Chapter Forty-Three
It wasn’t only Henry’s family who excluded Bram, but the man himself.
Despite all Bram had done for him, there was no mention of him in the will.
Not a thank you, not even a small token of appreciation.
It was as if Bram had never been a part of his life.
Neither was anything bequeathed to Harry Loveday, and only a small annuity to his devoted valet, Walter Collinson.
While friends sought to comprehend such a huge oversight, I wasn’t surprised.
Henry had never given Bram much consideration – look at his business decisions over the last years.
Ellen blamed Henry’s sons, who were anti-Irish.
Gilbert believed that Florence Irving held Bram and Harry Loveday responsible for barring her from the inner circle at the Lyceum (no, I told him, she’d managed that all by herself) and worked hard now to ensure Bram was punished.
All that may have been true, but their reasoning neither fully explained Henry’s choices nor exonerated him. The only redeeming moment was when I learned Lady Irving didn’t receive anything either.
It was hard not to be chewed up with bitterness.
Noel would pop by every other day, often bringing Neelie with him.
Hall travelled from his home on the Isle of Man and stayed just over a week.
To hear laughter coming from Bram’s study late at night was such a restorative.
Hall and I would talk when Bram was otherwise busy, both of us worried about the impact of Henry’s death.
‘Given time, I’ve no doubt Bram will recover,’ said Hall, unconvincingly.
While I hoped Henry’s demise would present opportunities for Bram, the pragmatic part of me was concerned how he’d make a living. The piecemeal writing, speaking engagements, his novels – they weren’t enough to support a household. When I said something to Hall, he tried to reassure me.
‘Bram will be inundated with offers, you wait and see.’
I threw up my hands and looked purposely around the room, towards the door, at the empty chairs. ‘It’s been weeks, Hall. Someone is yet to proposition him.’
‘People are just allowing him space to grieve,’ replied Hall. ‘That’s all.’
‘Grief doesn’t pay the bills,’ I said wryly, paraphrasing Bram’s brother Tom.
Whereas I thought our life would be easier with Henry Irving gone, in the following months he became a burden we couldn’t shift.
Bram spiralled into a black place, reliving the recent failures of the company he’d helped steer, instead of the years of joyous successes.
I lost my husband to melancholy and didn’t know how to summon him back.
Then, as if a switch had been flicked, before we left for Dublin in December, he began to write another book.
At first, I was delighted. I wrote to Hall, ‘At last, my husband is shedding the pall of grief that enveloped him and is wielding his pen again.’
One night, Bram revealed to me what he was working on. We were in his study. That very day, he’d attended the auction of Henry Irving’s possessions. Denied anything in the will, he was determined to own something, even if it meant purchasing a memento. If this was what Bram needed, then so be it.
I stared at what he’d bid for – a portrait drawn by Bernard Partridge three months before Henry died.
In it, Henry was smiling. There was also one of the great actor Edmund Kean that used to hang in the Beefsteak Room, and something resembling a cast of a face or body part.
It was hard to see, covered as it was by some loose pages.
Uncharacteristically, the study was in disarray; Bram had pulled books and manuscripts from the shelves and stacked them on the desk and upon the floor.
Atop a pile of his diaries, many with notes sticking out of the pages, was the magnifying glass he was starting to use as his eyesight began to deteriorate.
Bram himself looked … frayed. Frayed and timeworn.
The lines of his face were emphasised in the dim light of the lamp.
His hair needed a good brush, and I could see he’d been biting his nails.
When had he commenced that frightful habit?
There was a musty, stale smell in the air.
At first, I attributed it to the purchased items, before it occurred to me that it arose from Bram.
‘As I was saying, I’m putting aside my current novel, Lady Athelyn, to work on a new project.’
‘Oh? What’s that?’
Bram gave a small smile of … triumph? Pride? ‘While other people, like that good-for-nothing Austin Brereton, have written biographies of Henry —’
My heart began to tilt precariously. We knew the awful Austin was writing a second book about Henry.
