The Forest

by Edward Rutherfurd

  ‘Good. Here you are then.’

  He gave them the money and watched them go off. But for some reason, as if a thought had just struck him, Grockleton did not move at once but remained where he was for fully a minute, staring after them. And when Nathaniel glanced back, he saw that Grockleton was staring at him, particularly, in deep thought.

  Now why, he wondered, should Mr Grockleton be doing that?

  Oxford! Oxford at last. There it was, ahead of them, its spires and domes rising out of a faint morning mist that hung over the broad green meadows and the gentle river that wound past the colleges. Oxford on the River Isis, as the Thames is called on this stretch of its long journey. It was useless to pretend they were not excited.

  ‘And to think, Fanny, my sweetest, dearest friend,’ cried her cousin Louisa. ‘To think that we nearly did not set out at all!’

  How very pretty Louisa looked today, Fanny thought with pleasure. She had always admired Louisa’s dark hair and lustrous brown eyes, and this morning her cousin was looking particularly animated. How pleasant it was, she considered, that her closest cousin should also be her best friend.

  Their journey had almost been cancelled due to ill health. Not that of old Francis Albion, who had been scolded by his sister from death’s door back to his usual state, but unexpectedly by Louisa’s mother, Mrs Totton, who was to have accompanied them and who had fallen and sprained her leg so painfully that she really didn’t think she could travel. So they certainly wouldn’t have been able to go, if it hadn’t been for Mr Gilpin.

  ‘My wife thinks I have been sitting in Boldre for too long,’ he assured the grateful Tottons just as firmly as if it had been true. ‘She positively insists I accompany you. Remember, I was up at Oxford myself, so to visit it again is nothing but a pleasure to me.’

  With the vicar as their companion there could be no doubt of the girls’ safety. ‘Indeed,’ as Fanny reminded Louisa, ‘it is really a great honour for us to travel with such a distinguished man.’ And so, in high spirits they had set off in the Albions’ best carriage to Winchester and thence up the old road that led, due north, the forty miles to Oxford.

  By mid-morning they were installed in one of the city’s best inns, the Blue Boar in Cornhill, the girls sharing one room, Mr Gilpin taking another. And promptly at noon Edward Totton called for them.

  Having embraced his sister and his cousin, bowed and expressed his honour that Mr Gilpin should have accompanied them and seeing that they were all eager to explore the city, Edward suggested they should make a tour forthwith.

  What a delight the city was. With its broad, cobbled main streets, and its curious medieval lanes, ancient Gothic churches side by side with splendid neoclassical façades, the university had been quietly growing there for more than five centuries. Its streets were busy with all kinds of people. Tradesmen and farmers from the countryside around mixed with clerics and poor scholars, rich young men with powdered hair, stern professors in academic gowns and visitors like themselves. Here they would pass a stately gateway and porter’s lodge, like the entrance to a palace, and look into the huge cobbled quadrangle behind; there, down an alley, they would peep into some dark little yard that appeared to have been forgotten since medieval monks had used it four hundred years before.

  Edward was very cheerful, the girls in high spirits; but Fanny did not fail to notice, with admiration, the role that Mr Gilpin assumed. He accompanied them in the most companionable way, but said little. Occasionally – when they came to the Bodleian Library, for instance, or the classical perfection of Sir Christopher Wren’s Sheldonian Theatre – he would step forward and point out quietly, in his deep voice, a few of each building’s finer points. Not to do so, after all, would have been failing in his duty. When they visited his own college, Queen’s, he naturally took them round. But apart from these occasions he seemed to prefer to bring up the rear, letting Edward conduct the tour and not even allowing a hint of a frown to cross his distinguished brow when Edward got things wrong. Indeed, he seemed to be enjoying himself just as much as they were, as he poked his head into familiar old nooks and crannies with a delighted ‘Aha’, to find them just as they had been fifty years before. They visited mighty Balliol College, stately Christchurch, pleasant Oriel and, at towards three o’clock, came to Edward’s own college, which was Merton.

  ‘We say we are the oldest college,’ he informed them.

  ‘Disputed.’ Gilpin chuckled.

  ‘The first to be built, at least,’ Edward responded with a smile. ‘In 1264. We are very proud of ourselves. The Master of the college is known as the Warden.’

