Gates of Paradise

by Beryl Kingston

  There was plenty of work for everybody. Mr Hayley gave countless dinner parties for his visiting friends, Mr Grinder hired another chambermaid and two more potboys and Eddie was offered a job as second ostler at the George and took it happily.

  ‘Be a nice change from just muckin’ out,’ he told his friends at Turret House.

  Betsy wished him luck like everyone else, though privately she thought it was an unwelcome change and would have miserable consequences unless she and Johnnie could persuade the new stable lad to be accommodating. But for the moment the sun was shining, there were haystacks aplenty and, although they had even less time to themselves than usual, at least they had privacy out in the clear air and the warm fields.

  So it was a surprise to everyone when the quarrels began.

  The first was because Reuben Jones stood on a rake and bruised his foot. Ordinarily he would have accepted that he’d been clumsy and joked his pain away, but on this occasion he roared round the farmyard blaming everyone in sight for being ‘such danged fools as to leave the danged thing a-lyin’ about.’

  ‘You might ha’ know’d someone’ud get hisself hurt!’ he yelled.

  ‘With you in the yard,’ his workmates retorted, ‘how could we be off a’ knowin’?’

  At which he grabbed a fork and jabbed at them like a man demented, and they skipped out of his way, laughing and egging him on and driving him to more and more ridiculous excesses, until the farmer arrived to restore order by roaring.

  The second was a stand-up fight between Mr Grinder’s two new potboys, which began in the bar over a tip they were both claiming and yelled into the street where it gathered a cheering crowd. That was a more bloody affair, with split lips, torn knuckles and a broken nose, and it didn’t stop until Mrs Grinder came out in a temper and told them they were worse than a pair of turkey cocks and threw a bucket of cold water over them.

  And then that same afternoon, Mrs Beke removed the new stable lad from her kitchen by his ears and the coachman came storming into the house in high dudgeon and dirty boots to point out that the lad was his responsibility and to advise her to desist if she knew what was good for her. And Mrs Beke declared that she had never been spoken to in such a way in the whole of her life and gave him such a blazing piece of her mind it was a wonder the kitchen didn’t burst into spontaneous conflagration.

  From then on there seemed to be a quarrel every other day. Mrs Haynes said she thought the village was bewitched. ‘I never see such a pack,’ she said. ‘Allus at one another’s throats. I don’t know what’s got into them. You’d think they’d have enough to do without all this carry-on.’

  William Blake certainly had more than enough to do. Now that the ‘Life of Cowper’ had been written – even if it wasn’t entirely to Lady Hesketh’s satisfaction – Mr Hayley had returned to his ballads and had instructed his ‘engraver’ to produce the illustrations for the next four, which he was sure would sell ‘in great quantity’. The drawing of ‘The Elephant’ was already completed and now he was working on ‘The Eagle’, ‘The Lion’ and ‘The Dog’. It was very annoying when what he really wanted to do was to complete his half-written epic ‘Vala’ and begin work on the new poem that was burning his brain with constant fire.

  Unfortunately the ballads didn’t sell at all well, which was a disappointment to both men. Hayley was aggrieved because he felt his excellence was being unaccountably scorned, and Blake was angry. He was the one who had bought the paper for this venture, so he stood to lose his investment, and he hadn’t wanted to illustrate the things in the first place. For the first time since his arrival in the village he spoke out to his patron, accusing him of putting too much work his way and depriving him of the time he needed to work on his own poetry.

  The celebrated poet was considerably put out. As he explained to Mrs Beke afterwards, at some length and with much injured passion, he’d gone to a deal of trouble to persuade his friends to offer Mr Blake commissions, so it was ungrateful and hurtful of him to complain of it, indeed it was. For some weeks the two men were cool with one another and for two weeks Hayley went to breakfast with Miss Poole without his secretary. Then, in July, just when he hoped they were beginning to patch up their differences and they were both breakfasting with Miss Poole again, he was summoned to Bristol to report to Lady Hesketh.

