Sweet Sorrow

by David Roberts

  ‘Lady Corinth I could have lived with,’ Verity explained, ‘but Lady Edward . . .’ She threw up her hands in mock despair. ‘When people call me that I feel I’m just an appendage.’

  ‘Well, to answer your question,’ Edward continued, smiling, ‘we’ve only spent one night here so we haven’t had much time to meet people, but Colonel Heron came by to give us advice on the blackout. Apparently, our curtains show too much light and will have to be lined with what I believe is black felt.’

  ‘Heron is a busybody,’ Byron said. ‘He tried to tell me how to black out Ivy Cottage but I’m afraid I told him to go to hell. The worst thing about this war is going to be the little home-grown Hitlers who’ll try to regulate every minute of our daily lives.’

  ‘Didn’t I hear that Heron attacked you in the pub a few nights back?’ Leonard asked him.

  ‘He was drunk,’ Byron said dismissively. ‘He apologized the next day and we agreed to forget about it.’

  ‘Can I ask what he was accusing you of?’ Leonard persisted.

  ‘Apparently he knew my first wife – this was some time before we married – and he had the gall to accuse me of mistreating her. I’ve no idea how he would know as he was in India during the time we were married. It was all some fantasy of his. I believe he may have had a thing about Marion and went off to India when she rejected him. I don’t know for certain and I don’t care but we agreed to keep clear of one another. That’s why I don’t want him telling me how to black out my cottage.’

  ‘I’m so sorry,’ Virginia said. ‘Rodmell’s too small a village for quarrels.’

  ‘Don’t concern yourself, Virginia,’ Byron replied. ‘It was just a silly misunderstanding and it’s all over now. Let’s forget it, shall we?’

  ‘He says he’s going to drop off some gas masks for us to try on,’ Virginia added, ‘as though one were trying on a hat.’

  ‘Well, it’s no good if they are too small or too large,’ Leonard said gently.

  ‘I refuse to wear a gas mask. The thing disgusts me. If there is a gas attack, I shall just die. I’d rather die than wear one. The very sight of a gas mask with its hateful snout and tiny eyepiece terrifies me.’ Virginia’s eyes were wide, her pupils dilated.

  ‘I agree,’ Verity said, hoping to soothe her. ‘It’s certainly not a fashion accessory.’

  Virginia smiled weakly and the hysteria that had seemed about to bubble over subsided.

  ‘Colonel Heron is one of our churchwardens,’ Leonard told them. ‘He’s very active in the village.’

  ‘Too active, if you ask me,’ Byron grumbled. ‘You won’t catch me in church. I get the feeling our dear vicar doesn’t approve of me at all.’

  ‘I want you to meet Mark Redel, the painter,’ Leonard went on as though Byron had not spoken. ‘He lives in the little cottage just down the road. We invited him tonight but he absolutely refuses to come out to dinner when he’s in the middle of a picture. You’ve got to know him well, haven’t you, Adrian?’

  ‘Yes. He’s difficult – no point in pretending he’s a social animal – but he’s a great painter, in a different league from me.’ Verity smiled at her friend. Adrian was always so modest about his work but when she chided him he joked that he had a lot to be modest about. ‘He’s racked with guilt about being safe in England and hate for the Nazis. He gets terrible depressions but . . .’

  ‘I get the impression, Leonard,’ Edward interjected, ‘that you have gathered quite an artistic colony around here?’

  ‘We have done our best, particularly for our Jewish friends. I’m a Jew, of course, but Virginia feels just as strongly that we have to do what we can, though it’s little enough.’

  ‘And you must meet The Ladies, as we call them,’ Virginia said with a smile. ‘Miss Bron and Miss Fairweather have lived together for thirty or more years just outside the village.’

  ‘Miss Fairweather? Is she the writer?’ Edward asked.

  ‘Yes, she’s a wonderful woman. Quite formidable, though. I have to admit, she frightens me sometimes. She reminds me rather of Rebecca West. Her novels are acute, sensitive, and I believe they will last but she, like Redel, can be impossible. She bullies her friend unmercifully, which I don’t like.’ She hesitated and, as though something had just occurred to her, added, ‘Or at least I think she does. Maybe in reality . . . I don’t know – it’s odd that someone who writes as well as Miss Fairweather can be so unfeeling, but who knows how friendships work? I have spent what seems like a lifetime trying to make sense of human relationships but I still know nothing.’

