Stephanie Barron - Jane and the Barque of Frailty

“But then, you are the naughtiest of creatures,” Julia Radcliffe volunteered, in a voice that held all the soft caress of finest silk. “You have all our concern and interest, ma’am — but I think perhaps we are de trop in such company. Come along, Harriette!”

Lord Moira lifted his hat to the two Cyprians as they swayed off down the gravel under a single parasol, then said, with delightful perspicacity, “You must be in considerable discomfort, ma’am. May I have the honour of conveying you to your brother’s house — or anywhere else in the Kingdom?”

I glanced at Henry, who was looking less anxious than resigned. “You are too good, sir. But the indisposition is very trifling — I am sure that if my brother will lend me his support—”

Henry lifted me to my feet and said, “Lord Moira, I do not think you met my sister in Sloane Street on Tuesday last — may I introduce Miss Jane Austen to your acquaintance?”

“Pleasure.” The gentleman bowed over my glove with an audible creak of his stays, while I hung on Henry’s arm and endeavoured to look wan.

“My sister is on a visit to London, sir, of several weeks’ duration,” Henry persisted.

“Indeed? And how do you find the Metropolis, Miss Austen?”

“It is everything that is delightful, sir. My sister, the Comtesse de Feuillide, is unceasing in her efforts to amuse.”

“Little Eliza!” Moira’s eyes creased with fondness. “I remember her in her first youth, my dear — such a winsome child, and so pretty even in her widowhood. … It was quite a feat, you know, that your brother brought off, in persuading such a flower to be leg-shackled to him. But I perceive that you limp — decidedly you are lame in the right foot — and I cannot allow you to strain the joint further.”

“Perhaps a hackney … ” I demurred.

“Where is such a conveyance to be found, at this fashionable hour in the Park? No, no — I assure you, it is not the slightest trouble. I should be very happy— know my way to Sloane Street in the veritable dark—”

I smiled tremulously. “Thank you, my lord. I confess I should be better for the rest. And then I might release my brother — who has been unflagging in his escort, but most anxious to reach his club, for at least an hour past!”

“Jane—” Henry began indignantly.

“Do not apologise, my dear,” I assured him. “I know how tiresome females are to a man of affairs, such as yourself. But Lord Moira is all politeness — all consideration. I confess he recalls dear Lord Harold to mind!”

It was perhaps paltry of me to employ my love for the Rogue in such a mean service — but the idle chatter had its effect. The Earl halted in his steps, surveyed me acutely through his quizzing-glass, and said, “Not Lord Harold Trowbridge?”

“A very intimate friend, sir — and a sad loss. You were acquainted with him, I collect?”

“From our school days! By Jove! A friend of Harry’s! Not that half the world was not — but still, I should have thought … What a wonder the world is, hey? Let me help you to ascend—”

And thus I was established behind a pair of blood chestnuts to rival the very Highest Flyer’s.

Friday, 26 April 1811, cont.

“I WAS NEVER MORE ASTONISHED THAN WHEN I learned of Harry’s death,” Lord Moira observed, as he gathered up the ribbons and flicked his whip-point over the leader’s ear. “I recollect exactly where I was at the time: entering a wager in Watier’s betting book. There was Henry Vassall — Lord Holland, you know — with his face whiter than the piece of paper he held in his hands, and the news of Harry’s death written on it. For a moment I thought old Holland had suffered a fit — whole family’s prone to apoplexy, that’s how his uncle Fox went — but no. ‘Harry’s gone,’ he said. And, ‘What, back to Oporto?’ I returned. ‘He’s been done to death by his valet,’ Holland said, ‘somewhere down near Portsmouth.’

And even then, my dear, I thought it the queerest turnout ever conceived for Harold Trowbridge. He was the sort of man one expected to die on the duelling ground — not at the hands of some deranged servant.”

For an instant, I could feel the Rogue’s hands tightening about my own, and the smooth butt of a pistol nestled in my palm. The targets had been placed in the courtyard of the Dolphin Inn, and the ostlers were watching; the meeting was intended for the following dawn. Lord Harold could snuff the flame of a candle with a single ball, he could nick the suit from a playing card at thirty paces; but I had never held a gun before, and should have dropped the thing but for his hand supporting mine.

“He was too fine a shot to end on the duelling ground,” I replied. “Treachery — not the defence of honour — was his undoing. Orlando was a Buonapartist spy.”

Lord Moira turned his chin to stare at me, a feat all the more remarkable for the height and stiffness of his collar-points. “How well did ye know Harry, Miss Austen?”

“I watched him die, Lord Moira.”

My companion uttered an ejaculation, and must have slackened his grip on the reins, for the blood chestnuts showed a disposition to bolt. The Earl was taken up with managing his high-bred cattle in all the confusion of a Hyde Park afternoon, and I was soon too breathless with fear and speed to do more than steel myself to the crash I felt must inevitably come— but after an interval, the whirl of scenery abated, and I unclenched my hands.

Lord Moira’s countenance was red and his lips were clamped tight on all the oaths he must have suppressed; but at length, the severity of expression relaxed, and he said, “Never tell me you’re the young woman to whom Harry left that extraordinary bequest?”

“If you would mean the collection of his papers — then yes, my lord, I am she.”

“Good God! And to think that Wilborough — Harry’s brother, the Duke — put up such a stink and fuss! He must never have set eyes upon you, my dear, for how he could think a slip of a female—”

Whatever he might have said, the Earl abruptly forestalled, his face growing if possible more crimson.

“—should be called a doxy? A jade? An unscrupulous vixen? I can well imagine the epithets His Grace might summon. And indeed, my lord, I cannot account for Lord Harold’s decision to place his most vital records in my keeping — other than that which he disclosed in a posthumous communication: He wished me to compose his memoirs.”

To my surprise, Lord Moira threw back his head and gave a bark of laughter. “His memoirs! In the hands of a delicately-nurtured lady! How rich! Only Harry could fob off such a bit of cajolery on the Great World! My dear Miss Austen — I long to read your account of all our dreadful pasts, indeed I do!”

I placed my gloved hand on the Earl’s coat sleeve. “It was my sincere hope,” I said earnestly, “that you would assist me in drafting the volume, through the explication of certain political matters I cannot comprehend at all. Tell me, sir — are you at all familiar with the bombardment of Copenhagen? Or the particulars of the Walcheren campaign?”

Lord Moira frowned. “What has any of that to do with Harry? He was in the Peninsula, surely, when the fool’s errand was mounted?”

“—By which, I collect, you would refer to Lord Castlereagh’s expedition.”

“Each of Castlereagh’s missteps is very like another,” the Earl returned brusquely. “A waste of time, men, and opportunity in the pursuit of a chimera! But I repeat: What had this to do with Harry?”

“It afforded him a good deal of anxiety at the time,” I said. “His journal entries for 1808 are replete with references to confusion at the highest levels— the need for arms and policy in Spain, and the diversion of both to the Baltic — disagreement between the intelligence he received of personal agents in Oporto, and that which was read by others in London — in short, an uneasiness and an apprehension of duplicity.”