The Crimson Bed (32 page)

    'I
have
made a settlement on her long ago, through her mother.'

    Yet if it was true, he did feel he owed the girl something. How strange that he should have come across her as he did that night. That she too was drawn to him in turn. Had it all been set up to trap him? He pondered the idea but no, that meeting with Jessaline had been pure chance, no one could have known of his intention to go out that night. She must later have mentioned his real name to Sue, who saw an opportunity to set him up. If only he had never gone out at all. If only Ellie had been at home. He half blamed her for not being there as good wife should be. She was always elsewhere, always abandoning him to his own darkness and depravity. He needed a steady hand to lift him out of all this.

    For the moment, he was trapped and had no idea where to turn or what to do. He looked at Sue with loathing but she merely smiled a little, her arms folded, the dog seated on her lap, baring its little teeth and growling at him as if sensing his anger and unpleasant intentions.

    'You needn't try anything funny, either,' she said. 'I have my protectors. And Oldham knows all about you too and he'll make a regular song and dance. I'm not asking a lot. Not asking for money. Just bring me that Turner you got the other day. That'll do for now. '

Ellie wondered of late what was wrong with Fred. He was in a very withdrawn and dark humour, his normally cheerful face creased with worried frowns. Her beloved father, Joshua, had died a week ago. Her heart was very heavy and she yearned for some consolation, a shoulder to lean on. She had spent the last month in Oxford, waiting on Joshua, constantly by his bedside. With her own hand she had fed him as he lay helpless and feeble upon the pillows. Her arm about his shoulders, she would raise up his now light, porous form while she spooned the broth into his mouth with loving care.

    He looked so weak and shrunken in his illness and she knew he was in pain. Yet not a murmur of complaint arose from him. He smiled at her a little. When he spoke, it was in a voice that was nothing like the strong voice of Joshua Farnham but rather some fading echo of what he had been.

    'Thank you, Ellie, dear good girl.'

    Even this was too much effort but he said it often, always thanking her, always quiet and patient and humble. She felt the tears streaming down her face despite her efforts to be composed and calm.

    'Don't leave me, Papa,' she murmured one day, thinking him asleep.

    He opened his eyes and gave her his weak smile.

    'I'll be with Maria again... won't leave you, Ellie. We'll both watch over you.'

    'Oh, Papa... I want you here!'

    'Can't stay forever, none of us... we just get too tired.'

    She watched his eyes close again and he fell into a gentle slumber. Tired with watching and waiting, she also fell asleep in the chair by his bed. When she awoke, she felt a strange sense of stillness in the room and rising up quickly, her heart pounding, went to him and looked at his face and was amazed at how smooth and peaceful it looked. She knew then that the spirit had departed his body and that he was, as he had hoped and yearned, with his beloved wife, Maria.

    Ellie returned home to the joy of her children, glad and happy to be with her little ones again. The house had run smoothly enough in her absence but something was different and she had no idea quite what it was, simply sensed an atmosphere, especially when Fred was around. He was irritable, moody and impossible to talk to these days. He didn't seem to care about her father's death except in the most perfunctory and practical manner while she felt close to tears all the time.

    Once he would have been there when she needed him, comforting, warm and secure but now it was as if he had drawn away from her. It didn't do to let the children see her grief and so she had to smother it within when they were around. It would have been so consoling to join her husband in the parlour of an evening and talk with him, sense his kindly presence even if nothing was said. Many an evening Fred was either out and she had no idea where he went, or else he was at home but went straight to his study and absorbed himself in papers and books.

    He seemed to be writing poetry again. She kept finding wrinkled up scraps of paper on the floor. This was so strange. Fred never made a mess, hated things out of place. One evening, she picked up one of the pieces of paper and smoothing it out, read:

... It's a dark place with howling
Grief and pain and weeping
Old ghosts come swirling up
To greet you, take you back...

Another piece read thus:

There is a bond in some dark secret part of me

That's part of you, a canker in your soul as well From our first glance, first touch on secret places known to me Your dark, my dark, confused and mingling dwell...

