The Woman In The Mirror: A haunting gothic story of obsession, tinged with suspense. Rebecca James
‘Father said we’re not to touch her,’ says Edmund. ‘Remember?’
‘Alice doesn’t mind,’ says Constance, ‘do you, Alice?’
‘I won’t break.’
‘Constance breaks all her toys,’ says Edmund. ‘That’s why I won’t let her play with any of mine. Especially my locomotives.’
‘I do not!’ objects the girl.
‘Chop-chop, children,’ says Mrs Yarrow, encouraging them to sit. ‘Miss Miller will want to get on with your lessons this morning. Eat your breakfast first.’
‘I can eat one-handed,’ says Constance. ‘I’m not letting go.’
I ought to deter her, follow the captain’s rules. But there is such charm about her, about them both, that I am happy to be held.
I’m not letting go.
I was told that before, in another life, when I was another girl. It’s not an easy thing to hear, neither is it easy to resist. And I was let go, wasn’t I? Our hands parted, and I fell.
*
Thus far the children have been educated in an upstairs bedroom, one of the many chambers at Winterbourne that otherwise go unused. On seeing the forlorn space, a dark turret with the oppressive atmosphere of a sanatorium, I immediately decide to relocate. ‘Oh, I never liked it,’ agrees Mrs Yarrow, as she helps Tom and me carry the desks to the drawing room. As the stand-in between governesses, she’d been employed short-term in the twins’ tutelage. ‘Too dingy, and the children kept complaining of coughs and chills. Besides, I could feel her watching me all the time.’
‘Her?’
‘The woman who was here before you,’ Mrs Yarrow says quickly, under Tom’s dissatisfied glare. ‘She had her ways of doing things. That’s all.’
‘What sort of ways?’
‘Oh, nothing, nothing important…’
‘Is this very well for you, miss?’ Tom squares the desks so they’re facing the window. ‘Will you need anything else?’
‘Thank you, Tom, that will be all. Children should be educated in a good light, don’t you agree, Mrs Yarrow? I want Edmund and Constance to feel inspired by our lessons, and where better place to start than with a fine view of nature.’
‘Right you are.’
And I must admit, an hour later, I am feeling positive about our progress. The de Grey twins continue to amaze me in their enthusiasm, their confidence, and their understanding that whatever they know is a mere grain when set against what still remains to be found. They are unfailingly polite, amenable characters with a zest for learning, making my job no less than a pleasure. I had worried, slightly, for the educative aspect. I had been honest about my lack of teaching experience but feared it would prove a challenge. Now I see why my honesty didn’t count against me: these pupils are just about the easiest, loveliest, most rewarding novices a teacher could hope to influence. Whatever methods my predecessor had, they must have worked.
After lunch, the three of us venture into parkland. The lawns at Winterbourne would once have been impeccably tended, but now, as I observed in the Rolls when we first approached, they are hopelessly overgrown. Creepers straggle across the paths; chipped stone planters are covered in moss, and two lion heads at the top of a run of steps have ears and eyes missing, stolen by the elements. The topiary is melted out of shape and the whole impression is one of a garden underwater, liquid and strange. Behind us, Winterbourne rises in giant, eerie magnificence. I hear the sea, an incessant, rhythmic breath as it washes into shore.
‘This afternoon,’ I tell them as we take the path to the wood, ‘we’re going to draw a picture.’ I’m invigorated by the day: the sun, the sky and the birdsong.
‘Like a flower?’ says Constance.
‘Like a fox,’ says Edmund.
‘A flower would be easier to draw than a fox,’ I say, ‘because we need to be able to really look at it. We’re going to look at it in incredible detail, and keep looking at it as we draw, so that we can reproduce as accurate a likeness as possible.’
‘It has to be still, then,’ says Edmund.
‘That’s absolutely right. One can draw a moving thing, of course one can, but one isn’t able to study it with as much care.’ We pick our way over a twisted tree branch. The children are used to coming this way for they step over it easily, while I am obliged to stop and adjust my skirt. ‘Tom found a dead fox,’ says Edmund. He collects a stick and pokes the ground with it. ‘He’s always finding dead foxes.’
‘Edmund!’ Constance covers her ears.
‘It’s all right, Constance.’ I smile. ‘Nature is red in tooth and claw.’
‘I don’t like it.’
‘Could I draw a dead fox?’ says Edmund.
‘You could if you wanted. But it’s rather morbid, don’t you think?’
‘But I could study it, in detail, then, as you say. It wouldn’t be able to get away from me. It wouldn’t be able to run away.’
‘True. But when you looked at your picture afterwards, you wouldn’t think of the fox as living, would you? You wouldn’t remember how clever you were to reproduce its detail as it rushed through the wood. You’d remember it as a body.’
‘And you’d hate to look at it,’ says Constance. ‘It would make you sad.’
‘I suppose,’ says Edmund. A neat frown puckers his childish brow. ‘But Father has his case of birds – those stuffed crows on the landing. They used to scare us, didn’t they, Connie? We’d run past them with our eyes shut in case they jumped out and pecked us! People like to look at those, and that’s the same thing, isn’t it?’
I spy a place for us to sketch, a soft clearing, surrounded by flora.
‘It depends on the person,’ I say. ‘Everybody likes different things. Hence the multiplicity of art.’
‘What does multiplicity mean?’
‘A big collection, full of variety.’
‘I’m going to draw a flower,’ says Constance.
‘That’s boring,’ says the boy.
‘In your opinion,’ I tell him. ‘And that’s what we’re talking about. Art is preference. Art is personal. Constance prefers the flower, while you prefer the fox. Neither is right or wrong. It’s about what you wish to see in the thing you’re looking at. Do you wish to observe a living soul, or do you wish to capture it?’
Edmund thinks about it for a moment. Then he smiles cunningly and says,‘May we draw you, miss?’
‘That isn’t really the object of the exercise.’
‘Alice is a pretty name,’ interjects Constance.
‘Thank you.’
‘I wish I were called Alice.’
‘Constance is lovely. It means for ever.’
‘That’s what Mummy used to say.’
The mention of their mother catches me off guard. Another detail, another candle held up to the frozen mist I hold in my mind. What did Mrs de Grey look like? Was she fair, like me, or dark like her husband? She must have been very beautiful, I think, to have such beautiful children and to have attracted a man like the captain.
It is a relief to reach the clearing, and to incite the children to sit and open their sketchbooks. Perhaps it is the ghost of Mrs de Grey still clinging to our collective mood, or perhaps it is the sheer sweetness of their faces as they gaze hopefully