Authors: Sarah Waters
She had come to the table to write, her head was very near my own, and her voice, when she spoke, was little more than a whisper. She said, ‘I wonder, Miss Prior, if you ever, when you are writing in your diary, write this name there?’
I couldn’t answer her for a moment; for, hearing her murmur, feeling the warmth of her in that chill cell, I was struck with the thought of how often I
have
written of her. But then, why
shouldn’t
I write of her, since I write of the other women there? And it is surely better to write of her, than of Helen.
So what I said was only, ‘Should you mind it, if I did write of you?’
Mind it? She smiled. She said she would be glad to think of anyone—but especially of me, seated at my desk—writing of her, writing,
Selina said this
or
Selina did that
. She laughed: ‘
Selina told me a lot of nonsense about the spirits . . .
’
She shook her head. But then, as swiftly as it had risen in her, her laughter died and, as I watched, her smile faded. ‘Of course,’ she said in a lower tone, ‘you would not say that. You would say only
Dawes
, like they do.’
I told her, that I would say any name she liked.
‘Would you?’ she asked me then. ‘Oh,’ she added, ‘you mustn’t think that I would ever ask to call you anything but “Miss Prior”, in return . . .’
I hesitated. I said, that I supposed the matrons would not think it very proper.
‘They would not! And yet,’ she looked away from me, ‘I would not
say
the name upon the wards. But I find, when I think of you—for I do think of you, at night, when the gaol is quiet—and it is not “Miss Prior” that I say then. It is—well, you were kind enough to tell it to me, once, the time you said you came to be my friend . . .’
A little awkwardly, she placed the pen upon the page again and wrote, beneath her own name:
Margaret
.
Margaret. I saw it, and flinched: she might have put some oath there, or drawn my features in a caricature. She said at once, Oh! She shouldn’t have written it, it was too familiar of her! I said, No, no, it was not that, ‘It is only—well, it is a name I never cared for. It is a name that seems to have all the worst of me in it—my sister, you know, has a handsome name. When I hear it, I hear my mother’s voice. My father called me “Peggy” . . .’
‘Then let me say that,’ she said. But I remembered then that she had said it once to me already—and I still cannot think of that, without shuddering. I shook my head. She murmured at last, ‘Give me another name, then, to call you by. Give me any name but “Miss Prior”—which might be the name of a matron, or of any common visitor; which might as well be nothing to me. Give me a name that will be something—give me a secret name, a name that has, not the worst of you, but the best . . .’
She went on like this—until at last, in the same quick, queer spirit in which I had handed her the book, and then the pen, I said: ‘Aurora! You may say then, Aurora! For that is a name—it is a name that—’
I did not of course say it was a name that Helen gave me, before she married my brother. I said it was a name I used to like to call myself, ‘when I was young’. And then I blushed, to hear the foolish thing spoken aloud.
She, however, only looked solemn. She gripped the pen again, wrote a line through
Margaret
, and put
Aurora
in its stead.
And then she said, ‘Selina, and Aurora. How well they look! They look like angels’ names—don’t they?’
The ward seemed all at once terribly quiet. I heard the slam of a gate in some distant passage, and the shrieking of a bolt, and then I thought I caught the sound of sand crunched beneath a prison heel, much nearer. Awkwardly, feeling her fingers hard against my own, I took the pen from her. I said, ‘I’m afraid I have wearied you.’
‘Oh, no.’
‘Yes, I think so.’ I rose, and went fearfully to the gate. The corridor beyond was empty. I called, ‘Mrs Jelf!’, and heard an answering cry—‘One moment, miss!’—from some far cell. Then I turned and—since there was no-one, after all, to overhear or to see—I held out my hand. ‘Good-bye then, Selina.’
Again came her fingers in mine, and she smiled. ‘Goodbye,
Aurora
’—she whispered it into the cold air of the cell, so that for one long second the word hung white as gauze before her lips. I drew away my hand and made to turn towards the gate; and then it seemed to me that her look again lost a little of its artlessness.
I said, Why did she do that?
‘Do what, Aurora?’
Why did she smile, in that secret way?
‘Do I smile, in a secret way?’
‘You know you do. What is it?’
She seemed to hesitate. Then she said, ‘It is only that you are so very proud. All our talk of spirits, and—’
And what?
