what a relief.
She heard the ring at the bell and her heart jumped. She composed herself and pretended to be busy writing her letters. The maid knocked.
‘It’s a gentleman to see you, ma’am. He said to give you his card.’
She took the card, glanced at it and said, ‘Where is the gentleman?’
‘In the drawing room, ma’am.’
‘Well, bring him in here.’
‘Very well, ma’am.’
Alfie came to the door and the girl bumped into him as she turned to go and exclaimed with surprise.
Ellie laughed and said, ‘It’s all right, Bridget, it seems our visitor has found his way alone.’
An alarmed Bridget scuttled off like a rabbit. Alfie came into the room with his usual bold assurance and shut the door firmly behind him. He leaned on it, folded his arms as if to defy any interruption, and looked at Ellie, a smile playing around his lips and in his eyes. He looked very charming and handsome at that moment. She looked back at him, also smiling but inside herself, and despite her apparent composure, she was trembling. She had to lay down the pen she was holding. She waved him to a seat.
‘Alfie, do sit down and stop trying to frighten me into submission. I know your wiles.’
He glanced quickly out of the window but there was no one in the garden. He came over to her and taking her hand, covered it with fierce kisses.
‘Stop it, Alfie! Don’t be such a fool!’
‘Are you going to play the modest married lady, Ellie?’ he asked mockingly. ‘You know that’s nonsense. You should be my wife. You are my wife. I took you when a virgin.’
‘Well, I’m not your legal wife!’ she retorted, snatching her hand away. ‘You know you shouldn’t be here, Alfie,’ she added uneasily, ‘please open the door again. The servants will gossip.’
‘I care not a whit for the servants or their gossip or anyone else
for that matter,’ he replied.
He took a chair, turned it about and sat upon it legs astraddle, folding his arms on the back of it and regarded her with that penetrating, deep look, so like his father’s, that always made her turn to jelly. It was as if he could see into her heart and soul. She loved it yet was terrified by it, like a hare caught by the gaze of a snake.
‘Remember… you didn’t tell me not to come,’ he said, wagging his finger at her.
‘No, I didn’t,’ she admitted and hung her head.
He laughed a little, ‘Not often you’ll admit you are wrong, ma’am! Oh Ellie! Do you know how much I’ve missed you? We were so inseparable in our youth; you have always been a part of my life and part of my being. You know that.’
‘I do, Alfie… and you mine. I’ve missed you too.’
‘We love one another, Ellie. Is there any use denying it?’
She sighed deeply.
‘No.’
‘Shall we run away together?’
‘You are just being ridiculous and you know it, Alfie. You are in the army now and about to go and fight a war. You can’t run away from what you have chosen and neither can I. We’re not children any more.’
‘No, alas!’ he said sadly, ‘not children to romp and play and be carefree. You are right. You are right, my dearest. I have to leave tomorrow. I may never return, Ellie, you know that. ‘
She went pale, ‘Don’t say that, Alfie!’
He regarded her with faint satisfaction, ‘At least I see you do care if I live or die. Death is all I want if you and I can’t be together.’
‘Now, you’re being silly and dramatic. Just stop trying to upset me. You are so wicked, Alfie, do you know that? To tease and torment me like this! You always wanted to be a soldier. It’s what you have chosen. Go and fight and pray that God will spare you.’
‘Thank you,’ he said dryly, ‘for those few kind words. Will you
at least write to me? Remind me of home, talk about our old amusements and pleasures and all the merry things we once did together as children?’
‘Of course, I will.’
‘Will that prig of a husband of yours object?’
‘He may but he’ll have to put up with it. He knows a little about you. I told him we were childhood friends.’
‘Oh, a little, eh?’ mocked Alfie, ‘You didn’t tell him about those days in the woods at Oreton Hall then? Don’t you remember them?’
‘You shouldn’t remind me, sir,’ she said blushing and turning her head away.
‘D’you wish then that it had never happened?’
She hesitated but she knew what she had to say, her voice as firm as she could make it.
