Wearily he looks up at the painting on his wall that depicts a peace treaty between William Penn and the Lenape Tribe in Pennsylvania. It is a copy of a work he created for Penn’s son, Thomas, some years beforehand – at the point, he reflects bitterly, when he was riding high in both England and America following the success of The Death of General Wolfe. As requested, he had painted it so that it appeared to show perfect harmony between the Europeans and the natives of America. He had received much praise for it, but in his uneasy state of mind it strikes him with force that the painting depicts a lie, that it is a mask for hidden tensions that would play themselves out for decades.
He starts to write again.
‘What has transpired since has, I believe, vindicated me further. Ann Jemima did perform a Demonstrasion of the method to the artists, and several of them have now try’d it. Reports are now reaching me that a Number of them are unable to make it work. There is a young prodigy at the Academy called Thomas Lawrence. His Arroganse knows no bounds, and we have suffer’d Disagreements on a number of occasions. However, yesterday he came to me after taking a Lesson in the method with the two Provises. He told me he felt as if he had surendered his Paintbrush to two fools who knew much less than he did. In no small ironie, I did find myself defending the Provises. Yet he is now firmly resolv’d that it is Folly on the part of the other artists to credit them.
‘Mr Farington, most Insidi’ous individual that he is, is I should confess, having a little more success. Yet in truth, I have never had a great Admiration for his art – he is as cautious and calculating on the canvas as he is in Politicks. While his experiments with the method are no cause for embarrassment, there is equally Nothing that announces him to be the next Titian. Increasingly I believe I was right to delay handing over the sum of money, but I know better now, than to Declare such thoughts out loud.’
For a moment his face looks less weary. A half-smile starts to play on his lips as the quill continues to scratch across the paper.
‘No, the best way to acquit myself in Triumph is to enshure that even tho’ the Secret has now been shared, it will be I who displays the most impresive painting at the Academy’s forthcoming exhibition. Permit me a little Arroganse in this. The question of an apposite subject has taunted me for a while. If I did consult my heart, I would choose to paint my late dear friend Benjamin Franklin, whom I still believe to be the greatest American of our time. Since the method brings together science and art, it strikes me that his experiment to capture Electricyty from the sky would make an excellent subject for a work demonstrating its Merits.
‘Yet to my Sorrow it is – once more – a wretched time to celebrate being an American in this cold little ile. After a failed attempt this Christmas last, there are fears in Britain that there will be another invasion led by the French in Collaborasion with Irish Republicans. One of the commanders is said to be a certain American, Colonel William Tate. His family was kill’d by Native Americans who supported the British side in the American War of Independence. Thus he does hate the British.
‘I have never met this Colonel William Tate, nor am I Sympathetick to his immediate intentions. But because of him I must once more tread carefully in displaying the pride I have in my home country. Since Mr Franklin’s extraordinary Intellekt is considered in many quarters to have played an important part in pushing France towards its Revolution, I am in little doubt that I would invite considerable Opprobrium by creating his likeness.’
He looks out of the window. ‘Damn them,’ he whispers. ‘Damn them all. How often have I had to conceal my thoughts to remain acceptable to those around me? And still they have found a way to condemn me. I detest and loathe them all.’
He composes himself.
‘There is something stubbern in me’, he writes, ‘that cannot altogether Relinquish cherishing the memory of my dear friend. So I plan to do what many opress’d artists have done before now, and reach into history to pay a more Subtil tribute. The painting I plan to create will be set in Sicily, almost a century before the birth of Christ. Imagine if you will the heat of the sun, the darting of lizards, the sounds and smell of the sea. In front of you is the great Cicero, a politician and philosopher whose renown extends across the Roman Empire. He is leading the people of Syracuse to discover a secret that has lain hidden for centuries. That secret? Nothing less than the tomb of Archimedes, who, like my great friend Mr Franklin, was one of the great scientists and inventors of his time.
