The Silversmith's Wife _ Sophia Tobin (24 page)

Joanna went to her. ‘You are mistress here,’ she said. ‘It is tea and bread and butter, that is all.’

‘Yes,’ said Harriet. ‘I must be brave, I suppose.’

As Nicholas Chichester walked in, he was pulling his long frock coat down, his hands running over the buttons. The light danced over the spangles and coloured silks of his waistcoat. Harriet trembled into life and smiled at him, her suffering giving her looks a piquancy that suited them. Joanna fixed her gaze on the middle distance as the master bowed and kissed his wife’s hand. She knew he would not wish to be reminded of her existence.

‘The room looks most wonderful, sir,’ said Harriet. Her tone was pleasant and unforced, and Joanna imagined the surprise he must have felt.

‘It was my aunt’s favourite room,’ she heard him say. ‘I’m glad you like it.’

Then the first guests were announced, and Joanna felt herself begin to breathe again. She could not bear the thought of them together in that room, the master’s eyes ribboning this way and that to avoid looking at her. Harriet, wrapped up in her own agony, would surely not notice, but the footmen would.

As more guests arrived Joanna moved back against the wall. She realized now that it suited her; that she would never have wanted to be in Harriet’s position, holding her hand out to every person, a faint, anaemic little smile flitting across her white face. The crowds grew. People came dressed in their finery, smelling of the enormous dinners they had just consumed: onions and sauces and meats and wine; men belching surreptitiously before picking up slabs of bread and butter. Draped in white with a pale turquoise sash, Harriet moved like a ghost through the throng.

Time passed quickly enough. As the voices rose, the babble filling the room with echoing noise, Joanna slipped out on to the landing. The master walked past her. She felt the air move as he passed, felt revulsion rise in her at the clipped sound of his shoes on the floor. ‘Mr Chichester,’ she said, in a low voice.

He stopped, turned, and gave her an icy glance. Then he began to descend the stairs without a word.

The footman by the door glanced at her. He was a new boy; she was glad he was not Will or Oliver. ‘Ungracious bastard, isn’t he?’ he said in an undertone, and she was able to breathe again. He took her little sigh as an assent, giving her a glance as he stood, stock-still. ‘And we all know where he’s off to, don’t we?’ he said.

‘What are you talking about?’ she said.

‘I was in the Running Footman the other night. Heard them talking about him. Off to the molly house, he is. Unnatural. Doesn’t care for his wife, longs only for young boys, very young boys, so I’ve heard. Someone’ll give him the ending he deserves one of these days.’

With his index finger, he drew a line across his throat.

Joanna leaned against the wall. He glanced at her again. ‘Didn’t mean to offend you,’ he said. ‘I forget what I say sometimes, get carried away. Sorry, miss. You won’t say anything, will you?’

Joanna shook her head.

12th September, 1792

Such a day this has been. A day to make me fall on my knees and thank God.

I went to Berkeley Square this morning. The Chichesters received me in the breakfast room. There was something amiss between them, I could see that at once. She insisted that I make some small alteration to the design of the dressing set and bring it to her that afternoon. As I left she slipped me a note.

These many changes mean I see you many times,
it said;
I will be alone this afternoon.

‘Now that the French King is dead,’ said Grisa, polishing a set of salts with small, ineffective, fretful movements, ‘all people can talk of is bloodshed and the war with France. no one cares for beauty in such days. Before long, this business will be gone.’ He clicked his fingers and sniffed.

One of the shop windows had been smashed a few nights before, startling them all as they sat at dinner. Though it was now fixed, out of the house’s inhabitants it had seemed to destabilize Grisa the most; he veered between ecstatic cheerfulness and deep melancholy.

‘You are not a companion for a winter’s day,’ said Alban. The window had discomforted him too; he had gone out into the evening, but the culprit was long gone. ‘You are right, trade is quiet, but I am sure things will pick up.’

He was not so sure. He had not designed a piece of silver in weeks; he had only managed some small repairs in the quiet of the workshop, glad that Benjamin had been given leave to visit his parents. A letter from Dr Taylor had smoothed things out; he was to stay there for several weeks, and luxuriate in his family’s company, for he was one day to own a silversmith’s business in London, and was clearly enjoying some local fame.

‘You do the apprentice’s job better than him,’ said Grisa, watching as Alban carefully rearranged a tray of mourning rings, seals and necklaces. Then, the shop manager gave a small, stifled sob, and cast his polishing rag down.

Alban sighed. Grisa’s theatricality was no fun without Mary to share in his ridiculousness; over the past few weeks they had slowly become allies in the ill-assorted household.

