Talland House

by Maggie Humm

  “It’ll be a bit of extra money,” Mrs. Bast had said, “if my son has a go at the garden.”

  Mrs. McNab stared at the pond. It was covered in algae. Insects swarmed above the surface before sticking. She swayed into the corridor. The dying air dozed in the hallway. In the drawing room Mrs. Bast had commandeered the comfy armchair and handed over her flagon.

  “At least it’s not raining today,” Mrs. McNab said as she flopped down. “The day when we heard Andrew was killed at the front, it rained torrents.” She took a swig of beer. “What’s the news then?” She’d need to keep Mrs. Bast awake to finish the polishing, though the beer did taste good.

  “You talking about Andrew,” Mrs. Bast said, “makes me think of the poor woman who jumped off Clodgy Point last week. Her brothers killed in the war. Parents dead. They said she wore her best black clothes and gave her penknife to a young boy before she jumped.”

  “It’s the house bringing on these death stories,” Mrs. McNab said, wiping her arm across the flagon’s spout. “They should never have fixed a skull to the nursery wall. Must have given the children nightmares. Best finish off,” she said, and put down the flagon. “The servants arrive tomorrow.”

  “George is driving the cart to the station to pick them up,” Mrs. Bast said. “You’ll be happy to see Mrs. Farrell again.”

  The next evening Mrs. McNab helped Mrs. Farrell set out the pans.

  “You’ve done a good job,” the cook said, smiling at her. “Kitchen’s clean as a whistle.”

  “George tapped down the broken linoleum,” Mrs. McNab said, “but we scrubbed the whole house from top to bottom, Mrs. Farrell.”

  “You can call me Sophie. We’ve known each other for a long time,” the cook said, her eyes crinkling. “The family call me treasure.”

  Mrs. McNab chortled, her wandering eye searching for its partner. Sophie began sorting some spice jars. Coals glowed russet-red through the stove’s square window, and the cook spat on a black metal plate.

  “Hot enough to take the rice pudding,” she said as the sizzling died. “Why don’t you have a seat by the door to rest, Mrs. McNab, while the rice is stewing?”

  The cleaning woman sat watching Sophie pick out nutmeg and cinnamon from the jars she’d assembled in a line between the larder door and the stove.

  “How’s your son?” Sophie asked as she grated lemon peel onto a dish.

  “Never been back since he left for sea,” Mrs. McNab replied. “Don’t miss him much—but in the night-time.”

  The Ramsay children had been more her own than Jack. She’d never understood why Jack went to sea after seeing his old man stiff as the board he lay on. Jack had sobbed that night, and the next.

  “You look glum,” Sophie said as she chopped some butter. “What’s up?” She smiled. “Lover’s tiff?”

  The two women laughed. Mrs. McNab shifted her weight, and, squeezing her left side out of the chair, she reached into her pocket.

  “It’s watching you sort the spice jars,” she said, “reminded me. There’s this little bottle, found it in the mistress’s old dressing table.”

  Sophie held the bottle up to the light. “The label’s discoloured,” she said, “but I saw the mistress using these.”

  “What’s in it then?” Mrs. McNab asked, putting her hands back in her pockets. “Something valuable?”

  Sophie’s brow furrowed. “I’ll keep it,” she said. “Should be in a safe place. Mrs. Ramsay always hid these when she was alive. So why should people know about them now? The mistress is dead, but the memory of her kind deeds is alive. Don’t want those tarnished.” She opened the larder and pushed the bottle behind sacks of flour.

  Wide-eyed, Mrs. McNab nodded vehemently. “I won’t say a word,” she replied. “You know me. The mistress meant a lot to me too. Such a lovely lady. Best be on my way.”

  As Lily clambered from the train, Mr. Carmichael was manoeuvring his bulky body down the other train steps with care while clutching in one hand a slim leather-bound book. The same yellow stains as a decade ago marked his beard, and he mumbled into it as before. He must have been asleep in his carriage with the book turned over on his lap and been surprised by the station manager’s call of “St Ives.” She wished he’d arrived separately. Mr. Carmichael was hard work. His brain was a slow train on a diversion, going along several unfamiliar branch lines, and she was relieved she hadn’t met him in Paddington or at the changeover in St Erth.

