The Lodger: A Novel (24 page)

When she had cried herself out completely, cold calm descended on her, and something bordering on relief. She closed her eyes and an image came into her mind of floating amongst the clouds with her baby, looking down at treetops and houses far below. It comforted her. She had a sense of belonging to an order that was much larger than herself, and a feeling of restored faith in its mysterious workings.

A new thought arrived. She was free. She didn’t have to be a hostage in Bertie’s demented world any longer.

Eighteen

As time passed, Dorothy’s body healed slowly, but a strange cold numbness crept into her soul. It stole around her like a shroud, inviolate and impenetrable, unlike anything she had ever experienced before. She moved through her days feeling cut off from other people, isolated in chilly bleakness. Yet as she stood with Bertie in the Russell Square rooms, her lack of feeling seemed like armor, protecting her, and she was almost glad of it.

“I can’t believe you’re doing this. Is it really what you want?” Bertie’s voice was little more than a whisper.

Dorothy nodded wordlessly. Each sound and movement came to her as if from far away, failing to penetrate the force field of isolation. She wondered if she would always feel this alone. If so, she must learn to bear it.

“Don’t break us up, Dora. I’m begging you.”

“I have to.”

The numbness lifted without warning, and she found herself hardly able to speak for the pain that flooded through her. She cleared her throat and tried again. “We had our chance at happiness, and we’ve made a damned mess of it … a terrible waste and mess. Jane’s betrayed and hurt, we’re all damaged … we can’t carry on as though nothing happened.”

Bertie swallowed audibly. He tried to take her hand, but she moved away.

He put his head in his hands. “I was shattered, you know, when we lost the baby. Your pregnancy lifted me into a state of tremendous elation, and when it ended, I came crashing down from a great height. But I never, for one moment, thought I’d lose you as well…” His voice was trembling. “We’ll be miserable apart. It will tear a great hole in my heart. I’m sure it won’t leave much in yours … I’m finished without you.”

Dorothy was experiencing the old pull toward him … there was nobody quite like him. Her throat hurt with the effort of holding back tears; with the effort of not putting her arms around him. She’d give anything to lean into his solid warmth one last time. The strength of the desire was like a physical force, stronger than she was. She wanted to dissolve into him, to give herself over to being shaped by him … One hand reached toward him, halted before it touched him. She knew that if she succumbed, she would never summon the strength to break free. Sternly, she reminded herself that being with him had nearly destroyed her. It was wrong; it couldn’t lead to happiness. She forced her hand to drop. Though the room was warm, she felt shivery and sick in her stomach.

Bertie stood up and walked toward her, both hands outstretched. “My darling Dora, you aren’t yourself. You’ve been through a horrible ordeal, and you’re weaker than you realize. Don’t break us up now, you might feel differently when you’re better.”

Dorothy shook her head. “I’ve made up my mind. There’s nothing more to say.”

Despite the certainty with which she spoke, she couldn’t extinguish the wild hope that he would suddenly turn into the person she was searching for … that he would say or do some marvelous thing to redeem himself and save them both.

There was silence.

“I’ve handed in my notice at work,” she said at last.

Bertie made a sound that expressed amazement and derision. “Why chuck everything over at once? What a fearfully silly thing to do.”

“It’s hard to explain … I need a complete break, to be totally free, to start over…”

“How will you survive? What are you going to
do
?”

Involuntarily, his hand reached toward the inside pocket of his jacket, where he kept his wallet.

Dorothy shook her head. “I shall manage.”

He sighed. “I can’t help feeling that you’ve taken leave of your senses.”

She bristled. “On the contrary; I’ve never felt so sane and clearheaded in my life.”

There was another pause. Eventually, Bertie said “You’ll still support me, take an interest in my work?”

She nodded, unable to meet his eyes.

He said sadly, “You know where to find me if you need me.”

*   *   *

VERONICA STOOD IN
the middle of her room. A wild disorder of garments and belongings were strewn over the floor, and over every surface. She looked frail and sickly; her color was bad and her eyes seemed too large for her thin face. Making her way to the bed, she began to fold a heap of blouses; her movements were slow and careful. Her old speed and supple grace, her way of throwing herself into everything she did, had gone.

