Seven. Honeymoon in Hanbury Street
Seven
Honeymoon in Hanbury Street
FOUR WEEKS EARLIER
Tower Hamlets, July 3, 1865
She raced down the steps to the basement flat in Hanbury and into Denham’s arms. The carriage from Victoria station, with Nicholas Nelson still inside, was not yet gone and already Denham was carrying her over the threshold.
He carried her straight past the tiny front parlor and into the bedroom, slamming the door behind them. It had been such a long waiting; never more than a quick touch on the arm or brush of the cheek in the many parks and squares of Boston, before anyone else might see. At twenty-five years of age, Henrietta had never been really kissed—dutiful or hesitant pecks from schoolboys only, leaving nothing in their wake. But as Denham kissed her, every part of her felt changed by him and made over—now as much a part of him as her own self, and he a part of her.
When it was over, when he had cried out and shivered from the pleasure that she had given him, she felt another wave of ecstasy followed by the most surprising and incredible sense of power. For as much as she felt at his mercy, Denham seemed equally beholden to her. It had been part of their shared silent understanding from the very start of their acquaintance—the way he looked at her, sought her out, caught her eye when no one else was looking. She had felt truly seen and now, in his arms, she felt all the adoration she had always envied other women and more. It was impossible to believe that anyone else in the world had ever experienced such bliss as this.
They lay naked together afterward, collapsed in each other’s embrace, truly joined together. He continued to touch her, even spent as she was, and she found herself kissing him to make him stop, then begging him not to. Looking back, she would wonder at this—at his enjoyment of her submission, of what he was able to make her feel and do in return. But at the time it felt like hunger and desire such as she could only dream of, if she had even known it could exist.
There was a scratching noise on the other side of the door, and Denham sat up and boyishly laughed. “I have a surprise.…”
She watched his taut, lean back as he disappeared into the hallway, a beautiful man, every muscle so perfectly, intentionally wrought, then returned with a small spaniel in his arms. The puppy left scratch marks on her own, and Denham kissed the red lines on her skin and promised to better train the little creature he had named Biscuit in her absence.
Nearby church bells rang out four o’clock and Denham jumped up again. “I forgot—my brothers and sisters!”
They quickly tidied themselves and soon the small flat—as cozy as his letters had promised—was full of a group of young people bearing an interesting mix of features similar to his own. They ranged in age from ten to twenty, and Denham was devoted to them all. Henrietta was used to a quiet house at Eleven Beacon Street, made even more quiet by the reading that she, Charlie, and their father constantly undertook. Denham’s family was much more active, jostling and joking, always speaking out of turn. There was no “Harry on the right, Charlie on the left,” no need for politeness, no reserve. Yet they were struggling all the same. Denham’s wages were being supplemented by the oldest siblings taking on servant work, two of the brothers toiled in the warehouses of nearby Tobacco Dock, and one sister had fallen on particularly hard times.
They gave her several handmade wedding presents—a quilt, a wooden jewelry box to hold the garnet, an engraved leather collar for Biscuit. But grateful as Henrietta was, when they had all left, it was as if a tumult had passed. She and Denham stood facing each other just as they had on the moonlit deck, another little posy of white bachelor buttons now in a vase on the sideboard, put there by Denham in tribute to that most romantic moment on ship. They returned to the bedroom and made love again, and in the wake of the overwhelming surge of all her feminine power, she finally told him about the bequest. She would have done so sooner—looking back, she would wish she had—but for all the commotion of their lovemaking and the lengthy visit by his family, who were now her family, too.
“You have it here?” he asked. Getting up, naked, she went over to the small valise she had bought on the ship and returned with the admiral’s gift in her hands.
Pulling the new wedding quilt around her, Henrietta watched as Denham examined the telescope carefully, rotated the lens, activated the tell-tale click. Without asking for permission, he pulled the draw tube from the barrel, then shook it hard until the paper fell out to land on the bed between them. He read it carefully, twice, then placed it back down on the quilt.
“We know for certain no one else has seen it?”
“No, but the letter breaks off so— Sir Francis’s second wife, Martha, found it after Jane’s death. It is quite possible that Cassandra never even knew of its existence, despite its being addressed to her.”
Denham got that look in his eyes that she remembered from across the gallery at the Music Hall, the day the Girl Orator spoke. He was always on the lookout: it was how he had survived. Oh, how lucky she and Charlotte were, to never have to look out or too far ahead, to have the luxuries of life constantly at the ready. Henrietta felt guilt over that, always had. She wondered at the London slums where Denham’s siblings lived and their little flat skirted—they were just separated enough from such a life. Until the babies came—and at this rate, she blushed to herself, there would be many—and Denham rose at the paper, she could perhaps help with social work. Many women of Boston had taken that on; Louisa had told how her own mother, Abigail, herself the daughter of a prominent family, had been one of the first paid social workers in the city.
“You well know how little I know the work of Austen,” he said, staring back down at the letter. “But it would seem to me that this answers so much. The lifelong grudge against a sister, the desire for love with the so-called seaside gentleman, the alleged machinations by Cassandra that ruined the budding romance and left Jane with nothing but books to write and a boatload of regret—”
She had to stop him there. “The letter does not precisely say that.”
He laughed. “Yes, but we can surmise, can we not, that Jane would regret never experiencing something akin to what we have felt today?”