‘Consider the scene once more, and you may note another Seeries of parallels. Cicero – tho’ greater than your humble brother – resembled myself in many Aspekts. He too had raised himself up into public life through the Merits of self-education. He too had been forced to thrive in an environment dominated by civil unrest. He too had striven for moral uprightness in a time of conspiracy and corruption. And at the moment I want to capture in this painting, he was far from home on a small island. Archimedes had been a native of this island, and was probably its greatest son. Yet despite this fact, the natives of Syracuse had neglected his legacy so greatly that his tomb was overgrown, and people by this point had forgotten that it was there at all. What they needed was an outsider to reveal the value of his legacy, just as I am sure the Gentlemen of the Academy, need my insights to unlock this method.’
His foot starts to tap impatiently as he writes. ‘Perhaps it is too much,’ he mutters. ‘Perhaps I exalt myself too greatly.’ The expression in his eyes hardens. ‘Yet it will be sweet revenge. When they see that I can interpret the method like no other, when they realise that both in the subject I have chosen and in its execution I have had the last laugh…’
He grits his teeth.
‘We shall see how this plays at this year’s Exhibition. My sentiment is that even if it is Hail’d as a success, I am tempted to Resign my post and return to my beloved America. I have been away too many years now. In the Meenwhile wish me good fortune.
Your brother,
Benjamin.’
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
The ingenious Miss Provis
So did the selfe-conceited Megabyzus, when hee was sitting in Zeuxis his shop, presume to prattle something about matters of art, even as if his big lookes and purple coat should have made his unadvised discourses good; but he found himself very much deceived: seeing Zeuxis did not sticke to tell him to his face, that he was both admired & reverenced of all that saw him, as long as he held his peace: whereas now having begun to speake senselesly, hee was laughed at even of the boyes that did grinde colours.’
franciscus junius,
The Painting of the Ancients, 1638
The stone hit the window of John Opie’s bedroom at six o’clock in the morning. The thwack of it on the glass made him wake with a yelp. A half-chewed dream fled from his head without a murmur. He lunged from the bed and hurtled to see what had awakened him.
In the darkness he could see a dishevelled heap of a man. He flung up the window just as the second stone came and clipped him on the ribs. Opie opened his mouth and bellowed. Even he wasn’t sure what the word was: it expressed some incoherent hostility that froze in the darkness before collapsing in splinters.
‘Let me in, Opie.’
The dishevelled heap asserted itself. The familiar voice allowed Opie to discern the face cloaked by darkness.
‘Darton, you jackanapes. Why are you waking me at this hour?’
‘If you leave me on the pavement much longer, I shall freeze to death and be unable to tell you,’ came the response. ‘Come down and open the door.’
Cursing, Opie lit the lamp by his bed. Every move, both mental and physical, was an effort. He made his way downstairs to the front hallway, holding up the lamp as he slid back the latch and opened the door.
Darton pushed his way past Opie and into the hall.
‘Brandy,’ he declared.
‘Are there not houses of ill-repute which could give you brandy at this time of the morning?’ exploded Opie.
‘Oh,
the brandy is as much for you as it is for myself,’ declared Darton, looking at him with a half-smile. ‘After what I am about to tell you, you will find yourself in need of it.’
Opie frowned. He gestured sharply upstairs towards the drawing room before rubbing his eyes.
‘Tell me not. The French have invaded London and King George’s head is already on a stake.’
‘No, this is far better.’
Opie walked to the drinks cabinet and got out a bottle of brandy and two glasses.
‘Have you slept tonight?’
‘Not at all. I arrived back by stage close to midnight, and went straight to my house, but the importance of what I have to tell you refused to let me go to bed. You are lucky that I woke you as late as this.’
Opie frowned as he handed him the glass of brandy.
‘What are you talking about? What have you discovered?’
‘Your Ann Jemima Provis.’ Darton stared at him impudently. ‘Your Ann Jemima Provis,’ he pointed his finger accusatorily, ‘does not exist.’