  ‘You’re coming to the fête, I hope, Edward? You‘ll meet them there. In fact you’ll meet everyone there,’ Leonard said.

  ‘Miss Fairweather writes a pageant which the children perform,’ Virginia explained. ‘It’s slightly absurd but one can’t not be moved to watch them, dressed by their mothers as Queen Elizabeth or Cromwell or whatever, and so proud to be taking part.’

  ‘Do they act out scenes from history?’ Edward inquired with a smile.

  ‘The children are arranged in tableaux – you know the sort of thing, St George with his dragon, Alfred burning the cakes, Canute ordering the tide to turn. Miss Bron, who has a remarkable speaking voice and was, I believe, an actress at one time, recites Miss Fairweather’s description of what each tableau illustrates. There are prizes of course. The fête wouldn’t be the same without the pageant.’

  ‘It sounds splendid,’ Edward said. ‘It’s tomorrow week, isn’t it? We shall certainly be there.’

  As long as I’m not on my way to France, Verity thought to herself. Aloud, she asked Leonard what he meant by ‘everyone’ coming to the fête. ‘How many is “everyone”?’

  ‘You remember the census the government carried out earlier in the year when it was preparing plans to evacuate children from town to country? The population of Rodmell and Southease was put at three hundred and fifty nine though with incomers like you we must be almost four hundred now.’

  Shortly after ten thirty, Edward and Verity pleaded fatigue and asked to be forgiven for breaking up the party.

  ‘How is the house?’ Leonard asked as they rose to leave. ‘The Paxtons, who had it before you, loved it – particularly the garden. Did you know it has a ghost?’

  ‘The Old Vicarage? How exciting!’ Verity replied. ‘When we were sent the sale particulars, I never saw anything about a ghost.’

  ‘You don’t have to worry. The Paxtons said it’s a friendly ghost. Apparently, it walks from room to room in the night. These old houses crack and creak like any arthritic old man.’

  As they walked back with Charlotte and Adrian, Verity reprimanded her husband. ‘It was so tactless of you, Edward, to quote that depressing poem about dying. Couldn’t you see Mrs Woolf was upset?’

  ‘What about you going on and on about Spain?’ he riposted. ‘I believe her nephew’s death really upset her, as of course it would.’

  ‘She’s very close to her sister, Vanessa,’ Charlotte nodded.

  Adrian, always the peacemaker, said, ‘They both liked you, I could see. The way Leonard opened up to you about politics . . . social conditions, everything. He loves to have someone to argue with and Virginia likes anyone who keeps Leonard happy.’

  ‘So you think we will be asked back?’ Verity inquired.

  ‘Of course! What did you think of Monk’s House?’

  ‘I loved it,’ Verity replied, ‘though I’m not sure about all that green paint.’

  ‘It’s smaller than I imagined,’ Edward added. ‘I can’t think where Mrs Woolf writes.’

  ‘There’s an upstairs sitting-room which you didn’t see, and she’s converted a tool shed at the end of the garden into a writing-room,’ Charlotte told them. ‘I love the house. It’s a house in which books are all-important. You usually can’t see the floor for books but they tidied up for us.’

  ‘And did you like Byron?’ Adrian asked.

  ‘He’s very good-looking,’ Verity said, sneaking a g
lance at Edward to see if he would rise.

  ‘I didn’t like him,’ he responded predictably. ‘His hair’s too long and he smelt. I’m not surprised he seems to have made so many enemies in the village.’

  ‘I hear on the grapevine that he has a mistress in London. While his wife’s in Hollywood . . .’ Adrian told them with a smirk in his voice.

  ‘Just what I would have suspected,’ Edward commented loftily.

  ‘I wonder what the children are like?’ Verity mused.

  ‘You’ll see them at the fête if not before,’ Charlotte pointed out.

