Selected
Quotes
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By
the time they sat down for lunch the day was sweltering. Andersen
was wearing a white suit and had a straw hat at the ready as if
he were preparing to go boating. They discussed how the afternoon
might be spent, and when Andersen learned how close they were to
the sea and how easy it would be to go to the strand by bicycle,
he insisted that he had no greater wish than to bathe in the salt
water and walk in his bare feet on the sand. His enthusiasm
was a lovely relief as he refrained from mentioning any of his plans
to win fame as a sculptor throughout the meal. Once lunch
was over, they changed into clothes more suitable for both cycling
and lounging on the beach and then set out on the two well-oiled
bicycles Burgess Noakes had fetched from the shed behind the kitchen.
They rode slowly down the cobbled hill and then set out for Winchelsea,
the breeze from the sea cool and salty in their faces. Andersen,
with his bathing costume and towel tied to the carrier, was in high
good humor as he pedaled hard along the flat road and down the hill
at Udimore to the sea.
When they left their bicycles
and walked along the sandy path through the dunes, Henry noticed
the haze of heat which made everything vague and the horizon barely
visible. The mild exertion and the closeness of the sea seemed
to have changed Andersen's mood, had made him quiet. When
finally they reached the water's edge, he stopped and looked out
to sea, narrowing his eyes against the light, briefly and affectionately
putting his arm around Henry.
"I had forgotten
about this," he said. "I'm not sure where I am.
I could swim to Bergen, I could swim to Newport. If my brother
was here now..."
He stopped and shook his
head in wonder.
"You know,"
he said, "if I closed my eyes and open them, I can imagine
a stretch of sand and the light like this and I'm in Norway and
I must be five or six years old, but Newport can be like this, too,
on a summer's day. It's the air, the sea breeze. I could
be home now."
They walked along by the
line the water made against the sand. The waves were calm
and the beach was almost deserted. Henry stood looking out
to sea as Andersen changed into his bathing costume, and, leaving
Henry to guard his clothes, he became a moving version of one of
his own sculptures, his torso richly smooth and white, his arms
and legs muscular.
"It will be cold,"
he said. "I can tell by looking."
Henry watched him as he
waded into the water, jumping to avoid each wave before diving under
the water and swimming out, the strokes strong and firm. At
times he disappeared under the waves, allowing himself to float
in towards the shore, waving at Henry who stood fully clothed, enjoying
the heat of the sun.
When Andersen had dried
himself and changed back into his clothes, they walked for miles
along the strand, meeting almost no one. Both of them stopped
regularly for no reason to look out to sea, studying the far horizon
or a boat in the distance. Andersen listened when Henry explained
how the land had been reclaimed, thus making inland towns out of
places which had once been harbors.
"If this was Newport,"
Andersen said, "we should be able to walk to the pier and watch
them unloading the catch or preparing for a night's fishing."
Andersen then began to
talk about the Newport he had first seen as a child, arriving from
Norway with his parents, his two brothers and his sister.
That was when he had heard of the James family, he said. He
knew where they lived and that the son had become a writer because
everyone told him so. The Andersens, he said, had everything
except money; his brother was so clearly a talented painter when
he was a mere child, just as he, too, was precociously talented,
just as his younger brother was a promising musician. Old
Newport, the old ladies and the half-Europeanized families, believed
in talent, he said, more than they did in money, but that was because
they had plenty of money, or had inherited enough never to think
about it. The Andersens, he said, might have seemed
like that, too, when they went visiting or went to church, but at
home they had no money, so money was all they thought about.
"They bought us oil
paint and easels," he said, "and pretended not to notice
our patched clothes. They discussed great art with us in the
late afternoon and we could smell their hot suppers being made knowing
that we were going home to cold suppers or grim suppers."
"Rome," Henry
said, "must have been a relief."
"If only Rome had
beaches and salt water," Andersen said.
"And if only Newport
had the Colosseum," and if only the Andersens had possessed
a fortune."
"And if only the
James brothers had patches in their trousers." Andersen laughed
and punched Henry freely and softly in the stomach before putting
his arm around him.
