Stephanie Barron - Jane and the Ghosts of Netley

“Miss Austen!” Sophia cried, and rose with alacrity to embrace me. I was startled at the effusion of her welcome, but returned her warmth unquestioningly. “How lovely you look in that gown!”

Her eyes moved lightly over my figure — lingered an instant upon the golden crucifix at my throat, but without any peculiar regard — and took in the effect of the paisley shawl with obvious pleasure.

“I must order a gown just like it, immediately — only not, I think, in black. Then we may be seen to be two girls together, sharing confidences, as we ride about the country in my charming phaeton! Maria — may I have the honour of introducing Miss Austen to your acquaintance?”

At that moment, a lady was entering the drawingroom, in a magnificent gown of deep pink drawn up over a white satin slip; it was fastened at the knee with a cluster of silver roses and green foil, and allowed to drape on the opposite side to just above the bottom of the petticoat. Had she been less stately in her person, the gown might have been ravishing; but as it was, she appeared rather like an overlarge sweetmeat trundled through the room on a rolling cart. Her ample white bosom surged above the tight diamond lacing of her bodice; and a necklace of amethyst trembled in her décolletage.

“Miss Austen — Mrs. Fitzherbert. Maria, this is Miss Austen — my sole friend in Southampton, and a very great adventuress on horseback.”

“A pleasure,” said Maria Fitzherbert. She inclined her head. I curtseyed quite low — for one is so rarely in the presence of a royal mistress, particularly one who believes herself a wife, that I was determined no lack of civility should characterise our meeting. She smiled at me; said a word or two respecting “dear Sophia, and her bruising experience in Oporto,” made it known that she regarded me as an object of gratitude for having taken “dear Sophia” under my wing — and moved, in her ponderous fashion, towards the window seat. There she took up her workbag and commenced to unfurl a quantity of fringe.

I had heard from my cousin Eliza de Feuillide, who knew a little of the lady, that Maria Fitzherbert was the most placid and domestic of creatures; that she loved nothing so much as a comfortable coze in the countryside, particularly at her house on the Steine in Brighton; that the Prince’s predilection for loud company and late hours was the saddest of trials; and that, if left to herself, she would summon no more than three friends of an evening, to make up her table at whist. She must be more than fifty, I presumed, and the sylph-like beauty she had commanded at eighteen — the year of her first marriage, to the heir of Lulworth Castle in Dorset — was now utterly fled. Mr. Weld had been six-and-twenty years her senior, and he had survived his wedding night but three months. She was no luckier in her second union, to Mr. Thomas Fitzherbert of Swynnerton Park and London; for he died but four years after their marriage, along with her infant son. She had been nine-and-twenty when at last the Prince prevailed against her scruples, and persuaded her to be his consort. Now the golden hair was turned to grey; her flawless complexion flaccid. But the Prince was said to prefer portly women.

Mr. Ord crossed the room, apparently to admire Mrs. Fitzherbert’s fringe — his attitude all politeness — but a tug on the tails of his black coat from the little girl in the green sash brought him whirling around, at the ready to tickle her. She shrieked with delight, and hid herself behind the column of Sophia Challoner’s dress; Mr. Ord, however, forbore to pursue her there.

“Minney,” said Mrs. Fitzherbert quietly, “it is time you were returned to Miss LaSalles; come, kiss my cheek and make your adieux.”

The child affected to pout, and cast down her eyes; but she was a dutiful creature, and did not hesitate to peck the matron’s cheek and skip out of the room in search of her governess.

“That is little Mary Seymour,” Sophia informed me in a low voice. “You will have heard of her troubled case, I am certain.”

I had read of Minney Seymour, as she was known, in all the London papers. She was the seventh child of Lord Hugh and Lady Horatia Seymour, the latter a consumptive who had placed the infant in Mrs. Fitzherbert’s care before going abroad for a cure. Poor Lady Seymour, whose husband was a ViceAdmiral of the Royal Navy, had returned to England when her daughter was two — only to die of consumption a few weeks later. Her husband, serving on the West Indies station, had survived her but a matter of months. The child had remained with Mrs. Fitzherbert, much doted upon by the lady and her royal consort — until the Seymour family demanded her return when Minney was four. The furor that then ensued was indescribable.

The Prince claimed immediately to have had conversations with the dying mother, in which she made over the care of her child to Mrs. Fitzherbert; he used his influence with every member of the Seymour clan; made over a fortune for the girl’s use, once she should be of age — and when the case was brought to the House of Lords two years since, His Royal Highness shamelessly manipulated the votes of his cronies to require a judgement in Mrs. Fitzherbert’s favour. Some part of the Seymour family was said to be outraged: not least that the child was to be raised by a Catholic, and subject to the polluted atmosphere of the Prince of Wales. But having seen the blooming girl and her adoptive mother, I could not think Minney Seymour so very unhappy. The child had never, one must remember, known her true parents — and could hardly be expected to rush from all the comforts of a royal household in Brighton, to the arms of her unknown relations.

“I am very glad that you are come,” Sophia said in my ear. “Would you oblige me — before the rest of the guests are assembled — in walking into my dressing room for a little conversation? For I should dearly like to consult you.”

“Of course,” I said in surprise.

With a glittering smile at Mr. Ord, who now stood in a becoming attitude near Mrs. Fitzherbert’s seat, she swept out of the room and led me swiftly up the stairs. I could not imagine the source of such urgency — had she commissioned a gown of whose style she was in doubt, and required a second opinion?

“Ah, Conte, ” she said as she achieved the head of the stairs, “they are all waiting for you. How distinguished you look, in the Order of the Regent!”

The man to whom she spoke was tall and blackhaired, with the olive skin of Iberia; a thin, whipcord figure exquisitely dressed, with a sword swinging at his side. A broad scarlet riband crossed his breast, and from it hung what appeared to be a gold and enamel medal: the Order of the Regent, she had called it, by which she signified the vanished Regent of Portugal now resident in Brazil.

Hand on his sword-hilt, he clicked his heels together and bowed deeply. “You are the brightest flower in the English garden,” he said with considerable effort.

“Your command of our tongue certainly increases.” Sophia’s tone was playful. “Miss Austen, may I have the honour of presenting the Conte da SilvaMoreira to your acquaintance?”

Silva-Moreira. Silva. A common enough handle, by all accounts, in that part of the world, Frank had said. Sophia had spoken in English, rather than her accustomed Portuguese — and again I heard my brother: He may have been an Iberian — but I’ll swear the fellow spoke nothing but French!

“The Conte is a very old friend of myself and Mrs. Fitzherbert, with whom he has been staying in Brighton since his removal from Oporto. Conte, Miss Austen.”

I made my courtesy, and the black-haired Count clicked his heels again. He bent over my hand, his lips grazing my glove, and his eyes swept my figure indolently. Then his gaze returned, arrested, to the pulse at my throat.