Mortal Love (14 page)

“That I would paint. I took the position at Garrison with the understanding that I would work there for two years and earn enough money to pay for individual painting lessons—”

“Which you accomplished.”

Radborne flushed. “Well, in a manner of speaking. My father died unexpectedly and left me a small inheritance. My mother died when I was very young. I arranged for the sale of the house in Elmira, and that made it possible for me to go to New York City this past spring. I studied with a Dutch painter. Wilhelm van der Ven—”

“Van der Ven?” Dr. Learmont lifted an eyebrow. “You must have talent, then.”

Radborne looked surprised. “You know him?”

“Not personally. I am familiar with his work.
The Flight into Egypt,
in particular, is a very fine painting. Was he a good teacher?”

“Extremely good—and generous. He was kind enough to secure me a position as illustrator for
Leslie's
magazine. And he arranged introductions for me here in London, and helped arrange my travel accommodations as well. It has been a dream of mine, to visit London—”

“And one which proved impossible to achieve while your father lived.”

“No! That isn't—”

“Oh, leave him be, Thomas,” said Algernon irritably. “God knows he's
cleaner
than most of them ever are at his age. I had rather wanted to have a blancmange than this mess of beef. Where is that waiter?”

His limpid green eyes fixed on a hapless figure on the far side of the room. “May I inquire as to a blancmange?” Algernon cried in a high, braying voice. “
May I?”

Radborne cringed, but Dr. Learmont only placed a hand on Algernon's waving arm. “Please—I will speak to the chef,” he said, and, excusing himself, headed for the maître d'hôtel. Algernon waited until he was out of sight, then leaned across the table to grab Radborne's hand.

“You're not to go with him,” he said in a low, warning voice. “Promise me! You
won't
go.”

Radborne stared at the wild-eyed little man, his graying hair awry and his face flushed with emotion. “I beg your pardon? Go where?”

“To his asylum.” Algernon shook his head violently. “It will be your ruin, Mr. Cornstick—”

“Comstock.”

“Mr. Comstock. Do you fancy yourself an artist? He ruins artists—do you know how? By flattering them, by claiming to save them from their diseased minds. By
collecting
them, as though you were a scrap of canvas or a page torn from a book. Do you value your soul, sir?”

“Not especially.”

“Oh, you are young and a fool!” Algernon snatched his hand back. “I trusted him once—we all did.”

“Who?” demanded Radborne. “Dr. Learmont? I hardly know him, but he seems perfectly agreeable.”

“Do not trust him! He is corruption and deception masquerading as a rational mind. A panderer and a jailer!”

His voice dropped; his little hands clenched, and he slammed them on the table so that the wineglasses danced. “And yet you do not believe me. That is no surprise: I heeded none of the warnings that I received, and were it not for the love of my dear friend Watts-Dunton—my
savior—
I would be lost as well. You doubt me?”

“I have no idea what you refer to!”

“No? Ask Lizzie, breathing worms and darkness!” he hissed. “Ask Gabriel! He is quite mad now and sees no one—he will be dead within the year.”

Radborne sat up. “Do you mean Rossetti? The painter?”

“Ah! He speaks!” squealed Algernon, his face violet with anger. “Yes, I mean Rossetti! And Ned, and Ruskin—all of 'em! He lures them to his lair and shows them Beauty, and She devours them—but, oh, how they love to burn! How we all loved to burn. . . .”

Radborne took a long draft from his wine. “Do you know Lady Wilde?” he asked, refilling his glass.

Algernon licked his lips. “A terrifying woman. Her son is a poetaster.”

“I met her earlier this evening, with Dr. Learmont. She also spoke to me of burning: pretending to be a sibyl, I supposed.
She
didn't warn me of Dr. Learmont.”

“She's a fool and does not know his nature. Her son, now—a tadpole poet, but very ambitious. He will be destroyed by her.”

“By his mother?”

Algernon fixed him with a cold beryl eye. “Don't
you
be a fool, Mr. Comstock. Arrogance becomes you, but not idiocy. Lady Wilde dabbles in witchery like the rest of 'em. Lang and his cronies—they would make a science of stories, but Learmont has no interest in science: he is a lover who has lost the thing he loves. He pursues one who spurned him, even though it means his death. ‘Yet there are worse things waiting for men than death.'”

His mouth curved slightly in a smile. “How old are you, Mr. Comstock?”

“Twenty-three.”

