Beauty in Thorns

by Kate Forsyth

  It had all begun after their summer at Kelmscott Manor. An unknown critic had written a review of Gabriel’s book of poems, calling it the ‘Fleshly School of Poetry’. At first Gabriel had laughed it off, and made jokes. Then it turned out it was some old enemy called Robert Buchanan who had written the review under a pseudonym. Gabriel had been furious, and spent hours writing up a response. He’d paced about, reading it aloud to Janey and begging for her opinion. Janey had been sure he should not respond. She had always believed that old saying that silence was golden. It was like trying to bridle a runaway horse, however. Gabriel was determined to have his say.

  His response was published before Christmas. Gabriel called it ‘The Stealthy School of Criticism’. Everyone had thought it was very clever and funny, and they’d clinked their glasses and cheered him.

  Then, in May, Mr Buchanan republished his review as a pamphlet printed on flesh-coloured paper. All the papers began to publish extracts from the pamphlet, and write articles quoting it, adding their own voices and opinions. Gabriel began to think it was a conspiracy, to destroy his reputation and drag him down.

  Flushed and excited, Gabriel had read out bits from the newspapers to her. ‘“But honest plainness of speech is not the characteristic of the Fleshly School …” See, everyone’s calling us the Fleshly School now. It’s stuck! I knew it would. “It is their sickly self-consciousness, their emasculated delight in brooding over and toying with matters which healthy, manly men put out of their thoughts …” Emasculated! It is as if he knows about my swollen testicle, and is mocking me.’

  ‘Surely not,’ Janey had murmured. ‘How could they know?’

  ‘Someone’s spying on me … leaking it all to the press.’

  She had stared at him in troubled amazement. ‘But who? And why?’

  The newspaper shook in his hands. ‘Just listen! I’ll prove it to you.’ He read out loud: ‘“It is, in short, their utter unmanliness which is at once so disgusting …” Unmanliness! Again. And, oh! Listen to this! “With Mr Rossetti the shutters seem to be always closed, the blinds down, there are candles for sunshine, and the atmosphere is of a close heavy kind that reminds one alternately of the sick-room and the conservatory.” You cannot tell me that the writer has not been spying on me!’

  ‘Well, you do keep all the curtains drawn,’ Janey said. ‘Anyone walking past can see that.’

  ‘My eyes! My eyes! The light hurts my eyes!’

  ‘I know, I know,’ Janey had said soothingly.

  Gabriel came over and caught her hands in his so tightly, she winced. ‘Janey, you don’t understand. I think Buchanan is hinting at our affair. And in the most awful of ways.’

  Janey stared at him, her throat tight.

  Gabriel gave her the pamphlet to read, pointing with a trembling finger at a few paragraphs. Janey read silently: ‘I cannot forbear expressing my wonder, by the way, at the kind of women whom it seems the unhappy lot of these gentlemen to encounter. I have lived as long in the world as they have, but never yet come across persons of the other sex who conduct themselves in the manner described. Females who bite, scratch, scream, bubble, munch, sweat, writhe, twist, wriggle, foam, and in a general way slaver over their lovers, must surely possess some extraordinary qualities to counteract their otherwise most offensive mode of conducting themselves.’

  Janey felt sick. Carefully she laid the paper down. ‘We cannot see each other for a while. Not till the gossip has died down.’

  In her head, words were shrieking about like frightened bats. What if her daughters overheard someone talking? What if a gutter journalist named her? She would be ruined, Topsy would be ruined.

  ‘No!’ Gabriel caught her hands. ‘Janey, you can’t mean it. Please! You are the one good thing … the only thing keeping me from going mad … Don’t abandon me … don’t leave me alone …’

  Janey had pressed his hands close to her cheek, unable to speak. Eventually, though, she had to rise and go home and listen to her daughters’ lessons and pretend that all was well. And she had been staunch in refusing to see Gabriel for a while, even though she had longed for him.

  She had hoped the rumours and gossip would die down.

  But now this.

  Surely Gabriel could not really be mad? It was just his vehement Italian nature, his propensity for hyperbole, his love of drama. These cold-blooded Englishmen disliked such violence, such fervency. They did not understand him.

