Mrs Whistler

by Matthew Plampin

  ‘There it is,’ declared Rosa, proudly it seemed. ‘There is a true model.’

  The others agreed; they even gave her a round of applause. Maud dropped the pose, flexing her arms, and immediately felt the sickness beginning to build. Jimmy was talking now, explaining some aspect of his technique, so she stepped away, over to the French doors, staring hard at the sun-browned garden.

  ‘Miss Franklin, are you – do excuse me, but are you quite all right?’

  Matthew Eldon had followed her over, concern upon his wide, guileless face. Maud’s lie about borrowing the two pounds from him had obliged her to admit Eldon into her confidence, to a certain degree. She hadn’t revealed the true source of the money, saying simply that she needed him to cover for her, and that it was to help Jimmy; she then told him about her condition, to arouse his sympathy. This had been more than enough to secure both Eldon’s cooperation and a pledge of secrecy, winning her a new, somewhat overly devoted ally. She did her best to distract him, insisting that there was no cause for alarm and asking questions about the other guests – in particular Ellen Terry, star of the Lyceum, who was over on the far side of the studio. Taller than most of the men, this celebrated lady was dark blonde and about thirty years of age, dressed in a fashionably cut gown the colour of autumn honey. The actress had arrived with Mr Irving and had yet to stray from his side, but this plainly wasn’t due to shyness. She was looking past him as they talked, surveying the rest of the party with large, calm eyes.

  Eldon grew confiding, giving her a lopsided smile. ‘Well, you know the story there, don’t you?’ he murmured. ‘Jimmy invited Miss Terry along for Godwin.’

  ‘But Godwin—’ Maud bit her lip in confusion. The architect had been pointedly omitted from this gathering, on account of what Jimmy regarded as his failings over the White House – his feeble defence against the Board of Works. ‘Godwin isn’t here.’

  Before any more could be said there was an eruption of claps and whistles in the centre of the room. Jimmy had raised a hand, to signal an announcement.

  ‘The artist,’ he said, ‘will now quit the studio. Dear room, site of such striving, of such triumph and such bitter disappointment – I bid you adieu!’

  With that he started down the passageway to the hall, saying farewell to everything he passed. The panelling, so warped and stained! The banister knob, so exquisitely carved to resemble – what was it, precisely? A nut? Some kind of sprout? The doorstep, trodden upon by so many hundreds of feet, clad in everything from hobnail boots to the finest dancing slippers!

  The party collected its hats and jackets and made to depart. It seemed to be happening quickly now, after so much waiting and delay – in a rush almost. Through that front door they went, the hinge creaking as always, for the very last time; down the path, crowded by leaves and snagging branches; out onto the pavement beyond. Maud’s feelings, there beneath the plane trees of Lindsey Row, were desperately mixed. She was keen to be gone from that narrow, gloomy terrace; to be gone from it all, she sometimes thought. Yet the life that awaited her downriver – and the house within which it would be played out – was uncertain indeed. She paused, the procession forming around her in the light evening mist; and Rosa Corder was at her side, taking hold of her arm and kissing her cheek, telling her again how marvellously she modelled. You hold the moment. That’s how she put it. You hold it completely.

  Then Rosa was asking about a set of Maud’s own studies that she’d seen the last time she called, a fortnight or so before: begonias, taken in chalk, the petals red and white like slices of radish. Had Maud found time to do any more? Had they been taken already to Tite Street? Might they be brought out once they’d arrived there?

  Maud held firm. ‘I came to your studio the other day,’ she said. ‘To Southampton Row.’

  Yes, Rosa replied at once, Charles had told her of this. She embarked upon an explanation of how Owl and Jimmy had somehow missed one another out on St James’s, and then Owl had been obliged to leave for King’s Cross, to see to a pressing piece of business; how Owl was wracked with remorse at the thought that he might have let them down; how the porters at the Albemarle had—

  ‘Where were you?’ Maud interrupted. ‘You told me you worked every Saturday. I needed your help. We both did.’

