Mrs Whistler

by Matthew Plampin

  Jim’s business was in the heart of theatre-land. The cab dropped them just by the Strand, at the top of Wellington Street. It was quiet, cobwebbed with fog, performances well underway in all the major houses. With his cane, Jim pointed towards the Lyceum – or rather to the small parade of shops beside it. One in the middle still had its lamps lit. Stencilled across the window in a gentle arc was Thomas Way & Son: Fine Printmakers.

  ‘Are you quite sure that we won’t be a nuisance?’ asked Miss Corder as they approached.

  This hadn’t occurred to Jim at all. ‘Goodness, no,’ he replied. ‘Absolutely not.’

  Jim had always liked offices, workshops, that sort of place; not actually to work in, of course – heaven forbid! – but he found the air of efficiency and order peculiarly reassuring, so alien was it to him. Upon his entrance, the two fellows named on the window hurried out from the back to shake his hand, murmur their greetings and compliments, and say what a pleasure it was to remain open past their usual hours to receive him. Thomas Way was a bandy, bright-eyed spaniel of a man; and his son basically himself as a youth, no more than eighteen years old. Both were in ink-stained aprons, bless them, with printers’ tools tucked in the front pockets and those little green visors upon their brows. The artist and his retinue plainly left them rather awestruck, and if they did feel any unseemliness at having Maud there, or Miss Corder, they didn’t dare show any sign of it.

  ‘Mr Way,’ Jim informed his companions, ‘is a master lithographer, the best in London. And therefore the world. He is poised, mes amis, to save me.’ He swept his arm around the office – the display cabinets, the framed prints on the wall, the machines just visible to the rear. ‘His form, this great medium of the lithograph, will save me entirely.’

  Jim’s arm finished its sweep upon the shop counter, indicating a mounted print, unframed, standing on a desk-easel: a Nocturne in ink, an original work. The Thames was shown in the full serenity of night – an unbroken expanse of water, stirred by the faintest ripple, the darker ridge of the opposite bank, a single chimney against the immaculate sky – all of it done with only soft jades and a note of shimmering blue. The lithograph, with its panels of stone and grease crayons, was one branch of print-making about which Jim could be genuinely keen, and he was proud indeed of this first attempt. It had been drawn a week or so before, in a single sitting – from memory, as was his practice – right there in Way’s office, at a desk in the back, with the printer and his son in reverential attendance. He couldn’t help noticing, however, that dear Way was beginning to look rather uncomfortable. The printer’s smile was flattered, unmistakably, yet a touch queasy as well. Leaving the others to admire the Nocturne, Jim took Way aside and enquired about subscriptions – the true purpose of his visit, after all.

  The terms had been extremely reasonable, perhaps too reasonable: signed proofs at one guinea each, unmounted prints at half a guinea. This had been done at Owl’s urging, shortly after he’d first brought Jim to Way’s office and made the introduction.

  ‘A modest start,’ he’d said, ‘is vital. We must make the things accessible, get them out there, you know – and then slowly restrict supply, increasing our prices as we go. Basic commerce, old man. Basic commerce.’

  Owl had also assisted with the circulars, providing several hundred names on top of those that Jim and Way could summon, creating a great roll-call of London’s print collectors. Success had seemed guaranteed. Now Jim gripped Way’s shoulder, in a gesture of confidence and confidentiality. The man’s muscles were like ropes; all that print-pulling, he supposed.

  ‘What news, Way?’ he asked. ‘How many so far?’

  Way couldn’t meet his eye. ‘We’ve had three in the past week, Mr Whistler. Since they was sent out, that is.’

  Jim didn’t understand – was this some printer’s abbreviation? ‘Three score, you mean? Three dozen?’ He paused. ‘Three hundred?’

  The fellow shook his head. ‘No, sir. Three.’

  Jim released him. There was a ghastly cramping sensation gathering inside his chest, like the clenching of a fist. ‘Three,’ he said.

  ‘Others may come,’ Way told him, a little desperately. ‘I’ve known it happen. Word may get around. You mustn’t lose heart, Mr Whistler. We are just beginning here. Mr Watts has been in, several times, talking of the Piccadilly. It may be that once your images are in his magazine, interest in them will increase.’

