Nina In Utopia

by Miranda Miller

  TUESDAY

  There is a rookery near by where I try to be of use, bringing soup and good advice into the lives of those less fortunate than myself. I do not feel very fortunate just now, so it is a salutary reminder of my relative prosperity to visit families who live ten to a room without any drainage or sanitation.

  This morning I spent an hour with Mrs Jenks (a courtesy Mrs, I fear), trying to persuade her that seven children are more than enough and that, having foolishly conceived an eighth, she had much better leave it at the foundling hospital where it will be properly cared for and brought up. The woman was most ungrateful and called me an interfering old c—w and threatened to trample me to pieces if I ‘come canting into our court again’. She is not a bad but an ignorant woman. I left her some pamphlets on abstinence and temperance and a copy of the Bible. She and her so-called husband cannot read, but perhaps one of their verminous brood will acquire an education some day.

  The Misses Devirill-Prendergasts (a long name for two short dumpy ladies) have organized a Fancy Fair to raise money for the Missionary Society. They hope to raise as much as a thousand pounds, and I am kept busy with their committee meetings. Well, it is better to wear out than to rust. Tonight I am sitting up late, crocheting shawls and working on my patchwork quilt. The one I worked for the Lighten Their Darkness Benevolent Society was sold for three guineas. I am very sensible of my own darkness as I sit alone by my fire. I wonder if I should go to Africa as a missionary instead of to Bath as a governess. Would it not be more rewarding to bring the true faith into the lives of the benighted than to teach creatures of fiddlers and dancing masters how to come into a room and get into a carriage? Whenever I consider leaving London it is the thought of leaving you that I cannot bear. Knowing that you exist in the same city has been a great comfort to me all these long years. Foolishness, of course, but your face etched itself on my heart so long ago that I cannot remove it. Your face, and my heart, grow older.

  I know my own face is, if possible, even plainer than it was when I was seventeen and Miss Baker said, ‘My dear, if you don’t marry you will find that you have on your shoulders half-a-dozen husbands and as many families of children.’ There is a freemasonry among plain women. Miss Baker meant, but did not say, that I should get a husband, any husband, no matter how old or ugly or beastly, rather than slave away teaching spiteful girls as she had done all her life. She knew too well that it is the lot of unmarried daughters to perform cheerless duties and watch by thankless sickbeds until they fade into querulous and disappointed old age. Who was it that nursed our parents in their final illnesses? Not my frivolous sister.

  FRIDAY

  I knew you would come to me again, my prince, but did not think that it would be so soon. This time you came before breakfast. When I heard the bell I thought you were the baker’s boy. When Rachel showed you in I was still in my old grey dressing-gown, but I don’t suppose you noticed what I was wearing. Your handsome face was shrouded with anxiety, and your hand was cold despite the warm sun outside. You slumped in the chair opposite mine, usually so empty, and refused all refreshment except black coffee. Then you pushed a package at me across the table with a helpless gesture that made me long to embrace you. I did not, of course. My arms are so unaccustomed to the feel of another human being that they ignored the wild cries of my heart and went on buttering my toast.

  ‘I want you to read this, Henrietta. It’s a letter Nina wrote to me after her … disappearance. It seems to me quite unbalanced, but I can’t separate my medical opinion from my private sentiments.’

  Eagerly, I tore open the envelope, but you put out your hand to prevent me. You cannot know, I don’t wish you to know, how your touch disturbs me.

  ‘Don’t read it until I have gone.’

  ‘Is my sister … you think her insane?’

  ‘She is so changed that I hardly know how to describe her. You must see her and judge for yourself.’

  ‘I have called several times and have sent her notes, but she has made it very clear she does not wish to see me.’

  ‘Don’t be angry, Henrietta.’

  ‘I always try to forgive, to submit cheerfully to the evils of life. But this is not the first time she has rebuffed me. When poor little Bella died Nina refused to let me near her. I only wanted to ensure the child had a beautiful death.’

  ‘Nina was distraught. Naturally. She objected to being told to rejoice at such a time.’

  ‘Bella had gone to a better world. I felt joy as well as sorrow as her innocent spirit winged its way to Heaven.’

