The Seance (18 page)

A few weeks later, Edward decided to visit his father in Cumbria. I would have loved to go with him, but to travel together unchaperoned, without my mother’s permission, was out of the question. Edward wanted to tell his father in person, and so I set myself to the business of writing to my mother on the morning after his departure. I had tried and discarded half a dozen variations upon ‘I know you will not approve . . .’ or ‘I fear you will be displeased . . .’ before I settled upon ‘You will be surprised but not, I hope, displeased, to hear that I am engaged to be married to Mr Edward Ravenscroft, the artist.’ It seemed best not to mention that Edward was staying at the rectory; the difficulty, indeed, was to think of anything whatever that would not simply heighten my mother’s displeasure.

I was still struggling with my letter when George returned from a visit to Aldeburgh with the news that he had run into John Montague, an acquaintance of whom he had spoken, in the company of a very agreeable man who turned out to be Magnus Wraxford, the prospective owner of Wraxford Hall; so agreeable, indeed, that George had invited them both to dine with us the following evening. I was sorry that Edward would miss the occasion, for Mr Montague was a keen amateur painter
as well as solicitor to the Wraxford estate, but Dr Wraxford was only in town for a few days, to attend a hearing into his uncle’s disappearance.

Ada, despite the lack of notice, was pleased for George’s sake. ‘He has so little opportunity to talk to men of ideas,’ she said, ‘and whilst Edward is always delightful company . . .’ I could not disagree, for Edward’s theology went no further than ‘if, when I die, I discover there is an after-life, I shall be pleasantly surprised – at least I trust the surprise will be a pleasant one – if not, it will be mere oblivion.
Carpe diem
for me, I’m afraid.’ But rather than seizing the day, I used the welter of preparation as an excuse to set my letter aside, with the result that it was not finished until the following morning, and then only because Ada insisted that if we were to speak of my engagement before Dr Wraxford – a London physician with, presumably, a large acquaintance – the letter must absolutely be in the post to my mother before the gentlemen arrived.

Ada and I were standing by the drawing-room window as our guests were shown in. I was wearing a plain white gown of which my mother deeply disapproved (on the ground that it was so out of fashion it might have been worn in the last century); Ada was in deep blue, and I suppose with the last of the evening sun picking up the lights in our hair, we made something of a picture. But I was quite unprepared for its effect – my effect, as I soon realised – upon Mr Montague.

At first glance, however, my attention was captured by Magnus Wraxford. He was only an inch or two taller than John Montague, though broader in the shoulders, but beside him Mr Montague seemed to be moving in deep shadow as they advanced across the carpet. Magnus Wraxford looked no more than thirty-five, with thick black hair, a clipped black beard which gave him a slightly Mephistophelean air, and dark eyes of remarkable luminosity. Though George had said he was handsome, the sheer force of his presence took me by surprise. The saying that eyes are the windows of the soul flitted across my mind as
I extended my hand, but I had the discomfiting sensation, as our fingers touched, that my own soul had become momentarily transparent to his gaze.

‘I am delighted to make your acquaintance, Miss Unwin.’ His voice was low and resonant, reminding me of someone, I was not sure whom.

‘And this is Mr John Montague,’ said George.

I turned to greet him – a spare, dark-suited man with brown hair already receding – and saw that he was deeply agitated. John Montague was staring at me – and struggling, as our eyes met, to conceal his emotion – as if I had been a ghost. Something in his haunted expression brought back a fleeting memory of my last visitation, an ominous shadow from which I recoiled as swiftly. The hand that clasped mine was cold, and trembled perceptibly.

‘And I too, Miss – Unwin, am – am very much delighted,’ he said, stumbling over the words.

‘Thank you, sir. I am only sorry that my – my fiancé, Mr Ravenscroft, could not be here to meet you.’

I had not meant to declare my engagement so precipitately, but his agitation compelled me to it. He started visibly at the word ‘fiancé’, and seemed to make a great effort to bring his emotions under control.

‘Mr Ravenscroft is an artist by profession,’ said Ada, ‘and travels a great deal in search of subjects.’

‘Most remarkable,’ said Mr Montague, with his gaze still fixed upon me. ‘I mean ... that is to say . . .’ There was an awkward pause while we waited for him to continue.

‘Miss Unwin,’ he said at last, ‘you must forgive me. The fact is – you bear an extraordinary likeness to my late wife Phoebe, and it has rather shaken me.’

‘I am very sorry,’ I replied, ‘to hear of her death. Was it very recent?’

‘No – she died six years ago.’

‘I am very sorry to hear it,’ I repeated, and could not think of anything else to say; at that distance, his shock at the resemblance was all the more
unnerving. Ada, to my relief, led him a little away from the rest of us, and Dr Wraxford began to converse with me.

‘Does Mr Ravenscroft live in this part of the country?’

‘Not always,’ I said uncomfortably, ‘as Ada mentioned, Edward travels a great deal. He has gone to Cumbria to visit his father.’

‘Edward Ravenscroft ... I don’t think I know his name, but I wonder if I have seen some of his work.’

‘Perhaps not yet,’ I said. ‘Edward is still making his way in the world – he is only twenty-six, you see – though I am sure he will succeed.’