  2

  The following morning was spent trying to put the house to rights. Verity flapped about, surprisingly indecisive, agreeing gratefully with any suggestion Mrs Brendel made about what furniture should go where. Edward quickly got bored and irritated and left with Basil for a walk on the downs, which he was already beginning to love. He felt he could breathe when he was up above the hurly-burly and he enjoyed a kind of peace striding along with Basil bounding in front of him chasing after hares, rabbits and pheasants, none of which he managed to catch. Much as he loved Verity, Edward found that he needed to be alone sometimes to think and contemplate the future. He knew this was the calm that comes before a storm and he wanted to make the most of it.

  Verity was not a natural home-maker. She had always lived out of a suitcase and, although she liked the idea of a nest to which she could return from foreign trips, she had no belief in the reality of her new home. It was partly because so little of the furniture was hers. It mostly came from Mersham and she felt rather hopeless when – appealing to Edward for advice on, say, curtain material – he shrugged his shoulders and told her to ask Charlotte. She knew, too, that in just three or four weeks she would receive her marching orders from Lord Weaver at the New Gazette and have to drop everything to travel to some war-torn capital to report on another scene of misery and chaos. This was just playing, and she felt a slight chill in her bones. Was this marriage going to work? Would they be able to make the necessary compromises?

  At lunchtime Adrian appeared and she welcomed the excuse to stop pretending she was being useful and leave everything to the housekeeper and the gardener’s boy. Adrian wanted to introduce her to his friend, the painter Mark Redel.

  ‘I’m afraid he’s not an easy man to get on with. He says what he thinks, however hurtful. He hates my paintings! But he’s a great painter – completely undervalued. In May he had an exhibition at the Lefèvre galleries but it wasn’t a success. People were shocked by the nudes – he likes large ladies – but there were some wonderful still lifes and landscapes. You ought to make Edward buy one.’

  ‘Of course. He’s Jewish, isn’t he?’

  ‘Very,’ Adrian responded.

  ‘Is he married?’

  ‘His wife left him about a year ago and took their son, Luke, with her.’

  ‘Left him!’ Verity suddenly felt panicky as though someone had said Edward had left her.

  ‘Yes, she’s in Paris with an Austrian refugee. Another painter, I believe. Oh dear, I make it sound all doom and gloom but really he can be very good company when he’s not drunk or depressed.’

  As they approached Redel’s house – a small cottage on the main street – Verity wondered if she would be able to cope with him, but she was pleasantly surprised. He was in his studio, which was little more than a hut in the garden, and welcomed her with a smile.

  ‘Please don’t let us interrupt you,’ she said nervously.

  ‘Not at all,’ Redel replied, putting down his brush. ‘I’ve done enough for today.’

  ‘May I see?’ she inquired, expecting to be snubbed. Redel lifted the painting off the easel and showed it to her. It was a self-portrait – quite small – but even Verity, who knew little about art, could feel the power and vigour of each brush stroke.

  ‘It’s magnificent!’ she exclaimed.

  ‘You really think so?’ Redel sounded shy but pleased.

  ‘I do. It quite takes my breath away. You know we have just moved into the Old Vicarage? We have no pictures – neither my husband nor I have ever had a house fit to hang pictures in. Will it be for sale – the self-portrait? Oh dear, I’m so sorry. I’m probably being rude. We’ve hardly met and here I go . . . ’

  ‘Don’t apologize. You can’t imagine how heartening it is for a painter to have his work praised. Adrian knows what it feels like.’

  ‘Not often,’ Adrian said ruefully, ‘but I agree with Verity. It’s magnificent.’

  ‘Have you eaten?’ Redel asked. ‘We could walk down to the pub for a pint of the local brew and bread and cheese. Charlotte is always telling me I’m too thin but I don’t eat much when I’m working. When I’m idle, I put on weight – it’s very odd.’

  ‘What a good idea,’ Adrian said. ‘Charlotte’s trying to finish off a book and has banned me from the house, and Verity, you said Edward has abandoned you.’

  ‘Not abandoned me, I hope,’ she said nervously, ‘but he’s taken the dog for a walk. Mrs Brendel will tell him where I’ve gone.’

  ‘Bread and cheese is about all I live on,’ Redel said gloomily.

  ‘That’s nonsense, Mark. You are always being invited out to dinner. You just don’t choose to accept. The Woolves invited you last night – they told us.’

  ‘Yes, but I couldn’t go. Virginia said she’d invited Byron Gates. I really can’t stand the man. He has nothing to say and he says it at great length.’