  Merton was certainly delightful. Its quadrangles were not large and grand, but more intimate and suggestive of its antiquity. Its chapel, however, was a very imposing affair, at the west end of which were a number of monuments and memorials. They had paused in front of a rather fine one to a Warden, Robert Wintle, who had died some decades before, and Gilpin had just begun to say, ‘A fine scholar, I remember Robert Wintle well,’ when Edward interrupted him with a happy cry: ‘Ah, here he is! I told him he’d find us at Merton.’

  And to their great surprise, Mr Gilpin and the two young ladies saw an elegantly dressed man, a few years older and somewhat taller than Edward, with a pale, aristocratic face and a good head of dark hair, which had been blown a little carelessly by the breeze. Seeing Edward, he nodded and smiled, then made Gilpin and the ladies a brief, formal bow.

  ‘I said nothing, because I had no idea if he would come,’ said Edward. ‘He often doesn’t,’ he added. ‘This is Mr Martell.’

  The introductions were quickly performed, Mr Martell bowing again, with grave politeness to Gilpin and each of the girls, though it was hard to tell whether he was really interested.

  ‘Martell was in his final year when I came up to Oxford,’ Edward explained. ‘He was very kind to me. He used to talk to me.’ He laughed. ‘He doesn’t talk to everyone, you know.’

  Fanny glanced at Martell to see if he was going to deny this. He didn’t.

  ‘You are of the Dorset family of Martell, perhaps?’ Gilpin enquired.

  ‘I am, Sir,’ Martell replied. ‘I know nothing about the Gilpin family, I confess.’

  ‘My family has Scaleby Castle, near Carlisle,’ Gilpin said firmly. Fanny had never heard him say this before and looked at her old friend with new interest.

  ‘Indeed, Sir? You will know Lord Laversdale, perhaps.’

  ‘All my life. His land marches with ours.’ This having been duly noted, Gilpin glanced towards Fanny and continued more easily: ‘You know of the Albion estate in the New Forest, I dare say?’

  ‘I know of it, although I have never had the pleasure of seeing it,’ said Mr Martell, again with a slight bow towards Fanny. There was, she thought, a faint tinge of warmth in his manner now, but it might just have been a trick of the light in the chapel.

  ‘Let’s go outside,’ said Edward Totton.

  One of the delights of Merton College was its setting: for its buildings backed on to the open green space of Merton Field beyond which, across the Broad Walk, lay the lovely expanse of Christchurch Meadow and the river.

  They made a pleasant group as they set out into this Arcadian scene, the two girls in their long, simple dresses, Mr Gilpin in his clerical hat, the two men in their tail coats and breeches and striped silk stockings. As they were leaving the college, Edward had kept up a lively discourse, explaining how his friend came to be staying in the vicinity, what a noted sportsman he had been at Oxford, and a scholar too, it seemed. But as they started across Merton Field, his supply of conversation seemed temporarily to have dried up, and as neither Fanny nor Louisa wished to lead the conversation with the stranger, and Mr Martell himself showed no inclination to say anything, Mr Gilpin stepped in, walking beside Martell while the other three followed, listening, just behind.

  ‘Have you taken up any career, Mr Martell?’ he enquired.

  ‘Not yet, Sir.’

  ‘You cons
idered it?’

  ‘I did. At Oxford I considered entering the Church, but the responsibilities of my position decided me against it.’

  ‘A man may be the owner of a large estate and be a clergyman too,’ Gilpin pointed out. ‘My grandfather was.’

  ‘Certainly, Sir. But shortly after I completed my studies at Oxford a kinsman of my father’s died, leaving me a large estate in Kent: this in addition to the estates in Dorset, which will be mine on the death of my father. The two lie a hundred miles apart; unless I relinquish one – which would betray a trust laid upon me – I conceive that it would be impossible to carry out my duties as a clergyman as well. I could, of course, engage a perpetual curate, but if I do that there seems little point in taking holy orders.’

  ‘I see,’ said Mr Gilpin.

  ‘I think, perhaps,’ continued Mr Martell, ‘of entering politics.’

  ‘He’s looking for a seat,’ Edward now interrupted from behind. ‘I’ve told him he should talk to Harry Burrard. He decides who the members for Lymington will be.’ He laughed. ‘I think Martell should represent us, Mr Gilpin. What do you think?’

