Jane and the Genius of the Place

by Stephanie Barron

  “Lizzy assured me that you would wish to attend the inquest,” he said to me now, over a cooling glass of lemonade, “and I have returned to Godmersham expressly that Henry and I might convey you into Canterbury in the barouche.”

  “You are very good—”

  “Do not tell me that you intend to refuse!” He set down his glass with an emphasis that might have shattered a lesser piece. “Am I to be sent on a fool’s errand every hour of the day?”

  “Of course I should be happy to accompany you into Canterbury,” I said quickly. “I might complete a few purchases towards my toilette, before tonight’s Assembly.”

  “I see that Lizzy was entirely mistaken in your character,” he returned, amused. “She was convinced you should be drawn to the macabre deliberation as a fly to jam.”

  “It is just that I have learned to despise the coroner and his panel, Neddie.”

  “You are acquainted with Mr. Wing?”

  “Of particular coroners I may say nothing. Mr. Wing, and his merits or detractions, are entirely unknown to me, as I am sure you are aware. It is just that every instance of a coroner’s judgement I have seen, has proved so fallacious and, indeed, injurious to the parties concerned, that I dread to countenance another by attending.”

  “Strong words, Jane. Unless I am very much mistaken, Mr. Wing and his panel shall return the only conceivable verdict in the present case.”

  “—That Mrs. Grey was murdered, and by Denys CoUingforth.”

  “Can there be any other construction placed upon events?”

  “You know full well, Neddie, that there can.”

  He was silent a moment.

  “Given how litde we truly comprehend of what was toward, any judgement at present must be the grossest presumption. What is required is time, and sufficient proofs, if the guilty party is to be charged. That must be true whether Mr. CoUingforth is eventually revealed as that party or no.”

  “You are suggesting I should request of Mr. Wing a postponement.”

  “As Justice, you might be heard.”

  “But Valentine Grey is most insistent that the burial be effected at the soonest moment. In this heat, the decay of the corpse must be advanced; and yet the coroner’s panel must view the body before they are empanelled. Any delay will be most unfortunate for all concerned.”1

  “That is true. You must do as you think best, of course.”

  “I must confess that I long for a swift judgement against Collingforth,” he replied with becoming candour. “The man is already fled, and quite unlikely to be discovered; he cannot suffer from the charge. It is the judgement, in fine, that all of Kent expects. Valentine Grey would be appeased. I should feel that I had discharged my duty, and there would be an end to the affair.”

  “Until you found yourself lying wakeful at night, besieged with a thousand doubts as to the body’s disposition,” I said. “Why was it returned to the race-meeting at all, much less to Collingforth’s chaise? That, and an hundred other questions, should plague you until your final hour.”

  “God preserve me from a prescient woman!” Neddie exclaimed. He drew his watch from his waistcoat. “Let us summon the carriage, Jane, and set about the wretched business.”

  WE MADE OUR WAY DOWN THE CANTERBURY ROAD UNDER a blazing sky, with the Stour very low in its banks, and a haze of insects hovering over the bent heads of the meadow flowers. Already a shelf of cloud hung over the Kentish downs, replete with the false promise of a shower; I knew these clouds of old, and dismissed them as false friends. If Napoleon’s hordes had truly embarked for Kent, as the London papers would have it, then Fortune sailed with them. No furious wave should guard the chalk cliffs, or howling wind send the flotilla to oblivion; the French might make the crossing unharassed but for the few leaking, timeworn vessels of the Royal Navy’s Channel fleet.

  As Neddie’s bays jingled their harness, and snorted at the dust, I considered of my brother Frank, and the daily perils he endured. His circumstances must be uppermost in my thoughts, far more than the invasion’s threat to Kent; for if the Navy were overwhelmed, and Frank cut down by a French gun, it mattered little what hole we bolted to. The Kingdom would capitulate in a matter of days.

  Such a surge of melancholy was unlike my usual spirits, and I detected the effect of the oppressive weather— the lurking, ominous portent of the heat, as though even the air above Kent awaited the thunder of cannon. Activity was the best remedy for such thoughts; but the fever of packing was done, the delights of dressing for the Assembly still ahead; I could hardly do better than to expend my energies in a trip to town.

