The Very Picture of You

by Isabel Wolff

  ‘I’ve no idea. Maybe he loved her – maybe he loved them both. Maybe he was just … confused.’

  ‘Confused?’ Mum gave me a glacial stare. ‘Allowing men to be “confused” gives them an excuse to just … string other women along, offering them nothing.’

  ‘Then those “other women” should keep away.’ A muscle at the corner of Mum’s mouth twitched – she’d always loathed the idea that her daughter had been an ‘other woman’. I pulled the brush through a rag. ‘But Chloë really fell for Max.’

  Mum sniffed. ‘Goodness knows why. He’s not attractive – and he can’t earn much, working for a charity.’

  ‘He doesn’t just work for a charity, Mum – he runs Well-Spring, the international clean-water charity, and he isn’t unattractive – just a bit unkempt.’

  ‘All right – what he does is worthwhile,’ Mum conceded. ‘But that doesn’t alter the fact that he should have left Chloë alone.’

  ‘She should have left him alone – I was appalled when she told me that she’d become involved with him. But she believed him when he told her that his marriage was unhappy.’

  Mum smiled unctuously. ‘So much so that we now see him proudly posing with his wife in Hello!’

  Mum had a point there. ‘So you saw that.’

  ‘I did – and it made me feel sick. But it also made me realise that I was right to give Chloë the guidance that I gave her.’ Mum’s lips had become a thin line. ‘Because once she started talking about having his baby, then I knew that things couldn’t continue. Do you remember that, Ella?’

  ‘Yes.’ I reached for the paint rag again. ‘Not a great idea.’

  ‘So I decided that it was time that Max’s wife knew what was going on. I mean – there she was, writing detective fiction while failing to detect that her own husband had been having a year-long affair!’

  I looked at Mum, aghast. ‘You weren’t really going to tell Max’s wife – were you?’

  ‘I was …’ She exhaled through her nose. ‘But Roy dissuaded me.’

  I lowered my palette. ‘Thank God! Chloë was a grown woman. You have to let her make her own mistakes; it would have been dreadful to have talked to Sylvia.’

  ‘I know,’ Mum said tetchily. ‘But I was sorely tempted, because I could see that Chloë was on the verge of wrecking her life. I told her that time was marching on, and that it was quite clear that Max was never going to leave Sylvia. Chloë had convinced herself that if she got pregnant he would. So it was up to me to tell her that she was deluded and that it would be …’

  ‘Wrong?’ I suggested.

  The flanges of Mum’s nostrils flared. ‘Too big a risk. I was determined to protect her,’ she added quietly. ‘Just as I’d have protected you; not that you would have been stupid enough to fall for a man who wasn’t available.’

  ‘Hm …’

  ‘So I told Chloë, yet again, just what the realities of life are for a mistress.’ Mum’s voice, normally so soft and low, had begun to rise. ‘I told her that she’d be forever waiting for him to call, and that she wouldn’t be able to do anything with him openly and honestly. I said that her relationship with Max was low. She insisted that they were in love. I told her that, in that case, Max had to prove that he loved her – by committing to her, which he wasn’t. Chloë finally recognised the bitter truth of that and ended it – at last.’ Mum inhaled through her nose as though calming herself after some trauma.

  ‘Mum,’ I said gently. ‘Why are you getting so worked up? It’s all in the past now.’

  She blinked, as if waking from some dark dream. ‘Yes,’ she murmured. ‘It is.’ She gave a little laugh. ‘Why am I even talking about it? Chloë’s not with Max, she’s with Nate; they’re getting married and we’re all just thrilled.’ She gave a little shudder of happiness. ‘Aren’t we, Ella?’

  ‘Yes. Yes, of course we are …’

  SIX

  ‘Thanks for coming with me,’ Chloë said the following Thursday at 6.30. We were standing outside the Vintage Wedding-Dress Store in Covent Garden’s Neal Street. She pressed the old-fashioned brass bell. ‘It’s good that they do evening appointments – I don’t feel I can take any time off during the day.’

  ‘So your nose is to the grindstone?’

  ‘It is – as are my cheeks, mouth and chin. I’m surprised I’ve still got a face,’ she added with a laugh. Then the door was buzzed open and she pushed on it.

  ‘But you’re enjoying the work?’ I asked her.

