My dearest girl,
This, as a reminder of the memory that touches heaven for me.
I cannot stop my thoughts from racing. If I were free.
I want but one word from your dear sweet lips; my name.
I will not suffer her forever.
All of the letters were in handwriting that had its swirls and flourishes, yet the characters were strangely laboured and childlike. All of them were signed with the same initials.
P.R.
For a moment, Joanna froze. She had learned what she had come here for, yet she felt a cold sinking, then the realization that if she could put the letters back and unlearn it, she would. She had long suspected Pierre Renard, but the new reality of it, his initials before her eyes, was too sudden. She read more slowly, but that made it worse, for she began to pick up the full content of the letters, and some of it was explicit, sparking sickening images in her mind.
Somewhere in the depths of the house something fell; a silver knife on a marble floor. The distant sound – for everything echoed in this house, as though it was a cathedral – struck a resonance of fear in her and she pushed the letters back into the compartment, not caring whether she crumpled them, slamming the doors shut and fumbling with the key. She put it back in its box on the dressing table and slammed the lid shut with shaking hands.
Her whole body was trembling uncontrollably.
She stood there, in the silence. There was no one there.
She took a few steps back, and sat down on one of the silk-covered chairs. She looked around the room; at the sheen of the hangings, the tall windows, the toilet service. Beside Harriet’s bed, the small pile of books and the miniature of Mr Chichester.
I am justified, she thought. Why should a woman such as Harriet Chichester live unpunished when my child was left to die, crying for her mother and the father she would never see?
She sat there for a few minutes, speaking harsh words to herself, and cradling her now-imaginary daughter in her arms. Then she went to her room, got out the writing implements left her by her master, and, after straightening the pots containing the sand and the ink, began to write.
Alban approached the church of St James’s Piccadilly from York Street. The church was illuminated for evening service, and he paused in the winter darkness to appreciate its effect, and to quieten his breathing, which had quickened at the thought of seeing Mary. To him the interior of the church did seem blessed; within the space contained by the huge windows, glazed with chequers of uneven glass, all was warmth and light, while everything outside languished in darkness. If it was an illusion of sanctity, he thought, it was a fine one.
He was late and, thinking only of Mary, he had not prepared himself for the eyes of the congregation: Piccadilly’s finest in their silks and satins, looking askance at the stranger dressed in a black coat, his black hair unpowdered, his eyes searching. It reminded him of Jesse’s words as he had left the house: ‘They count the money in your purse before they even let you in there.’ Despite entering amidst a great crash of organ music he still attracted glances and nudges as he nodded to the church warden, then the cross, and stood at the back of the church.
The great brass candle branches had been lit. He did not pause to count, but it seemed as though the white walls of the church and its gilded details glinted in the light of hundreds of candles.
His eyes scudded over the congregation: tall wigs, natural powdered curls, feathers, hats and hoods. When he finally found Mary, it gave him a tremor of shock, for she was sitting exactly where she had sat all those years ago, her back to him, looking ahead. Renard must have bought a pew here, long ago, he thought. Part of him had assumed that she would not be here, that this trip was just a sop to throw to Jesse. He allowed his eyes to rest on her in her widow’s garb. A few powdered curls were visible at the edge of her cap, and his eyes lingered on her white neck.
So much has changed, he thought, though I try to set time under crystal. When she knew me first I was a much younger man. Do I differ, other than my back is stiffer, and my right elbow has begun to pain me, so that sometimes I have to put the hammer down? He thought that perhaps, day by day, he had changed by slight degrees, and the Alban Steele that stood here now was an entirely different man from the one that had stood here eleven years before. He wondered how she had changed, and doubt crept into his mind.
It was Jesse who had sent him here. Jesse, carving a piece of wood, looking up at him this afternoon and saying: ‘She came for you.’
‘What do you mean?’ he said.
