Love & Friendship

by Whit Stillman

  Frederica was very wrong to have spoken to Reginald about this matter. Ungrateful for, and uncomprehending of, the efforts her mother was making on her behalf, Frederica closed her mind to a worthy young man while putting at risk her mother’s and Reginald’s cordial relations, so important to them both. Such behaviour is common among girls who have been indulged either too much or too little. I believe that later in life Frederica herself realized this. Reginald DeCourcy might have been handsome, both as a young man and in age, but Sir James was ever cheerful and amusing, whether intentionally or not, and over a long life those qualities come to have great value, in my opinion.

  An interview took place between Lady Susan and Reginald at this point of which we know only the posterior result and comment.

  Afterwards Reginald joined Catherine in the Blue Room, where she was sorting through small trinkets she was preparing as Christmas presents. Though rich, Catherine was neither considerate nor generous; those who frequent such circles know that this seeming paradox is, in fact, quite ordinary.

  “Catherine, I would like to thank you for this visit.”

  Reginald seemed somewhat agitated; there was a slight high colour or blush to his complexion.

  “You are leaving?”

  “Yes, I must.”

  “Why?”

  “As you’ve said it’s important that, at this season, one of us be with our parents.”

  “You’ve just decided this now?”

  “Yes. But before going I must ask one thing: I’d be grateful if you could see justice is done Frederica. She’s a sweet girl who deserves a better fate.”

  “I’m glad you now see her worth.”

  “Yes, my eyes have opened* to many things…”

  Not long after this conversation Frederica, in a visibly distressed state, descended the stairs and approached Catherine in the Gold Room.

  “Aunt, I did something very wrong—”

  “I’m sure not—”

  “No, I did,” Frederica insisted. “And now Mr. DeCourcy and my mother have quarrelled: He is to leave and it is my fault! Mother will never forgive me—”

  “Don’t worry: If any of what you fear comes to pass, I’ll happily intercede…”

  Frederica retreated to her room, just missing her mother as she left hers. Lady Susan carried carefully in her hand a small, neatly-wrapped package.

  “Good afternoon, Catherine. That cough of young Frederic’s worries me—I have from London Dr. Preston’s excellent lozenges. Might you take them for the dear boy?”

  She handed Catherine the small packet, which carried the pleasingly printed motto, “Dr. Preston’s Famous Lozenges for the Cough and Maladies of the Throat.”

  “Yes, thank you,” Catherine said, a lack of sincere gratitude evident.

  “Also, is it true that we will be losing Mr. DeCourcy today?”

  “Yes, it seems that we will be.”

  “How remarkable! When he and I spoke, barely an hour ago, he made no mention of it…”

  Susan examined Catherine’s expression in search of an answer and believed she found it: “But, perhaps he then did not know himself. Young men are so impetuous in their resolutions—”

  “I wouldn’t say Reginald is impetuous—”

  “Oh, yes, he is,” Susan insisted lightly. “He’s like other young men that way: Hasty in making resolutions and then just as quick to unmake them! I would be very surprised if he were not to change his mind and stay.”

  “He seemed quite decided.”

  “Well, we’ll see…” Susan smiled. She started to leave, then stopped. “Some strangeness seems to be affecting Frederica too—I believe the girl’s actually fallen in love, with your brother the object!”

  Soon after this conversation, the same afternoon, Wilson, the butler, knocked at Reginald’s door. Reginald, jacketless, opened it. The country aristocracy of that period conducted themselves with less formality than we do today, an occasionally rough manners-less-ness. The history of manners has been one of steady improvement and increased elegance.

  “Sir, Lady Susan asked if she might have a word with you, if you would be so kind as to visit her in her dressing room.” Wilson bowed and left. Reginald put on his jacket with an expression partly of longing, partly of dread. He slowly descended the stairs to the floor where Lady Susan’s rooms were located and knocked on her door.

  “Come in.” Lady Susan’s voice was weak, as if she had been in tears and was not fully recovered. She rose from her writing table as Reginald entered.

  “I beg your pardon for calling you here, Sir, but I’ve just learned of your intention to leave today. Is that true?”

  “Yes, it is.”

  “You may close the door,” she said, her voice wavering. She took a seat and indicated for Reginald to do so also.

  “I entreat you not, on my account, to shorten your visit by even an hour,” she began. “I am perfectly aware that after what has passed between us it would ill-suit either of us to remain in the same house. But it is I, not you, who should go.”

  “No. Why?”

  Lady Susan raised her hand.

  “My visit has already been inconvenient for your family; for me to stay risks dividing a clan affectionately attached to one another. Where I go is of little consequence”—here the waver in her voice returned—“whereas your presence is important to all.”

  In the Gold Room Catherine’s concern was for Frederica’s situation. Her hands busied with needlework; the great solace of such activities is how they allow the body to disconnect from the mind, normally a jealous tyrant. Reginald appeared in the room, standing in its midst, perfectly still.

