And dined in silence. And sat by the drawing room fire in silence, while the chambermaids prepared their room, clattering about with warming pans and sweet herbs and scuttles full of coal, and the housekeeper fussed over the number of pillows they might require and whether or not she should serve them hot toddy as a night cap, ‘on such a cold evening’.
‘They are very attentive, my dear,’ he said, when they were finally allowed to enter their bedroom.
‘Yes, my love.’
‘We should retire, I think,’ he suggested. ‘It grows very late.’ And he gave an exaggerated yawn to help her to agree with him.
‘As you wish,’ she said, ringing for her maid.
He retreated to the dressing room while she prepared for bed, because that was the correct thing to do, and because it gave him a chance to peek through the crack in the door and watch her without her knowledge.
She undressed deftly, folding her clothes before she handed them to her maid, lace cap, bodice, skirt, and then one petticoat after another, while her husband wondered however many more there would be. She was so thin once all her padding was gone that her stays were really unnecessary. But she removed them neatly too, reminding her maid to powder them thoroughly. And then the only thing between her and the flesh he now owned was a fawn chemise trimmed with expensive blonde lace.
All the whores he’d used had looked mighty alluring in their stays, with their waists so ridiculously slender he’d felt he could snap them in two if he wanted, and their breasts pushed up into tempting mounds of pliable flesh ready for his hands. In fact almost the best part of the procedure had been watching them strip and waiting for the gradual revelation of breast and thigh. But as far as he could see through the crack, Mirabelle had no breasts at all. It was a disappointment. And it would make their first night rather difficult, because he simply couldn’t feel any desire for her at all. Perhaps things would improve when she took off her chemise.
But to his frustration she left the undergarment where it was while her maid lowered a voluminous nightgown over her head, past the wall-eye, cloaking her narrow neck, falling like a stage curtain across flat bosom, wide waist and narrow hips until it reached her long white feet, which he watched stepping delicately out of a pile of fawn linen, which was then lifted from the floor and folded, and turned out to be her chemise. What amazing modesty! he thought. Somehow or other she had contrived to take off her chemise underneath her nightgown. Imagine that!
Then her hair was unpinned and brushed out of curl and arranged in a neat plait over one shoulder. And at last the maid was dismissed. Edward was quite intrigued to see what she would do next. Would she get into bed and wait for him there, or sit by the fire, or stay where she was before the dressing table?
But no. She did none of these things. She walked across to the wash-stand, took a candle from the sconce and left the room. Gone to the closet, he thought, and was annoyed to be reminded of something so vulgar at such a time.
She was a long time gone. Long enough for him to undress, ring for his man, have his clothes taken away, and climb into bed. And by then he was getting impatient. What did she think she was doing, keeping him waiting? And on his wedding night too.
But at last she returned, pale and expressionless behind the yellow star of her candle. She climbed into the bed beside him, without looking at him or saying a word and snuffed out the candle without consulting him, as though she was sleeping on her own.
It was disconcerting to be suddenly marooned in darkness like that. He felt so aggrieved that he reached out and grabbed at her roughly. ‘You are my wife,’ he said angrily.
‘Yes,’ her voice came softly out of the darkness. ‘Of course, my dear, that is perfectly understood.’
Her calm was infuriating. He would rather she’d wept, or sounded afraid, or pleaded with him to treat her gently. Very well, he thought, if you give me nothing I will take what I want, and it will be all your own fault for behaving in such an unwomanly way. Feeling angry with himself because he knew he was treating her badly, angry with her because she had provoked his harshness, he ran his hands roughly over her body, pushing the nightgown up and out of his way, exploring for soft flesh and finding bone, for endearments, clinging arms, welcoming breasts, finding none, angry with everything in a vague generalized way, growling discontentment.
But she said nothing. She lay quite still and let him do whatever he wanted and made no sound, except for an odd intake of breath at the moment of entry, as though she was wincing. He took her in a rush of angry desire and very limited pleasure. And was more angry than ever when the deed was done.
She lay beside him in the darkness until he had recovered his breath and then she sat up, rearranged her nightgown and lit the candle.