  There was such a strange excitement returning to St Ives, and she wanted to see Talland House for herself so every moment, every gesture of the Ramsays, could be sharply in focus, unsullied by memories of past visitors like Mr. Carmichael, especially since she was staying in the house for the first time. She didn’t know why, but the memory of Mrs. Ramsay sitting on the steps into the garden made her eyes fill with tears. Mrs. Ramsay had always reminded Lily of her mother, of those childhood years when everything was calm and happy and mysteriously certain.

  Mr. Carmichael had spotted her and waved his book from side to side in greeting. She’d need to help him get safely to the Ramsays. Waiting for the boy and trap to carry them up the long hill road through the town, they stood awkwardly side by side.

  “How was your journey, Miss Briscoe?” Mr. Carmichael asked, spit dribbling into his beard.

  “Very tolerable, thank you,” Lily said, wishing he’d be silent. The Ramsays were in the front of her mind, as well as images of all of Talland House’s rooms. The couple had always slept separately. Would she be staying in Mrs. Ramsay’s old bedroom? She bit her lip, trying to recapture her student self in 1900, on the very first visit, when life seemed to begin, the delights of the studio, and Talland House itself open, inviting, everything novel and exciting.

  Hearing a clanging on the cobblestones as a trap rumbled near, she picked up her bag, turning towards the sound. It was definitely the same trap she’d sat in all those years ago; she recognized the large ironclad wheels with their alternating blue-and-red spokes. The boy was now a handsome young man, if it was the same person. Removing his cap, he smiled charmingly at her and carefully tucked their bags under a tarpaulin covering the rear of the wagon.

  “I remember you, Miss, when you first came,” he said. “I was tongue-tied.”

  She glanced at the carter’s profile, surprised she’d lived in the thoughts of another human being all this time without even knowing his name. People and things go on existing when we’re not there, and Talland House was always in her mind. She hoped it would be unchanged, with her watercolour hanging in the drawing room, the same mismatched cups and saucers in its cupboards. The horse snorted, sweating as it clipped up the last narrow road leading to the garden gate hidden deep in the escallonia hedge.

  It was Nancy, whom Lily barely recognized, opening the gate—a slim young woman, startlingly like her mother, with the same aquiline nose, bowing and smiling.

  “Welcome, Mr. Carmichael, and we’re so pleased you could visit, Miss Briscoe,” she said, helping them down from the trap. “Father was delighted, he told me, when you agreed to return and finish Mama’s portrait. Such a pity Miss Stillman is abroad.”

  Lily smiled back, intrigued to see Nancy transformed from her unruly younger self into quite the gracious lady. Surely she was too young to have married, though Nancy seemed comfortable taking on something of a wife’s role, greeting guests.

  “I’m so happy to be here, staying with you all in Talland House,” Lily said. “I will certainly try my very hardest to finish the portrait before I leave.”

  They picked their way up the path, and the old black-and-white photograph of Talland House turned into colour. The garden had become a wilderness in spite of what looked like a quick recent trim. The pond was covered with algae so thick no little boys would ever sail boats across it again. The rose bower had lost its curved ceiling of interwoven branches and flowers, and Lily saw, with a pang, spiky tendrils pushing ragged stalks upwards into the sky. Heather and gorse had spread everywher
e, turning the lawn into a rough moor rather than a gentle grassy slope. Mrs. Ramsay’s devoted gardening had all been for nothing.

  As she entered the hallway, she noticed a lingering smell of polish and the banister felt smooth to the touch.

  “Mrs. McNab, you remember the cleaning woman?” Nancy asked, seeing Lily’s glance. “She’s done sterling service for our return. There were swallows nesting in the drawing room and thistles growing in the larder, she told us! We’ve put down fresh rugs.”

  Lily stood for a moment, catching her breath as her eyes swept around. How remarkable, how marvellous it was she was here, but there was a murmur coming from Mr. Ramsay’s den.