  ‘It’s not true,’ she said. ‘They’re just jealous of his genius … they want to tear him down … he’ll show them.’

  Topsy kicked her embroidery again and went out, slamming the door behind him.

  Janey was restless and unhappy the next few days. She wrote to Gabriel several times but tore up the letters and flung them on the fire. She read all the newspapers, her heart bruised by the innuendo.

  A few days later, Mr Scott called at the house and asked to see Janey. Topsy was at work, and Janey busy playing tea parties with the girls. She hesitated, then nodded that he should be admitted. Asking the girls to go up to the nursery, she settled herself on the couch and picked up her embroidery.

  Mr Scott was a florid-faced man with a rather noticeable hairpiece covering the bald dome of his head and a waistcoat straining at the buttons. Every line of his face and body spoke of his dislike and disapproval of her.

  ‘Mrs Morris, I apologise for disturbing you. I … have a rather unpleasant duty to discharge.’

  ‘Yes?’ she asked coolly.

  ‘Are you aware that Gabriel has been … suffering some delusions?’

  ‘So my husband informed me.’ Janey carefully set another stitch.

  ‘We took him to Roehampton last Thursday, hoping that the country air and the quiet would help. It was a terrible journey. Gabriel kept … hearing things … bells. He kept banging on the roof of the cab with his stick. We tried to keep him quiet, but to no avail. Then, the next day, he … there is no easy way to describe this. He saw some gypsies carrying a banner. It was Whitsun, you see. He thought they were setting up a gibbet. To hang him. He attacked them.’

  Janey closed her eyes for a moment.

  ‘We had to drag him back into the house. The gypsies … we were lucky not to have started a riot.’

  He waited a moment, as if expecting Janey to make some comment. She did not look at him, but down at her embroidery. Her hands were shaking. She closed one upon the other.

  ‘That night … that night Gabriel heard voices whispering to him. He says they said insupportable things to him.’

  Janey braced herself.

  In a harsh voice, Mr Scott went on. ‘Gabriel could not bear it. He drank a whole bottle of laudanum.’

  She gasped. ‘What? No!’

  He leant forward, as if pleased to have provoked a response. ‘Yes, he did. A whole bottle. No-one realised, though. Poor William was so relieved that his brother was sleeping at last that he did not try to rouse him. It was not till it was after four that William thought to check on him. He called the doctor, then went to collect his mother and sister so they could be there at the end.’

  Janey could not move even a finger, or snatch even the faintest breath. Her eyes were fixed on Mr Scott’s.

  After a long moment, he went on, speaking in a voice of cold politeness. ‘You will be glad to hear, Mrs Morris, that the doctor found the laudanum bottle and knew what to do. He administered black coffee and ammonia till at last Gabriel was awakened.’

  Janey sucked in a breath. She felt so sick and giddy she had to put a hand on the arm of the sofa to steady herself.

  ‘Is he … is he …’ She could not manage the words, and so she closed her mouth and said nothing.

  ‘He is weak down all one side of his body,’ Mr Scott said. ‘And very wild and unhappy in his thoughts. He shall need to be watched carefully. His mother thinks he should be committed to the care of an asylum. And poor William is at his wits’ end trying to deal with his affairs. Apparently they are in some disorder.
’

  Let me watch him! Janey wanted to sob. Let me care for him!

  She did not speak.

  ‘We think it best to take him far away from London. For some reason, he is asking for you. He will not agree to go away until he has seen you. I am here to request you to be most circumspect in your approach to him. Any … hint of strong emotion … could be enough to tip him over the edge again.’

  ‘So I … I can come and see him?’

  ‘Tomorrow, if that suits.’

  Janey picked up her embroidery again, set a stitch so large and wild it would need to be unpicked. ‘Of course,’ she said colourlessly. ‘Shall I come early afternoon?’

  Mr Scott stood up. ‘That would suit admirably.’

  Janey would not allow herself to break down until she knew he was gone. Then she sank to the floor, utterly undone. To think of Gabriel, the most brilliant of men, attacking cab drivers and gypsies, drinking laudanum. Laudanum! The drug that had killed Lizzie. What had the voices in the night said, to drive him to try to take his own life?