“Twenty-three. When I was twenty-three, I had already been Beauty's slave for years. It was the happiest time of my life.”

He picked up his glass and raised it toward Radborne. “To your destruction,” he said.

“My destruction,” echoed Radborne. He finished his claret. Algernon replaced his own glass untouched. “Well, you're a cheerful sibyl at least.”

“Am I?” Algernon smiled sadly. “I do not feel so cheerful these days. I sensed that Beauty was leaving me, and, not wishing to be a spurned lover, I departed first.” He stared at Radborne, then past him toward the door. His wistful expression faded. “Look, I've no time for you, young man, and no business either. But.”

He leaned forward, grasping Radborne's wrists with thin fingers. Radborne glanced back to see Dr. Learmont talking to a man wearing the restaurant's blue-and-black livery. As the doctor turned, the bright flicker of shears flashed from beneath his jacket. Algernon's voice dropped to a whisper.

“Mr. Comstock. You are a painter, not a poet: so were many of my dearest friends in their youth. I have no use for them now. Our history is one of disappointment and betrayal. Yet you remind me of them—you so clearly have bad fortune on your side.

“And,” Algernon added, “you are tall and handsome. And arrogant. A stunner,” he said, and giggled mirthlessly. “I will give you some advice.

“Do not go with Learmont. He said he is offering you employment? Refuse him! If it means you starve in the streets or end up in the workhouse, refuse him! But—if you find yourself unable to escape him, be very wary of any woman in his care.”

“Women? Do you mean patients—lunatics?”

“Yes. He has theories about the birth of Art: they involve entrapment and madness and—”

Behind them a figure loomed. Dr. Learmont smiled down at Algernon as though he were a beloved if troublesome child.

“Algernon, have you been egging on Mr. Comstock?” He pointed at Radborne's empty wineglass and the empty decanter beside it.

Algernon sniffed. “You know that I despise claret.”

“I'm glad to hear it!” Learmont clapped his hands together, then turned to indicate the man waiting by the door. “The maître d'hôtel has just informed me that Watts-Dunton has sent a driver for you, Algernon. All the way from Putney. I think we should not keep him waiting any longer.”

Algernon stared at the tablecloth, defeated, then glanced at Radborne. The little man's green eyes were weary and bloodshot, his face lined and sad. After a moment he nodded, pushed his chair back, and shuffled to his feet.

“Mr. Comstock.” He made a mocking half bow, his unruly hair falling across his face. “I hope your visit to London will be a happy one.”

Radborne smiled. “Thank you.”

“Happy, because happiness is anathema to art, and I wonder if you know what it means to be an artist. But if you truly wish to pursue painting, why, then, I wish you misery and madness and an early death. Good night, Mr. Comstock.”

Radborne watched him go. “What a weird little gentleman,” he said.

Learmont took his seat. “You know Swinburne's work, then?”

“Swinburne!” Radborne sat up, appalled. “
That was
Swinburne?”

“Of course. Who did you think he was?”

“Why ... I had no idea! You never told me his name!” Radborne swiveled to see if he could get a final view of the departing poet. “Of course I know him! His books—a college friend gave me the loan of
Laus Veneris.
What a remarkable work! I regret to say I never returned it.” Radborne laughed. “He looks so old. Was he a patient of yours?”

“No. Though he was indeed in danger of dying of his strange obsessions and drunkenness. Much to my regret, he avoided any sort of treatment with me, but this Watts-Dunton took him under his care, moved him to the wilderness of Putney, and . . .”

He made an odd gesture, half dismissal and half regret. “He is as you see him: one whom the gods have abandoned.”

Radborne felt a shiver pass through him. For a few minutes he said nothing, poking at his plate while his companion stared at the ceiling. Finally Dr. Learmont glanced at his pocketwatch, then beckoned for the waiter.

“Well, I fear the time has come to begin my long journey westward. If you are in no hurry, Mr. Comstock, why don't you accompany me to Paddington, and then I will have the cab bring you back to Southwark.”

Radborne began to protest, but Learmont was already on his feet. “As I mentioned, Mr. Comstock, I wish to discuss a matter of possible employment—my original intent in asking you to dine with me, before we encountered dear Algernon. Now, if you please . . .”

It was well after midnight when Radborne at last stumbled from the cab and upstairs into bed, his giddiness and exhilaration replaced by a pounding headache. When he finally came down to breakfast in the morning, Mrs. Beale greeted him coolly, though Mr. Balcombe gave him a knowing (and sympathetic) look as he spooned his oatmeal porridge.