  Rosa appeared chastened, for a second; yet when she apologised, her voice held little contrition, as if she felt Maud was being irrational but didn’t wish to argue. Before any more could be said, Owl remarked somewhere up ahead that they should all be on their guard for creditors, for that pesky cheesemonger perhaps, lest they try to bring down Jimmy Whistler while he was on the move. The artist, finding this notion rather less amusing than his guests, redirected them towards a more comfortable subject: his imminent legal victory over John Ruskin.

  ‘We do not yet,’ he announced, swinging his cane, ‘have a date for the trial. But my goodness, such an army of supporters we are recruiting! So many of the really major painters! All of them will be coming to the White House to dine, and to inspect my works. To be shown precisely what is at stake here.’

  ‘What of Ruskin?’ someone asked. ‘Any word from him?’

  ‘Rien de tout. Word was going around that the old goat was actually relishing the prospect – that he wished to discipline me in public, would you believe, for my crimes against art. But this was months ago. Now he simply hides away among his lakes, allowing his various lickspittles to quibble and dodge, and go about the task of assembling his doomed defence.’

  Mr Irving spoke up, volunteering a theory that the venerated critic, fearful of public confrontation, was preparing to flee to the Continent. This prompted a rush of opinion and ridicule; Maud barely listened, thinking instead of her encounter with Mrs Leyland in that alley off High Holborn. She’d yet to tell anyone about this. It was paralysing, a proper dilemma, made a little worse by each passing day. If she told, it would only inflame everything further, and rob Jimmy of his balance; if she didn’t, she might well discover later on that she’d kept back a vital fact. They are meeting, the shipbroker’s wife had said. Some kind of scheme is being put together.

  There were cheers, and a short round of applause; Maud lifted her head to see that the White House was coming into view. Scaffolding gone at last, the pristine brickwork looked bright and sharp in the low light. As they drew closer, Maud’s predisposition to like what she saw grated slightly against the actual reality of it – for it was an odd jumble, this house, with a multitude of small, irregular windows and strangely placed doors. It wasn’t even clear where the different storeys might begin and end. The rest of the procession were praising its originality, saying that there was nothing else like it in London, which was certainly true; Maud noticed, however, that Jimmy himself was less exultant than might have been expected. Having brought this thing into being in the face of all manner of practical objections and obstacles, he now seemed unable to take pleasure in it, seeing only the compromises he’d been required to make. These he pointed out and criticised with some passion, in particular the carved panels, vaguely floral in character, that had been set around the windows; and the new elevation, which meant his splendid green roof tiles could no longer be seen from the front.

  ‘We were forced, mes amis, forced under threat of demolition, to embellish a building already complete in every sense. To gild our perfect white lily.’

  The party entered through a low door – possibly the front door, it was difficult to tell – and was soon split apart so completely that it seemed almost a function of the design. Maud found herself wandering through a string of what appeared to be parlours, running along the front of the house. The structure was shallow, barely more than a room and a half wide. The ceilings were low like the door, and the passages narrow; the walls were ivory, mustard, robin’s egg blue. It was even more sparsely furnished than Lindsey Row, some rooms containing no more than a rug and a pair of simple chairs. A Japanese effect, Maud supposed.

  Rosa remained at her side. ‘How i
n God’s name,’ she said, ‘are you supposed to live here?’

  Maud couldn’t contain her grin; although it faded quickly enough when they found, amid the warren of corridors, the smallest, steepest staircase she had ever seen in her life. She imagined herself in the months to come, with swollen ankles and heavy belly, having to scale this thing simply to reach her bed. Rosa took it three steps at a time, beckoning for her to follow. They went up to the top, to the studio, which occupied the entire third storey. Maud saw that the whole building had been arranged around it. The floors were stained dark brown, and the walls painted a cool, pinkish grey; the ceiling was higher than downstairs, but still not particularly high; the windows were all on one side, in a row, washing the long room with dusky light. At one end was propped Jimmy’s huge mirror, taller than a man, and at the other was the model table. After the poky studio at Lindsey Row, the sheer distance between them seemed incredible.

