Page 106 of A Thousand Painted Hours

I applied myself instead to getting the rest of them ready to move. I’d asked Nina if I might bring a group of them over, and arranged forMrs. Cotton to come sit with Mother. I hadn’t seen Peter for a few days, which had been a surprise since the raids had been less problematic.

But who knew what intelligence swirled at headquarters? The raids were visible to ordinary people, but they were only the tip of the war machine.

I felt an odd urgency as I gathered the paintings I’d already removed from their stretchers and began layering them, paint side up, with sheets I’d cut for the purpose between each layer. I had already moved the most financially valuable paintings to Helen’s, and these were in a different tier—works I loved that had not necessarily appealed to collectors, some of the experimental landscapes I’d painted in Cairo and then India; more interiors, quiet moments within a woman’s world. Finally, I brought out the Tanveer portraits, from youth to full manhood, Tanveer bent over books by the fire at Herewich, as a maharaja in his black coat, Channan at his side. The formal portraits I’d left with them, but I’d brought one back for myself, too.

When I was finished, I rolled the lot into bundles and tied them with string. They were heavy and unwieldy, but not unmanageable. I loaded them in the Austin, then went back up to the attic.

I’d dithered about my sketchbooks. They were not in the least valuable to anyone but me. But it would grieve me to lose them nonetheless. Resisting the urge to flip through them, I loaded stacks of them into cardboard boxes I’d collected from the grocer, focusing on periods of great productivity or growth—living at Herewich in the last year of the war, the vivid painting experiments in Cairo, living in Talwarpur Palace in India, and earlier, at Slade, when I’d been so desperately trying to find my voice. I had five boxes, and when they were filled, I left the years that would not fit on the table, neatly, each with a note on the spine,GreylakeorInteriors, 1932. I would have to stop and ask for more boxes on my way back home.

Going up and down the stairs several times, I loaded the sketchbooks in the boot, and was on the way back up for the last one when I had to sit down in dizziness halfway between the first floor and thesecond, where my mother slept. It was dark because I hadn’t opened the blackout curtains, a task Betty had ordinarily performed. Even in the dimness, I could see dust on the balusters, thick enough they’d collected long bits of hair. How long since anyone had dusted? I didn’t know. The thought of another task winded me.

As if he sat right beside me, I heard Tanveer’s voice.You must take care of yourself. You must endure.

Right. I touched my empty belly, tried to remember what I’d eaten the night before. I’d had little energy left over to be creative with our rations, and had been eating mainly potatoes I dug from the garden, bread with whatever bacon or other meat we had week to week, a little cheese. And eggs. Always eggs. A blessing, even if I’d never much cared for them. Most of the food I tried to fashion into things mother would eat—broths and easy, soft foods that did little to entice my appetite.

Foolish. If I meant to survive this war, I had to care for the body that carried me. When the dizziness passed, I headed to the kitchen and made a cup of tea with a full teaspoon of sugar and plenty of milk, then made a porridge of oatmeal and milk, and topped it with a small spoonful of jam.

I intended to survive. I ate the meal. I drank the tea.

Nina’s yardman, Hugh, a spindly old man with arms that belied his age, helped me bring the paintings and boxes into the house, and then down into the cellar. Once they were settled, Nina and I drank tea and ate some little cakes that hardly seemed as if they’d been made with fakery. “Sassy is a genius with substitutions,” I said. “She should submit this recipe toThe Kitchen Fronton the radio.”

“She should, indeed. Have you found a new housekeeper?”

“Peter was meant to be looking among the refugees, but I haven’t heard anything from him.”

“Mmm.”

I looked up. “What is it? Has he done something again?”

“I don’t honestly know, Elsie. Jonathan has been awfully out of sorts with him, but, of course, all the secrecy means he can hardly say a word.”

“Drinking, is it?”

“Perhaps.” She shrugged, shaking her head. “He had seemed better, hadn’t he?”

“Yes. Much better, almost as solid as after he returned from Kabul.”

“But?”

“I haven’t seen him in a couple of days. I noticed this morning only because the raids have been somewhat quiet, and I supposed he might come home to sleep and shower instead of staying at headquarters.”

Again, a little information flitted over her mouth.

“You would be a terrible spy,” I said. “Out with it. You know I have no attachment. Is it that girl, Trudy?”

She nodded. “From all accounts, it’s quite torrid.”

I’d been certain of this outcome from the moment I’d seen her. “Exactly his type,” I said.

“I think his type is beautiful,” Nina said with a roll of her eyes. “He’s always loved to worship from afar, like women are all the lost fairy queen he can’t quite attain.”

“Lost, yes,” I added. That had been the piece I hadn’t quite seen in Cairo. Margo had been a widow mourning her husband when she and Peter met.

“His womanizing is a surprise,” she said. “As a youth, he was so ... earnest. Do you remember?”

“Of course.”

“He fell for you that very first day, and never gave up, did he?”