I chose to sidestep this swamp of politics, being country-bred and of Tory stock myself; I should leave the navigation of Whig waters to Henry, who was adept at playing every side to advantage. “But what can be Lady Caroline’s purpose in remaining in Brighton?”
“She intends to plague poor Byron—so much is certain. He will not meet her in London if he can help it—deliberately avoids every rout or ball that Caro is pleased to attend—and is forever in Lady Oxford’s keeping. Caro employs an army of pages deployed upon the streets, expressly for divining other people’s business; from one she learnt that Byron quitted London on horseback late Saturday, intending to do a bit of sailing in Brighton. He has come down from Town some once or twice in recent weeks, drawn by the lure of the sea, and keeps a room at the King’s Arms, I believe, against just such whimsical excursions.”
Or drawn, I thought, by the ingenuous charms of Catherine Twining, of whom neither Lady Oxford nor Caro Lamb has yet an inkling of.
“Learning of his departure,” Mona persisted, “nothing must suit Caro then but that she should rattle down the New Road in her perch phaeton, with only her tyger up behind her, on Sunday! There has never been a propriety she feared to flaunt; and this is the result of it. She must have set out while it was yet dark, to achieve the shingle at the hour she did. But that is Caro Lamb all over—careless of opinion and sense.”
“—And mad as Bedlam into the bargain,” added Lord Swithin. “I confess I was not sorry to see her quit our house almost as soon as she entered it—having gained a foothold, she might have stayed all summer.”
“—Forcing us to flee delightfully to the Lakes,” his wife murmured, with one of her sidelong glances. “But no matter. Having seen Caro plunge after him into the sea, Byron will wish nothing more to do with boats or sailing for a time, and has probably already bolted back to St. James’s.”
“You believe that he knew her ladyship, then?” Henry demanded. “—That Lord Byron did not mistake her clothing and appearance for that of a boy, and sailed on in ignorance as tho’ the merest stranger had hailed him?”
“Certainly he knew his pursuer for Caroline Lamb,” Swithin replied, “and was willing to let her try her strength against the sea. Lord Byron knows her ladyship to be indestructible. Little Mania, he calls her; and claims she haunts his very dreams, like a virago. One can hardly blame him for coldness; anything else should be read by Caro as encouragement.”
“But I cannot forgive his lordship’s total indifference,” I protested. “To push resolutely forward, while the poor creature was o’erwhelmed by the waves—suggests a cold-heartedness of which no poet ought to be capable.”
“You would have Byron stand by the spirit of what he writes?” Mona enquired, as the bell was rung for dinner.
“A poet ought to be all sensibility—else he should better engage in political speeches, which nobody bothers to believe. Lord Byron’s verse offers every range of emotion—ardour, violence, the bitterest loss—but his behaviour yesterday betrays a coldness of inhuman proportions.”
“Caro Lamb is inhuman in her proportions,” Swithin corrected. “No girl can be so thin, and yet survive; I am with Byron—and believe her to be a walking Wraith.”
“Charles!” his wife cried. “Confess that you admired her, in her first Season! Indeed, I understood you nearly offered for her!”
“A pitiable ploy, my darling, to pique your interest. You were decidedly averse to my suit in those days.”
Desdemona pursed her lips to prevent herself from laughing; for indeed, she had treated poor Swithin abominably when she was but eighteen.
“Caro Lamb’s persistence should drive any man mad,” the Earl concluded. “Moreover, it suggests a passion for self-abasement—and that cannot be admired. She is like a dog that craves to be whipped, and is forever kicked instead. Had George saved her from drowning, as I did, he should never be rid of her!”
“Then let us hope Caro does not transfer her affections to you,” Desdemona said teasingly, “out of bottomless gratitude.”
“If she does, my darling, you have my hearty consent to toss her back into the sea!”
“Charles, you are the greatest beast in nature. Is he not, Mr. Austen?”
The Countess, despite her words, was gazing at her husband with immense good humour. She slipped her arm through Henry’s. “I think I shall allow you to escort me into dinner!”