  Rosa walked off on a wide circuit. Maud stopped just inside the doorway, however, the fullness of it all striking suddenly against her. Jimmy had had a house built – a house built from scratch, from nothing. They were living on credit, in debt to a great long laundry list of Chelsea tradesmen. Each hour that passed held the threat of the bailiff’s knock. So much was unknown, conjecture, based only on their best hopes. Yet he’d built a house! These walls, these floors, these windows, arranged in such an original manner, would have to be paid for, every last one. And then there was her new circumstance. Many expenses would be involved in that. Tears stung her eyes; nausea burned at the back of her throat; and for the first time she began to think, really think, of what it would be to give birth again.

  Maud had always considered herself to be brave. She’d never been one to run from a barking dog, or a bully twisting ears on a street corner. But no amount of courage was sufficient for what lay ahead of her now. Much of Ione’s birth had passed in a fog of chloral. Her limbs had been rubbery and unreliable; the lamps too dim, then too bright, blotting across her vision; she’d seen the blood on the midwife’s hands, her forearms; the baby slick and wailing, dark with colour against her bone-white thigh. The drug had not been enough, however, to spare her from the pain. She’d been warned of it – had witnessed it, even, in her own mother – yet still it had managed to catch her utterly by surprise. It had left her broken, trampled all out of shape, squeezed and split like a spent paint-tube. She’d been thankful to live, thankful too that the child had lived, when so many didn’t. She’d fought to set herself right; to recover her strength and accept the bargain she’d made. And yet here it was once more. It would be upon her in no time.

  Rosa was there, holding up a handkerchief to mop at Maud’s face, her streaming eyes – guiding her to the centre of the room, encouraging her to sit cross-legged on the floorboards. Later on, she couldn’t quite work out if she’d revealed what had befallen her or if Rosa had guessed, but she was as sympathetic and as reassuring as you could wish for. She understood, she said; it was bad luck, that was all. Maud was resilient and wise. She would survive it.

  How could Maud not grab at this, grab at it with both hands? How could she not be grateful? So Rosa had not been there to help on the day of the Albemarle – what of it? She knew Maud’s life. She knew why Maud chose to live as she did. Maud spoke of her fears; of the oily tide of debt that was closing around their heels, rising up their calves; and then of Mrs Leyland’s warning. This last one was begun on impulse, but felt right straight away. Maud saw that she had to tell somebody – and who better, honestly, than Rosa Corder? It got muddled in the telling, emerging largely backwards; she’d just reached the ruse about the golden locket when Rosa cut her off.

  ‘You must forget Mrs Leyland,’ she said. ‘Put that woman from your mind.’

  Maud hesitated. ‘But it can’t be nothing, can it? She took a risk to meet with me, Rosa, a grave risk. If her husband had found out, she would’ve been in the most—’

  ‘He knew. Dear Maud, it was probably his idea. They want Jimmy to lose his nerve, don’t you see? To spare Ruskin what he deserves. And they want Jimmy to suffer – to be deprived of his justice in the name of petty vengeance, of spite and wounded pride. It’s that dreadful hack Ned Jones, you know. He’s the link here. Charles says that he’s an old confidante of Ruskin’s – and the new favourite artist of Frederick Leyland. Quite a coincidence, wouldn’t you agree?’ Rosa let out an impatient sigh. ‘If Mrs Leyland remains such a friend to Jimmy – if she is so very worried for him, despite everything – I wonder why she has never stood up to her husband and made the brute see reason. I wonder why she doesn’t do that instead of delivering useless warnings.’

  Maud recalled those savage letters – the weakness of a woman – and the great urgency in Mrs Leyland’s grip. ‘So you truly believe it was all a – a trick? That they’re in league?’

  ‘All that matters,’ Rosa replied, ‘is that Jimmy will win. Ruskin will be made to pay. This house will be the site of a new beginning. For Jimmy Whistler, for you, for every one of us who follows his example.’

  Thinking of how things would be in the White House brought Maud back to her child. Her second child. Jimmy’s attitude had been measured. Things would proceed exactly as before. They would even place the baby with the same family, if it could be arranged. Maud had agreed – what else could she do? She had wondered, though, exactly how many times she could go along with this. Was she to fall pregnant every year, every other year, for the next decade? The next two decades? She couldn’t say with any certainty when it had happened this time. There had been many instances throughout the spring, before his optimism began to wane, when (she realised now) she’d given only the most cursory consideration to the point in the month. She frowned at the stained floor. Had she grown careless? Could it have been, in some peculiar way, deliberate?