  But whether the vicar of Boldre meant to reply would never be known, for Fanny suddenly cried: ‘Oh, look, Mr Gilpin! A ruin.’

  The object at which she was pointing was a small bridge over the river, some way off to their right. If not exactly a ruin, it was certainly in a very dilapidated state, with its arches visibly crumbling. It looked most unsafe.

  ‘Folly Bridge,’ said Mr Gilpin, who seemed glad to change the subject. ‘Now then, Edward, can you tell me the date of it? No? Mr Martell? No also. Well, it is believed to date from the late eleventh century, about the time of King William Rufus. If so, it is much older than the university.’

  This information having been received with respect, Fanny decided she could properly address the stranger. ‘Do you care for ruins, Mr Martell?’

  He turned and looked at her. ‘I am aware’ – he inclined his head momentarily towards Gilpin – ‘having read Mr Gilpin’s Observations with great profit, of the picturesque nature of ruins; certainly there is much to admire in, and much to learn from, the ruins of antiquity. But I admit, Miss Albion, that I prefer the vigour of a living building to the decadence of its remains.’

  ‘Yet there are some people who build ruins,’ she offered.

  ‘I had a friend who did. But I consider it preposterous all the same.’

  ‘Oh.’ Thinking of her own plans she could not help blushing. ‘Why?’

  ‘I should not care to spend so great a sum upon an object so useless. I see no sense in it.’

  ‘Come, Sir.’ Gilpin came to her defence. ‘Your argument surely has this weakness: you might say the same of any work of art. A painting of a ruin, then, should not be made either.’

  ‘I grant the justice of what you say, Sir,’ replied Martell, ‘and yet find I am not satisfied. It is, I think, a question of degree. The painter, no matter how great his labour, expends only his time, paint, canvas. Yet for the cost of even a small ruin a man might build a score of cottages that could be both useful and pleasing to the eye.’ He paused. Did he, perhaps, resent being obliged to speak for so long? ‘There is this further, Sir. A mansion is what it is, namely a house; a painting is a painting. But a constructed ruin pretends to be something it is not. It is false. The sentiments, the reveries it is intended to provoke are also false.’

  ‘You do not care for the Gothic fashion in building, then?’ asked Fanny.

  ‘Taking a good house and adding Gothic ornaments to it to make it look like something else? Certainly not, Miss Albion. I abominate that fashion.’

  ‘Ha,’ said Mr Gilpin.

  They went across, all the same, to inspect Folly Bridge, then walked along the river bank a little way. Edward had started to chatter again. It was very pleasant. By the time they had done this, Mr Gilpin and the two girls felt ready to return to the Blue Boar Inn to dine and rest. Edward and Mr Martell accompanied them to the inn and it was agreed that Edward should join them again the next morning to continue their investigation of Oxford. Mr Martell, it seemed, had other engagements. For their final day, however, Edward proposed that they should venture out to the village of Woodstock and visit the huge country mansion of Blenheim Palace, which lay in a magnificent park nearby.

  ‘The duke is away at present,’ said Edward, ‘but one can visit the house upon application, which I have already made.’

  ‘Capital!’ cried Gilpin. ‘The duke has some paintings by Rubens which must not be missed.’

  ‘Martell,’ asked Edward, ‘you will accompany us, perhaps?’ His friend seeming to hesitate, he asked: ‘Have you visited Blenheim?’

  ‘I have stayed there once or twice,’ Martell replied quietly.

  ‘Oh God, Martell,’ Edward cried, not at all abashed, ‘I should have guessed you would know the duke. So come now, will you keep these ladies company – or do you only go to Blenheim when the owner is there to receive you?’

  To Fanny’s astonishment Martell merely shook his head, half smiling, at this sally. It seemed he did not mind Edward’s puppyish teasing. ‘I should be delighted to accompany you,’ he said with a slight bow; although whether he really wanted to Fanny could not guess.

  Mr Martell left them after this and so the two girls dined with Edward and Mr Gilpin. Fanny decided that this was preferable, really, since it relieved them of the necessity of conversing with a man who had no great desire for their company. She did ask Mr Gilpin for his opinion of Edward’s friend, though.