  ‘Three,’ said Jim again, rather harder and louder. He heard a sneering note in his voice this time, directed at Thomas Way, artistic pygmy that he was, and his depressingly ordinary premises; at himself and the failure that dogged him. That clung to him like a bad goddamned smell.

  A minute later they were outside, Miss Corder taking them to a restaurant she knew of nearby. They went to a table and ordered, the women chattering in a determined fashion that made it plain they’d deduced the nature of Way’s news. Jim said next to nothing. Eldon filled his glass, but he did not drink. The food arrived, a rack of beef; Jim could barely stand to load his fork and lift it to his mouth. The meat was matter only, devoid of flavour and nourishment. He managed less than a quarter of his portion.

  ‘Jimmy,’ Maud whispered, ‘shall we go home?’

  He glanced up. Three worried faces were leaning in on him. This served as an immediate corrective. What man could stand to be pitied, on top of the rest of it?

  ‘No,’ he said. ‘Of course not.’ He pushed his plate away and removed the napkin from his collar; he brushed a crumb from the deep black of his dinner dress. ‘It is the Grasshopper, Maud. It is the end of the run. Whistler must be in attendance.’

  This production was a farce of the broadest kind, a speciality of the Gaiety – penned originally in Paris, Jim had been told, to mock artists and the disordered lives they led, and to take a couple of more targeted shots at those painters the papers had begun to call Impressionists. Adapting the piece rather hurriedly for the London stage, someone at the Gaiety had decided that Whistler, and Whistler in isolation, was the local equivalent. Jim’s reaction to this had been one of open glee. He’d been to see the thing a half dozen times over the course of its short run, always in company, drawing as much attention to himself and his enjoyment as he could.

  Certain of his friends had been mystified by this. ‘But it is mockery,’ they’d say, ‘and such a mediocre script. The jokes are so stale. How can you bear it?’

  ‘You must understand,’ he’d explained, ‘that something of this nature should be owned. Taken into one’s possession. This draws the venom from it, you know, every last drop. And it is proof of real distinction, after all. Mon chers, it is proof of fame.’

  On this final night, however, the Gaiety’s cavernous, gaudy hall was more than half empty, the stalls dappled with vacant seats. Many of Jim’s circle who’d vowed that they’d be present were not, as far as he could see. Even Godwin – who was often at the Gaiety, prowling about for actresses – was nowhere to be found. Nonetheless, Jim managed to prop himself at the front of their box, the eyeglass inserted so that it would flash in the stage lights, in order to laugh loudly – and not entirely kindly – at the parts that concerned him. Despite the numerous times he’d seen it, he couldn’t say with any great certainty what the plot involved. Two young friends vying for artistic prominence? A girl who wished to paint disguising herself as a man to improve her chances of success? Perhaps. It hardly seemed important. His scenes, as he thought of them, were in this last act. At one point, a full-length caricature was wheeled out – with bamboo cane, white forelock and eyeglass – to be venerated by all onstage as a likeness of the master. At another, a crude parody of a Nocturne was made to serve as two different paintings by the ingenious conceit of being turned upside down.

  Eldon laughed along with Jim, with the same sardonic heartiness; he really was the best follower one could wish for. Maud, hanging back in the shadows, let out the occasional groan. Miss Corder, however, was contemptuous, quite nakedly so. New to The Grassh
opper, and made fractious by wine, she took against its liberties in the very fiercest manner. She scowled and sighed. She tutted and heckled. And then, at the conclusion, to Jim’s enormous delight, she rose from her chair and she damn well booed it. She booed the actors individually, and she booed the ensemble when they lined up for their final bow – throaty honks of disdain that one wouldn’t imagine a young woman of her build and apparent refinement was capable of producing.

  ‘I will never understand those,’ she announced, as they prepared to leave, ‘who actually take pride in their damned ignorance.’

