Emily Hudson

by Melissa Jones

  “No matter, I would try to remember it. Work it out later at the studio.”

  “It could certainly be done. Cumbersome, but possible.”

  “If I chose a place nearer the palazzo, I could walk to it every day.”

  “You are too impatient. Concentrate on what you are doing now.”

  It was strange that Emily did not object to Miss Drake telling her what to do—because she understood.

  They ate their lunch of bread and meats and cheese, the first tomatoes and cherries, and they drank the lemonade that Anna had made them that morning. Miss Drake had a keen appetite and Emily loved eating with her because they could be greedy and not speak.

  “It is strange to think I have done this alone these past ten years,” said Miss Drake. “And now it seems quite comfortable to be lunching and working with you.” Miss Drake did not usually speak about herself, but on this occasion did not appear embarrassed, even though she did not look at Emily.

  Emily glanced at her friend’s profile, so solid and determined. “Will you stay always here at Rome?”

  “It is my home. One cannot turn back and leave aside all that one has come to know, exchange it for—”

  “For what?”

  “That kind of new darkness they mistake for bright dawn, our countrymen and women.”

  Emily tore off a piece of grass and began to examine it, listening.

  “Not that one is treated with any great understanding here. The Italians think I am eccentric—everyone does. But at least I can live and work unmolested according to my own lights.”

  “What of your family?”

  “I am an only child and, like yours, my parents are dead. When it became clear that I would never marry I became—restless, and I began to think of what I could do. I have a little money. I had always traveled. When I reached Rome it came to me that I could not be anywhere else.”

  Emily smiled. “Do you not tire of being brought to think of God and passionate human love, death and sacrifice so continually?”

  Miss Drake turned to face Emily and look at her full in the eyes. “It is better than to be turned to stone. When I have longings of the heart, or am brought low, I work; that is what I do.”

  Emily fought tears that surprised her by coming into her eyes, dropping her head so that they could not be seen. She could hear the sound of the tethered horse snatching at the grass beneath the trees, of children playing in the distance—they must have come out of school—and the tinkle of harness when the horse’s back shivered away a fly.

  “I was indisposed for quite a long time one winter,” Miss Drake continued, “and I discovered the habit of learning a poem every day. It was a great discipline. I had to keep to my bed and was frustrated. But at the end of every day when I could no longer point to a sketch that I had made, or a paper I had written for my students—for I was obliged to close my studio—I at least knew that I had learned a poem.”

  “A—friend gave me a book of poetry when I was ill once.”

  “Indeed?”

  “I have not opened it.”

  Miss Drake laughed, sharply. “You are in a position to choose not to accept gifts?”

  “I did not think of it.“

  “The young are very peculiar,” observed her friend. “What was the book?”

  “It was Mrs. Browning’s Sonnets from the Portuguese.”

  “Ah.”

  Emily laughed. “What does that signify?”

  “You will discover it. You could read one each day even if you did not learn them. It would be good for you.”

  “The gentleman advised me of the same thing.”

  “Wise counsel. One must increase one’s stock of images, every day, in language as well as through the eyes. Neither should one be afraid to listen to advice.”

  “They settled at Rome, did they not?”

  “Mr. and Mrs. Browning? Yes, they did. I had occasion to meet them once.”

  “It was my cousin who first encouraged me to read—truly to read and think,” said Emily, with a sudden stab of wistfulness at the memory.

  “He is not entirely without merit then.”

  Emily began to rip her little piece of grass into infinitesimal shreds.

  “Do you think you will remain at Rome?” Miss Drake asked.

  She shivered. “I do not know.” The cloudless day, the warm meadow, seemed infinitely more precious at the mere idea of their precariousness. “I shall work, I shall see, and I shall discover.”

  “In time you will desire your own establishment. But understand that you are always welcome to share mine.”

  Emily looked at Miss Drake: her thick eye-browed, close-featured face, her air of determination and resolve, the restraint of her feeling, and was moved. “I believe I am fortunate in you.”

  “Yes, my dear; I think you are.”

  In her narrow bed that night Emily began to read the first sonnet from Mrs. Browning’s book.

  I Thought Once How Theocritus Had Sung

  I thought once how Theocritus had sung

  Of the sweet years, the dear and wished-for years,

  Who each one in a gracious hand appears

  To bear a gift for mortals, old or young:

  And, as I mused it in his antique tongue,

  I saw, in gradual vision through my tears,

  The sweet, sad years, the melancholy years,

  Those of my own life, who by turns had flung

  A shadow across me. Straightway I was “ware,

  So weeping, how a mystic Shape did move

  Behind me, and drew me backward by the hair;

  And a voice said in mastery, while I strove,—

  “Guess now who holds thee?”—“Death,” I said. But there,

  The silver answer rang, “Not Death, but Love.”

