Stephanie Barron - Jane and the Canterbury Tale

Mr. Thane, offering a tribute of flowers to a lady, the morning after a ball. The Regency Buck was up to every trick, and should never be backwards in any attention—my dear Fanny’s head was certain to be turned. She could not leave off admiring her flowers, though a nuncheon had been thoughtfully laid out upon a sideboard: sliced apples, a large cheese, cold ham and tongue, and a platter of sausages with the special mustard for which Mrs. Driver is famous.

Of the gentlemen, my nephew George, Jupiter Finch-Hatton, and Mr. Lushington—I had forgot to mention Mr. Lushington, but shall explain him presently—were to be seen; the rest of the shooting-party, Fanny informed me, were hanging over Mr. James Wildman as he attempted to craft his delicate missive to his cousin Adelaide.

“Tho’ ten to one they are merely disturbing his train of thought, and causing him to blot his copy,” Finch-Hatton observed with a yawn. “I declined to make another of such a great passel of boobies.”

“Mr. Plumptre might be of signal assistance,” Fanny retorted, her eyes flashing, “for he is a very learned young man, I believe, and devotes considerable hours to questions of philosophy.”

“—Sure to drive poor Mrs. MacCallister into strong hysterics, then,” Finch-Hatton rejoined, “and make a vile situation entirely desperate. Plumptre was never such a dead bore when he was living in Kent—I declare that Oxford has much to answer for, when unexceptionable young men are turned prosy and prudish, and all from reading too much in books. Ought to be outlawed, in my opinion.”

Mr. Lushington burst out in laughter at this sally, and speared a sausage with a convenient knife. “Good God, George,” he said—meaning Mr. Finch-Hatton, not my young nephew; there are no less than four Georges at Godmersham at present. “A few more books might render your conversation bearable—to me as well as to the ladies. Any more of it, I warn you, and I’ll pack you off to Oxford myself—tho’ you are several years past your scholarly prime.”

Mr. Stephen Rumbold Lushington is an excellent man, all smiling, wide teeth, and good address; he is our Member of Parliament for Canterbury, and is, I daresay, ambitious and insincere—your short men often are—but he speaks so well of Milton, when he has a volume of the master in his hands, that I am a little in love with him, despite his being a year younger than myself and already married these fifteen years at least. And why is Mr. Lushington staying the night at Godmersham, one may ask? Because in this house there is a constant succession of small events; somebody is always going or coming. The world entire walks in and out of my brother Edward’s doors and heartily consents to remain for dinner. Mr. Lushington, besides being our MP, is also Manager of the Lodge Hounds; he came to talk of fox hunting with young Edward, and shall be leaving us one day or another. I shall make good use of him before he goes, however, for I mean to get a frank for my letter to Cassandra—if ever I find a moment to sit down and write it [3] Members of Parliament and peers were permitted to affix their signatures or seals to letters, allowing them to be delivered free of charge—a practice known as “franking.” Otherwise, Cassandra would have paid the fee for Jane’s letter, according to its weight, upon receiving it from the post. — Editor’s note . .

“Is it true, Aunt, that the dead pilgrim is really Curzon Fiske?” George demanded breathlessly. He was, after all, but seventeen—and tho’ much inclined to ape Jupiter’s affectations, and in awe of Mr. Lushington, he could not mask avidity with studied indifference.

“So it would seem. Your father, I am sure, shall tell you all about it.”

“Dashed smoky affair,” Mr. Lushington remarked briskly. “But Mr. Knight shall sort it all out for the rest of us, I am sure.”

“Were you at all acquainted with Mr. Fiske in former years, sir?” I asked.

He appeared to hesitate, tho’ perhaps he was merely digesting his sausage. “I suppose I knew him a little, but very long ago, I’m afraid. You could have knocked me over with a feather when I learnt he had been found but a stone’s throw from this door—and dead yet again !”

“Poor Mrs. MacCallister,” murmured Fanny in my ear. “To think that she was married to the Captain in all innocence—and that the union is now thrown under a cloud! How unkind is Fate! I have been turning it over in my mind all morning—and am so troubled in spirit I declare I have not been able to swallow a mouthful! Every feeling revolts at the sight of food , when such tragedy oppresses the soul!”

“Then I am certain I possess not the slightest sensibility at all,” I told her mildly, “for I have never sat down to breakfast—and am utterly famished! I shall certainly carve myself a slice of ham, and perhaps some cheese, and if Mrs. Driver can discover one of Cook’s apple tarts hiding in the larder, I may be so bold as to request a slice, with a strong pot of tea. If events continue as they have begun, my dear Fanny, we are all of us likely to miss dinner, as well—so pray force yourself to whatever you find least disgusting, lest you faint dead away upon a sopha.”

“The sausages are excellent,” Mr. Lushington observed.

“Made of pheasant,” Jupiter Finch-Hatton added with a roguish look, “tho’ not the ones we bagged this morning.”

“Pheasant,” Fanny whispered with revulsion, the circumstances of Mr. Fiske’s discovery no doubt rising in her mind. “How can you speak so, Mr. Finch-Hatton, when a man lies dead but one floor below?”

“Now, don’t go all missish on me, Fanny.” He pierced a slice of apple with an idle fork, and offered it to her with a bow. “Man’s been dead for years, after all—or as good as.”

“But only consider of the anxieties that must attend this dreadful news among all those who remain at Chilham Castle,” she returned in a trembling accent. “Mrs. Thane, for instance, and … and … young Mr. Thane, both of whom must feel so deeply for Mrs. MacCallister in the present case—do you not think, Aunt, that it is our duty to accompany Mr. Wildman when he returns home, to condole with all his relations? We might be able to assure them, from our hearts, that every proper observance is being accorded to the unfortunate Mr. Fiske’s remains.”

As I wished very much to observe the effect of the unfortunate Mr. Fiske’s second death upon those most nearly related to him, I was on the point of adopting Fanny’s scheme; but I required rather more of the late gentleman’s history first.

“My dear girl,” I suggested, “you are looking decidedly unwell. Let us send the gentlemen back to their billiards, until such time as the coroner is able to hear their story of the morning’s events—while you and I repair to your boudoir. We might have our tea and apple tart brought up at once, and consume them there in peace.”

“I assure you, I could not swallow a mouthful!”

“Fanny, I should like to have a word with you in private.”

As one of my speaking looks attended these words, her indignant expression faded. “Very well, Aunt. I do admit to wanting my tea.” She ignored Mr. Finch-Hatton’s speared apple, sweeping by that cosseted gentleman with a scornful look that quite astonished him. “George, do pray challenge Mr. Finch-Hatton and Mr. Lushington to a game—and mind,” she added in a lowered tone as she passed her brother, “that you trounce Jupiter soundly.”

“Now,” I said once we were settled by a brisk fire in the comfortable sitting room Edward had made over for his eldest daughter’s comfort, and which had been freshened with paint and hung with gaily-flowered paper during her absence that summer, “tell me everything you know of Curzon Fiske and Adelaide Thane.”