Insult provoked Una. She again belittled John’s new book, told her it was as worthless as Emblem Hurlstone and that Ladye would flood her with the real book when the time was right. John cried at such discouragement. By damning her writing and her love of Evguenia, it was as if Una was draining her of life.
Because of visa restrictions, Evguenia went ahead to Paris on 24 October. John and Una followed with a Nurse Bright. There were gales on the Channel and the Golden Arrow was delayed. Mary the dog got bitten by an Alsatian. At the Gare du Nord, Una and the nurse could not get John and her wheelchair off the train. John had lost strength in her undamaged leg and seemed in a state of collapse. A porter said they would all end up in a siding.
In Paris Dr Fuller said John was nervously exhausted and Una in a hysterical state. They could not get four adjacent sleeping berths on the train for Italy until 10 November. John worried that the weather was too cold for Evguenia. In Florence they all booked in at the Hotel Gran Bretagne. Evguenia kept to her room, studied after breakfast and went to bed at eight-thirty in the evenings. Una beat on her door and told her she was neglecting John. Evguenia felt she wanted to scream.
She found a flat for herself in the via dei Benci. It was on two floors of the Palazzo dei Fossi and had several small rooms and a blaze of sun. John began walking with difficulty and with the aid of two sticks. She had no enthusiasm for moving with Una to their flat at 18 Lungarno Acciaiuoli. Una was energetic at furnishing it. John’s only interest was in Evguenia’s place. She could not bring herself to speak to Una and recoiled if Una touched her. ‘She denigrates and ignores me and tells Evguenia how wonderfully she gives medicine or plumps a pillow.’ John implored Una to be nicer to Evguenia. ‘Whatever she is she is as she is and good or bad I need her.’
They all had stuffed turkey for Christmas and their usual prayers. On New Year’s Eve Evguenia took offence at Una’s insults and flounced out back to her flat. John asked Una to phone and persuade her to return. When Una complied, she thanked her for being so generous.
34
Never mind Una
John’s inability to choose between Una and Evguenia seemed like manipulation. She was omnipotent but dependent as a child. She bought two bullfinches, one for Una, one for Evguenia. She called them Caterina and Bambino and put them in a cage. When they started pecking each other to death she separated them.
For a while in Florence it seemed as if compromise was achieved. Evguenia studied Italian, art and typing, liked her flat and invited students back to it. Una sniped. ‘Of course this “study” is all balderdash and will lead to nothing ever.’ But it was from a distance and Evguenia was spared her perpetual presence. And John no longer insisted that she share her every waking hour.
Una had a perfect apartment in her favourite city. She decorated it as a showcase of status. If not quite a home with John it was a triumphalist snook at Evguenia. John assured her she would never leave her but she asked her nastily if she intended wearing sandals until she was seventy, and when she wanted her shoulders massaged told her to get Maria to do it. Una thought of all John did so eagerly for Evguenia, even frictioning her hair to make it grow.
John divided her time between them. But keeping them separate was not what she wanted. She could not abide by it. This was her family and she thought it ought be united. She cried when Evguenia had a cold and refused to come to Lungarno Acciaiuoli to be looked after. She wanted her to work as her secretary, ‘that way you would have earned your £300 a year and I would have been spared hearing that you want your own money. You are mistaken if you think that Una would have opposed your working as my secretary. Only of course you would have had to let her help you a bit to get into the work and this I suppose you would not have liked.’
The American publisher Covici-Friede invited John to write her autobiography. At first Una encouraged this to divert her from The Shoemaker of Merano. She typed twenty pages of Forebears and Infancy, but then went off this idea too. She feared revelations about women whom John had loved and wanted none of it aired. She told her to ‘write the thing privately for eventual publication after we are all gone’. John protested that the Merano book contained her best style and writing and she wanted to dedicate it to Evguenia. Una objected with corrosive persistence: it was not a true idea, it lacked inspiration, John would make no progress while Evguenia was in her life.
Every task except writing to Evguenia is a burden. She does not answer letters to the public. She does nothing about her translations or reprints. All her ideas vanish into thin air. All is dead sea fruit. God only knows when the phoenix of her talent will rise again from the ashes of the ruin. Art is a jealous goddess and does not admit of a divided allegiance.
Una and Art went hand in hand. She described herself as fostering John’s talent ‘with night and day care and solicitude’. It was only elements of this talent she
