by Ann Harries
As Joubert attempted to explain the features of K’ang Hsi to me, his eyes vivid blue in their clear whites, I had a curiously energising vision of the young man dancing bare-footed upon a far-off shore, where monkeys swung on mango trees and flamingos strutted through the waves, a perfect Ming vase in his upraised, exultant hand. Indeed, such was the energy pulsing from his restless body that I feared he might at any minute feel obliged to cartwheel across the floor.
‘Do let me join you, Wills,’ murmured a voice behind me. Milner edged his way between us, as if hoping that we might conceal him completely. I have spent the last twenty minutes discussing the infallibility of the Pope with the Jesuit chief of Central Africa. Have you seen the tea and coffee service he has given our host? – entirely covered in dead gold by a process known only in his monastery, giving it the appearance of solid metal. No doubt each is squaring the other for reasons we shall understand only when it is too late. I’m so sorry to interrupt your animated conversation.’
‘Have you met Mr Joubert?’ I enquired, feeling for the envelope in my breast pocket and wondering how to get rid of the young man who had become awed into sudden silence by the august presence which had descended upon him. But he remained solidly put, his half-open mouth revealing his faultless teeth.
‘I recently spent the weekend at Petworth, where the Duchess of Somerset has a most extraordinary closet of china,’ gabbled Milner, after nodding at Joubert. ‘Seven vast blue-and-white vases from the K’ang Hsi period – I don’t see anything here on the same scale. I remember as a child in Germany hearing how Augustus the Strong of Saxony exchanged a whole regiment of dragoons with the King of Prussia for six such vases!’
‘Joubert was about to test me on which is Delft and which from China or Japan,’ I heard myself improvising. ‘He is quite the expert.’
‘Ah, now, let me see.’ Milner drew on his cigarette and directed his hooded gaze at the blue-and-white crockery. ‘Now, that I would say is early K’ang Hsi, because the blue still has overtones of grey, whereas …’ And for a full five minutes he held forth on the precise origins of every jug and jar, dismissing the Delft (some of which, to my eyes, seemed very fine) and causing Joubert’s jaw to drop even further. Finally he angled his head kindly towards the young man. ‘Am I right?’
Joubert’s tanned face flooded with admiration. ‘Oh, yes, sir. You obviously know far more about china than I ever shall.’
‘We once had a friend, did we not, Wills, who famously aspired to the condition of his Sèvres china. I suppose you could say that he fulfilled his ambition too well, and became a broken man as a consequence.’
‘Someone you know wanted to become a piece of china?’ Joubert’s voice was full of good-humoured disbelief. I noticed his Dutch colonial inflections for the first time.
‘The pernicious influence of Pater, I’m afraid.’ Milner turned to smile at the innocent young secretary. ‘Something which I’m glad to say you appear to have entirely evaded, Mr Joubert.’
Our host’s voice arched like a rocket through the silence that followed this observation. ‘Wills! You are hiding! There is someone I want you to meet!’
The Colossus was looking rather distinguished, having made the effort to change into a formal dinner jacket and tie, which, together with a pair of well-cut trousers, had a decidedly slimming effect on his great bulk. Even his hair was combed and oiled flat upon his head. His mood was ebullient as he thumped his enormous hand on to my shoulder and withdrew me, as if I were a book upon a shelf. Milner at once slid away, while Joubert rushed to join a gaggle of inebriated secretaries.
‘Or should I say,’ continued the Colossus in his excited, soprano voice, ‘there’s someone who wants to meet you. Don’t try to escape, there’s a good man!’ – as I followed Milner with my eyes.
We were approaching a group of men and women who had gathered in a circle around a slight, vivacious man. The women, who included among their number the breakfast mother and daughter, twisted their necks and corseted bodies in an attempt to gain the little man’s attention, while the men spoke to him in respectful tones, their eyes gleaming. My host ploughed through this company as if it were froth or foam, and laid his other hand on the small man’s shoulder. ‘This is my friend, Dr Jameson,’ he said to me proudly. ‘Dr Jameson – Professor Wills.’
