A Dark Dividing (3 page)
Authors: Sarah Rayne
Simone studied Angelica covertly. Today she was wearing the newly acquired glasses with huge tortoise-shell-framed spectacles. She did not need them but they were part of her new image. Simone thought they made her look like a very sexy Oxford don; she thought only Angelica could have managed to look both sexy and studious at the same time, and she suddenly wanted to make a portrait photograph of her, to see if she could show both moods at the same time. Would Harry Fitzglen see these two aspects of Angelica when he took her out, and if so which one would he prefer? He would prefer the sexy side, of course. Men always did.
Or would he? He had been far more intelligent than he had let on at the opening and much more perceptive; Simone had known that almost straight off. Even without that Shakespeare quote about bad dreams he had seen the darkness within Mortmain, although anyone with halfway normal eyesight would probably have done so. But that question he had put about Simone herself seeing the darkness had put him in another category altogether because as far as she knew no one else had ever sensed the presence of darkness in her own mind.
No one had ever known about the little girl who watched her.
She had been four years old when she became aware of this inner darkness, and she had been a bit over five when she began to understand where it came from.
The other little girl. The unseen, unheard child whom no one else could see or hear, but who lay coiled and invisible inside Simone’s mind. Simone did not know her name so she just called her the little girl.
To begin with it had not been anything to be especially frightened or anxious about. Simone had not even known that other people did not have this invisible companion to talk to. And she quite liked having this other little girl around; she liked the sudden ruffling of her mind that meant the little girl was there, and she liked talking to her and listening to some of her stories which were really good. Simone liked stories; she liked people to read them out of books, although not everybody read them in the right way.
Mother always read them in the right way. Simone liked listening to Mother, and she liked watching her when she read. Her voice was rather soft and everyone thought she was quiet and gentle—people at school said, Gosh, what a great mother to have, isn’t she a pushover for things?—but Simone’s mother was not a pushover at all. She made rules about not watching too much television, and about homework and bedtime at seven o’clock every night, but everyone said this was what most mothers did. And Simone was pretty lucky not to have lots of boring relations because you had to be polite to them, and sometimes there were cousins who came to stay and you had to give up your bed, or uncles who had too much to drink and aunts who got cross. It was not so great having lots of family.
But Simone would have quite liked some family, and so when the little girl said, ‘I’ll be your family,’ she was pleased.
The other little girl did not have to do the same things as Simone. She did not seem to go to school although she had lessons at a table and she had to learn a lot of things by heart. Simone did not get to know this all at once; it came in bits, like a series of pictures coming inside her head, or like the nights when she could not sleep and kept hearing snatches of the television from downstairs but not enough to know the programme or recognize the voices. She always knew when the little girl was there, because there was the feeling of something ruffling her mind, like when you blew on the surface of water and made it ripple.
Once she tried making a drawing of the little girl. This was a bit spooky because it turned out to be much easier than Simone had expected. As she drew, the girl’s face got steadily clearer, like polishing the surface of a smoky, smeary old mirror until at last you saw your reflection.
The girl’s face looked straight up out of the paper. Simone thought it was what people called a heart-shaped face, and she thought the girl ought to have been quite pretty. But she was not. She had a sly look, which made Simone feel uncomfortable and even a bit frightened. Until then she had been quite pleased with the drawing but when she saw the sly eyes she scrunched the paper up and threw it in the dustbin when Mother was not looking. But even then she had the feeling that the eyes were still watching her through the thrown-away bits of food and tea-leaves.
Extract from Charlotte Quinton’s diaries:
30th November 1899
Edward points out that if calculations are all accurate, the twins may be born on 1st January 1900, and thinks this a good omen. Has even gone so far as to make a little joke about that night in March after your birthday dinner, my dear, which is the kind of remark he normally regards as rather near. Clearly I’m being viewed with indulgence at the moment. It will be God’s mercy if it lasts.
But a new year and a new century and two new lives, Edward says, pleased at having coined this neat phrase by himself. He adds, expansively, perhaps a new house, as well, what do I think? Some very nice villas out at Dulwich.
Saw copy of Floy’s latest book in Hatchard’s while shopping this morning. Horrid shock since dozens of them were displayed in the window, and especially a shock since photograph of Floy in middle of it all. He looked as if he had been dragged protesting into the photographer’s studio for the likeness to be taken. Highly upsetting to come upon image of ex-lover staring angrily out of Hatchard’s window.
Came straight home and went to bed, telling Edward I felt sick and dizzy. Felt dreadfully guilty when he insisted on calling Dr Austin out, since could hardly explain real reason for sickness and dizziness in first place.