  April 1878

  Jimmy’s voice was shrill, signalling exasperation. Maud had been heading through the studio, towards the double doors and the garden beyond, where he’d been for most of the morning. Now she slowed, hanging back. Someone had joined him; they were talking through the situation at the White House. The equation Jimmy had sketched for her that night on Tite Street – the series of debits and credits that would carry them through the construction and the trial, to the golden uplands beyond – had already been shown to be unworkable. This had caused disgruntlement and dismay, the occasional moment of wild terror, and much, much discussion. Maud wasn’t completely sure that she wanted to hear it all again.

  Owl was standing there in his grey topper, set against a backdrop of seething greenery. He looked rather out of his element; brushing away a shaggy tendril that was dipping over his shoulder, he began repinning his crimson ribbon, his Order of Merit or whatever it was, nodding as he did so. To the left of him were several of Jimmy’s canvases, propped in the sunshine – mellowing, as he would have it, after a spot of touching up ahead of their transportation to the second Grosvenor exhibition. It was to be a more modest showing for Whistler this year. Maud could see a Nocturne and two full-lengths set up by the garden wall, tilted like sunflowers upon their easels, the images partly obscured by the crackle of light across the varnish.

  Jimmy was out of view, off somewhere to her right. He was holding forth with great vehemence about the delays caused by the recent interference of the Metropolitan Board of Works. One of their architects had objected to the character of Jimmy and Godwin’s design, apparently, declaring it to be too plain.

  ‘Like a dead house, they are saying. A dead house, Owl! They are insisting on changes, the most vulgar additions, before they’ll grant the lease.’ Jimmy made a sound, partway between a growl and a sigh. ‘I blame Godwin. It pains me to say so, mon vieux, but I do. This is his realm. These are his people. He should have anticipated it. Acted to forestall it.’

  ‘The Board of Works,’ Owl demurred, ‘are difficult buggers at the best of times. I’m not sure—’

  ‘I shall do what I can, naturellement. Spread word about town. They have no idea, I think, who they’ve picked as an enemy here. I’ve dined with a couple of the very top Board of Works fellows – or their wives, at least. There’ll be an angle.’

  ‘That’s the spirit, old chap. You must stare it in the eye.’

  ‘It’s a campaign, you know,’ Jimmy continued. ‘A campaign against me. For he knew the very minute I obtained the plot. He has his spies, no doubt, on the Board of Works, who are seeing to it that these ridiculous ob­­structions are placed in my path. Palms have been greased, mon cher, and greased well. Why, I’d be surprised if this damned Board architect hasn’t been bought entire.’

  Owl hardly needed to ask to whom Jimmy was referring. The hand of Frederick Richards Leyland was seen everywhere. Several seasons had passed since the horsewhipping threat, the better part of a year; it had seemed, for a while, that Jimmy’s sense of grievance was diminishing. But then news had reached him that Fanny Leyland – being something of a prize, a girl both pretty and staggeringly rich – was engaged after but a single turn about the course, to some dullard in naval insurance, a widower older even than Jimmy. He’d been particularly stung by the fact that the family had celebrated this happy event in the Peacock Room – exactly the sort of thing he’d envisaged when he created it, only with himself numbered among the most honoured guests. Now he began reeling off his various nicknames for his foe, a nearby rhododendron bush shaking as he swiped at it.

  ‘British businessman – befrilled barbarian – counting-house rat! He means to bring me down, don’t you see, by whatever means he can. The graceful slur of the Peacock Room must be avenged. The sympathetic ear I lent his poor wife must be sliced off and tossed on the fire. Dark wheels are turning, Owl. Sinister machinery is being brought to bear. He was behind this accursed Ruskin business – egging it on, if not originating it. And I am inclined to think that it was his influence that doomed the first lithograph. A whispering campaign, you know, amongst those who might otherwise have been disposed to buy.’

  Owl seemed to agree. He looked at the canvases for a moment, the Nocturne especially; then he turned towards the house and spotted Maud lingering at the edge of the studio doorway. She stepped outside at once, trying to appear as if in motion. Jimmy was pacing on the lawn. He looked extraordinary that day, clad in a yachtsman’s suit of blue serge, worn with his best square-tipped shoes and his straw boater; an outfit smart yet individual, casual yet not informal. The reason was a newspaperman, dispatched from a new magazine called The World, who was calling at eleven to interview him about his paintings and the way they were made. There had been much rehearsal and preparation, on everything from costume and decor to what precisely he would say. A quiverful of lines had been readied, potent phrases that he planned to loose, ever so casually, in the journalist’s general direction. Owl was there in the garden, Maud presumed, to offer some last-minute guidance. She attempted to adopt a more friendly expression.