  ‘Yes – and it’s great to have the responsibility. Oh. Hi.’ Chloë was smiling at the proprietor, who was walking towards us. ‘Are you Annie?’

  ‘I am – you must be Chloë.’ Annie, was about my age, slim, with short, dark hair. She was wearing a nineteen fifties circle skirt, with a pattern of strawberries, with a yellow cashmere jumper and white pumps.

  ‘This is my sister, Ella,’ Chloë explained. ‘She’s going to give me a second opinion on everything.’

  ‘Great.’ Annie smiled. ‘Come on in.’

  We followed her to the back of the shop. The walls were painted a restful pale green and were hung with framed sketches of wedding gowns by Balenciaga, Norman Hartnell and Dior. On the display stands were antique veils, vintage headdresses and exquisitely embroidered satin slippers. Beneath our feet the cream velvet carpet was voluptuously thick – a comforting surface for stressed-out brides.

  The changing room was very big, with two carved mahogany chairs with blue velvet seats like thrones. Hanging from the antique brass pegs were several wedding gowns, just visible inside their muslin bags, like cabbage whites about to emerge from their chrysalises.

  ‘I’ve brought out the ones we discussed on the phone,’ Annie told us. ‘So that’s “Gina” here.’ She began to unzip the bag. ‘I’ve also put out “Greta”, the slipper silk gown from the 1930s, and the sixties one that you liked – “Jackie”.’ She nodded at it. ‘It’s by Lanvin – hence the price. There are also three others I thought you might try, including one designed by Marc Bohan before he went to work for Dior. Do you wear much vintage?’ she asked Chloë.

  ‘Quite a bit,’ Chloë answered. ‘But I’d always thought that if I ever got married I’d wear a vintage dress, in order to have something … original.’

  ‘Well, these are unique,’ Annie said.

  ‘Where do you get them?’ Chloë asked.

  ‘I buy them at auction,’ Annie replied. ‘I get quite a few in New York – like this one.’ She gently pulled the ‘Gina’ out of its bag. ‘It’s by Will Steinman, which was a big name in America in the forties and fifties. And, of course, people bring dresses in to show me. I also have a friend who owns a vintage dress shop in Blackheath – Village Vintage.’

  ‘I’ve heard of it,’ said Chloë.

  ‘This friend – in fact, I used to work for her – doesn’t sell wedding gowns herself, so if she comes across a particularly lovely one she kindly sends it my way.’ Annie put her hand in her pocket and produced a pair of white cotton gloves of the sort Polly often wears. ‘So …’ She pulled them on. ‘Let’s make a start.’

  ‘Should I wear gloves?’ Chloë asked.

  ‘No – but could I ask if you’re wearing much make-up?’

  ‘Almost none,’ Chloë replied, ‘but I’ll be very careful.’ She turned to me. ‘Will you come in with me, Ella?’

  ‘Sure.’

  I sat in one of the chairs and Annie drew the calico curtain across, then left us. Chloë quickly got undressed. It was a long time since I’d seen her in just her bra and pants.

  ‘You’ve lost weight again, Chloë.’ She’d put it back on over the past year, but now you could see the jut of her hips.

  She glanced anxiously at her reflection. ‘It must be the stress of the job – and of getting married, of course, and, well … everything really.’ She put her clothes on the other chair.

  ‘I wish I could give you some of my pounds.’ I smiled ruefully.

  ‘You’re not fat, Ella –
just strong.’

  ‘I know – it’s hard to believe that Mum ever gave birth to me!’ I had the sturdiness and broad shoulders of my father, I’d realised since seeing that photograph. I saw myself standing beside him on that beach in Anglesey, my hand in his. I wondered if he’d known then, as he’d smiled for my mother’s camera, that he’d soon be leaving us. He probably did. Another good reason for not keeping the photo, I decided.

  ‘I’m ready, Annie,’ Chloë called.

  Annie parted the curtain and came in. She took the ‘Gina’ dress off its hanger, and held it up, the silk swishing softly. Chloë stepped into it, gingerly, as though getting into hot water.

  Annie lifted the dress on to Chloë’s shoulders, did up a few of the loop fastenings then gently pulled it in at the back so that Chloë could see the fitted effect in the mirror.

  Chloë appraised her reflection. ‘It’s gorgeous,’ she murmured. ‘But I’m too thin for it.’ Her hand went to her chest. ‘I don’t have enough up here – and a dress like this needs to be … filled.’ She glanced at me. ‘It would suit you, Ella.’