Had to endure excruciating examination, although must admit Dr Austin v. gentlemanly and impersonal. It will teach me not to tell untruths, however. He prodded around and measured my hips, and asked some questions, then looked portentous, but said, oh nothing to worry about, Mrs Quinton, and he would send round a mixture for the sickness.
Edward’s mother to dinner tonight (third time this month!), which meant one of Edward’s mother’s homilies. This one was to the effect that I am racketing about town too much, and rest is important in my condition. Told her high time science found a less inconvenient and messy method of reproducing after all these thousands of years, and was accused of being Darwinian and having peculiar reading habits—also of scamping on housekeeping since first course was eggs in sunlight, and the tomato sauce was pronounced too acidic. Not surprising I feel sick if this is the kind of dish I allow on my dinner table… And on and on.
Went to bed in bad temper. Will not buy Floy’s book, absolutely will not…
Later
Sent out to Hatchard’s for Floy’s book on principle that better to read it and be prepared before anyone tries to discomfit me by telling me about it. Have always suspected that Wyvern-Smith female of trying to sink her claws into Floy on her own account, and do not trust her not to drop the subject into dinner-table conversation out of sheer malice. Edward’s mother says she dyes her hair—Clara Wyvern-Smith that is, not Edward’s mother. Would not be at all surprised, although wonder how Edward’s mother knows.
6th December 1899
Think something may be wrong. Dr Austin downstairs in earnest conclave with Edward earlier, although when I asked if anything wrong, all Dr Austin would say was that he thought the twins were a little quiet, considering how near to the confinement we are.
However, Edward has gone off to his managers’ meeting as usual, telling me not to wait up since he may be late. He may be as late as he likes for all I care.
9th December 1899
Floy’s book brilliant. Have had to read it piecemeal and in secrecy in case anyone sees and wonders, and it is not the kind of book that should be read like that. Should be read in one glorious sweeping read, so that you shut the rest of the world out while you walk through the landscapes that Floy unfolds, all of which are like glowing jewel-studded tapestries unfurling silkily across your inner vision. It’s about lost loves and relinquished passions, and a heroine who struggles between duty and love… Have not dared wonder, even for a second, if Floy wrote it after that last agonizing scene, when I told him I must stay with Edward and he called me a middle-class provincial-minded conformist, which is about the most stinging string of epithets Floy can bestow.
(I’m lying, of course. I spent the rest of the night wondering furiously if he wrote it after we parted.)
But whenever it was written, Floy has—and always will have, I think—a gift for making his readers feel that he has invited them into a soft, secret world, glowing with dappled afternoon sunlight or golden lamplight, with siren songs humming under old casement windows, and sexual stirrings and erotic whisperings everywhere. And that the reader is there alone with him, and that it’s a wholly enchanted place to be…
Refuse to apologize for that burst of sentiment, since if cannot be sentimental about a lost love, not much point to life.
12th December
What a delight to have an excuse for handing over the Christmas and New Year preparations to Mrs Tigg and Maisie-the-daisie! Also to avoid unutterably tedious dinners with Edward’s business colleagues—‘Dreadfully sorry, don’t quite feel up to formal entertaining this year. What with the birth imminent-feeling wretchedly tired—sure you’ll understand.’
‘A quiet Christmas,’ Edward has told everyone. ‘Charlotte is not feeling quite the thing.’
Charlotte is feeling very much not the thing, especially when it comes to interminable dinner parties with eight courses and the conversation exclusively about politics, banking, or scandalous behaviour of Prince of Wales. Last Christmas one of Edward’s managers stroked my thigh under the tablecloth.
Ridiculous and pointless to wonder how Floy will spend Christmas. Do people in Bloomsbury have Christmas, one wonders? Or do they sit around earnestly and paganly discussing life and love and art (or Art), like they did on the one occasion when Floy took me to someone’s studio, and we all ate Italian food and drank Chianti, and somebody asked to paint me only Floy objected because he said the man was a bad leftover from the Pre-Raphaelites, and I was so beautiful no painter in the world could possibly capture my looks…
All flummery and soft soap, of course, I know that now. Even so, spent most of the evening remembering Floy’s house in Bloomsbury, with the scents of old timbers and the incense he burns when he is working because he says it stimulates his brain… And the night he lit dozens of candles in his bedroom and we made wild love there, with the sounds of London all around us and the distant view of the British Museum from the window.
Wonder if Floy will be stroking anyone’s thigh under tablecloth at Christmas?
Later
Am increasingly worried about that remark of Dr Austin’s that the twins are a little quiet. Do not want them leaping around like the Russian ballet, but would feel better if they were a bit more assertive.
If everyone’s calculations right, only a couple of weeks left now.