The Honeymoon (39 page)

“Thank you, ma’am,” Brett said. “But I’m a teetotaler.” There was a boundary that Brett knew better than to cross, that made her ultimately unknowable to them and
preserved her dignity. Servants forced themselves to love their masters to make their daily work tolerable.

“You’re good to be a teetotaler,” she told Brett. She picked up the glass, raised it to Brett, and took another sip. “Don’t worry, Brett. It’s only the second glass. Doctor’s orders — remember?”

That night, when she went up to bed, the second floor of the house was hot and airless. There was an immense orange moon in the bedroom window hanging over the land, seeming almost as big as the earth itself. A nightingale had recently taken up residence in the elm and, as if on cue at her presence, it began to sing. “Yup-yup-yup … tweet-tweet-tweet …”

It was so hot that she took off her chemise and drawers. She was about to put on her nightdress when she caught a glimpse of herself in the cheval mirror.

She stepped closer to the mirror. She’d lost weight. Her flesh seemed to hang in creases from her arms and thighs. Her breasts, once firm, were flattened and hollowed out. The woman’s hair between her legs had thinned and become gray. She was an old woman, not to be seen by anyone. Did the same thing happen to other women when they aged? She had no sister living, no Chrissey, whom she might have seen undressed.

Outside, the nightingale continued its song, little trills going on and on, mysterious and lonely in the dark.
Light-winged Dryad of the trees
 …

Its song drowned out all the other sounds of the night, the grasshoppers and the cicadas … “Yes-yes-yes,” it seemed to say.

When he next came to call, carrying his Dante, he said not a word about their previous conversation, as if afraid she’d make him go away forever.

The summer had reached its apex, not even the shade of the summerhouse provided relief. Johnnie kept on with his translation, stuttering like a schoolboy, constantly looking up for approval as he plodded along, she smiling constantly with encouragement.

“You’re making a noble effort,” she teased.

“This is the most important thing in my life now.”

“I would hope you have something better to do.”

“No,” he said.

In late August they arrived at Canto VII and the Fifth Circle of Hell, where the sullen and the perpetually self-pitying are mired in the banks of the river Styx.

“Tristi fummo ne l’aere dolce che dal sol s’allegra,”
he read.

“Yes?” she prodded.

“ ‘Sad’?” he asked. “ ‘We were sad …’?”

“Yes?”

He stumbled along. “ ‘We were sad in the sweet air …’ ”

“He’s saying there is no virtue in gloom. It’s only an excuse for idleness. He’s telling us we must give up gloom.” She paused and smiled. “Perhaps we should listen to him,” she said. “Both of us. ‘The sun makes the air sweet and we shouldn’t use our sorrow to be idle here …’ ”

Suddenly he clasped her hands in his. “Let’s take the lesson,” he said. “Please, don’t make me go away again. I want to marry you, Marian. I want to make you happy.”

At once she wished she could disappear, that her body would shrink into itself. The thought of … what he would think if … if he actually embraced her, kissed her full on the lips … felt her body close to his own — smelled her, her breath?

“It’s impossible. I can’t,” she said gently.

“But why?”

“I’m terrified … I couldn’t bear another man ever to — to be a bride — the physical side —”

He put his arm around her shoulders. “Marian, if that’s what you’re worried about …”

She nodded blindly.

“Then,” he said, “it’s no impediment. We don’t have to be that way … We can be — lovers in our hearts and minds, but not the other way, if that’s what you insist on …”

An odd disappointment slid from the back of her throat down to her womb. She surprised herself. Was he willing to give that up?

“I can’t think about it now,” she said. “It’s all too soon. It hasn’t even been a year.”

“Then,” he said, “let me just take care of you. We’ll put the subject aside. For now. All I want, more than anything in the world, is to see you healthy and happy. And perhaps to see you write another novel again.”

She didn’t answer him. They’d reached a détente. She hadn’t refused him absolutely, though they’d agreed not to discuss it.

They began taking private walks through the woods, arm in arm along the dappled paths. He didn’t mention his proposal, but he seemed at ease, grateful she hadn’t cut him
off entirely. He seemed resolved to abide by her admonition that there be no real physical contact between them, and he held his arm out stiffly for her to hold.

He never kissed her on the lips upon arrival and departure, only on the cheek.

As they walked along the paths, as she looked up at him at her side and admired his young man’s beauty — he was thirty-nine years old, to her, young. She admired the damp flesh of his neck, his curls stuck to his forehead in the heat; she wondered, just for a moment, what it would be like if his lips did touch hers. But the thought lasted only a second. Then fear overcame her.

