A/N: And now the short finale of Part Two: Sink, Sank, Sunk
Tides of Bath
Chapter Fourteen: Che farò senza Euridice?
What is life to me without thee,
What is life if thou art dead?
What is life, life without thee,
What is life without my love?
What is life if thou art dead?
Euridice! Euridice!
In my dread anguish naught can aid me,
None can comfort,
Earth is cruel, heaven is cold!
-Christoph Gluck, Orpheus and Euridice
The Octagon Room was abuzz. Musicians, at the room's front, were quietly tuning their instruments. They spoke softly to one another as they did so. The conductor was turning through the pages of music on the stand before him.
All around the room, the concert-goers were whispers with one another, studying programs or fanning themselves with them. The heat of the last days had finally broken, but it was still warm, and the press of people in the Octagon room made it even warmer there.
Anne's mind was abuzz and whispering. She and Lady Russell — and Lady Russell's Philosophical Society acquaintance, Mr. James Fowler, arrived after the bulk of the crowd. Lady Russell had done the introductions outside the Octagon Room and they had taken a few minutes.
When they entered, most of the concert-goers were in their seats. They passed by Mary and Charles Musgrove, who were there with other Bath friends of Charles', unknown to Anne.
Mary, seated near the end of her row, stopped Anne to ask about Elizabeth and Sir Walter. Anne told Mary that Elizabeth had sat up for a part of the day and was growing stronger, her appetite returning. Nurse Rook was there. Sir Walter had decided to stay at home: he had been out most of the day and was fatigued by the heat. Anne imagined him among his mirrors, staring into the Baronetage.
Mary told Anne that her boys were being tended by their friends' governess; their friends had a small girl about the age of Mary's oldest.
Anne and Lady Russell and Mr. Fowler moved on past Mary and Charles toward Lady Russell's reserved seats near the front.
Mr. Fowler was talking to Anne as they walked and she was trying to listen, but her attention was suddenly fixed on their destination. The three chairs awaiting them were immediately behind the chairs in which Captain Wentworth, Miss Ustus, and the Crofts were seated. Anne saw Mrs, Croft turn and look. Her eyes settled on Anne and Anne held her breath. Something flashed in Mrs. Croft's eyes and Anne felt her spirits fall. Mrs. Croft knew, knew about Anne's past with Frederick. Anne half-forced a smile, and Mrs. Croft nodded, but her eyes shifted to Lady Russell, and Mr. Fowler, who, Anne realized, was still talking.
Anne tried to attend, but she saw Mrs. Croft look away from them to her brother, and then she saw Captain Wentworth turn and look. His eyes settled on Anne for a moment — and then on Mr. Fowler. Miss Ustus turned and smiled at Anne, her dimples showing, her face lovely in the light of the many candles in the room. When Miss Ustus saw Mr. Fowler, her dimples deepened.
Anne could not still the buzzing and whispering in her head; Mr. Fowler was talking about Montaigne, but Anne could not keep the thread. She could only wonder, as she sat down, what was in the minds and hearts of those seated in front of her. Admiral Croft finally noticed her and gave her a warm smile and nod. Whatever Mrs. Croft knew, Anne was sure in that moment that the Admiral knew nothing.
"Have you read Montaigne, Miss Elliot?" Mr. Fowler was asking.
Anne forced herself to hear, to listen. "A little. Lady Russell has the Florio translation in her library, and I have looked into it during visits with her."
"So you have not read it in French?"
"No, I have not. I don't believe I have seen a French copy, although I recall reading somewhere that his French is quite difficult."
"Yes," Mr. Fowler said, shaking his head. "It is quite antique. Even the French now find it hard to read. They say it is much like you or I reading Chaucer: it would be our language but presented with forbidding aspect."
Anne nodded. "I do not know how much is Florio and how much Montaigne, but I found the essays I read delightful."
Anne had enjoyed them, although her heart was not in this conversation. She watched as Miss Ustus talked, low and excitedly, to Captain Wentworth, her gloved hands now and then alighting on Captain Wentworth's sleeve. Anne's heart sank inside her; and Anne, a courageous captain, went down with her ship. Her eyes filled with water.
She blinked, blinked away the sudden tears, and out of the corner of her eye, she saw Lady Russell, on the opposite side — Anne was seated between Mr. Fowler and Lady Russell — notice the Miss Ustus' gloved touches and subtly shake her head.
Mr. Fowler had not noticed Anne's tears; none had fallen. He was still talking of Montaigne. "As Lady Russell said, I am a tutor at Cambridge. I have several students reading Montaigne with me. One of my brightest has been writing on this line of Montaigne's: 'Life in itself is neither good nor evil; it is the place of good or evil as you prepare it for them.' It is a challenging thought, is it not?"
Anne turned to Mr. Fowler. He was a small man, fastidiously dressed. His hair was light, his eyes too. He smiled at Anne as he waited for an answer.
"Yes, it is. It makes me think of Hamlet: 'For there is nothing good or bad but thinking makes it so."
"Capital, Miss Elliot, Lady Russell's praise of you is shown true," Mr. Fowler gushed in a whisper. "Indeed, the thoughts are quite similar. But do you think them true?"
Anne glanced at Captain Wentworth, seated in front of her. Despite the conversation passing over him between Miss Ustus and the Admiral, Anne thought he was listening to her conversation with Mr. Fowler.