  Canterbury is a place that I have known and admired for almost half my life. Its soaring fortifications, so thick that ten men might walk abreast, and the spires of its venerable cathedral rising above its prosperous shops and houses, must proclaim its storied place in English history. Crowds of the penitent and the hopeful still choke the narrow streets on high holy days, while those who would profit by the pious, hawk their relics and bits of the True Cross under the shadow of the cathedral gates.

  It was to the West Gate we proceeded this morning, for tho’ the Canterbury gaol is some miles distant, in Longport, the constabulary’s offices are housed hard by the gate, in a crabbed and swaybacked Tudor building desperately in want of whitewash. A few steps along the street stood the Hound and Tooth, where the inquest was to be held.

  “We shall call for you at White Friars, in two hours’ time,” Henry assured me. This was the elegant house belonging to Mrs. Knight, Neddie’s adoptive mother, not far from the cathedral close. I was always happy to visit Mrs. Knight, who had shown such good sense in reverting Godmersham to my brother well in advance of her own death; for she had been willed a life interest in the estate, and might have presided in Lizzy’s place a decade or more. In Canterbury, however, she might learn all the news of her friends without stirring a step from her door; she had the comforts of ready provision, without the care of an estate.

  “White Friars, in two hours’ time,” I repeated, and Henry handed me from the barouche. I watched the coachman’s impatient progress down the crowded High Street, until the carriage had turned in at the Hound and Tooth’s stableyard; then my gaze drifted back along bow-windowed shopfronts and came to rest upon the curtained first floor of Delmar’s Rooms. Here was the scene of this evening’s ball—where Mrs. Grey, and all her deceits, should be forgot for a time. Tho’ my purse had grown thin from so protracted a visit in Kent, I intended to make as fine an appearance as my means and years would allow. A new pair of long silk gloves, at the very least, was quite essential—and perhaps an ornament for my hair. I turned with a little skip of pleasure, and went in search of the linendraper.

  “MISS AUSTEN! JANEF’

  The voice was Harriot Bridges’s—so very like Lizzy’s, and yet lacking her languid elegance. Harriot, tho’ four-and-twenty, retained all the claims of youth, and might betray the breathlessness of sixteen in her accent. She hastened down the length of the draper’s shop, still clutching a card of lace, and embraced me as an old friend.

  “Harriot! You are blooming. And does my sister accompany you?” I enquired, with real pleasure. All resemblance to Lizzy ended in her sister’s voice; for Harriot’s hair was a light brown, and her eyes were blue—where Lizzy was a graceful column, Harriot was a cheerful rolling-pin.

  “She does not, I am sorry to say. You find me quite alone—excepting my brother, Mr. Bridges, who consented to drive me into town. But how delightful to find you here! Have you completed your purchases? And what do you think of this lace? I confess it is rather dear—but quite bewitching, when I consider of my drab old gown. I might sew it along the flounce in a quarter-hour, and feel myself the queen of the Assembly!”

  I had learned long ago that Harriot rarely required an answer, or valued an opinion; she was content to swim in an easy flow of conversation that was as unconsidered as it was constant; and so I merely smiled, and nodded, and hovered at her elbow, while she fli
tted among the shop’s fine stuffs like a bee in a full-blown border. It was part of her enchantment to be as wanting in guile as a child; men found her rosy plumpness and inveterate good humour utterly bewitching; she was constantly in request among the wide acquaintance she cultivated in Kent. It was merely a wonder, I thought as I found her laughing over a length of sprigged muslin, that she had not been snatched up by Captain Woodford long ago.

  “And how does Mr. Bridges?”

  Harriot pulled a face. “Very ill, indeed. He is fretful and tiresome and hovers about the house until I think I shall run mad! It would be one thing if my brother managed some pleasant conversation—if he endeavoured, at least, to be charming—but he mutters barely a word, and only then when he is spoken to. I thought Cassandra might have the taming of him—he was prodigiously civil to her last week, and seemed to exert himself a little, as he rarely does when we are just a family at home—but he has fallen mumpish of late, and can barely be stirred to exercise his horse. Did I not know Edward, indeed, I should think him to be suffering from a Dreadful Presentiment.”