Jameson’s eyes were large pools of transparent hazel. His face appeared to be absolutely symmetrical, the right side the mirror image of the left, as if fashioned in a machine. So frank and open were his facial features that the onlooker was left without a purchase on which to settle: no irregularity of any sort offered itself for inspection. I found my gaze sliding about the broad dome of his forehead and his wide cheeks, avoiding those limpid eyes that, for some reason, were examining my person with undisguised interest. For a moment he did not respond to his friend’s introduction, but allowed his stare – for by now the interest in his eyes had reached an uncomfortable intensity – to travel to my shoes and back to my own eyes. Then his lips split apart beneath his moustache into a brilliant, triangular smile, the reckless smile of the devil-may-care, irresistible to men and women alike.
‘How d’ye do, Wills,’ he said. ‘You must be relieved there are no dogs in this house.’
Even as my brain tried to make sense of this curious remark, I felt my heart perform a somersault at the mere mention of my private phobia. How did this neat little man know that I have only to see a pampered lap-dog upon his mistress’s knee for the perspiration to burst from my brow in fat, wet buds?
My knees began to buckle; the blood to drain from my face. I was aware that Jameson’s circle of admirers had melted away and that the Colossus loomed over me, genial but expectant. In the absence of a rejoinder from me (it was all I could do to remain upright), he gave a kind of preliminary whine and exclaimed: ‘Extraordinary! How on earth do you do it, my dear Jameson?’
I could now detect a certain patness in this response and realised I was their plaything.
‘Elementary, my dear Watson,’ replied the doctor. ‘A glance at Professor Wills’ right hand told me that in his youth he had been savaged by a small dog: the scars are almost imperceptible, but visible, none the less, to a physician’s eye. A closer look at his face revealed further small scars beneath his beard, which I assume the Professor has grown to hide these minute blemishes. To be bitten on the cheeks by a dog of whatever size will inevitably induce a fear of further attacks that in the end will become unreasonable – though understandable.’
My face flooded with colour and I felt able to speak. ‘Your deductions are absolutely accurate,’ I admitted. ‘For the reasons you have given, it is indeed a relief to me that I do not have to encounter dogs in this household.’ In fact, my physician had made full enquiries into this possibility before I would agree to undertake the songbird project.
‘I think we have enough animals on the estate as it is,’ smiled the Colossus, visibly delighted by his friend’s astuteness. ‘I like to see my pets in their original, wild state, roaming free and unspoilt by the hand of man. But now I shall leave you two gentlemen as I see I am wanted by Father McVlellan.’ He withdrew, and I felt suddenly exposed, as if a great tree had vanished from beside me. Jameson, a mere sapling, was reluctant to relinquish the topic of his deductive prowess. He puffed on a rather large cigar.
‘I’m simply using the techniques of Conan Doyle’s tutor, Dr Bell, at Edinburgh; my tutor as well, as it happens. His method was simply to make the medical students study their patients in silence before enquiring about their ailments, so that the students could recognise this one as a left-handed tailor or that one as a retired guardsman who had served in Barbados. As a result, I pride myself that my powers of accurate observation are almost as good as Sherlock Holmes’s!’ He took another puff of his cigar, undeterred by my silence. ‘I go so far as to say that I am able to read precisely the train of thoughts that pass through my good friend’s brain simply by watching his features work while he is seated
in a state of reverie.’ He blew out an immense stream of blue smoke that he had somehow retained in his lungs during this last utterance. ‘You have no doubt read The Adventure of the Cardboard Box, one of Doyle’s best. In this story Holmes amazes Watson by his ability to read the good doctor’s thoughts, simply by observing the movements of his eyes from the newspaper to the pictures on the wall, and the changes of expression that took place during those movements. I can honestly say that I have only to look at my friend’s eyes, and then follow his gaze, to know almost exactly what he is thinking.’ Jameson laughed briefly. ‘Ironically, he likes to think that he is Holmes to my Watson. For a man of his state of ill-health, it is essential to humour him. He loves to play his little games, to guess where I have just been, or the occupations and predilections of unfamiliar guests who arrive in this house.’