15 Raggett’s was a gentleman’s club opened by the proprietor of the exclusive (and Tory-affiliated) White’s Club in London. At Raggett’s the aristocratic Regency gentleman might secure all the comforts of Pall Mall while exiled in Brighton—gaming, privacy, and a neat dinner free of women.—Editor’s note.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Cut Dead
MONDAY, 10 MAY 1813
BRIGHTON, CONT.
STRAINS OF MUSIC DRIFTED FROM THE ASSEMBLY ROOMS as we mounted the Castle’s stairs, and the entry was crowded with young ladies in white muslin, gentlemen in satin knee breeches, and duennas of imposing gravity determined to protect the virtue of their charges. We were to part from the Earl and his lady at the Assembly Room doors, where the Swithins intended to form a part of the glittering throng; and as Henry and I turned from the brightly-lit room—hundreds of candles being illuminated in chandeliers suspended from the lofty ceiling—I was greeted in a barely audible accent by my young acquaintance, Miss Catherine Twining.
She looked all the youthfulness of her fifteen years, a slight figure beside the imposing height and breadth of her father, the General; the white muslin she wore made her skin appear sallow; but her dark hair and eyes were as lovely as ever. Only a natural flush to her cheeks and an appearance of joy common to one of the Season’s first Assemblies, were utterly lacking—Catherine, I perceived, was not in spirits this evening.
I begged the honour of making her known to our friends—performed the introduction of Earl and Countess, to Catherine’s pleased confusion; and joined my thanks to Lady Swithin for our delightful evening, with my brother Henry’s.
“I shall call upon you first thing, my dear Miss Austen, to give you an account of the ball,” Desdemona promised, twinkling; and then her lord swept her into the Rooms, which were as full as they could hold.
“How very fashionable the Countess is, and how very kind the Earl,” Catherine Twining breathed. “He looks most truly the gentleman.”
She may have compared him to the unfavourable memory of Lord Byron; or perhaps to that of her more determined suitor—for a second glance at the crowd mounting the stairs behind General Twining revealed Mr. Hendred Smalls. He formed a third in the Twining party, and had no doubt already claimed several of Catherine’s dances.
She made so bold, however, as to renew our acquaintance; pressed her father to acknowledge my brother Henry; extended the honour to Mr. Hendred Smalls, who bared his unfortunate teeth; and concluded breathlessly, in a lowered voice meant for my ears alone, “Oh, Miss Austen, are you indeed attending? Might I hope to speak with you in the interval between dances? For you must know, I am all of a quake!”
“My state of mourning prevents me entirely from joining the Assembly; but I shall sadly miss your society, Miss Twining.” And I confess I did regret retiring to my bedchamber; the music was infectious, my foot was tapping out a reel. “What has occurred, my dear, to discompose you so?”
“He is here!” she breathed. “Do but glance through the doors, and you shall espy him leaning against a column, for all the world as tho’ he were not in the habit of abducting unwilling females! I had thought him returned for good to London! Am I never to be free of his society?”
“Lord Byron shall hardly attempt to seduce you in the middle of a ball.” I was amused despite myself. But Miss Twining was too agitated for ill-applied humour.
“Oh, Miss Austen, do you think it possible he has published my shame to all of Brighton? Am I entirely exposed? Is it likely I shall enter the Assembly, only to be cut dead by all my acquaintance?”
“Hush, my child!” I glanced with a casual air through the doorway. As the sumptuously-dressed throng shifted and parted before my dazzled eyes, I caught a glimpse of a classic profile, a sweep of dark curls, a snowy cravat carelessly tied. Lord Byron leaned negligently against the wall, his lame right foot crossed over his left, one hand tucked into the breast of his coat. A branch of candles, flickering in the great room’s draughts, threw his face half in shadow—as romantical a picture as any poet could desire. As I watched, he leaned to whisper in the ear of another gentleman—a tall, thin exquisite with receding hair. Both men smiled.
“His lordship is engrossed in conversation, and it does not appear that anyone has cut him dead,” I observed.
“That is only Mr. Scrope Davies, who has been intimate with Byron for ages,” Catherine retorted. “I am sure he is already in possession of every detail—indeed, it was probably his cravat I choked on in my misery; Mr. Davies is a dandy, you know, and ruins a score of freshly-ironed cravats each morning, before his valet declares the last to be perfection.”