  “A Dreadful Presentiment?”

  Harriot looked over her shoulder, and attempted an air of gravity. “He seems a man goaded past endurance, Jane. He can neither submit to the confinement of the Farm, nor find courage to venture beyond it. He has not been farther than the lane into the Park, in fully two days!”

  “How extraordinary.” Mr. Bridges was the sort of gendeman who was never to be found at home. Fishing, playing at cricket, cocking, or riding were his usual pursuits; but Harriot’s description suggested he was ill. “He consented to drive you into town today, however?”

  “On account of Mrs. Grey’s inquest. My brother was most insistent that he should attend—the duty of a clergyman, he said, tho’ I believe that is so much stuff. When has Edward ever considered the duties of a clergyman before his own comfort?”

  There would be no proper answer to such a comment; and the speaker being Harriot, happily none was expected. But her words must give me cause to wonder. Edward Bridges was behaving like a man in fear for his life—and his behaviour might be marked from the very day of Mrs. Grey’s death. He bore watching.

  “Does Mr. Bridges intend the Assembly this evening?”

  “Oh, yes—as does Captain Woodford!” Harriot cried, her countenance reddening.

  “Captain Woodford? You astonish me, Harriot. From his aspect yesterday, I was certain he should be mounted in a beacon post somewhere along the coast, searching the horizon with his one good eye, and single-handedly in defence of the French.”

  “How can you speak of him so?” she said reproachfully. “I am sure I can offer him nothing but respect. Such wounds as he has suffered—”

  “Yes, yes,” I rejoined, “but only consider how ludicrous, Harriot! At one moment the Guards would have us dismande entire estates, and in the next, they are dashing about the floor of Delmar’s Rooms, as tho’ Buonaparte might be bested in a quadrille!”

  “Captain Woodford assured me that it was a question of honour,” Harriot told me stiffly. “General Lord Forbes would not have the populace alarmed, by an appearance of anxiety on the part of his men.”

  “How like a man of the General’s talents,” I muttered, thinking of Neddie’s sainfoin harvest put to burn; but the irony must be lost on Harriot.

  I PARTED FROM LLZZY’S SISTER IN THE HLGH, AND TOOK my separate way to the circulating library. I selected one of Maria Edgeworth’s novels—Castle Rackrent—then turned my steps towards Mrs. Knight at White Friars, a quarter-hour before my brothers were expected. I might sit for a decent interval with the older woman, and regale her with Fanny’s exploits and the progress of my nephew Edward’s cold, without prolonging the visit beyond what was comfortable.

  To my surprise, however, the housemaid informed me that Mrs. Knight was not at home. I was enough an intimate of White Friars, however, that I was invited very civilly within, and offered a glass of wine and a slice of lemon cake. When Neddie and Henry called to claim me, I was thus established in all the splendour of an empty apartment, with an aspect giving out on a late-August garden, quite engrossed in my book.

  “This is living fine, indeed,” Neddie cried. “Poor Collingforth is charged with murder, and you can do nothing but consume a quantity of cake!”

  I closed my book and surveyed him narrowly. “Lizzy has informed me that you are invariably peevish when suffering the pangs of hunger. Call for some more cake, I beg, and tell me of the inquest. Was Mr. Grey in evidence?”

  “He arrived in haste, some moments after the jury had viewed the remains of his wife. Mr. Wing, our coroner, actually called Grey to the stand—but he could offer littie concerning his wife’s death, beyond attesting that he was absent from the country at the time.”

  “And did Mr. Wing enquire as to his movements?”

  “He did not. A gendeman’s word, after all, is his bond.” Neddie could affect the ironical nearly as well as myself. His own man in London, it seemed, had not yet returned with the desired intelligence.

  ‘You presented the note?”

  “And had the pleasure of witnessing Mrs. Collingforth called. The coroner thought it necessary she should attest to her husband’s hand—which she did, albeit in an inaudible tone. She looked very ill.”

  “She fainted,” Henry supplied.

