The Steady Running of the Hour: A Novel Page 10

—You’d get in trouble?

  —I’m already in trouble, she says. I’ve neglected certain plans tonight. You make me terribly irresponsible.

  The rain quickens. A few large drops sink between the leaves, landing cold on Ashley’s neck. Imogen leans her head upon his shoulder, her fingers brushing the knot of his khaki necktie.

  —But I’ve no regrets, she adds.

  —Nor I.

  Ashley puts his hand to her bare forearm. Her skin is damp and cool. He can feel the fine goose bumps on her arm. Imogen kisses the bottom of his chin and moves up toward his mouth, her lips skirting his.

  —I knew you’d be at the concert, she whispers.

  She takes his swagger cane and tosses it aside. Ashley brings her close and they kiss softly at first, then harder. Imogen pulls back and looks at him. She smiles, then takes his hand and lays her head upon his chest.

  —I suppose you shall think me the sort of girl to kiss a man she scarcely knows.

  —I expected so. For heaven’s sake, why do you think I came—

  —Ashley!

  He laughs as Imogen elbows him. He runs his hand over her hair, smoothing it, spreading the raindrops into the glossy band above her face.

  —You aren’t any sort, he whispers. You’re only yourself.

  —Darling. You know I’ve never done anything like this. It’s only that I felt we had to. There isn’t time enough for you to take me on strolls once a week—

  She looks up at him.

  —You leave on Thursday?

  —Yes.

  She nods. —Five days.

  Ashley strokes her neck, bringing her close until he can feel the warmth of her body through her wet dress. They kiss on and on with mad abandon, trying to satisfy something that will not be satisfied. Imogen leans back against him. Ashley wraps his arms around her shoulders.

  —I’ve seen you before, he says suddenly. I didn’t tell you, but I knew it the moment I saw you at the lecture. It was in Snowdonia, the Gorphwysfa Hotel. The last Pen y Pass party before the war. You were with a group motoring by—

  Imogen springs up.

  —You were there? she gasps. I’m sorry—

  —We didn’t meet. I only saw you. You play the piano, don’t you?

  —A bit. But how could you remember that? It was years ago.

  —It’s not the kind of thing one forgets.

  Imogen laughs and puts her arms around his neck. She kisses him on the cheek and tells him that this is wonderful news.

  —It wasn’t any accident that brought us here.

  —With only five days?

  —Five days, she repeats. We’ll spend them all together.

  —I’m meant to go to Berkshire tomorrow. I have to see my people before I cross—

  —I’ll go with you.

  —To Sutton Courtenay?

  —Why not? I’ll stay in a hotel nearby. In the evenings you’ll say you’re visiting school chums and you’ll sneak out to see me. You’ll go out your bedroom window and climb down a trellis. You do love to climb.

  —You’re so certain of this already?

  —Already?

  —It’s been only a day.

  Imogen lies back with her head on his chest. She looks up to the canopy of leaves above, all of them humming in the rain.

  —But we’ve known each other for years, she says.

  —You didn’t remember me.

  Imogen plucks a wet blade of grass from the lawn and lifts it before her eyes. She studies the blade, turning it in her hand.

  —No, she says. But you remembered me.

  THE CACHE

  It is late. I know this from the brightness of the stars in the open doorway, and because the shouting and singing outside ended long ago. Everyone must have gone to sleep by now.

  I went through the boxes one by one, sifting through contents and stacking, moving chairs and garden tools and old appliances to clear a path. All the documents and mail here are addressed to the Sjöbergs, which must be Karin’s family.

  Finally I reach the staircase and I begin pulling out the boxes. Rusty old socket wrenches, tubes of grout, paintbrushes and scrapers. At the top of the steps there’s a roll of fiberglass insulation and a heavy box full of hardcover books. I move the insulation and step over the box.

  Moonlight pours through windows onto the warped floorboards of the hallway. As I walk I have the sensation of leaning sideways. The floorboards groan. My feet make tracks in the thick dust.