‘Yes, Alfie, I do. I regret it in many ways. Our feelings ran away with us.’
Suddenly he lost his bantering manner and his eyes and voice became serious.
‘Our feelings ran away with us… indeed they did. But it is nothing that I shall ever be ashamed about. That was the most wonderful time I have known, the most glorious experience. We were both virgins, fresh, young, lovely and innocent. Nothing so pure and sweet has happened to me since. Yes, I confess that not hearing from you I did take other women but they were just camp followers, nothing but that. Mere playthings, believe me, to relieve my needs. Nothing will ever match that experience of utter joy we both felt that first time we came together. It was a sublime union made in Heaven. You cannot deny it.’
‘No,’ she admitted sadly, ‘I cannot deny it, Alfie.’
She felt a longing to weep, to throw herself upon him and say, ‘yes, let us defy the world and run away to the Continent, live in sin… who cares!’
Alfie rose and came to her, sensing her unhappiness, and she also rose. They clung to one another and kissed. She had forgotten how sweet and dry his mouth was, forgotten the familiar smell of him. God, it was so very familiar, a part of herself, her very being. She shut her eyes and sighed, submitting to his hand pressing her breast, almost fainting with desire. He drew her away from the window and out of sight, leant her against the wall by the curtains and began to fumble with her clothes, lifting her skirts to her waist.
Ellie pushed him away in sudden alarm, and freeing herself moved well away from him, settling her skirts and trying hard to compose herself.
‘Alfie… don’t be stupid! Anyone might come and knock at any minute. You’ve been here too long already.’
He looked at her in a strange desperation.
‘Ellie, Ellie, you have become so cruel! Once you used to do anything I asked of you. You flouted convention; you were a wild and wonderful being. We were wild together, children of the woods and fields. Now what has come over you? You say you love me but you push me away.’
‘I do love you. I always will. It is impossible to explain what it is we feel for one another. Bonded by memories, by our youth, by our early freedom and by the fact that we are so alike, too much alike in nature. But that’s all past now, dearest. I am married now. I love Fred too, though it is nothing like the feeling I have for you, my own, my dearest love, nothing like that almost animal pain when we are apart… but, Alfie, I prefer it. It is more manageable and more comfortable. I couldn’t live every day feeling like this, it would destroy me. It is too painful. Don’t try to cajole me or revive what I felt. It’s wrong. Things are different now. I will not be disloyal to my husband. What happened before is another matter.’
‘Another matter indeed.’
Alfie pulled his coat into shape, brushed back his unruly hair and regarded her with the expression of a spoilt child who cannot have what he wants.
‘So be it,’ he said at last as Ellie remained silent, her eyes downcast.
He turned and pulled the bell.
‘I will make myself scarce and never see you again, then?’
‘It would be better and wiser.’
‘But you’ll write at least?’
She hesitated. ‘I’m not sure… perhaps, after all, it would be prudent not to do so.’
‘I don’t think you will ever see me again, Ellie,’ he said in
a low voice, ‘I shall dare Death rather than face life without you. Can you live with that? I cannot live without you.’
Chapter 16
Fred stood in the centre of his neat little studio in an upstairs room that overlooked the rear garden. The walls were lined with bookshelves filled mainly with his collection of old and new leather-bound poetry books, each volume neatly in its proper place. The little desk beneath a side window had some beautiful objects upon it, a brass inkpot in the shape of a sphinx, a delicately carved wooden holder that carried his sharpened and awaiting quills. He loved to write letters and his handwriting was legible, elegant, without too many flourishes and certainly no blots.
The carved head of a lion in marble graced a small occasional table and a lacquered chest stood in a corner containing all his paper, boxes of chalks and charcoals and a box of brushes. Lining the windowsill, on which Ellie had placed a vase of sweet peas in all their effusive shades of pinks, whites and mauves, was a row of small pots. These contained various mixtures of oil colours, ready for use. Some canvases were stacked against a far wall, turned around so the designs could not be seen – for Fred, never confident about his work, preferred to hide it till he felt it to be passably ready.