She was packing to go home, in disgrace. Her brother’s goodwill and indulgence, stretched to its utmost limit on so many occasions, had finally snapped under the indelible dishonor of prison.

Veronica paused in the middle of what she was doing, and sat down heavily on the bed.

“Are you all right?” Dorothy asked. “Should you be seen by a doctor, in case? The things they did to you could have caused an internal injury.”

“Oh, I’m not too bad. I do get tired more easily these days, but I expect that a combination of taking it easy and Mother’s cooking will put me right.”

“I can’t imagine how ghastly it must have been.”

“I haven’t told you about the forcible feeding.”

Dorothy pressed her lips together. “I didn’t ask, because I don’t want to make you relive it.”

“I’ll tell you…” Veronica paused, half closing her eyes. She began to speak in a flat expressionless voice, very matter of fact, as though she was talking about someone else.

“It took five of them to do it. Two wardresses pinned my arms down, one wrenched back my head, and one had both feet, stretching my limbs to their limit, so that my body took on the shape of a cross. The doctor bent over my chest to get at my mouth; he had to lean on my knees to do it. I’d closed my mouth tightly, but he managed to prise it open by digging the sharp edge of his thumbnail into my lips. He forced my jaws wide, as far as they would stretch, and a gag was tied so my teeth couldn’t close. A rubber tube was pushed down my throat—it seemed enormous, far too thick to do the job—and it made me choke, from the second it touched the back of my throat till it was thrust into my stomach. It seemed to take them forever to get it into me; I can’t describe the agony of it. The choking, the lack of air got worse and worse; I was struggling desperately for breath, convinced I was going to suffocate. I’m sure they passed the tube too far down, because it caused an excruciating pain in my side.

“Then liquid food was poured very quickly into my stomach, through a funnel. My eardrums felt like they were exploding; there was a terrible burning in my chest, which I could feel to the end of my breastbone. It was too much food, too fast, and I was immediately sick over the doctor and wardresses. The act of vomiting made me double up involuntarily, but the wardresses pressed my head back and the doctor leant on my knees to keep me straight. God, it was humiliating! Vomit gushed everywhere, over my face and hair. It soaked through my dress and splashed onto their clothes and shoes. There was so much of it, and it simply stank; it was a revolting mess. It seemed an age before they took the tube out, and when it came up, it felt like it was tearing out the whole of my insides with it.

“By that stage, I could hardly remember who I was, let alone why I was there. I forgot equal rights; I forgot the other suffragettes. I was aware of nothing but my own misery. Before the doctor walked out, he slapped me across the face. It wasn’t a forceful blow, but it seemed to express how much he despised me and my behavior … I was left almost fainting in a pool of sick. I was gripped by a fit of shivering and I couldn’t move; they said it was too late at night to fetch a change of clothes for me.”

“But that’s inhuman! You wouldn’t treat an animal like that!”

“Exactly. Yet this torture is happening to suffragettes in gaols all over the country, and it’s sanctioned by His Majesty’s Government … I was fed like that four or five times, and each time was worse than the one that went before, partly, I think, because knowing what was in store made the anticipation of it an utter torment.”

Dorothy was silent, battling for composure.

“To tell the truth, I feel rather broken by it all,” Veronica went on. “Damaged in health, and weakened in spirit. I keep asking myself what it was for. All our protests failed, and I’m not sure they were worth the price … the vote seems further away than ever. I’m thinking of giving up on the suffrage, actually.”

It was almost more than Dorothy could bear to hear Veronica talk like this. “Your march failed, but one day the suffragettes will succeed,” she said stoutly.

“Do you think so? Right now, having the vote seems as unlikely as you and I being allowed to love each other openly.”

Dorothy paused for a moment, before saying softly “I’m sure a time will come for both. It just isn’t now.”

“Hmm.” Veronica was examining the ragged skin around her fingernails. “At any rate, I’ve realized you were right. We can’t stand up against the whole world.”

“Don’t. It kills me to hear you sound so defeated.”

Shrugging her shoulders, Veronica hauled herself to her feet and turned back to her packing; for a time, they were silent.

“Are you looking forward to going home?” Dorothy asked, at last.

