Page 40 of The Extraordinary Florence Stoker

My figure may have returned, but the skin that had once been taut over a baby bulge remained a bit loose, and I still burned whenever I used the privy or washed myself. I took to ensuring I was always garbed before Bram – a nightgown, a shift, a petticoat. If he was uninterested in seeing me naked before, I didn’t want him to see me now. Not that he would. Since I fell pregnant, Bram had made no attempt to have conjugal relations. We shared the drawing room, but our beds and bodies were our own.

While I was grateful for his lack of interest in sex (it was the last thing on my mind), a man had needs, and I began to wonder if Bram kept a mistress to ensure his were met. After all, women loved Bram and he in turn was very fond of them – look at Mrs Daw and Emma, Genevieve Ward, the other actresses at the Lyceum; their faces lit up when he was around, their eyes followed him everywhere and they looked for any excuse to engage him. Why, even Lucy Gilbert sang his praises. I supposed I should be jealous that he attracted such attention. I wasn’t, but I was curious. When I mentioned it to Ellen one afternoon, phrasing it in a cavalier fashion as though the thought wasn’t beginning to preoccupy me, she threw back her head and laughed.

‘Why would Bram need a mistress when he’s the envy of every man who meets you? Good God, Lemon! Don’t be a doddypoll. Bram works too hard to keep anyone else, let alone a secret woman.’ She shook her head in disbelief. ‘How he even had time to make a child defeats me. Henry runs him ragged. When would he see a mistress?’

Nevertheless, I wondered. What did Bram do to satisfy his urges? Did he touch himself? (I blushed just thinking about it, at the same time recalling the way he would tug at himself, cure his lobcock, when we’d had relations.)

It was partly why, despite mounting bills from my endless shopping (as Matilda put it), I’d cast aside all concerns about the cost of the dress I’d had made for the celebration of The Merchant of Venice’s one hundredth show. This event was important to Bram and, as it was my first public appearance since the babbie’s birth, it was important to me.

Gilbert and I waited our turn to check the seating plan and then joined the multitudes. I recognised the Dickens family, Charles’s widow looking resplendent in a silver fur stole, her son and his wife less impressive. Gilbert’s business partner, Arthur Sullivan, waved, as did Ellen, who was surrounded by admirers. She looked glorious in magenta.

I didn’t see Henry Irving, who, like most of the men, was dressed in a black evening suit, until everyone had finally taken their seats. Seated next to Baroness Burdett-Coutts, who’d returned from Paris just to attend, Henry encircled himself with politicians, artists, playwrights and Bram’s writer-friend, Hall Caine, who hailed from the Isle of Man but was now lodging with our neighbour, the charming but infirm artist Dante Gabriel Rossetti.

‘There are so many famous people here,’ I whispered to Gilbert, trying not to stare too hard.

‘When everybody is somebody,’ said Gilbert dismissively, ‘nobody is anybody.’

‘What does that make me?’ I asked, mouth twitching.

Gilbert regarded me seriously. ‘Somebody anybody would be proud to accompany.’

I laughed delightedly and kissed his bearded cheek.

I smiled greetings at those I recognised as waiters poured drinks, my ear tuned to the conversations around me. Bram had organised the Lyceum caterers to prepare a seven-course banquet. I’d virtually starved myself in preparation.

I was studying the gorgeously designed menus, done in a Japanese style, adorned with images of kingfishers, butterflies and emerald fronds, when I became aware that someone was watching me.

‘Why, if it isn’t the most beautiful mother in the world,’ said an unctuous voice. The American artist James Whistler wrapped a sweaty palm over my bare shoulder.

I lifted his hand away. ‘It’s just as well your dear mother is no longer alive to hear you say that, Mr Whistler. Wasn’t that the title you bestowed upon her?’

Gilbert spluttered.

Mr Whistler waved a dismissive hand, as if I hadn’t spoken. ‘When are you going to sit for me?’

‘So long as it’s not on your lap, as you suggested last time we met, then, maybe one day …’ I picked up my drink.

‘I … err … Till then,’ Mr Whistler stammered before pretending to acknowledge someone else and walking away.

‘Marvellous artist,’ I said casually to those listening. ‘What a pity he can’t paint himself in a better light.’

Gilbert guffawed. Two women opposite raised their drinks in my direction, bestowing broad smiles, the men nodding approvingly. The gentleman next to me twisted in his seat.

‘I must know the name of the woman who finally put Whistler in his place,’ he began.

‘This is Mrs Bram Stoker,’ said Gilbert proudly. ‘Florence, allow me to introduce Arthur Balfour.’

Ah, the conservative politician. A man to be watched, according to George.

Suddenly, everyone around us wanted an introduction – not to Mr Balfour, but me, including a publisher, Edward Marston, who proved most gregarious. I was about to mention Bram’s literary aspirations when Bram rose from his chair and, banging a knife on his glass, called for silence.

Before he could begin, there was a commotion at the back of the theatre. People swung around, some half-rising, craning their necks to see what the disturbance was.

It was a man in a dark, flowing cape, carrying a top hat. Whoever it was paused dramatically halfway down the central aisle, directly beneath the lights.

‘Why, it’s Oscar Wilde!’ declared someone.

My heart flung itself against my ribs. Ice, then heat, filled my chest. It couldn’t be, could it?