Awakening (38 page)

‘Oh dear!'

Mrs Quarles is onto it like a cat with a grasshopper. Her face brims with the riling sympathy that feasts on a neighbour's mortification. She remarks that dear Anna was always a highly sensitive young person. The brain can become inflamed in such cases. The doctor's wife has observed what she calls ‘unusual ladies' going in and out of Sarum House. ‘There was one lady who seemed to be carrying a whole pheasant on her head. Doubtless a city fashion.'

Mrs Quarles drops the subject and goes on to lament Dr Quarles's toothache and his refusal to visit the dentist. Dear oh dear: great men can often be fretful patients. How did the Bard put it: ‘For there was never yet philosopher who could endure the tooth ache patiently.'
A profound truth there. Shakespeare never lets you down. ‘Do you read much Shakespeare, Beatrice?' she enquires. ‘The Bard is a tonic. I could never manage without my Shakespeare.'

‘Very little. Dr Quarles's tooth should come out,' Beatrice observes trenchantly. ‘Without delay.'

The lady with the pheasant hat was a female bookseller from London. She and Anna sequestered themselves with a catalogue from which Anna selected works she ‘needed' to read. ‘It's my own money, Beatrice.'
Two boxes duly arrived, which Anna carried up to the spare bedroom she has requisitioned for a ‘study'. Locking the door, Anna pocketed both keys. No by-your-leave. But Anna's manner was and remains calm and gentle, even humorous. When Beatrice pointed out that the room was frequently required for a visiting minister, Anna apologized – ‘I'm so sorry, love, if it puts you out'. But she said there were plenty of rooms for that; the ministers could double up – and anyone extra could be accommodated by the Eliases. Anna is affable, no trouble to anyone. Never quite here with us really, Beatrice thinks. Anna wears her inkstains like a badge of office. She wanders round the wilderness muttering to herself.

It's no longer Beatrice's place to assess her sister's reading: that duty falls to Will. All one can say is that there have been no further visits to or from Antigone Kyffin and Anna has assured her sister that she views the whole performance with irony. ‘It's sheer legerdemain,' she says, evidently trying out a new word and feeling pleased with it. ‘Only (and this is the interesting part) the poor deluded conjurer has no idea she's playing tricks. So it is not intelligent. Interesting though. As a phenomenon.' She would like to attend more of the séances to observe – but not if Beatrice objects.

And every day Anna seems, in a subtle way, to cede her husband to her sister. There's to be an ecumenical meeting in Salisbury, to prepare for the Awakening. Will naturally assumes that Anna will accompany him.

‘Oh no, Will, I'm so sorry, I can't go.' She says this sorrowfully, not as wishing to give offence but with an air of perplexity. ‘Take Beatrice. You'll go, won't you, darling?'

‘It will be a great pleasure to me if Beatrice accompanies us, Annie. But your presence will be looked for, dear. As my wife.'

‘Surely not, Will? Beatrice will even enjoy it.' And so I would, Beatrice thinks; just sitting with Will is a comfort, even if he never looks at me or speaks to me. But he does look, he does speak, his whole person is aware of me. That will always be so. She knows that, in Anna's warped mind, every hour she's kept from her desk and books is an hour lost.

‘Your absence will be commented on, dear. I'm constantly being asked where you are these days.' Will speaks lightly but there's a level of grave concern Beatrice never saw before his marriage.

‘People will always talk though, won't they,
cariad
?
' Anna responds, not in a cantankerous spirit but touching Will's arm, with a confident smile. ‘Let them. You'll go for both of us, won't you, Beattie?'

‘No, Annie. I'm afraid not. Not if you don't.' Beatrice won't make it easy for Anna to shirk her responsibilities. She can't make her out. It was so much easier in the days of her hysterical illnesses. Is this calm just another kind of insanity? Anna has crossed some line but Beatrice cannot make out how this happened. She's acting – yes, that's it – like a man. As if she had the right to dictate her way of life. And everyone else should recognise it. Yet she looks hale and happy. She's put on weight and eats like a horse.

‘Bless you, you don't realise
,
cariad,
' Anna says to Will.

‘Realise what?'