They began to ask each other questions, like typical young lovers exploring the contours of one another’s souls.

“Have you ever been in love?” she dared to ask.

“I’ve never loved anyone but you,” he said firmly.

“Please — don’t say that.”

“But it’s true,” he said calmly.

“You mean, you’ve never even had a — romance?”

“I never have,” he said.

It had taken a lot to ask him that and she didn’t pursue it.

Another time, he asked her, “Do you believe in God?”

“I believe in the religion of humanity,” she told him. “I believe God is but a projection of our own best qualities. Religion is doing good, kindness, bringing a smile to someone’s face, the smile on a father’s face when he catches sight of his little girl.”

“That’s wonderful,” he said. “What language did Jesus speak, anyway?” he asked.

“Didn’t they teach you that at Rugby?”

He smiled, abashed. “Probably. I don’t remember. As I’ve said, I wasn’t much of a pupil, I’m afraid. Hebrew, or Greek, wasn’t it?”

“Jesus was born in Bethlehem,” she said, “but he spent most of his life in the Galilee in the North. They spoke an Aramaic dialect. He probably had a little Greek too, because that was the lingua franca of the day, and some Hebrew, because it’s very like Aramaic.”

“I should’ve known that,” he said.

“Well, now you do,” she told him.

A letter came from Blackwood, saying that, contrary to all expectations,
Theophrastus
had completely sold out, six thousand copies in four months. She had no interest in the reviews. They were probably bad.

The next morning, in a surge of new confidence, she took out the “quarry” in which, before George died, she’d started making notes for her new novel on the Napoleonic Wars, and she began to write again.

She’d conceived, dimly, of a central character for the story. He’d be a man wrongly accused of something. There was always someone wrongly accused in her books. The central character in her new book would be wrongly accused of selling weapons to the French enemy.

Now, what to name him? The naming of a character was so important, like christening a child. You had to live with it for years. Perhaps Cyril — from
Kyrillos
, “lordly, masterful,” with its sacred undertones. Cyril Ambrose — “Ambrose,” connotations of amber, something embedded within, hidden.
“Cyril Ambrose,”
she wrote,
“a man of inventive power in
science as well as philosophy married young, is very poor, has a family to support …”

But she didn’t have a complete story yet. Perhaps if she did more research, she’d discover one. That was usually the case. She’d carted down some of her books on the Napoleonic Wars to Witley from London, hoping to get something from them. They were heavy tomes.
The Memoirs of the Life of Sir Samuel Romilly
, a solicitor general during the wars, and
The Principles of the Law of Evidence: With Elementary Rules for Conducting the Cross-Examination of Witnesses
.

Now, every morning, she got up, went to her desk, and read through the various books, jotting down notes. Her days started to assume something of their old, contented rhythm, work in the mornings, entertainment in the afternoons, only now with Johnnie at her side, encouraging her and propping her up.

In early September, the air was golden, dryer. The leaves began to turn, drifting softly to the ground. The flowers in the garden were mostly gone, except for the late-blooming purple asters.

Barbara Bodichon wrote to say that she was coming down to Witley for a visit. It had been so long since she’d seen her friend, with whom she’d shared so much — even John Chapman. She was coming alone because the good Dr. Bodichon was in Algeria.

It was a shock when Barbara got off the train. She was in her fifties now, her once golden hair was graying, and she’d had a stroke. Instead of her old self-confident stride, she dragged her foot. Seeing her, Marian couldn’t speak. Was
this what she, Marian, must look like now to her old friend Barbara, worn and gray?

She recovered, and rushed to hug and kiss Barbara and to help her with her things.

They arrived at the Heights, and suddenly it was filled with Barbara’s energy. She brought out gifts, including a painting she’d done for Marian of the sere Algerian countryside. Barbara was quite well known now, her work had been exhibited at the Salon and the Royal Academy. “And here’s Eugène’s book,
Étude sur l’Algérie et l’Afrique
.”

Marian had invited Johnnie over from Weybridge to see Barbara. At supper he was charming, as if trying to win her old friend over to his cause. Barbara was full of news about Girton, the women’s college she and her friend, Emily Davies, had founded at Cambridge, to which Marion had donated fifty pounds, a generous sum, more than Brett’s annual wage. “The main building’s complete,” Barbara said. “We’ve got a new science laboratory for the women. Now we’ve got to raise more money … By the way, Marian, I assume you’ve made George’s physiology studentship open to women?”