“I beg your pardon, sir, for this…ignorant soldier,” said the newcomer, turning to us now and obviously suppressing the desire to use stronger language. Now, what would your business be here?”
Renewed explanations at least brought the result of finding us sitting on a hard, wooden form in what appeared to be a kind of waiting room, where an extremely inky clerk assured us that the Colonel would see us ‘shortly’.
Short and long are relative terms, of course. I lost count of how long we waited in that dreary room. I had minutely counted every fly upon the walls, every crack in the ceiling, every knot in the floorboards, and was reduced actually to listening to Mrs. Bennet recount, with a commendable attention to detail, why she thought “this Newcastle was not such a very fine place after all, no matter who may cry it up,” before a different clerk entered and informed us that the Colonel would see us now.
He showed us into a larger room, with oak-panelled walls, a large bay- or rather, oriole window looking out onto the courtyard, and a desk quite large enough to have served for a banqueting table at Longbourn. Its surface was almost entirely covered with piles of papers, which served nearly to hide from view the rather portly gentleman of a certain age, in spectacles and a plain blue coat who sat behind it.
“Good day, sir,” he said, in a voice little more than a whisper, motioning us to seats on our side of the desk.
“They tell me you wish to see me. I never knew what popularity was until I accepted this posting. At least half the town seem to join you in that wish. But I do not wish to be ungracious, and at least you do not appear to be a deputation – unless, of course, the presence of the ladies is an innocent deception?”
“Good day to you sir,” I replied. “My name is Bennet. These ladies are my wife and daughters. My daughter, Lydia, is married to one of the officers in your regiment, Mr. Wickham. Hearing of her condition, we are come to visit, and to assist if we may, but we do not know their present direction, as my daughter forgot to include it in her last letter. Any information you can give us would be very gratefully received. I have heard that the regiment has been sent to Spain, and can only hope we are not too late.”
The change in our interlocutor’s manner was immediate. He put down his pen, rose from his seat, and advanced around the desk with hand outstretched.
“Well, well, well, Mr. Bennet! Your daughter has often mentioned you, sir, and the rest of her family. Perhaps you would be good enough to introduce me to the ladies?”
Introductions were then effected, with quite as much bowing and simpering on both sides as etiquette required.
“Welcome to the Old Sixty-eighth,” said the Colonel. “Or, rather, to the very new Sixty-eighth. The old Sixty-eighth, the First Battalion, are over the hills and far away, if not in Flanders, then at least somewhere in Portugal or Spain. We are but a skeleton battalion here, serving but to recruit replacements and give them their basic training before sending them off to Shorncliff and the Light Infantry School there. There is scarce a company above quarter strength, and officers are even thinner on the ground. I am but a poor, fustian colonel myself, but since the bulk of those recruits have always come from my family’s estate, it was rather difficult to avoid the job. But, sit down, sit down.”
At this he rang a bell which was perched rather precariously on one corner of the desk.
“Coffee all round, Barker,” he said to the clerk who entered in response. “And some of those Singing Hinnies if there’s any left. Or should you prefer tea? Coffee will be fine? Good. You may trust our coffee. One of the advantages of living in one of the principal seaports of the realm is that the produce of all the world is at our disposal, whatever that scoundrel Bonaparte may say about the ‘starving English’.”
We necessarily talked about the weather while the coffee and cakes were serving.
“Now,” he said, when the servant had departed. “I fear I have a mixture of good news and bad for you. First, Mr. and Mrs. Wickham are not gone to Spain with the First Battalion. I take it you will consider that to be good news. Secondly, it is not Mr. Wickham any more, it is Captain Wickham. I take it that will be good news, too. Whether it would have been so under other circumstances is a point we need not go into.
