The Prince of Eden (8 page)

Edward leaned forward. "She would be here if she could, William, if she knew—"

The old man nodded quickly. "I know. You must convey to her my affection." He continued to stare intently into Edward's face as though seeing beyond it. "My God," he murmured, smiling, "that woman has never been where I wanted her. It seems as though I've spent half my life waiting for her, calling for her. When I lost this—" He glanced down at his smooth right side, then abruptly broke off" speaking.

Edward fought continuously against the conflict within him, the feeling that he should leave and the desire to stay. "Please, William," he begged, "try to be at ease. Don't—"

"Be at ease," the man scoffed on diminishing breath. "I'll be at ease soon enough. For now, let's talk of you."

Edward had not expected such a direct focus.

Apparently William saw the surprise on his face. "IVe followed the trial, Edward," he said, his voice strong. "I know all about the young woman, and I know too of your constant attendance in the company of that jackass. Sir Claudius Potter—" He hesitated, not faltering this time, merely giving Edward a chance to assimilate his words. Slowly he went on. "What I don't know is your involvement in the affair."

Edward bowed his head. "My involvement is total," he confessed.

William nodded. "I thought as much." Again he fell into a close scrutiny of Edward's face. "Well," he sighed, "fifty years ago you would have met the offended husband in the meadows beyond Hampstead Heath and the affair would have been settled in a matter of minutes. Now, in this 'progressive age,' the two cocks go free and the poor hen is left to suffer the consequences."

"She will not suffer," Edward interjected quickly.

William looked surprised. "Sentence has been handed down, and knowing the old magistrate, it will stand—"

Edward agreed, and disagreed. "But she will never face it. I have friends in Newgate—"

Suddenly the old man's face brightened. "A plot? Oh, how delicious. Tell me all, Edward. A farewell plot to warm an old man's bones—"

In spite of himself, Edward smiled. The very matter of which he'd agonized for four long weeks seemed suddenly as important as a theatrical at the Haymarket. "Some money will change hands," he began. "The head turnkey at Newgate will conveniently leave doors unlocked. My friends will spirit her out—" He came to a halt in his narrative, realizing that there his plot ended.

"And?" prompted William.

Edward shrugged. "And—nothing. She'll be free."

"To do what?"

"What she pleases," Edward replied, rather snappish. He left the bedside and went to the window.

Behind him he heard a soft inquiry. "Do you love her?"

Edward stared through the window at the patch of dwindling blue above. "I made love to her," he replied.

Again from behind, he heard a clucking noise. "Oh, Edward," William sighed. "What a waste."

As Edward looked over his shoulder, he saw the white head wagging back and forth. "Mind you, I'm not opposed to taking other men's wives. I took a few of my own in my day. But I always did it with passion." 'He closed his eyes as though the word tasted sweet upon his lips. "Passion," he repeated, smiling, "the true test of vulgarity and refinement."

In his own defense, Edward said, "She was lonely, as was I. I loved

her in a fashion, still love her, perhaps—" In despair, he shook his head and again looked out the window. "My problem, William, seems to be the classic inability to define love—"

For a moment, the room was silent behind him. When that silence persisted, he turned in alarm, only to find the man staring at him. Still when he did not speak, Edward stepped back to the bed. In some confusion, he saw tears on the old man's face.

"Have I said something, William, that—"

But quickly the man shook his head. As though embarrassed by his own weakness, he hurriedly wiped the moisture away. "You'd think that at eighty plus, the word would have lost its hold on me. But it hasn't. I hear the word and I see one face, hear one voice—"

A tribute to Jane, Edward thought, and found it touching. But the man spoke on. "You should have known her as a girl, Edward, your beloved mother, the miraculous Marianne—"

Edward stepped closer, the ancient puzzle from his childhood beginning to fall into place. William was speaking quite steadily now, though his eyes were closed, his voice low. "I remember the first time I laid eyes on her, a drowned rat she was after the coach ride from North Devon, a mere girl of sixteen, with a scarred back"—his voice hardened—"the handiwork of your father, I might add." The hardness passed. "But what spirit, what light! Jane had banished her to the storeroom, her first feeble attempt to make a servant of her." The dim eyes opened. "What a foolish gesture that was." Again the voice fell. "Oh, God, how I loved her, love her still, if you'll forgive an old man's confession."

