The Map of Time (3 page)

3

In order not to draw attention to himself, Andrew made Harold pull up the luxurious carriage in Leadenhall and continued alone on foot towards Commercial Street. After wandering a good way down that evil-smelling street, he plucked up his courage and entered the maze of alleyways that made up Whitechapel. Within ten minutes, a dozen prostitutes loomed out of the fog to offer him a trip to Mount Venus for the price of a few pennies, but none of them was the girl in the portrait. Had they been draped in seaweed, Andrew might easily have mistaken them for faded, dirty ship figureheads. He refused them politely without pausing, a dreadful sadness welling up in him at the sight of those scarecrows hunched against the cold who had no better way of earning a living. Their toothless mouths attempting bawdy smiles were more repulsive than desirable. Would Marie look like that outside the portrait, far from the brushstrokes that had transformed her into an angelic creature? He soon realized he was unlikely to find her by chance. Perhaps he would have more luck if he asked for her directly. Once he was sure his disguise was convincing, he entered the Ten Bells, a popular tavern on the corner of Fournier Street and Commercial Street opposite the ghostly Christ Church. When he peered inside the pub, it looked to him like just the sort of place whores went to in search of clients. As soon as he reached the bar, two of them came up to him. Trying to look casual, Andrew offered them a glass of stout, refusing their propositions as politely as possible.

He explained he was looking for a woman called Marie Jeannette.

One of the whores left immediately, pretending to be offended, perhaps because she did not want to waste the evening with someone who didn’t want to pay for her services, but the other, the taller of the two, decided to accept his invitation: “I suppose you mean Marie Kelly. That dratted Irishwoman, everybody wants her. I expect she’s done a few by now and is in the Britannia—that’s where we all go when we’ve made enough for a bed and a bit more besides so that we can get drunk quick and forget our sorrows,” she said, with more irony than bitterness.

“Where is this tavern?” Andrew asked.

“Near here, on the corner of Crispin Street and Dorset Street.” The least Andrew could do was thank her for the information by giving her four shillings.

“Get yourself a room,”” he recommended, with a warm smile.

“It’s too cold out there tonight to be traipsing the streets.” “Why, thank you, mister. You’re too kind, I’m sure,” said the whore, genuinely grateful.

Andrew said good-bye, politely doffing his cap.

“If Marie Kelly won’t give you what you want, come back and see me,” she shouted after him with a flash of coquettishness that was blighted by her toothless smile. “My name’s Liz. Liz Stride, don’t forget.” Andrew had no problem finding the Britannia, a seedy bar with a windowed front. Despite being brilliantly lit by oil lamps, the room was thick with tobacco smoke. At the far end was a long bar, with a couple of private rooms to the left. A crowd of noisy customers filled the large main area cluttered with tables and chairs, the floor strewn with sawdust. A fleet of bartenders in filthy aprons squeezed their way between tightly packed tables juggling metal tankards brimming with beer. In the corner, a battered old piano displayed its grubby keys to anyone wishing to enliven the evening with a tune. Andrew reached the bar, the surface of which was laden with large jugs of wine, oil lamps, and plates of cheese cut into huge chunks that looked more like bits of rubble from a dump. He lit a cigarette from one of the lamps, ordered a pint of beer, and leaned discreetly against the bar, surveying the crowd and wrinkling his nose at the strong smell of cooked sausage emanating from the kitchen. As he had been told, the atmosphere there was more relaxed than at the Ten Bells.

Most of the tables were occupied by sailors on shore leave and local people dressed as modestly as he, although he also noticed a few groups of prostitutes busy getting drunk. He sipped his beer slowly and looked for one who fitted Marie Kelly’s description, but none did. By his third beer, he had begun to despair and to wonder what on earth he was doing there, chasing an illusion.