He regarded his latest effort at painting. It was a small piece, a little sunlit scene with Ellie seated in the garden reading a book.
He took it over to the window and let the light fall upon it. He put it back upon the easel and stared at it for a few minutes longer, his face screwed up as if in pain. Then he picked up a brush and his palette and wondered whether to work a little more on Ellie’s bare forearms. They looked a peculiar green just now. Maybe he had overdone the purple-green tinge that lay in the shadows of her neck as well. How did Gabriel Rossetti always manage to use the strangest tints in flesh tones and make it look normal? When Fred did so, faithfully following the instructions of the master, it always looked as if the flesh was going rotten and mouldy.
Ellie entered the room at that moment and went to a drawer to fetch something. She stopped to look at the painting, smiled and taking the palette and brush from his fingers very gently, said, ‘It’s lovely, Fred. It’s just right as it is. Now put away that paintbrush for goodness sake or you’ll go fiddling about with it till you ruin it and then I shall be cross. Go and buy a frame instead and we’ll hang it up in the dining room. It will look very pleasing there over the sideboard.’
He sighed and let her put his palette aside.
‘But it’s such an appalling picture, Ellie. I know you say it’s nice to please me; you are such a dear, kindly wife. But my work is never going to improve, try as I will. I simply haven’t the talent and I suppose I must face up to the fact.’
‘Nonsense! You do have talent. And I don’t say I like it just to please you. I don’t do that sort of thing. You know I always say what I think.’
‘True enough,’ he said with a wry smile, ‘you can be counted upon for that.’
‘Well then, Mr Thorpe, have faith in your missus. Your trouble is that you are such a perfectionist, everything has to be just so! Perhaps you need to find a new style. Look at Henry, he says he means to give up on this slow, painstaking method of painting that old fusspot Holman Hunt taught his pre-Raphaelite brothers. And as far as I know so has Millais. Henry adapts, that’s the secret of his success. He adapts to his own nature. Maybe you should try that instead. Have a change of medium – try watercolours.’
‘Have a change of occupation. That might be wiser. All you say is sound and right, my dear, but it isn’t the answer, not for me
at least.’
He looked again at his painting and shaking his head, turned it to face the wall. Suddenly he hated his painting and even his poetry. It was hopeless stuff. He fooled himself thinking he could ever be like Rossetti or Millais or Winstone – or any of them. They all tolerated him as a friend but not as an artist brother. Probably they laughed at him behind his back with cruel jests at his expense. He felt himself go hot with shame at the mere thought of it; that his friends, those people he admired so deeply, might laugh at him. He was not a good artist and never would be. It was sweet of Ellie to try and encourage him but he had to be honest with himself.
‘Father was giving me a lecture the other day,’ he said. ‘He felt I needed to find what he calls a “proper occupation” and told me that I should stop fooling about with painting and poetry. He kindly informed me that if I had even a modicum of talent he would support my efforts. But as I haven’t, he won’t. He wants me to go into business, can you believe it? When I made a face about it, he said that I was as lazy as my dear mother. That really made me angry. I’m not a bit lazy, am I, Ellie?’
She laughed merrily, ‘Well, a little my love. But it would be hard to be as lazy as your dear mother.’
‘You think me lazy too!’ he said despondently and sat down in a chair, his face a study in gloom.
Ellie laughed again. Her laughter was not malicious but she did find it hard to take Fred seriously at times. He was such a boy at heart but then all these artists were. Just like boys… jesting, teasing, quarrelling, playing around at life and love.
She sat down beside him and took his hand in her own.
‘Maybe your father is right. You do need an occupation, Fred. I expect your father suggested that you should join him in the Bank?’
‘Well, yes, as a matter of fact he did. But, Ellie, you know I could never do anything as soulless as that.’
She became serious now. ‘No, Fred, I don’t think you could follow a profession of that sort. Nor would I ask you to. I understand your heart. You’re a sensitive soul, you are a poet. But you know, dear one, God willing, we shall have children sometime and maybe you should think about ways of maintaining a family. Neither poetry nor painting pays the bills. For the present we have nothing but our allowances to live on and I have no wish for anyone to die to help me live in lazy comfort, have you?’
