Stephanie Barron - Jane and the Madness of Lord Byron

I glanced about the elegant little drawing-room: the Earl was tossing the bones with Hodge and the Bow Street Runner; Lady Swithin was tuning the strings of the violinist’s instrument; and my brother was once more trading pleasant nothings with Mr. Scrope Davies, who appeared to have recovered from the head-ache. Our host was remarkably pallid, however; sweat stood out on his brow; and he determinedly avoided glancing in his friend Byron’s direction. All was not perfect cordiality between the two, I supposed; tho’ Byron should probably fail to observe it.

“My lord,” I said, “that child’s body was wrapped in a hammock taken from your yacht. It was placed in the bedchamber thought to be yours. If we regard as credible your assertion that you did not drown her—”

He bared his teeth and I was reminded, inevitably, of the wolf. “The coroner has proclaimed it!”

“—then someone has gone to great lengths to see you hang. Who hates you so much?”

He drained his bottle to the dregs. “The better part of England, my poor darling.”

The voice was a caress I forced myself to ignore.“That will not do. You must confine yourself to those who hate you, and knew of your passion for Miss Twining. A much more select gathering, I’ll be bound.”

His eyes roved over my form, as tho’ my gown were transparent, and I revealed in all my nakedness. I raised my chin and stared back at him.

“You are decidedly imperturbable,” he observed. “Our Jane is not missish . Neither an ape-leader nor an old maid; nor yet a simpering dowd, for all she does go in black.”

Perversely, I blushed—the words and the intensity of his tone having their predictable effect. Indeed, the man should not be allowed to roam unfettered in polite Society!

“Shall I draw up a list of my enemies for your private perusal?” he jested. “Do I understand you undertake to name Miss Twining’s murderer?”

“She was by way of being a friend,” I retorted. “And indeed, I should relish any list you could summon. You might send it to my direction at the Castle Inn.”

“Then start,” he said bitterly, “with Caro Lamb—she lives for the amusement of spinning webs, and is entirely capable of drowning a rival. There is a Lucretia Borgia quality to the act that should undoubtedly appeal to her more lurid phantasies. And now, Miss Austen—I beg your pardon—but I feel an overwhelming need to relieve myself. You will , I know, excuse me.”—With which churlish frankness, he quitted my side—and I felt myself to have been released from a disturbing influence, powerful and heady.

All of us in that room, so carelessly crowded, fell silent as we observed his limping progress towards the door—the club foot swinging with clumsy violence. It was as tho’ a spirit beloved of the gods—given every gift of beauty and conceit by a benevolent Olympus—had been deliberately blighted. Lord Byron was a warning against the human quest for Perfection; it could not be attained in all things.

I doubt I am the first to make this judgement of his lordship—and I am certain I shall not be the last.

WEDNESDAY, 12 MAY 1813

BRIGHTON, CONT.

WE PARTED FROM THE EARL AND COUNTESS ON SCROPE Davies’s doorstep. It had been agreed that Henry should accompany Swithin to the day’s race-meeting—“for murder or no,” he said, “I have a horse running at four o’clock, and must not fail to appear, or the betting shall be all against me. Wyncourt—old Gravetye’s heir, you know, and as sound a judge of horseflesh as any ever born—is my only competition.”

“I have seen Lord Wyncourt’s gelding,” Henry observed coolly, “and thought it a trifle too short in the back—” At which the Earl clapped my brother delightedly, and the two set off in search of a hackney carriage bound for the Downs east of town.

Lady Swithin was to return to the Marine Parade, in expectation of her friend Lady Oxford’s arrival; and she invited me cordially to accompany her—but a nearer duty obtruded. Directly opposite our position was General Twining’s house, its doorknocker muffled and its windows hung with crape.

“I must pay a call upon a bereaved parent,” I said, “however much I should prefer a few hours of sun and excitement on the racing-ground.”

The Countess’s face lit up. “But I have a capital scheme! I shall call round in my perch phaeton, with or without my London friend, in half an hour’s time—to save you from the General’s clutches, and carry you off to the races. All the world shall be there, you know, and it must prove an excellent opportunity for your researches.”

“I can have no objection, and should be delighted to accept of your ladyship’s invitation,” I replied.

Lady Swithin unfurled her sunshade with a look brimful of mischief and said, “I almost hope Lady Oxford is delayed. We might enjoy a most delicious tête-à-tête in the phaeton—for I mean to hear every word Byron spoke to you this morning. Never have I seen him so little bored by a lady’s conversation—even Caro Lamb’s!”

I coloured, and deflected suspicion with the novelist’s chief tool—a facility for timely invention. “That is because I was impertinent. Lord Byron cannot often meet with a woman so little inclined to captivate him.”

“I wonder it did not send him into strong hysterics,” Desdemona said, “but you must school your tongue a little, my dear, before entering the opposite abode—it should never do to carry pugnacity to the General!”

She was correct, of course; the encounter with Byron had perhaps been too invigourating. I ordered my emotions into a confirmed serenity, bade her ladyship adieu , and crossed to the far paving with a step that was the very picture of meek womanhood.

It seemed, at the first, as tho’ my efforts were for naught—Suddley the butler being little inclined to admit me this morning, whether he recognised my countenance from my previous visit, or no.

“The General is not at home to visitors,” he said austerely; and I could well imagine that the General was loath to parade his grief before the stream of the curious and the hypocritical who had left their cards upon the foyer’s table. Suddley’s elderly face was marked with the ravages of grief; and I recalled how Catherine had greeted him as one might an old nurse, a friend of the schoolroom. How little right the serving class was accorded to mourn for those they loved, of whatever station—duty must always intervene. Someone must lay the fire each morning; someone must answer the door.

“I quite understand.” My voice was firm and a trifle over-loud; behind Suddley’s stooped form was the hushed length of the Twining hall, and if there was to be any hope of the General’s overlistening our conversation, I must condescend to bray a little. “If you would be so good as to convey Miss Jane Austen’s deepest sympathy to General Twining. Tho’ I knew his daughter only briefly, I could not help but regard her with admiration and respect—and know how severe his loss must be.”

“You are very good, ma’am,” the butler said in a quavering voice, and his gaze—which had been correctly fixed at an indeterminate point over my right shoulder—met my own. “It is an affliction we never looked for, in plain terms. Such a sweet and biddable child as she was—hardly one of these harum-scarum misses, wild for a red coat and no thought to her family name. I wish that Lord Byron had never been born! Her death, that Devil’s imp was, from the moment his evil foot crossed her path.”

I murmured encouraging nothings.