‘But you’re holding me back!’ Robin cuts him off. There’s a startled pause, the sound of more pacing feet. ‘Albert … I can only think that you are the reason I haven’t been able to see the elementals yet. You are not adept, and your inner vibrations are discordant to them! Without the ability to tune yourself to their energetic frequency, you make yourself intolerable to them!’
‘But … but … it was I who first saw the elementals, Robin … It was I who saw them first!’
‘They chose to reveal themselves to you, it’s true … And you are not without potential, I’ve told you. But there simply isn’t time to wait while you reach a fine enough level of attunement. I must continue without you for now, my friend,’ the theosophist says. There is a long, uneasy pause and when he speaks again, Robin’s voice is low. ‘Have you considered that perhaps they reached into your thoughts that morning and found me there – your memories of me from my lecture? Have you wondered whether, by revealing themselves to you, they were in fact calling out to me?’ Robin demands, and much of the fury has burnt out of his voice, leaving something stony and cold in its ashes. The vicar is silent for a long time.
‘You no longer want my help?’ he asks at last, and Cat frowns. His tone is like a child’s, near heartbroken.
‘No. Not on my summonings out in the meadows.’
‘Perhaps, as with any wild thing, there is a trust to be built up before communion may take place …’ Albert ventures.
‘If I am to have a chance of capturing an elemental in a photograph, it will take all of my inner faculties, and I can’t have you upsetting the balance … But continue with your studies, Albert. Ask me whatever you like, and I will teach you what I can,’ Robin says, more gently now. ‘You are only at the beginning of the long road to enlightenment, but you have taken your first steps – the first and most vital steps! Don’t lose heart. Soon, when I have proof, you will be a part of the greatest revolution in civilised thought for a generation!’
‘You’re sure you will succeed, then? Where none have before?’ Albert asks.
‘I will succeed,’ Robin replies, and his conviction is like steel in his voice. Suddenly uneasy, Cat slips from the corridor down to the kitchen, where she can be sure they will not follow.
*
Friday morning is hot as soon as the sun clears the horizon. Hester sits at her dressing table and starts to pin up her hair, feeling how damp it is close to her scalp. Albert is long gone from the room. She isn’t even sure, looking at the smooth rise of his pillow, that he came to bed at all. But she herself has been so restless in the night, and made such a knot of the sheets, it is hard to tell. She gazes at the pristine pillow, so bright where the sun lights it that it’s almost painful to look at. Her thoughts turn to the theosophist’s words, the many, many words he has spoken since his arrival; most of them to Albert. Words like drops of rain, falling from his lips. Albert seems to absorb them all like dry ground. She sees it on his face – that little frown of distraction, the way his eyes sink out of focus. Lately it seems that she doesn’t see Albert unless she sees Robin Durrant as well. The theosophist is always right beside him. Or perhaps it is Albert who is always right beside Robin. Hester sighs.
As she pats cold cream into the corners of her eyes, she begins to compose a letter to Amelia in her head. I wouldn’t mind as much if I had some idea of how long he might intend to stay … she drafted. Bertie’s stipend is as modest as ever it was. Modest enough to prohibit the telephone I would love to install. And yet we can apparently support this young man for as many months as it will take him to finish his project! How she would love to hear her sister’s voice. But even if they’d had the funds, Albert would probably still refuse her a telephone – his mistrust of modernity growing ever stronger. I think if he could he would ban motor cars, dismantle all the trains and roll up the track! Thank heavens he can see the merits of electric lights, at least. But now it sounds like she is criticising Albert as well as their house guest, and, suddenly feeling like a sulky wife and a graceless hostess, Hester discards the imagined letter. The bedroom is suddenly too quiet, too still. Hester feels desperate to talk to somebody.
Down in the parlour, she finds Albert sitting behind the morning paper, a dejected expression on his face. The theosophist, for once, is nowhere in sight. Hester stoops to kiss Albert’s cheek.
‘Good morning, my love. How are you?’ she says.
‘I am quite well, Hetty. Quite well,’ Albert replies, distractedly. Hester’s smile fades.