‘Heaven forbid!’
‘Then you must think about it and see what you could do that would not offend your spirit and yet be a worthwhile occupation.’
‘I have given it thought,’ he said with a frown, ‘and I think as I cannot paint, yet love art, books and photographs, perhaps I should turn to writing about it all like Ruskin or William Rossetti. Write articles for the papers and the Magazine of Art, that sort of thing. In addition, I may begin to invest in a few pictures with the idea of buying and selling. If that idiot Ruskin can do it, so can I. I put that idea to Father and he felt it was a good one and that he could be of great assistance in such a scheme. He can find me plenty of wealthy Northern business men who want to snap up the sort of paintings our friends produce. And I can help out all our friends at the same time which would make me very happy.’
‘You’re such a good soul, Fred,’ said Ellie with a smile and a kiss on his cheek, ‘such a good soul. Let’s go round to tell Henry the news and take a picnic with us. We can sit out by his big window and watch the folks plying their boats up and down the river. Oh, come, it would be such a nice thing!’
‘Near that smelly old river! Why pass time there by those unwholesome docks when we have Hampstead Heath?’
‘Oh, you’re a grump today and mean to see only the blight on the rose all the time. Yes, the river can be smelly but it is also beautiful and interesting. I love to see the bargees passing by and calling out to one another and the tall ships with their masts silhouetted in the sunset. Think of Turner and how romantic he made the river seem! One should look at that and not the faults all the time. That’s half your trouble, Fred. You always see what is wrong and never what is right.’
‘True enough. And I’m sure you will help me to follow your good advice,’ he replied humbly. ‘How glad I am I have you in my life, Ellie, to wake me up and encourage me along my path. I’m a lucky man.’
Delighted to see his son stirring himself in a sensible direction at last, James Thorpe was indeed helpful in making introductions to various important and w
ealthy businessmen from Liverpool, Birmingham and Manchester.
No longer were the aristocracy the patrons of art; as often as not half of them were strapped for cash themselves and were obliged to sell family paintings in order to upkeep their estates. Even if they had enough money to spare, their taste still tended towards the classical and well tested styles, suspicious of the value of anything new and avant garde. It was the uprising middle classes who were eager to buy art at reasonable prices and were open to new styles and ideas; moreover, they wanted to see their beloved pictures hanging in their homes, not kept in dusty vaults. This meant smaller, more intimate works of art to fit in smaller rooms, not vast, imposing canvases that took up an entire wall of a mansion.
Fred was so full of his new activities, meetings and splendid finds that he did not notice the fact that Ellie, despite her smiles and attempts to be cheerful, was feeling very unhappy.
Before the British Expeditionary Force had left the country, Captain Anthony Neville had grumbled about it to James Thorpe over dinner at their club.
‘It’s a real nuisance, d’you know? We shall miss the Season, by gad. First we knew of it was when they took all our swords off to be sharpened and we can’t draw ‘em now till we meet the enemy. That’s the orders. And, believe me, we can’t wait to go and slice up those evil Russkies and make mincemeat of them. They’ll go limping off home and regret the day they ventured out of their holes. We’ll get back for Christmas at least. But to miss Ascot… damned inconvenient!’
When Fred heard his father’s account of this conversation, he thought it very amusing and reported it to Ellie. She made no reply and didn’t seem to see the joke. But then, he observed, she wasn’t very good-humoured at all of late and he vaguely wondered why.
Ellie knew she would not hear anything from Alfie for a long time. The British Expeditionary Force had now set off for Varna in the Crimea. It would be many long, tedious, dangerous weeks on the sea before the army at last disembarked and were rallied together, ready for the march to Sebastopol. Alfie’s parting words lingered in her mind and she wished she had been kinder to him, not so cold and rigid. She woke every morning with a sense of anxiety and trouble in her heart, a sense too of regret.
Loretta Proctor Page 15