‘This is a cursed house,’ said Grisa eventually, obviously annoyed that Alban was ignoring him.

The word needled Alban; he remembered Jesse saying it. ‘Then why do you stay here?’ he said. ‘Out of loyalty to Mr Renard?’

‘I know why
you
stay here,’ said Grisa, sniffing.

‘I have been inside long enough,’ said Alban, with an air of finality, as he pushed the tray of jewellery back on to its shelf. ‘And you have been melancholy long enough. I will get you some of those lozenges you have been asking for.’

Grisa wiped his eyes with the back of his hand, and began polishing again. ‘You are a good friend, Mr Steele,’ he said, with the weakest of smiles.

It was to be a trial of his new commercial approach, Alban thought, as he walked along Bond Street. It was not far to his intended stop. Mr Jones the apothecary had a shop a few yards down from Renard’s on Bond Street. The shop floor was a fine room: plenty of dark wood, mirrors and gold writing advertising the potions anzd pills Jones sold, for he specialized in treatments for fashionable ailments.

Jones was a man who seemed to speak in swirls, and it was unclear whether he had been given this manner by nature or designed it himself. Alban thought he could have listened to his voice, rising and falling like the tides, for hours, for it had a strange musicality, and was often comic.

‘Ah, Mr Steele, Mr Steele,’ said Jones. ‘How can I help you? Do you have the headache? Nausea? You can tell me, Mr Steele, if you supped too long with Bacchus last night.’

Alban laughed. ‘I’ve come to get some of your best lozenges for Mr Grisa,’ he said. ‘He believes himself to be consumptive half the time; and an advert in
The Times
has convinced him that he will be well if he has your special lozenges.’

‘Him, consumptive?’ said Jones, losing a little of his delicate accent. ‘The man grew up in Southwark. He has the constitution of a mule. But who am I to argue with my customers?’ He handed the small packet over with a smile.

‘By the by,’ Alban said. He felt uncomfortable, but he hazarded that Pierre Renard would never have faltered at introducing business at any moment. ‘Mr Holt mentioned that he was at dinner with you, and that you have a fine pair of candlesticks from our firm. Do they give satisfaction?’

The colour drained from Jones’s face. ‘What of it?’ he said. His voice was faint. In the corner of the shop, a lady exclaimed over a pot of vegetable cream for the complexion.

‘I wondered only if you cared for any more table wares to match?’ said Alban, worried by the expression of annoyance on the apothecary’s face.

‘Not at present,’ said Jones. He raised his voice. ‘In fact, I regret buying them. It is unlikely I will venture to your shop again.’

‘Are they faulty?’ said Alban.

‘No, not exactly – but they are old-fashioned, heavy French things. I believe I was talked into it by Mr Renard. God rest his soul. He was a friend of mine – and persuasive.’

‘Perhaps we could exchange them?’ said Alban, but this evidently dissatisfied Jones. He shook his head and took a step away, smoothing down his hair nervously.

‘If you will excuse me, Mr Steele, I have customers to deal with. I wish you a pleasant day.’

‘May I pay you for—’

‘Just take them,’ said Jones, adding, in a biting undertone, ‘Do not come and see me about this again, and do not – I repeat, do not – mention this to anyone.’

‘May we join you, Mr Steele?’ said Mary that evening.

‘If you don’t mind watching me polish the stock,’ he said. ‘Mr Grisa began it today, but now he is laid up in bed.’

The shop was open late, the windows lit by candles, and as Mary walked past him, Alban caught the sweet scent of her.

Mallory crept down after her, a glass of red wine in her hand, looking rather merrier than usual. Her children’s voices drifted down from upstairs, for they were being expertly cared for by Avery, who tirelessly involved them in conversation and games. Mary and Mallory moved around the shop, looking at pieces together and remarking on them. Mallory draped a chain of graduated amethysts around Mary’s neck; the colour suited her pale skin, and as she turned in the candlelight, her eyes seemed bright in a way Alban had not seen before, so that for a moment he ceased to look at the silver, and put it down on the counter.

‘Why do you powder your hair?’ he said. ‘It is such a colour.’

‘Would you have me appear like a revolutionary?’ she said, smiling. ‘There are so many hidden things, so many signs. My husband taught me to look out for them, and now I am terrified of many transgressions. I hardly know how to keep up with them. You know how Dr Taylor thinks everyone a radical. If I left my hair as nature intended he would say God save the King every other sentence.’

‘He already does,’ he said, and she laughed.

Recently, their words and looks had begun to fit into each other, a puzzle that was gradually being constructed between them.

‘You should not be afraid now,’ he said to her, and saw Mallory tip another mouthful of red wine back.