“Mr. Comstock,” Mrs. Beale announced when Mr. Balcombe had gone upstairs, “if you are going to keep midnight hours, and company, I must suggest you take rooms elsewhere. There are gentlemen's coffee rooms and accommodations at the Old Gander. No doubt your stimulating companions can make other recommendations for you as well.”

As it turned out, this was not necessary. Late that morning an envelope arrived.

Mrs. Beale cast such a malevolent eye upon the letter that Radborne fled outside and down the street, to read it beneath the flapping wing of Dr. Trent's testimonials.

Radborne couldn't recall mentioning his constrained circumstances to Learmont, but then he supposed that one would not have to be a Physician in Charge, or even a Renowned Phrenologist, to take the measure of a secondhand greatcoat and paint stains on a best shirt. For some minutes he stood in the chill noonday sun, watching vans rattling toward warehouses and observing the flight of a single rook as it circled around and around the black spire of Southwark Cathedral. He read the letter one more time, folded it, and replaced it in the envelope. Then, his headache starting to recede, he hurried back to Mrs. Beale's to post his reply. The next morning he was on his way to Cornwall.

CHAPTER FIVE

The Eve of St. Agnes

D
aniel was no stranger to intoxicants.
Psilocybin, cocaine, methamphetamine, LSD, opium, Ecstasy: in the name of Art, and, occasionally, Love, he'd tried all of them, even once watching in rapt horror as a junkie girlfriend injected brown liquid into his own green-sick vein. His subsequent physical and psychic nausea was enough to flense the last bit of curiosity from him regarding altered states of consciousness. He now reserved sensual experimentation for California wines, occasionally investigating some outré Web site recommended by Nick and inevitably regretting the experience.

So he was completely unprepared for what happened to the world after three absinthes with Larkin in the Café Chouette.

“Is it always like this?” He was sprawled across the table, arms draped around her, his face buried in her hair as though it were a mass of flowers. “Like, uh ...”

He attempted a meaningful gesture, falling from his chair in the process. Larkin caught him, laughing, and Daniel stared at her imploringly as she helped him back into his seat.

“I think traditionally it's the woman who gets potted and falls down.” She swiped the hair from her eyes and smiled. “But apart from that? Yes, I think it is always like this. It's why all those poets and painters went mad.”

“And me? Will I go mad?”

“After three drinks? Highly doubtful. Especially for a journalist. I'd think your resistance would be fairly high.”

“I knew it.” He grasped her hand, so tightly his fingers tingled. “The first moment I saw you, I
just knew.'”

“Did you? What did you know?”

“Well . . .”

He opened his mouth but suddenly found that he had no idea what he was talking about. He could not, in fact, think of anything at all: couldn't even look at anything save the woman beside him.

“Just . .
. you,”
he said helplessly. Around him the room had contracted to two points of yellow light centered in her bottle-green eyes. “You. Who . . . are . . . you?”

He leaned toward her, and she took his face in her hands. Her fingers were so hot he flinched. When her mouth touched his, he resisted, but only for an instant. Then he felt as though his entire body were somehow being remade beneath her touch, her limbs flashing heat so intense he gasped, the skin burned from him so that his ribs scored her breasts and his skull her cheek, his hair tangling hers in tendrils of ash and flame and his fingers blue fire flickering across her face.

“Walk with me,” she whispered, and of course he could not.

But of course he did. Because where was he but in a bar in Bloomsbury of a late afternoon, the maître d' bowing slightly as he let them pass, a flushed, drunk man in youngish middle age with his arms around a tall woman—russet-haired, strong-featured, green-eyed—whose age was impossible to guess.

“Where are we going?” he asked when he was finally able to talk again. “Not that it matters. And who paid the check?”

“I did.

“You may thank me later,” she added, with a look that nearly sent Daniel walking straight into a lamppost.

“Oh. Well, sure.” He paused, zipping his bomber jacket and watching Larkin as she strode on, oblivious of puddles underfoot and the drizzle silvering her hair. Above them the narrow band of sky had brightened from gray to the lustrous green of seaglass. He put a hand to the lamppost to steady himself and glanced at his watch, dreamily registering that it was almost four-thirty. He laughed: a three-absinthe lunch!