Thirdly, however, I fear you are come to the wrong shop. Captain and Mrs. Wickham are no longer in Newcastle. They are gone, as they say in these parts ‘ower the watter’. No, you need not look so serious. They are not beyond the North Sea, or the Channel, still less the Atlantic, but across a much more significant stretch of water, the great and mighty river Tyne. Wickham’s company, being the only one in the battalion approaching half strength, has been sent to garrison the new fort now building at Sunderland, and to make it ready to house the entire regiment in due course. It has long been a bone of contention with the Prince Bishops that their regiment should be housed outside their Palatinate, and this new fort is to remedy that distressing proceeding. But it is there that you must seek your son and daughter, I fear.”
Our disappointment must have shown on our faces, but there was nothing for it but to thank our host and ask for directions to the coach to Sunderland.
“But, my dear sir, we cannot have you think of such a thing,” was the response. “We have a detachment going there ourselves on Monday, with supplies and munitions, and you may ride with them, straight to your family’ arms, as it were. In the meantime you must consider yourselves our guests. Mrs. Wickham is a great friend of my wife’s and she would love to meet her parents and sisters, I am sure, and we are rattling about in that great place with absolutely nothing else to do but entertain. You must allow us to do this for the family of a brother officer, you really must.”
The pile of papers on his desk rather gave the lie to his claim to have nothing else to do, but the path of least resistance is always so tempting, and we could but thank the colonel, and follow him across the yard, while he sent a soldier to pay the bill and collect our bags from the hackney.
Lydia, I remember thinking, could scarcely have led us a merrier dance if she had tried, but we should get there yet.
Chapter Twenty: Newcastle
Mrs. Colonel – or, rather, Mrs. Lambton, I should say, turned out to be rather less than half her husband’s age. If challenged to do so, I should have put her age at no more than a year or two beyond Lydia’s. She was certainly well enough turned out, and obviously spent a great deal of time – and, probably - money on her appearance. I could see Mrs. Bennet making mental notes on the cut of her chemise, the quality of her muslin, and the particular effect of its sprigging, and tightening her lips at the comparison between a gown fresh from the seamstress and the wrecks which so many days and nights travelling had left of the Bennet ladies’ attire. There was a rather sharp cast to Mrs. Colonel’s eyes which I did not quite like, and there was an even sharper tone to the voice in which she addressed her husband. The words were perfectly unexceptionable, but there was something in the tone which said “who are these people you have dragged in off the street to plague me with now?”
Her manner changed instantly, however, when we were introduced.
“Mr. and Mrs. Bennet! How delightful! And these two charmers must be Mary and Kitty, I make no doubt. Mrs. Wickham is my greatest friend, and she has often spoken about you. So you are come a-visiting at last? What a pity you should miss your welcome. Dear, dear Lydia, how I do miss her now that she has been sent all that way across the water! One’s society is so restricted in the wretched provinces, is not it? You must call again on your way home, and tell me how she does. Henry, you must send one of your great, rough soldiers to show them the way.”
“I have done better than that, my love. They are to travel with the powder train on Monday. I said that we should put them up until then.”
“Did you, my dear? Did you really? Whatever can you have been thinking of, to impose on dear, dear Lydia’s family in such a way, when they must be more than eager to reach their journey’s end? Did you not recollect that we are
to dine with the Butterfields’ tonight?”
“I recollected that these are a brother officer’s people, who have come right across the country to see their son and daughter, and, now I come to think of it, probably their new grandchild by now, and if you and I, my dear, were in such a position, I am sure that we should wish to receive a friendly welcome and all the assistance that might be expected.”
“Should we, indeed? If you say so, my dear, and I have no wish to seem either unfriendly or unwelcoming, to be sure. But what am I to tell Cassy Butterfield?”
“You may tell her how well she looks in the new gown she will no doubt be wearing, for we shall certainly go, and what is more, we shall take our new guests with us.”
This sort of thing could not be endured, of course. Mary and Kitty were looking on with mild amusement, but I could see that Mrs. Bennet was about to say something we should all regret, so I hastened to make my excuses for our being unable to take advantage of their most kind offer, etc.