  ‘However, we were so grateful to you for taking Tommy away.’

  ‘Grateful? Were you? But he was not. When I told him his sister was safe with Jesus he howled and shouted that Jesus should give her back and get his own sister. Really, Charles, the child seems to have had no religious instruction whatsoever. Perhaps I should begin my career as a missionary in Harley Street.’

  ‘Are you going to be a missionary? What an extraordinary woman you are! I can just picture you keeping the cannibals in order.’

  ‘“Care to our coffin adds a nail no doubt / While every laugh so many, draws one out,”’ I said, hurt by his levity. ‘I am glad my misfortune amuses you.’

  ‘Oh dear - I didn’t realize - are you short of cash?’

  ‘Uninterrupted prosperity is not the lot of man. Or woman.’

  ‘Not my lot either, unfortunately, otherwise I’d help. What about your railway shares? In the old Worse and Worse, weren’t they?’

  ‘I sold them a few years ago. At the wrong time, it seems. Whenever I go to Oxford, Worcester or Wolverhampton I feel quite indignant, as if those cities had robbed me.’

  ‘Poor Henrietta.’

  Your sympathy brought shameful tears to my eyes. ‘Yes, I must work hard in the Lord’s vineyards. A governess in Bath or a missionary in Bulawayo - that, it seems, is to be my fate.’

  ‘We shall miss you.’

  ‘I don’t believe Nina will miss me one little bit.’

  ‘She is very ill, Henrietta. Not physically, perhaps, but … that is really why I have come today. Last night we had a dinner party and her behaviour was … most singular. She has some delusion about the future - that she has been there - you will understand better when you have read this.’ You tapped the bulging envelope propped up against my teapot and gazed at me, hurt and puzzled.

  ‘She has always been eccentric, but I had no idea she was actually …’

  ‘Her grief over darling Bella’s death may have brought on some temporary derangement. In a few months, quite possibly, she will be herself again.’

  ‘How can I help, Charles?’ Behind your eyes I glimpsed a desperate man.

  ‘I was going to ask if you would come to stay. Just until Nina is better. Our household is in disorder. Tommy is quite out of control, the servants do as they please, and I’m afraid of driving away the patients I have and discouraging new ones. It will hardly be a holiday for you, but it would make my life so much easier if I knew a woman of sense was under our roof.’

  You have never before asked me for a favour. I have always been the beggar at your gate, silently longing for the alms of your attention. Now I held it, and Bath and Bulawayo receded as I tried to restrain my joy.

  ‘Perhaps we might attempt this domestic experiment. For a short period.’

  ‘I should be so grateful. One cannot put a price on such help and, in fact … my finances are not …’

  ‘I shan’t expect any payment, Charles.’

  ‘How wonderfully selfless you are.’

  My self roared like a hungry tigress. If my sister has lost her self I think I have found mine for the first time. No, there was a brief period in early childhood when I felt beloved and at peace. I know what paradise is, for I lived there for five years until my serpent sister was born. You were subdued, so I tried to look and sound less jubilant than I felt. ‘I am deeply conscious of my deficiencies, but I shall attempt to be of service.’


  ‘How soon can you come to us?’

  ‘Perhaps … would Friday morning be convenient?’

  ‘The sooner you come, the longer you stay, the happier I shall be. Now, I must go. I have a patient to visit in Cavendish Square, and I cannot be absent from home for too long or the household will fall into anarchy.’

  ‘Poor Charles. What a trial this year has been for you.’ I went to the front door with you. On the doorstep you kissed me. A chaste kiss, on the brow, but still the first kiss you have ever given me.

  ‘I am so grateful to you, Henrietta. You are the only one in whom I can confide.’

  I watched you into the hackney cab you had kept waiting, and when I returned to my sitting-room I was shaking so much that I could hardly pour myself a cup of tea.

  SATURDAY

  I have read it. My sister’s spiritual state is very grave. During those lost days Nina writes of so strangely, what was the extent of her intimacy with this Jonathan? I understand now why you are distraught. Dearest Charles! In my imagination I see such scenes between us - I dare not write of them, even here.