  “Reginald, Charles would like to speak with you before you go—”

  “That won’t be necessary.”

  “But… he wanted to speak with you about the hunt.”

  “What I mean is, I will not be leaving. I have decided to stay.”

  “Not go to Parklands?”

  “No. There’s been a terrible mistake.” Reginald looked around as if to ensure that they were entirely alone. “Might I explain?”

  “Yes, certainly, please do.”

  He took a seat.

  “I am afraid I have acted with a discreditable impetuousness. In so doing, I have done Lady Susan an acute injustice. I was entirely mistaken and was on the point of leaving under a false impression. Frederica has misunderstood her mother; Lady Susan means the girl nothing but well—”

  “Obliging her to marry Sir James Martin?”

  “That has been misrepresented; the true problem is that Frederica will not make a friend of her mother—”

  “Not make a friend of her?”

  “Yes—it seems that during Mr. Vernon’s prolonged illness Frederica’s behaviour to her mother turned hostile. Such a posture—resenting a well-meaning parent—is apparently quite common among girls her age. I had no right to interfere—and Miss Vernon was mistaken in applying to me.”

  “But Lady Susan was obliging her to marry—”

  “No, not at all. Frederica completely misunderstood her mother. A misunderstanding which has caused Lady Susan much concern; she has asked me to request the favour of an interview.”

  “An ‘interview’? With me?”

  “Yes. She is still quite discomposed and remains in her dressing room. Might you go to her?”

  “Come in.”

  The reply was pronounced in such a soft and fragile tone Catherine could scarcely make it out. She opened the door; Susan welcomed her with a poignant smile.

  “My brother tells me that you wished to speak,” Catherine said.

  “Yes. Thank you for coming. Please have a seat.”

  When they had both settled at the set of chairs next to the fire, Susan began:

  “Did I not express to you my fond hope that your brother would stay?”

  “Yes. You certainly have an uncanny knack for divining the future where my brother is concerned.”

  “Please don’t resent t
his intuition!” Susan exclaimed, her tone one of sad regret. “I shouldn’t have hazarded any guess had it not, at that moment, occurred to me that his decision followed upon a heated discussion between us regarding Sir James’ presence here. I know that Sir James seems ‘under par’*—to some—his boyish manner and athletic interests, et cetera.”

  “Does that surprise you?”

  “No. It is how Frederica went about making her opposition known—”

  “I believe she feared you would be angry.”

  “I know. But, on the contrary, I applaud her good sense. It surprises and delights me.”

  “You were not aware of it?”

  Susan considered the question. “No, I wasn’t. Frederica rarely does herself justice. Her manner is shy, her habit of mind solitary. Perhaps her father’s indulgent nature spoiled her to a degree; the severity I have had to show since has given her a strange fear of me. This éloignement** between us might have led Frederica to waylay Mr. DeCourcy and beg him to intercede on her behalf—”

  “What other recourse had she?”

  “My God, what must you think of me! Could you possibly believe I was aware how unhappy she was? For any mother our child’s welfare is our first earthly promise and duty!”

  “You didn’t know she disliked Sir James?”

  “I knew he was not the first man she would have chosen if left to her youthful, unformed judgement or, rather, ill-formed from reading the sort of novels that put terms such as ‘Love’ and the like in their titles. What harm such books do! But I was not persuaded her decision was firmly established.”

  Lady Susan paused, then leaned forward to take her sister-in-law into her confidence, a note of sadness again in her voice:

  “There is something I have concealed: Frederica’s applying to Mr. DeCourcy, and his instantly taking her part, hurt me greatly. His disposition is warm and when he came to expostulate with me his compassion was all alive for this ill-used girl! He thought me more to blame than I was, while I considered his interference less excusable than I now find it. When I understood his intention of leaving Churchill I resolved to have an explanation before it was too late. Now that I know the depth of Frederica’s aversion to Sir James I reproach myself for having ever, though innocently, made her unhappy on that score. I shall instantly inform the poor man he must give up all hope of her!”

  Even so many decades after these events it still makes my “blood boil” to read how my uncle was denigrated; thoroughly despisefied. It is no coincidence, I believe, that those who most deprecated Sir James were also those who calumniated Lady Susan and her charming American friend, Mrs. Johnson.

  A ludicrous episode in the spinster authoress’ chronicle recounts a supposed conversation (transposed, of course, into an exchange of letters) between Lady Susan and Mrs. Johnson, said to have taken place just after Lady Susan had regained London that December. It portrays Lady Susan as visiting Alicia at Edward Street (an impossibility since Mr. Johnson had banned her visits there).

  “I call on you for congratulations, my dear! I am again myself—gay and triumphant—”

  “Congratulations!” this account has Mrs. Johnson replying. “How wonderful—”

  “But it’s terrifying how close I came to destruction, only escaping at the last with a degree of insouciance that I must say surprised even me.”

