by Anne Perry
How could he so misunderstand her? He had known her for more than a quarter of a century, and he thought she was agreeing with him! Did he not recognize sarcasm when he heard it? Or was he clever enough to turn it against her, disarm her by seeming to take it at face value?
She met his eyes across the table, almost hoping that he was mocking her. It would at least be a communication, an intelligence. But he was not. He looked back at her blankly, and turned to the archdeacon’s wife and began wittering on about memories of his blessed mother, who, as Isadora remembered her, had been actually quite fun, and certainly not the characterless creature he was painting with his words.
But how many people she knew tended not to see their parents as the rest of the world did, but rather as stereotypes of mother and father as they held them to be, good or bad? Perhaps she had not known her own parents so very well?
The women at the table said very little. It would be considered rude for them to speak across the men’s conversation, and they were not equipped to join in. They believed women to be good by nature—at least the best of them; the worst were at the very roots of damnation. There were not so many in between. But being good and knowing anything about goodness were not the same thing. It was for women to do it, and men to talk about it and, when necessary, to tell women how it should be done.
Since she was neither required nor permitted to contribute to the discussion, other than by a pleasant and interested expression, she allowed her mind to wander. Curious how many of her mental images involved faraway places, especially over the sea. She thought of the vast spaces of the ocean with a level horizon on every side, trying to imagine what it would feel like to have only a deck beneath your feet, constantly moving, the wind and sun on your face, to know that you must have in the tiny wholeness of that ship all that you needed to survive and to find your way across the trackless waste which could rise up in terrible storms to batter you, even to hold and crush you like a mighty hand. Or it could lie so still there was not enough breath across its face to fill your sails.
What lived beneath it? Beautiful things? Fearful things? Unimaginable things? And the only guidance was in the stars above, or of course the sun and a perfect clock, if you had the skill.
“. . . really have to speak to someone about it,” a woman in tan and tobacco-brown lace was saying. “We look to you, Bishop.”
“Of course, Mrs. Howarth.” He nodded sagely, touching his napkin to his lips. “Of course.”
Isadora averted her eyes. She did not want to be drawn into the conversation. Why didn’t they talk about the ocean? It was the ideal analogy of how alone each person is on the voyage of life, how you have to carry within you everything you need, and only by the understanding of the heavens could you ever know in which direction to steer.
Captain Cornwallis would have understood. Then she blushed at how easily his name had come to her mind, and with what a lurch of pleasure. She felt as if she were transparent. Had anyone else seen her face? Of course she and Cornwallis had never spoken of such things, not directly, but she knew he felt it more completely than any speech. He could say so much in a sentence or two, whereas these men around her were drowning the evening in words, and saying almost nothing.
The Bishop was still talking, and she looked at his complacent, unlistening face, and realized with a horror that rippled right through her, like insects crawling, that she actually disliked him. How long had she felt like that? Since meeting John Cornwallis, or before?
What had her whole life been, spent in the daily presence—she could not say company—of a man she did not even truly like, much less love? A duty? A discipline of the spirit? A waste?
What would it have been like if she could only have met Cornwallis thirty-one years ago?
She might not have loved him then, or he her. They had both been such different people, the lessons of time and loneliness unlearned. Anyway, it was pointless to think of it. No past can ever be undone.
But she could not dismiss the future in the same way. What if she escaped this charade, just walked away? Would it be possible? Go to Cornwallis? Of course they had neither of them ever said as much—it would be unthinkable—but she knew he loved her, as she had slowly realized she loved him. He had the honesty, the courage, the simplicity of mind that was like clear water to her inner thirst. She had to search for his humor, wait for it, but it was there, and without unkindness. It hurt to think of him. It made this ridiculous evening, and her presence in it, even more painful. Had any of them even the remotest idea of where her imagination was? Her face flamed at the thought.
They were still talking about politics, the same subject of how dangerous the extreme Liberal ideas were, already they undermined the values of Christianity. They threatened sobriety, church attendance, the keeping of the Sabbath, the general obedience and respect appropriate, even the very sanctity of the home, safeguarded by the modesty of women.
What would she and Cornwallis have been talking about? Certainly not what other people ought to be doing, saying, or thinking! They would speak of wonderful places, ancient cities on the shores of other seas, cities like Istanbul, Athens, Alexandria, places of ancient legend and adventure. In her mind the sun shone on warm stones, the sky was blue, too bright to look at for more than a moment, and the air was warm. It would be enough even to talk about it with him; she would not ever have to go there, just listen and dream. Even to sit in silence knowing his thoughts were the same would be good enough.
What would happen if she left here and went to him? What would she lose? Her reputation, of course. The condemnation would be deafening! Men would be scandalized, and of course terrified their own wives might be given the idea and the example to do the same thing! Women would be even more furious, because they would envy her and hate her for it. Those who stayed at the call of duty, which would be almost all of them, would positively bristle with virtue.
