At the beginning of the third week of Edward’s absence, he took the hansom west and, the day’s letter in hand, determined to uncover answers himself about Edward’s whereabouts. But the only person he found at the boardinghouse was the wan little maid who seemed to spend most of her time lugging a pail of brackish-looking water from one floor to the next. “I dunno, sir,” she mumbled, looking doubtfully at David’s shoes, recoiling from the letter he held out for her as if it might burn her, “he dinna say when he’ll be back.” He left the house, then, but stood on the sidewalk, looking up at Edward’s windows, over which the dark curtains were fully drawn, the same as they had been for the past sixteen days.
That evening, though, he remembered something that might help him, and as he and his grandfather assumed their after-dinner positions, he asked, “Grandfather, have you heard of a woman named Florence Larsson?”
His grandfather appraised him, coolly, before tamping down the tobacco in his pipe and puffing. “Florence Larsson,” he repeated. “That’s a name I’ve not heard in a very long time. Why do you ask?”
“Oh, Charles was mentioning that his clerk lived in a boardinghouse she owns,” he said, dismayed not just by the speed of his duplicity but by his involving Charles in it.
“So it’s true,” his grandfather murmured, almost to himself, before sighing. “I never knew her myself, mind you—she is even older than I am; frankly, I’m surprised she’s still alive—but when she was around your age, she was involved in an awful scandal.”
“What happened?”
“Well. She was the only daughter of a quite well-to-do man—a doctor, I believe—and was herself studying to be a doctor. Then, one night, she met a man—I cannot remember his name—at a party thrown by her cousin. He was, apparently, spectacularly handsome and deeply charming, and utterly penniless—one of those men who seem to come from nowhere, and are connected to no one, and yet, through their appearance and witty conversation, are able to find themselves in society, among all the best people.”
“And so what happened?”
“What often happens in these circumstances, I’m sorry to say. He wooed her; she fell in love; her father threatened to disown her if she married the man…and she did so anyway. She had a fortune bestowed upon her by her late mother, and soon after they married, the man absconded with it all, every last cent. She was left destitute, and while she was able to return to her father’s house, he was so spiteful—a very coldhearted man, everyone said—that he did as he’d threatened and disinherited her entirely. If she’s still alive, she’d be living in her late aunt’s house, which I suppose she’s been in ever since her father’s death. She was, by all accounts, bereft. She never continued her studies. And she never married again—never even flirted with the possibility, from what I understand.”
He felt a coldness move over him. “And what happened to the man?”
“Who can say? For many years, there were rumors about him. He was sighted here or there, he emigrated to England or the Continent, he remarried this or that heiress—but no one ever knew for sure, and at any rate, he was never heard from again. But David—what’s wrong? You’ve gone pale!”
“It is nothing,” he managed to say. “I think the fish tonight disagreed with me, somewhat.”
“Oh dear—I know you love sole.”
Upstairs, back in the safety of his study, he tried to calm himself. The comparisons, which had risen unbidden, were ludicrous. Yes, Edward knew of his money, but he had never asked for any—he had even been bashful about accepting the blanket—and they were certainly not discussing marriage. But still, something about the story upset him, as if it were an echo of another story, a worse story, a story he had heard once but could not, however he tried, recall.
He was unable to sleep that night, and for the first time in a long while, he spent the following morning in bed, waving away the maids’ offers of breakfast, staring at a water stain along the baseboard, where the two walls met in a V. It was his secret, this patch of yellow, and when he had been confined, he had gazed at it for hours, certain that were he to turn from it, or to blink, when he opened his eyes next the room would be transformed into an unfamiliar place, someplace terrifyingly dark and small: a monk’s cell, the hold of a ship, the bottom of a well. The stain was what was keeping him in the world, and it demanded all of his concentration.
In his confinements, he was sometimes unable to even stand, but now he was not ill, only fearful of something he could not name, and so, finally, he made himself wash and dress, and by the time he’d ventured downstairs, it was already late in the afternoon.
“A letter for you, Mister David.”
He felt his heart quicken. “Thank you, Matthew.” But once he had plucked the letter from the silver tray, he set it on a table and sat, folding his hands in his lap, trying to still his heart, to lengthen and slow his breaths. Finally, cautiously, he stretched out his arm and picked up the letter. It is not from him, he told himself.
And it was not. It was another note from Charles, inquiring about his health and asking if he might like to accompany him to a recitation that Friday evening: It is of Shakespeare’s sonnets, of which I know you are fond.
He sat, holding the letter, his disappointment mingling with something he was once again unable to identify. Then, before he could hesitate, he rang for Matthew and asked for paper and ink, and quickly scrawled a response to Charles, accepting his invitation, and handed the envelope back to Matthew, telling him to deliver it immediately.
Once this was done, his final reserves of strength left him, and he stood and made his slow way upstairs, back to his chambers, where he rang for the maid and told her to tell Adams to tell his grandfather that he was still feeling poorly and would have to miss dinner tonight. And then he stood in the center of his study and looked about him, trying to find something—a book, a painting, a portfolio of drawings—to distract him, to quell the feeling of unease that now arose within him.
XI
The sonnets were recited by an all-female troupe, more enthusiastic than talented, but young enough so that, despite their lack of skill, they were still fresh and appealing to watch—it was easy to applaud them at the show’s conclusion.
He wasn’t hungry afterward, but Charles was, and suggested—hopefully, David thought—that they might have something to eat at his house. “Something simple,” he said, and David, from lack of anything to do and in need of distraction, agreed.
Back at the house, Charles suggested they sit in his upstairs parlor, which, though as inappropriately extravagant as the downstairs one—carpets so thick they felt like pelt beneath the foot; curtains of gloria that crackled, like burning paper, when one brushed against them—was at least smaller, friendlier in its scale. “Shall we just eat in here?” David asked him.
“Shall we?” Charles asked, raising his eyebrows. “I had told Walden to set the dining room. But I would far prefer to stay here, if you would.”
“Anything you decide,” he replied, suddenly losing interest, not only in the meal but in the conversation about it.