Chapter 8: London Docklands: March 1853

Frederic Ashton Thorpe walked towards Swan's Pier, past Southwark Bridge, swinging a thin ivory-topped cane and looking his usual dapper self. He wondered, as he always did when he visited this area, what on earth had induced his good friend, Henry Winstone, to rent chambers here? It was a dismal, lowering sort of place in the day, half-lit, eerie and forbidding at night. He had left behind him the comforting rattle and clatter of home going vehicles from the City. Fleet Street still hummed with printing presses and the hurrying footsteps of the newspaper men who fed them with the nation's foibles and gossip. The merry, raucous voices of a group of idlers could be heard, taking themselves off to the inns and chophouses and other evening amusements.

It was now late afternoon and the sun had not set but Upper Thames Street was already cast in shadows. Dark warehouses hemmed around him. They stared at passers-by with a humourless aspect; blank, forbidding windows like the unclosed eyes of the dead. These tall, square, ugly buildings arose from the banks of the Thames, growing like fungi from the rotting timbers of the piles and wharves. Monuments to materialism, Fred thought scathingly.

Once, he mused, this ancient riverside would have been open fields and marshes, banks full of reeds, the waters rippling and pure and filled with fish and wildlife of all kinds. In those days, flocks of swans graced the waters in abundance. Now the unhealthy pall that arose from it was foul. The river carried bodies, rubbish, debris, all manner of excreta. It moved along in a slow, sluggish manner, hardly able to flow at all in some places, snagging and catching at the piles with the strange angry gulping sound of a creature that was dying and gasping for air. He'd have to persuade Henry to move out of this place. It was unhealthy.

The housekeeper let Fred in and he bounded up the stairs to the second floor. He knocked at the door to Henry's chambers. It was opened by a tall stolid red-haired girl eating an apple.

'Good evening, Miss Gamm.'

The young woman gave a little laugh as if Fred's formality amused her.

'Evenin', Mister Ashton Thorpe,' she said, mimicking his precise manner. Her voice was mocking. She laughed again, flicking the apple core into the fireplace.

'Who is it, Rosie?' A voice called from the adjacent room and Henry Winstone came out rubbing his oily hands on his painting coat.

'It's your friend, Thorpe,' she called back.

'Fred, old fellow!' As always Henry's rich, melodious voice with its cheerful welcome lightened Fred's heart. 'Come on in at once, don't stand there on ceremony. Rosie! Get the coffee pot nice and hot, there's a good girl.'

Fred laid down his hat, cane and gloves with tidy care upon a small table, making sure he set his topper down on the brim so as not to wear out the fabric. Rosie stood and watched him, half-amused as always at his fastidiousness.

'Go and get the coffee, you lazy girl,' repeated Henry giving her ample bottom a poke with a paintbrush. 'Oh, she's a slut, that girl,' he added good-humouredly as, shrugging her shoulders, Rosie swirled away with a flourish of her skirt, armed with the boiling kettle from the hob.

'Why d'you bother with her, then?'

'Need you ask?' Henry said with a grin. 'Ain't she a stunner - as Rossetti and his crowd would say? In bed, on canvas, a most obliging girl is Rosie. Most obliging. Besides, I'm fond of her. I feel comfortable with her. She don't make any demands of me and she's thrilled to be living somewhere better than the hole where I found her. This - as you well know - was down a Brixton lane where her father and her brothers made good use of her charms.'

Fred made a face at this and Henry laughed as always at his friend's prudery.

'Come on, take a seat, Fred! Did you remember to bring the copal varnish by the way? I'm running out and need it to finish off that little scene for Atkins. I'm strapped for cash as always and the sooner I get it over to him, the better.'

'Yes, I stopped at Roberson's on the way. I've left it on the table out there in the passage,' replied Fred as he made to sit in a sagging armchair by the fire.

'Hang on, don't sit there! You'll park your arse on my wide-awake!'

Fred, startled, looked behind him to see a battered felt hat at the back of the chair.

'If you took a little more care of your possessions. . .' he grumbled as he handed it over.

'Oh, I do!' said Henry with a laugh as he tossed the hat over to the corner where it landed neatly on a bust of Wellington.

'Like hell you do.' Fred dusted the seat down now and cast a wary eye out for any other objects likely to be there.

'C'mon, Rosie, what the dickens are you doing out there with that coffee?' Henry yelled. His darling lady appeared at the door with arms akimbo and told him what she thought of him in a few choice words before disappearing back to her noisy efforts next door.