  But I must not be fanciful. ‘Tis Fancy that has ruined my foolish sister. It was no great shock to hear from you that she is worse than foolish, for I always knew her for a whore, from the first moment she sucked my mother’s nipple and seduced her away from me. She stole you, too, but not for ever, for you have come to me at last.

  As Miss Amelia used to warn us when we were children, if you want to become weak-headed, nervous and good for nothing, read novels. My sister haunted the circulating library, and when she was fifteen I even caught her reading George Sand. I told our father, but he only laughed and said I was a prig and that Nina should be a free citizen in the world of books.

  The only novel I have ever felt able to read with a clear conscience was Hannah More’s beautiful offering Coelebs in Search of a Wife. I read it first when I was sixteen, when the coincidence that the hero, so full of admirable qualities, is called Charles, seemed most fateful. Eventually he sees through Miss Flams and Miss Rattle, who read only bosh and study only music and whim-whams, and learns to appreciate the intellectual worth of Lucilla. ‘How intelligent her silence! How well bred her attention!’ Nightingales sing but are of no further use. Women such as Lucilla may not be decorative, but we are practical and sensible and may be entrusted with the spiritual life of a family.

  Well, it is only a story. Now at last I have my own story, and it grows more interesting by the moment. In a few hours I shall be beneath your roof, not as a despised poor relation but as a valued confidante. I must discover the truth about my slyboots sister. Can it really be that she had some form of criminal conversation with this fellow? I will draw out Lucy on the matter. Rachel will accompany me, and I shall pump her for the servants’ gossip.

  My mother used to say, if you want to know the truth about a marriage, ask the servants. She had a dreadfully louche way of talking of such things; indeed it was her indelicacy that led me to reject her Catholic faith. From the age of eleven I refused to go to church with her on Sundays. But my sister always went and later made a great fuss about her first communion, looking like a little meringue in her ridiculous white frock and veil. The two of them used to sneak off together for their nasty foreign rites. For all I know Nina goes to confession still, and she would appear to have a great deal to confess to.

  CHARLES

  AMOST ILLUMINATING conversation with William. I carved a couple of hours out of my frantic afternoon to visit him in Hanover Square. As soon as I entered his magnificent hallway I felt the contrast between our lives: his flunkeys grovel convincingly; his marble floors and classical busts are genuine, not veneer; and his wife and children are enviably invisible. By the time the butler had shown me up to his library (designed by Adam, first editions of Johnson’s Rasselas and Byron’s Childe Harold) I was distinctly green. But William is still a charmer, and my meanness of spirit soon dissolved in his warmth and fine Madeira.

  ‘The boys are away at school, and Emily is in the country,’ he explained when I marvelled at his domestic peace. ‘And how is your own dear wife, Charles?’

  ‘Sadly reduced. She grieves for our little one, which is natural, and still raves about the future, which is not.’

  ‘Poor lady. Is she being well nursed?’

  ‘My sister-in-law has kindly agreed to stay with us.’

  ‘So you now live with two beautiful ladies!’

  ‘Not at all. Henrietta does not resemble her sister. She is over thirty, faded and worn, but she is extremely practical.’

  ‘That must be a great comfort.’

  ‘To me, most certainly. I naturally have no aptitude for domestic duties, which are the realm of women. Now that Henrietta rules our household my son stays in his nursery and meals arrive on time. But Nina is mightily huffed.’

  ‘The two sisters do not … ?’

  ‘Can’t bear each other. Henrietta is a spinster, a monstrous prig but a great organizer. She has always been jealous of her younger, prettier sister and lives in fear of the ghastly genteel fate of being a governess. The poor creature fancies herself in love with me, but I take no notice.’

  William roared with laughter. ‘My dear chap, you have a harem in Harley Street. But why should she be a governess? Are they not from a wealthy family? I thought you would marry some great heiress with your lady-killing looks.’

  William stared at me, and I recalled drunken late-night conversations long ago when we both vowed to get on in the world. He did, looking past an unfortunate nose to a great fortune. ‘Nina had but three thousand pour tout potage. Her papa was a doctor in Finsbury Square, too kind-hearted to prosper much.’