But she had grown suddenly playful again. She would only shake her head and laugh at me.
At last, ‘Give me the pen again,’ she said; and before I could reply she had seized it from me and stepped again to the book, and begun to write upon it very rapidly. Now I did hear Mrs Jelf’s boot upon the passage-way. ‘Quickly!’ I said—for my heart had begun to beat so fast in my breast, I saw the cloth above it give a quiver, like a drum-skin. But she smiled, and wrote on. Still the boot came closer, still my heart thumped!—and then the book was closed at last, the pen screwed up and returned to my hand, and Mrs Jelf made her appearance at the bars. I saw her dark eyes searching, in their usual fretful way; but there was nothing now to see, except my fluttering breast—and that I covered with my coat while she still turned the key and pushed the gate. Dawes had taken a step away from me. Now she put her arms across her apron and bowed her head, not smiling at all. She said only: ‘Goodbye, Miss Prior.’
I nodded to her once, then let myself be escorted from her cell, and across the wards, without a word.
But all the time I walked I felt my note-book swing against my hip: she had made a strange and terrible burden of it. At the junction of the gaols I took my glove off, and placed my naked palm upon the binding, and the leather seemed warm, still, from the grip of her rough fingers. But I did not dare to draw it from my pocket. Only when they had shut me into a cab, and the driver had put the whip to his horse, did I pull the book free again; then it took me a moment to find the page, and then another to tilt it so that the street-light fell upon what she had written. I saw it, then closed the book at once and placed it back inside my pocket, but kept my hand upon it, still, through all that jolting ride—at last the leather grew damp.
Now I have it before me. There are the blots of ink, the names she wrote—her own, and my old, secret one. And there, beneath them, is this:
All our talk of spirits & not a mention of your locket.
Did you think they wouldn’t tell me, when they took it?
How they smiled Aurora, to see you search!
I am writing by candle-light, and the flame is very low, and dipping. The night is a harsh one, the wind slithers beneath the doors and lifts the carpet from the floor. Mother and Pris are asleep in their beds. The whole of Cheyne Walk might be asleep, the whole of Chelsea. Only I sit awake—only I, and Vigers, for I hear her stir above me, in Boyd’s old room—what has she heard, that makes her so restless? I used to think the house grew still at night; now I seem to catch the beating of every clock and watch in it, the creaking of every board and stair. I look at my own face, that is reflected in my bulging window: it seems strange to me, I am afraid to gaze too hard at it. But I am afraid, too, to look beyond it, to the night which presses at it. For the night has Millbank in it, with its thick, thick shadows; and in one of those shadows
Selina
is lying—
Selina
—she is making me write the name here, she is growing more real, more solid and quick, with every stroking of the nib across the page—
Selina
. In one of those shadows
Selina
is lying. Her eyes are open, and she is looking at me.
26 November 1872
I wish my aunty might see me where I am now. - For I am at Sydenham, at Mrs Brink’s house! She has brought me here, all in the space of a single day, saying she would rather have me perish than have me pass another hour at Mr Vincy’s. Mr Vincy said ‘You may have her, ma’am! & much trouble I hope she will bring you’, though Miss Sibree wept to see me pass her door, saying she knows I will be very great. Mrs Brink drove with me in her own carriage, & when we arrived at her house I thought I should faint, for it is the grandest place you ever saw, with a garden all about it & a path of gravel leading up to the front door. Mrs Brink saw me looking & said ‘My child, you are white as chalk! Of course, this will be queer for you.’ Then she took my hand to lead me through the porch, then took me quietly from room to room, saying ‘Now, how does this seem to you? Do you know this - & this?’ I said I was not sure, because my thoughts were cloudy, & she answered ‘Well I daresay it will come, in time.’
Then she brought me to this room, that was once her mother’s & is now to be mine. It is so large, I thought at first it must be another parlour. Then I saw the bed in it, & I went & touched the post of it, & I must have turned white again for Mrs Brink said then ‘O! This has been too great a shock for you after all! Shall I take you back, to Holborn?’
