What Alice Knew: A Most Curious Tale of Henry James and Jack the Ripper

Chapter 34

I don’t think you should go through with this,” said William, as he, Alice, and Henry sat together in her bedroom. She had, he saw to his consternation, already gone to some trouble to prepare for Sickert’s visit. She had had Sally purchase her a new cap, and she had changed the coverlet on her bed to the lace one that had belonged to their mother and that she generally kept in storage. She had also made Archie move the armoire so that there would be room for Sickert’s easel and paints.

The idea that she was looking forward to the visit upset William considerably. Ella Abrams had succumbed, and now his sister, of all people, was showing herself to be susceptible. What was it with this man Sickert, and more to the point, with the women who found him alluring?

He had tried his best to explain to Alice why Sickert’s ownership of the De Quincey volumes strongly supported his guilt, but she stubbornly refused to be convinced.

“I agree that it’s a coincidence,” she said, “but we remain unsure of so many things: whether the photograph was planted in the book and whether the owner might not simply have notated it without any intention to kill. It’s a popular essay, and someone who finds it of interest isn’t necessarily a murderer.”

“But the initials!” insisted William.

“Who’s to say that they refer to ‘pupil of Whistler’? It’s an ingenious but unsubstantiated assumption. They could mean anything. And”—she spoke with a certain knowing emphasis here—“perhaps they were put in the book before the set was given to Sickert by your young lady. We don’t know how the volume became separated from the set.”

She was making excuses on his behalf, thought William angrily; she was engaging in the sort of rationalizations one heard from an infatuated woman. As much as he might deny it, he had always found secret comfort in the fact that she had never seemed to care for men. Her friendship with Katherine had pleased him in this respect, alleviating any need to be jealous in a conventional sense. But now he was both jealous and afraid.

“I insist on being present during the sitting,” he asserted vehemently. “There’s no telling what that maniac might do alone with you in your bedroom.”

“I am quite sure he will not ravish me…unless I cooperate,” said Alice, ignoring the shocked expression on her brother’s face. “And he couldn’t possibly cut my throat. Everyone is within shouting range. Your inspector’s man will be keeping watch outside.”

“You must have Katherine with you, then,” said William, sensing that Alice’s companion was a bar of more than a physical sort to any kind of emotional entanglement.

“Katherine is off to nurse her sister in Sussex. And it is just as well. If I am to arrive at any sort of conclusion, I must see him alone.”

“We can’t condone it,” William fumed. “Can we, Henry?”

Henry, who had been sitting off to the side musing, was not prepared to agree unequivocally with his brother. “I don’t know,” he said. “Sickert seems rather a nice sort of fellow.”

William looked disgusted. “Of course he’s nice. It’s his modus operandi to be nice.” He was half in mind to tell them about the attack on his life, and then thought better of it. It would only upset Alice without necessarily convincing her of anything.

“If you insist on worrying, you can keep watch from my closet,” said Alice finally, indicating the small room off to side that contained a commode and a large washbasin that could be moved into the back hall.

It was, William concluded, not a bad idea. The space connected to the bedroom by way of a little door with slats that could be adjusted so its occupants might see what was transpiring in the next room.

“I realize that it’s not very dignified to hide in a loo,” Alice noted with amusement, “but it offers a good vantage point on the proceedings.”

William said he did not care about his dignity, and Henry, who had roused himself to become involved in the discussion, said he didn’t either. He could not think of Sickert as a murderer, but the idea of spying on him seemed an exciting prospect from which he was not about to be excluded.

“It’s too cramped for both of us,” protested William, looking at his brother with annoyance.

“I think there’s plenty of room,” countered Henry.

“Why should the two of us keep watch?”

“Because I may catch something you miss.”

There was some truth in this point, William grudgingly admitted to himself. His brother had a way of seeing things that never ceased to surprise him. There was no denying that Henry could be an astute observer, and that the nature of their respective vision was often complementary. William therefore nodded curtly in acquiescence.

They brought their chairs into the little room, arranged the slats on the door, and took their places.

“It’s moldy in here,” complained Henry, sniffling.

“Then leave.”

“I was just making an observation.”

William glared at his younger brother. “If you insist on being here, I ask only one thing: that you keep quiet!”

Sickert was late. William had begun to shift restlessly, and Henry, though he had kept his mouth shut as stipulated, was sniffling from the mold in the closet when the visitor finally made his appearance at almost four p.m.

He arrived weighed down with easel, paint box, and canvas, which he placed in the corner of the room, and then he came directly up to the bed, took Alice’s hand, and kissed it gallantly. His lateness, he explained, was because he had to wait for the canvas to be stretched. For this purpose he relied on a man who was often out on errands, yet here Sickert was, and the canvas was just as he liked.

He sat for a few moments on the edge of the bed, holding Alice’s hand and looking at her closely, as he had done at the dinner party. The brothers peered through the slats. There was hardly room for both to look at once, so there was some jostling and elbowing. Sickert’s closeness to Alice and the silence in which he gazed at her struck William as sinister, but his sister did not seem to mind. She returned his gaze, smiling.