  The days continued warmer, and in her brooding heart Emily began to ponder over the past and her treatment of her cousin. Had she been cruel and unthinking, unheeding of his feeling of her? Might the outcome between them have been different if she had deprived herself of her selfishness? Had he not loved her sufficiently tenderly (she could think of no other word now that he was no longer present to shrink from it) to devote himself to her keeping, deliver her from his father, from the bonds that had chafed her so terribly? Did he not pay for her to live, to go to school, to pursue her every ambition? Had he not introduced her to Caroline, the chaperone in every sense most suited to lead her into English society? Had he not found a house for her for the summer, sensible of her love for the sea? And she had thwarted him with her conduct and behavior, embarrassed him with her dalliance with Lord Firle: would she not behave differently now that she was a little older and far wiser? At first she had considered herself innocent and injured. It came over her that perhaps she had been deeply at fault. She felt it keenly.

  And at nighttime with her candle and poetry book, the passionate love that Elizabeth Browning felt for her soul’s equal, her profound gratitude, this moved her, and she berated herself for never having counted gratitude among her blessings.

  When she thought of Firle it was of the intoxication that his presence had always given to her—the dizzy sense of freedom at the brazen-ness of his intentions and invitations; but where before she had flattered herself that it was her charm that had inspired these attentions, now she wondered if it were merely her defenselessness. When she thought of Captain Lindsay it was with the old tenderness and pain, if she could bear to think of him at all; her mind and heart shied away from it. Beyond that she had a sense almost of shame. What would have become of his faith in her if he had seen how she had conducted herself with Lord Firle? The liberties she had allowed him to take?

  In her moments of reflection in the studio or on the loggia, observing the sparrows in the eaves or making patterns in the sky; the vault of Rome’s heavens, the roofs and spires and domes beneath, she questioned each action, each feeling, from her arrival at Newport to her flight to Rome, and could draw no other conclusion than that m
any of her actions, thoughts, feelings, had been the height of selfishness and folly.

  At the memory of her dear mother and father she would still flinch with instinctive hard inner pain, and when that passed she could see her mother’s goodness, not as the angel of their house as Mr. Dickens would have her be, but as solid flesh and blood; her devotion, what she had taught about duty and work and love and truth to one’s heart, and she thought that these teachings were not entirely unlike the way Miss Drake spoke and acted. She did not intrude upon Emily with questions. Every day she was kind: to Emily, to her students, to the flowers of the field, and she gave herself up to the life she had chosen with such discipline, such single- minded American zeal that Emily was put in mind of the pilgrims her friend so affected to despise. It was a tangle. It was a coil. She could not puzzle it out.

  They were breakfasting on the loggia and it was already warm. The bright morning sunlight defined the shadows. Emily liked feeling warm in her bones. It was as if she were being held by a divine hand.

  “I notice that you no longer appear consumptive,” said Miss Drake.

  Emily nearly dropped her coffee cup. They looked at one another.

  “I am glad of it. I dare say you are too,” she continued, tartly. “Do you know, I have never seen you speechless before.” She broke a brioche and covered it with thick black jam.

  “I thought you had no idea! I thought I had concealed it.”

  “In the first instance you are entirely transparent. In the second, consumption has a very distinctive face. In the third, it is impossible to conceal anything from me. How long since you last coughed blood? A month?”

  “Six weeks.”

  “You have more flesh on your bones. And you sleep better at night. I do not hear you move about as I used to.”

  Emily shook her head and began to laugh, pressing the backs of her hands to her eyes to quell the water, as she always did at the first starting of tears to her eyes. “I think it has left me. For the time being.”

  “Well, let us make sure it does not come back, shall we?” smiled her friend, taking a saucer of milk to the corner of the loggia and calling for Anna’s cat.

  WILLIAM CORNFORD, ESQ.

  CARLTON CLUB, SW

  PALAZZO———, ROME

  May 30th, 1863

  Dear William,

  Forgive me for writing when I had assured you in my last letter that I would have no occasion to.

  It is a simple thing I have to say: mea culpa. I am truly sorry. Perhaps it is being surrounded by the many candlelit penances of Rome (I apologize for my jest—the city has not robbed me of an inability to be serious), but I have come to understand that I have acted selfishly and thoughtlessly throughout our friendship and that I have injured you.

  You are the person to whom I owe my very existence beyond America and I have used you ill in return for your generosity.

  I do not expect a reply, nor ask for one, but merely desire you to have the comfort—should you require it—of knowing how very sorry I am.

  With love as ever,

  Emily

  MISS CAROLINE TRELAWNEY

  GROSVENOR SQUARE, SW

  PALAZZO———, ROME

  June 1st, 1863

  My dear Caroline,

  Thank you so very much for your last letter: I am delighted to hear that you are enjoying the start of the season and beginning to initiate a whole gaggle of new young ladies into the pleasures of poetry readings and suppers. Your soirees must be a welcome respite—for most, I would imagine—from their mammas parading them through the Park and to every party and ball imaginable in search of a husband. Or should I correct myself—it seems that in your country young ladies marry houses rather than gentlemen. Forgive the bitterness behind my observation. (Doubtless if I had had a dowry and been courted I would have been contented enough; I fear I am like those who are not blessed with beauty becoming acid-tongued about the joys of love.)

