Iain Pears - The Portrait

With Jacky, of all people? A man such as yourself should bed only the crème de la crème, no? The greatest poetesses, the daughters of earls, playwrights or artists. Or at least someone with five hundred a year of her own. Not the artistic equivalent of a flower girl. Such people are all very well for artists. Expected, even. But for a critic? Dear me, no! And to commit the solecism of getting the woman pregnant? Oh, the fun of it!

So unlikely that my incredulous laughter was instrumental in persuading your wife that her unease was merest fantasy. You owe me much. The first I heard of any of it came from her, and she was so bothered at her suspicions and jealousy she came to me specifically, and risked humiliation to raise the subject. She wrote, asking to see me over a matter of some importance. I was bemused and agreed, not least because I wished to find out what it was all about. She had always rather disapproved of me; I was not her sort of person at all. She had not forgotten my visit to Hampshire to paint your portrait, and did not forgive bad behaviour. The very idea that she might need me I found somewhat exciting.

She arrived exactly on time—she was as punctual as you were late. Curiously, I had little experience with dealing with lady visitors; the only women who ever came to my studio were either models or clients. I did not know what to do with her, and all the inadequacies of my upbringing burst forth. I felt as though I should offer her tea or something, and the realisation that even after all these years I could still be made uncomfortable by a woman like her brought out all my natural rudeness.

I think she very nearly left without explaining why she’d come, but she was desperate. Eventually my discomfort exhausted itself and I asked her what she wanted, although I imagine I added something to the effect that if she could be quick then I would be able to get back to my work. No-one could say I wheedled my way into her confidence; quite the contrary.

“It is about William,” she began. “Have you heard any stories about him?”

“Many,” I replied. “He is one of those people who generates stories; it is part of the way he has become influential.”

Her distress was by now so obvious even I could not bring myself to continue her torment. She was beginning to look absurd, and that was unfair for someone so naturally sure of herself. Quite old-fashioned, she is; I had never realised it before. Something of a survival of the last century, tightly bound into her clothes, straight-backed and unbending. No-one would want to paint her now, I think; she does not have a modern air. Millais, perhaps, might have done her justice, and conveyed that plush velvet and window-closed soul of hers. I felt myself beginning to lose interest, so told her to sit down and explain a little more clearly what she wanted. It was not what I said, you understand, but the way that I said it that made all the difference. She only needed the barest hint of sympathy to let loose all her woes and become a different person entirely.

“I have been worried for the last few months. You no doubt think me a silly woman, with foolish ideas. But William has always been the best of husbands. . . .”

“Indeed he has. I have often wondered how he manages it. I know I never could. But then, he is married to you, and that is a powerful incentive to good behaviour.”

She blushed. “I know that men are not like women,” she began, “and I know that being faithful does not come easily to them. . . .”

“Oh. I see.” Her look of steely self-control as she brought herself to this point was far better explanation than anything she had said.

“Have you noticed anything, or heard anything? I know you would not think it proper to say, but if you knew the agonies I have suffered in the last few months, you would pity me.”

I had a choice here, you see. My response could take two forms; I could exploit the situation, feed her fears, offer her false sympathy and reap the rewards. For they were on offer, you know. That most virtuous of women could easily have fallen into my arms then with only the slightest encouragement. Millais’s women were often fallen, or about to fall. What a glorious triumph it would have been! And rather a pleasurable one, I imagine. I was always intrigued by that combination of icy control and the occasional flash of the eye, the way the façade sometimes failed to hide a hint of hunger. But, alas, you were my friend.

I sprang to your defence. I had seen nothing and heard less. Which was true, I had seen progressively less of you over the years; we were moving ever more definitely in different circles. Had you been having a grand affair, no doubt I would have noticed. But Jacky was not the sort of person you took to the opera, or entertained to lavish dinners. A squalid little encounter once a week in a Bermondsey boarding house could easily pass unnoticed, although when we were closer I would have caught even that. Only a wife might notice something amiss, and then not enough to form any solid conclusions. So I told her that any changes she noticed should be put down to your preoccupation with this great exhibition you were planning. She had to understand how all-consuming such a thing could be. “It is a terrible thing to say of a man, but faced with a choice between Cleopatra and a painting of Cleopatra, William would take the canvas.” She should not worry, I told her, firmly but gently. All would be well and her foolish fears would be soon forgotten.

She left soon after, giving me a look of such gratitude I half regretted my altruism. I bathed in the warm glow of my virtue for some time afterwards. But as she stood by the door, she turned, and her face hardened. “I am glad of what you said. It is the one thing I would never have forgiven in him.” And, by God, she meant it. The calm way she said it frightened even me, and I had nothing to do with it. I never realised quite how proud, quite how conventional she was. You must have known all too well, and knew what her reaction was likely to be. How would it be, William, to have to earn your own living for once? To give up the house, the works of art, the weekends at country houses, the balls? To have to become one of those hand-to-mouth bohemians you praise at a distance? That’s what her look implied. Having a mistress might be acceptable in Chelsea; it was not in Mayfair, and certainly not with a wife like yours. You tried to straddle both worlds, and for the first time you risked losing your balance.

So how could you make such a slip? I do not ask how you could do such a thing, consort with a common shop girl when a beautiful if somewhat well-controlled woman was already yours. That is all too clear; there is something quite horrible in a woman who will not bend to your will, when everyone else not only bends but breaks at your very nod. But the magnitude of the mistake! You, who had never taken a false step in your life! That is something I cannot understand. It almost makes you human. Almost makes you deserve sympathy—would do, except for the way you reacted. But Jacky? What was it? Was it sleeping with a woman artists slept with? Is that your frailty, that all along that was what you wanted to be? Does your unstoppable desire to control and direct painters come from a frustration at not being one yourself? I cannot believe it, and yet I cannot think of any other reason why you would choose her. Did you talk of tactility with her, after the passion had passed? Seek her opinion on Post-Impressionism? Or did you enter into her enthusiasms and quiver with anticipation as she showed you her latest rouge? Or was it the squalor of it that you needed; some respite from the beauty and aestheticism? A sordid and furtive animality to act as counterpoint to all that refinement. I hope you were satisfied with your choice, but I doubt it. You were no more able to arouse Jacky than I could, of that I am sure. Perhaps it was the payment that excited you, the reduction of human emotion to cash transaction?