London Lodgings

by Claire Rayner

  But he did not move and she saw he was afraid to, and understood that he was having to use all his strength to remain where he was.

  ‘Well, it has happened now,’ she said, amazed at her own equanimity. ‘So there is little sense in your running away. You had best to sit down. There is a bench there beside the tree.’

  Now he did move and fetched the bench a little nearer, but set it discreetly so that he was sitting at a decent distance from her, and certainly not looking directly at her. She smiled and looked down at Duff, who had decided beneath his covering shawl that he had suckled enough and had drifted into surfeited sleep. With one unobtrusive hand she rebuttoned her bodice and then sat, decently covered, with Duff in her arms.

  ‘I came to say goodbye,’ he said after a long pause, and still did not look at her.

  ‘I said goodbye to you the night you – some time ago,’ she said steadily. ‘I cannot see that it is necessary to say it again.’

  ‘I am going away.’ He said it abruptly. ‘We have let the house, or rather Alice has.’ There was a bitterness in his tone which was strange, for she had never heard such a note from him. ‘I would not of course make any claim to her property. I regard men who do that as – well, I will not behave so. Her inheritance remains her own to handle as she wishes, whatever may be the fate of the law. Now she has decided to go and live amongst some friends in Staffordshire, with Mary to look after her. I shall find other accommodation.’

  ‘Mary?’ Tilly said wonderingly. ‘The maid who –’

  ‘I told you she had a powerful attachment to my wife. Not an entirely healthy one, I believe. However, let that be. Sufficient to say I have been told she is to live in rural peace and wishes no longer to live under my roof, or to have me under hers. I shall of course not argue with her. She has to be free to live her own life as she wishes. I believe this most ardently.’ He smiled a little crookedly. ‘As you see, I am a supporter of the old politics, a follower of Thomas Paine.’

  ‘Politics,’ she said wonderingly. ‘What has that to do with the ways of married people? She may say she wishes to live elsewhere, but – how can you permit this?’

  ‘Permit it? How can I stop it?’ He sounded angry but resigned. ‘Politics is as much a matter of family life as public life, I do assure you. And the principles I hold dear for public expression I must, in all conscience, follow at home. If she wishes to leave me, therefore, she must be free to do so.’

  ‘I do not understand. I know husbands and wives disagree –’

  She reddened suddenly, remembering with a painful vividness the way she and Frank had argued. ‘But to live separately, how can that be possible?’

  ‘Some people seek divorce,’ he said and she blinked at him.

  ‘That is shameful!’ she said. ‘I hear of such matters – of cases of crim. con. – isn’t that what they say, the fast set? But it is not for people like us.’

  ‘I am glad to hear it,’ he said.

  There was a silence and then she ventured, ‘I trust, Fred-Mr Compton, that this – this schism between you – is not in any way due to – I mean, that I did not – oh dear!’ She felt wretched, remembering the adoring way Alice had hung on this man’s arm, and then the tigerish attack of misplaced wifely jealousy she had mounted on Tilly. Could that be the same woman who had abandoned him now? It seemed incredible.

  He laughed, a short ugly sound. ‘Oh please, do not take all the credit. She assures me I am quite hatefully boring after all, and she wishes no more of me.’ He caught his breath. ‘She may have a point. I have found myself in recent months thinking so much of other things that – well, perhaps I have not been the best of husbandly company.’

  She said nothing, and he turned and looked directly at her for the first time. ‘It cannot come as a surprise, Tilly, that I have developed a tendresse for you. You are – well, there it is. I believed myself to be fully attached to my wife and indeed I was. But after – after our disagreement – she displayed so unpleasant a side to her nature and tormented me so – and she did, I must tell you, indeed she did – that love died. But in its place –’

  ‘Please, not another word.’ She got to her feet and Duff stirred and whimpered in her arms but did not wake. ‘I must go inside now. I wish you well, Mr Compton, indeed I do, but–’

  ‘Please. Call me Freddy,’ he tried to smile at her, ‘in the old way? It would comfort me more than a little.’