Edward held his position beside the bed. Words were beyond him. There was nothing to forgive. It wasn't embarrassment he felt, rather a kind of relief, as more pieces fell into place, as though he'd known forever what the man was now confessing.

Then an urgency surfaced on the old face. He waved wildly for Edward to come closer. "I have lived," he whispered, "my entire life on the nourishment of what might have been." His head pressed backward into the pillow as though he were seized by a tremor. "What a waste," he gasped.

Edward felt concern for him, the emotional remembrances obviously taking a tremendous toll. "Please, William," he begged, "no more talk-"

The old man looked up. "Do I shock you?" he grinned. "These antics of the heart? The young always think their elders too stupid for such knowledge. But if you are listening carefully, you will hear a lesson—aimed particularly at you."

Distracted, Edward murmured, "I don't understand."

William laughed. "You were never dense before, Edward. Why now, when you need most to listen and to understand?"

Hurriedly Edward shook his head. "I'm concerned for you, William—"

The laugh faded rapidly. The enfeebled head tried to lift. "Forget about me," he rasped. "It's you. You're the one." He relaxed again into the pillow as though he knew he was spending more energy than he had to spare. "I look at you, Edward, and you become for me a flawless pier glass. I see myself as I was forty years ago, full of the rancor of an ambitious man who knows he has powers and is savage because they aren't being used, feels that the months, the years are being gnawed away—you are just at the stage, Edward, when you are ready and willing for liberation. You are too robust a man, have too much strength and warmth of nature—"

Edward started to protest, but William cut him off. "No, hear me out. You have too much strength and warmth of nature to abide in passive despondency much longer." Again he smiled and shook his head. "Depression, yes. The two of us are born depressives. I struggled against it for a lifetime, as you will too. But like all true depressives, we have much capacity for enjoyment—and love, and I think, in your case, it is ready to break out—"

He was trembling. Edward could feel it in his hand. "Did you break out, William?" he asked softly.

A look of grief crossed the man's face. "No," he whispered. "Instead I committed the worst crime that a man can perpetrate on himself." He looked directly up at Edward. "I accustomed myself to it."

Edward listened closely. He leaned forward and with his handkerchief caressed the sweat-covered brow. The eyes which had been closed opened again.

"I apologize for painting such a black picture, Edward," he whispered. "And it isn't true that I'm not grateful. God grant everyone such a life." He smiled warmly. "But it might have been more, if I'd only had the will to—"

Suddenly he broke off in a spasm of coughing. The frail frame shook under the paroxysm. Edward started forward in alarm. Although the spasm passed, it left him with his head pushed backward, eyes closed. But the mind was still working, forming words.

"Remember one thing, Edward. Nature isn't to be changed. But character, by will and effort, might be—"

The cough was almost continuous now. Tears filled his eyes. "Please, William," Edward begged.

"Oh God," the old man moaned.

Edward tried to rise. The physicians were just outside. But in spite of the weakness now engulfing William, he would not release Edward's hand. The man's lips were moving. Edward leaned closer in order to hear.

"Thank you, Edward," he whispered, "for sharing this life with me. And thank your mother—" The sentences were coming in fragments now. "Much love—much indulgence—much bewilderment, suffering this hour of dreams—this life. There is no error in the design, merely errors in—us—"

The bell for evening matins sounded in St. Mark's down the road. Edward leaned forward and kissed the man. Blind with tears, he murmured, "I love you, William."

He saw the head turn upon the pillow as though he might speak. But instead an awful gasp escaped through purple lips. Edward saw his mouth frozen in a final attempt to draw breath.

He sat a moment longer, clasping the hand. He tried to remember what the man had said, but the words were a jumble.

The bell in the church steeple began to ring again. As in a trance, Edward placed the hand upon the sunken chest. Again he leaned forward and kissed the beloved face.

Suddenly in a pain of grief, he bent over and bodily lifted William into his arms, cradled him close, and rocked him as though he were a child in need of comfort. Beneath the nightshirt, Edward felt the ancient stump, felt as mutilated as the man he held, something cut off, missing, gone forever.