  ‘What of the Leyland paintings that you still have?’ Owl asked. ‘All those portraits, for instance?’ He gave Maud the very slightest of sidelong looks. ‘Or that glorious painting of the three girls? If any of these were to be made available, I’m sure that I could have my people bring about—’

  Jimmy cut him off with some impatience, informing him that yes, those canvases did remain in his hands, but they were unfinished, quite unworthy of display or engraving or anything else; and they had been paid for, furthermore, a number of years previously. Maud was watching him closely. This testiness told her that something was underway, right then and there – that Owl’s visit wasn’t about The World at all.

  On cue, John appeared at the back gate, in his shirtsleeves, trying to manoeuvre a thin crate in from the lane. Owl stepped forward to speed things up, taking hold of one of the lower corners; John cowered a little, almost as if he expected the urbane Portuguese to clout him around the ear. The crate was carried into the studio and laid out on its back. Jimmy watched, chewing distractedly on a thumbnail. Maud had listened to him talk on endlessly about this World article, what a great puff it was, and the splendid figure he must cut. Unwittingly or not, the Owl was threatening to knock him off-course.

  ‘What’s going on?’ she asked.

  Jimmy didn’t answer her. John crossed the studio, walking fast, heading up into the house, while Owl sauntered back to the lawn, making for a small leather bag that had been lying at his feet. He bent down to open it, pulling it towards him, metal objects jangling within. Out came a length of dark, oily iron, hooked at one end. He straightened up, weighing the thing in his hands. It was a crowbar.

  Maud crossed her arms. Almost without realising it, she took a step that placed her between Jimmy and Owl. She liked this man – how could you not? – but she was surprised by how easy it was to mistrust him. She hadn’t forgotten those prints. There was a readiness in the Portuguese, she reckoned, to act without permission.

  ‘All right,’ she said, ‘what the devil is going on?’

  There was a short silence. Owl looked past Maud, to Jimmy.

  ‘He’s taking the Carlyle,’ Jimmy said. ‘It’s all agreed, Maudie.’

  And then Maud saw it, at the rear of the studio, waiting to be packed away in Owl’s crate – one of Jimmy’s few well-
received works, its silver and fawn tones dulled by shadow. The old gentleman – a famous scholar, she’d been told – was shown from the side, grey-bearded, sitting on a simple kitchen chair. His coat was across his lap, his hat perched upon his knee, and a gloved hand set atop his cane. Maud always thought that he looked ready to hurry off; as if he’d mistakenly given too much time to the sitting and was keen to be gone.

  ‘Taking it where? For sale?’ This didn’t seem likely; Jimmy would certainly have said something. ‘For engraving?’

  ‘Soon, yes,’ Owl cut in. ‘Very soon. My man Graves has a mezzotinter in mind, and a fine one at that. Mr Carlyle over there should be with him by the summer.’ He launched into his standard assurances regarding the tin that would soon be pouring in.

  ‘But it isn’t going to him today,’ Maud interrupted. ‘Is it, Owl?’

  ‘There are great things on their way,’ Owl said. ‘That is definite. But by heaven, Maud, they aren’t here yet. Our British art collectors may not see the value in these pictures, dense as they are, but plenty of others do. They see the value and they will advance good coin against it.’

  Maud stood quite still. ‘So you’re pawning them, then,’ she said. ‘You’re going to put Jimmy’s paintings in pawn.’

  ‘Security,’ Owl qualified, adjusting his hold on the crowbar. ‘They are serving as security. It is a testament to what Jimmy has achieved, really it is. We’ve raised a tidy sum in a matter of days.’

  ‘But pawning them, Owl?’

  The Portuguese’s smile hardened just a fraction. ‘The show is afire, my dear girl. I don’t need to tell you this, I’m sure. The flames leap high indeed, and we must fight them in any way we can. Those works over there in the studio have real worth, buyers or not. And so we must send them out to earn.’