“I was beginning to think that you had second thoughts about painting me,” she said.

“On the contrary. I have been looking forward to it all day.” He moved his head closer to hers and touched the strings of her bonnet. “But I think you should remove the cap.” With a quick stroke, he pulled the strings and unceremoniously took the cap from her head and threw it on the floor.

“It’s a new cap,” protested Alice.

“So much the worse for it. I’m not painting the cap.” He smoothed her hair with his hand, and she did not protest.

Henry elbowed William sharply to get a view through the slats, and William elbowed back, his teeth clenched in anger at the sight of Sickert with his hand on his sister’s head.

Sickert moved his hand to her cheek and held it there a moment, then got up, walked back to the easel, and stood looking at her from that vantage point. “Unclasp your hands, please,” he said. “Place them at your sides.”

She did.

“Now close your eyes.”

Alice paused. “You want to paint me as if I’m sleeping. Or dead?”

“No,” said Sickert. “I want you to relax your face. Close your eyes and then open them again.”

She did.

“You look more relaxed already.”

“I never relax,” protested Alice.

“We’ll see.”

“I am not a picturesque subject,” she added.

“I don’t care for picturesque subjects.”

Her face dropped slightly. She had expected him to say that she was picturesque.

He did not speak for a moment as he prepared his palette, and then he finally said, “I care for interesting subjects, not picturesque ones. Beauty, in the conventional sense, is not interesting.” He began to daub the canvas with paint, moving back and forth, looking at her with his bright blue eyes and then bringing his brush to the canvas in quick, sharp jabs.

William poked Henry to observe the manner in which Sickert was applying the paint.

“You do not care for beauty?” Alice asked, a touch of rancor in her voice.

“I said I do not care for conventional beauty. You are beautiful.”

“Yes, I have a beautiful soul.”

“I don’t believe in the soul,” said Sickert drily.

“Morality holds no interest for you?”

“I didn’t say that. But I have no use for conventional morality either. I follow my own morality.”

“And what does that consist of?”

He paused. “I don’t judge human desire, and I don’t deny my own.”

“But do you consider other people?”

He paused again. “Others must occasionally be sacrificed.”

“Sacrificed?”

“Inevitably, there is pain.”

Alice had grown pale and motioned to the door. “Can you call for some wine?” she said softly. “I feel a bit faint.”

Sickert put down his brush, went to the door, and called down the stairs. Almost immediately Archie appeared with a glass of wine. He handed the glass to Alice and stood waiting at the side of the bed as she took a few sips.

Sickert watched him curiously. “How old are you, young man?” he asked the boy.

“Twelve or thereabouts,” said Archie.

“You seem very attentive to this lady.”

“I does my best, sir. She been good to me.”

“And how did you come to this employment, may I ask?”

“Milady took me on after me mum died,” said the boy matter-of-factly.

“I see,” said Sickert gently. “You seem a very bright and responsible young man, if I may say so. I think your mother would be proud of you.”

The boy looked up but said nothing.

“You can go now, Archie,” Alice instructed. Her eyes lingered on Sickert as he returned to the canvas and picked up his brush. “I thought you didn’t believe in morality,” she said as he began to jab at the canvas again. “You seemed to feel for the boy.”

“Of course I feel for the boy,” said Sickert with some annoyance. “I’m not a monster or a stone.”

Alice nodded. She would have to tell Jane Cobden that her brother-in-law, despite his neglect of her sister, was kind. Watching his short encounter with Archie, her feelings had undergone a change, or rather had settled into a kind of certainty. She felt she had seen into Sickert’s character and could put aside any doubts she may have entertained about his guilt. A man who could speak with such simplicity of feeling to a child could not, she was convinced, be capable of murder.

“Tell me about your wife,” she said.

Sickert put down his brush as if contemplating how to answer. “I have great affection for her,” he said.

“But you are not faithful.” Alice completed the thought.

“I follow my inclinations.”

Inside the closet, William had become flushed with anger. The man was shameless, acknowledging his depravity so boldly. Who could doubt that he had murdered those women in the East End? He poked Henry again, to register his outrage, but his brother was not paying attention. The mold in the closet was seriously irritating his sinus cavity, and he had begun to sniffle loudly. Suddenly he sneezed, the sound reverberating beyond the closet into the adjoining room.

“I think you have a chaperone,” noted Sickert.

“He heard you,” whispered William furiously. “Go out there. Come up with an excuse.”

Henry stumbled out of the closet, taking a notebook from his pocket and nodding to Sickert. “Hello,” he said vaguely. “I was doing a little writing in the”—he motioned behind him and waved the tablet—“an enclosed space excites the imagination, you know.” He sneezed again. “But it’s moldy.”

Sickert laughed and offered his handkerchief, which Henry pressed gratefully to his nose. It was of fine cambric and smelled faintly of lavender.