Page 44 of The Missing Pages
Violet discovered A. Edward Newton’s tribute to him, in the September 1918 edition ofThe Atlantic. The author, a former friend and classmate, shared that Harry had once shown him one of his beloved treasures—a copy ofCowper’s Taskthat previously belonged to W.M. Thackeray. The acclaimed novelist had written on the dedication page, “A great point in a great man, a great love for his mother. A very fine and true portrait. Could an artist possibly choose a better position than the above?”
According to his friend, Harry pointed out the dedication and said, “Isn’t that a lovely sentiment? And yet they say Thackeray was acynicand asnob.”
No one, certainly anyone who had done any digging about Harry or Eleanor Elkins Widener, would deny that the mother and son were close. After all, she’d created a Taj Mahal–like memorial to her beloved son after his death, ensuring his name was forever associated with books. But was there ever anyone else who owned Harry’s heart?
As Violet pushed open the heavy wooden door, the maple-scented fall air flooded through her nostrils, invigorating her. She would not tell her suitemates about what had just happened in the Memorial Room. They’d think she was crazy, maybe even report her to Health Services out of genuine concern. She needed to figure out on her own a way to ask Harry more questions and see whether he communicated back.
As she entered the quad, she noticed Theo walking in the quad holding an elaborately carved pumpkin. He must have seen her, too, as he called out to her as she approached the main gates.
“Vi!” he hollered.
She stopped and waited for him to come closer.
“Hey,” he said. “I thought that was you.”
“Are you delivering jack-o’-lanterns?” she asked, pointing to the pumpkin in arms.
He laughed. “Oh this? Well, I was put in charge of ‘spookin’ out’ the house,” he said. “We’re having a Halloween party at the Owl on Friday night. You should stop by.”
Violet offered a weak smile. She wasn’t sure she had it in her to attend another party at the Owl.
“Come on,” he nudged. “It’s a costume party. It’ll be fun. Your suitemates will all be there.”
“I appreciate the invitation. I really do. It’s just hard.”
“Promise, you’ll think about it?” He smiled and lifted the pumpkin in her direction. “I’d hate for all my carving to go to waste.”
Had she not run into Theo, Violet would have forgotten completely that Halloween was just two days away. True, the shops in Harvard Square had been outfitted in goblins and witches for weeks now, but the orange and black seasonal trimmings had quickly grown tired. Soon they’d be putting up cardboard turkeys and pilgrim hats, and Thanksgiving would mean it was time to venture home again for a few days, where she’d sit at the table with her parents and try to pretend she had recovered from Hugo’s death and was their happy daughter once again.
It was strange to think that only last year, she and Hugo had been huddled up in his dorm room, his arms wrapped around her, and theywere musing on who they should dress up as for the Owl’s annual Halloween fest. Violet had suggested Lucille Ball and Desi Arnez, thinking her red hair and his thick black curls already made up half the costume needed. She was sure she could find a polka-dotted dress in the Salvation Army thrift store.
“Maybe it’s too on the nose,” Hugo said, stroking the inner part of her arm. “We can do better.”
“I’m just not going as a French maid, or Catwoman to your Batman, okay?” she teased and nuzzled deeper into his chest.
He knew she was more the girl next door than the femme fatale. “I got sidetracked with the red hair thing. It’s just one less thing to have to buy for a costume.”
He laughed. “Well, let’s work with that.” Hugo glanced at his bookshelf. The Dante Rossetti poetry book she’d given him for their first anniversary was right next to his poli-sci textbook.
“I always call you my Elizabeth Siddal.”
She smiled. They could go as Rossetti and Siddal. She was the poet’s muse and his beloved. It would be perfect.
“Oh my god, that’s brilliant,” she said. “And it’s sous.”
“Yes. No one else could be them but us.”
“Probably best to accentuate the painter side of Rossetti, rather than the poet. It gives us more to work with.” Violet was already dreaming of how they could pull this pairing off. She could so easily imagine Hugo with his tousled dark Byronian curls, a white artist’s smock with maybe some paint blotches on it for good measure, and an oil brush tucked into the side pocket. She couldn’t picture him carrying a palette and brush around throughout the party, though. It would be gone within minutes, replaced with a red Solo cup of beer as soon as his teammates greeted him at the door.
“And you could dress like Siddal in one of his portraits of her,” he said.
“Yes.” A half-dozen images quickly came to mind.
In the end, she chose the portrait that Rossetti had done of Siddal in his 1869 painting,Bocca Baciata.Violet had teased out her auburn hair and parted it down the middle, clipping a gold-colored comb on one side and a white silk flower on the other. She’d found a bottle green robe at the thrift store and accented it with a vermeil necklace. Unlike Hugo, she didn’t need both of her hands free at the party, so she was happy to carry the pomegranate around all night, to make it seem like she’d just been lifted off Rossetti’s canvas.
It was strange to think back now that Hugo had mentioned later on that evening that it was too bad the famous portrait Siddal had posed for depicting a drowned Ophelia floating in a stream of water, one hand clutching a nosegay of brightly colored flowers, had not been painted by Rossetti but instead by his friend, John Everett Millais. “You would have been gorgeous as Ophelia tonight,” he said.
But now Violet cringed thinking about the image of the tragic girl drowned in the water. The foreshadowing of one of them lost to water was impossible to bear.