I was interrupted by Mrs. Lambton, however, who clasped my hands and curtsied.
“Please forgive me, Mr. Bennet,” she cried. “It was the air, or the phases of the moon, or the junction of the planets, or original sin. I always take unexpected news the wrong way. We should both be honoured and delighted if you would only consent to accept our hospitality until you move on to Wearmouth, and we will do our very best to make sure your stay with us is a happy one. Do stay, I beg you. I should be quite miserable else.”
The lugubrious sort of smile with which she accompanied her request lent her face such a comical aspect that resistance was impossible.
“I certainly should not wish to make any young lady miserable,” I replied. “Although I find it hard to credit that my absence could have such an effect upon anyone. But I shall yield to the dictates of selfishness as well as your entreaties, for we have been on the road for several days now, and I confess that a short stay in a genuine home, rather than a bustling inn, would be very tempting.”
“Good!” said the Colonel. “That is settled then. Perhaps you should all like to get settled in now? Mrs Lambton will show you what accommodations we may dispose, while I step across to the Office and tell them not to expect me back today. I will send an orderly across with your bags while I am there. I am sure the ladies will have many things to talk about, many things to discuss and compare, and, perhaps, some shopping to do, and when I get back, perhaps you would care to join me in a turn about the town, Mr Bennet? The natives take great pride in it, and, while not one myself, I may be able to point out one or two sights that you would otherwise have missed.”
He was as good as his word, conducting me all about the town, pointing out the ancient gates in the walls, the picturesque ‘chares’ that descend to the Tyne, such landmarks as Trinity House and the courtyard round the back, with its anchor from the Spanish Armada. There seemed to be no great plan to his tour, any more than there seems to be to the town, with modern terraces mixed in with mediaeval stone buildings and Tudor half-timbered houses with their long galleries.
This was particularly evident down by the Quayside, where the mixture of eras was quite marked. We had not had the advantage of arriving in Newcastle by means of the mediaeval bridge, which looks quaint enough, to be sure, and is perched on the much more substantial foundations of the ancient Roman Pons Aelius. Some way upstream from this, we stopped outside a substantial, modern building, with fashionable red bricks and freestone quoining.
“I had best go and smooth the way for tonight,” said the Colonel, “before we go back and make our – or, rather – my peace with the powers that be. Captain Butterfield is a capital fellow, and his wife is a particular friend of mine – and of your Lydia, too, for that matter. I trust you will not find him too much of a rough diamond, however.”
So saying, he rapped upon the door, which was opened almost instantly by a liveried servant.
“Good morning to you, Harrison. Is your master in?”
“They are both in the morning room, sir. I will just announce you and then bring some fresh coffee-cups.”
And he ushered us through a door on the left, into a handsome, elegant, well-lit room where a handsome, elegant, well-lit couple sat behind a polished walnut table.
“Colonel Lambton,” he announced, “and friend.” Before closing the door noiselessly behind him.
It seems to be the fashion in Newcastle just at the moment for gentlemen of mature years to marry ladies very much their junior. I was convinced that the young lady seated next to the red-faced gentleman must be his daughter, but introductions soon disabused me of this notion.
“Permit me to introduce my good friend Mr Bennet,” said the Colonel. “He is Lydia Wickham’s father, come to visit her in her interesting condition. Mrs Bennet and the two Misses Bennet are at present enjoying my Felicity’s entertainment. I shall be sending them on to the other place on Monday morning.”
Our hosts rose to make their bobs, revealing Mrs Butterfield to be a very tall young lady, indeed, almost scraping the ceiling, while not at all resembling the proverbial beanpole but rather a genuine giantess.
My astonishment must have shown in my face, for her husband – himself almost perfectly spherical – chuckled.