It had been years since he'd gotten drunk during working hours. Storefronts looked glazed, like the sugared windows of a gingerbread house, and yellow mist rose from the pavement. A sweet summery smell floated above the reek of diesel exhaust. Beneath his hand the lamppost felt charged with heat.

The air breathes upon us here most sweetly,
thought Daniel.
How lush and lusty the grass looks! How green!

From somewhere high overhead, a bell pealed softly, as though the diminishing rain had a sound. Daniel stared at the sky, waiting, but nothing revealed itself.

Only when he glanced down again, a large black cab was driving past him, very slowly, just inches from the curb. He saw his own face reflected in the rain-flecked window, and behind it another face.

The cab stopped to idle at the curb. As Daniel stared, the window rolled down. A long-fingered hand extended a sunflower to him—a woman's hand, he thought at first, though the nails were very dirty. He squinted, trying to get a better look at whoever it was inside the taxi, could barely glimpse a thin figure wearing a mustard-colored zoot suit over a V-neck sweater: short scruffy blond hair, downy mustache, slightly upturned pale-blue eyes, vulpine grin.

“‘Be not afeard, the isle is full of noises.'” The voice was hoarse and reedy: not a man's voice at all. Daniel gaped as the figure lifted a hand in farewell and the window slid shut. The cab rolled forward. Daniel ran into the road behind it, watched it turn onto Woburn Street and disappear.

“What the fuck ... ?” He stared at the sunflower, its bloom the size of his hand, looked up to see Larkin waiting for him halfway down the block.

“You coming?” she shouted.

He ran to catch up with her.

“Look!” He handed her the flower. “Someone in a big black cab just gave me this.”

“She must've liked your looks.”

“I don't think it
was
a woman. She had a mustache.”

Larkin laughed. “A drag king! And she gave you this?” She tapped him on the chin with the sunflower. “In Whitechapel that'd mean you were betrothed.”

“Really?”

“Of course not.” She took his hand. “I could tell you anything and you'd believe it.”

“Absolutely.” He pulled her to him. “You know, I think I'm going nuts. 'Cause I was just standing there, thinking of a line from
The Tempest
—and I swear to God that cab appeared and—”

“Be careful—you almost walked right into that one, too!” She steered him away from another lamppost. “You Yanks can't hold your liquor, that's all.”

It was a few minutes' walk back to Paynim House, winding through the alleys around Woburn Street and jumping over channels of rainwater surging alongside the curbs. In the side street, someone had pried loose several manhole covers, and the bright yellow warning cones set beside them had been blown onto the sidewalks.

“Watch it, Daniel!”

Gouts of steam rose from an open manhole, freeing a lost childhood memory: downtown Manhattan, the burned-cloth scent of roasting chestnuts and the roast-chestnut man himself, singing in a cracked Irish tenor. “‘My darling, my darling, my darling young one . . .'”

“An old man died here last spring,” said Larkin. “Fell right in and broke his neck.”

“Jesus.” Daniel stopped and stared at the hole. A rusted ladder protruded from it. Balanced on the pile of rubble was the manhole cover. Raised letters marched across its center: ELF KING.

“Elf King?” said Daniel.

He stooped to examine it. Filth and rust covered the heavy metal disk like lichen, but he could see the faint outlines of other letters, nearly worn away.

SELF-LOCKING, it read.

Daniel traced the words with his finger. “Hey, Lark! Look at this!”

“I know. You'd be amazed what you see, once you start looking.”

She glanced at Paynim House. “Listen, why don't you just wait here? I'll only be a minute.”

She ran toward the front door and went inside. Daniel waved his sunflower forlornly, then looked around at the desolate courtyard, pools of standing water, disintegrating newsprint, a crow picking at an orange peel. There were no television aerials or satellite dishes, no lights burning in any of the surrounding buildings. Except for the parked Mini, the place probably looked much as it had a hundred years ago.

The thought made Daniel feel isolated and anxious, and with the first dank stirrings of a hangover. The odd brilliance that colored everything since he'd left the Café Chouette clung to the courtyard as well, though here it had a harsh metallic glare that made his eyes ache.

Still, it was only a few minutes before the door opened again and Larkin stepped back out. She headed toward the car, looking at Daniel. “You coming?”

He took a deep breath. “Sure,” he said, and hurried to join her.

She was bending to unlock the car. As she straightened, her hair fell across her face. Without thinking, he reached to draw it back.