Anne tried to forget that as she answered Mr. Fowler but without any success. It made her slightly dizzy. "I suppose the line exaggerated, Mr. Fowler. Hamlet, if I recall, finds Denmark a prison and he justifies himself by so saying. I do not deny that what we think...or feel...can make something — or someone — a blessing — or a curse to us…" Anne paused to take a breath, to regain her balance, "...but I also believe that some things — some people — are good or evil in themselves, independent of our thinking. And perhaps Montaigne's line is more sensitive to that distinction than is Shakespeare's — but, of course, Hamlet, in that scene, is engaged in elaborate self-apology, is not he?"
Mr. Fowler clapped his hands, drawing attention to himself for a moment. He shrank down in embarrassment but then smiled at Anne, and whispered, "Capital!"
The music started a moment later. Anne's position required her to look between Captain Wentworth and Miss Ustus to see the singer. It was an unfortunate position. She tried to foreground the singer in her consciousness, putting Captain Wentworth and Miss Ustus in the background, but she could not maintain that structure of attention for long: after a moment, Captain Wentworth and Miss Ustus were the foreground and the singer the background.
Anne shifted in her chair, unable to sit comfortably. Each time Miss Ustus touched Captain Wentworth, and the touches, brief and small, were frequent, Anne died a little inside. She was frustrated with herself. She knew that Miss Ustus was now the Captain's object. Anne had no right to be envious. She had forfeited any such right five years ago. But she felt envy in herself, cold and brittle and sharp-edged, and she struggled to control it.
Luckily, the program featured one of Anne's favorite songs, Che farò senza Euridice, one that she often played for herself — no one ever listened to her — at Kellynch, Gluck's Che farò from his Orpheus and Euridice. It was the final song before intermission.
The song was an overwhelming sadness and an aching beauty. The singer, good, finally held Anne's attention. She lost herself in the words, felt them her own. When the song ended, Anne realized that her cheeks were wet with tears. Mr. Fowler did not notice; a man next to him took advantage of the intermission to ask Mr. Fowler a question. Another friend of Lady Russell's, seated behind them, had leaned forward to speak to her.
For a moment, a mercy, Anne was alone. She wiped her tears away, trying to make her movement, and herself, as inconspicuous as possible.
As she did, she heard Miss Ustus ask Captain Wentworth to tell her what the song was about. It took him a moment to respond; he had to clear his throat. "Do you know the story of Orpheus and Euridice?"
Miss Ustus shook her head while smiling. "The names are familiar but I do not recall the story."
"Euridice is Orpheus great love. She dies — bitten by a snake — and he goes to the underworld to find her, retrieve her. He locates her there — he is the son of Apollo and so can survive in that netherworld — and he eventually has an audience with Hades, ruler of the Underworld. Orpheus plays the lyre for Hades, and his playing so moves Hades that he allows Orpheus to leave the Underworld with Euridice, but on one condition: she must follow him out to the human world, and Orpheus must not look back at her until they have both emerged from the darkness. But Orpheus, just a few feet from his goal, hearing feet behind him but still losing faith, turns. Euridice is there but then she is whisked back into the Underworld forever."
Captain Wentworth paused and cleared his throat again. Anne was hanging on each overheard word. "The song is Orpheus' lament after losing Euridice, losing her a second time — and as a result of faithlessness. His deep grief cannot be comforted."
Miss Ustus nodded. "Gods always have conditions, don't they? — It sounded so very sad. You seemed much moved, Captain. You must have known the piece before?"
"Yes…", he said quietly, "Benwick, my officer, I have told you about him, he and I have often played it aboard ship. I like to play it, though it...taxes me. But we do not sing it, and so I have not often heard the words, although I know them."
Miss Ustus then looked back at Anne, noticed her damp, red cheeks. "You seem to have been moved by the song too, Miss Elliot?"
Captain Wentworth turned to look too, and, for an eternal second, their eyes met.
For the first time since the day broke their engagement, he looked at her with tenderness, and not anger, resentment. His look supplied fresh tears to Anne's eyes.
"I'm sorry, it is close here, and I need to step into the outer room." Without waiting to hear a response or taking the time to speak to Mr. Fowler or Lady Russell, Anne stood up and made her way to the center aisle, and escaped from the Octagon Room.
Anne returned to her seat before the music began a second time. It had taken her several minutes of reflection and some fretting, but she had gained control of herself. But if Captain Wentworth were to look at her like that again…
He did not. The rest of the program passed over Anne heard but unregistered. Went it was over, Captain Wentworth nodded to her and left the room with Miss Ustus and the Crofts. Mrs. Croft seemed to want to speak to Anne, but the movement of the crowd and the interposition of Mr. Fowler and Lady Russell prevented it.
Anne left the room in a kind of dream. She ended up walking out a few people behind Captain Wentworth. For a moment, she was Euridice, following Orpheus.
Captain Wentworth reached the doors but never looked back.
When Anne entered Camden Place, she crossed paths with Nurse Rook, who was preparing to leave. "How was the music, Miss Anne?"
"It was good. Some of it was very good."
Nurse Rook smiled. "I'm glad. You're carrying too much sadness around for such a tiny lady. I guess Mr. Ustus was not at the music?"
Anne was puzzled by this non-sequitur. "Yes, Nurse Rook, that's right. How did you know?"
She gave Anne a look. "Because he spent most of the evening here, shut up in the drawing-room with Sir Walter, thick as thieves."
Anne had no idea what to make of that information but it added to her disquiet. She showed Nurse Rook out and thanked her.
In her room, exhausted, she undressed for bed and blew out her candle, and felt whisked into the netherworld dark.
Look-ahoy! Join me next time as we begin Part Three, the final part of our story: To the Lighthouse.
Deep into COVID college teaching. But I hope to keep up with a chapter-every-couple-of-days sort of pace.
Zettel