The Things We Don’t Say

by Ella Carey

  Laura looked out the window. War was no place for sensitive artists who could not kill another person, and the fact that Patrick was gay and that was illegal at the time, and Emma was a woman who believed in freedom of love . . . How their values and beliefs must have been up against the wall. And yet, the most profound art often came from conflict.

  “So you leased Summerfield in 1916 and got Patrick a job working as a farmhand once conscription was introduced.”

  “It seemed a simple, sensible solution. He had started working in East Anglia on a farm, but the local villagers hassled him. Not least because of his sexuality. But during that time, while he was subject to all that attack, ironically, was when we became especially close for the first time. He came to stay with me when I went out to the countryside to escape London with Calum.”

  Laura waited.

  “But then something happened.”

  “Something happened?”

  Emma tapped her arm on the sofa. “So! Anyway—back to this day and age. Ivan won’t accept my refutation in the Times?”

  “Wait—”

  “I will do everything I can to get to the bottom of it, to find the truth, and to ensure that you can continue with your music. To me, that is the most important thing. I can live anywhere, dear. I’m not worried about that. All I want is for you to have that one precious thing in your life that will always be yours. It should be the one thing that no one can take away from you. I cannot die thinking that there is any risk you might lose your music.”

  Laura knew better than to ask her grandmother anything more on the topic she seemed to be avoiding.

  “Circles, while interesting thought patterns, are not useful when getting to the bottom of a linear problem,” Emma went on. “In some ways, trying to remember is like searching for one specific grain on a sandy beach. I need to examine everything before I find the one piece of information that contains the truth we need.”

  Laura slumped down in her seat. “Alternatively, I could go and belt Ewan over the head and make him confess to making up the whole story.”

  Emma chuckled. “I do adore you, darling. You know I never had any time for bores, and since you were a little girl, I knew you were never going to be one of those . . . that was part of my problem, I suspect. People had to be either fascinating or fun for them to intrigue me. But that is beside the point. I just wish I could remember something concrete. I am frustrated, you see.”

  Laura took in the still, quiet room. While Emma’s influential friends’ ideas and beliefs seemed simple and clear enough, there was no question that their lives and their feelings toward each other had been woven into a complicated, tangled web. How Emma was going to get to the bottom of what really went on behind the scenes in her circle, Laura had no idea.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  England, March 1916

  Emma removed the scarf that she wore to protect her hair and laid it on the large worktable in Lawrence’s new workshop in Fitzroy Square. His venture provided the perfect conduit for Emma to keep in touch with Patrick now that they were back in London. She, Patrick, and Lawrence had become joint directors of the studio, situated in a charming house on the corner of Fitzroy Square in Bloomsbury, a short walk from the house that Emma shared with Calum, his nanny, and occasionally Oscar, along with visits from her circle of friends. Lawrence’s studio, set up just before war broke out, housed artists’ work spaces upstairs, a large collaborative workroom, and a public showroom on the airy ground floor, where customers could browse the workshop’s designs.

  Lawrence remained the driving force behind the venture, and what motivated him was a passion to see some of the ideas of modern art—bold use of color and simple forms—translated into other creative outlets: fabric, furniture, and fashion design.

  He also viewed the workshop as a way to nurture the careers of his many artist friends, to give them a chance to earn a living decorating furniture and textiles, while working on their real passions as artists at the same time. The studio was collaborative and profit sharing. It offered select customers decorating schemes for their homes. Patrick and Emma’s murals at Thea and Beatrice’s chateau had inspired a handful of socialites in London to follow the idea; printed curtains, fabrics, and murals were all featured, and Emma started to design bohemian, free-flowing dresses using Patrick’s fabric designs.

  Lawrence picked up talent by visiting exhibitions and art schools. The artists worked part time at the workshop, and as employment at the studio was informal, some artists worked at the workshop for only a short time before moving on. The workshop’s existence was supported by only a small elite artistic and literary circle—those few aristocrats who were willing to experiment with the avant-garde in their homes.

  Press coverage was never flattering, and while the workshop did sell a few expensive commissions, the itinerant nature of the artists, their sometimes volatile relationships with each other, and the fact that Lawrence was funding the majority of the enterprise’s costs from his own pocket rendered the financial rewards to be very slim. And yet, there was no doubt that this was where Emma started to view Patrick as a partner in her work.

  “Something odd happened this morning,” she told him, pulling her hair out of its confining bun.

  He looked up at her, his face still wearing that concentration that took over while he worked.

  She came to stand beside him while he put down the brush that he was using to apply delicate patterns to a fabric design; the quietness in the studio, the almost misty atmosphere had become to Emma a haven and a refuge from the constant reminders of war. Both she and Patrick acknowledged that they used the space as a way to come together and try to create something beautiful in spite of all the horror, now that almost every day the newspapers were filled with double spreads of graphic photographs of the fighting that was going on across the channel in France.

  “There was a visitor, unwelcome, I would think, here before you arrived this morning,” Emma said.

  Patrick ran a hand through his dark hair, the muscles in his forearms flickering in the lamplight.