There was a knock at the shop door. ‘I’ll go,’ said Mallory, and she went to the door with a heavy step.

The door opened, banging the bell against the frame, and Dr Taylor peered in. ‘Mrs Renard, Mrs Dunning, Mr Steele,’ he said, removing his hat and bowing. ‘I saw you at the window, Mrs Renard.’ There was a tone of gentle disapproval in his voice. ‘I know Mr Renard always said that you were dazzled by some of the jewels in this shop.’

‘We have been surrounded by metal and stones our whole lives,’ said Mallory. ‘They hardly dazzle us, sir.’

‘I did not mean to offend you, Mrs Dunning,’ said Taylor. ‘Though I see, as usual, you are quick to jump to it.’

‘I will ask for tea,’ said Mary, not daring to catch Alban’s eye, for she knew he found Taylor and Mallory’s irritation with each other amusing.

‘There is no need,’ said Taylor. ‘I simply called to say that I have heard word from Thomas Havering, and I have given him leave to call on you, next week.’

Silence fell over the room.

Mallory spoke first. ‘Well,’ she said, ‘it is a sensible thing, indeed, for him to visit.’

‘You always hated him,’ said Mary to Mallory, undoing the amethyst necklace, and crumpling it into her hands.

‘Do you know him well?’ said Taylor. He was leaning on his gold-topped cane, his eyes fixed on the floor.

‘A little,’ said Mary. ‘My father did work for him. I used to hide behind his legs when Mr Havering came to call.’

She wished to add that Pierre had modelled himself on goldsmiths like Havering: bluff, thriving men, who knew how to woo and flatter, but never did anything unless it was to their advantage. She recalled Havering’s square figure, his clothes enriched with gold lace, thick fingers adorned with an indecent number of rings as though he was a walking advertisement for his trade, and a nose that seemed wrinkled with permanent discontent.

As a child of nine, she had attended the burial of the goldsmith’s first wife, Anne, at a country graveyard in St Pancras. She remembered chiefly the rain falling all around, and Havering expressing the worry that he might have caught a cold. Mary glanced at her sister, but Mallory was finding it hard to look at her, as was Taylor. Only Alban’s eyes were fixed on her face.

‘He has spoken warmly of you,’ said Taylor. His voice was trembling slightly. ‘Forgive me; this is an indelicate conversation, but an advantageous marriage, that would take you far away from these dangerous streets . . .’ He let his voice trail off.

‘Dr Taylor may have a point,’ said Mallory. ‘I am afraid for you, after everything that has happened.’

Alban put the ledger down hard on the counter, making everyone jump. ‘Your book, Mrs Renard,’ he said.

‘What is this?’ said Taylor.

‘I have volunteered to keep the accounts,’ said Mary.

‘There is no need for you to involve yourself in the workings of the business,’ he said.

‘But I wish to be involved,’ said Mary. ‘My mother was a burnisher, you know. The women in my family were not always so helpless.’

‘She writes a fine hand,’ said Alban.

‘I say again,’ said Taylor, with a pained expression. ‘There is no need. You must excuse me; Mrs Taylor has held the dinner long enough. Mrs Renard, do think on what I have said.’

He bowed, and went out on to the street, walking slowly, his eyes fixed on the ground as though he was deep in thought. Mallory brushed her skirts down. ‘Avery must be rescued from the children,’ she said. ‘I have stayed too late. Mary, will you go up and bid them come down to me, if you please?’

Mary went, biting her lip, her face pale. Mallory put her empty glass down on the counter. She put her hands on her hips, as though she was gathering strength for something.

‘Mr Steele,’ she said, ‘you must learn to hide your face, for in your expression I see everything, you know.’

Alban continued to polish the silver. ‘I do not know,’ he said.

She shook her head. ‘You think me harsh,’ she said, her voice slurring slightly, but only slightly, under his minute observation of her words. ‘But it did grieve me to see all the life drain out of your face, and hers, when Havering was mentioned. I do not agree with Dr Taylor on much, but it will be best if Mary leaves here.’

‘You have often said you wish to protect her,’ he said.

‘And so I do,’ she said.

‘Perhaps this is not the best way. She is stronger than you think,’ he said.

Mallory stared at him. She leaned so close that he could see the pores in her fine skin.

‘You were not there,’ she said, ‘on the day our brother was taken. I held the door shut when they carried him to the carriage. I stopped her from following him. The cry that came from her lips was unearthly. It froze my blood. I knew then she is not as I am. Not rooted in this world, but in some other.’

Her eyes dropped to the counter, as she heard her children’s feet on the stairs. ‘Proceed, if you must, Mr Steele,’ she said quietly. ‘But if you break her, I will break you.’