I was watching Jameson as carefully as he was watching me. As the words spilled from his neat mouth I found myself beginning to vibrate with the restlessness, the nervous energy, that lay beneath his air of garrulous bonhomie, and that caused him – and me – to startle with every sudden noise, to flex unseen leg and arm muscles, to glance at both clock and human faces even as he tried to fix me with his own powerful gaze. And within those brilliant eyes, that vigorous frame, at last drifted upwards, intangible as fragrance, a fatal exhaustion, a morbidity, an aura of failure which permeated even the brightest smile.
I nodded, and even ventured some mild congratulation.
He continued: ‘My friend believes your nightingales will restore to him the gift of youth – or immortality. As a medical doctor, I cannot of course support this view.’
I replied as calmly as I could: ‘I am merely a supervisor of songbirds. Their song has no medicinal – or magical – property known to me.’
His eyes were following the arrival of a woman who had caused some considerable stir. I recognised her at once as the woman who had helped me find my way through the corridors that morning.
Mrs Kipling was by far the plainest woman in the room, and made no attempt to erase the hard vertical line between her brows with the kind of false smile that stretched the lips of the other female guests. Instead she bustled straight up to her husband and, after a brief nod at the other gentlemen, began murmuring to him in low, urgent tones.
‘That woman can’t stand the sight of me,’ said Jameson, unexpectedly. ‘One of her children is ill, and will she call me in? Not on your life. Now Daddy will have to go up and tell stories instead.’
Sure enough Kipling immediately left the room, while his wife remained with our host, who seemed relaxed enough in her company. (I had watched him twitch horribly while conversing with the flirtatious women.) Jameson’s eyes were cold as he watched her smile calmly at the great man’s sallies. ‘He’s building a house nearby for them to stay in during the summer. A writer’s residence.’
‘Ah.’ When would he get to the point? I made my restlessness visible by rotating first one, then the other, shoulder.
He cleared his throat briskly. ‘I don’t know if you happen to know that a few years ago I spent a short period in Holloway prison – detained at Her Majesty’s pleasure, if you like. An interesting experience, curtailed by gallstones.’ He cleared his throat again.
I raised my eyebrows. Jameson’s cigar had become a cylinder of ash.
‘I stayed in a common criminal’s cell. Graffiti covered the walls. I read it avidly. In among the illiterate scrawl, a chain of initials stood out, clearly written by a person of letters. O.F.O.F.W.W. The initials were followed by four lines of verse. I later learned that Mr Wilde had occupied my cell between his trials, less than a year before.’ Jameson placed the dead cigar between his lips and struck a match. ‘Our host tells me he is your friend.’
‘Do you remember the lines?’ I asked carefully.
Jameson laughed amidst plumes of smoke. ‘Remember them! Why, they kept me going in my darkest days. I learned them off by heart.’
‘Could you repeat them to me?’
Jameson cast his eyes about to ensure that no one was eavesdropping; then, in a low voice, uttered these lines:
‘Who never ate his bread in sorrow,
Who never spent the midnight hours
Weeping and waiting for the morrow –
He knows you not, ye heavenly powers.’
‘Goethe,’ I said. ‘Oscar repeated those very lines in his De Profundis.’
‘I too could have written a De Profundis,’ said Jameson rapidly. ‘Do not for one moment think that the so-called hero-worship I now receive in any way compensates for the catastrophe of my life. Kipling simply got it wrong – I’ve long ago lost my heart, nerve and sinew, though perhaps I haven’t yet lost the common touch!’
Gusts of laughter rose from a nearby group. Orpheus swirled a silver tray of sherry between Jameson and me. He continued: ‘It’s a relief to talk about this. In England, people walked out of the room if you mentioned your friend’s name. Did you know the man who prosecuted him – ruined him, more like – was my defence?’
‘Ah, Carson, the Irishman. He was at Trinity with Oscar before he went up to Oxford. At first we thought this might be an advantage.’