  ‘Do you wish him to marry you?’

  Maud looked up; she had a sense, unnervingly clear, of having been found out. Marriage was not discussed at Lindsey Row; she’d never expected it to be. She’d never wanted it, in fact, considering wedlock to be a great symbol of the loveless, stifling propriety she’d vowed early on to avoid, as best as she was able. Even when Mrs Whistler had mentioned it the other week, in that sitting room by the sea, it had seemed rather laughable – something that could not and should not ever happen. Right then, though, sitting raw-eyed and nauseous on the studio floor, she had to admit that it didn’t seem laughable any longer.

  ‘I don’t – it hasn’t—’

  Rosa leaned in closer. ‘Perhaps I should ask why you would want him to.’

  Now Maud’s mystification was complete. ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘There are alternatives. Other paths. This is becoming ever more clear.’ Voices could be heard down below – Jimmy and the two actors sharing a joke with much exaggerated laughter. ‘Take, for instance, tonight’s guest of honour, the acclaimed Miss Ellen Terry.’

  Rosa then spun the tale of a child prodigy, married at sixteen to a man thirty years her senior, whose eye she’d had the misfortune to catch while on the stage. It had been a dismal union, from which she’d been rescued by none other than Edward Godwin. After their elopement she’d lived with him out in the country for several years, much as Maud lived with Jimmy, and had borne him two children; yet now she was married again, to another gentleman. Furthermore, she was experiencing a theatrical resurrection that few could have predicted, under her own name and based entirely upon her talents.

  ‘Our Miss Terry is more famous today,’ Rosa concluded, ‘and more admired, than she has ever been.’

  Maud sniffed, trying to swallow her sickness. She remembered what Eldon had said at Lindsey Row – his connection of the actress and the architect. ‘She – she really had Godwin’s babies?’

  ‘A boy and a girl. They live with her, here in London. Godwin and Miss Terry don’t care to meet one another any longer, though. Too much has changed. Securing her attendance tonight, you might say, was Jimmy’s way of informin
g Godwin that he himself was not welcome.’ Rosa took Maud’s clammy hands in hers. ‘Why marry? That’s the lesson here, don’t you see? Moral types may mutter and grumble, but who gives a single fig for them? Why restrict yourself, and what you might do? Children are not the end, Maud. Not in the least. Money is coming, enough money to throw the world open. I can see a future well away from London. We’ll be artists together, you and I. Charles and Jimmy can come with us, or they can remain behind. We’ll take a place in the countryside. Or away in Portugal, like we talked of at the Café Royal. A villa by the ocean. We’ll paint for our living. And our children will play in the gardens around us while we work.’

  Maud glanced at Rosa. She was smiling, her lilac eyes narrowed, completely serious. Maud’s earlier doubts were quite gone; she was now close to deciding that Rosa Corder was the best, the very dearest friend she’d ever had. Overcome by this vision of Portugal, so vivid and beautiful and just so utterly bloody perfect, she began to sob again.

  The voices were on the staircase now. Rosa made no effort to rise. She wrapped an arm around Maud’s shoulders and gathered her in. Maud found her teary face pressed against Rosa’s gown; it smelled of paint and dust, edged with the subtlest scent of roses.

  ‘It will happen,’ Rosa said, her lips close to Maud’s ear, as the first people entered the studio. ‘You’ll see.’

  Autumn 1878

  What was it about the Owl that made one forgive him so much upon sight alone? There in Reeve’s office, four floors up in a rather swank block just back from the Strand, Jim had thought that if the fellow did actually deign to appear, he might experience a degree of annoyance, of resentment perhaps; that it could even impair the progress of their discussions. Yet when that familiar silhouette slid onto the smoked glass panel of the office door, he felt nothing but gladness. He was on his feet, introducing Mr Charles Augustus Howell to the barristers as an expert in objets d’art and the London market who had generously agreed to assist with the plan of battle, and apologising for having begun the meeting without him, even though Owl was more than half an hour late. It really wasn’t like Jim at all.