“Go on, Ed. I’ll escort the lady.” And he puts his arm through Clara’s before she can say anything to object.
Edward nods and blows her a kiss, then runs off down the street without another word. She stares after him. He has never made that gesture before, and at the moment it seems to her like the combination of a cough and the motion one makes when swatting at a troublesome insect. She cannot shake the sense that there has been something evasive about his actions this evening. Something is wrong. And she is going to find out what it is.
She turns to Arthur with her sweetest and most engaging smile. “Shall we go?” she asks.
EDWARD WALKS TOWARD the river feeling buoyant, swinging his arms. His camera case hangs on a strap across his shoulders. It feels good to be outside at last, to be walking, to lose himself a little in the motion of his own limbs. The evening streets are crowded with people and noisy with the sounds of their talk and laughter. He makes his way along the Boulevard St-Michel, past the red awnings and open doors of restaurants that spill sharp electric light onto the pavement, through the dull orange flicker of the streetlamps where the shadows of strangers turn like clock hands and vanish. He is thinking about Kathleen.
He knows he should not be thinking about her, but he has told himself to stop a hundred times and none of his attempts have worked. So he has given up censuring his brain and instead he is floating quietly along on the memory of her hands, her soft mouth, the way she has of opening her eyes very wide when she wants to say something serious. She really does have wonderful hands: long articulate fingers, each knuckle a little rough and dry where the clay she uses for modeling has sucked out all the moisture. He inhales deeply and feels a precarious exhilaration. The street around him resonates in sympathy. This city, he thinks, is like magic, a trick of the light. You can drink it through your skin.
Does Clara suspect something? He dismisses this thought: Of course she doesn’t. What is there for her to suspect? Almost nothing. He has hardly done anything wrong.
He met Kathleen Bruce last year when he was in London for an exhibition. She introduced herself and complimented him on some prints of the Brooklyn Bridge that he’d taken. It turned out she was an artist herself, a sculptress. They liked each other right away. Since then they have written letters back and forth, mostly about their work, a little about their lives outside it. When she came to visit Paris earlier in the summer, he showed her some of the sights. They dined together and attended the theater. She met Clara, and the two of them got along famously. After that they had continued to correspond, and when he learned he would be in London to exhibit again this year, he wrote and told her. She made arrangements to come down by train from Edinburgh, to stay with an aunt who owned a house in Kensington. This time, she wrote, I can be your guide.
But then there was that afternoon, just two days before he was due to return to Paris. They were walking in Hyde Park together, Kathleen’s idea, intending to stroll over to Kensington Palace. They were alone. Edward was in a bad mood: his prints had sold badly and he believed it was because of where they had been hung—a rear corner of the exhibition hall, in bad light. Kathleen had sympathized, but she seemed distracted, sad for some reason she didn’t explain, and the conversation had slowed, then stopped altogether. What’s wrong? he asked her eventually. She didn’t reply right away, just kept walking, looking away from him so he couldn’t see the expression on her face. He took her wrist and pulled her around toward him. Her face was contorted, her mouth held in the rigid effort of a smile. You must be stupid to ask that, she said. Then: I’m sorry. Please excuse me. I don’t know what I’m saying. She cleared her throat. Why don’t you walk me home? I don’t feel like seeing the palace today after all.
No, he said. He held on to her wrist. I don’t want you to go home yet.
Oh, don’t, she replied. She sounded tired. Playing the overwrought romantic doesn’t suit you, Edward. I’m sure your fiancée would agree. Will you take me home, or do I have to go by myself?
Irritated he let go of her hand and they walked out of the park. They hailed a cab to take them the rest of the way. They sat in silence as the streets rolled by the open windows, and at the end of her aunt’s road, Kathleen reached up and knocked on the ceiling. When the cab stopped, she held out her hand to him. Well, goodbye, she said, her voice wooden. He took her hand and instead of the perfunctory shake that she’d intended for it, he drew it up and kissed it slowly, one small knuckle after another. She pulled it away, a sharp, angry motion, and for a minute he thought she might smack him, but then she was kissing him and he forgot about everything else.
It is this kiss which pulls him into its whirlpool, drawing him down, so he tastes her mouth again, and feels her body rise against him in the shaded interior of the cab. He tries not to remember it. It was only once, after all, and afterward they had fallen away from each other, guilty, unable to speak. Kathleen had wiped her mouth with the back of her hand, slowly, still watching him as she did it, her eyes slitted narrow like a cat’s.
“Edward!” Clara calls from the other side of the street. The sound of her voice breaks in on him, and he starts as though he has been discovered doing something illicit. There is the whole party waiting for him on the riverward side of the Quai Montebello. He waves and calls out: “Hello, darling!” then wonders if he sounds too falsely hearty. He crosses toward them. Clara comes and slides her arm though his, and they move off across the bridge. In the middle she stops to look down at the black water slipping away beneath them. “How I love rivers,” she says, and cranes her neck down to peer into this one. “It’s so dark, you can’t see anything in its surface. Not even us.”