The sudden light hurt his eyes. ‘Blow that out,’ he said.
‘Not yet, my love,’ she said calmly. ‘We have things to talk about.’
After all that silence, he thought, she chooses this moment to talk. The perversity of woman. ‘No, we don’t,’ he said. ‘Blow it out.’
She lit the second candle in the holder. And then the third. The light was blazing. ‘We have things to talk about now that we are one flesh and truly married,’ she said.
‘I want to go to sleep,’ he said, sulkily, closing his eyes against the glare.
‘I’ve no doubt you do, my love,’ she said, ‘and so you shall when we’ve decided how we are to live our lives.’
What was she talking about? ‘Live our lives?’ he said, thickly, opening his eyes to squint up at her.
‘Indeed yes,’ she said, and she smiled at him, her head half turned away from him so that he could only see her good eye. ‘We have to decide what we are going to do with the money.’
‘The money?’
‘Yes indeed. The twelve thousand pounds, my love. The money you married me for.’
He was so shocked his mouth fell open. ‘How can you say such a thing?’ he spluttered. ‘I’m sure such a thought never crossed my mind. I’m sure I never …’
‘Yes, you did,’ she said coolly. ‘All my suitors did. Every single one. And you as much as any of them. I am not such a fool as to imagine that you married me for my beauty. No, no you married me for the money. That is perfectly understood. Now we have to decide how it is to be used.’
He couldn’t think of anything to say to her after such coarseness. He couldn’t bear to look at her. That one eye was altogether too direct and unblinking. So he listened, scowling at the sheet.
‘At present the money is invested in government bonds,’ she said, ‘which bring me in a comfortable return, sufficient to keep me in clothes and books and newspapers and trips to the theatre and suchlike commodities, and to pay for my maid and such personal bills as I might run up from time to time, the hairdresser, milliner, dressmaker and so forth, and still have enough over to run a literary salon should I so require. Left to accumulate they could continue to provide indefinitely, with careful re-investment whenever necessary, of course. That is what I would advise us to do.’
‘You talk like a banker,’ he tried to joke, glancing up at her to see if his words would soften her at all.
But she took the joke as a compliment. ‘You flatter me,’ she said, smiling at him again.
‘However, my love,’ he said, ‘it ain’t for you to say how the money’s to be used. Not now. Not now when you have a husband to attend to it for you.’
‘Not according to the law,’ she said calmly. ‘No, you are right. In law you own the money just: as you own me. But law ain’t the only thing you have to consider tonight, my love.’
‘Why no, indeed,’ he said, smiling back at her and deciding to try tenderness this time. ‘This is a night for love, not law. Our wedding night, my love.’
‘Hum,’ she said, and the little sound wasn’t encouraging. ‘Well, we’ll not speak of that. At least not now. There is time enough to amend those matters later. At present we have to decide about the money. As you say, by law the
money now belongs to you and you could spend it in any way you chose, if you decided to be so foolish. But I do not think you a foolish man, or I would not have married you.’
‘I hoped you married me for love,’ he said weakly.
‘Oh dear me no,’ she said. ‘Although I daresay we shall come to love one another in time if we treat one another well enough. Oh no, I married you, my dear, because you are an Easter, and a name in the newspaper world, and consequently a man who would not wish the newspapers to know anything to his discredit, which they most certainly would if you were so foolish as to squander my money on selfish luxuries.’
It sounded uncomfortably like blackmail. ‘Oh come,’ he tried. ‘A man’s finances are his own concern. How could they possibly know how I spent my money?’
‘They would know,’ she said firmly, ‘because I would tell them. The editor and owner of the Daily Record is my mother’s cousin.’
It was blackmail. Dear heavens! Blackmail, from one’s own wife!
‘The decision is yours, of course,’ she was saying. ‘Sleep on it, my dear. You have no need to say anything now. You can tell me what you have decided in the morning. We have all the time in the world.’
And I have none of the money, he thought, bitterly. And he turned on his side and pulled the covers over his head, boiling with anger and frustration. To be caught so. And by a woman too, an old ugly woman who had no right to be behaving in such a way.