They freewheeled homewards in the
twilight, dismounting briefly when they came to Udimore and again
as they approached close to Lamb House. They arranged to meet
in the garden for drinks after dressing for the evening.
As Henry waited for Andersen
to come down, the scale of the garden, its modest and guarded proportions,
in the raw slanted light which came from the dying sun, appeared
more natural, closer to the scale of the landscape they had been
moving in, and strangely closer to their range of feeling, Henry
thought, than the openness and grand vistas of Rome. It might
be easier, he thought, now that the rain has lifted and now that
Andersen had seemed to settle, for them to relax together, to enjoy
one another.
When Andersen came down,
his hair was freshly washed and still wet at the ends and his light
skin had been reddened by the day's sun. He smiled and made
himself comfortable and sipped a drink and slowly examined the garden
as though he had not seen if before. Henry had previously
indicated the garden room to him as the place where he worked in
the summer, but had not as yet invited him into the room.
When he did so now, they walked slowly, drinks in hand, across the
lawn.
"This is where all
your work is done," Andersen said when Henry had closed the
door behind them.
"This is where the
tales are told," Henry said.
To the left of the entrance
there was a wall of books, and when Andersen had studied the view
and marveled at the light, he walked over to inspect the books,
not appearing to realize at first that all of them bore his host's
name. He took down one or two and then gradually it seemed
to dawn on him that this large high bookcase contained the novels
and stories of Henry James in all their editions from both sides
of the Atlantic. He became agitated and excited as he took
volumes down and looked at the spines and the title pages.
"You have written
a whole library," he said. "I will have to read
them all."
He turned and looked at
Henry.
"Did you always know
that you would write all these books?"
"I know the next
sentence," Henry said, "and often the next story and I
take notes for novels."
"But did you not
once plan it all? Did you not say this is what I will do with
my life?"
By the time he asked the
second question, Henry had turned away from him and was facing towards
the window with no idea why his eyes had filled with tears.
When they had talked for
a while after supper, Henry went to bed leaving Andersen downstairs
reading one of his collections, insisting that he would finish at
least a substantial number of the stories before he left Rye the
next day. After a time he heard the stairs creak and he began
to imagine Andersen's tall frame, book in hand, arriving on the
landing; he pictured him opening his door and going into his bedroom.
Soon, he heard him cross the landing to go to the bathroom and then
return to the bedroom and close the door.
As the floorboards creaked
under Andersen's feet, Henry imagined his friend undressing, removing
his jacket and his tie. And then he heard only silence as
perhaps Andersen sat on the bed to remove his shoes and his socks.
Henry waited, listening. And now after an interval came further
creaks as, Henry surmised, he must have been removing his shirt;
he dreamed of him standing bare-chested in the room, and then reaching
to find his night attire. Henry did not know what Andersen
would do now. He wondered if he would not remove his trousers
and his underwear and stand naked studying himself in the mirror,
looking at how the sun had marked his neck, observing how strong
he was, staring at the blue of his own eyes, not making a sound.
And then he heard another
creak as though Andersen had briefly changed his position.
Henry imagined the room, the dark green curtains and light green
wallpaper, the rugs on the floor and the large old bed which Lady
Wolseley had made him buy, and the lamps on small tables on each
side of the bed which Burgess Noakes would have lit, having, as
was his custom, turned the main light off in each bedroom.
Henry, as he lay on his back, with the book he was reading left
to one side, his own lamp still switched on and shining, closed
his eyes and envisioned his guest now, naked in lamplight, his body
powerful and perfect, his skin smooth and soft to the touch, the
floorboards creaking under him as, having inspected himself in the
mirror one more time, he got into his night attire and crossed the
room to fetch his book perhaps, and returned to the bed. Then
there was silence. Henry could only hear his own breathing.
He waited, not moving. Andersen, he thought, must be in bed.
He wondered if he were lying in the dark, or if he had continued
reading. He heard the sound of a cough or a clearing of his
throat, but nothing else. He took up the book and found his
place and resumed reading, concentrating as hard as he could on
the words, turning the page in the silence which had now descended
on Lamb House."
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