“Wait,” he said. He felt that if he didn't touch her, he would faint, that the cobblestones would shift beneath his feet and he'd be gone, like that, into the earth. “Please . . .”

She stared at him, one hand still upon the car door, and he could not bear her gaze, he could not bear that she should see him like this, nothing but raw yearning. His face dipped to hers, and he pulled her to him, the folds of her scarf falling away as he kissed her. Pale green light exploded behind his eyes, heat and the pressure of her mouth on his, her coat falling open and his hands on her shoulders. There was a smell of green apple and fresh sap. He moaned and drew back, his desire so strong it was like a sickness, like a poison; the sunflower fell between them, its stem broken. He gasped, blinking.

“I. . . I'm sorry,” he said. “God, I . . .”

She shook her head. Her face was flushed, and there was a speck on her chin, a feathered frond of moss. She flicked back a strand of her hair, then glanced at the ground where the sunflower lay, its dark-green eye gazing back from within a fringe of gold and black.

“No,” she said, and lifted her head to stare at Daniel. “I wanted it. I wanted you.”

He shuddered, fighting to keep from grabbing her, from coming right there, fully clothed, as a woman he hardly knew pressed her hand upon his chest.

“We should go.” She let her hand trail upward to cover his mouth. He kissed her fingers: earth and sweetbreads, bitter wormwood. “We should go now.”

She stooped and retrieved the sunflower, then got into the car. Daniel slid in beside her, still trembling, and they drove away from Paynim House.

The juddering stop-and-start
of London rush-hour traffic went a long way toward purging Daniel of sickening desire. Now he just felt sick. Leaning out the window didn't help much: the Mini afforded a dizzying view of the passing cars and buses. It also put Daniel in direct contact with an endless spume of exhaust. He finally settled on slumping in a miserable heap in the passenger seat, waiting for his hangover to pass.

“Would you mind if we made a stop first?”

Daniel glanced up to see Larkin looking far too cheerful for someone stuck in a roundabout near Charing Cross. “Stop?” he asked weakly.

“Yes. Well, two stops. I almost forgot. I have this reception to attend. A going-away sort of thing. You can come,” she added. “It won't take long. You might find it interesting—artists and collectors.”

Daniel frowned, rubbing his unshaven chin. “I'm not really dressed for an artistic reception.”

“That's why I thought we'd stop by Sira's first—”

Daniel groaned. “No!
Please!”

“They're letting me keep my clothes there. My place is so small. This way I can change and you can borrow something of Nick's.”

“Nick is ten inches shorter than I am.”

“Then you can borrow something of mine. Look, we're almost there!”

They weren't. When they finally did arrive, it was past six. Neither Nick nor Sira was home, but Larkin had a key; she opened the door and ran upstairs. Daniel followed grumpily, stopping in the kitchen to pour himself some fizzy water, then searching the cupboards for something to help his headache.

“Maybe this isn't such a good idea,” he said. There was no ibuprofen in sight, so he settled for eating most of a jar of lime pickle. By the time Larkin came back downstairs, he'd broken a sweat and was feeling much better.

“Daniel? What do you think?”

He set the empty pickle jar in the sink, turned and whistled. “You look fantastic. Did you borrow that from the V&A?”

She flashed him a smile, tossing an armful of clothing onto the sofa. She was wearing a long, clinging dress of midnight-blue velvet, low-cut and long-waisted, with a necklace of jet beads and gold dragonflies gleaming against her pale skin. Daniel looked in dismay at his own clothes: loose black linen trousers, white cambric shirt, no belt, no tie. He said, “I'm not worthy.”

“He's an art collector, Daniel. Everyone will think you're somebody.”

“I
am
somebody,” he protested. “But not when I'm not dressed like a yoga instructor.”

“Then don't worry. Or here, wait—”

She turned to the heap of clothes on the sofa, sorting through them until she held up some sort of jacket. “Try this.”

“Jesus, Larkin, is it a costume party?”

He tugged it on: a long jacket of very fine soft wool, so dark a red it was nearly black, with crystal buttons and deep slash pockets lined with white satin. It was old and worn but fit him beautifully. He smoothed the cloth, grinning despite himself, then looked at Larkin. “Well? Do I pass?”

“It's gorgeous.
You're
gorgeous. Look.”

She turned him around to face the full-length ormolu mirror in Sira's living room. Daniel winced. “I look like I've just come from the Council of Elrond.”

“You look great.” She glanced to where the sunflower lay on a table. “Here.”