‘The day after you met her at church. She was out with her brother on an errand for her father, and she came near the house. I was on the step seeing someone out. Eli was running along the street; he nearly got in front of a carriage and I caught him. Little imp, he was, always laughing.’
‘So you met her in the street,’ said Alban, sardonically.
‘She came for you,’ said Jesse. ‘Whether she knew it or not. I found a way to make it clear that you had gone.’
‘Why did you not tell me?’ said Alban.
‘There was nothing to be done. You were already in the coach, going back to Chester. She was married within the week and the boy sent away. I did not speak of it before because I thought you would reproach yourself, and I only tell you now because I think it might make you do something.’
Standing in the church where he had first met Eli and Mary, he remembered the child’s face so clearly, his blue eyes, the smile that lit up his face, and the weight of him as he threw him in the air. Then, the smile that Mary had given him.
‘Who is she?’ he had whispered to Jesse, after he had led the child back to the family pew and handed him to his mother. ‘Mary Just,’ said Jesse. ‘Mallory’s sister.’ That little girl, he had thought – when he had visited as a fourteen-year-old apprentice, a child himself -I remember her, the girl with the mischievous eyes.
Of course it had only taken a moment for him to piece it all together; he had just heard her banns read, and for the last time of asking.
Weeks afterwards when he was back in Chester, he woke one morning and thought: I glimpsed the divine in that church. All those years I sought it, then I had it for one moment. But then he woke properly, and splashed cold water on his face, and was himself again. He reasserted it as he walked to work that day: I do not believe in serendipity. And I do not believe in God.
Mary kept her head bowed until the service came to a close. People were winding their way out, the babble of several hundred voices rising in the great white space of the church, when she felt Avery’s hand on her arm. She turned, and saw Alban standing there, watching her as he had on the day of the funeral. The sight of him filled her with hope and a deep sense of relief. As she walked towards him, each step slow and measured so that she might look at him the longer, a hesitant smile filtered its way across his face.
He bowed and said her name, and took the hand she presented to him.
‘I am glad to see you,’ she said. ‘It is a lucky chance. I normally worship at St George’s, but friends allowed us a place in their pew this evening. I come here sometimes for my brother.’
She glanced over her shoulder, as though she might see Eli there, running towards them. But there was no one there but the stragglers in the congregation, and Avery, who was speaking with two of the other worshippers. When she turned back she saw that her sadness was reflected in his eyes.
‘Being here reminds me of him and my parents. It is the only place. My father’s house was let long ago.’
‘I am sorry,’ he said.
Mary smiled. ‘No,’ she said. ‘You have no need to be sorry. I remember the kindness you showed him.’ She took a breath, wondering how she could lengthen the precious conversation. ‘How do you find London?’
‘Constantly changing, yet unchanging,’ he said. ‘It seems a hard place to me sometimes. A man here may wear a true-seeming face before a false heart, and not be discovered. But then I am an outsider. Perh
aps I do not understand what it takes to succeed here.’ He was looking around, as though agitated. When he spoke again, there was a note of decision in his voice.
‘I came to tell you,’ he said, and he swallowed. ‘My accounts are all in order. I have some resources. I am not a rich man, but I have enough to be comfortable.’
She could not decipher his meaning; he had spoken too quickly, and she panicked a little. ‘I am glad for you,’ she said, taking refuge in politeness.
‘Forgive me, I am not making myself clear,’ he said urgently. ‘I have come to ask you if you will consider becoming my wife. As I said, my accounts are all in order, and I can present them to Dr Taylor at his convenience.’
Mary searched for, but could not find, emotion in his eyes. But of course, she thought; he speaks of money, why would he not? I was a fool to have imagined more. It felt to her as though the colour had drained out of the surroundings. She had placed meaning on such inconsequential events, so many years ago. All at once she felt ridiculous, and wronged, and angry. The memory of Mr Exham speaking to Benjamin on the stairs was still sharp.