She blushed again at the truth of his words.
“You will no longer apologize then, as you once did, for wanting to be a wife and mother? I will hold you to today, you know. I have never seen you happier or more beautiful.” He leaned over to kiss her shoulder, then the space between her breasts where the garnet ring still dangled, left there for this moment with him in bed.
“The letter…” Denham stopped to think. “Dickens has destroyed everything, you know—quite a good thing, that, in light of the rail crash he only just escaped. Everyone has their chance in life. Austen chose not to take it.”
“What are you saying?”
He shrugged. “It explains so much. The world would be very interested—not just here but in America, too. Think of your little judges’ literary circle—the Nelsons’ lucrative trade—the pirated editions being made. Anyone who prints the story—”
“The story?”
“—would have sellers’ rights. There’s no copyright in a letter, after all.”
She sat up, clasped the garnet against her chest. “It’s private, Denham.”
“Privacy doesn’t last forever—where would your beloved history be, if it did?”
She stared at him, something inside her running cold as ice. “Her brother is still alive!”
“For now.”
“Denham!” She pulled the quilt entirely around her. “My word, what are you saying?”
“I’m just saying that the right to privacy is not so absolute or lasting as any of us might wish. We are all free agents—we have plenty of time to burn whatsoever we choose. If we don’t, what is that to the next generation, or the one after that? One day—”
“One day is not today.”
“But it has to start sometime, Henrietta. Maybe your life of privilege allows for such delicacy, but I am a newspaperman with a living to cobble together. I do not have a wealthy father supporting me.”
“Neither do I, in marrying you!”
“Exactly! Now we are one and the same, of the same mind. You have pledged to honor and obey me, while my duty is to provide for my family. You must acknowledge my efforts there.” He rubbed his jaw in frustration as he assessed her troubled gaze. “Do you know what I make? Do you know what anyone makes?”
She could only stare at him as if he were changing before her very eyes.
“For God’s sake, Henrietta, I make fifty pounds a year—fifty! A box at the Royal Opera costs eight bloody thousand! Even if we sell this letter for just a few hundred pounds, that’s still years of work for me. I could discharge all my family’s debts—my brother Spencer could stay in school—Ethan could finally start his apprenticeship before it grows too late.”
Henrietta’s head was throbbing. He was making the smallest possible sense, but at what cost? Sir Francis had kept the letter to himself for decades—how could she bear him seeing it splashed across the pages of Reynolds’s Newspaper or The Pall Mall Gazette ? Should Fanny learn of the bequest from the papers, she would surely alert her father no matter how dire his state of health.
“Denham, I can’t. Not now. Maybe one day, as you yourself said. If money is such a concern, perhaps I can ask Father—”
“Your father’s money is his, as this is ours.” He picked up the letter and waved it freely at her, then checked the pocket watch resting on the small camping chair next to the bed. “Don’t worry, darling, I’ll take it to my editor—he works long into the night—and we shall see what he says.” He got up and began to dress while she watched him, speechless.
“Denham, don’t be ridiculous. It’s past ten.” She reached out for the letter but he held it away from her grasp, then sat back down on the bed to pull on his boots. Henrietta’s head swirled—she actually feared fainting from exhaustion if she stood up too fast. She and Nick had left Portsmouth at the break of dawn to reach London as quickly as possible. They had thought they were fleeing only Fanny-Sophia, for who knew what Sir Francis might confess as he faced the end, causing her to come for the letter. Henrietta wanted it to survive, to not be fuel on another pyre, yet at the same time—and yes, she heard a voice inside her say, one could want both—she did not want the world to read it. Not now—maybe not ever. But it should be her prerogative to decide— her property to deal with.
“Denham…” She got out of bed and grabbed her robe from the small case on the floor. Suddenly she did not want him to see her naked and exposed—suddenly everything happening between them was taking on the violence of a power struggle. She wrapped her robe about her like armor, for the struggle was in fact very real—who would determine the rules for their life together? Had the wedding vows truly suspended and merged her personhood into his, as English law declared and Denham appeared to believe? From the start, Denham had thrilled to the similarity in their sense of humor, interests, and intelligence—how could she become something else to him entirely, and somehow even less, simply because of words exchanged in the moonlight?
“Give me the letter, Denham. I mean it.”
“You mean it? What does that mean?”
She stood before him, hesitating. There would be no turning back once she said it. “It means it is my letter—it was given to me —and my wishes regarding it are to be respected, just as I would respect yours.”
But he was heading for the door. “We’ll discuss this when I get back. I’m sure when you hear how much my editor will pay for it…”
She lunged for it again, surprising them both, and he laughed as if it were a game—as if he did not take any of it, or her, seriously. The letter stayed held aloft, for as tall as she was, he was still several inches taller. He did not hit her, but it felt like a slap all the same.
And then he left. Just like that. She dropped onto her bare knees and sobbed, felt the rough wood of the floorboards digging into her skin, didn’t care. The little dog Biscuit emerged from wherever it had been hiding and nuzzled up against her lap, but she didn’t touch it. She refused to. She had to unmake her home of one day.
When Denham returned a few hours later, she pretended to be asleep, tears silently streaming down her face. She could tell he was happy; she had heard him whistling when he came in. She would have to act fast, destroy it all, just like Fanny-Sophia had.
In the morning, when he woke, she—and the letter—were gone.