“Yes, I am, although being with them is only a different kind of prison—a more luxurious one, with an unstinting clothes allowance.” She gave Dorothy the ghost of a smile. “It’s odd, but I feel I scarcely want to be free; I’ve lost the will. I never realized how habit forming obedience is. You never use reason or judgment in prison; you’re told what to do, and you follow orders without query or hesitation. The idea of thinking for myself, or taking any kind of initiative is quite frightening.”

There was another pause.

“I’m glad Benjamin came to visit you,” Dorothy said.

“I’ve never been so surprised in my life as I was to see him. I suppose you told him I was in prison?”

“Yes.” Dorothy clamped her mouth shut to stop herself confessing that his call had been made entirely at her suggestion.

Dorothy could picture Benjamin in the horrible visiting room: the unabashedly soulful look on his face as he took in the grime and the smell, and steeled himself for a difficult meeting, not wanting to disappoint Dorothy. He would have seemed like a visitor from another world in the frock coat and silk hat of his hard-won city status, waiting for Veronica with barely suppressed impatience, his case of legal documents under his arm. These details would not have been lost on the fearsome wardresses. Dorothy hoped his visit had resulted in more careful treatment for Veronica.

Dorothy could see Veronica emerging, at last, from the bowels of the building, her beauty dimmed but not extinguished by the graceless uniform. She would have been nonplussed and speechless at the unexpected sight of Benjamin, gathering all her self-possession to manage the occasion. There would have been no sign of the laughter he had found so irrelevant and annoying at their first meeting. Benjamin had probably gazed at her in silence, the muscles in his face contracting and his eyebrows raised with effort as he sought phrases to alleviate his discomfiture, saying something like, “Hello. You will most certainly not have been expecting me.” How could he fail to be moved by the radiantly accepting, grateful smile that would have greeted his words?

Dorothy wondered what they had talked about. Had it dawned on him gradually, or all at once, that Veronica was intelligent and brave as well as beautiful; that she had principles and was prepared to endure real suffering for the sake of them?

“He said he would come and see me at home,” Veronica was saying. Dorothy couldn’t, for a few moments, work out what the unfamiliar tone in her voice meant … she realized, with a shock, that it expressed successful rivalry! Veronica was competing with her for Benjamin; worse still, she believed herself victorious.

Dorothy was silent, struggling to come to terms with the fact that the train of events she’d set in motion had assumed an unstoppable life of its own, and was sliding rapidly away from her. She looked at Veronica standing in front of the French windows. Cold sunlight streamed in through the glass, falling sharply over her pale face and shoulders. There was no depth in the light. Dorothy wondered if this was how a novelist might feel who, having breathed life into his characters, unexpectedly found they had assumed independent wills, and were refusing to be controlled.

“I don’t know what Mother will make of Benjamin…” Veronica sounded less confident. “He won’t exactly fit in with her idea of an acceptable suitor.”

There was another hesitation.

“Why can’t we stay the way we were?” Veronica asked suddenly, with a flash of her old impulsiveness. Dorothy breathed her relief: the essence of their relationship was unchanged.

“Yes.”

“Let’s go away somewhere. To France or Italy; anywhere nobody knows us or cares what we are to each other. Let’s pack up and leave, just the two of us.”

“I wish we could.”

“God, we’ve been happy together. I can hardly bear to leave all this. I’ve never been so happy in my life as I am with you.”

Veronica walked over and slipped an arm around her waist; her lips brushed the side of Dorothy’s mouth. Gentle and sweet, almost chaste, her touch brought their old world all about them: peerless, inextinguishable. They fell silent, reveling in the completeness of it. The whole of life flowed between them, within them, in a way no man and woman, however well matched, could hope to attain.

In a few hours, Veronica would be isolated with her family’s chilly disapproval.

*   *   *

VERONICA WAS READY.
Dorothy’s hands felt large and shaky, and her feet were cold. The room looked barren and desolate without the clutter Veronica attracted. It was funny how quickly a room died without an inhabitant. Veronica turned off the gas and stood for a moment in the doorway, taking one last look. She closed the door softly and they walked downstairs together. Her luggage was waiting in the hall.