  She could have wept for him. The dull heaviness she had come to associate with his unsmiling face was quite gone. What she saw now was a man so deeply unhappy that he could barely lift his head; and she wanted to reach out to touch him, even hug him to restore him to the good-humoured, agreeable man he had been in the past. But of course that was not possible. All she could do was shake her head.

  ‘You must see that however large is the debt I owe you for your past friendship towards me, I cannot possibly permit myself any familiarity now. Especially as you – as Alice has gone. You must see that.’

  He sat silently for a while and then nodded. ‘I suppose so.’ He too stood up. ‘I was of small service of course, but for what I was able to do, I am glad. I am particularly happy to see that your fears for your security here in this house were unfounded. Your father did after all leave you his house and fortune.’

  ‘The house yes. It was in fact held in trust for my mother and so he could not have left it away from me. It was different with his personal fortune of course.’

  She stopped and he looked at her sharply. ‘Oh?’

  She should not confide in him, she knew; he was after all going away and rightly so. But she let it come out all the same. ‘He left what monies he had to Mrs Leander,’ she said in a low voice. ‘It is being held for her by the lawyer. They have not been able to find her to give it her, despite advertising.’

  There was a silence and then he gave an odd sort of groan.

  ‘Whatever is the matter?’ He had gone quite white and she was alarmed. ‘Are you ill? Is there anything –’

  ‘No, I am not ill.’ He seemed to recover himself. ‘I have just –’ He managed a sort of smile. ‘I am once again bouleversé by my beliefs – those politics that you did not think affected our daily life.’

  She frowned, and shook her head in mystification.

  ‘I am sorry – it is just that you have presented me with a dilemma. I – I am sad indeed that your father left his money so. It is a shocking thing to have done to you.’

  ‘Indeed,’ she said. ‘But I manage well enough. I have my lodgers. They pay the bills for me, and feed us. I can contrive –’

  ‘I am sure you can. I simply wish it were not necessary. But now, as to Mrs Leander.’

  ‘What about her?’

  ‘I cannot – it is difficult to know what to do.’ He seemed genuinely distressed, and sat down again and so did she, staring at him over Duff’s sleeping head. He thought broodingly for a while and then lifted his chin.

  ‘I am afraid that I may know where Mrs Leander is to be found. The question is, should I reveal the fact so that your lawyers might give to her her rightful inheritance? A painful question indeed.’

  ‘Rightful?’ Tilly cried wrathfully. ‘You call it rightful?’

  ‘It is not just and it is not kind of your father to have left his money so,’ he said steadily. ‘But having done so, it is her right to receive it, is it not?’

  She was silent for a long moment and then said unwillingly, ‘I suppose so.’

  ‘So knowing, as I suspect I do, where she might be – is it not right I should say so? Or will the money come to you in due course if I do not? And even if that is the case, would it be right of me to – oh dear, it is so difficult to behave as an honourable man should!’ His face was twisted with anxiety, and he looked at her almost piteously. ‘I have indeed a problem to be solved here.’

  ‘If she does not claim it, it does not come to me,’ Tilly said after a pause. ‘It is to go to her issue. That is her daughter Dorcas, wherever sh
e may be. She ran away some time ago. I have not seen or heard from her since.’

  ‘Then telling the laywers where they might find Mrs Leander will not harm you?’ His face cleared and he looked almost his old beaming self. ‘Oh, that helps me greatly! I am, I know, weak. I should do the right thing, painful or not, but it is so much easier if – well, never mind. I must go and see the laywers. I know where to find them from that day we spent in the City, you will remember.’

  She remembered and preferred not to. ‘I would rather you told me so that I might tell them,’ she said.

  He went a sudden deep red and she was puzzled. He looked as ashamed as a child caught stealing, and it seemed so odd a reaction that she stared at him, almost open-mouthed.

  ‘I – it is a matter of some shame to me that I should know,’ he said. ‘I would prefer – and yet –’ Again he seemed lost in thought, and then lifted his head and spoke with some energy. ‘I have no right to hide my own sins behind another’s – well, there it is. I must, I think, tell the truth. I was mendacious when we dealt with the woman before, Tilly. It is time to be honest now. Then we can part as good friends, I hope, with nothing disagreeable left for me to remember when I am alone.’