  He travelled with as much support as he could muster – his coachman, naturally, his valet and two of the chambermaids – so he required both carriages, which meant that Johnnie was commandeered to drive the second one, he being more knowledgeable about Mr Hayley’s horses than the new stable lad, who didn’t seem to be knowledgeable about anything except porter. The arrangement didn’t suit the stable lad, who went about his labours in a black sulk, and it didn’t suit Betsy either. She said she couldn’t see the necessity for two carriages and sighed and complained until Johnnie kissed her and promised he’d be back like greased lightning.

  In fact they were gone for ten days and she missed him miserably on every single one of them. What was the good of all that sunshine if she couldn’t be out in the fields with her darling?

  Mr and Mrs Blake, on the other hand, were glad of warm weather. Catherine’s knees didn’t ache so much when the sun shone and William could enjoy his rides to Lavant to take breakfast with Miss Poole. When Hayley announced his impending visit to Bristol, he assumed that the breakfasts would be put into abeyance until his return, but Miss Poole had another opinion of it. ‘You must come without him,’ she said to Blake. ‘I must have company of a morning, and he’ll not mind, will you Mr Hayley.’

  So the new stable boy was left instructions and managed to saddle Bruno on his own and to lead him out to the mounting block as if he’d been doing such things all his life and William took an easy ride to Lavant to keep the lady company. It was one of the most pleasant meals they’d taken together for they talked of poetry throughout and of William’s poetry in particular.

  ‘I have heard so much about Mr Hayley’s ‘Life of Cowper’ and his collection of ballads,’ she said, ‘but very little about your work, Mr Blake.’

  ‘I fear I have written very little of late,’ he had to confess.

  She pressed him. ‘But something, I am sure,’ she said, ‘for I cannot believe that your talents are without expression of any kind.’

  So he told her about the poem he’d been writing before he came to Sussex and tried to explain what it was about. ‘’Tis the story of mankind and the manner in which our lives are passed here on earth,’ he said, ‘an account of our hopes and despairs, our trials, our triumphs and disappointments.’ The explanation didn’t satisfy him, for it was too brief and over-simplified, but she understood it well enough to question him.

  ‘Then you are writing an epic, are you not?’

  He agreed that he was.

  ‘Mr Hayley is of the opinion that the epic is the highest form of literature,’ she said, ‘as he has doubtless told you. I take it that your story is written in the mythological style.’ And when he told her that it was, she urged him to explain the major figures to her. ‘I have heard much about the great mythologies, naturally,’ she said, ‘the gods of Greece and Rome. Do these appear in your epic, or do you use the Christian mythology?’

  ‘Neither, ma’am,’ Blake told her and added with pride, ‘I have minted a new mythology of my own.’

  She was surprised and impressed. ‘Have you so?’ she said. ‘In that case, you have set yourself a mighty task.’

  So he told her about Vala, ‘who is the eternal female, a goddess of beauty and nature, the lily of the desert, veiled in beauty and yet wearing the veil of moral virtue, which is woven by laws.’

  ‘Which is why you have called her ‘Veil-a’.’

  ‘Exactly so but I spell it VALA.’

  ‘A woman of great beauty and moral virtue,’ Miss Poole said, leaning her chin on her hand, as she considered what he had said. ‘She sounds a magnificent creature. Does she represent truth and goodness, too? Is she the p
attern of perfection?’

  They had reached the heart of his thinking. ‘No, ma’am,’ he said. ‘She is composed of contraries, as we all are. I do not believe in opposites, Miss Poole. There is no right and wrong for me, no good and evil. To think that is to distort the truth. We are all things at once, love and hatred, kindness and cruelty, pleasure and pain, never all good, never all bad. I try to reflect that condition in everything I write.’

  ‘’Tis a dangerous doctrine, Mr Blake,’ she said smiling at him, ‘and there are many who would take exception to it, especially among the clergy.’

  ‘I know it,’ he said, smiling back. ‘But I must write what I know to be true.’

  ‘Is there a god, Mr Blake, to match your veiled goddess?’

  ‘There is.’