Fred, who had a horror of profanities on a woman's lips, blinked at the coarse language. 'She's a good deal cleaner than when you found her but I can't say her manners have improved,' he remarked. 'I thought you were going to send her to some academy.'

'What academy, eh? I'm not sending her back to some damned brothel, if that's what you're hinting.' Henry looked a trifle peeved by this remark.

'You know perfectly well what I mean. Not a pushing school, you idiot. Somewhere like Mrs Jessop's in Kensington or wherever; an academy that'll educate her into a ladylike disposition.'

Henry smiled again, his temper seldom soured for long. 'You always growl about Rosie. Will I never get you two to like one another? You act as if the poor girl was a bad smell under your nose. Yes, I am going to send her to a nice place I've heard of where she'll be "made all proper" as Rosie puts it. Who knows? Then I might even marry her.'

'You wouldn't!'

'I might. She's a good girl and very fond of me.'

Fred sighed and said no more. It was up to Henry who he slept with.

'Can't make a silk purse out of a sow's ear,' he muttered.

'I suppose not,' said Henry comfortably, 'but it doesn't bother me. I'm not a social being like you so I don't need a paragon to grace my home. I just want an easy-going, caring woman, warm and welcoming in bed, who thinks I'm wonderful and who doesn't expect me to earn a fortune to keep her in smart clothes. I've become content with little while you're used to having money all your life and not working for it. I know you want to keep a smart establishment some day and hob-nob with the rich and famous. So, you keep looking for your Arthurian princess. You'll find her someday.'

'If she'll have me,' sighed Fred. 'Would Perfection want me?'

'Oh, cheer up. Perfection will love you. You're a very good catch -handsome, rich and idle.'

'I'm certainly not idle!' protested Fred indignantly. 'I finished off a splendid commission this morning for Watson. His wife wanted her little spaniel commemorated in oils. It was a bit of a bore - but I felt pleased with it afterwards and Mrs W raved about it. My only fear is she'll get me to do the cats and then all her friends' pets next. I'm not that fond of animals. The damned thing tried to bite me when I wanted to settle it on a cushion. Wouldn't stay still till Mrs W decided it might be easier to put the wretched creature on her lap and hold it for me.'

Henry smiled. 'Animals are damnable, that's certain. I steer clear of 'em unless it's vital. Even horses can be trouble. Sheep and cows are about the best - at least they stay still for two minutes. Ah, here's our coffee at last.'

Rosie returned carrying a tray with a steaming coffee pot and cups on it.

'Some saucers would be nice, dear,' said Henry.

She stared at him. 'You ain't got none what match.'

'Oh, you want them to match! Well, that shows a little taste. Don't worry if they match or not. Just fetch 'em, there's a girl. And spoons, cream and sugar too.'

He proceeded to pour out the coffee. Fred watched Rosie flounce off into the small room that served as kitchen-cum-storeroom. It was mainly filled with painting materials and books but some dry goods, wine glasses and odd crockery were stored in a cupboard there and these Rosie proceeded to bang about while searching for saucers and cream jugs. Fred's face clouded over for a moment. Her large, comfortable frame awoke unpleasant memories in him. Memories he would far rather forget. Perhaps it was for this reason that he felt an irrational dislike for her. She came back with the required implements, a hotchpotch collection of patterned saucers, which she discarded upon the table, leaving the men to sort them out for themselves.

Rosie now bent over to stir up the fire and Fred found himself staring at her ample buttocks that were almost thrust into his face. He felt sure she flaunted herself like this on purpose. She seemed determined to disturb him. He tore his eyes away, glanced swiftly at his friend. Henry however, was equally interested in Rosie's backside. In fact, he got up with a laugh and seizing the girl's thighs made a mock show of butting into her which made her shout and swear at him. The pair of them rolled onto the floor together.

Fred turned his eyes away and looked elsewhere. Henry sat up and catching the look of faint disgust, laughed uproariously and scrambled back to his feet. He patted his friend on the shoulder - Fred's mobile features were screwed up, lips tightly pursed like some puritanical old woman.

'There, there, my dear! There, there! Damnation, Fred, old chap, don't play the mimsy man with me. You used to like a bit of horseplay too - or so I've heard.'

'Where have you heard such a thing!' snapped Fred, 'Where?' He half arose in his indignation. Who knew his secret? Dammit! Who'd been spreading gossip about him? His heart palpitated in dismay.