    This was strange sentiment. Very strange. She frowned and wondered.

    She could only suppose one thing – that there was some other woman in his life.

    She came in the study one day to find him staring moodily into space. His face looked drawn and tired and she was puzzled. What had happened to her smiling, easy-going husband? What was it that seemed to eat him from within? She was afraid that he might be ill and this frightened her. Nothing must happen to her Fred. She couldn't bear it if anything was to happen to him too.

    'Dearest, what is it?' she asked going over to him and putting her cool hands on his brow.

    He flinched at the touch of her hands.

    'What is it, Fred?' she repeated, alarmed. 'Are you unwell?'

    He roused himself with difficulty. 'I'm tired, Ellie. Just had a busy day, that's all. I mean to retire early tonight.'

    'Would you like some supper brought to your room?'

    'No. I'm not really hungry. I thank you, my love.'

    She continued to look at him with sad, questioning eyes that bored into him.

I am unworthy, was
what Fred wanted to say to his wife
. I am
unworthy to be touched by your pure, lovely hands.

    He had just returned from Sue's chambers and despite scrubbing himself so clean that his skin still tingled with the rawness of it, he felt foul inside himself. Every time he was with her, he secretly scrutinised the woman for any telltale blisters or pustules that might give away some foul disease. He became more and more terrified of the idea that he could pass something terrible onto his innocent wife. He had heard of such things happening when men went whoring. Why did he desire those awful things he still allowed Sue to perform? Why? It was bestial of him.

    If only he had never met Oldham. It was he who had helped awaken this sleeping beast, this black dragon within his breast. As for the woman, she was in some way connected with Oldham and now she was blackmailing him. Suppose Ellie was ever to find out the depths he had sunk to, the dubious pleasures Sue performed on him. He had no doubt Sue would delight in the chance of telling his wife all the gory details and shocking her beyond expression. Then Ellie would throw him out of their home. She would seek a divorce and make him a laughing stock before the rest of society and rightly so. He would deserve it.

    Even the Millais-Ruskin scandal would be nothing compared to this.

    Perhaps he would fall sick and die of something. Then at least he would be mourned and the whole situation would be resolved.

    No, he didn't really want to die. He wanted his happy family home, his clear conscience and his comfortable existence back again. That was what he wanted more than anything else. But that had fled from him forever.

Chapter 29

'I intend to go to Derbyshire to see Lottie.'

    A happy, smiling Ellie entered Fred's study, carrying a letter in her hand, which she waved at him. 'Her baby will be due soon and I must be near her at that time.'

    'Why should you be there? You have enough to do here at home with your own family. She has other friends and relations now she is married into the Pendletons. There are whole crowds of them and they're all interfering busybodies. Let them attend her.'

    She stared at him. He would never have spoken in that hard, negative manner before. Now he seemed to care little about anything or anyone. He turned away from her now, distracted, apparently busy with his accounts and papers.

    'Listen to me, Fred,' she said, sitting on the chair beside him and putting a hand on his to still its rapid jerky movements, 'listen to me, dear. I truly want to visit my friend Charlotte. We haven't seen one another since her wedding and that was last spring. You forget – she is almost like a sister to me. I've known her since she was born. And I have no sisters of my own. Will you not allow me this one sisterly act?'

    He looked up at this.

    He felt a sense of sheer panic at the idea of Ellie going away anywhere. He was constantly afraid that every time she made a call on a friend, or went to visit his mother, that she might meet with someone who would tell her the truth about his hidden life. Suppose someone had seen him with Sue? Suppose she met Oldham somewhere when she went up north to see Charlotte? These things spread around and his mother in particular had an uncanny way of knowing what anyone was doing despite the fact that she seldom moved from that sofa of hers. To upset Ellie would give her the greatest delight, he knew that. His mind whirled with possibilities and fears.