  “Have any of the other guests from my last visit to the house been invited to return?” she asked. Surely Charles Tansley wouldn’t need his work approved by Mr. Ramsay any more, she thought, remembering the powerful pacifist speech he’d given in the London church and his adoring audience.

  “Oh, no,” Nancy replied. “It’s Father spouting poetry as usual. He never tires of Tennyson. James will take your bags to your rooms.”

  Nancy’s brother stepped forward to shake their hands. He was older, too, of course, but less changed than his sister. He had the same surly expression on his face, the same reddish flush on his cheeks and lush lips through which his voice, as Nancy’s, was instantly recognizable.

  “We’ve put you both on the first floor,” James said. “You’ll be relieved to escape the nursery, which is sadly my lot and Cam’s. You’re in Andrew’s old room, Mr. Carmichael, and you in Prue’s, Miss Briscoe.”

  They climbed the stairs, following James into the freshness of the landing. Bedroom doors were all open to circulate the air, and Lily smiled. Mrs. Ramsay would have approved.

  “Rose can’t be with us,” James said, “so we thought Mrs. Beckwith might be comfortable in her room.”

  So no one slept in Mrs. Ramsay’s precious bed. Was the room cleared of her clothes, or would her perfume waft in the air? In spite of Mrs. McNab’s best efforts, the smell of long-lying dust was in Lily’s nostrils. Perhaps the clothes had been remade for Nancy? It would be too distressing to see a miniature Mrs. Ramsay taking her place.

  Closing her bedroom door, Lily felt her eyes moisten, thinking about the portrait. Here she was again, held in the aura of Mrs. Ramsay, not wanting to escape. Yet if she completed the painting, she would be free from her, and her mother, too, or at least they’d not be so continually present, if lives could be contained within a frame, a perspective, a brushstroke. A fine work could turn her into the successful artist her mother had always wanted her to become. The list of wishes was often the same, although their order sometimes changed. Sitting on her bed, she could hear murmurs from the Ramsays below, the sound of branches tapping the shingles, the hallway clock striking the quarter, and dinner being prepared in the kitchen. She stared through a recently cleaned window down into the town, over the cottages, right to the harbour. The urge to open her satchel was intense, to take her sketchbook and lay pencil lines across a page, to capture the outline of the scene, but there was tea, Nancy had said.

  Descending the staircase, she gripped the curved banister, wanting to absorb all the shapes of the house again, to be intimate with its architecture, to feel the same tingle of excitement she’d felt the first time in Talland House. The evening light had turned sepia, and she pictured Mrs. Ramsay again in her white dress brightening up the dusk, sitting on the steps from the drawing room into the garden. It was one of the images Lily treasured most. She’d loved Talland House wherever she was, and the fading light couldn’t dampen the memory.

  “I’ll pour tea.” Nancy smiled, offering a plate of bread and butter. “We have local honey, and Sophie has baked her special marble cake to welcome you.”

  Lily glanced around the room. The walls were empty of pictures, including her watercolour. There were pale square shapes where they’d all once hung, but the dining seats with their little wooden struts were the same, and the old wide armchairs stood at each side of the French windows. Someone had hung some new muslin curtains, tied back now so they could appreciate the last of the sunlight, and a small jar of flowers might be Cam’s gift to the room, although they were roses, not Sweet Alice as before.

  Lily took some cake, smiling at Nancy, and began redesigning Mrs. Ramsay’s portrait in her mind, the pleasure planning always brought flooding through her. She could see through the window the hedge hadn’t been cut down, but the positions of mother and child would have to change. James was grown—not a little boy sitting at his mother’s feet—and without knowing more about Mrs. Ramsay’s death, she couldn’t imagine what shapes would be right. Rubbing her eyes, she felt her muscles ache. She was tired after the long train journey—that was all. She needed to talk to Mr. Ramsay.

  The next morning Mr. Ramsay was sitting at one end of the breakfast table. His silence drew Lily’s eyes to his face, but his expression was closed up as if disconnected from anyone in the room. There was only James left eating.

  “It’s wonderful to be back,” Lily said, trying to sound as friendly as she could. Mr. Ramsay looked up and nodded.

