Stephanie Barron - Jane and the Genius of the Place

“I doubt it was Captain Woodford who published the intelligence,” I mused, “but I should not vouch for Lady Forbes. She has quite the look of a woman who enjoys a sensation — and herself at the centre of it, above all things.”

“She is quite the persecution of poor Woodford,” Lizzy murmured. “Were it not for the deference he owes his commanding officer, I am sure he should shake her off in a trice; but she will hang upon his arm, and regard him as her personal pug-dog, to be petted and spoilt for show.”

“You observed once that Lady Forbes was intimate with Mrs. Grey,” I said. “On what was their friendship founded?”

Lizzy waved her fan, a gleaming arc of ivory in the darkness. “On a mutual love of finery — of spending more than they ought — and of a desire for shared confidences. There is little that occurred in the Army's Officer Corps, I am sure, that was not known at The Larches an hour later. Lady Forbes is the kind of woman who delights in confiding secrets.”

“And Mrs. Grey, in possessing them?” I added thoughtfully. The notion of blackmail was never far from my mind, when I considered of that lady. What might she not have known regarding Captain Woodford, for example, that should thwart his career in the Army? — Or of the spendthrift curate, Edward Bridges, whose luck proved so ruinous at her card-table? She should be unlikely to toy with them for money; she possessed enough of it herself. What, then, had been her object? What form of pressure had she employed? And was her interest merely a malicious delight in the unhappiness of others — or had she a greater object in view?

“Mrs. Grey's relation is a secretive sort, as well,” Neddie observed from his corner, as the carriage jolted down the road. “I could not make the Comte out at all; but I quite liked him, all the same.”

“The Comte de Penfleur! A very elegant gentleman, indeed.” Lizzy was all approval. “But I cannot think it the wisest thing you have ever done, Neddie, to closet yourself fully an hour in his company. All of Canterbury must be alive to the interest of your tete-a-tete; and all of Canterbury will be chattering even now.”

“It is clear, at least, that the Comte attended the Assembly solely with our conversation in view. He is greatly distressed at Mrs. Grey's death, and cannot feel sanguine with Grey's management of it.”

“Grey's management? — But Grey is not the Justice responsible,” I cried.

“No more he is,” my brother replied comfortably, “and the Comte de Penfleur was relieved to hear of it. He was circumspect enough, for the first quarter-hour; but he unbent a great deal, and intimated almost too much, for the remaining three. I should judge him much attached to Francoise Grey; profoundly distrustful of her husband; and anxious that her murderer should not go unpunished.”

“As he believes Denys Collingforth will,” I added.

“He cares nothing for Collingforth, unless he be guilty — and it is quite clear, from his manner of speaking, that he cannot believe him so. Mr. Grey is too eager to charge poor Collingforth with the murder, for the Comte's liking.”

“How very intriguing, to be sure.” Lizzy sighed. “It has quite a Continental flavour to it, Jane, almost of a tragic opera. I am sure the stage shall be littered with the dead and dying, before the final curtain is rung down — do not neglect to inform me of how it all ends. For the present, however, I must implore you, Neddie, not to forget that the Finch-Hattons are to be at dinner tomorrow. We cannot neglect what is due to our friends, however tedious they might prove, merely because of invasion and murder.”

My brother laughed aloud, and kissed his wife's gloved hand, and was content to pass the remainder of the drive in reflective silence.

But I very much wondered, as the shades of night flitted disconsolately past the carriage windows, how greatly the Comte had been attached to his adoptive sister — and whether it was he who had written that letter, in agonised French, to urge a meeting at Pegwell Bay.

Thursday,

22 August 1805

I SET DOWN MY ACCOUNT OF THE BALL IN THE EARLY hours of the morning. Once in bed, I tossed and turned until the rain broke before five o'clock, and brought a cooling breeze through the open window. I rose not three hours later and took tea in my room, where I might collect my thoughts before the rest of the house had stirred.

Breakfast at Godmersham is never before ten o'clock, although the children are served in the nursery far earlier. By the time our indolent Lizzy is dressed and abroad, her numerous infants are long since out-of-doors — under the supervision of Sackree, the nurse, or the long-suffering Miss Sharpe. There had been talk yesterday of an expedition with the gamekeeper, in search of wild raspberries; we should have clotted cream and fresh fruit for the Finch-Hattons at dinner.

I found the breakfast parlour quite deserted of life when at last I descended, and was allowed the consumption of tea and toast unmolested. Afterwards I hied myself to the little saloon at the back of the house, which serves the ladies of Godmersham as a sort of morning-room; here my sister Lizzy keeps a cunning little marquetry desk, well-supplied with a quantity of paper, pens, and sealing-wax. I settled myself to compose a letter to my mother — who has been happily established these several weeks in Hampshire with our dear friends, the Lloyds. She was to come to us in September, and together we intended a visit to the seaside at Weymouth. I very much feared, however, that the pleasure-trip would be put off, from a superfluity of French along the Channel coast — but saw no reason to alarm my mother. She is given to the wildest fancies at the best of times, and should require no spur at present from her youngest daughter. One source of consolation I found at least: the Lloyds took no London paper. Mrs. Austen should thus be preserved in ignorance of the sailing of the French fleet, a circumstance devoutly to be hoped. Did the rumour of invasion happen to reach her ears, she should demand her daughters' immediate removal into Hampshire — a prospect I could not regard with composure. The society of Kent was too beguiling, and the matter of Mrs. Grey's death too intriguing, to permit of a hasty departure.

My letter, as a result, was full of a great deal of nothing — a recital of the delights of Race Week, absent the interesting events of the meeting itself. I spoke of Henry's horse, of Henry's disappointment, of the scene at the grounds and the Assembly soon after — all without the slightest mention of the scandalous sensation that had torn Canterbury's peace. Such a letter, being a complex of subterfuge and delicate evasion, required considerable effort; I devoted a half-hour to the task, and had just determined to spend the rest of the morning with the admirable (if tiresome) Sorrows of Young Werther , when my industry was abruptly interrupted. [27] The Romantic novel by Goethe, presumably read in the translation. — Editor's note.

The sound of a horse's hooves galloping to the door — a man's voice, raised in anger — the protest of the servants — perhaps it was another constable, come posthaste with news? I threw down my volume and stepped into the back passage.

A gentleman I had never seen before was crossing the chequered marble of the hall with a rapidity that argued extreme necessity, or a violence of temper. He must pass by where I stood to achieve the library — his obvious intention, as my brother Neddie was generally to be found within after breakfast — but aside from the briefest glance at my face, he offered no acknowledgement or courtesy. Tho' hardly above medium height, the stranger was powerfully-built, with a beautifully-moulded head and greying hair trimmed far shorter than was fashionable. Something of the regimental was writ large in his form; or perhaps it was the air of battle he wore upon his countenance. I should judge him to be about the age of forty; but perhaps it was the weight of care that had traced years upon his looks.