  “A dealer, Patrick. He wanted to talk to you about representation. But exclusive. It would mean you couldn’t work for Lawrence anymore.”

  “Well, the answer to that is simple for me. I could never abandon Lawrence. He is part of the family.”

  “Will you tell him no?”

  Patrick shrugged. “Of course.”

  As if in some unspoken agreement, members of the Circle always came first in all dealings, both business and personal. If there was a choice between financial gain and loyalty to their friends, the latter won every time.

  Emma searched Patrick’s face. She reached out a hand again, only to draw it back. While the decision to reject a dealer who could offer financial reward might cause him to shrug, she knew that he was wrestling far more troubling demons than that. And yet, she wasn’t sure how to help him.

  Patrick was one of two male artists who worked here now while nearly every other male in the country was at war. He remained steadfast. He refused to fight on the grounds that he could not kill another human, in spite of the manner in which he was harassed whenever he walked in London’s streets.

  Bloomsbury was only a tenuous haven for him. London was in the grip of wartime hysteria—women handed out white feathers to farm laborers who remained in the countryside and to men in the cities who did not enlist. Innocent people were victimized, and the talk was of nothing but war. His life was becoming shaded by withdrawal, not only because of his pacifism, which was endemic to the entire circle, but also, she knew, because he worried about links being made between his homosexuality and his refusal to fight.

  Emma had begun to conceive of an idea as to how she might be able to help with both problems, a way to protect her male homosexual friends by offering them a safe haven in some way, where they could be accepted as they were rather than derided as shirkers. Patrick had received his pardon as a conscientious objector at the war tribunal onl
y a few days earlier, and Emma knew that in order for him to be able to stay away from the conflict, he had to find vital farmwork, and soon.

  She rested a hand on his shoulder and looked at what he was working on. “Stunning,” she murmured, taking the design, which was a delicate rendering of flowers on pale yellow fabric, in her hand. “Imagine the inspiration you could find in the countryside.”

  “I hate to think of the suffering of other men.” He leaned his head on her hand.

  A cloud passed across Emma’s features. So far, four of Oscar’s friends from Cambridge had been lost. Oscar was seeing out the war and maintaining his pacifist beliefs so far at Mrs. Townsend’s country home, while Ambrose was occupied in the War Treasury Office, and Lawrence had received a pardon due to his poor eyesight.

  Emma swiveled Patrick to face her. “I’ve found the place for you,” she said. “We can keep Calum safe. And Ambrose can come out on weekends. It’s in Sussex, and the house is called Summerfield . . .”

  He leaned heavily on the workbench.

  “I’m going to look at it tomorrow.” Summerfield and keeping Calum, Patrick, and her circle of friends safe were already intertwined together in her mind as at least some small way of living through this dreadful war.

  The following morning, Emma made her way to the old farmhouse. It was down at the end of a rickety lane filled with potholes, deep in the Sussex countryside. The nearest village was fifteen minutes by foot. The fact that Summerfield sat in isolation in glorious unspoiled countryside below the Sussex Downs was one thing, but knowing that the farmer who owned it was seeking help from someone exactly like Patrick rendered it almost meant to be. Emma pushed her bicycle up to the front door and took in the wild, unkempt garden and the pond overhung with willow trees. The surrounding fields sat in silence filled with crops that needed to be tended while all the regular farmworkers fought in the war.

  Emma propped her bike against the front wall of the old house, placing it so it did not disturb the climbing roses, whose still-green buds dotted the paintwork. Daffodils had just started to raise their heads in the grass that surrounded the pond in front of the house, and a bank of narcissus had already popped up under the great willow tree, but even in today’s sunshine, the air was cold. Emma preferred not to dwell on the inconveniences here; there was no running water or electricity in the house. The first few months were going to be tough, and heavens knew what the next winter would be like without electricity. But that was a minor inconvenience. Safety for the people she loved had to come first.

  Emma had worked out her finances with great care, factoring in that Oscar gave her an allowance to supplement Ambrose’s generous offer to help pay rent in return for a room in the house for himself. Ambrose had cleverly invested her inheritance from her father, or what was left of it, too, allowing her at least some financial independence. She would never be rich, but she had enough to live on if she were careful.

  Emma hoped that as Calum reached his fifth birthday, hardly understanding that he was growing up in a broken family, he would not miss Oscar very much. Calum had come to view Patrick as a sort of lovable and fun older brother, an uncle of sorts. Having Patrick here with Emma’s son would be perfect for the little boy. Apparently Calum told his nanny that he thought all the adults around him were mad. Everyone else’s parents in London talked of nothing but German submarine campaigns and the fact that the country had just declared war on Portugal. The word war was never mentioned at his home. He also wondered why his house in Bloomsbury had a bright red front door when everyone else’s was painted staid dark green or black.