  ‘Composed of contraries, too, no doubt. What do you call him?’

  ‘His name is Lover,’ he told her. ‘But not spelt as you would expect. I have spelt him L U V A H, to show that love is delight and despair, pleasure and pain, selfish and unselfish and all shades between.’

  ‘The clod and the pebble,’ she said, remembering.

  Their conversation continued for another hour after the meal was over, which was most unusual. ‘We will talk again on Friday,’ she promised when they finally parted. ‘You must bring me what is written of your great epic and read it to me. I should like to hear it.’

  He was ecstatic to have found such understanding and returned home in a state of such euphoria he fairly bounded through the wicket gate into his garden. The two Catherines had spent the morning hard at work washing the dirty linen and when he arrived they were out in the garden draping the wet clothes over the walls and bushes to dry.

  ‘’Twas a pleasant visit, I see,’ his wife observed, hanging his shirt on the flint wall, where it dangled an inch above the young corn like a man in a faint.

  ‘Our lady Paulina,’ he said, calling her by Hayley’s pet name for her, ‘is a woman of quite splendid intelligence. She has asked to see all that I have written of ‘Vala’.’

  She did even better than that. For when he returned for their second tête-à-tête, she told him very firmly that he must complete his great work. ‘’Tis insupportable that poetry of such quality be left unfinished,’ she said. ‘I trust you will return to it at the very first opportunity.’

  He returned to it that very afternoon, using the unsold copies of Mr Hayley’s ballads as rough paper, and working with such speed and satisfaction that it was all he could do to absent himself from his mythical lovers for long enough to eat his supper.

  His sister made her wry grimace. ‘’Tis as well I leave you tomorrow,’ she said to Catherine, ‘for he’ll be monstrous company ‘til that’s done. We shan’t have a word out of him.’

  His wife was surprised when he walked his sister into Lavant the next day without a word of complaint and kissed her goodbye quite fondly, but he made up for his restraint on the way home, complaining bitterly that he’d lost a morning’s work and that every moment was precious. ‘My tormentor could be home tomorrow,’ he said, ‘and if that is the case, I shall be dragged back to his engravings and there won’t be a word written for weeks.’

  But as it turned out he had another four days of freedom and by the time the two Hayley carriages bedraggled back to Turret House, a very great deal had been written.

  Chapter Twelve

  August 1802

  William Hayley was in high good humour when he got back to Felpham after his visit to Bristol. The ‘Life of Cowper’ was selling well and had received ecstatic reviews and Lady Hesketh was satisfied at last.

  ‘It is well thought of, you see,’ he said to Blake, as they set off to Lavant for their next breakfast with Miss Poole. ‘A fine work. Paulina will be pleased.’

  She praised him fulsomely, as he expected, and said that it was no more than he deserved. Then she praised Blake too, when he’d told her how much progress he was making with his work. ‘He is composing an epic, Mr Hayley,’ she said.

  ‘I am glad to hear it,’ Hayley said generously. ‘The epic is the highest literary form known to man.’

  Unfortunately, it wasn’t quite high enough to take precedence over his next commission. Later that morning, when they were back at Turret House, he asked Blake to join him in the library for a few minutes before his return to the cottage and, once there, told him he had an excellent commission for him. Lady Hesketh, ‘a woman of exquisite taste and ever mindful to enhance my reputation’ had suggested that he should produce another edition of his famous poem ‘The Triumphs of Temper’. ‘Her advice is sound,’ he said, ‘so I shall comply with her wishes. Naturally, my dear friend, you are just the man to provide fresh illustrations.’

  To his credit his dear friend didn’t rage or argue, much though he wanted to, but accepted the commission with as good a grace as he could summon up. A new design would pay well and it would give him scope to draw an original figure or two, which would be no bad thing. But to his chagrin he discovered that six designs had already been chosen. All that he was required to do was to copy and engrave them. Even then he kept his nervous fear under control and merely asked the name of the artist who had drawn the originals. It was a crushing blow to be told that it was Maria, the sister of their mutual friend, Mr Flaxman, a pleasant enough woman, as he knew having met her, but one with no artistic talent whatsoever. He received the information like the insult it was.