“Oh, aye, she’s a big lass and a bonny lass, just like in the song. You should have seen them when her and Mrs Lambton and your Lydia got together, sir (he pronounced this ‘sor’, and his voice betrayed a definitely local accent, but was otherwise perfectly intelligible), when they acted ‘Macbeth’. But that’s it! Not the Three Witches, but the Three Graces! You must bring your wife and daughters to our little entertainment tonight, Mr Bennet. Then one of her sisters can take Lydia’s place in the tableau that our ladies were to put on before the costume grew too tight. We still have the Grecian dresses, I am sure, and I dare say at least one of her sisters is much of a size with Lydia?”
I did my best to cool his enthusiasm, but, placed as we were, it was impossible to prove too inflexible, and we left with plans for the evening fixed in such a fashion as could only be undone by fleeing the city at great offense to all ours – and Lydia’s – acquaintance.
Not for the first time, I asked myself why I had not stayed quietly at home.
That evening found us bowling through the streets in our host’s carriage, Mrs Lambton having used our absence to win Mary’s allegiance by agreeing with the desirability of female education, Kitty’s by lending her a ballgown of striking figured velvet, and Mrs Bennet by extravagant and incessant praise of her daughters.
She seemed to have a talent for that sort of thing, and I found it amusing, for the first hour or so, to watch for her repeating herself in her discourses upon muslin, long sleeves, Paris fashions and every other sort of female frippery.
But none of it led anywhere, any more than the interminable meal we were served, where course upon course succeeded each other in inexorable order from turtle soup to nameless savouries.
“Old Bill Butterfield has really overdone it tonight,” said the Colonel as we filed into the concert room, “but he was never one to worry about spending money, and he’s laying out for Mayor next year. The owner of a dozen colliers can afford it, of course. And I see he’s got a special guest tonight.”
As he said this, our host came through the press, escorting, with much bowing and scraping, a thin, discontented-looking gentleman, who looked neither right nor left at the crowds giving way and bowing on all sides, nor at anything else that was not directly beneath his upturned nose.
I was surprised when this individual stopped by our seats, ignoring all his host’s efforts to propel him towards the front row.
A look of the most ineffable weariness passed across his face, as he turned towards the Colonel and, with a barely perceptible inclination of his head uttered one word.
“Lambton.”
The Colonel’s response was both timed and graduated to a whisker.
“Percy,” he replied, with a nod so minimal I t
hink I would have missed it had I not been so intent.
Then both stood motionless, staring not so much at, as towards each other, until the newcomer turned away and took his long-awaited seat.
Fortunately, I did not long have to contain my curiosity.
“The airs these people give themselves!” exclaimed my companion. “Forced to acknowledge someone else in the room it would not demean him to exchange a word with! We may bear no strawberry leaves, but “Lambton went a fishing in the Wear” a hundred years and more before there was a Percy at Alnwick. But hush! Now we must do our duty to the ladies.”
This ‘duty’ consisted of feigning both interest and delight while Mrs Lambton and Mrs Butterfield shuffled about the floor in front of us in flimsy, flowing draperies, almost transparent and, seemingly, in ever-present danger of detaching themselves from the ladies’ shoulders, to the music of a harp played somewhere in the background.
This proceeding would have been quite sufficiently depressing in itself, but was made even more so by the presence on the dance floor of Kitty, who had been seized upon by the other ladies to substitute for Lydia, who, apparently, was a regular participant in these ‘entertainments’.
I had represented to my daughter that she was under no obligation to take any such part, but her mother had been insistent on her obliging our hosts.
“For just think, Kitty my dear, what better opportunity could you have of catching the eyes of the young gentlemen? These ship owners and mine owners may not be quite the thing, but they are every one as rich as – what was that old king’s name? – as rich as Creosote. And think what a convenience it would be to be settled so near to Lydia!”
“We shall be leaving the day after tomorrow, dear,” I pointed out, in the faint hope that reason might prevail, “so any hearts there are to win will have to be won rather quickly. And should you really like to have another daughter settled at the far end of the country?”
More Sport for our Neighbours Page 14