Jameson was overcome. He looked downwards and agitated his head, as if trying to shake loose a thought. Finally he raised his face, his eyes full of confusion. ‘You know what I think, Wills? I think: it’s a bloody small world!’
In response to which observation (or so it seemed to my overtaxed imagination) Huxley struck one of the Javanese gongs and announced that dinner was served. The flirtatious mother became clamped to my unwilling arm, but she had no eyes for me. A sleek little man escorted her daughter and was engaged in the energetic task of twisting his moustache suggestively at both women, and ravishing them with his fiery eyes.
‘Good heavens!’ I exclaimed as the doors closed behind us. ‘It’s Frank Harris!’
London 1885
Only once did Oscar attempt to intrude upon the asceticism which has been so distinctive a feature of my life: it was upon this occasion that I met Frank Harris for the first time.
I had been invited to dinner at the Wildes’ House Beautiful in Chelsea, and accepted the invitation on condition that no one other than his wife, Constance, should be there. The visit was not to be a success.
On arriving, I could tell at once that my friend’s extravagant décor would upset my digestion: the Moorish flamboyance of the library with its blue and gold walls, heavily adorned ottomans, Aladdin lamps and exotic hangings made my stomach palpitate with fear of foreign cuisine. A reproduction of Oscar’s favourite martyr, Saint Sebastian, pierced with arrows, his head twisted improbably to expose his manly neck, hung in the hallway, surrounded by candles, while the dining-room, with its endless swathes of white curtains embroidered in white silk, had the curious effect of resurrecting my bed-ridden childhood.
On top of this, Constance was heavily pregnant, and Oscar could not bring himself to look at her. Indeed, her boyish, sprightly figure, hidden though it was within brilliant fabrics which hung, Grecian-style, from her shoulders, seemed forever lost. Yet ironically, Oscar’s girth was greater than hers: his jowls flabby; his cheeks puffy through physical sloth. But the incandescent fancies and paradoxes which permeated his conversation overrode these physical considerations so that I sat torn between enchantment and revulsion throughout the meal.
However, it was plain that Oscar had another appointment later in the evening which interested him more than dining at home (thankfully, on plain boiled food, as I had requested) with his wife and old friend. His eyes kept straying to the Louis-Quinze clock surrounded by his blue china of Oxford fame, and he grew tetchy as Constance, apparently a founder member of the Anti-Tight Lacing League, embarked on a lecture concerning the curse of the corset. She informed us that even after her pregnancy she would continue to wear loose, hanging garments without bustles and the like. Her remarks were directed very largely at her husband, who had strong views on this topic, hav
ing once edited a women’s magazine, but who refused to meet her pleading eye, gazing at me instead, with sardonic humour. Finally she turned to me.
‘Do you know, Francis, there is a general belief that women breathe only from the chest, so it doesn’t matter if their abdomens are held in a vice?’
Never in my life had I heard a series of words uttered with such sudden fervour, as if their meaning was something quite other. Oscar spread his purple lips into a polite smile, his fingers fluttering across his mouth to hide the blackened teeth, and drawled, while examining the variety of rings on his fingers: ‘Well, my dear, not even a vice could hold in your abdomen at the moment. Besides, fashion has decreed that the waist is not a delicate curve but an abrupt right angle in the middle of the body. But we can take heart from the fact that fashion is merely a form of ugliness so unbearable that we are compelled to alter it every six months.’
I believe we rose from the table there and then, leaving Constance to run her hands across the mound beneath her Grecian robe, rocking her torso as if the babe were already in her arms.
In fact I was spending the weekend with Mr James and Elspeth in their Battersea home, and now looked forward to the sanctuary of 147 Lavender Hill, where Elspeth was no doubt at that very moment placing an earthenware hot-water bottle between my sheets. But, having thrown myself with some relief into the Wilde carriage, I was alarmed to note that the route we were taking to Battersea – which should have been a simple trip over Chelsea Bridge – had become absurdly circuitous. The bright lights and bustling crowds of Piccadilly, even at that late hour, were far removed from the quiet environs of my foster-parents’ house; somewhat sharply I enquired of Oscar the reason for this diversion.