  I enter the bedroom facing the woods. More boxes everywhere. I push them aside until I reach a short bed of ancient oak, the bedposts decorated with elaborate carvings. Against the opposite wall there is an antique writing desk stacked with old linens and bedspreads. I move the linens to the bed and go through the desk drawers. Paper clips; rolls of undeveloped film; rusted keys on a ring; steel sewing bobbins still wound with thread. In a bureau wedged below the desk there is a heavy case of stained walnut. I flip the brass latches. A butterfly collection under glass, the insects speared with pins and labeled in Latin and Swedish. Danaus plexippus. Monarkfjäril.

  —The monarch butterfly, I whisper.

  A paper tag is affixed inside the lid of the case. Per Andersson. Svartmangatan 11, Uppsala.

  A shiver passes through me. I sit on the floor to take a breath and think. A few minutes later I cross the hall to the opposite bedroom. More boxes, a pair of twin beds covered in hand-knitted throws. No doubt once snow-white, the throws are grayed with decades of dust. Inside the boxes are folded linens and porcelain plates wrapped in brittle newspaper. I move the boxes and sit on one of the beds. Beside me is a red nightstand, its year of manufacture painted in florid numerals: 1663. The nightstand has a large drawer. I pull on the handle, but it is stuck shut. After a few jerks it pulls open.

  The drawer is filled with magazines. The Athenaeum, Nouvelle Revue Française, The Egoist, The Burlington Magazine. I check the dates. August 1915. Julliet 1916.

  I pace around the two bedrooms, peering under the beds, throwing back curtains. The air is full of dust and it makes me sneeze. In the hall closet there are lapelled jackets, a long fur coat and several pairs of rubber boots. I reach for the tag on the coat and some of the fur comes off on my fingers. Fourrures Weill. 4 Rue Ste Anne Paris. I pull out all of the clothing and make a pile in the hallway. I’m making a lot of noise now and I think I hear footsteps on the staircase. I stop and listen, my breath heavy. No one comes in. I go back to the second bedroom and sit on the bed.

  The sisters must have come here in December. I imagine them being rowed across the lake in the cold, a thick cloak wrapped around Imogen’s shoulders as she watched the trees of the town grow smaller, the trees of the island grow larger and larger. There must have been snow everywhere, the ropes at the pier coated in ice. They would have walked up the twisting path to the house, someone carrying their suitcases, Eleanor in front and Imogen following slowly behind, about to see her home for the next six months. She had never seen it in snow before. Finally the red house would come into view through the trees, black smoke rising from the chimney, the caretaker coming out into the icy clearing and taking the bags from their hands.

  I go back into the bedroom and look inside the boxes with the porcelain, unwrapping the newspaper to check the date. Tirsdag aften den 6 Mars 1919. I pull everything from the box, the plates and linens, a dark cardboard portfolio with cloth ties. Inside the portfolio are receipts in Swedish and English: railway tickets, hotel receipts, folded grocers’ bills. The dates run from 1916 to 1919. One of the receipts is in French, the top printed MOISSE—Toiles & Tableaux et Couleurs—Encadrements—28, Rue Pigalle. There are columns for the order numbers, the designation des articles and the prices, but the handwriting is in a wild longhand that’s hard to read. I make out ocre jaune among the list of items. Another line says terre de Sienne. It must be a receipt for oil paints. I refold it and put it in my pocket to look at later.

  I open the other box on the bed. A small silver pitcher wrap
ped in cloth, a set of pewter apostle spoons in a wooden case. Beneath these is a parcel wrapped in brown paper, about the size of a shoe box. I shine my light at the address on the front. C.T. Grafton, 58 Cartwright Gardens, London WC1, ENGLAND. There are no stamps and the box isn’t postmarked.

  I tear off the paper. There is a tin inside, the lid stamped Green’s of Brighton: The House of Quality. I take off the lid. A blue booklet is at the top, and beneath this two tightly fitted bundles of letters, each secured with twine. The booklet’s cover reads The Geographical Journal, Vol. XLVII No. 5, May 1916. The Astrolabe and Wireless. Notes on the Alto Rio Branco, North Amazonas. The Position of Sir Ernest Shackleton’s Expedition. The booklet parts at the center to reveal a white notecard engraved The Langham Hotel, Portland Place, London W. The card is inscribed in brown ink.

