the vicinity of this dressing room at the start of last Saturday’s performance of Le Cid. If to the cast you add the stagehands and the firemen and the members of the orchestra, we’re talking of upward of a hundred people. If you include the audience, we’re talking of upward of a thousand!’

  ‘But isn’t suicide still the most obvious explanation?’

  ‘I have never been interested in the obvious, Robert. Even on so brief an acquaintance you should know that of me.’ He sat back and pulled open his frock-coat. He put his hand into his waistcoat pocket and from it produced a small maroon-coloured ball, the size of a cherry. He held it out towards me.

  ‘What is it?’ I asked.

  ‘A sweet,’ he replied. ‘A bonbon. It tastes of aniseed. My new friend, the Reverend Paul White, gave me a little box of them. Suck on it, Robert. You’ll find that it has the flavour of absinthe without any of the deleterious side effects.’

  I took the sweet and tasted it.

  ‘Of course,’ he continued, ‘what the Reverend White fails to appreciate is that, for us, Robert, flavour in itself is not sufficient. The aniseed jujube is all very well in its way, but, as a substitute for absinthe, it doesn’t quite come up to the mark. Do you agree?’

  I sucked on the sweet. ‘It’s pleasant enough,’ I said, ‘but I agree with you — of course.’ I looked at him, perplexed. ‘Why are we discussing this ridiculous sweet, Oscar?’

  ‘Because I want you to understand why I do not believe that Washington Traquair could have taken his own life.’

  I looked at my friend, utterly bewildered. ‘I am lost, Oscar. I confess it.’

  ‘We are pleasure-seekers, Robert, you and I. Pleasure is the only thing that one should live for. That is my philosophy. I know that the realisation of oneself is the prime aim of life and I believe that to realise oneself through pleasure is finer than to do so through pain. I am on this point entirely on the side of the Greeks in general and Epicurus in particular. It is a pagan idea.’

  ‘What on earth has this got to do with Traquair?’ I cried, suddenly exasperated.

  ‘Nothing!’ exclaimed Oscar. ‘That is my point. Traquair was neither a pagan nor a philosopher. He was a simple valet who knew nothing of the Greeks. He was a Christian and an American. He lived by the rules that his mother and his Church had taught him. “Suicide is sinful.” The God-fearing Washington Traquair would not have taken his own life, however unhappy he was.

  ‘But, Oscar,’ I protested, pointing to the door to the dresser’s cubicle, ‘consider the evidence. When we found his body, Traquair’s room was locked from the inside, was it not?’

  ‘Apparently so.’

  ‘You found the key.’

  ‘I did.’

  ‘And the poor man’s upturned face was lying immediately beneath the jet of gas.’

  ‘It was.’

  ‘And the gas was on but unlit. Poisonous gas was filling the air.’

  ‘I don’t deny it.’ He got to his feet and walked over to the door to the dresser’s room. The door was ajar. He pulled it open. ‘But I ask myself,’ he continued, stepping into the darkened space beyond the door, ‘who was it that turned on the jet of gas? Was it Traquair, alone in his room, who turned the key at the side of the gas-burner and lay down to die? Or could it have been an outside agent, turning a different key in a different part of the building, hoping to poison Traquair in his sleep?’ Oscar stepped back into La Grange’s dressing room. He looked at me in a headmasterly fashion. ‘Robert,’ he enquired, ‘did you discover if there’s another tap that controls the flow of gas to these rooms?’

  ‘I did indeed, sir,’ I replied, unable to disguise the note of satisfaction in my voice. I turned, opened the main dressing-room door and
beckoned to my friend to join me in the wings. ‘I followed the line of the gas pipe from Traquair’s room through the partition wall into the dressing room and along the skirting board and through the outer wall — to here.’

  Oscar was now at my side. We stood immediately outside La Grange’s dressing room, to the left of the door. I pointed to the ground. In the corner, where the wooden outside wall of the dressing room abutted the brick wall of the theatre itself, at floor level, attached to the gas pipe was a small metal tap no bigger than a florin. It was barely visible in the gloom. Holding onto my arm with his left hand, with difficulty Oscar lowered his bulky frame and squatted for a moment to inspect it.

  ‘It’s covered in dust,’ he said. With his right hand, he attempted to turn the tap. ‘It’s very stiff.’ He struggled to his feet and examined his fingers. ‘And very grimy.’

  ‘And it stops and starts the flow of gas to both Monsieur La Grange’s dressing room and the dresser’s cubicle,’ I added. ‘You couldn’t alter the gas flow to one room without doing it to the other.’