Property of a Lady

January 1881

The marriage has indeed taken place. I was not invited, of course – I dare say neither the aristocratic Marstons nor the patrician Lees are even aware of my existence, and if they were, they would hardly include a common clockmaker in the guests.

I was there, though, watching the ceremony from behind a pillar in the church. She wore white velvet, with a little fur-lined cape, and carried a sheaf of Christmas roses. While they signed the register, I slipped out through the chancel door and stood in the concealment of the yew tree until they came out.

I don’t care for that Paul Pry image of myself, but it’s what I did. I stood there, on the crisp, cold January morning, and I saw those two – my Elizabeth and that man – come out through the church doors, with bells ringing and choirs caterwauling and everyone laughing and throwing rice, and my stomach rebelled and I had to turn away to be sick behind a wall, because I could not bear it – I simply could not bear seeing them together. Mr and Mrs William Lee. I think it was then, straightening up from the spasms of sickness, wiping my mouth on my handkerchief, that the black madness entered my heart.

Tonight I shall lie wakeful in my bed upstairs, imagining the marriage night, every step of the way. A firelit bedchamber in Mallow House, snow crusting the window panes outside . . . She will lie warm and soft in scented sheets, waiting for him . . .

He’ll go to her bed with a book of sonnets or some metaphysical poet’s works, and I wouldn’t put it past him to forget to remove his spectacles from his nose when he turns back the sheets . . .

April 1881

Today I sat three rows behind my Elizabeth in church and feasted my eyes on the little tendrils escaping from her bonnet and clustering over the nape of her neck. And the whiteness of her neck as it emerges from the collar of her gown . . . Is she happy with him? Is he good to her? When he bends his head in prayer, he looks exactly like a pale-brown vulture. I never before wished a man dead, but by God, I wish this one dead!

My father used to say that hatred is one of the devil’s favourite guises.

November 1881

‘Mr and Mrs William Lee of Mallow House, Marston Lacy, in the County of Shropshire, are happy and proud to announce the birth of a daughter, Elvira Victoria, on 10th November.’



Of course I should have expected that! Or did I believe theirs would be a marriage of convenience: separate rooms, separate beds, separate bodies? Didn’t I know, deep down, that the grasshopper, the juiceless bookworm, would mate with the dragonfly? Oh Elizabeth . . .

The hatred walks through my workshop and my house every night now. The only place where I can find the smallest fragment of peace is in my workshop. But sometimes even there I feel the darkness enclosing me, and it’s a darkness that whispers there are things that can be done to soothe an aching heart and burning loins, and ways to make an unwilling lady yield her body, if not her heart . . . If only I could have one night with her I believe this hunger would be quenched for ever. Just one night . . .

‘The writing changes a bit on the next page,’ said Nell as Michael paused to reach for his wine.

‘Yes. It’s the same person writing it, though. D’you want to keep reading?’

‘No,’ said Nell, ‘but it’s like opening up the cellar earlier – not knowing will be worse.’

‘There’s rather a lot still to read,’ he said, looking at the papers.

‘Are you saying we could be here all night?’

Michael turned his head slowly and looked at her. Nell had thought she was being very cool and very controlled about this, but when he looked at her in this way, a bolt of desire seemed to slice through her entire body.