For a second the thought flashed across Opie’s brain that his friend had contracted syphilis and was now suffering the madness of its last stages.
He looked once more at his dishevelled appearance and the wildness in the eyes.
‘Josiah, she does exist,’ he replied gently. ‘You and I have had a number of encounters with her…’
‘No, no, no,’ laughed Darton, waving his hand in the air as if to brush away Opie’s interpretation. ‘I do not mean that the girl we have met does not exist. I mean that her name is not Ann Jemima Provis.’
Opie took a sip of the brandy. Darton’s assertion kicked round his head.
‘You are telling me that she has an assumed identity?’ he said finally.
Darton nodded.
‘That she is…’ he hesitated, frowning, ‘not Provis’s daughter?’
Over the next few minutes, Darton told him all he had discovered in Somerset. Opie exclaimed at the suffering Provis had undergone.
‘Do we think this is the cause of the blackmail? That Cosway has heard it from someone who has not told the story in a way that shows Provis’s innocence?’
‘At first I thought that must be it too. But Cosway’s attack on Ann Jemima shows that he holds both of them to account.’
‘And if we now know her not to be his daughter…’ Opie had a larger mouthful of brandy, ‘it seems more than probable that Cosway does as well.’
The silence that ensued rang around them.
‘What does this mean for the manuscript?’ Darton eventually asked.
Opie laughed sarcastically.
‘Benjamin West wrote a letter to the entire Academy, shortly after you left, saying that he should have acknowledged the Provises. He considers their method to be genuine.’
Darton’s eyes widened.
‘So Thomas and Ann Jemima Provis stand to make their money. Unless someone ruins it by revealing that Ann Jemima is not who she claims to be.’
They stared at one another for a moment.
‘Who do we talk to about this? Opie asked. ‘We don’t want to smash bottles before we know why we are smashing them.’
‘Indeed,’ replied Darton. ‘I think one individual stands out as holding all the keys in this business.’
He looked hard at Opie.
‘Indeed, it is evident. Shall we see him first?’
Darton nodded. ‘Let me return home and wash. We shall call on him after breakfast.’
The look on Richard Cosway’s face when they were shown into his drawing room was detached, gently amused. Yet the red eyebrows levitated gently as he surveyed their faces.
‘Gentlemen, I see you have arrived on a matter of some urgency.’ The pale mouth pursed itself in faint amusement.
‘Who is she?’ Darton’s voice punched across the room.
‘I’m sorry, my dear Josiah, I do not see the she to whom you are referring.’
‘You know precisely of whom I am talking,’ said Darton.
Opie could see a faint flare of alarm in Cosway’s eyes.
‘It would seem Ann Jemima Provis is not precisely who she claims she is,’ Opie said more calmly. ‘Since it was you, my dear Cosway, who introduced her to West, we thought you might know the truth about her background.’
Cosway essayed a smile.
‘This is a curious assertion, gentlemen. Benjamin West himself has confessed that the meth…’
‘We are not talking about the method,’ interrupted Opie, ‘though I suspect what we have discovered discredits that utterly, whatever West may say.’
Now he noticed Cosway’s swallow of discomfort. He knows for certain, he thought to himself, but he is trying to work out a way to deny it. Darton had noticed the swallow as well. He looked quickly over to Opie.
‘Can you explain to me, Cosway,’ he said menacingly, ‘why there is a grave in Somerset with Ann Jemima’s name on it?’
It was as if the truth were quicksand, and Cosway had suddenly found himself in it up to the neck.
‘There has presumably been more than one Ann Jemima Provis in this world…’ he said, but the tone of his voice was somewhat strangulated, even as his words attempted to feign some composure. He cleared his throat. ‘Neither our names nor we ourselves are as unique as we imagine ourselves to be…’
‘Desist from your mock philosophising, Cosway,’ spat Darton. ‘I talked to people who knew her father. There is no doubt that it is Thomas Provis’s daughter who lies dead there. Who is the woman who has taken her name?’