He was still furiously angry when he woke up in the morning, and his anger increased when he saw how peacefully she was sleeping, and went on sleeping despite all the noise he made getting up and washing and dressing.
It was a foul day but he went out for an early morning stroll despite the weather. He could hardly stay in the bedroom with such a wife. Mist lay across the meadows like a white sea; the paths in the gardens were ridged with mud and treacherous with puddles; and the boughs above him dripped moisture like miserable tears. So he was cross and wet when he finally returned for breakfast.
Mirabelle was at the table, enjoying steak and eggs. The sight of her pleasure removed what little appetite he had.
‘Have you come to a decision?’ she asked.
He walked across to the sideboard to get away from the unpleasantness of such talk, not wanting to speak at all because he was so cast down. ‘Yes,’ he said at last. ‘I suppose the money must stay where it is.’
‘Very wise,’ she said, cutting the steak.
‘I want to go home,’ he said petulantly, lifting the covers from the dishes on the sideboard and sniffing their contents.
‘Of course, my love,’ she agreed.
‘Today,’ he said, helping himself to bacon.
‘Would that be wise?’ she asked mildly. ‘If we return too soon people might think all was not well between us, and that would be bad for trade, would it not?’
Right again, he thought bitterly. Aggravating woman. ‘We will stay a week then,’ he said.
‘A fortnight would be better.’
‘A fortnight would be interminable,’ he said.
And it was.
But at last they were back in London in their new home in Bayswater and he could escape to the Strand and leave all his annoying troubles behind him. It was a relief to be back on home ground, with men to obey him and the knowledge that poorly paid as he was he still had power in the firm. But his temper was easily frayed. It made him cross just to think of all that capital lying in Mirabelle’s banking account untouched and untouchable. The slightest fault or the faintest insult, real or imaginary, had him bull-roaring in an instant. Within a day of his return people who could were avoiding him.
Not that marriage to Mirabelle was all loss. She ran their house extremely well, and was an excellent hostess at their dinner parties. So good, in fact, that they were soon to become quite renowned for the excellence of their hospitality.
But public success, however sweet, didn’t bring curves to Mirabelle’s flesh nor joy to their marriage bed. He made love to her whenever he could, but the little pleasure it gave him was rarely worth the effort.
Until the day he discovered Mr Leonard Snipe.
It was a fine summer afternoon. He had finished his work in the warehouse and was strolling down the Strand towards the Somerset coffee house, enjoying the sunshine and feeling pleasantly idle, when he saw an old college friend of his just ahead of him. He quickened his pace to catch up with the fellow, but instead of continuing along the Strand as he expected, the young man cut across the churchyard of St Clements’ Danes and disappeared into the crowds that tangled in the narrow lane behind the church. As he had nothing better to do, Edward followed.
Holywell Street was narrow and old and chronically run down. Several of the houses were clumsily buttressed but their inhabitants had turned this particular misfortune to advantage and used the slanting beams to display the second-hand clothes they hoped to sell. Most of the shops in the alley were small and poorly lit, so a great deal of trade was done in the street among the mounds of rubbish and the carefully gathered manure stored there by the street sweepers. Whores watched for custom from the upstairs windows, and small pickpockets mingled with the customers, dark hands at the ready. It was a busy, pungent, noisy place, and until that afternoon Edward had avoided it. Now looking in vain for the blue top hat of his friend among the welter of old clothes and dirty faces, he was convinced he’d been wise to do so.
There was no sign of the top hat, and he was just about to turn round and fight his way out of the crowd when he saw a neat hand-printed notice in the corner of an otherwise blank shop window. ‘Literature for discerning gentlemen of quality’ it said. ‘Full colour plates of delectable beauty. Academic erotica. For list of titles enquire within.’
He was interested at once. Literature for discerning gentlemen could only mean one thing, and colour plates sounded too good to miss. He lifted the latch and stepped down into the shop, closing the door upon the stink and racket outside.