She would never be able to speak to any of them again. They would cut her dead in the street. She would become invisible. Funny how a scarlet woman was not seen. You would think she would be the most highly visible of all! Isadora smiled at the thought, and saw a look of puzzlement in the face of the woman across the table from her. The conversation was hardly humorous!
Reality came back. It was only a daydream, a sweet and painful way of escaping a tedious evening. Even if she were wild enough to go to Cornwallis, he would never accept her offer. It would be utterly dishonorable to take another man’s wife. Would he even be tempted? Perhaps not. He would be embarrassed by her, ashamed of her forwardness, or that she should even think that he might accept such an offer.
Would that hurt intolerably?
No. If he were a man who would have accepted, then she would not have wanted him.
The conversation babbled on around her, getting heated over some difference of theological opinion now.
But if Cornwallis would have accepted her, would she have gone? The answer hovered only a moment on her mind, undecided, then she was afraid that at this instant, hearing the suffocating pomposity around her at this stiff, unhappy table, yes . . . yes! She would have seized the chance and escaped!
But it would not happen. She knew that absolutely; it was more real than the lights of the chandeliers or the hard edge of the table under her hands. The voices ebbed and flowed around her. Nobody noticed that she had said nothing for a while, not even the polite murmuring of agreement.
Going to Cornwallis was a daydream she would never follow through, but suddenly it was intensely important that she know if he would have wished her to, were it possible; if in some way it could have been all right. Nothing else mattered quite as much. She needed to see him again, just to talk, about anything or nothing, but to know that he still cared. He would not say so, he never had. Maybe she would never hear him say the words “I love you.” She would have to make do with silence, awkwardness, the look in his eyes and the sudden color in his face.
Where could they meet that would c
ause no comment? It must be a place where both of them customarily went, so it would look to be chance. An exhibition of some sort, of paintings or artifacts. She had no idea what was showing at the moment. She had not until this moment felt like looking. The National Gallery always had something. She would write to Cornwallis, send him a message, casually worded, an invitation to see whatever it was. It would be simple enough to find out. She would do it in the morning, first thing. She could say something about its being interesting and wondering if he might find it enjoyable also. If it were seascapes no excuse would be needed; if something else, then it hardly mattered whether he believed her or not, what counted was if he came. It was immodest, the very thing the archdeacon had been railing against, but what was there to lose? What had she anyway but this empty game, words without communication, closeness without intimacy, passion, laughter or tenderness?
Her mind was made up. Suddenly she was hungry, and the crème caramel in front of her seemed hardly more than a couple of mouthfuls. She should not have ignored the preceding courses, but it was too late now.
Actually, the National Gallery was showing an exhibition of Hogarth’s paintings—portraits, not his political cartoons and commentaries. In his lifetime, some hundred and odd years ago, he had been dismissed by the critics as a miserable colorist, but now his stand-ing had risen considerably. It was something she could quite easily suggest was worth seeing to make one’s own judgment, and either confirm the critics or confound them.
She wrote quickly, without giving herself time to become self-conscious and lose her courage.
Dear Captain Cornwallis,
I became aware this morning that the National Gallery has mounted an exhibition of the portraits painted by Hogarth which were much derided in his lifetime, but now have gained far more favorable attention. It is remarkable how opinion can swing so wildly upon a single talent. I should now like to see them for myself and form my own judgment.
Knowing your interest in art, and your own ability, I thought you might also find them thought-provoking.
I appreciate that you have little time for such things, but in the hope that duty might allow you half an hour or so I thought to inform you. I have determined to take at least that long for myself, perhaps towards the end of this afternoon when I am not required at home. My curiosity is awakened. Is he as bad as they first said, or as good as they say now?
I hope I have not intruded upon your time.
Sincerely,
Isadora Underhill
No matter how many times she went over it, it would always be clumsier than she wished.
She must post it before she read it through again and felt too abashed to send it.
A quick walk to the letterbox on the corner, and it was irretrievable.
At four o’clock she dressed in her most flattering summer costume of old rose with falls of white lace over both sleeves as far as the elbow, and setting her hat on at a more rakish angle than usual, left her home.
It was only when her cab turned into Trafalgar Square that suddenly she felt she was being ridiculous. She leaned forward to tell the driver that she had changed her mind, then said nothing. If she did not now go and Cornwallis was there, he would feel it a deliberate rejection. She would have taken an irrevocable step she did not mean. She could never afterwards withdraw it. He was not a man to whom one could explain. He would simply not open himself up to such hurt again.
She sat back in the seat and waited until the cab stopped near the wide steps up to the immense pillars and the imposing front of the gallery. She alighted and paid her fare. Then she stood in the sun amid the pigeons and the sightseers, the flower sellers, the distant, impressive stone lions, the noise of traffic.
She must have let the boredom addle her wits last night! By writing to Cornwallis she had placed herself in a position where she had either to go back or forward; she could no longer remain where she was, lonely, uncommitted, dreaming but afraid. It was like standing at a gambling table and having cast the dice, waiting for them to stop rolling and decide her fate.