‘Despite all the rumours, Mr Steele,’ she said, ‘I am not a good investment. I thank you for your kind offer. I will pretend you never made it.’ As she turned away, she felt as though every piece of warmth had fled to the core of her body, leaving her weak.
‘Wait,’ he said.
She stood still, her back to him.
‘I did not think of the money,’ he said in low voice. She felt, rather than heard, him take a step towards her. ‘I ask you to consider my offer,’ he said. ‘It is honestly made.’
She waited for a moment, but no more words came from him. She felt no flicker of temper; only the leadenness of disappointment in her stomach.
‘Do not make me repeat myself,’ she said, but she did not move. There was something she had to ask. She didn’t know whether it was because she had to guard the pillaged treasure of the past, or let it be finally trampled and laid waste.
‘Did you think of me much these past years?’ she said.
She saw Avery watching them, silently, from across the aisle.
‘Why would I?’ he said. ‘You were married, and far from me.’
There was nothing she could say in response; she only looked at him, as though for the last time.
‘I promise always to be honest with you,’ he said.
Mary turned, curtseyed without meeting his eyes, then left the church. It was only out in the darkness of Jermyn Street that Avery finally caught up with her.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
2nd June, 1792
I was looking over the ledgers tonight, when my wife interrupted me with her meaningless chatter. When she remarked that Benjamin seemed to be a good boy, but a little timid, I detected her cunning at work. I told her that she was not to criticize him, and that he meant more to me than she knew, and at this she protested. It is my habit to keep things close to me and not to share them with Mary, but I could not help but tell her that there had been someone before her, far better than she. Yet when I spoke it did not quite come out so; there was a bitterness to my words. I am vexed that I did not keep myself more in check, but when a man has been wounded so many times, it is natural that a little venom should now and then escape. I must follow Dr Taylor’s example, be patient, and pray, for I know God is just.
Alban lay back on the mattress, the footsteps of his nieces and nephews pounding backwards and forwards on the floorboards. He was exhausted, but the sound of their running feet comforted him. He remembered what it was like to be a child, to run thoughtlessly, when every day was like a new lifetime.
Jesse came down the stairs, yawning. ‘Don’t get up,’ he said. ‘What time did you work until?’
Alban shrugged.
‘Listen to them. Doesn’t it make you glad not to be a father?’ said Jesse.
Alban said nothing. He did think that perhaps it was for the best that he would never be a father now; he did not want to watch his children become mired in the cares of the world. But he wished Jesse and Agnes would stop trying to prise acceptance out of him. He could seek it in his own way, though he did not wish to rebuff their kindness.
As he lay there he could not chase away his memory of eleven years before. We were not alone, he thought, for one moment long ago. I know we found each other. A brief illumination, as when a cloud moves away from the sun, before another passes over it.
He said to himself now that Mary had punished him for telling the truth. Her vanity had been unable to bear it. He had not had time to explain that there would have been no point in thinking of her, or torturing himself with a useless jealousy Until that day on Bond Street he had believed himself dead to her, and it would have been as pointless as banging his head against a wall to have dwelt on the hope that had flared so briefly into life and then been snuffed out.
What he had not told her was that in those moments after their eyes had met, so many years ago, he had committed her name to memory, holding the swaying Eli in his arms, the child all warmth and life and glowing blue eyes. Mary Just. He had pictured the letters of it in the way he remembered decorative motifs, borders, edgings, designs, so that it could be assigned to his visual memory. He was a man who saved scraps of beauty, who buried precious things in his mind, hoarding them to be used later in the process of creation. So he had said her name, then buried it. He had not dwelt on her in the intervening years. Occasionally, in the long evenings when he drew, he would fall into a reverie, and return to London, and Mary, in his imagination. One evening he had designed a dinner service; drawn it completely to his own taste. He could see it on his own table, and the life he could have lived. She was there, in that life, even if she was only represented in the cypher he had drawn of their initials. Her name had always been there. If she could not see the sanctity of it, that was her fault.