He was about to leave when she pushed her way through the pub door. He recognized her at once. There was no doubt about it: she was the girl in the portrait, but more beautiful still for being endowed with movement. Her face looked drained, yet she moved with the same energy Andrew had imagined she would from seeing her on canvas. Most of the other customers remained oblivious to the apparition. “How was it possible for anyone not to react to the small miracle that had just taken place in the tavern?” thought Andrew. This complete indifference made him feel he was a privileged witness to the phenomenon. And he could not help recalling the time when, as a child, he had seen the wind take a leaf between invisible fingers and balance the tip of it on the surface of a puddle, spinning it like a top until a carriage wheel put an end to its dance. To Andrew it had seemed that Mother Nature had engineered that magic trick for his eyes alone. From then on, he was convinced that the universe dazzled mankind with volcanic eruptions, but had its own secret way of communicating with the select few, people like Andrew who looked at reality as though it were a strip of wallpaper covering up something else. Taken aback, he watched Marie Kelly walk towards him as if she knew him. This made his heart start pounding, but he calmed down when she propped her elbow on the bar and ordered half a pint of beer without even glancing at him.

“Having a good night, Marie?” “Can’t grumble, Mrs. Ringer.” Andrew swallowed, on the verge of blacking out. She was standing next to him! He could scarcely believe it, yet it was true.

He had heard her voice. A tired, rather husky voice, but lovely in any case. And if he really tried, ridding the air of the superfluous stench of tobacco smoke and sausages, he could probably smell her, too. Smell Marie Kelly. Mesmerized, Andrew gazed at her in admiration, rediscovering in her every gesture what he already knew. In the same way a shell holds the roar of the sea, so this frail-looking body seemed to contain within it a force of nature.

When the landlady placed the beer on the counter, Andrew realized this was an opportunity he must not waste. He rummaged swiftly in his pockets and paid before she could: “Allow me, miss.” The gesture, as unexpected as it was chivalrous, earned him an openly approving look from Marie Kelly. Being the focus of her gaze paralyzed him. As the painting had already shown, the girl’s eyes were beautiful, and yet they seemed buried beneath a layer of resentment. He could not help comparing her to a poppy field where someone has decided to dump refuse. And yet he was completely, hopelessly enthralled by her, and he tried to make that instant when their eyes crossed as meaningful to her as it was to him, but—and my apologies to any romantic souls reading these lines—some things cannot be expressed in a look. How could Andrew make her share in the almost mystical feeling overwhelming him at that moment? How could he convey, with nothing more than his eyes, the sudden realization that he had been searching for her all his life without knowing it? If in addition we consider that Marie Kelly’s existence up to that point had done little to increase her understanding of life’s subtleties, it should come as no surprise that this initial attempt at spiritual communion (for want of a better way of putting it) was doomed to failure. Andrew did his best, obviously, but the girl understood his passionate gaze just as she interpreted that of the other men who accosted her every evening.

“Thanks, mister,” she replied with a lewd smile, no doubt from force of habit.

Andrew nodded, dismissing the significance of a gesture he considered an all-important part of his strategy, then realized with horror that his careful plan had not taken into account how he was to strike up a conversation with the girl once he found her. What did he have to say to her? Or more precisely, what did he have to say to a whore? A Whitechapel whore, at that. He had never bothered speaking much to the Chelsea prostitutes, only enough to discuss positions or the lighting in the room, and with the charming Keller sisters, or his other female acquaintances— young ladies whom it would not do to worry with talk of politics or Darwin’s theories—he only discussed trivia: Paris fashions, botany, and, more recently spiritualism, the latest craze everyone was taking up. But none of these subjects seemed suitable to discuss with the woman, who was hardly likely to want to summon up some spirit to tell her which of her many suitors she would end by marrying. And so he simply stared at her, enraptured. Luckily, Marie Kelly knew a better way of breaking the ice.

“I know what you want, mister, although you’re too shy to ask,” she said, her grin broadening as she gave his hand a fugitive caress that brought him out in goose pimples. “Thruppence and I can make your dreams come true. Tonight, at any rate.” Andrew gazed at her, shaken: she did not know how right she was. She had been his only dream those past few nights, his deepest longing, his most urgent desire, and now, although he was still scarcely able to believe it, finally he could have her. His whole body tingled with excitement at the mere thought of touching her, of caressing the slender body silhouetted beneath that shabby dress, of bringing forth deep moans from her lips as he was set alight before her eyes, those of a wild animal, a tormented indomitable creature. And yet that tremor of joy rapidly gave way to a profound sadness when he considered the unjust plight of that fallen angel, the ease with which any man could grope her, defile her in a filthy back alley, without anyone in the world uttering a single cry of protest. Was that what such a unique creature had been created for? He had no choice but to accept her invitation, a lump in his throat, distressed at being compelled to take her the same way as her other clients, as if his intentions were no different from theirs. Once he had accepted, Marie Kelly smiled with what looked to Andrew like forced enthusiasm and tilted her head for them to leave the pub.