  ‘I don’t understand,’ she said. ‘You’re speaking in riddles.’

  ‘I think in riddles too, I sometimes believe.’ He laughed oddly. ‘Perhaps I think too much. Well, there it is. I trust your delicacy will not be too offended by what I must tell you.’

  ‘Delicacy?’ She managed to laugh herself. ‘Mr Compton, I am a married lady – a widow – and a mother. Surely I don’t need to be protected, as though I were an infant, from the truths of this world!’

  ‘I would protect you for ever if I could,’ he said fiercely and then looked away as she in her turn reddened. ‘I am sorry if I offended you in any way at all. So,’ he took a deep breath, ‘I think – I believe Mrs Leander might be found –’ He looked at her almost piteously. ‘I would so much rather tell the lawyer.’

  ‘And I would rather you told me,’ she said firmly. ‘If this is a matter affecting my father, as it is, then I have a right to know, surely.’

  He seemed to make up his mind fully at last.

  ‘Very well,’ he said with a new crisp note in his voice. ‘I must tell you then that when I told Mrs Leander I knew matters of her past which made her remaining in this house no longer permissible, I was not pretending. I did know she was. She used to live in a house of – a house of assignation. She had earned her living in this manner for some time, before she came here as a housekeeper. I told her that unless she left at once I would tell Mr Kingsley this fact. She chose to go.’ He bent his head. ‘I believed the means justified the ends, heaven help me. I was so concerned for your peace of mind that I resorted to what is a form of threat. It was not admirable in me.’

  ‘Oh, but it was!’ she cried. ‘You made me so happy, sending her away, even though afterwards it all – well, you were kind to me. Don’t punish yourself for that.’

  ‘Thank you,’ he said. ‘I am grateful for that.’

  There was a silence and then she said, as though the words were being pushed out of her, ‘How did you know this?’

  He smiled, a tight ugly grimace. ‘I was waiting for the question. Because, of course, I saw her there. Often.’ He took a sharp breath. ‘When I told the full story of our friendship and my actions on your behalf to Alice – feeling it the best way to reassure her – she asked the same question. It was my answer to it that made her so – that turned her against me, and that led to our parting. She could not understand that men sometimes, that men have needs that – well, she had a point. If such places and the behaviour inside them is reprehensible for women, I suppose it should be so regarded for men. Though most sensible people do understand that we – well, let be. So, now you know it, and I hope indeed I have not offended you as I offended Alice. I feel so much better than I did. Confession indeed is a source of great release. I have burdened you with my guilt, however, and I beg your pardon for that.’

  She shook her head, trying to get some order into her thoughts which were whirling and confused. ‘You need not. You were good to me and I make no – I do not care how it was you were able to be of help to me. It was enough that you were. Anyway, we all know that gentlemen are different. They are able to behave in ways that would indeed be disgusting in women but which matter little to them. I see no reason to be angry with you.’

  ‘Ah, but you are not my wife,’ he said.

  Again she was embarrassed. ‘That is true. I suppose – I can understand Alice’s anger.’

  ‘Revulsion,’ he said.

  ‘Well, perhaps, if that is not too strong a word.’

  ‘It was not for her,’ he said.

  Again there was a silence between them and then she got to her feet once more, this time with some determination. ‘We must say goodbye, Mr Compton. I will ask you indeed to tell Mr Cobbold what you know of Mrs Leander. I have no pecuniary interest in the matter at all, but I agree with you. However bitterly I resent my father’s action she has the right to her legal inheritance, I suppose.’

  He too was on his feet. ‘Thank you. You have saved my conscience. And now – once again, may I ask you that we part as friends. Will you say, “Goodbye Freddy,” to me in the old way? To send me on my way, if not happy, at least with peace of mind?’

  She looked at him for a long moment and then nodded.