‘Then I shall look forward to seeing the fruits of it. I take a keen interest in painting, Miss Unwin, especially in the work of my contemporaries.’

‘As it happens, sir,’ I said hesitantly, ‘we have one of his pictures here; I am sure he would not mind you seeing it – and Mr Montague too, if he would like to.’

Edward’s study of the keep at Orford had been framed, and was hanging in the sitting-room opposite. Both men – John Montague had by now recovered his composure, though I sensed his gaze straying towards me whenever he thought I was unaware of it – examined the picture in silence for some time while George and I awaited the verdict; Ada had gone to see about the dinner.

‘This is very fine – very fine indeed,’ said Dr Wraxford at last. ‘And most original – has Mr Ravenscroft been to Paris?’

‘No,’ I replied, ‘though he hopes to, before very long.’ Edward was determined that we should go there for our honeymoon; I felt my colour rising at the thought of it.

‘Even more impressive, in that case. Don’t you think so, Montague?’

‘Er, yes, yes – very fine, as you say. I must have made a dozen attempts at this very subject – none half so accomplished as this.’

‘Come, come, my dear fellow,’ said Magnus, ‘you know that your picture of the Hall can stand in any company – in fact there’s something about this that reminds me of it. Mr Montague,’ he explained, ‘has painted a superb study of Wraxford Hall by moonlight.’

‘Which I fear will be my swan-song. You may have heard, Mr Woodward, of the superstition amongst the poaching fraternity: that anyone who sees the ghost of the monk will die within the month. In my case (though I saw no ghost) it seems to have been my talent, such as it was, that died.’ He spoke lightly, but the undertone of bitterness was plain.

‘I am sure,’ said George, ‘that your talent only needs to lie fallow for a while. Besides, you are a professional man, with many calls upon your time; you cannot expect to outdo the work of men who do nothing all day but paint.’

Mr Montague’s expression suggested that he did not at all agree, but whatever reply he had been contemplating was forestalled by the gong for dinner.

By the time the fish service had been cleared it was quite dark outside. George was sitting at the head of the table, his back to the unlit fire, with Ada and Magnus Wraxford on his right, and myself and John Montague on his left, facing the windows, an arrangement for which I was grateful, as I did not have to meet his gaze unless he addressed me directly, which he seldom did. I was still struggling to shake off the foreboding he had inspired.

The conversation thus far had ranged from Mr Millais’s election to the Academy, to the new biblical scholarship, to the efficacy of mesmerism in alleviating pain and even curing disease, a practice which, according to Dr Wraxford, had been prematurely rejected by the medical profession. He spoke for some time about the nature of mesmeric suggestion, and how it could influence even the action of the heart.

‘For all our talk of progress,’ he said in conclusion, ‘we – that is to say, the majority of my colleagues – seem positively to spurn any treatment, however effective, for which we cannot account in material terms.
Such is the great difficulty with mesmerism; that, and its misuse by mountebanks and quacks. You must forgive me, Montague – he has heard me on this theme before.’

John Montague murmured something I did not catch.

‘Is it possible,’ asked George, ‘to mesmerise someone against his will?’

‘Possible, yes, given an impressionable subject; but only a charlatan would attempt it.’

‘And once mesmerised, is the subject compelled to do whatever the mesmerist commands?’

‘I doubt whether a mature, rational individual could be compelled to act against his deepest instincts: further than that I shouldn’t care to go.’

‘You remarked, I think,’ said Ada, ‘that in a state of trance, a subject can be instructed to see persons who are not actually present?’

I divined, from the way she avoided my glance, that she was asking on my behalf.

‘Yes – quite correct.’

‘And might this explain, do you think, how spiritualists – spirit mediums – believe they can have commerce with the dead?’

‘It might indeed, Mrs Woodward – at least, those who are not simply perpetrating a fraud, which is regrettably common in spiritualist circles.’

‘And is it possible,’ I asked, striving to keep my voice steady, ‘for a person to fall into a trance without being aware of it, and thus to see – people who are not there?’

Dr Wraxford regarded me for a moment before answering. I felt that he was seeking to divine the thought behind the question; it was quite unsettling, the way his dark eyes held the candlelight.

‘Possible, yes. But for a subject to become deeply entranced without being aware of it; that would be most uncommon, Miss Unwin, unless you mean that state between sleeping and waking?’

‘No,’ I replied, summoning my courage. ‘I suppose I mean ... a friend once told me of a strange experience: she walked into a room one afternoon where her mother and sisters were sitting, and saw a young man
upon the sofa, a young man she had never seen before. But then she realised that he was invisible to the others. He got up and walked towards her – she was not afraid – and then – seemed to dissolve into the air. And so I wondered ... whether she might have fallen into a trance.’

‘I don’t think trance will explain it – and you are presumably sure your friend was not deceiving herself, or ...’

‘I am certain the experience was exactly as she described it.’

‘And your friend was not afraid. That is most unusual.’

‘Not afraid of the young man: she said she did not think of him as a ghost, because he seemed so ordinary – she could hear the sound of his tread upon the floor. But it left her very shaken, knowing the others had not seen him.’