‘Why are we going so slowly?’
‘A lot of ice, ma’am.’
The back of Mr. Voss’s solid neck bulges above his collar in three fat rolls. My mouth opens, shuts, opens again. We have taken nearly an hour thus far, and in this grey light it feels longer.
‘Where are we?’
‘We are on Toller Down, ma’am.’
Toller Down! Of all places! This is where they were to meet, according to the poem! A bare expanse of grasses stretching away, without a shelter in sight; even looking at it makes me feel cold.
‘Will we get there before dark?’
After a long pause there comes his lugubrious reply: ‘If it doesn’t get any worse.’
Was it such a good idea to drive out here, on such a cold afternoon, on icy roads? There is no traffic; we have not met another car for at least ten minutes and it might have been better if I had written her a letter; after all, I am good at writing letters, stiff letters, I write them every day. But a letter would have taken time to reach her and it felt imperative that I should settle the matter now, that I should not have to face another night of worry. Worry is not good for me, not in the state of my health, although in truth for the sake of my health I should not be here, enduring this terrible cold. I have reached the conclusion that I feel the cold more than other people, more than Mr. Voss, I am sure, and certainly more than my husband, who hardly seems to feel the cold at all. Closing my eyes I try to pretend that I am at home by the fire with Wessie at my feet, but I am no good at this kind of pretence, and when the car begins to bump and rock I look up. The road is much steeper than it was, and to my alarm Mr. Voss is driving with one set of wheels on the road, the other in the verge. I lean forward.
‘Mr. Voss, why are we driving half off the road?’
‘Avoiding the need to brake, ma’am. The danger is, ma’am, the wheels lock and we go on sliding down. That’s the danger.’
‘If it is dangerous, you must say. If it’s not safe we should turn back.’
Half of me would not care if we did turn back. I should be glad of it.
‘It’s not that much further, ma’am. It’s the last part that may be difficult.’
I close my eyes again, but open them when Mr. Voss hoots the horn. Four large, bedraggled sheep – one with a long strand of bramble hanging from its fleece – occupy the middle of the road. He hoots again, and they begin to trot before us. We herd them on. O, we are going so slowly!
The sheep turn through a gap in the hedge; a car comes in the opposite direction, moving more quickly. Over frosted fields I make out the town, grey with smoke.
I know the name of her cottage, Riverside Cottage, but not the name of the street. So we draw up by an old woman carrying a bundle of wood. Gaunt, with hollowed cheeks, she is bent half double, as if in addition to the few miserable sticks in her arms there were an invisible heap of timber strapped on her back. Old village women must have looked like this since time immemorial. She is no use to us. She is deaf. When Mr. Voss speaks to her she merely shakes her head and shuffles off. There is no one else in sight, no one else foolish enough to be outside on an afternoon like this. A piebald horse – great cloudy breaths issuing from its mouth – stands in the shafts of a cart loaded with turnips, but there is not a person in sight. We drive up the hill to a little square with a stone memorial, and Mr. Voss climbs out to ask directions. He disappears into a butcher’s shop. Pale, flayed haunches of meat hang outside, on hooks.
I wait, my knees pressed together, my whole self pressed tight. He returns. The cottage is somewhere down the hill, by the river. We drive down very slowly, and stop. A stream, half frozen, runs between the street and a small terraced cottage with a slate roof.
‘That must be it, ma’am.’
Is this it? Is this icy stream supposed to be a river? I unwrap the rug and push open the car door. I cross the stream, using a short wooden bridge slippery with ice.
There is a knocker, but no door-bell. I knock, and then again, and wait, and when I knock again and again there is no answer I find myself confronting the possibility, one I had not contemplated, that Gertrude may be out. Perhaps this is for the best, perhaps I should retreat to the car; suddenly I am in dread of the conversation ahead. Then I hear a sound on the other side of the door.
‘Mrs. Hardy!’ Her surprise is complete. ‘Do come in! Are you alone?’
‘Is it a convenient moment? I am not interrupting anything?’