  24 Aug 1916

  To my Darling –

  That she will remember that I belong not to Flanders mud, nor to His Majesty’s Army, nor to God, nor yet even to myself, but instead am held as surely & as easily as a loving girl holds a lover’s note. For you shall hold this, and I shall come back to you.

  A.

  I flip the card over and over. My hands are shaking. I untie one of the bundles of letters. The envelopes are of plain stock or YMCA stationery, the paper brown and brittle. A few green envelopes are marked ACTIVE SERVICE with printed instructions on the front. They are all addressed in blunt pencil.

  Miss I. Soames-Andersson

  Yarrow Cottage

  Selsey

  England

  All of them have the same return address: A.E. Walsingham, 2/Lt., 1 Batt. Royal Berkshire Regt. I take the sheets from an envelope.

  So we marched all night; if I tried to describe the cold or fatigue I should fail. The men hadn’t any consolation but to sing. And so they sang – endlessly, to the tune of ‘Auld Lang Syne’: ‘We’re here because we’re here, because we’re here, because we’re here.’

  It was terrible at first, then beautiful, and finally terrible again. I shall not forget it.

  I go to the next page and read to the end.

  You are the source & measure of all good things; even in a pit so wretched as this I know my happiness comes from you.

  When we come back into the dug-out after 18 hours crawling in frozen mud, and we have a cup of steaming tea & a tin of bully beef, I know what pleasure there is comes from you.

  When at midnight watch the shelling ceases suddenly, for no more reason than it ever started, and the sky is incandescent with streaming flares – then I see some signature of the divine and, knowing there is no God, I know that signature is yours.

  I did not need to see such cruelty as I have to know how I loved you, nor to know how rare & fragile the time we shared was.

  But I have learnt something. We have words for places of utter bliss & utter agony; we call them heaven & hell, and place them in some distant domain, far beyond death. But this is mistaken. These are names we give to things that exist in this world and only here, and I have seen them share the same field.

  Imogen, I care nothing for future salvation, nor for the prizes of this stumbling world. You were the wise one, wise to understand what we were when I hardly knew myself; wiser still to weep when I left, knowing the price we paid for my conceit. If this war tests men as men have never been tested, I survive only through you. And when we stand again together beneath the arch at All Saints, I shall have the only salvation I desire.

  Yours Ever,

  Ashley

  My hands are still shaking. Again I get the feeling that someone is watching me. I go to the window and pull back the dusty curtains, peering into the dark woods. There’s no one outside. The sky is turning blue at the horizon.

  I look through the rest of the boxes and check the closet again, but I don’t find anything else. I carry the tin downstairs and go outside, standing in the shimmering field in my shirtsleeves. A warm breeze passes through the trees.

  20 August 1916

  Cavendish Square

  Marylebone, Central London

  Ashley and Imogen do not find the latchkey, not in Regent’s Park or anywhere else. An hour after dawn they go to Imogen’s house and Ashley watches from the sidewalk on Cavendish Square as Imogen taps the ground-floor window until the housekeeper opens the door. A few minutes later the light goes on and off in the second-story window. Then Ashley knows she is all right.

  He boards the 9:38 from Paddington and tries to sleep. But with fewer trains running all the time, the carriage is crowded and stuffy, and when Ashley closes his eyes he can think only of Imogen, replaying scenes from the night before with a surge of pleasure at each fresh memory. He does not know whether he trusts or mistrusts her, whether he understands her or knows less about her than any woman he’s ever spent an hour with, let alone a whole night. Had they really stayed out until dawn? And what had they said to each other in those smaller moments, the ones he was already forgetting? The train travels at half speed to save fuel and when Ashley reaches Didcot Station the only transport is an ancient hansom cab, the caped driver peering down from his sprung seat above the carriage.

  —No motor taxis, sir, we haven’t the petrol. But I can take you as you please.

  Ashley grins, stepping in through the twin front doors of the cab. When he reaches his mother’s house he pays the driver and claps the knocker on the door. He embraces his mother hurriedly.