There was still money to be made from the actor and those keen to exploit even the weakest of associations.
The newspapers had been filled with anecdotes, poems, personal thoughts and more about the knight.
Each one had galled Bram and contributed to his black mood.
‘No-one has my insight, the access I had to Henry’s thoughts, the impact he had not only on the people he met, but the places he went as well: the provinces, Ireland, America, Canada. The influence he had on British theatre.’
‘There are many who would say the same of you, dear,’ I managed as coolly as I could, even while my chest felt it was going to fly open and my heart fall out.
‘Maybe,’ conceded Bram. ‘But it’s what I’ll say about him in my book that will really count.’
‘You’re writing a book.’ My soul started to shrink. ‘About Henry.’
‘I’m going to call it Personal Reminiscences of Henry Irving.’
I couldn’t move.
‘It will be my way of honouring a great man,’ continued Bram, completely unaware of the effect of this revelation. ‘A great friend.’ His voice began to break. ‘Showing a side of him the world never saw from the person who knew him best.’
Hot anger coursed through my chest and down my arms. I half expected to raise my palms and find imprints burned into the surface of the desk where they rested.
‘Have you nothing to say, Florrie?’ he asked gently.
Oh, I had plenty. I was furious that now, when Bram had the chance to break free of whatever damn spell that man had cast over him, he refused to try. I was livid that even in death, Henry Irving wouldn’t let Bram go. Let us go.
But mostly, I was furious with myself for not predicting this; that I hadn’t steered Bram in a different direction. Instead, I’d left him alone to mourn in his own way, knowing that when he emerged, I’d be there for him.
Bram looked so pleased with his decision, so ignorant of the storm brewing inside me. I should have known that Bram would always, always, serve Henry’s interests before his own.
I couldn’t bear to look at him; to be in the same room. I turned and wrenched the door open.
‘Florrie?’ cried Bram. ‘What is it? What have I done?’
I paused but didn’t turn around. I’d been right all along; my husband was incapable of change. ‘Nothing, Bram,’ I said steadily. ‘You haven’t done a single damn thing.’
Less than a year later, between giving speeches, soliciting interviews with other writers and politicians to be published in the newspapers, visiting the Harland and Wolff shipyard in Belfast for an article about a large ocean liner they’d been commissioned to build, and a few weeks at Cruden Bay to go over the proofs, Bram’s Reminiscences was published in two volumes.
For the year it took him to complete, I did whatever was in my power to avoid being in his company.
Did that make me a poor wife and friend?
Maybe. But sharing a house while he worked on the book was hard enough.
A day didn’t pass without Henry’s name being spoken, memories of his performances recounted, anecdotes of the time Henry did this, said this, asked for that.
Though Ellen, the Gilberts and some of my closest friends understood that hearing his name was anathema to me, they couldn’t avoid being drawn into the conversations.
Why, even my Sunday salons became dedicated to Henry for a while.
Noel would visit and together we made a pact never to say the Irving name in each other’s company. Out of everyone, Noel felt the same antipathy as me.
‘That man stole my father from me,’ he said.
Yes, I’d think. But your father let him.
I can always have another son. What I cannot have is another Henry Irving.
When the two volumes were published, we received gratis copies.
Bram happened to be meeting with an American opera singer, David Bispham, with a view to becoming his business manager, when they were delivered.
I wasn’t entirely happy about the prospect of him working in theatre again, especially on a musical production that hadn’t been proven, The Vicar of Wakefield.
But, without a regular wage, our situation was becoming desperate.
Bram needed to take whatever work came his way.
Ada carried the box of books into Bram’s study, and I cleared a space on the desk. About to follow her out, I changed my mind and, waiting until I heard her descend to the kitchen, closed the door and, as carefully as I could, opened it.
The books were hardbound in red cloth, with the title and a profile of Henry embossed in gold on the cover. Rather childishly, I held one up to his portrait.
‘This is all about you, sir. Except this is the last time you pull his strings. You’re dead, your kingdom has been sold, and all your princes, lords and ladies vanquished. Never again will my husband do your bidding.’