I cross the threshold and find myself unbuttoning my coat, which she hangs over the banister at the bottom of the stairway. Then she offers me a cup of tea. I accept, with a sense of growing dismay: why am I unable to stick to my plan? But already I am peeling off my gloves and following her into the kitchen. Her baby girl is sitting at the table, in a high chair. She has dark silky hair and fat cheeks. She has a towelling bib round her neck and a mouth covered in jam. At the sight of me she buries her face in her hands.
This is not the place that I had envisaged for our little talk. I had envisaged a suitably cold side-room, a rarely used front parlour – not this scene of easy domesticity, this warm, cosy, cramped kitchen with the laundry hanging on a rail above the range and the table cluttered with bread and butter and jam, and the other things that form part of her daily life but of which I know nothing. Until now it did not occur to me that she had a daily life. And then the baby – above all, I had not imagined such a fat, dark-haired baby. O, Florence! This is Gertrude’s home, not yours! How could you have let yourself in for this? Clearly I am interrupting the baby’s meal. But I steel myself. I am determined, I have not come all this way for nothing.
At her invitation I sit down. Gertrude puts the kettle on the stove and asks whether Mr. Hardy is well. (What should I say? That he is at his desk, writing her love poems?)
‘He is very well, thank you.’
‘I always think he is astonishing, for his age.’
‘He is very good at putting on a show. He is frailer than he appears, I am afraid.’
No doubt she is wondering why I am here, but for all the rehearsing I have done in my head I cannot think how to begin. It is the presence of the baby that disconcerts me so much. She is now peeping at me between her jammy fingers. Any moment she will probably begin to cry.
I wait. Gertrude and I exchange small talk about the weather, how cold it is, how long the cold will last. I compliment her on the baby (‘How beautiful,’ I say, ‘you must be so proud of her’) and she thanks me. Then the kettle begins to whistle. She lifts it off the stove, pours some boiling water into the brown pot, spoons in tea and leaves it to stand. She opens a tin of ginger biscuits and arranges them on a plate. She pours out the tea and sits down. She offers me a biscuit.
I can delay no longer. I take a deep breath and plunge like a swimmer into a pool, and rather to my astonishment the first sentences emerge with remarkable fluency. I explain that Mr. Hardy has been thinking about the Haymarket, and that he feels he may have persuaded her into something that she may come to regret, that may be against her best interests, that London is such a very unforgiving, lonely place, that the London theatre reviewers can be so cruel. Of course (I hurry on) the play may be judged a great success; if that were to happen, she might be asked to stay in town for a longer run. But (I point out), with her family down here, she could not possibly stay longer than a month. So, a little quicker than I should have liked, I reach my conclusion: ‘You see what Mr. Hardy and I are afraid of. We feel, strongly, that it is a mistake, and that it would be better if you were not to do it, especially when your little girl is taken into account. That is the other thing Mr. Hardy and I feel so strongly.’
Gertrude is puzzled. ‘There is nothing I want more than to play the part at the Haymarket.’
‘Of course.’
‘I am prepared for unfavourable reviews. And I am looking forward to staying in London.’
‘Of course you are. But it cannot be right for you to abandon your family –’
‘I a
m not abandoning them!’ She draws herself up in her chair and repeats herself, very firmly: ‘Mrs. Hardy, I am not abandoning them.’
‘Maybe abandoning is not the right word. But you will be leaving them. And you will miss them so much when you are away, and they will miss you, so much. And I know that to you it is only a matter of weeks, but to her –’ I smile at the baby, who is suddenly turning out to be very useful in my argument – ‘imagine it, an eternity, without her mother.’
I am delighted with myself this far. I have expressed myself clearly, my tone has been reasonable and concerned and diplomatic, I could not have done it better if I had practised it a dozen times. I am so full of admiration at my performance that I feel like giving myself a pat of congratulation. All that is now required is for Gertrude to agree with me.
‘Diana will be looked after very well, Mrs. Hardy; there is nothing for you or Mr. Hardy to worry about. I assure you I am not abandoning my family. My husband wants me to go to London.’