‘Oh, sweetheart, there's just so much work to get through.'

Will takes a deep breath; puts his hand through his hair. Softly Beatrice lays her hand on his back for just a moment.

‘But what is it you're doing?' he asks. ‘And why? You won't let anyone in. Why keep it secret?'

When you knock, Anna peers round the door. She doesn't invite you into the room she has usurped. She's behaving as if she were the head of household. It's risible. Risible too that she takes herself for a great authoress. What has she ever written worth keeping?

‘Books are my
vocation
,' Anna says.

‘I am a minister of the church, Anna. That is a vocation. And you – are my wife – and a Christian
.
'
Will speaks with studied patience as if explaining to a child. There's also a note of pleading in his voice. Beatrice, who keeps quiet, sees how the pulse at his throat throbs.

‘Well. But, dear heart,' replies Anna in the most rational way, ‘not in any narrow sense.'

Will says nothing. He turns to the window, looks out through the slanting rain. Beatrice stands perfectly still. When he turns back to them, Will suggests that they all three pray together: ‘Peace upon our house,' he begins. ‘And fellowship one with the other.'

Anna, closing her eyes, seems to surrender to the prayer; she bows her head. She's just waiting to get back to her scribbling, Beatrice knows. And Will can never winkle her out. She appeals to Joss to talk their sister round.

‘Poor Annie has temporarily mislaid her sense of humour,' is all Joss will say. He's expecting a visit from Mr Munby and cannot spare much attention, having let fall that he has something important to discuss with his friend. ‘Annie will come round, won't she? Not to worry, Beattie, she'll soon recover. Just let her be. Always the best way.'

For once, Beatrice takes her brother's advice. And in any case she intuits that nature will soon clip Anna's wings. Routinely Beatrice trims the wings of the hens to stop them escaping, clipping the flight feathers of one wing so the bird's out of balance. Hens can't fly but could easily leap the fence. As long as you start above the shafts of the feathers where the blood vessels are, there's no pain. And every time the bird moults, you repeat the process. It's time. Beatrice will do this soon. She has deliberately ignored, could hardly bear to acknowledge, her sister's state. In point of fact all she has to do is ask, ‘When do you expect your confinement, dear?' And Anna will fall to earth, her Icarus dreams of fame aborted.

In the night Beatrice is awoken by the sound of the Anwyls' door opening and closing. The door of Anna's so-called study also opens and closes. There are sounds of a whispered altercation. Anna has gone in there to sleep – is that it? – and refused her husband entrance? There's a long pause, then the sound of slow footsteps down the stairs. Beatrice waits for the click of the latch. Peering from her window, she sees her brother-in-law in the garden, walking slowly up and down, fingers at his temples.

There's no answer when Beatrice knocks. ‘Anna! What on earth are you doing?'

Nothing.

‘Come to the door, dear
.
'

Nothing.

If Anna won't go to Will, Beatrice must. She'll bring him into the kitchen; brew him tea; talk the whole thing through and work out what steps to take to rid their home of turmoil.
Vocation
,
she thinks,
vocation!
The voice that's calling Anna to wall herself up like an anchoress in her cell must be either demented or demonic. She thinks of the voice of Lore speaking through poor Antigone. Whatever's going on in that room, in that wayward head of Anna's? Beatrice shivers: she doesn't really want to know. Wrapping her shawl around her, she follows Will out. The fragrance of night-scented stocks hits her with the shock of an archaic memory. She looks up to see if her sister is standing at a window. No – and the candles are all out. Anna can't be asleep?

Once upon a time I met Will at the end of the garden, she thinks. The barn owl was out hunting. Will's fingers brushed me – just here. I've not been touched since then; Christian has never touched me. It seems a world away and only yesterday. He asked me – again – and he kissed me – and I could have accepted him – and whyever did I refuse?

Will threatened: in that case I shall go to
her.

And now we're both paying for our mistake. How can I ever have said no to darling Will when I wanted him so much? And still I melt every time I hear his voice. Now Anna is saying, too late: ‘Here you are, have him back. The two of you are welcome to one another.'

Will has moved away from the house. She calls his name.