  “We’re very happy to have you here, Miss Briscoe,” he said, but returned immediately to his food.

  James sat silent at the other end, opening and closing a clasp knife with one hand as he forked up his eggs with the other. Was it a new tool or the same knife Mrs. Ramsay had tried to remove from Andrew at the Arts Club dinner? Mrs. Ramsay wouldn’t have allowed a dangerous knife at the breakfast table, and the atmosphere in the room felt different, colder, more hushed, than the last time she’d been here. As she watched James, her hunger dissipated. Coffee and toast would suffice. It was difficult to start a conversation with James’s dedication to his knife and Mr. Ramsay’s indifference to its threat, but it was probably as odd and sad for James and Mr. Ramsay to be here again too.

  “I do hope it’ll be fine today,” Lily said to the room. “I’m eager to start the portrait.” Mr. Ramsay and his son nodded again, concentrating on their food, silently chewing. Glancing out of a window, she was pleased the morning offered empty hours before lunch and there’d be time to prepare her paints carefully, but how could she talk to Mr. Ramsay about his wife, how would she capture Mrs. Ramsay’s figure in her mind in a way she could recreate in paint without knowing more? The distraught, vulnerable man in the Royal Academy had turned into a preoccupied distant silhouette.

  “When does your friend Mrs. Beckwith arrive?” Mr. Ramsay asked, finally looking up.

  “Not for three days,” Lily replied. “She’s writing up her discoveries for a journal. She’s quite an expert on medicines.”

  An anxious frown creased his forehead and he stood up abruptly, avoiding her gaze and glancing three inches to the left of her, as though a shadow of someone else was standing beside her.

  “Do excuse me, Miss Briscoe,” he said. “I have much work to do today.” He slammed the door behind him, closely followed by James.

  She told herself he wasn’t practised in everyday conversations and the years since Mrs. Ramsay’s death must have been lonely. It was difficult to travel during the war, with petrol hard to come by and trains full of soldiers. He’d have missed his publishing world and talking to students. But why was she trying to excuse his brusqueness? Her mind was becoming too busy. In order to paint the portrait, she’d have to try not to think about him, or anything about the family, and concentrate instead on what she could see, what she could observe.

  The day was fine, and Lily placed her easel at the edge of the lawn as she had almost a decade before, stroking her supple sable brushes. It was hard to begin painting without Mrs. Ramsay, and she clasped her hands behind her back and surveyed the scene. The escallonia hedge was a brilliant violet, although the adjacent wall was grimy rather than the searing white she remembered. The wall could be remedied easily with zinc white—Olsson had taught her well how to create different tones of white for buildings and boats. Looking up a
t the house, she noticed the drawing room window was now a grey square, empty of figures, and there was a shadow over the steps where Mrs. Ramsay used to sit.

  Shaking her head, freeing herself from memories, she dipped a brush into heliotrope. She was here to observe and find new shapes, to try and complete the figure outlines, despite Mrs. Ramsay’s absence. Nothing was more important than painting Mrs. Ramsay. Gazing around, she prayed there wouldn’t be distractions today from the family or Mr. Carmichael. Dense perfect forms of pure natural colour were right in front of her in the garden, and she took a deep breath and let the strength of the scene flow through her.

  A tree ahead, its trunk black against the purple hedge, seemed to be offering her a firm line, making her more confident about what she could do. She’d begin the portrait all over again. Mr. Ramsay had been reassuring, but she couldn’t make the original portrait better. Feeling nervous, she began to see in the distance two masses, the blocks of Mrs. Ramsay and James as completely new shapes, with perhaps the tree behind. It would be granite and rainbow. Nothing could dislodge those shapes. Once she’d imagined it, the outlines of a painting could emerge, and she let the certain comfort settle any anxiety. The work must appear like flowers to a gardener, as somehow natural and the focus of everything. That’s what Louis had always said, as well as “Painting should be a persistent effort to render the magic and poetry which you daily see around you.” She’d seen magic and poetry at first in St Ives because Louis was around—and his smile.