Through the sleeve of his shirt he can feel her body pressed against his arm, and when he leans down to see what she sees, he smells the dark scent of her hair. He looks into the water where she is pointing, and she is right: there is nothing below them to show that they exist at all. But for the fact they can sense each other’s life and warmth and solidity, they might easily be ghosts. He has an overwhelming feeling of tenderness, of wanting to protect her from the world, from the worst parts of himself. Surely this feeling is love, he thinks. This is what separates love from all those other transient desires that we lazily call by that name. And then, suddenly, he is terribly sorry for what he has done.
THE CATHEDRAL RISES into the darkness until it disappears, and at night the great rose window looks like an empty eye, the arched doors like open mouths. Gas lamps send a dim, wavering glow over the hunched figures of the patriarchs and saints that crowd the western face.
“Like bees,” Marion says, and Clara thinks this is a good way to describe them.
“For years,” Leo says, “there was no stained glass in the nave. Since the revolution, in fact. It’s only recently that they’ve restored the windows to their original state.”
“I don’t care what you say,” Clara says, “it is spooky.”
They walk around to the side of the building. When they are a little way from the others, Clara says to Marion, “Edward seems out of sorts this evening, doesn’t he?”
“Perhaps he is tired.”
“Oh, no. I don’t think it is only that. He seems so, well, absent. Like his head is somewhere else entirely. I don’t know what’s gotten into him.”
Marion sighs. “I think I know what it might be,” she says. “Something to do with his trip to London. I don’t know whether or not I should tell you.”
“Oh, you must!” says Clara.
“Are you sure? I could be wrong about this, you know. Wouldn’t it be better to simply ask him yourself if there is anything the matter?”
“Men don’t tell you things just because you ask them.”
“Well, I would hope if you were marrying them, they might.”
“Just tell me what you heard.”
“All right.” Marion draws her away along the side of the cathedral. They find one of the wooden park benches and sit down on it. They are almost fully immersed
in shadow so they can hardly see each other’s faces.
“Something unexpected happened while he was in England. Mildred told me this. At the exhibition.”
“Well?”
“The photographs that he took to the show. They didn’t sell—or not very many of them. Mildred said it was a great disappointment for him, all told. He thinks they were put away in a corner where people couldn’t see them. He was quite angry—apparently he argued with Fred Holland Day about it; I don’t think that they parted on good terms.”
“Oh, the poor thing!” Clara cries. “Why didn’t he tell me?”
“Well, perhaps he didn’t want to burden you with it. Think about it. He is getting married to you next year. He wants to be certain he can provide for his wife. He doesn’t have family wealth to fall back on like some of us, so he must earn money. He doesn’t want you to start to doubt him now.”
“But if I’m going to be his wife, he needs to tell me things like this. I have to help him through difficulties, support him—that is what wives are for!”
“Listen, I’m not certain about any of this,” Marion says. “It is all hearsay. I’m not sure that is what is really troubling him, or that he didn’t intend to tell you eventually.”
“No, I’m quite sure you are right,” Clara says. “It is the only reasonable explanation.”
“Please, don’t be hasty, Clara. Think before you say anything to him.”
“Of course. I must draw him out on it. He must learn to trust me.” She jumps to her feet and grabs Marion’s hand. Almost at a run, she pulls her back toward the western end of the building where the others are, pausing only to kiss her on the cheek and whisper, “Thank you. You are such a good, wise friend.”
That must be it, Clara thinks. He is disappointed. His work was received badly, and he doesn’t want to admit it. He is a man who has had a great deal of acclaim almost from the very beginning of his career, and he is not accustomed to dealing with failure. He isn’t even used to being disappointed. But she can help him learn to do this—every artist will have good and bad times, and surely it is the love and support of their wives that gets them through the difficulties. Look at Rodin and Rose Beuret. Look at Amélie and Henri Matisse. Yes, helping him to accept this setback in London and move on from it will bring them closer than mere romance. It will be her first real act as his wife. As she walks toward where he is setting up his photographic equipment, she feels as though an entirely new chapter of her life is beginning.
HE SETS HIS tripod across from the western façade while the others wander around the immense perimeter of the cathedral. He can see them as vague shadows in couples and threes, their individual figures nearly indistinguishable. If he peers closer, he can see Leo’s pointed beard and spectacles, and Mildred’s slightly stooped form beside him. He can see Arthur pointing up at the flying buttresses and gremlins on one corner. He isn’t sure if there will be enough light to capture this scene, but he will try with a flashbulb. He puts his eye to the viewfinder, and through it he sees one of the figures separate from the darkness at the side of the building, no, two figures, walking quickly and close together, one pulling the other along by the hand. Marion and Clara, though in this darkness and distance he cannot tell which is which. One woman stops near the main door to the nave, and the other continues to come toward him. As she gets closer, he sees that it is Clara.
“Stop right there,” he calls. “I wonder if I can get you and the cathedral together. Will you look out toward the river for me?”
She obliges by turning away from him. “Is this right?”
“Yes,” he says. “Perfect. Just let me get the flashbulb set up. Don’t move.”