  ‘I’m not the one getting married,’ I said – a bit too sharply, I realised, as I saw Chloë blink at my tone. ‘You … could always stuff it with those chicken-fillet things.’

  She shook her head. ‘That would make me feel fake; and your wedding day is surely one day in your life when you want to feel that you’re being true to yourself.’

  ‘I agree,’ said Annie. ‘You are a bit slender for it.’ She undid the fastenings. ‘Let’s try the “Greta”.’

  Chloë put the ‘Greta’ on. It looked much better than the ‘Gina’ had done, and the drape and gleam of the satin was lovely. Chloë didn’t mind the low back, but the dress had clearly been made for someone tall, because even when she put on a pair of heels, the fabric pooled at her feet.

  Now she tried on another fifties dress, ‘Grace’. It didn’t suit her, but it made me think of Grace Clarke, whose portrait I had now begun. The photos that her uncle had lent me were good, but it was still going to be hard to create the illusion of three dimensions out of these two-dimensional images. I decided to ask her uncle if there was any recent video footage of Grace that I might see.

  Now Chloë was putting on the ‘Jackie’, which was made of thick shantung silk which gave it a structured, architectural look. It was a beautiful dress, but, as we had suspected, it was far too big.

  Next she tried on another sixties dress with a pleated skirt, then the Marc Bohan gown, which was a simple ivory tunic with a silvery lace overlay, like a cobweb; she then put on an eighties duchesse silk dress with lace-trimmed, elbow-length sleeves. As Chloë looked at herself she grimaced.

  Annie agreed. ‘It’s not really you. It’s very like Sarah Ferguson’s wedding dress. That was way back in 1986, so I don’t suppose you remember it.’

  ‘I don’t,’ Chloë replied as she took the dress off.

  ‘You did see the wedding,’ I told her. ‘You’d just turned five. I remember it very well.’ I’d never forgotten it, because of what my mother had told me that day.

  ‘Are you sure you won’t try on the “Giselle”?’ Annie asked as she hung the dress up.

  ‘I’m quite sure,’ Chloë replied. ‘I wouldn’t want my dress to have any negative associations, and Giselle has a hard time of it on the wedding front.’

  Annie zipped up the bag. ‘Why? What happens to her?’

  ‘She’s an innocent girl,’ Chloë began, ‘who falls in love with this handsome huntsman, Loys, who’s been madly flirting with her. When Giselle finds out that Loys is really Duke Albrecht, and that he’s engaged to Princess Bathilde, she goes insane with grief and grabs Albrecht’s sword and stabs herself—’

  ‘No,’ I interrupted. ‘She collapses because of her already frail health, before she can stab herself.’

  ‘Okay,’ Chloë conceded. ‘Anyway, heartbroken, she dies and then becomes a Wili – a ghost of a jilted bride – which is the only time she gets to wear a wedding dress, poor girl.’ I thought of Mum, in that poster, in her long tutu and veil. ‘Do you ever get to know the history of these dresses?’ Chloë asked Annie.

  ‘Sometimes,’ she replied. ‘In fact, I know the story behind this one …’ Out of the last bag she took a nineteen fifties gown with a ruffled silk tulle skirt and a heart-shaped satin bodice. The small bustle was topped with dainty blue flowers.

  Chloë’s face lit up. ‘It’s lovely.’

  Annie took the dress off its hanger. ‘I bought it from my next-door neighbour. When I told her that I was setting up my own vintage wedding-dress shop, she offered it to me. She’d kept it beautifully, but the red roses on the bustle had faded, so I replaced them with these forget-me-nots.’

  ‘Something blue,’ said Chloë happily as Annie held it out to her. She stepped into it and Annie pulled up the zip. Chloë looked at herself in the mirror and her eyes widened with pleasure. ‘It’s … beautiful.’

  As I looked at Chloë’s reflection I imagined Nate waiting at the altar, then turning and seeing her walking towards him in this glorious gown. I saw his face light up with delighted pride.

  ‘Are you okay, Ella?’ I heard Chloë ask. ‘You look a bit sad.’

  ‘Oh, I’m … just tired. But it’s a lovely dress.’

  ‘It is,’ Annie murmured. ‘And it’s a terrific fit.’

  Chloë turned to Annie. ‘So what’s the story behind it?’

  ‘The story is … that it was never worn.’

