Tracy Chevalier - Falling Angels

The Borough Press

An imprint of HarperCollins Publishers Ltd

1 London Bridge Street

London SE1 9GF

www.harpercollins.co.uk

Published by HarperCollins Publishers 2001

Copyright © Tracy Chevalier 2001

Chapter head motifs © Neil Gower

Cover design by Holly Macdonald © HarperCollins Publishers Ltd 2019

Cover image © Colin Underhill / Alamy Stock Photo

Tracy Chevalier asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins.

Source ISBN: 9780007217236

Ebook Edition © 2014 ISBN: 9780007324354

Version: 2019-06-07

For Jonathan, again

Table of Contents

Cover

Title Page

Copyright

Dedication

January 1901

Kitty Coleman

Richard Coleman

Maude Coleman

Kitty Coleman

Lavinia Waterhouse

Gertrude Waterhouse

Albert Waterhouse

Simon Field

December 1901

Richard Coleman

March 1903

Lavinia Waterhouse

Maude Coleman

Gertrude Waterhouse

June 1903

Maude Coleman

Jenny Whitby

November 1903

Kitty Coleman

May 1904

Maude Coleman

Kitty Coleman

Lavinia Waterhouse

Edith Coleman

Simon Field

January 1905

Jenny Whitby

October 1905

Gertrude Waterhouse

February 1906

Maude Coleman

Kitty Coleman

April 1906

Lavinia Waterhouse

Maude Coleman

Simon Field

Jenny Whitby

Lavinia Waterhouse

Richard Coleman

Kitty Coleman

May 1906

Albert Waterhouse

July 1906

Edith Coleman

Maude Coleman

Simon Field

Jenny Whitby

September 1906

Albert Waterhouse

October 1906

Lavinia Waterhouse

Gertrude Waterhouse

Maude Coleman

Kitty Coleman

Simon Field

Lavinia Waterhouse

November 1906

Jenny Whitby

Edith Coleman

Richard Coleman

February 1907

Gertrude Waterhouse

Jenny Whitby

July 1907

Maude Coleman

February 1908

Kitty Coleman

Dorothy Baker

March 1908

Simon Field

Lavinia Waterhouse

Maude Coleman

Richard Coleman

May 1908

Albert Waterhouse

Kitty Coleman

Richard Coleman

Edith Coleman

June 1908

Lavinia Waterhouse

Gertrude Waterhouse

Maude Coleman

Simon Field

Kitty Coleman

Lavinia Waterhouse

Maude Coleman

Lavinia Waterhouse

Jenny Whitby

Ivy May Waterhouse

Simon Field

Maude Coleman

Kitty Coleman

Simon Field

John Jackson

Richard Coleman

Lavinia Waterhouse

Gertrude Waterhouse

Edith Coleman

Jenny Whitby

Albert Waterhouse

Maude Coleman

Dorothy Baker

Simon Field

May 1910

Lavinia Waterhouse

Maude Coleman

Simon Field

Gertrude Waterhouse

Albert Waterhouse

Richard Coleman

Dorothy Baker

Simon Field

Lavinia Waterhouse

Maude Coleman

Simon Field

Acknowledgements

About the Author

By Tracy Chevalier

About the Publisher

I woke this morning with a stranger in my bed. The head of blond hair beside me was decidedly not my husband’s. I did not know whether to be shocked or amused.

Well, I thought, here’s a novel way to begin the new century.

Then I remembered the evening before and felt rather sick. I wondered where Richard was in this huge house and how we were meant to swap back. Everyone else here – the man beside me included – was far more experienced in the mechanics of these matters than I. Than we. Much as Richard bluffed last night, he was just as much in the dark as me, though he was more keen. Much more keen. It made me wonder.

I nudged the sleeper with my elbow, gently at first and then harder until at last he woke with a snort.

‘Out you go,’ I said. And he did, without a murmur. Thankfully he didn’t try to kiss me. How I stood that beard last night I’ll never remember – the claret helped, I suppose. My cheeks are red with scratches.

When Richard came in a few minutes later, clutching his clothes in a bundle, I could barely look at him. I was embarrassed, and angry too – angry that I should feel embarrassed and yet not expect him to feel so as well. It was all the more infuriating that he simply kissed me, said, ‘Hello, darling,’ and began to dress. I could smell her perfume on his neck.

Yet I could say nothing. As I myself have so often said, I am open-minded – I pride myself on it. Those words bite now.

I lay watching Richard dress, and found myself thinking of my brother. Harry always used to tease me for thinking too much – though he refused to concede that he was at all responsible for encouraging me. But all those evenings spent reviewing with me what his tutors had taught him in the morning – he said it was to help him remember it – what did that do but teach me to think and speak my mind? Perhaps he regretted it later. I shall never know now. I am only just out of mourning for him, but some days it feels as if I am still clutching that telegram.

Harry would be mortified to see where his teaching has led. Not that one has to be clever for this sort of thing – most of them downstairs are stupid as buckets of coal, my blond beard among them. Not one could I have a proper conversation with. I had to resort to the wine.

Frankly I’m relieved not to be of this set – to paddle in its shallows occasionally is quite enough for me. Richard, I suspect, feels differently, but he has married the wrong wife if he wanted that sort of life. Or perhaps it is I who chose badly – though I would never have thought so once, back when we were mad for each other.

I think Richard has made me do this to show me he is not as conventional as I feared. But it has had the opposite effect on me. He has become everything I had not thought he would when we married. He has become ordinary.

I feel so flat this morning. Daddy and Harry would have laughed at me, but I secretly hoped that the change in the century would bring a change in us all; that England would miraculously slough off her shabby black coat to reveal something glittering and new. It is only eleven hours into the twentieth century, but I know very well that nothing has changed but a number.