There's a churring as of a nightjar. They fly on silent wings around Chauntsey Woods and never sing by day or venture far beyond the woods. Beatrice moves into the voluptuous darkness and is enveloped.

Chapter 21

The long prophesied Awakening is at hand. Florian Street has been praying and singing, soliciting a special outpouring of the Spirit. The faithful keep it up all night, attending in shifts. Dissenting and evangelical Anglican churches join forces: the bickering sects lay down their ancient quarrels and unite as one. The Call is out. Conversions are expected on a mass scale and the churches must be ready, for it's not just a matter of harvesting souls – in a sense the easy part – but of settling converts in stable congregations.

The Spirit is due to arrive on the London train in the persons of four ministers: Christian Ritter, home from his Irish mission; Idris Jones; John Clifford and – a singular coup – the famous Charles Haddon Spurgeon. Later a deputation from Wales is expected: five young evangelists, millenarian disciples of poor Humphrey Jones, who, having brought the flame of Revival from America to Aberystwyth, has wandered along strange paths leading to Carmarthen Mental Hospital.

Waiting with the Eliases on the platform at Salisbury Station, Beatrice is in a painful state of tremulous anticipation – less perhaps at the prospect of the Awakening than at the expectation of having her husband home. Her dear husband, for he is dear. The head of her family, for he is master of her house. Surely she has never wished it otherwise, even in her most vagrant state? Whatever happens now, at least it will bring an end to the struggle in Sarum House. Christian must speak to Anna about her behaviour.

And surely Beatrice has nothing with which to reproach herself, beyond the general worthlessness of a common sinner. Whatever occurred in darkness between herself and Gwilym Anwyl may surely remain in darkness? She has tried and failed to feel guilty about it.

For after all, what did happen? Are words actions? Indeed, are silences actions? Are they events?

Yes, in all honesty, one must admit that they are. It cannot be said that the two of them uttered more than a handful of words. All was communicated in darkness, haunted by the vanilla perfume of unseen flowers. Love held them as close together as people can be who are scarcely touching. Every pore of Beatrice was open to Will in the darkness. But only their fingertips met, in parting.

Could it be said that they met and spoke as brother and sister – or soul with soul? Beatrice hopes that the love they expressed and lived might be as blameless as that. If that was not so, she asks God's forgiveness. Nothing was said that should injure Anna or Christian.

And Luke seemed there in the quiet, beside them, hushed in his cradle. For the first time she felt his presence in God. Not as a troubled spirit struggling to approach her from the Other World but in a vast repose. Safe, my boy, safe beyond suffering. In a region where there are no more tears, for God has wiped them from mortal eyes.

This knowledge Beatrice must close in her hand, a pearl never to be shown, even to dear Christian. For he is dear. Let in the common light and the pearl will lose lustre. It has to last the rest of her life.

The following morning Anna appeared at the breakfast table with apprehensive eyes. But nothing was said. They ate together quietly. There were no questions or recriminations. Anna fell to wolfing eggs and toast.

And, oh yes, Beatrice thought once more, with scarcely a pang: you're with child. Anyone with eyes can see that.

It threw everything into a new light. These aberrations, apparently under the influence of the notorious Mrs Sala, may be nothing more than the freaks and foibles of pregnancy. Be patient, wait, and they'll be brushed aside by the imperatives of the coming baby. Beatrice, to her surprise, is conscious of no particular envy.

‘Step back!'

The locomotive approaches, precisely to time, in a hissing welter of steam and smoke. Doors are thrown open and here they are, the four ministers. What a treat for their fellow-passengers to have overheard their conversation, perhaps the most inspired voices in England – and Beatrice's husband not the least of them for eloquence. Christian hurries ahead and takes his wife's gloved hand in his gloved hand. Their eyes meet with comical bashfulness. And here is young Mr Clifford, with his social passion. It occurs to Beatrice that it will be good for Anna to talk with him: he might do better than Christian. In the doubt-laden atmosphere of the times Mr Clifford is a shining beacon and may bring Anna round. Beatrice remembers how caught up with him her sister was when he preached at Chauntsey. The look on Anna's face was quietly focused. ‘One loves the man, one venerates him
,
'
she said then from her wheeled chair.