‘But for a man – to look after her when she is so very young –’
‘He is looking forward to it.’
‘Are you sure?’
‘I am certain.’
She is watching me closely – O, how difficult this is. I press on:
‘Gertrude, if “Tess” is to be put on in London Mr. Hardy is certain to wish to go up to see it, and the air – the cold – the strain – the journey will be very injurious to his health. As I say he is quite frail. He is nearly eighty-five! Living quietly at home he manages well enough, but London would be too much for him, and yet if you are playing the part of Tess he will insist on being there.’
‘Can you not stop him?’
‘I cannot, I cannot, he is determined to go and I can do nothing. It is a very difficult position for me to be in. The truth is that I have come here in secret, I haven’t told him, but it is absolutely necessary. You see, it is not merely that “Tess” has always been his favourite novel, but also … you must have noticed how fond he is of you. It is beyond anything you can possibly imagine. In the past few days he has even written some extraordinary poems … I am sorry but you must understand my position! I cannot allow it, I will not allow it! It will be too embarrassing, he will make a fool of himself!’
I am in full gabble, my voice has risen to a pitch of hysteria. I am aware of it but there is nothing I can do to stop myself. Gertrude is staring at me with those huge eyes of hers.
‘What are these poems?’
‘They are –’ I hesitate. I should not have mentioned the poems; I had no intention of doing so. How foolish of me! But my voice hurries on. ‘They are about you. That is what they are about, and other things, too. I have destroyed them, of course, I have destroyed them all. But, you see, this is what he is sometimes like. He is a very old man, he suffers from delusions, he thinks he’s still thirty-five years old. He has a very loose grasp on reality.’
‘They are about me?’
‘There is a poem about meeting you at Toller Down Gate and eloping with you. I know – it is laughable! But to me it is intensely, intensely distressing. It is distressing and embarrassing! You must understand my position, I cannot have him pursuing you up to London!’ I might also say how humiliating it is for me, how very humiliating it is for me. To have my husband, in his dotage, behaving like this!
‘Mrs. Hardy, I am still not entirely clear. What is it you are saying?’
‘I am afraid you must write to Mr. Harrison and tell him that you cannot play the part.’
‘I must write to Mr. Harrison?’
‘Yes. People will admire you for it.’
‘Why will they admire me?’
‘For putting your family first.’
She flushes, distinctly, and not only with shock. When she speaks her voice is much harder and angrier than I have ever heard it.
‘Mrs. Hardy, I am not sure you understand my position.’
‘O but I do, Gertrude, I do –’
‘I’m not sure you can. When Mr. Hardy first talked to me about the Haymarket I didn’t tell anyone except for my husband, in case it didn’t work out. Since then I have told everyone. Everyone around here knows. When I take out Diana in the pram, people stop me to ask about it. Now you tell me that it is not possible, you cannot allow it, I must write to Mr. Harrison. What can I say to people? What can I possibly say to them? You say that people will admire me. They will not admire me, they will think I have been making the whole thing up. I will be a laughing-stock.’
‘You will not be a laughing-stock.’
‘Why can you not stop him from going to London?’
‘I cannot! Believe me, Gertrude, I wish I could, but he pays no attention to me. I cannot stop him. He is the most obstinate of men.’
‘And what am I supposed to write to Mr. Harrison? That I have changed my mind? I have not changed my mind. There is nothing I have ever wanted more than to act at the Haymarket.’
We are at an impasse. As our voices have risen the baby has been growing restless and now she begins to cry, a horrible sound in such a small room. Gertrude lifts her out of the high chair. ‘Sssh, sssh, sssh. There. What’s all this fuss about? Sssh, sssh. I’m sorry. Sssh.’
I say nothing as she cuddles and comforts the baby, but I feel such an intruder. To come here uninvited, forcing my way into the warmth of her home only to dash her hopes – how churlish and ill-mannered it must seem to her! If only she knew what it is to live with him, a man who cares more for the company of his pen than that of his wife, a man of such privacy that he keeps his wife at a chilly distance from his thoughts and makes her into an irrelevance, she might forgive me. How much I could tell her of my life and its unreal nature! But I have said too much already, to say more would be disloyal.