  Murderer? Adulterer? Cuckolder?

  Fool, failure, flop?

  The next day Topsy took her to see Gabriel.

  He was lying on the couch, pale and haggard. His hands shook.

  The room was full of people. His brother William. Bruno. Mr Scott, damn his holier-than-thou air. Gabriel’s studio assistant, Mr Dunn. Doctors.

  They all stared at Janey as she came in. She shrank back, but then steeled her spine. She must give them no cause for gossip.

  Gabriel’s face lit up at the sight of her. It was one of the things she had always loved most about him. But Janey dared not show her own joy at the sight of him.

  She sat down. ‘So sorry to hear you’ve been unwell,’ she heard herself say.

  ‘I wanted you, Janey. Why didn’t you come?’

  She bent her head. ‘I knew you were in good hands.’

  ‘Good hands! Oh, yes, the very best. But I wanted yours.’

  She wanted to tell him that they had forbidden her to come. That she had longed to be with him, looking after him, shielding him from all that hurt him. But it was impossible.

  She heard herself say, as one would to a bare acquaintance: ‘I do hope you are feeling better soon.’

  Afterwards, she poured out her heart to him in a letter, incoherently trying to explain herself and begging his pardon. She had no answer. She wrote again and again, but never heard a word.

  Janey suspected her letters were not being delivered. She had confirmation of this, two months later, when Gabriel’s doctor wrote to her, very coldly, and said that Mr Rossetti had insisted on writing to her and would not be calm till he knew she had received his letter. ‘I must insist that you send your response to me so that I may be sure it does no harm.’

  As Janey wrote, she had to wipe away the tears that fell thick and fast. Yet her strongest emotion was anger. Because she was a woman … because she was an ostler’s daughter … because she was married to another … because she had dared to flout their stupid rules … rules they were free to flout as it pleased them because they were men … because she was a woman who wanted … because …

  Gabriel had written in his letter: You are the one necessary person to me …

  Janey wrote as coolly and carefully as she could, so her letter would be delivered. But at the end she said, with all of her heart: As you are to me.

  It was late September before Gabriel came to Kelmscott. The elms were flaming with autumn colour, and the willows were yellow. He came with a young man called George Hake, the son of one of his doctors. It took Janey only a few moments to understand that young Mr Hake was there to act as spy.

  She and Gabriel could do no more than clasp hands, exchange greetings. Jenny and May were jumping about enthusiastically, showing Gabriel their new treasures – a blown robin’s egg, shiny brown conkers, the fragile skeleton of a leaf.

  Gabriel looked tired, but he smiled and seemed glad to be there. It smote Janey’s heart to see how he needed a stick to walk. She made him as comfortable as she could, though he did not want tea but asked her to bring him the whisky decanter. With Mr Hake listening to every word, they made polite conversation.

  The young man went out of the room for a moment, and at once Janey went to Gabriel and sank to her knees beside him and kissed the back of his hand. ‘I am so sorry. I wrote, I truly did, and I tried to see you. They would not let me.’

  A strange look contorted his face. ‘It is hard to know who to trust. They are all in a conspiracy, you know. They seek to drag me down.’

  She sat back on her heels. ‘You can trust me, Gabriel.’

  ‘If only …’ he murmured. ‘If only …’

  She did not know what he meant and she could not ask. Mr Hake’s quick footsteps coming along the hall. She had to rise and return to her seat, and pretend to be sewing, with her questions choking in her throat.

  Gabriel drank a lot at dinner, and then settled down to play draughts with George Hake. He kept the decanter of whisky at his elbow.

  All Janey wanted was to hold him in her arms, and be sure that all was well again. But there was no chance to be together. George Hake did not leave them alone for a moment. Eventually Janey went to bed, hoping Gabriel would come to her. She could hear the two men talking, laughing, playing cards. She rose often and went to listen at the door. Eventually she fell asleep, despite herself.

  Gabriel woke her much later, banging at her door, calling out to her. He was drunk. She flew to let him in, trying to keep him quiet. He staggered in, almost knocking her over. He stumbled towards the bed, his hands heavy and clumsy on her body. His breath reeked of whisky and tobacco.

