Stephanie Barron - Jane and the Ghosts of Netley

“You do not go to Netley Lodge this morning?” I enquired benignly.

“Mrs. Challoner expects a large party of guests. I don’t like to be in the way, you know. Can’t wear out my welcome.”

“You were not acquainted with Mrs. Challoner, I understand, before arriving in England?”

Mr. Ord shook his head. “I’ve been moving about the Continent on a kind of Grand Tour for the past six months, handing one letter of introduction after another to people I’ve never met before — and to a soul they’ve been no end obliging. But Mrs. Challoner beats the rest of them all hollow. She’s what you English like to call an Incomparable.”

It was a word for the greatest beauty of the day — for a Diamond of the First Water — and I smiled to hear it on the lips of an American. “It is no wonder, then, that you cannot bear to embark for Maryland!”

He appeared to hesitate. “I’ve a matter of business I must conclude first. On behalf of my guardian.”

“I see. You were so unfortunate as to lose your parents?”

“When I was very young,” he said easily. “I was born here in Hampshire, you know — it’s my native turf. But my mother, being a widow, followed her brother to Spain — my uncle James was in the employ of the Royal Navy.”

“Indeed? He was an officer?”

“Able Seaman,” Mr. Ord replied, “deputed to serve the King of Spain. It was there my family became acquainted with Mrs. Challoner’s late husband — who, though a wine merchant in Oporto, took care that none of the British subjects in the Peninsula fell beyond his ken.”

The statement was so extraordinary, that I nearly laughed in the young man’s face — but a glance revealed that he spoke in all earnestness, and clearly believed the tale he told. That a fellow of such obvious gentility, good breeding, and education should be happy to admit that his uncle was a common sailor, was surprising enough; but that he could, in the same breath, claim that the sailor had been ordered to serve the King of Spain was beyond belief.

“And in America?” I asked hesitantly. “Your family, I must suppose, prospered there?”

“My mother, unfortunately, died but two years after our arrival.”

“I am sorry to hear it.”

“The climate did not agree with her. I was but six years old when she was taken off — and I spent the remainder of my youth under the guardianship of a very great family, the Carrolls of Baltimore, who are distant connexions of my mother’s.”

— who married, it must be assumed, to disoblige her family. Uncle James was undoubtedly Mrs. Ord’s brother by marriage, not birth, as it seemed unlikely that a great family — even in America — would produce so low a member as an Able Seaman.

“How fortunate for you,” I managed. “And it is the Carrolls who determined you ought to tour the Continent? And provided you with letters of introduction?”

Mr. Ord bowed. “Mr. Charles Carroll of Carrollton is never done exerting himself on my behalf. I may safely say that I owe that gentleman — and his family — everything.”

It was a strange story, and one I felt nearly certain must be nine parts fabrication. Had this ingenuous young man, with the fair blond looks of a Greek god, invented the outline of his history on the spot? Was this my reward for too-inquisitive manners? But why, if phantasy were his object, should Mr. Ord choose a seaman for an uncle? Why not turn his father into the son of a lord? An attempt at fiction should have appeared more regular, more predictable, in its elements. The tale was just odd enough to seem. . natural.

“I hope that we shall meet again before you quit these shores,” I told Mr. Ord as I halted before my gate.

He raised his hat and smiled engagingly. “At Mrs. Challoner’s, perhaps.”

31 October 1808, cont.

I had read nearly half of MARMION, and had reached the passage where Constance, the perjured nun — who is travelling in her lover’s train disguised as a page — is betrayed to her convent and walled up alive in penance for her sins. So engrossing was Sir Walter’s tale that I barely discerned Phebe’s voice, announcing Lord Harold Trowbridge. It appeared, from our maidservant’s expression, that she had ceased to find anything very extraordinary in the Rogue’s descent upon Castle Square. As she stood in the doorway, however, she threw me a speaking glance in respect of my crumpled black gown, and the ineffectual arrangement of hair that had sufficed for a morning at home. I thrust Marmion hastily behind a cushion, dabbed at my chignon with vague hands, and rose to greet his lordship.

“Miss Austen — I hope I find you well?”

He bowed, his countenance expressionless, and Phebe hastily closed the parlour door on our tête-à- tête . The news that I was closeted with Lord Harold, I thought despairingly, should be in my mother’s ears within the instant.

“I am quite well. Pray sit down.”

“I cannot stay — I have come only to enquire

whether you know aught of my man Orlando’s movements this morning.”

“Orlando?” I repeated in bewilderment. “I last saw him at the Water Gate Quay yesterday evening. That would have been at — oh, half-past five o’clock.”

“I am aware that he was so good as to convey you and Miss Lloyd from the Abbey to Southampton, following a mishap among the ruins — for Orlando left a note in our rooms at the Dolphin Inn, relating the entire history. Of Orlando himself, however, I have seen nothing since my return from Netley Lodge last night. I dined alone; and when I retired, he still had not appeared. Naturally I grew anxious.”

As Lord Harold usually dined at the fashionable hour of seven o’clock, I understood from this that he had spent a good deal of the day in Mrs. Challoner’s company. Before I could reply, however, the parlour door opened to admit my mother — who came forward with an expression of welcome, her arms outstretched.

“My dear Lord Harold! What a pleasure it always is to find you in Castle Square, to be sure!”

“Mrs. Austen — your humble servant.” He bowed correctly. “I hope I find you well?”

“Very well, indeed! Though it has been more than two years since we have met, I flatter myself that I have not enjoyed more than an hour’s discomfort from ill-health in the interval!”

As the good lady had spent more than half the attested period in her rooms, complaining of a wealth of injuries to body and soul, I found this blithe testament difficult to support; but forbore to argue.

“And how well you are looking, I declare! Always the man of Fashion! Though I observe that you are in mourning like ourselves. My condolences on the passing of your mother.”

“Thank you, ma’am.” Lord Harold’s expression was wooden. That he longed to see my parent returned to her needlework in an adjoining parlour was evident; but propriety insisted otherwise.

“May I offer you a cordial, my lord? A glass of brandy, perhaps?” my mother cried. “I am sure that Jane would benefit from a little ratafia, for she is undoubtedly looking peaked, from the effects of too much excitement and grief — she was quite devoted to our late Mrs. Austen, you know, and is so unselfish in her dedication to those she loves, that I declare she has quite gone into the grave with her! Can you perhaps conspire with me, my lord, to return our dear Jane to the bloom of health? We were so very grateful that you offered her an airing in your chaise — exactly suited to restoring the roses to a girl’s cheeks!”

As I had long since left my girlhood behind, along with the roses to which my mother referred, this last was injurious to my dignity.