Stephanie Barron: Jane and the Canterbury Tale

Wednesday, 20 October 1813

Godmersham Park, Kent

“Ah, Miss Austen,” cried Mr. Richard Tylden as he offered me a glass of claret this evening—most welcome, as the day had been exceedingly wet, and the crush of persons in the ballroom at Chilham Castle so great as to entirely prevent me approaching the fire—“It has been an age since we met! And yet you appear to greater advantage than ever, if I may permit myself to offer so bold a compliment. That gown is excessively becoming. A shade exactly suited to a lady of your colouring.”

As the gown was new, and a source of inordinate pride—the very kick of fashion and purchased at breathless expence only six months before in Brighton—I blushed like a schoolgirl. “You flatter me, Mr. Tylden.”

“Indeed I do not!” he insisted, and raised his glass in salute. “To marriages made in Heaven,” he intoned, “and acquaintance renewed, after far too long a lapse.”

I had no intention of flirting with the poor man, who is already long since married and devoted to his country church; but I condescended to beam at him before taking a sip of wine. I could not help but be pleased with my situation—having come into Kent with my brother Edward’s entire family party in September, I had endured a headlong whirl of gaiety ever since, and tho’ excessively fatiguing, the change from the quieter pleasures of the Hampshire countryside had undoubtedly done me good. I might revisit all those treasured scenes of happier days, when Edward’s beloved Elizabeth reigned at his beautiful Godmersham Park; serve as counselor to my niece Fanny, who was caught in all the toils of young womanhood; and appear as boon companion to the affected and rather silly spinster charged with the governance of Edward’s madcap younger daughters. In the midst of which, naturally, I snatched the odd hour to jot my immortal phrases into the little books I sew up from bits of foolscap. They have a distinct advantage, in being no larger than the span of a pocket in a lady’s gown—into which mine are frequently slipped, when an unwanted visitor shatters the solitude of Edward’s great library.

There is nothing like a sojourn in the environs of Canterbury, indeed, for the refreshment and further education of a novelist—albeit a secret one, like myself. Everyone is rich here, and each has his peculiar story to tell. I think I could spend my whole life in Kent, collecting my characters and assembling my comic situations; and as I am presently at work on the story of a wealthy and indulged young lady by the name of Emma Woodhouse, who orders the existence of everybody about her exactly to her liking, much as my niece Fanny does—I could not be better placed. A wedding-party at Chilham Castle, for example, with all the elegance of Edward’s Kentish neighbours, must provide endless food for the writer’s imagination. Add to its recommendations, that it is the perfect occasion for the parading of my beloved wine-coloured silk—and you will understand a little of my inner exultation.

No matter if Mr. Tylden were sparse of hair and stooped of shoulder; I knew myself to be in excellent looks, and must be gratified that someone, and a male someone at that, had admired my prize on its first wearing.

“It has been some time since you were come into Kent, I think?” Mr. Tylden persisted.

“Four years, at least.”

“So long! I shall have to dispute the question of hospitality with your esteemed brother, Miss Austen—I certainly shall! I wonder you know your nieces and nephews again, after so long a lapse!”

“But you forget, sir—my brother has lately been staying with all his family on his Hampshire estate, in the village where I myself reside, so that our intercourse has been a matter of daily occurrence.”

“Just so. Nearly half the year they were gone to Chawton, and a refurbishment of Godmersham Park undertaken, I collect, during Mr. Knight’s absence. We were excessively glad to have the whole party back again.”

I frowned a little at the use of Edward’s adoptive name, tho’ it is hardly the first time I have heard it since coming into Kent. My brother must leave off the name of Austen, now that his patroness, our distant cousin Mrs. Knight, has passed from this world. In acceding to his full inheritance, Edward and all his progeny must be Knights forevermore; the Will so stipulates it. Mr. Tylden has accepted the change with more aplomb than myself; he did not stumble over his address, as I am forever doing, when some Kentish neighbour hails Edward unawares.

“And there are the fortunate couple now,” Mr. Tylden observed, setting down his glass with a benevolent look, as befit a man who had united Captain Andrew MacCallister with Adelaide Fiske. The two had just entered the ballroom, followed by our host, Mr. James Wildman, the bride’s cousin; and were receiving congratulations from every side.

“And you truly regard theirs as a marriage made in Heaven?” I enquired idly.

“Who could not? So much gallantry on the gentleman’s side, and so much beauty on the lady’s!”

These observations were certainly apt; and if nothing more than gallantry and beauty were required for conjugal happiness, the MacCallisters bid fair to enjoy a halcyon future. The Captain is a man of thirty, battle-hardened and a coming fellow—attached to the Marquis of Wellington’s staff, no less. Some six years his junior, Adelaide Fiske is just that sort of tall, raven-haired beauty possessed of speaking dark eyes, that must turn every head upon entering a room. She possesses the carriage of a duchess and a figure that should make a courtesan wild with envy—tho’ I may not utter that judgement aloud in present company; only my brother Henry should know how to appreciate it, and he is in London at present. Adelaide Fiske’s life to date, however—but it would be as well to dwell as little as possible on the lady’s sad career. The history of Adelaide’s first marriage and widowhood are all to be forgot, now that she is once more a bride; and I should do well to heed Mr. Tylden’s better angels, in wishing the pair nothing but good fortune—and leaving off the name Fiske for the MacCallister she has vowed to cherish until death.

It is unbecoming in a spinster to dwell upon the ominous at a wedding feast; it smacks of disappointment.

“Ah, they are to dance!” Mr. Tylden cried in appreciation. “Only look how well they appear together!”

And it was true, of course. MacCallister swept his wife into the daring strains of a waltz, his dress uniform a blaze of colour against her pale blue gown. His hair might be of a fiery carrot hue and his features nothing out of the ordinary way, but his shoulders were good; and his countenance was suffused with adoration as he gazed at his wife, so that it seemed almost indecent to observe them. Here was the true article: love deep and encompassing, not the pale social convention that too-often passes for it. I read triumph in the soldier’s look, and guessed he had worked long to win his prize. In the lady’s countenance there was greater reserve; she had long ago learnt to meet the publick eye with composure. Scandal is a hard school for young ladies gently bred.