  ‘You try me too hard,’ he said to Mr Hayley. ‘Indeed you do, sir. ’Tis not to be borne.’

  ‘I provide you with gainful employment,’ Mr Hayley pointed out, his face stiff with displeasure. ‘Which you would do well to remember.’

  The rebuke provoked an outburst of anger. ‘How can I forget when I am burdened on every side?’ Blake cried. ‘I labour for you day and night, sir. I have no time to call my own. ’Tis the devil’s work to treat me so.’

  It was a long quarrel and a very loud one. The household walked on tiptoe and held its breath so as not to miss a word. And that night in The Fox it was rehearsed and savoured with great enjoyment. ‘At it hammer an’ tongs they was,’ Mr Hosier reported. ‘I could hear ’em out in the garden.’

  ‘Who’d ha’ thought our mad poet would go off like that?’ Mr Cosens asked, puffing smoke. ‘I allus thought he was a mild sort a’ man.’

  ‘Oi would,’ Reuben said, nodding knowledgeably. ‘Oi knew he was a firebrand first time Oi see him. You can tell by that oiye of his’n. That’s the fiercest oiye Oi ever see. Loike a sabre.’

  ‘He got a good pair a’ shoulders on him,’ Mr Haynes observed, ‘what’s more to the mark if you’re a-fightin’. If it come to fisticuffs I’d back him against anybody.’

  But a fierce eye and a pair of broad shoulders were no help to Mr Blake in his present predicament. He could rage all he liked and put his tongue to every bit of low abuse he could bring to mind, but the engravings had to be done. He was short of money now that the ballads weren’t selling and even as anger swelled in his brain he knew he had no option but to do as he was bid. It was corrosive knowledge. Two days after the quarrel he took a fever and was ill for more than a fortnight. And when he finally struggled from his bed and declared that he was ready to work again, Maria’s wretched drawings lay on his round table to taunt him.

  ‘’Tis beyond endurance,’ he said to Catherine as he prepared the first plate. ‘I have neither the energy nor the will for it. And now here’s September come and neither of us well.’

  But no matter how he felt the work had to be completed. He laboured miserably as darkness seeped into the cottage and the cold air chilled his bones. It was late October before even two engravings were finished and he knew they were poorly produced and would print badly. How could it be otherwise when the originals were so clumsily drawn? He trudged them up to Turret House, hunched against a north-east wind, knowing he had taken too long with them, feeling cold and crabby and determined to be justified in his anger. And was then given even greater justifica
tion when the prints were taken from him at the door and he was not invited in.

  ‘You see how it is,’ he said to Catherine on his return. ‘You see how he treats me.’ He was white with fury, his blue eyes blazing. ‘’Tis not to be endured.’

  But he had to endure it just the same. He had no choice.

  The weeks passed and the quarrel dragged on. There were no more rides to Lavant and the comfort of Lady Paulina, no evenings in the library studying Greek and Latin – not that he could have expected such a thing after such harsh words had been exchanged – worse still, no news of any other commissions to keep him going through the winter. He had made a grievous mistake and now he was paying for it, betrayed by his own terrible nervous fear, caught up in the perpetual dilemma of any artist, with time to write his own poetry but with no money to clothe them and keep them fed.

  His inability to provide for them was anguish to him and Catherine, watching as he scowled and sweated over his great work in a room half lit and poorly heated, knew it and grieved for him. In the end she put on her bonnet, pulled up the collar of her greatcoat and walked up the lane to see if a gentle approach would mollify their powerful neighbour.

  He received her politely but was beyond mollification. He would, he said, endeavour to procure such commissions as he could for her husband, since he had given his word to Mr Flaxman that he would be a helpful patron and he had always been a man of his word, but he was of the opinion that they would be better advised to keep a sensible distance between them. ‘I am a man of extreme sensitivities,’ he told her, ‘and was much hurt by your husband’s belligerent attitude.’