  ‘His intellect’, Gilpin said cautiously, ‘is strong, although perhaps too rigid. But I should need to know him better.’ Which, while interesting, wasn’t quite what she’d meant.

  ‘He’s damnably rich,’ said Edward. ‘I can tell you that.’

  Later, in their room, she had asked Louisa what she thought. She always enjoyed discussing things with Louisa. Her cousin and she were very close, perhaps because they were so different. They both had a good eye and enjoyed painting; but while Fanny would take time to seek some particular effect of the light or weather on the landscape, Louisa after a while would content herself with a few quick dashes of colour and say she was done. Or sometimes, when Mr Gilpin was instructing, she would make some flippant addition to the scene and, as the distinguished artist passed, point to it and ask: ‘Do you like my rabbit, Mr Gilpin? It has floppy ears.’

  But as it was done in a cheerful way and was so in tune with her character, he would just smile and say, ‘Yes, Louisa’ and not take offence.

  Louisa had a talent for mimicry – her imitation of Mr Grockleton was beyond praise – but she was not malicious. She read books, as much as she wanted to; she spoke enough French to amuse the French officers in Lymington. With her lovely eyes and dark-haired good looks, Louisa had long ago concluded that her role as a pretty daughter of Lymington’s richest merchant suited her ambitions very well. And if she could have been cleverer or more hard-working if she wished, then she must have concluded that it was not in her self-interest. ‘What do I think of Mr Martell, Fanny? Why that he is a great catch and he knows it.’

  This was clearly true.

  ‘But what of his character and his opinions?’

  ‘Why, Fanny, I hardly know. It was you who spoke to him.’ Fanny had not thought of it, but she realized now that, unusually, Louisa had kept almost silent through their walk with Mr Martell. ‘I did observe one thing, Fanny,’ her pretty cousin continued with a smile.

  ‘Tell me what, Louisa?’

  ‘That you liked him.’ And now Louisa burst into a laugh.

  ‘I? Oh, no, Louisa. I do not think so. Why do you think such a thing?’

  But Louisa refused to discuss the matter further and instead went and sat in a chair by the window and, taking up a book, started to make a little drawing for herself upon the flyleaf. She busied herself in this way, refusing all conversation for some time, while Fanny began to prepare herself for bed, until finally she called
Fanny over and, quietly handing her the book, let her look at the drawing by the fading light.

  It was of a rutting stag: a great red deer, on the twilit forest heath, his head with its magnificent antlers thrown back about to emit his roar. It really was a very good likeness of the creature and well observed. With this one alteration: the face was that of Mr Martell.

  ‘It is as well we are not to see him tomorrow,’ said Fanny, ‘as I should be afraid of laughing.’

  They did not see Mr Martell, or even think of him, the next day, which passed delightfully. But the following morning he was at the door of the inn, wearing a brown coat and riding breeches, and a tall brown hat to match. While they rode in the carriage, he mounted a magnificent bay, explaining that, as the day was fine and his horse had now been stabled for two days, he thought it best to give it some exercise. While this made perfect sense, Fanny could not help but reflect that it also meant that he was spared the need of talking to them on the journey.

  With Mr Martell riding easily beside the carriage, the journey nonetheless passed very pleasantly. Of the Oxfordshire countryside Mr Gilpin had a poor opinion. ‘It is too flat. I can describe it’, he told them, ‘only as a cultivated dreariness.’ But if the landscape was sadly wanting in the picturesque, its history was more encouraging. At Woodstock, the vicar reminded them, a medieval English king had kept his lady love, the fair Rosamund. So jealous of this lady was the queen that she wanted to poison her. And so, it was said, the king built a maze around her house, and only he knew the way in. ‘A pleasant story, even if untrue,’ as the vicar remarked. With these and other tales he regaled them until they reached the park gates of the great palace of Blenheim.

  John Churchill had been a genial fellow, with only a poor squire’s fortune at the court of the merry monarch, with whom he had shared a mistress. But he was also a formidable soldier. Having won a string of brilliant victories for Queen Anne, he was made Duke of Marlborough and rewarded, as successful generals were, with a great estate. As their carriage rolled along the drive this sunny morning, Fanny looked out eagerly to see the mansion. And soon enough, looking across a great sweep, she did.