  ‘Really?’ said Chloë. ‘Why not?’ she added anxiously.

  ‘My neighbour, Pam, told me that she’d got engaged in 1958 to a boy called Jack whom she adored. She was twenty-three and still living at home, in a village near Sevenoaks. She saw the dress in Dickins & Jones – it cost forty guineas, which was a lot back then, but her parents wanted her to have her dream wedding so they bought it. Pam told me that she couldn’t wait for Jack to see her walk up the aisle in it. But a week before her big day Jack came to the house and told her that he couldn’t go through with it.’

  Chloë looked stricken, then she examined her reflection again, as if suddenly seeing the dress in a different light.

  ‘Pam’s parents tried to persuade Jack to change his mind, but he said he was sorry – he didn’t want to get married. He said he had too many doubts. Her parents then realised that they had no choice but to cancel everything and let the guests know. So there was no wedding – and their relationship was over, because Pam told him that she never wanted to see him again. Everything was ruined. She was distraught.’

  ‘Poor girl.’ Chloë’s face was a mask of sympathy. ‘But … I don’t think I’d want the dress now, knowing this.’ I wondered what on earth had induced Annie to tell such a negative story. Didn’t she want to sell it?

  She held up her hand. ‘Wait, there’s more. Three years later …’

  ‘She met someone else?’ Chloë anticipated. ‘I hope she did.’

  ‘Pam had moved to London by then, partly to get away from the memory of what had happened; and she was walking to work down Regent Street one morning when she looked up, and in the crowd she spotted Jack, coming towards her. Her heart started to pound. She told me that she’d decided to walk straight past him, as though she’d never known him.’ That’s what Mum would have done, I thought. ‘But some inner voice told her not to do that; so instead she called his name, and he stopped, clearly shocked. So there they both were, in the middle of the pavement with all these people weaving around them; and Pam asked him how he was, and he said fine, and he asked her how she was, and she said fine. And she was about to smile goodbye and walk on, when he asked her if she’d have time to have a cup of coffee with him. Pam hesitated, but then agreed. Then he rang her at work the next day and asked her if she’d have dinner with him one evening, and to cut a long story short …’

  ‘They got back together,’ Chloë murmured.

  Annie nodded. ‘They were married a few weeks later, in a register office, w
ith just two friends as witnesses.

  Pam wore a suit, but she’d kept her wedding dress because she’d been unable to part with it. So … that’s why it was never worn. She didn’t get her dream wedding, but she did have her happy ending – in fact, she said that she was happier with Jack because she believed she’d lost him.’

  ‘Was it hard for her to forgive him?’ Chloë asked.

  ‘She said it wasn’t, because she still loved him – she’d never stopped.’

  ‘But why didn’t he get in touch with her in the interim?’

  ‘He’d desperately wanted to, but didn’t feel that he could – remember, she’d told him that she never wanted to see him again. But they were married for forty-five years and had two sons. So it was a happy story …’

  ‘In the end,’ said Chloë quietly. As she gazed at her reflection, she frowned slightly, as though she was struggling with something.

  ‘Nate wouldn’t do that to you,’ I said. ‘If that’s what you’re thinking.’

  ‘I can put the dress on hold,’ said Annie. ‘If you’re not sure.’

  Chloë looked at herself, steadily, then the doubt in her face vanished. ‘No, I am sure. I’m going to buy it right now.’

  I’d hoped that helping Chloë choose the dress in which she was to marry Nate might have a calming effect on my feelings. It didn’t. Over the next few weeks they only intensified. In addition I became prey to a kind of schizophrenia in which I looked forward to seeing Nate but at the same time dreaded it. I had to gaze at him professionally, when I longed to do so personally. I had to stroke his face on to the canvas as if it were just a technical exercise when it had already become a labour of love. I’d think of Guy Lennox, and imagine his frustration at having to look at Edith from behind his easel when he’d probably wanted nothing more than just to stride up to her and take her face in his hands.

  In between sittings my mind would default to Nate, like a screensaver. I’d open my eyes in the morning and there he’d be, just as he was when I closed them at night. I would wake with a feeling of euphoria, then, as reality returned I’d feel sad and confused. I didn’t even know whether it was Nate’s own face I saw or the image of it that I was painting – they seemed to morph into one. I’d work on his portrait as a way of feeling close to him. I was in a state of exhilarated despair.