  ‘Oh, Janey, it’s been torture without you. I’ve been able to think of nothing else.’

  She tried to embrace him, to comfort him, but he was in a state of agitation, afraid George was listening at the door or that someone was crouching beneath the window. The call of a hunting owl alarmed him. She reassured him and drew him down to lie with her, but just the touch of her hands was enough to arouse him and within moments, he had spent himself in her palm.

  Afterwards, he slept heavily. She could not wake him. Janey was frantic with the fear that someone would find him in her bed. She had to heave him, drunk and half insensible, back to his own room, every stumble and slurred protest excruciatingly loud in the darkness of the night.

  Then, aroused but unsatisfied, she tiptoed back to her own bed, shaking in terror at the thought of being caught.

  He slept till well after noon the next day, disappointing the girls who kept asking why he slept so long. When at last he rose he was bleary-eyed and morose. He insisted on reading all the papers, looking for any mention of himself, or the Fleshly School. He thought his mail had been steamed open. Janey could not reassure him. She had seen George slip a few letters into his pocket before bringing them the morning post. She wondered bitterly if they were from the other women in Gabriel’s life, his models, his so-called housekeeper.

  It was catching, she told herself. Gabriel’s fears, his suspicions, his manias. If she was not careful, she would be driven mad herself.

  Every day there was some little sign of oddity. Gabriel opened doors abruptly, sure that someone was listening outside. He wanted all the curtains closed and the windows shut, even on a lovely day. He heard footsteps when there was no-one there, and alarm bells ringing in the middle of the night. The rooks in the elm trees perturbed him, with their constant wheeling and cawing. He thought the local villagers stared at him and muttered about him behind their hands. Janey had to admit they found Gabriel a strange sight, with his olive skin and intense stare, his flowered waistcoats and soft hats and nonchalantly knotted silk scarves. But then they stared at her too, and at the two lovely long-limbed girls in their loose medieval smocks and wooden beads.

  George spoke of wishing to be published one day. Gabriel said most seriously, ‘Then you should not be here with me. Any connection with my name is
sure to arouse a swarm of malignity.’

  The weeks before Gabriel had come had been calm and sweet and peaceful. Janey and the girls had read, and paddled about in the punt, and made bread together, and picked flowers for the house. Topsy had come down on the weekends, and delighted the girls by clipping the yew hedge into the fanciful shape of a dragon, which he christened ‘Fafnir’. The mulberry tree had been heavy with fruit, and the girls’ mouths had been stained red all day.

  Gabriel changed all that. It was like thunder muttered about him and lightning struck from his heels.

  Topsy came down once or twice, but he found Gabriel’s habits difficult to bear. Topsy wanted to be up early in the dawn, fishing in the river, tramping over the fields, collecting birds’ eggs with the girls.

  One day William Rossetti came down to stay the weekend, while Topsy was there. He listened to Topsy talk excitedly about the Norse myths he was translating, then remarked in his colourless way, ‘I am sure I cannot understand why anyone could be interested in a man who had a dragon for a brother.’

  Topsy, goaded beyond endurance, retorted, ‘I’d much rather have a dragon for a brother than a bloody fool.’

  Janey was worn out trying to keep the peace between them all.

  As the days slowly narrowed, and the fields grew stubbled and brown, Gabriel began painting Janey as Proserpina. The old myth had always intrigued him. The beautiful young woman abducted and raped by the God of the Underworld. The desperate search for Proserpina by her mother, the goddess of the earth. The winter of her despair that covered the land, making all dark and barren.

  Meanwhile, in the Underworld, Proserpina eats six pomegranate seeds, and so is condemned to spend half of every year in the land of the dead. Ever since, the world rejoices with her rebirth in the spring and grieves again for her imprisonment as winter closes in.

  Gabriel painted Janey with the broken pomegranate in her hand, a gleam of light on the wall behind her, smoke and shadows about her. It became like a madness for him. He did not want her to go back to London. Janey realised that, for Gabriel, her husband was her captor, her abductor, the ruler of the Underworld.