When he had come home from church and told them what had happened, Agnes had left the room, her hand clamped across her mouth, and tears in her eyes.
‘She is emotional, it’s the breeding,’ said Jesse. ‘She wishes you to stay, as we all do. She had some vision of you with a wife and a houseful of children.’
‘I will stay until you no longer need me,’ said Alban.
‘It is a cursed house, that Renard place,’ said Jesse. His expression was grim and hard. ‘And she is part of the curse.’
‘Why would you say that?’ said Alban. The cruelty in Jesse’s tone chilled him; he was glad Agnes had left the room. ‘Say you do not mean it, or we will have words.’
Jesse sighed. ‘Forgive me. If I speak harshly, it is out of loyalty to you. That woman has grieved you, and I am sorry for my part in it. I wish I could make her suffer as you do now.’
‘Do not say that,’ said Alban. ‘I do not wish her ill. She has done nothing wrong. And my injury is slight; I will forget it in a week. I was wrong to make a hasty proposal based on one look eleven years ago.’
When Mary entered the shop it was past ten in the morning. It did not seem as dark as usual, for Grisa had taken down some of the black velvet which had draped it in mourning, and the winter light reflected off the glass in the counter and presses. He held a salver up, turning it in his hands, inspecting the ornate chasing. It flashed in the light as he flipped it: white, grey, white, grey. Mary longed to rest her hands on its smooth coldness. Beside it, on the counter, a set of six salts had been placed, part unwrapped. Apiece of sacking was still draped over one of them. With her right forefinger Mary unhooked it and let it fall silently on the counter.
‘It is beautiful work,’ she said. Grisa looked at her, taking his eyeglass out.
‘Of course,’ he said. ‘Nothing but the best for the firm of Pierre Renard’s, though we strike your mark on it now.’
‘Who made it?’ said Mary.
‘Jesse Chamac’s workshop,’ said Grisa, and Mary felt a sick stab of distress in her stomach. ‘The new man, Alban, does fine work. I have asked him to send more pictures
too, for he designs, and they have just the right look: clean, not like that ornate heavy stuff. Hullo there!’ He waved his hand, and Mary looked back to see the watchman at the window, raising his hand in greeting. She nodded, and smiled, and he walked on. ‘He keeps looking in,’ said Grisa, raising an eyebrow. ‘I feel looked-after.’
Mary touched one of the salts, its cold surface hard and unyielding. It was edged with beading.
‘When were these made?’ she said.
‘They have just been delivered,’ said Grisa.
Mary ran her fingers over the beading. The pieces of silver had been made by a confident hand. They had the charisma of things thought about, more than pleasing, as though the craftsmen had set his finger on the balance of nature. Alban may have made this, she thought: he may have turned it in his hands. She imagined him at work at his bench. It seemed the most natural thing in the world for him to be a silversmith, as though those hands – large, rough hands with long fingers, she remembered – had been made to shape metal. Despite the keenness of her disappointment in church, she had found that she could not shake off her good opinion of him. Now, when she thought of him she felt sad; a sadness that lay lightly over everything like a layer of dust.
‘I’ll have the boy polish them,’ said Grisa, narrowing his eyes at her putting her hands all over the salts. ‘Let’s hope the customer pays this time.’
‘What of that?’ she said, pointing at a large monteith, plain but immense, on the floor beside Grisa’s feet.
‘It is to be melted down and refashioned,’ said Grisa.
Mary nodded. Pierre had loved the melting down of old pieces to make new; it had reminded him of his own desire for constant reinvention. She remembered him with an old salver to be scrapped, bending it with his bare hands just for the sport of it, stamping on it, laughing. If she was truthful, she had despised him for his ready destruction of something that had been made with such care. Yet she had laughed when he urged her to. How she despised her pliability now.
The Silversmith's Wife _ Sophia Tobin Page 19