I suppressed a smile. “Recollect that Lord Byron cannot publish an iota of your unfortunate encounter without bringing the whole world’s indignation on his own head. You may rest easy, Miss Twining—indeed you may. Do but remain by your father’s side, and all shall be well. You are certainly safe from dancing with his lordship.”
“True, he never dances,” Catherine said despairingly. “Not even with Lady Caroline Lamb.”
I gazed at her in astonishment. “You are acquainted with Lady Caroline?”
“Not at all,” Catherine admitted. “All the world is aware of her connexion with Lord Byron. It is said that he forbade her to waltz at Almack’s, because he could not bear to see her in the arms of another; and that she submitted to the prohibition!”
“We may assume Lady Caroline is waltzing again,” I said drily, “Lord Byron having formed a rival attachment.”
Catherine flushed. “I think her a very dashing female,” she said wistfully. “Quite out of the common way. I should like to have a glimpse of her. Did you know that she is come to Brighton?”
“I had heard as much, yes.”
“But oh, Miss Austen—” this was becoming a refrain with Miss Twining, rather as tho’ she had learnt it from a novel—“I am ready to sink! Papa shall retire to the card room as soon as the first dance is struck up; and I shall be consigned to the care of Mrs. Silchester. She is Papa’s chosen chaperon on every occasion, having been at school with dear Mamma; but she shrinks from offending the gentlemen. You saw how little her protection availed me with Colonel Hanger—and this is Byron! Could I not accompany you to your rooms, and sit with you for a little while?”
I studied the hectic looks of my young friend—the wide, startled eyes—and saw that she had worked herself into a nervous passion. “You are looking far too pretty to give up an Assembly, Miss Twining, and should be wasted on the closed air of my rooms!”
“Catherine!” the General’s voice called peremptorily from behind his daughter.
“Could you not stay a little?” she pressed in an urgent whisper.
“Even were I of a mind to sit down throughout, I am told that the Master of Ceremonies—Mr. Forth, is it not?—is very strict in observing the proprieties. I should not wish to excite his censure.”
“No—that is, I quite understand—”
“Catherine!” the General barked. “You are not attending! Make your excuses to your friend—Mr. Smalls awaits your pleasure!”
“Coming, Papa.” Catherine made her curtsey. “May I call upon you tomorrow, Miss Austen?”
“—And relate every detail of your Success. I shall be in the Castle’s writing room at one o’clock. I absolutely forbid you to be abroad any earlier—after the fatigues of the Assembly, you shall require a late morning.”
“I shall depend upon finding you.” And with one last, speaking look, Catherine Twining hurried off to place her flower-like hand in the crabbed paw of Mr. Hendred Smalls.
“WHY IS THE GENERAL DETERMINED TO THROW AWAY HIS daughter upon that aging cleric?” I demanded of my brother as we mounted the stairs to our rooms. “Were she a lady of my age—long since upon the shelf, and every prospect of romance blasted—I should understand his grasping at the most grotesque fellow who offered; but to thrust poor Catherine—who has everything to recommend her: youth, birth, and beauty—at a man who has none of these, is beyond my comprehension!”
“Do not be offering her a place in our curricle, Jane,” Henry warned as he paused before my door.
“I shall be as firm as you desire.”
“Our journey home shall be sadly flat,” he sighed, “without the prospect of duels or abduction to lend it spice.”
———
THE MUSIC AND BUSTLE THROUGHOUT THE CASTLE BEING likely to keep me awake some hours, I settled down to pen this account in my journal; and as my candle guttered low, and the cessation of the instruments suggested supper was being served, I stirred up Betsy’s excellent fire, replenished my candlestick, and got into bed to read by the dim light. The improving nature of the text—I had selected a volume of sermons in deference to Recent Events of a Melancholy Turn—was unequal to the fatigue of so advanced an hour; my mind was prone to wander. Laughter and hubbub drifted up from the Assembly Rooms, and I had an idea of the overheated girls, catching a chill as they moved from ballroom to supper, picking at their ices and smoked salmon. Catherine should yet be among them; I hoped for her sake that Lord Byron had quitted the rooms at an early hour, and that Mr. Smalls had retired, as the elderly must, to the card room—leaving the object of his fancy to more suitable partners. Poor Catherine! To be caught between the rage of the poet, and the simpering of the clergyman!