Around me, the spines of Bram’s library glared, as if they knew what I really wished to do with their new recruits. Restored to its usual tidiness, the study looked ready to welcome its regular occupant. I took no comfort in that. Not even its discernibly Bram smell of ambergris, cigars and whisky.
I was about to fling the book back into the box when curiosity overcame me. Instead, I sank into the armchair near the hearth and, first listening carefully lest anyone approach, opened the cover and turned to the table of contents.
Dear God, Bram had covered Henry’s life from his first impression of him as Captain Absolute way back in 1867.
I began to flick through the pages. There was so much detail, including, I noted as I reached for Volume Two, lists of guests who attended the Beefsteak dinners.
It was an impressive roll call of royalty, literary worthies, politicians, adventurers, scientists, actresses and so much more.
Why, even Mr Shaw was there, the man who disliked Henry so much, he refused to come to the funeral.
Bram had given him the middle initial F instead of B.
No doubt, deliberate; as was the omission of one name.
Though I searched, there was no mention of Oscar, one of the most celebrated guests at the dinners. In fact, as far as my cursory look allowed, Oscar appeared nowhere.
As I was flicking through, a particular line arrested my attention.
Looking back, wrote Bram, I cannot honestly find any moment in my life when I failed him, or when I put myself forward in any way.
I snapped the book shut. What kind of man admits to such a thing? Not just to himself, but the entire world? It confirmed him as the servant he’d been. Like Renfield in Dracula, suborned to his master’s will.
Bram had written a hagiography of a man who cared nothing for him, admitting openly he never advanced himself, only served, while a real friend, a dear, beloved friend with whom we shared so much, was erased.
I glared at Henry’s portrait. ‘Happy now?’ I scowled.
It was most definitely smirking. Even my husband’s memories had been sucked dry by this man so he might live beyond the grave.
I marched up to the painting.
‘You can’t have him,’ I snarled, daring him to step out of the frame and contradict me. Then I remembered a line from Dracula: ‘This man belongs to me!’ I spat, and stormed out, slamming the door.
Truth was, Bram didn’t belong to me. These two volumes, Bram’s own words, proved what everyone knew: my husband always had been, and still remained, the property of someone else.
When the reviews came in, apart from one or two that appreciated the depth and breadth of Bram’s work, they confirmed my worst fears. Described as ‘disappointing’, as not being critical enough, the book didn’t do anything to further Bram’s literary reputation.
Still, it sold well and kept the debtors from the door for a time, especially when, on the back of Reminiscences, Bram was invited to speak to various clubs and groups – speaking about Henry.
I didn’t accompany him.
When he finally came home after delivering yet another talk, I was at a gallery function. When I returned around ten in the evening, and Maria helped me undress, I didn’t even ask after him. I knew he was back because his portmanteau was in the hallway and a light beamed beneath the study door.
Sensing my mood, Maria didn’t mention ‘the master’ either.
I climbed into bed, reading when I was unable to sleep.
I was halfway through The Scarlet Pimpernel.
I’d seen the play a couple of years earlier at the New Theatre and been thoroughly captivated.
Though the book was excellent, not even the adventures of Lord Percy and his wife could keep my mind from wandering.
I kept thinking about Bram, about how I could excise the canker that was Henry Irving from our lives once and for all.
What would it take? The morning gave an answer.
There was a scream, running feet, then my door flung open.
‘Mrs S, Mrs S!’ cried Ada from the doorway. ‘Dear Lord in heaven! Come quick. Quick!’
‘What’s wrong?’ I threw back the covers, pushed my feet into slippers, reached for my gown. ‘Tell me.’ Ada was shaking like a trapped coney.
‘Oh, Mrs S,’ she sobbed. She tried to speak but gulped air instead.
‘What is it?’ I said, firmly.
‘It’s the master.’ She swallowed, took a breath and stared at me with panicked eyes. ‘He’s dead!’