  ‘You don’t like his poetry?’ Verity inquired.

  ‘Do you?’

  ‘I have to admit I have never read any. When we go to Lewes I’ll buy some. There is a bookshop, isn’t there?’

  ‘Yes, but really you don’t need to bother,’ Redel said viciously. ‘It’s rotten. If you want to read real poetry – there’s a fellow I know, Dylan Thomas. Now, he’s a real poet.’

  ‘You know Byron well, Mark?’ Adrian inquired.

  ‘When I used to live in Highgate our paths crossed, but we were never friends. If I’d known Virginia had got him a cottage down here, I might not have come myself.’

  ‘Oh, I see, Mrs Woolf found you this cottage?’ Verity asked.

  ‘Yes,’ Redel responded shortly. ‘She’s very kind. She heard I was on my uppers after Marjorie left and said I ought to come to Rodmell.’

  ‘How long have you been here?’

  ‘Just six months. I like it here. I’ve done some good work even if nobody agrees with me. I was really hoping to sell two or three to the Tate. Rothenstein came to the exhibition but bought nothing. In fact, I only sold two pictures. I think the Lefèvre will drop me.’

  ‘Don’t be so pessimistic, Mark,’ Adrian chided. ‘Virginia and Vanessa loved the exhibition and Roger Fry said – how did he put it? – that you retained your “clear vision of youth and were still an uncompromising rebel”.’

  ‘Yes, I know but I’m still broke. Did I tell you that I’m thinking of writing my autobiography? Gollancz has offered me a hundred pounds.’

  Verity looked at Redel with interest. She thought that, if he ever did write it, it was a book she would like to read. He wasn’t good-looking. His face was pouched and creased as though fate had thrown too many blows at him which he had been unable to absorb. His nose was red and she guessed he drank too much. His eyes, though small and black, were attractive – very bright and intelligent – and his hair was thick and almost lustrous. She found herself wondering what sort of lover he would make and decided he would be exciting but selfish and probably violent.

  In the Abergavenny Arms, Redel was welcomed as a regular and he and Adrian each ordered a pint of the thick local stout. There didn’t seem anything for Verity to drink so she asked for cider. It was strong and rough and her head began to swim. She hoped Edward wouldn’t be cross with her. He had rather an odd attitude to public houses. He never went in the pub at Mersham – something to do with it not being proper for the Duke or his brother to be seen drinking with the peasantry, she su
pposed. All nonsense, of course, but what could you do? As for women, she was quite sure the Duchess would never have entered it and she herself had never been allowed in. Yet, at the annual Mersham Show, the Duke would drink a pint or two in the tent with the local worthies and think nothing of it.

  When Verity got home, a little unsteady on her feet, she found Edward pacing the drawing-room.

  ‘There you are, V! I couldn’t think where you had got to. Mrs Brendel told me you had gone out with Adrian to see Redel but no one was there. I suppose you all went to the pub.’

  ‘We did. Why didn’t you join us?’

  ‘I don’t like pubs,’ he said, sulkily, ‘and I didn’t want to interrupt anything. I had to have lunch on my own.’

  ‘Don’t be absurd. I wish you had come with us. Mark is a remarkable painter and a most interesting man. His stuff is really amazing. You must see it. I told him we needed paintings for the house. There’s a self-portrait . . .’

  Edward spluttered. ‘If you think . . .’ He restrained himself from saying something he might regret. He didn’t want a row. ‘Well, anyway, now you’re back I want to tell you who I met on my walk. You remember Paul Fisher? We met him with Tommie Fox.’

  Tommie was one of Edward’s oldest friends, now a north London vicar. They had not seen him since their marriage which Verity guiltily attributed to her refusal to let him bless their union. Tommie had been badly hurt but she had insisted that it would be hypocritical to introduce a Christian element into the ceremony. She wondered if it had been selfish to deny an old friend a gesture which would surely not have affected her one way or the other and would have given him pleasure, but it was too late to do anything about it now.

  ‘Paul was up at Trinity with us,’ Edward went on, ‘though he’s a couple of years younger than me and we never got to know one another. Anyway, it turns out he’s the vicar down here. Since St Peter’s is practically in our garden, I thought I would show interest. I’ve asked him to supper after evensong tomorrow. I hope you don’t mind.’