  “Of course she did,” I returned impatiently. “It was expected by everyone in attendance. But I am astonished that she should admit to recognising the hand. Even the most truthful of wives might be forgiven a prevarication, in such a cause.”

  “Perhaps Laetitia Collingforth has other feelings, somewhat less expected in a wife,” Neddie suggested delicately.

  “Such as—a desire for revenge against her husband?”

  “She has been made to look a fool before her neighbours.”

  “True,” I said. “But what of the letter in French, discovered within the scandalous novel, Neddie? Did Mr. Grey still maintain that it was sent by a courier?”

  “Of course. Any other admission—such as the existence of yet another lover—should serve to cloud the waters. For whatever reason, Mr. Grey desired a swift conclusion to the day’s events. He was not inspired to confuse the coroner’s judgement. And as we know, Jane, Mrs. Grey did receive a courier.”

  “—Tho’ not on the shores of Pegwell Bay,” I mused.

  “You have neglected to mention the lad,” Henry prodded.

  Neddie frowned. “It cannot hope to serve Collingforth’s case. But perhaps Henry should inform you, Jane. I had stepped out when the lad was called.”

  “The lad?”

  “An undergroom of James Wildman’s,” Henry supplied. “He had been left to hold the horse while Wildman circulated among the crowd. He was positioned only a hundred yards, perhaps, from our own coach.”

  “I remember Mr. Wildman’s equipage,” I said; and indeed, the dark blue fittings of the carriage’s interior were elegant in the extreme, as suited the master of Chilham Castle.

  “The lad professes to have seen a gentleman unknown to him, enter Collingforth’s chaise.”

  “Could he describe this person?”

  “He could not,” Henry said, “and being just then distracted by some orders of Wildman’s, he did not observe the gentleman to depart. Some time later, when he chanced to look again at Collingforth’s chaise, it was to find Mrs. Grey on the point of quitting the interior— presumably after her conference with Collingforth himself.”

  “Or the unknown gentleman,” I said thoughtfully. “And is this boy to be credited?”

  Henry shrugged. “Wildman would have it that he comes of a respectable family, in the Castle’s employ these many years, and that he has never been known for a fanciful nature.”

  “How very odd,” I said slowly. “It is as tho’ Collingforth’s chaise was to let for the use of any number of passersby. Are we to assume, then, that Mrs. Grey was acquainted with the stranger? And that she met him by design within the borr
owed chaise?”

  “I should not be surprised to hear it,” Neddie replied. “Nothing that lady did while alive can seem extraordinary now in death. She was accustomed to liberties and behaviours that, in another, might seem inexplicable.”

  “What did the coroner make of the stable lad’s words?”

  “Very litde, it would seem, since he returned a verdict against Mr. Collingforth.”

  “Recollect, Jane, that all this is said to have occurred before the final heat,” Henry observed, “when Collingforth is known to have been at the cockpit, in company with his friend Everett. He was seen and recognised there by a score of his acquaintance; but, of course, it is immaterial where Collingforth was when Mrs. Grey was yet alive.”

  “It is clear, nonetheless, that despite her husband’s protests, there is a man in Mrs. Grey’s case,” I declared. “That man is hardly Denys Collingforth. Wildman’s groom should have recognised so near a neighbour. We must apply ourselves, Neddie, to learning the name of the Unknown Cicisbeo without further delay.”

  “Why should you exert yourself, Jane, for a rogue like Collingforth?” my brother asked me curiously. “He is dissolute, nearly ruined by gaming and drink, and he is said to treat his wife abominably. You are hardly even acquainted, and can certainly bear him no affection.”

  “But I am increasingly convinced that someone has endeavoured to place his neck in a noose,” I replied, “and I cannot bear to think that such malevolent cunning should go undetected, much less unpunished. That is all. Call it a simple desire for justice, if you will.”

  “Or the desire to outwit a foe,” he retorted. “I swear you might almost be a man at times. No wonder you are the despair of our mother, Jane.”

  “She may have Cassandra to console her,” I said. And smiled.

  1 It was considered necessary for a coroner’s jury to view the corpse, in order to form a judgment about the manner of death. This practice was later abolished, and replaced with medical examiners’ sworn testimony.—Editor’s note.