Henry put out a hand, helped haul Rosie to her feet and dusted her bottom down with a lavish care that set her off in gales of laughter again. She gave Fred an arch look at the same time, as if to say, 'Don't like it, eh? I'll betcha, Mr. Peep an' Pry!'

At least this was how Fred interpreted her challenging stare. Sinking back into his chair he glowered at Henry who smiled and said soothingly enough, 'Don't take on so, Fred! I'm only joking. You really do need to stop playing the puritan martyr about to be burnt at the stake. You never used to be like this when we were lads.'

'Some of us mature a little faster,' was the acid reply, 'and learn the stupidity of our ways.'

'Maturity, is it? Oh, aye.' Henry nodded. Suddenly he looked serious and sad. Once they had told one another all their youthful secrets and misdemeanours, joking, laughing and curious about each other's behaviour with the other sex, as fascinated as most young fellows were about women's bodies.

'I suppose you've always been a bit of a prude, Fred,' Henry sighed, 'you just like to sit and worship a woman - and if we all did that where would the human race be?'

'I have my ideal woman, just as you do, Henry.'

'Yes, some classical statue, some Galatea with you to be her Pygmalion and breathe life into her, I suppose. You're damned right, I do have my ideal. All women's bodies are beautiful to paint as far as I'm concerned, in youth or even in old age.'

Henry loved to try and capture the quality of what inspired him and that was the sense of touch rather than sight; the thrilling feel of soft, plump female flesh. Warmth, solid form, glorious large rounded breasts and buttocks. Earthy, substantial, enveloping, generous. That was his ideal. Not often to be found amongst the over-refined ladies of his own class, he sought her out amongst the women of the street or in the back of some tawdry little shop down an alleyway where some 'stunner' might come to light. Rossetti, Millais, Hunt, Fred, himself - they had all spent time looking for 'stunners' as they called them. And found a few too.

'Something's happened to you, Fred,' said Henry, 'Rosie, dear, go out and get some coal for us. The fire's dying down.'

'It's all fetch and carry,' grumbled Rosie, 'I'm not your bleedin' servant.'

'Rosie! Just do it, there's a good girl. Of course you're not my servant, you're my lover.' He pulled her down towards him and they both indulged in some lengthy kissing. There was a sense of heat arising between them that was not to do with their proximity to the fire. Fred turned his head away, stared at the dying embers and wondered whether it was envy that he felt.

Rosie picked up the empty hod of coals and giving Fred a glare of dislike, sallied forth into the hall to yell for the housemaid to come and take it to be filled. Henry shook his head at Fred's expression of mild distaste and said again, 'Some-thing happened, didn't it? You never told me. But there was some gossip. Why not unburden yourself, old man?'

Fred put down his coffee cup, rose and paced the room. His face had paled and he moved away from Henry as if to escape his questions.

'I sinned, Henry. That was what happened. I sinned and have been paying for it ever since.'

'Come now, nothing could be that bad. What sin, for Heaven's sake? So you laid some maidservant as a lad ...not the first to do it, not the last.'

'It seems the world knows about it,' said Fred bitterly, 'and that will be due to my beloved mother. I can always rely on her to open her mouth and reveal all. I assumed that even she wouldn't say anything on a matter like this. How do people seem to know everything? Why can nothing be kept secret?'

Henry shrugged. 'Because people are always prurient and interested in other folks' misfortunes. Where the tittle-tattle began I have no idea. Servants as like as not. They know exactly what's going on upstairs. These things are always spread around and you've done nothing to refute any rumours.'

'No,' sighed Fred. 'You're right, I should speak of it. It's a burden I've carried about for some time now and I can tell you it's poisoned my life ever since. I cannot be rid of the guilt I feel.'

'Then let's go into my studio and shut the door and you tell me about it all. Get it off your chest. Let me be your father confessor. You know you can trust me. We always spoke to one another about our secrets. Do you think I'm a gossip too?'

Henry looked hurt and Fred put an arm about his shoulder.

'Henry, I know I'm a fool. I find it hard to talk about even after all this time. I've let it sit on my heart and grow into a dark, monstrous thing that haunts me day and night. Yes, I know full well I can trust you. You're right, maybe then it will go away. I suppose that's the whole purpose of the confessional, is it not? To relieve the heart and soul of unspoken burdens which eat away inside and cause one pain and suffering.'

'Come on then. While you're in the mood for it.' Henry grabbed a bottle of whisky and the two men went into his studio.