There was incense burning in a brass censer just inside the door, but no sign of a shopkeeper and no books, but that was encouraging too, for given the work of the Society for the Suppression of Vice, books of this kind would hardly be on open display. But there was a small desk in one corner of the room with an ink well, a pen, a magnifying glass and a hand bell laid neatly upon it. He rang the bell.
There was a shuffle behind the blue baize curtain in the corner of the room and an eye appeared through a small hole in the curtain and glared at him balefully for several seconds. Then it disappeared and the curtain was held back and a man stepped into the room.
‘I can see that you are a gentleman of distinction, sir,’ he said, ‘so I know you will forgive my – um – scrutiny. There is such a need for caution in these – um – unfortunate days. Not that a gentleman like yourself would require instruction in such matters. No, no, no. I would not presume even to suggest such a thing. Can’t be too careful, can we, sir? People have such nasty minds. I do have the honour of addressing a connoisseur, do I not?’
Edward agreed that he did.
‘Leonard Snipe,’ the gentleman said, bowing deferentially.
He was an unremarkable looking man, straight as a wooden doll and with the same blank rotundity, a pale brown man, neatly dressed in a buff cloth coat, brown cloth trousers and two quiet waistcoats, one buff, one snuff and both faded. An unobtrusive man, with buff fingers and scant, straight, pale brown hair like a baby’s and a face as bland as a hard boiled egg, unblinking and almost totally devoid of expression. ‘Leonard Snipe, printer and publisher.’
‘Pleased to make your acquaintance,’ Edward said, as the words seemed to be expected of him.
‘Ah, pleasure!’ Mr Snipe said, lifting both his hands before him as though he were about to pray. ‘What a crying need there is for pleasure in this weary world of ours! Pleasure and beauty, sir, where would we be without ‘em? I consider it an honour, sir, to be able to provide such necessities to my discerning public. Did I say
an honour, sir? Nay, a duty. I am a man of principle, sir.’
‘Quite,’ Edward said, because he didn’t know what else to say.
The word seemed to satisfy. ‘I can see that you are a gentleman of true distinction, sir,’ Mr Snipe intoned. ‘And discretion, dare I hope?’
‘Of course.’
‘It is so necessary in these matters to be sure of discretion. People have such very nasty minds, sir. Positive cesspools, and no appreciation of art or the artist, who has a very different view of things, as I hardly need to tell you, sir. Would you care to see my current list?’
‘Yes,’ Edward admitted, trying not to sound too eager nor to show how impatient he was getting. What a long time this man took to get to the point.
The list was finally produced, after a brief disappearance behind the baize curtain. And a very tempting list it was. He read it with rising pleasure at the titillation it promised.
‘Tales of Twilight: or the amorous adventures of a company of ladies before marriage 10/6 (8 colourplates)
The Royal Wedding Jester: or all the fun and facetiae of the wedding night with all the good things said sung or done on that joyous occasion 2/6 reduced
The Wedding Night: or the battles of Venus
The Voluptuarian Cabinet: or Man of Pleasure miscellany 3/6 (5 plates)
Julia: or I have saved my rose 10/6 (8 plates)
The Jolly Companion: women disrobed.’
‘Of course, I have other publications,’ Mr Snipe smoothed, ‘should these not be to your taste.’
‘No, no,’ Edward said. ‘These are very much to my taste, Mr Snipe.’
He chose The Jolly Companion and he wasn’t disappointed. At least not until he’d made use of it on half a dozen occasions. Then he had to admit its effect began to pall, but that was only to be expected, and now that he knew where to find them other books could be bought.
Soon he had acquired quite an extensive library to lock away in the cupboard in his dressing room, a repertoire of delectable images that enabled him to make love to his poor plain wife far more often and with much greater pleasure, providing he could rouse himself by gazing upon the pictures as he disrobed. Oh yes, life was decidedly more enjoyable now that he and Mr Snipe were regular acquaintances. In fact as the weeks passed he wondered whether he might not ask the gentleman to dine at his house. After all he was a publisher, which made him acceptable providing nobody knew what additional material he published. And besides, it would jolly well serve Mirabelle right.
Sixpenny Stalls Page 17