  ‘Three thousand?’

  ‘And that is all gone now.’

  ‘My dear Charles, you should have struck a better bargain than that. I remember Mrs Porter’s papa wouldn’t come down with more than six thousand, but my governor said it shouldn’t be done under eight. I could have had a baronet’s daughter, a woman as tall and whiskery as a grenadier with ten thousand, but I felt that Emily’s social accomplishments were worth a great deal. Three thousand! You should have come to me sooner.’

  ‘Thank goodness I have come now.’

  And, indeed, after a couple of glasses I felt that William was my dearest friend. It was immensely cheering to recall our student days and the scrapes we got into. We chanted together the old ditty:

  Should a body want a body

  Anatomy to teach,

  Should a body snatch a body,

  Need a body peach?

  We were soon quite helpless with laughter, recollecting Sir Astley and his unconventional experiments.

  ‘And the elephant!’ I gasped. ‘Did you ever hear about Sir Astley and the elephant?’

  ‘No, old boy, tell me the one about the elephant.’

  ‘The elephant died in the menagerie at the Tower. Mr Cooper (as he was then, before George IV knighted him for removing a tumour from his scalp) naturally wanted to obtain the beast’s body. Pa helped him to hire a cart and covered the dead elephant with a cloth. I think my father would have done anything for him, in the interests of Science. I think he would have dissected the Holy Ghost to please him. Don’t tell Henrietta I said that. Well, the elephantine corpse was so heavy that the cart had to be left in front of the great surgeon’s house at St Mary Axe. A crowd collected outside the gates, and Mr C— had to dissect the animal in the open air with a carpet thrown over the railings to hide him.

  ‘Didn’t his neighbours complain about his activities?’

  ‘Not a bit of it. Everybody was charmed by Sir Astley. I loved to visit his house. You might say my medical education began there. My father brought me up to live by Sir Astley’s motto: “Be kind to everyone and most active to oblige”.’

  ‘And did he oblige you, when the time to choose a career?’

  ‘Up to a point. I would have liked to become a surgeon, but one had to pay a premium of fifty guineas to become a d
resser and Sir Astley preferred to help his godson and his nephews. Well-connected boobies all of them. How I seethed with envy. He told me to try my luck in the army, the navy or the provinces.’

  ‘Never mind. Here you are, twenty years later, a distinguished medical man in the best part of London.’

  Not wishing to gloat over achievements that felt distinctly shaky, I returned to the past. ‘Yes, what an amazing fellow he was. He was a great friend of the Lord Mayor, you know, who assured him he wouldn’t be bothered by constables if he occasionally stored a corpse or two in his attic. Henry, Sir Astley’s butler, stole dogs which were kept in the attic for experiments. He paid us boys two shillings and sixpence per dog.’

  ‘You must have had a rather more entertaining childhood than I did, growing up in Tunbridge Wells with a parson for a father.’

  ‘Ah, but your family was respectable. Being motherless, I accompanied my father everywhere. There were no toys at home, but I was allowed to play with the bones in Sir Astley’s private museum. He had Napoleon’s gut, you know. I adored his museum. All my life I have wanted to assemble my own. As a birthday treat Pa would take me to Don Saltero’s Coffee House at Cheyne Walk, near the Chelsea Bun shop. Did you ever see Don Saltero’s museum, William? I wonder if it still exists. It was founded by a servant of Sir Hans Sloane. How I loved that place! There one could see Pontius Pilate’s wife’s chambermaid’s straw hat and a largish chunk of manna from Canaan. I longed to eat it. I was sure it would be even more delicious than a Chelsea bun.’

  ‘When we were students I was deeply impressed by your medical knowledge. Now I know how you acquired it. Do you remember the lengths we had to go to to obtain the three cadavers required for out-training?’

  ‘Yes, medical students nowadays have too easy a time of it. Do you remember the trick we played on that drunkard in Aldersgate? How we wrapped him up in a sack and left him with the porter outside Bart’s, who remarked that there were complaints issuing from the package?’