Stephanie Barron - Jane and The Wandering Eye

“Though he uttered a falsehood? Such wickedness!”

It is remarkable, indeed, to spend all of one’s life in the company of a lady so thoroughly good as Cassandra. Never mind that a falsehood, at such a juncture, should be as nothing to the shedding of blood — the slightest misstep is capable of causing my sister pain. It is well, perhaps, that the untimely demise of her beloved intended should have left her pining in the single state. The vicissitudes of marriage — with that frailest of creatures, a man —should certainly have been the death of her.

“Lord Kinsfell insists that in the very midst of Hugh Conyngham’s declamation — a passage from Macbeth — he was overcome with an excess of heat and spirits, and intended to seek his bedchamber by passing through the little anteroom at one side of the main party. Upon throwing open the double doors, he observed Mr. Portal in his Harlequin dress, prone upon the floor with a most hideous blade protruding from his breast. Kinsfell gave a shout, and leapt to Portal’s side; he felt for a pulse, and then effected the removal of the knife; but was swiftly overpowered by two stout fellows convinced of his dangerous intent. It was only then that I observed him myself.”

“And this Portal? Had you remarked his figure before?”

“I had.” The memory of Lord Kinsfell’s bitter words to Richard Portal brought a frown to my countenance. I pushed aside my cup of cooling tea and toyed hopelessly with a piece of bread. Cook had allowed it to grow stale again.

“And did he betray any morbid sensibility?” Cassandra enquired.

“Of what, my dear?”

“Of his impending death! Did he comport himself as might a marked man?”

“Indeed, Cassandra, I might fancy you to have indulged too much the taste for horrid novels! Portal seemed no more marked than any eligible gentleman at a rout full of ladies!” I hesitated, uncertain how much to divulge. “I did observe him to dance with Lady Desdemona Trowbridge, Lord Kinsfell’s sister, and somewhat later, he treated the better part of the company to a scene of some belligerence.”

“On the point of blows, was he? And with whom?” my father asked.

“With Lord Kinsfell, I regret to say.”

He touched his napkin to his lips, eyes averted.

“An actor! Well!” my mother cried, as though picking up a thread of conversation quite lost long ago. “They are always coming to blows, with swords or pistols or ruffians for hire. One sees it constantly in Orchard Street— Hamlet is nothing but a brawl, though it pretends to treat of adultery. I never leave the theatre without feeling I have been pummelled from one end to the other.”

“But did Kinsfell perceive no one else in the room?” my father enquired.

“He did not. He persists in believing the murderer exited by the anteroom window, which stood open at Portal’s discovery.” I gazed soberly at the Reverend Austen’s lined and kindly face. In three-and-seventy years, my father had seen much of the evil men may do, though from so retired a vantage as a Hampshire parsonage. “But Lord Kinsfell’s assurances are open to doubt, Father. Not one of the chairmen assembled in the street below admitted to having observed a similar flight; and if they had, the man should certainly have been taken. The drop from window to pavement, moreover, must be full thirty feet. For any to attempt the ground — in darkness and in haste — is madness. The man should surely have broken a leg.”

“But you forget the heavy snow, my child. If there were a drift to break the fall—”

“The Dowager’s footmen were assiduous in sweeping the pavement, for the accommodation of her guests,” I replied wearily. “It seems unlikely that anyone quitted the house in so heedless a manner.”

A brief silence fell over the breakfast table, and I saw once more in memory the Duchess’s horror as Kinsfell was led away. But for Lady Desdemona, I believe Eugenie Wilborough should have sunk to a heap on the floor, her seventy years quite suddenly writ upon her face.

“Some toast, my dear? Or perhaps a muffin?”

“I believe I shall walk out, Mamma.” I thrust my chair from the table. “A breath of air will do my head a world of good.”

DESPITE THE HEAVY FALL OF SNOW LAST E’EN, THE SUN HAD consented to shine, with a brilliance that dazzled the eyes. I found that my own poor orbs, much weakened from years of plying my needle and pen in the indifferent light of a sitting-room candle, could barely sustain the force of the light, and so kept them fixed upon the paving-stones. Here the snow had begun to melt, and the water ran in rivulets along the gutter. In my cumbersome pattens, I picked my way around the puddles, clicking and clattering in company with every young lady so stout as to venture out-of-doors. Sydney Gardens should be impassable on such a day; my accustomed walk along the verge of the canal must be foresworn for drier weather. And so I ignored the roads leading down towards the river; and determined upon the much shorter distance through Queen Square, in the direction of Edgars Buildings.

Edgars Buildings are fine, respectable establishments, offering lodgings for respectable families who come to Bath yearly in the pursuit of health and marriageable young men. They comprise as well, on their ground floors, a group of respectable shops — and in one of these, I had remarked a very fetching demi-turban of apricot sarcenet, adorned with ostrich feathers, such as one might wear with a gown of the same fashionable shade. I had just such a gown in view — indeed, had one as yet in pieces, at a formidable mantua-maker renowned in all of Bath for her artistry. [17] Mantua-maker was the eighteenth-century term for dressmaker. Jane betrays her age by employing it here. It derives from the mantua, a loose style of gown common in the second half of the eighteenth century, made of silk from Mantua, Italy. — Editor’s note. My peach silk confection, so clearly suited to a Duchess’s rout, or a night at the theatre, or a concert in the Upper Rooms — a gown that should be utterly too fine for my usual diversion of Aunt Leigh-Perrot’s insipid card parties — should be the sole spoil of recent misadventure. Not two months ago, I had purchased the stuff from smugglers in Lyme. By such small sacrifice of Miss Austen’s judgement and integrity was a vicious murderer apprehended; and I may confess to no great unwillingness to revel in the gain.

With very little fuss, and only the negligible discomfort occasioned by over-hasty coachmen and their great splashing beasts, I soon achieved Edgars Buildings. My enquiry as to the cost of such a thing as an apricot demi-turban, arranged cunningly with plumes, was the matter of but a moment; and the acknowledgement that it should be too dear for my purse, required but another. I turned away, lost in contemplation of how a similar headdress might be contrived, through the remnants of my own cut-up silk, and the loan of my sister Eliza’s feathers — when a loud hallooing from the street brought my attention to bear.

Outriders, in a gorgeous livery of black and gold, with Bengal caps and tassels; postilions, mounted on the wheelers [18] Wheelers is a term connoting the horses closest to the carriage wheels — in a team of four, the two harnessed first within the traces. — Editor’s note. , similarly arrayed; and the coach-and-four, magnificent and sleek, the horses as black as night. A spirited team, chuffing and tossing their heads as they turned down Milsom Street — bound, no doubt, for the Bear or the White Hart. I strained to make out the coat of arms on the coach’s door — but it was unknown to me. Certainly not the Wilborough device; and so the conveyance could hardly hold Lord Harold. That the Gentleman Rogue was posting towards Bath, however, upon the early morning receipt of an express from his mother, I little doubted. Perhaps in the company of his brother, the Duke.