  ‘Goodbye Freddy,’ she said. ‘And I do indeed wish you well. You’ve always been most kind to me, and I most bitterly regret the difficulties in which you find yourself. If I am able some time in the future to be – to be of friendly service to you –’ She could say no more, but he understood and reached out and took her hand and half shook it, half patted it, and then turned and walked away across the sunny garden.

  She stood and watched him go, past the back of the house, towards the way that led out to Brompton Grove, and went on looking long after he had disappeared and the sound of his footsteps were gone.

  Chapter Twenty-three

  ‘AFTER SO LONG a time,’ Tilly said, to have located her after so many years only to discover she had died so recently? It is very strange.’

  ‘Not at all strange,’ Mr Cobbold said weightily. ‘God will not be mocked, Mrs Quentin. It is clear to me that this was divine intention. He wished to destroy the woman in her wickedness and not permit her to benefit from it in any way.’

  Tilly set her head on one side and looked at him consideringly. When the letter from the lawyer had arrived, asking for permission to wait upon her, her first reaction had been amazement, her second, fear. It had been, after all, more than four years since she had had any direct dealings with him; four busy, peaceful, happy years watching Duff grow from infancy to determined, sturdy noisy childhood; four years of peace during which she had not thought about Mrs Leander at all. And his letter had forced Tilly to think of her, which was not an agreeable experience.

  But once she had listened to what he had to say, her fear vanished, for there was now no more to fear from the woman who had once had the power to make her so miserable. And she looked at Mr Cobbold and thought about him instead.

  It was clear to her that he had in the past four years become caught up with the fervour of the currently fashionable evangelical movement, and she had at first found it incongruous in a man she remembered as being cheerful and comfortable.

  Then, as a woman who could not share his pleasure in the frequent mention of the hellfire and damnation that seemed to preoccupy him, she became profoundly irritated and no longer responded to those of his comments which derived from his beliefs.

  ‘It was just three months ago, you say?’ she asked. ‘Do you know no more about the circumstances of her death?’

  ‘Only that she died of the most dreadful ravages of the pox. I hesitate even to name the disease under the roof of a respectable and delicate lady like yourself, but you asked me, and I must answer you.’

 
And enjoy having something on which to hang a sermon while you do it, Tilly thought, crossly, and cut in quickly, ‘And she is buried where?’

  ‘In Kensal Green. They drew on a special fund to enable her to escape a pauper’s funeral. I told them that I would not have been so – well, I believe, as you know, that people must take the consequences of their own actions and hers were so evil, so devoted to Satan and all his wiles, that they led her to ignominy and death. They should have left her to the –’

  ‘Who drew on a fund?’ Tilly interrupted and he blinked.

  ‘Who? The hospital. She was sent to St Mary’s Hospital, in Highgate at the Archway, where they specialize in such horrid disorders. The – ahem – people at the house where she lived were concerned only with getting her off their premises so that she would not alarm the other drabsters, or their customers. She was, I am told, a dreadful sight. Covered in blisters and sores and –’

  She shuddered at the relish with which he spoke and held up a hand to silence him. Clearly gratified to have affected her so, he at once apologized copiously for any indelicacy and again she stopped him, sickened at his hypocrisy.

  ‘I cannot understand why it took so long to find the house where she lived,’ she said with some sharpness. ‘I know that Mr Compton told you five years ago that she would almost certainly be living in such a house of assignation – a brothel –’

  Mr Cobbold winced at the word ‘ – And there cannot be so many in London, after all.’

  ‘I lack knowledge of the precise numbers,’ Mr Cobbold said, with an air of great reasonableness. ‘How could one like myself possess such disgraceful information? I had to send out investigators. And since it is always incumbent upon me to use the monies in any legacy carefully, I could not in all conscience disburse large sums on the search. So it took a long time.’

  ‘While of course the money was invested?’ Tilly said, and for the first time the old look of the shrewd man of affairs appeared in Mr Cobbold’s eyes and she knew she had hit the target. They had been using Mrs Leander’s legacy for their own purposes, and had not prosecuted the search for her with any diligence at all; and now she was angry. The woman might have cheated her of her rightful inheritance from her father, but that did not mean these sharp lawyers should be permitted to do the same.