He loves night photography because it can suggest forms without having to show them in stark detail. At night the world softens, its distinctions blend, its objects bleed into each other. Their imperfections are hidden; they can tell a larger story than they could if they were photographed straight; they can keep their mystery. It is a process that he can enhance later with his brushes when he prints the exposures, altering them to make the forms less individuated and distinct. In this way photography can ascend toward the level of painting as a means of creating beauty; it can become more fully an art.
He will open up the camera and let as much light in as possible. The cathedral will not go anywhere, so he can afford to extend the exposure time. If Clara will just stay right where she is … there. He can just fit Marion’s silhouette into the frame, where she stands some twenty feet further away, gazing up at the balustrades. Two women, and the moon just risen in the black face of the river.
“Hold still,” he says to Clara. The flash goes off and he takes the picture, but with night photography it’s hard to be certain it will come out. He wants to make sure he captures this scene. “Just one more,” he says.
“Darling …” Clara says quietly.
“Yes, my dear?”
“I don’t mean to bother you, but is everything quite all right? I mean did everything go well in England this time?”
He stops adjusting the camera and stands up straight so he can see her with his own eyes.
“Yes. Fine,” he says. “Why?” His heart jumps in his chest. His palms feel suddenly damp. She knows. She must know. Otherwise, why these questions? But she doesn’t seem angry or upset. In fact, if he looks at her, she seems almost to be glowing, her eyes shining and calm.
“You seem a little out of temper. That’s all. I just wanted you to know that if anything happened, that was, well, unexpected or even bad, that you can tell me about it. I won’t be upset or doubt you—if I’m going to be your wife, my purpose is to help you. Through whatever happens. No matter what it is.”
He stares at her. He is speechless.
“I’m sorry,” she says. “You seemed upset so I asked people about it. I know you had an incident with a certain acquaintance there. Forgive me for going behind your back about it.”
Does he know this woman, standing not ten feet from him, whom he has courted and loved for nearly a year now? Did he have any idea of the depth of her generosity, her greatness of spirit? He would never have predicted this from her. If anything, though he loves her, desires her, he has felt, at times, a certain parochial rigidity to her opinions and ideas; he has suspected her of not really being very freethinking after all. How has he misjudged her so thoroughly? This is more extraordinary than he could even have supposed. She does know about Kathleen, and she has chosen to rise above it, to recognize it for the folly that it was. In his surprise he forgets to wonder who knew and who has told her. He goes to her and kneels down and puts his arms around her hips, and buries his head in her skirt.
“My love …” he says. “Do you really mean it?”
“Of course I do,” she says serenely. “Every word.”
“I wanted to tell you. As soon as I saw you, I wanted to tell you about her, but I was afraid of what you would say.”
He looks up in time to see the smile freeze on her face as she takes in his words. Something, he realizes, has gone terribly wrong.
“Her?” she asks.
—
THEY LEAVE AS quickly as they can.
“Miss Smith is feeling fatigued,” Edward tells the others. “I’m going to see her back to her rooms.”
“Yes, it just came over me all of a sudden,” Clara puts in, the recklessly strained attempt at a smile stretched across her face. “Thank you for a lovely evening, Mr. Stein.” Her voice comes out in squeaky bursts. Not noticing this, Leo waves easily to them, and goes back to discussing the architecture with Arthur.
“Clara, are you sure you are quite all right?” Marion comes running toward them.
“Yes, yes. I’m fine.” Clara backs away from her, trying to conceal that she is on the verge of tears.
“Well, if you are sure you’ll be fine …” Marion says.
“Quite fine,” Clara says. “Good night!”
They walk quickly, in silence across the bridge. W
hen they reach the other side Clara says, “I’m perfectly able to see myself home from here.”
“Clara, I’m not going to leave you in the middle of the city at night on your own. Let me get a cab.”
“Thank you, but I can get one for myself.” She begins to walk away down the street.
“Stop!” He strides after her, reaches out and grabs her by the shoulder. He holds her there, his hand fastened around her upper arm. She pulls against him, but he doesn’t let go. He is surprised by his own reaction. He had not intended to reach out for her when he did, or to prevent her going by force. He does not know where the fierce energy comes from that now flows through his arms and says that she must not, cannot, leave him.
“Please, Clara,” he says. “Stay here. Just let me find a taxi.” She nods, slowly, assenting, and he charges off down the street hailing every wheeled vehicle in sight.
Eventually, he finds one and helps her inside, then climbs up himself. He gives the driver the address of the hotel where she is staying and sinks back into the seat. She sits at the other end of the bench, as far away from him as she can get, looking out of the window with her face turned away. He feels he must say something. He must say it now. But he cannot think of what it should be.
“Clara, it was a mistake,” he says. She doesn’t even acknowledge that he is speaking. All he can see are her contours, cheekbones and neck in amber relief. Too soon they are at the hotel where she and Charlotte have taken rooms for the summer. The cab halts in front. She stands up and he climbs down to help her from the carriage, but she pushes his hand away. He stands aside and lets her past, then pays the driver and waves him on. They stand facing each other at the foot of the front steps of the hotel.
“I’d think it only courteous if you take steps to avoid our meeting socially, while I make arrangements to return to New York,” Clara says.
“What? You can’t be serious.”
“It is the least you can do.”
The Last Summer of the World Page 10