I watch her, joggling the baby in her arms. I ought to leave at once, and indeed I would like nothing more than to leave, but that nothing has been settled.
When the baby is quiet she turns to me.
‘Mrs. Hardy, what would you tell Mr. Hardy?’
‘How do you mean?’
‘If I were to write to Mr. Harrison.’
‘I would tell him that you had made the right decision. And he would respect you for it. He respects and admires you greatly. Believe me, Gertrude, I do know what a sacrifice I am asking you to make, but there will be another time for London, a better time; once he is gone, I promise you, I will make certain of it.’
‘Have I any alternative?’
I can hardly believe she is giving way. ‘Thank you, thank you.’
‘I shall write tomorrow.’
‘Thank you.’
I smile; she does not. She is desperate for me to be gone, I can see that. I am so sorry, I would like to say, can we not remain friends? But we have nothing left to say to each other. I pick up my gloves. Then there is a noise at the front door and to our mutual consternation in comes her husband, stooping under the low ceiling, a young man with a dark moustache and a face pale from the cold. What terrible timing! Two minutes later and I would have missed him! Now we have to be introduced to each other, we have to shake hands and exchange pleasantries about the weather. ‘I do hope the little one hasn’t been playing up too much,’ he remarks, and I reply that she has been perfect. Gertrude is silent, with the baby in her arms.
He puts an arm round Gertrude and kisses the baby.
‘Mrs. Hardy is just going,’ she says.
‘Yes, I must go, I must. How late it is.’ I make my way to the door. She follows. In a hurry I put on my coat, and then the door is open. Darkness has fallen, the air is icy.
I totter over the little bridge and climb into the taxi-cab, which smells of cigarette smoke, and without a word Mr. Voss starts the motor. I wrap the rug around my legs.
And now I ought to feel relief, I ought to feel the glow of success, since I have achieved what I set out to achieve, yet as we crawl back along the same slow roads I feel nothing of the sort, only a kind of dull emptiness mixed with an extraordinary
nervous fatigue. Why could I not have kept a better control of myself? Why did I tell her about the poems? O but she is more beautiful than I had realised. When she was on stage I never found her beautiful, but there in her own little kitchen, holding her baby, she seemed so beautiful. Am I jealous of her? I am, I am; ignoble as it may be, I cannot deny it, I am jealous of all she has, not only her beauty. The cottage was so much smaller than I had expected, and I can see that they do not have much money, but what does that matter? What does anything matter except love? I am the wife of an old man who happens to be a famous writer, a wealthy writer, perhaps the wealthiest writer in the entire country; it ought to be enough, and it is not. I ought to have been a mother, I ought to have had a baby of my own. I am living a life that I was not meant to lead.
The darkness slides by. Trying to conjure some familiar image to calm my distressed self, I am returned again and again to the ineradicable vision of Gertrude kissing her baby’s head. I feel as if I was being driven through some other world or falling unchecked down a deep chasm.
Time passes in which I am scarcely conscious, but at last the car pulls up by the gate. ‘Leave me here,’ I tell Mr. Voss. ‘I’d like to walk.’ I pay him his money and give him a good tip. ‘Thank you for getting me back safely.’
The sky is clear, the stars are thick. The cold is so sharp it seems to cut. The house will be cold, too. The ivy shines in the moonlight, and from each chimney there rises a pale curl of smoke.
CHAPTER X
Dinner consisted of broth, followed by boiled eggs and toast. This was the standard fare of which they partook each evening at half past seven. They sat in the dining room, with two candles on the table and further light provided by a pair of oil lamps on the large mahogany sideboard.
Florence’s head drooped. Only a few minutes had passed since her return from the town, and he and she had exchanged barely any words. Although neither seemed willing to refer to it, the altercation of the morning still cast a heavy shadow over the scene.
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