What she required, I thought, was a simple, bracing sportsman like my brother Edward had been. Henry, indeed, was confident that just such a suitor must appear. But what if the Unknown came too late? Jane, Jane, I scolded myself as I snuffed out my candle near two o’clock, when at last the sounds of revelry had died from the rooms and streets below—You ought to have nothing to do with the child’s troubles. But Lord Byron had decided that; it was his abduction that had ensnared me.
TUESDAY, 11 MAY 1813
“SUCH A SCENE, MY DEAR MISS AUSTEN, YOU CAN NEVER have witnessed!”
Lady Swithin threw back her head—which bore a pert little jockey bonnet this morning, worn with a spencer of French twill—and crowed with laughter. “Caro Lamb, with a circlet on her brow, a robe fit for a Greek chorus, sandals, and her toenails painted with gold leaf. She stopped all conversation dead when she appeared in the Assembly Rooms; and I am certain one of the violinists snapped a string, from the resounding twang! that greeted her arrival.”
“But she was known to be a guest of the Regent’s,” I observed reasonably. “I suppose she may attend the local ball, if she chuses.”
“It was not Caro, so much as her appearance! I do not think she could have aroused greater comment had she paraded through the Assembly naked. She was determined to figure as Lord Byron’s Attic Muse—the breathing heart of Childe Harold. When instead, as poor Swithin observed, she succeeded merely in suggesting a Cyprian Goddess.”
By this, of course, Lady Swithin meant a harlot.
“And Lord Byron?” I enquired.
“—Was a veritable picture of Persecuted Genius. His brow darkened stormily; he threw off all restraining hands; he muttered imprecations in Caro’s general direction; and departed without speaking so much as a word to her.”
“Very ungentlemanly. He thus exposed Lady Caroline to the ridicule of her world; and I cannot admire him for it.”
“No; but you shall be glad of one thing—Caro’s arrival freed your little friend, Miss Twining, from Byron’s pursuit at least! He was most determined last evening. She had only to quit the floor at the close of a dance, and loose the hand of her partner—who might be gone in search of lemonade, or pineapple ice—to be set upon by his lordship, blind t
o all else, and quoting impassioned words over her shrinking form. Poor goosecap, I quite pitied her; Swithin was just such an one, you know, when in the throes of passion for me.”
I had seen Lord Swithin in disappointed Love; he had never approached the diabolical figure who struck terror in Catherine’s heart.
“Then Miss Twining has cause to be grateful to Lady Caroline,” I observed.
“Yes, indeed! And I observed the two ladies conversing, if you will credit it, later that evening—so perhaps your friend found occasion to convey her thanks, however awkward Lord Byron might regard such a conversation, did he know of it. And now I must be off—Swithin has a horse running in the race, you know, and I dare not stay away. I wish you would make another of our party!”
I begged off, having formed a prior engagement; and looked forward to hearing an account of Catherine’s interesting evening from her own lips—but she did not appear in the Castle’s writing room at one o’clock.
I could not wonder at her absence; she must have been abroad very late, and no doubt slept until noon. I had crossed full two sheets to Cassandra with a report of our dinner in Marine Parade, and the hour was advanced, when my brother Henry burst into the panelled chamber. His looks were agitated and his face dreadfully pale.
“Henry!” I cried, starting up. “Are you unwell?”
He glanced around him wildly; I was not the sole occupant of the writing room, and whatever his news might be, it was not intended for a stranger’s ears. I collected my papers swiftly and joined him in the doorway.
“You have not heard,” he murmured, grasping me by the elbow and propelling me towards the Castle’s front door.
“You bear some dreadful news?”
“Catherine Twining. Your acquaintance. It is all over Raggett’s.”
“What scrape has the foolish girl fallen into now? She did not keep her appointment this afternoon.”
“Nor shall she keep any in future, Jane.”
Jane and the Madness of Lord Byron Page 11