AUTHOR'S NOTE

I've been remiss. For weeks now, I haven't delivered on my promise of a new chapter. I hate to be the kind of person who reneges on a promise. I am that kind of person, but I hate it! I will try to post more often by writing shorter chapters. A sincere thank you to all who haven't given up on an ending to this story.


CHAPTER 103, A CAREER

The Bates Room
Grantham House, London

That afternoon

Bates opened his bag, but fatigue took command and ordered him to relieve his feet of their burden. He obeyed and dropped backwards onto the bed. Anna's voice was barely audible from the next room. Bates closed his eyes and pictured his wife fussing over Thomas, and Thomas wallowing in motherly affection. He knew that Thomas was paying for their night's revelry with a dreadful headache and bouts of dizziness. Yet, his little brother had awakened that morning with a grin and showed off the scraps of paper that spilled from his notebook, each with the name and address of a new friend. Then he swore Bates to secrecy as he tucked away Josephine's brooch for some special occasion when he would bestow the treasure on Anna.

With his eyes closed, Bates' senses filled with memories of Paris. Gaston's food. Pears soap. Charcoal-smeared fingers. Tickling. Silk pyjamas. American jazz. Women in underclothes. Soapy feet. Thomas crying. Thomas laughing. Thomas' red-painted lips. Rodin's statue. That damned statue. Bates still had not reconciled with the rawness of the thing. Could he ever create something as gut-wrenching? He tried to imagine himself with Rodin's great beard and beret and laughed ruefully. What an old fool I am.

Bates heard Anna open and close the door, but he could not will himself into an upright position. His wife sat next to him and leaned back on an elbow. "Thomas is changing for bed. I'll go back in a few minutes and check on him." She began unbuttoning Bates' shirt. "You have time for a nap, if you like. Lord Grantham says he won't expect you until the gong. You look done in, Mr Bates."

"I am done in, Mrs Bates."

"Why don't you undress. I'll unpack your things."

"You spoil me."

"I like to spoil you."

"I like to be spoiled."

"If only that were true, Mr Bates."

Bates' weariness yielded to his affection for his wife, and he managed to sit up. He kissed Anna's welcoming lips and wished he could stall exhaustion as he did when he was younger. He knew what was hidden beneath Anna's modest dress – a figure that had grown the slightest bit rounder with each child. He found pleasure in her softer shape but dared not mention it. Modern fashion eschewed curves.

Anna returned her husband's kiss. "You have time to dawdle, my darling, but they'll send a search party for me if I stay too long." She pushed herself from the bed and turned her attention to her husband's bag, carefully moving aside the sketch Bates had shown her when he first arrived. "We'll have to hang this over the sofa when we get home."

"It's only an exercise, Anna. I'll have far too many to hang if I decide to delve further."

"You will delve further."

"You've decided that for me, have you, Mrs Bates?"

"Yes, I have. I can see you have an artist's eye, Mr Bates. Besides, a married man needs an interest outside of his marriage."

There was something in Anna's tone that disconcerted Bates. "What about a married woman?"

"The same goes for her."

A vague foreboding pushed Bates to his feet. "Anna, aren't you happy? Aren't the children and I enough for you?"

Anna turned and slipped her arms about Bates' waist and rested her cheek against his chest. "I'm happier than I ever expected to be, John, but ..."

"But ...?"

"It's not healthy for husbands and wives to be dependent on each other for all their happiness. It's important that you and I be able to find some satisfaction within ourselves."

"Within." Bates pulled back from his wife's embrace. "That's not how I was raised, Anna."

"I know, sweetheart, but perhaps if your mother had found something of her own, some passion in which she could have thrown herself, perhaps then she wouldn't have suffered so for the children she lost."

"My mother's passion was her family."

"I know, John."

"You kept that appointment with Gladys Cooper didn't you? To meet her ... her ..."

"... her wardrobe mistress. Certainly I kept it. Thomas took the time to set it up for me. I wasn't going to welcome him home by telling him that I didn't have the time to go."

Bates sat heavily on the bed. "And now you're to have a career, is that it?"

"It's not that simple, John. I have a great deal to learn first, just as you do with your charcoals. Why are you angry? I'm not angry about your sketch."

"I'm not angry ... I don't know what I am."

"I know that you're tired, and I know that I love you."

Bates sighed heavily. "What does it matter if I say I love you, if it's not enough for you?" Bates looked up to see a small smile playing on Anna's lips. "You're making me feel my age, macushla. I'm terribly old-fashioned, aren't I?"

"Yes, you are. It's one of your charms."

"So I have charms, do I?"

"One or two."

Bates chuckled. "I had a peculiar time in Paris, and I wasn't expecting to come home to something new. Let me get my bearings, and we'll talk about it tonight."

"Thank you, sweetheart." Anna began pulling items from her husband's bag and opening and closing drawers. "Thomas is exhausted too. Imagine him going to bed in the middle of the day. He's going to be all right, isn't he?"

Bates pulled off his shoes. "I think so. The concussion's the worst of it. I'm counting on you to enforce the doctor's orders. He'll take it more kindly from you."

"Doctor's orders?"

"To get enough rest ... especially once he's back to work."

"When will that be?"

Bates removed his shirt. "That depends on what the London doctor says tomorrow." He opened the night table drawer, found the aspirin, and downed the bitter remedy without water.

"Mr Bates, what on earth?"

Bates turned to see Anna pulling emerald pyjamas from his bag.

"There's a card here, too, and what's this? Is this a kimono?"

"Read the card, Anna. I don't have my glasses."

Anna pulled the card from its envelope. "What a gay night we had, my friends! Who could have imagined us whiling away the time with the likes of Josephine Baker! Please keep these items for your next pyjama party as a token of Her Ladyship's affection (and mine). Max."

"Would you care to explain this, Mr Bates. I thought you went to Paris to rescue your beloved brother from kidnappers."

"Thomas rescued himself."

"Did you truly meet Josephine Baker?"

"Meet her?" Bates chuckled softly. "I washed her feet."

"What?"

Bates freed himself from his trousers." I have so much to tell you, Anna, but I can't think what." He crawled under the sheets. "Give the kimono and the card to Thomas. He'll be so ... so pleased ..." Bates was asleep before Anna could demand a more satisfactory answer.