I said she must not think of doing that. I said we must expect that I should grow weak, but the weakness was nothing & would certainly pass. She said ‘Well, I shall leave you for an hour, to grow used to your new home.’ Then she kissed me. She did it, saying ‘I suppose I may do this, now?’ I thought of all the weeping ladies whose hands I have taken in the past half-year, & besides them of Mr Vincy, putting his fingers on me & waiting at my door. Yet no-one has kissed me, no-one at all, since Aunty died.
I had not thought of it before today, I only felt it now, feeling her lips come upon my cheek.
When she left me I went to look at the view from the window, which is all of trees & the Crystal Palace. The Crystal Palace however, I do not think is quite so marvellous as people say. Still, it is a better view than I had at Holborn! When I had looked at it, I walked about this room a little &, the floor being so wide, I tried a polka step upon it, the polka being a dance I have always longed to dance in a large room. I danced very quietly for a quarter of an hour, first taking care to remove my shoes so that Mrs Brink might not hear me in the rooms below. Then I looked about me, at the things that are here.
This is, after all, quite a queer sort of room, for there are a great many cabinets & drawers here, with things in all of them, such as, pieces of lace, papers, drawings, handkerchiefs, buttons,
&c
. There is a vast closet, & this is filled with gowns, & has rows & rows of little shoes, & shelves with folded stockings & bags of lavender. There is a dressing-table, with brushes & half-used bottles of scent upon it, & a box of brooches & rings & an emerald necklace. And though all these things are extremely old, they are all kept dusted & polished & smelling fresh, so that anyone seeing them, not knowing Mrs Brink, would think what a neat lady her mother must be. They would think ‘I’m sure I ought not to be here handling her things, she is sure to be back in a moment’ - when in fact of course, she has been dead for 40 years, they might stand & handle them for ever. I knew this, but even I felt I ought not to touch those things. I thought that if I did, then I would turn & see her standing at the door, looking at me.
And as I thought that I
did
turn, &
did
look at the door, & there
was
a woman standing looking at me! And I saw her, & my heart went into my mouth -
But it was only Mrs Brink’s maid, Ruth. She had come quietly, not like Betty used to come but like a real lady’s maid, like a ghost. She saw me jump & she said ‘O, miss, I do beg your pardon! Mrs Brink said you would be resting.’ She had brought water for me to wash my face in, & when she had come & poured it into Mrs Brink’s mother’s china bowl she said ‘Where is the gown you will be changing into, for dinner? If you like, I shall take it & have our girl press it up for you.’ She kept her eyes on the floor, not looking at me, though I think she might have noticed that my feet were bare, & I wonder if she could have guessed I had been dancing. She stood waiting for my gown, though of course I only have one dress that is finer than the one I was wearing then. I said ‘Do you really suppose that Mrs Brink will expect me to change?’ & she said ‘I think she will, miss.’ So I gave her my velvet dress & she brought it to me later, they had steamed it & it was very warm.
I sat in that dress until I heard a bell struck at 8, which is the astonishing hour at which they serve the dinner here. Ruth came for me then, & she unfastened the bow at my waist & retied it, saying ‘There, don’t you look handsome?’ & when she took me into the dining-room Mrs Brink saw me & said ‘O, but how handsome you look!’ so that I saw Ruth smile. They put me at one side of a great polished table, Mrs Brink sitting at the other, watching me eat & saying all the time ‘Ruth, will you give Miss Dawes a little more potato? - Miss Dawes, will you let Ruth cut you some cheese?’ She asked me if I cared for the food, & what sorts of food I liked best. The meal was an egg, a pork chop & a kidney, cheese & some figs. Once I thought of Mrs Vincy’s rabbit, & laughed. When Mrs Brink asked me why I was laughing I said it was because I was happy.
After dinner Mrs Brink said ‘Now, shall we see what influence this house might have upon your powers?’ & I sat entranced for an hour, & she I think was very satisfied. She says that tomorrow she will take me shopping for some gowns, & that on the next day or the day after that she will have me lead a circle for her friends, who want very much to have me work for them. She brought me to this room again, & again she kissed me, & Ruth brought more hot water & took my pot, which was not at all like Betty taking it, & made me blush. Now it is 11 o’clock & I am wide awake as anything, which I always am after a trance, though I did not like to tell them that here. There is not a sound in all this vast house. There is only Mrs Brink & Ruth, & the cook & another servant, & me, in all of it. We might just be a lot of nuns in a nunnery.