  But I did not mean all this in the least—there is so much more to tell you, and I have not even begun it yet.

  But before I do, let me tell you how happy I was to hear about your new puppies. It must be difficult for you to tear yourself away from them at Richmond, but presumably when they are older you shall be able to bring one or two to London to run with their parents in the Park beside your carriage. I can picture it now. And I am so touched that you should name one after me. Let us hope it proves more sweet-tempered and biddable than I!

  The days are beautifully warm here and we are fortunate that the palazzo is in the hills so we do not suffer from the heat and are quite the perfect temperature.

  I am feeling very well—extremely healthy, in fact. In the mornings I go for long walks and rambles in the hills before settling to work and that seems only to increase my energies.

  Miss Drake and I have been working diligently on preparing an exhibition of our and our students’ work. There are many difficulties: we lack sufficient hanging space in our studio, and the palazzo is quite out of the way, but that has not deterred my friend. We are striving to make the occasion a celebration of our students and all their endeavors.

  The truth of the matter is that the whole occasion comes very close to being a party, or reception, what you will, because there will be invitations, refreshments, perhaps even music. (You should taste what they eat and drink here—you would die of pleasure after just one grape!) We have been so quiet these past months that I have nothing at all suitable to wear and fear I must venture into a shop or dressmaker’s or disgrace myself for ever in my work clothes.

  Dear friend, I am really quite excited and must take my high spirits away from the paper for fear of stabbing it too hard!

  With much love,

  Emily

  MISS EMILY HUDSON

  PALAZZO———, ROME

  CARLTON CLUB, SW

  June 10th, 1863

  Dear Emily,

  For some days I have been at a loss as to how to reply to your letter.

  On the one hand your habit of bounding from one feeling or attitude to another appears to have remained intact; on the other, if I could believe in a true change of heart in this case, I might come to hold once more to the idea that my faith in you was, after all, justified.

  I hope you can appreciate that my ambivalence is well founded.

  If you should care to continue in a correspondence, delicately, I should not object.

  Yours truly,

  William Cornford

  Emily received this letter on the morning of the exhibition when there was such a commotion of preparation that they had hardly had time to take breakfast. Miss Drake had risen especially early and was already beginning the hanging in the studio with the help of a selection of her most favored students. The sight of her surrounded by this group of tall young men and women had caused Emily great amusement over recent days.

  One glance at the familiar handwriting caused a sensation of nervousness Emily had not enjoyed for some months and rather than read it on the loggia, she carried it down the small outside flight of stairs to the quiet balcony garden where plentiful pots of geraniums, a honeysuckle and an entire wall of dusty roses and plumbago competed in their beauty to give her strength. It had rained in the night, refreshing the plants, washing the view of Rome, and now the sun fell on the back of her neck and hands with reassuring warmth.

  She read it quickly, and then crossing to the balustrade leaned on it, looking ahead of her with blurred eyes. Of course he would not forgive her wholeheartedly—how could she have hoped for it, let alone expected it? The barb in his words, the familiar sensation of being put in the wrong, all chafed at her. But as she thought of it, she felt that, after all, he was entitled to look at her in that way. Without thinking any further she went to her room and wrote quickly:

  WILLIAM CORNFORD, ESQ.

  CARLTON CLUB, SW

  ROME

  June 15th, 1863

  Dear William,

  I have only just this moment re
ceived your letter.

  My apology remains, as does my affection for you, and I can understand from your words why you doubt me. All I can add is that should we ever have occasion to meet again you would not deny the sincerity of my words.

  Yours truly,

  Emily

  Then she hurried to put away the letter and join her friend.

  MISS CAROLINE TRELAWNEY

  GROSVENOR SQUARE, SW

  ROME

  June 15th, 1863

  My dear Caroline,

  Today quite an extraordinary thing happened.

  Anxious to escape from the continual preparation Miss Drake was making for the evening’s exhibition, and fairly shooed out of the way as I was, I went to the Villa Borghese, having not yet had the opportunity to view the collection there.

  Having been not a little shocked when I first came to Rome by the extravagant and overwhelming abandon of the Ecstasy of St. Teresa, I found quite a different thing in Bernini’s sculpture of Daphne and Apollo. It is almost the first sight to assail the senses when one arrives.

  I am sure that as a well-educated and -traveled young lady you have heard of it, but allow me to indulge myself with a rhapsodic—but quite inadequate—description.

  Apollo pursues Daphne—she is cold white marble, yet living, Daphne—and to escape him she is changing into a tree. The fierceness of his desire, the lightness of her escape and the sense of longing and flight—you could not but imagine the beauty of it—the living tree bringing a living death to that exquisite creature!