  —Awfully sorry, but I’m only dropping my bags. I’ll be back this afternoon. I need to take the motor back into town. Is it starting?

  —But Ashley, his mother protests, you’ve just arrived.

  He kisses her on the cheek.

  —I’m having luncheon with Richards. You remember him, don’t you? Archaeologist chap from Magdalene. I shan’t be long—

  Ashley meets Imogen at noon at Abingdon Station with the borrowed motorcar. She steps off the train and grasps his hand, whispering into his ear.

  —The slowest train I ever took. I’ve a present for you, darling.

  Imogen opens the clasp on her handbag and rummages through its contents, but the bag is so packed that she finally has to sit on a bench to the sift through the mess. There are tattered political leaflets and leather pocketbooks, celluloid safety pins and railway timetables; a small glass bottle of perfume, a wooden birdcall. At last Imogen pulls out an iron key triumphantly. Ashley shakes his head.

  —Don’t tell me it’s the one you lost.

  She smiles, putting the key in his hand.

  —You’re right, I shan’t tell.

  —Is it the latchkey? What does it open?

  —Ashley, I shan’t tell. You’ll have to find out, that’s the whole point. I promise it’s something terribly important. Have you eaten yet? I’m positively famished.

  They check into the nearby hotel as Mr. and Mrs. Walsingham and as Ashley says these names, Imogen touches his hand and looks away. The clerk gives an inquiring smile.

  —Newlyweds?

  —Married yesterday, Ashley says. How did you know?

  —You have that certain glow. I can tell it every time.

  At lunch in the hotel restaurant their bodies vacillate between exhaustion and euphoria, Ashley constantly looking around the room for fear of being discovered in their ruse. This amuses Imogen.

  —What does it matter what anyone thinks? In four days you’ll be in France. Anyhow that clerk thinks we’re married.

  Ashley looks up from his soup.

  —You looked unhappy when he said it.

  —Unhappy isn’t the word, Imogen says. It’s just not how I want to think of us. Look at Ellie and Charles. It’s a wonder to me how two perfectly fascinating people can become so dull once they’ve married—

  —They don’t seem dull to me.

  —Because you didn’t know them before. You should have seen Ellie three years ago, when she was still at the Slade, forever coming home with new ideas. New books, new fellows brought over for tea, the cleverest fellows you ever met. We
spoke of getting rooms together, Ellie and I, where we’d have people over every day of the week. If only she’d waited a few years, I might have gotten out of Cavendish Square. But now it’s hopeless, because Papa will never let me live on my own. And even if Ellie spends half her days with us, it’s not the same, because she’s not the same.

  —What happened?

  —Charles happened. Would you guess that when we met, I thought him the cleverest, the most fascinating of all the fellows? He’d just come down from Trinity and wouldn’t talk anything but pure genius rot. We’d pour the tea and he’d start at once on the perversity of beauty, the masochism of God, the meaning of earthly love. He once quarreled with Papa for an hour over universal suffrage. Charles said that Ellie and I had it wrong, that it wasn’t so much that women ought to have the vote, but that men oughtn’t to have it, because only men made war and valued profit over people—

  —Isn’t he in the army?

  —He is now. Of course he doesn’t fight, he just follows some major around and takes notes. And I haven’t the faintest idea what he believes anymore, because all Ellie and Charles talk about now is who was in the exhibition on Bond Street, or how much some fellow paid for his house in Clerkenwell. They don’t want to talk about the important things anymore.

  —You could ask.

  Imogen sighs. —I know I ought to, but it’s been so long that one can’t simply knock on Ellie’s door and ask, are you in really in love with Charles, or do you stay with him only because you have to? And are you really going to have children, because if you can’t or won’t, then stop moping about it, because anyone can see it’s making you miserable—

  —You can’t blame all this on marriage.

  —Can’t I? They were never like that before. It’s as if they’re playing roles instead of acting the way they feel, only after a while they aren’t roles anymore. Most people seem to regard a wife as half servant and half fool. I don’t say that Charles or Ellie subscribe to that, but what people expect can change you in the end. One oughtn’t give names to what two people are to one another. It only makes it harder to be one’s self.