  Now Emma opened the deep-blue front door of Summerfield. At once, she was hit with the reality of the low ceiling in the hallway, which was narrow, with four rooms leading off to either side. The floors were bare of any rugs, and the boards were dusty and pale. Ugly curtains hung from the windows that overlooked the garden. Emma swept into the first room on the left, pulling back the closed drapes, letting what little cold sunshine there was beam into the house. There was a fireplace and enough room for a large table in here, along with a little door that led to the kitchen behind. She moved back to the hallway, to the room on the opposite side. It afforded a fine view of the pond and had a charming window seat. Emma’s imagination painted curlicues and perhaps wood nymphs dancing around the windowsill. This would be the living room; she’d have to find comfortable chairs, and she’d install bookshelves for the part of her father’s collection that she would bring down here.

  Her shoes clattered in the silence, and it felt more than strange being here alone. She’d not brought Calum, as she was unsure of the state of the house, but she’d told the little boy how she was going to find them a place with a proper garden this morning, and he and his nanny had seemed entranced. Emma had to remind herself that she’d never, ever be on her own if she could help it.

  She ducked her head into the kitchen. Her mental list included a dresser and perhaps some blue and white china, although gradually, she and Patrick would replace her parents’ old crockery with modern pieces thrown on the newly acquired pottery wheel at Lawrence’s workshop. Thick cream plates and mugs would be just the thing to hold in her paint-stained hands after a long day’s work.

  As she marched upstairs, her hand running over the banister, which, surprisingly, was of highly polished wood, she glanced with satisfaction at the long, narrow hallway upstairs that led to three bedrooms off to the left. To her right, she made her way into a private wing that had two bedrooms and a small dressing room between them. One bedroom would be for her, one for Calum next to hers, and the other three large rooms would be perfect for Patrick, Ambrose, and any other guests—Lawrence would come regularly, of course. Oscar and Mrs. Townsend, she knew, would occupy one room when she could convince them they were perfectly welcome in her house.

  Emma sighed. It was all bare and ghostly, yet seeming to wait to burst into life. And perfect for what she needed for Patrick. A blank canvas. Exactly what she liked.

  She’d already gained approval from Mr. Hicks—the tenant who managed the attached farm while leasing it in turn from the aristocracy, who owned all the land around here—to paint, wallpaper, and decorate the rooms as she pleased. Emma was thinking about dove gray, which she was going to blend with a chalk white from the local soil to give a soft background to the paintings she would hang to brighten the house. She’d make new curtains to Patrick’s designs.

  Emma needed color and beauty around her like some people required the trappings of wealth. She’d decorate all the door panels with her particular circles and geometric shapes, while Patrick could contribute his moving figures to the woodwork if he were not exhausted by all the farm labor he’d have to carry out.

  Emma stood in the room that would be her bedroom, looking out over the walled garden, which she’d enhance with sculptures, another passion that she and Patrick had taken up together.

  Everything was slipping into place. Emma reached into her pocket for the letter that still lay tucked away there.

  Fitzroy Square, Sunday

  My dear Em,

  It seems that while I cannot stop your train of action, especially your move away from London to such remote countryside, I am laid at your feet with admiration for the way you are handling everything in your life. Because you’ve quite simply got yourself exactly what you wanted. You’ve got rid of my attentions while keeping me as a devoted friend, kept your relationship with Oscar intact, and are juggling what I know is your grand passion for Patrick with typical great aplomb. You’re going to save him and keep him sane, while raising Calum on your own.

  All this while producing works of art that, in my humble capacity as an art critic, I think are extraordinary in their modernity and scope. I love that your deviation away from abstract after a short flirtation with the form shows an extraordinary openness to your own independent feelings in spite of fashion, especially given the nature of our world and the forceful nature and influence of strong opinion on all
things in the world at present.

  You somehow manage to distill conflict and peace into one harmonious whole, recognizing that both exist in our world. You find a remarkable harmony between the two. If only there were more people like you, perhaps our young men would not be dying in France.

  You clearly have a genius not only for art but also for life.

  Yours dearly,

  Lawrence

  Emma gazed out at the garden as she made her way back down the wooden staircase to the hall. She moved out of the open front door, locking it and standing a moment on the small step outside. Something troubling had swelled in her. Was she now regarded as some sort of saint?

  Knowing she was being irrational, Emma almost fell toward her bicycle. When she reached it, she leaned her hand on the handlebars and took deep breaths. Lawrence was right, and yet also so wrong at the same time. His words were kind and exquisite, and yet they upset her for some reason that she could not quite pinpoint.

  What he did not say was that she was handling her life well only because she had no choice. If Patrick could not love her in the way she needed to be loved, all she could do was love him and accept him for who he was.

  While she rebelled against traditional marriage and the stultifying idea of being a kept woman, still she could not quite grasp in her hands what she wanted.

  And yet, it seemed imperative that she keep up a facade of placid contentment and personal peace in the absence of being fully loved. Otherwise, she risked losing that which she did have, which was not enough. How ironic. Was she only doing the same thing as she would have done had she chosen to be conventional?

  She decided to push her old bike up the uneven track, opening the farm gate and then closing it tight shut, throwing her left leg up onto the pedal, flicking up her skirt as if she couldn’t care less, when she actually cared about everything more than she could ever admit. As she made her way up the narrow lane, head down as if her life depended on it, she cycled fast toward the one person she wanted to see right now—and the other reason that taking on the lease at Summerfield made perfect sense.