That was overstating it! She had simply written to a friend advising him of an interesting exhibition which she was going to see herself.
Then why were her legs trembling as she walked up the steps and across the stones to the entrance?
“Good afternoon,” she said to the man at the door.
“Good afternoon, madam,” he replied politely, touching his cap.
“Where is the Hogarth exhibition?” she asked.
“To the left, madam,” he said, inclining his head towards a huge notice.
She blushed hotly and almost choked on the words as she thanked him. He must think her blind! How would anyone unable to see a notice a yard high be able to appreciate paintings?
She swept past him and into the first room. There were at least a dozen people in it. At a glance she saw two with whom she was acquainted. Should she speak to them and draw attention to herself? Or not, and perhaps be thought to snub them? That would cause comment, and certainly be repeated.
Before she could reach a decision, years of training overtook her and she spoke, then instantly thought she might have ruined her chance of speaking to Cornwallis other than meaninglessly, in passing. She could hardly say or hear anything she wanted to in company.
But it was too late, the acknowledgment was made. She asked after their health, commented on the weather, and prayed they would leave. She had not the slightest desire to discuss the pictures with them. In the end she lied, claiming to see in the next room some elderly lady she knew and urgently wished to speak with.
There were another dozen people there also, but not Cornwallis. Her heart sank. Why had she supposed he would come, as if he were at her beck and call, with nothing to do but go to art galleries on a whim? She had no doubt whatever that he had been attracted to her, but attraction was not love, not the profound and abiding emotion she felt!
The women were coming in from the previous room. She could not escape. A further half hour’s desperate conversation ensued. What did it matter? The whole idea had been ridiculous. She wished more than anything on earth that she had never written to him. If only the post had swallowed her letter, lost it forever!
Then she saw him. He had come! His stance, the set of his shoulders, she would recognize anywhere. In a moment he would turn and see her, then she would have to go forward. Between now and that instant she must control the thumping of her heart, hope to heaven her face did not betray her, and think what to say that opened the way for him to speak, and yet was not too forward, too eager. That would make her look gauche, and it would repel him.
He turned, as if he felt her stare. She saw the pleasure light his face, and then his effort to cover it. For his ease, she forgot herself and went forward.
“Good afternoon, Captain Cornwallis. I am delighted you were able to spare the time to see this for yourself.” She gestured delicately towards one of the largest paintings, that of six heads, all facing out of the canvas, looking over the left shoulder of the viewer. It was titled Hogarth’s Servants. “I think they were mistaken,” she said firmly. “Those are real people, and excellently drawn. Look at the anxiety of the one in the middle, poor man, and the calm of the woman on the left.”
“The one at the top looks scarcely more than a child,” he agreed, but the moment after he had glanced at the picture, his eyes were searching her face. “I’m glad we chanced to meet,” he said, then hesitated, as if he had been too elaborately casual. “It . . . it has been a long time . . . at least it seems so. How are you?”
She could not possibly answer with the truth, and yet she longed to say “So lonely I escape into daydreams. I have discovered that my husband not only bores me, but I actually dislike him.” Instead she said what she always did. “Very well, thank you. And you?” She looked away from the picture and at him.
There was a very slight color in his cheeks. “Oh, very well,” he answered, then he too turned away. He took a step
or two to the right and stopped in front of the next picture. It was another portrait, but this time a single person. “It must have been fashion,” he said thoughtfully. “One critic mimicking what the others had said. How could anyone with an open mind consider this poor? The face lives. It is highly individual. What more does one wish of a portrait?”
“I don’t know,” she admitted. “Perhaps they wanted it to tell them something they already believed? Sometimes people wish to hear only what supports the position they would like to maintain.” She thought of the Bishop as she said it, and the endless evenings when she had listened to men decrying ideas without looking at them. Maybe the ideas were bad, but then again, maybe not. Without consideration they would never know. “It is so much easier to blame,” she said aloud.
He looked at her quickly, his eyes full of questions, but he did not ask her. Of course he didn’t! That would be intrusive and improper.
She must not let the conversation die. She had come here to see him, to learn if his feelings were still the same. There was nothing to do . . . almost certainly! But she still needed to know if he longed for her as much as she did for him.
“There is so much in faces, don’t you think?” she remarked as they approached another portrait. “Things that can never be said and yet are there if you search for them.”
“Yes, indeed.” He looked down at the floor for a moment, then up again at the portrait. “When one has experienced something, one recognizes it in others. I . . . I remember a bosun I had once. Phillips, his name was. I couldn’t abide the man.” He hesitated, but did not look at her. “Then one early morning, we were off the Azores, terrible weather. Gales whipping up out of the west. Waves twenty, thirty feet high. Any sane man would be frightened, but there was a beauty in it as well. Troughs of the waves were dark still, but early light caught the spume on the tips. I saw the recognition of beauty in his face, just for an instant before he turned away. Can’t even remember what he was going to do.” His eyes were far away, but in a moment of realization in the past, the magic of understanding.