    He also knew that he was being a fool. Nobody could possibly have learnt his secret. It was in Sue's interest to keep him dangling. She wasn't going to kill the goose that lay the golden egg.

    Ellie waited patiently for a response. A frown crossed her face.

    'Is something wrong... perhaps with our finances, Fred? You always seem so troubled. Are we in some sort of difficulty?'

    'No, no, nothing is wrong. There's no problem there at all.'

    'Then... what is it?'

    He averted his face under her searching, puzzled gaze and stared out of the window into space, his thoughts miles away. After a few moments, he came back to the present and looked at her with a start as if surprised to find her still there. The look on her face frightened him a little as if she understood, as if she knew. What had she just said... finances... no, not that. She had asked about going to Charlotte's place. Oh, damn Charlotte, damn all the Dillingers!

    'Don't go, Ellie, stay here with me. I really do so hate it when you go away.'

    'But you are off to Liverpool yourself next week.' Ellie protested. 'You won't miss us. We shall be at Pendleton Hall and it isn't too far from Liverpool, is it? Call on us after you complete your business. Lottie would be so delighted to see you.'

    'I shall be away for three days, you will stay at Charlotte's for some weeks – I know you women. No, Ellie, I want you and the children here when I return. That's final.'

    Ellie accepted with very bad grace, unused to being thwarted.

    As she went out of the room, she turned to him and said, 'I wouldn't mind if there was a good reason but I see no reason at all. You are becoming very objectionable of late.'

When Fred had left for Liverpool to meet up with various interested patrons of art, Ellie felt irritated and restless.

    
Fred cares nothing for me any more
, she thought,
he has
hardly registered the fact that my beloved Pa has died and how I
feel so lonely and sad without him. This is not the kindly man I
married. I am almost beginning to hate him.

    Dillinger had written to tell her that he would be in London this week and would call on her later that afternoon. He at least would sympathise with her. The loss of his friend, Joshua, had meant a great deal to him as well. It was someone to talk to about Papa, someone who had known him since Oxford days. People found Dillie stern and unbending but to her he was eternally kind.

    She was still in mourning clothes but the weather was turning warmer by the day so she sent Mulhall to find a fine black cotton dress, which had been packed away during the winter. Charlie, now out of frocks, was at his lessons. Mary was being taken for a walk by the nursemaid.

    While she waited for the dress to be found, pressed and made fit to wear, Ellie decided to pass her time by turning out the contents of her jewellery box. She now had to confine herself to mourning jewellery. Delving into the large, carved box, which had once been her mother's, she found a large, heavy necklace that had belonged to Maria made of Whitby jet. However, it was too ornate for her taste and looked wrong around her slender neck. Her mother had worn it for a while after Grandmother Templeton had died and then for a succession of uncles and aunts. It had suited Maria well and she had dressed in black a good deal of the time, even when no longer in mourning.

    After the garnets and pearls, Ellie found the diamond necklace and earrings Fred had bought for her wedding day, still in their velvet casing in a small leather box. She seldom wore them, only to very special balls, grand dinners and theatre occasions. She paused to look at them and sighed. It had not really been the happy day she had dreamt her marriage day might be. She
had
loved Fred but at that time was still so unsure and troubled over Alfie.

    She let her mind roam to Alfie and the past. She saw his face very clearly all of a sudden, almost as if he was there in the room. It made her look up with a little start but the room was empty and silent, motes of dust floating idly in the sunbeams. She remembered little incidents like the day Alfie had set off on one of his adventures and she and the two little boys and baby Charlotte had all trailed after him across brooks and meadows, daring cattle and other wild creatures, to find some imaginary place he was bent on finding. Charlotte had ended up screaming and protesting and Ellie had carried her all the way back. Eventually the two younger boys had also given up and meandered back home but Alfie had carried on in his search for El Dorado or whatever it was he was looking for and arrived home much later in the day, dishevelled, muddy, cheerful and happy.
He was born to be a wanderer,
she thought with a sigh. Ah, Alfie! Where was he wandering now?