Behind him he heard the door softly open. Then he heard a rush of footsteps and the two physicians were separating them, one guiding Edward away, the other hovering over William.

Looking up, he saw Jane clinging to the door, her face buried in her hands. Quickly he went to her and separated her from the door and took her into his arms. As the old woman clung to him, her sobs increased. To one side, Edward saw the physicians drawing the coverlet over William's face. Still he continued to hold the frail woman and absorb her distress. With his hand pressing her head to his breast, he said, "His last words were of you, Jane, how empty his life would have been without you—"

She looked up at him, tears streaming in a crisscross pattern over the wrinkles of her face. "I loved him," she whispered fiercely, as though someone had challenged her. "I loved him always, and will love him to my grave."

Edward nodded. He continued to hold her for several minutes. Sooner than he might have expected, her grief seemed to subside,

There were important matters awaiting her, the physicians standing a discreet distance away. She dried her tears and with remarkable control asked Edward to stay close by. She would have need of him.

He assured her that he would, although as she turned toward the waiting physicians, he doubted her words. She had run William Pitch's life with extraordinary efficiency. She would preside over his death in a like manner.

The corridor outside the chamber was now filled with people, word of the death somehow having spread to the visitors waiting in the front parlor. As Jane rather primly arranged the dignitaries for final deathbed visitations, Edward retreated.

Hurriedly he pushed past the crowded corridor, heading for the stairs. Someone called after him, but he didn't stop in his downward progress. In fact his speed increased until he was running across the entrance hall and out into the cool May evening.

He saw the street still clogged with carriages, even more arriving. He wanted no fellowship, desired to exchange words with no man, and in an attempt to gain some privacy, he cut sharply to the left, skirted the house, and took refuge in the darkened garden.

He felt like something lost, trying to get home. The exhaustion was increasing. Slowly he sank down onto a stone bench and bowed his head.

Why couldn't he remember the man's last words? Something about looking into his face, seeing his own. And nature wasn't to be changed, but character, with— Or was it the other way around?

As his confusion mounted, tears commenced. He felt as though the death upstairs was beginning to spread. The thrust of his grief was that he could not imagine life without William Pitch.

Thank you for sharing this life with me, Edward.

The dam broke. Heavily he fell upon his knees in the moist grass, his head resting on the stone bench.

He was not at first aware of the footsteps approaching him, almost stealthily, in the dark. He thought he heard movement, but did not bother to look up. He was first aware that he was not alone when he heard the voice, deep, yet close: "Total eclipse without all hope of day."

He turned sharply and saw a gentleman standing a distance apart. "I trust, Mr. Eden," the man said, "that you do not weep from a sense of bereavement."

In darkness Edward could not clearly see the man's face and did not recognize the voice. "Please leave me," he muttered, resenting the intrusion. "I seek no consolation."

"But you're in sore need of it," the man persisted. He stepped closer. Edward started to rise.

"No," the gentleman commanded. "Hold your position. In the past, I've found it a comforting one, on my knees—"

All in the world that Edward desired at that moment was privacy. Was it too much to ask? Apparently it was.

The gentleman, still unidentified, drew nearer. "I repeat what I said, Mr. Eden. I trust you do not weep from a sense of bereavement. There is no prop withdrawn, no consolation torn away, no dear companion lost."

"The man is dead," Edward snapped angrily. "Now, please, I beg you, leave—"

"You weep for yourself," the man continued, undaunted. "All grief is selfish. All death a comfort. If only we could reconcile the two."

Edward looked up, still angry at the intrusion. "Who are you?"

The man inclined his head. "We met earlier inside. De Quincey. Thomas De Quincey."

"Why aren't you with the others?"

"Remains hold no fascination for me."

There was a certain harshness in his voice that Edward now found peculiarly comforting. The man's shadow continued to hover over the bench. He spoke softly. "All that one must bear in mind, Mr. Eden, is that earthly existence is not that precious. All our positions here are exquisitely painful. Death is merely the termination of that pain. In societies more primitive than ours, it is an occasion for great rejoic-ing-"