Andrew felt odd following the whore like that, walking behind her with birdlike steps as though Marie Kelly were leading him to the gallows instead of to plunge between her thighs.

And yet, could their meeting have been any different? From the moment he came across his cousin’s painting he had been penetrating deeper into unknown territory, where he could not get his bearings because nothing around him looked familiar, everything was new, and, judging from the deserted streets, they were going through, quite possibly dangerous. Was he blithely walking into some sort of trap laid by the whore’s pimp? He wondered whether Harold would hear his shouts, and if so, would he bother coming to his aid, or use the opportunity to avenge himself for the offhand treatment he had received from his master all these years? After guiding him part of the way along Hanbury Street, a muddy alley dimly lit by a single oil lamp sputtering on a corner, Marie Kelly beckoned him down a narrow passageway leading into pitch-darkness. Andrew followed her, convinced he would meet his death, or at least be beaten to within an inch of his life by a couple of ruffians much bigger than him, who, having stolen everything including his socks, would spit contemptuously on his bloody remains. That was how they did things here, and his idiotic adventure richly deserved such an ending. But before fear had time to take hold, they came out into a filthy waterlogged backyard, where to his surprise no one was waiting for him. Andrew glanced warily about him. Yes: strange as it might seem, they were alone in that evil-smelling place. The world they had left behind was reduced to a muffled rumble in which a distant church bell’s chimes rang out. At his feet, the moon reflected in a puddle looked like a crumpled letter some unhappy lover had tossed on the ground.

“We won’t be disturbed here, mister,” Marie Kelly reassured him, leaning back against the wall and drawing him to her.

Before he knew it, she had unbuttoned his trousers and pulled out his penis. She did so with startling ease, without any of the provocative foreplay to which the Chelsea prostitutes had accustomed him. The matter-of-fact way she maneuvered his sex beneath her hiked-up skirts made it clear to Andrew that what to him was another magical moment for her was no more than simple routine.

“It’s in,” she assured him.

In? Andrew had enough experience to know the whore was lying. She was simply gripping his penis between her thighs. He assumed it was common practice among them, a trick to avoid penetration, which, if they were lucky and the client failed to notice or was too drunk, reduced the number of hasty intrusions they were forced to undergo each day, and with them the unwanted pregnancies such a flood of sperm could bring about.

With this in mind, Andrew began thrusting energetically, prepared to go along with the charade, because in reality it was more than enough for him to rub his erect member against the silky skin of her inner thigh, to feel her body pressed against his for as long as the pretense lasted. What did it matter whether it was all a sham if this phantom penetration allowed him to cross the boundary imposed by good manners and force his way into that intimacy only lovers share. Feeling her hot sticky breath in his ear, inhaling the delicate odor from her neck, and clasping her to him until he felt the contours of her body merge with his was worth infinitely more than thruppence. And, as he soon discovered to his consternation when he ejaculated into her petticoats, it had the same effect on him as other greater undertakings.

Slightly ashamed at his lack of endurance, he finished emptying himself in quiet contemplation, still pressed against her, until he felt her stir impatiently. He stepped back, embarrassed. Oblivious to his unease, the whore straightened her skirts and thrust out a hand to be paid. Trying to regain his composure, Andrew hurriedly gave her the agreed sum. He had enough money left in his pockets to buy her for the whole night, but he preferred to savor what he had just experienced in the privacy of his own bed, and to get her to meet him the next night.

“My name’s Andrew,” he introduced himself, his voice high-pitched from emotion. She raised an eyebrow, amused. “And I’d like to see you again tomorrow.” “Certainly, mister. You know where to find me,” the whore said, leading him back along the gloomy passageway she had brought him down.