Cosway shot him a caustic glance. ‘There is no reason to be so aggressive, Mr Darton.’ Distractedly he rang a bell for a servant. ‘May I offer you a drink, gentlemen? Some coffee perhaps?’
Here he looked particularly hard at Darton.
‘This is not, as you may have gathered, a social visit,’ said Opie.
‘Well, there is no harm in playing at dignity,’ replied Cosway.
The man is loathsome, Opie thought to himself. As Cosway calmly ordered coffee for all three of them, he planned the next line of attack.
‘Did you realise she was not Provis’s daughter when you first introduced her to West?’ he said, as the servant disappeared to the kitchens.
‘I had no idea there was anything amiss…’ began Cosway, but Darton interrupted again.
‘Why did you attempt to rape her?’
Again Cosway started.
‘Do not deny it,’ Darton continued. ‘She has told me herself.’ He knew Cosway was in no position to contest what he said. ‘I believe you sustained a nasty wound during the attempt. Since then you have tried to atone for your transgression by approaching Mr West and ensuring that, despite the doubts, the method was successfully sold. Some small compensation for what you made her suffer.’
Cosway bowed his head down for a moment. When he lifted it, he sighed.
‘I first met Ann Jemima four years ago at a seamstress’s.’
‘Which one?’ asked Darton sharply.
‘Mrs Gage’s, in Moor Lane.’
The atmosphere in the room changed.
‘Not an establishment that gentlemen visit for the sewing,’ said Darton.
‘Quite,’ said Cosway. ‘I suspected you would recognise the reference, Josiah.’ His impudence was laconic.
‘So it was close to the house in Fournier Street where I found her knocking on the door.’
‘I will come to that.’ Cosway rolled his eyes. ‘I was most surprised that Mrs Gage offered her to me,’ he continued. ‘She was much too young for my tastes. There is a bishop who visits who apparently has an inclination towards that sort of thing. But though I am not averse to experiment, I like women and not girls.’
Opie and Darton exchanged glances.
‘It turned out she had become quite agitated when she heard I was visiting. I was told her grandmother had possessed some miniatures of mine.’ His eyes flickered. ‘We were shown to a room. Mrs Gage disappeared. I sat there, feeling somewha
t disinclined. She was in an absurd dress and bonnet that were meant to make her look more like a woman, but simply emphasised her gawkiness. I was about to hand over my payment and leave, when suddenly she burst into tears and flung herself on my mercy.’
His foot began to tap.
‘It transpired she had come to London from Bath following the death of her father and grandmother from smallpox. Her mother died when she was an infant. Her father had been a doctor, and a colleague of his in Spitalfields agreed to take her in as a servant for his wife.’ Here he stared at Darton. ‘That will have been the house where you found her. She realised quickly his interest in her was more anatomical than philanthropic. He made such goatish advances towards her whenever his wife was out that in the end the girl fled. That night she slept on the street.’
‘Who was the girl who came to the door?’
‘The family had a daughter, about the same age as Ann Jemima. It was the first friendship she had when she came to London. Yet of course the friendship could not endure once she had fled. She would have had to explain why living in the house was impossible. The risk of whether her friend would believe her or her father was not one she wished to take.’
Darton was quiet for a moment.
‘How was she rescued from her situation by Mrs Gage?’ he eventually asked. ‘From the cauldron to the bonfire in one fell swoop?’
‘She did what many girls from the country do when they find themselves in London without friends or family,’ Cosway chided him. ‘She went to an intelligence office to find domestic work. When Mrs Gage appeared there, she of course had affected a veneer of respectability so convincing that the girl had no hesitation in going with her. By the time she knew what was happening, it was too late. She was installed, and Mrs Gage had most of her possessions and the little money she had locked safely in a cupboard.’
The Optickal Illusion Page 31