  “Your friends have long known it, my dear—”

  “What friends?” Susan joked; she was certainly aware of her many friends, but she enjoyed flattering Alicia’s privileged position.

  “I pride myself on being the only one, other than yourself, to know the extent of your brilliance.”

  “Thank you; but, there is no danger of Mr. Johnson surprising us?”

  “I am happy to report that Mr. Johnson’s gout has taken him to Bath where, if the waters are favourable, he’ll be laid up many weeks.”

  The idea of Alicia Johnson’s making such a statement is malicious invention; among other things Mr. Johnson detested Bath, considering Tunbridge Wells more respectable.

  “It started with Frederica,” Lady Susan began, “who, in the grip of a madness of some kind, entreated Reginald to intercede on her behalf—as if I were some unkind mother not wanting the best for my child! Reginald appeared at my rooms with an expression of the utmost solemnity to inform me of the impropriety of allowing Sir James Martin to court Frederica! I tried to joke him out of it but he refused to be. When I calmly required an explanation, begging to know by what he was impelled, by whom commissioned, to reprimand me he then told me—mixing in a few ill-timed compliments—that my daughter had acquainted him with some circumstances which gave him ‘great uneasiness’—”

  “Heavens, is he really so pompous?”

  “The pomposity I assume; it’s the disloyalty which outrages me. If he held me in true regard he would not believe such insinuations in my disfavour. A worthy lover should assume one has unanswerable motives for all one does!”

  “Certainly—”

  “Where was the resentment which true love requires against those who defame one’s beloved? And she a child, a chit, without talent or education, whom he had been well taught to despise? I was calm for a time but the greatest forbearance may be overcome. He endeavoured—long endeavoured—to soften my resentment but at length left as deeply provoked as I was.”

  Obviously this account is gravely distorted; Lady Susan was devoted to her daughter as she stated on many occasions. Note how the clever (though not in a sense anyone could admire), unscrupulous authoress seeks to give an aura of “Truth” to her version by interweaving with it actual conversations.

  “Scarcely an hour had gone by when I learned Reginald was leaving Churchill,” Susan said (according to this version). “Something had to be done; condescension was necessary though I abhor it. I sent for Reginald; when he appeared the angry emotions which had marked his countenance were partly subdued. He seemed astonished at the summons, and looked as if half-wishing, half-fearing to be softened by what I might say—”

  “With what admiration can I imagine the result!”

  “The outcome justifies some portion of vanity, my dear, for it was no less favourable than immediate.”

  “You brilliant creature!”

  “How delightful to watch the variations of his countenance while I convinced him of his error! To see the struggle between returning tenderness and the remains of doubt. There is something very agreeable in feelings so easily worked on. Yet this Reginald, whom a very few words from me softened at once into the utmost submission, and rendered more attached, more devoted than ever, would have left me in the first angry swelling of his proud heart without deigning to seek an explanation!”

  “How outrageous—and yet, I’m afraid, characteristic of their sex…”

  “Humbled as he now was, I found it hard to forgive him this eruption of pride. I wondered whether I ought to punish him by dismissing him at once—or by marrying and teasing him forever.”

  “Marry him! A man so easily influenced is to be treasured.”

  “As for Frederica, with her little rebellious heart and indelicate feelings, throwing herself on the protection of a young man she scarcely knew—her impudence and his credulity equally astound me. So now, my dear, I have many tasks: I must punish Frederica for her application to Reginald, and punish him for receiving it so favourably; torment my sister-in-law for the insolent triumph of her manner; and make myself serious amends for the humiliations I’ve been obliged to undergo.”

  “Where will you start?”

  “I believe I owe it to myself to quickly complete the match between Frederica and Sir James after having so long intended it. As you know, flexibility of mind is not an attribute I’m desirous of obtaining.”

  “But… shouldn’t you think more of yourself, your own interests?”

  “Excuse me?” When surprised this is a manner of asking, what?

  “Why not leave Frederica to the misery of that romantic tender-heartedness whic
h will punish her for the plague she’s given you. Secure DeCourcy for yourself—surely it’s more in your interest to be well-established yourself than to sacrifice everything for the sake of an ungrateful child. My dear, you are far too concerned for the interests of others—not enough for your own.”

  Susan considered this carefully.

  “There is something in what you say.”

  “I have another reason to say it: Manwaring’s in town.”

  “Manwaring! How is he, the divine man?”

  “Absolutely miserable about you and jealous of DeCourcy—to such a degree I can’t answer for his not committing some great imprudence such as following you to Churchill—”

  “Heavens!” Lady Susan exclaimed, according to this account.

  “I think I dissuaded him from it,” Alicia said. “If you do take my advice and marry DeCourcy, it will be indispensable for you to get Manwaring out of the way. Only you have the influence to send him home.”

  Partial truth is Falsehood’s fiercest bodyguard. It might be conceded that portions of the above conversation could have occurred as described; as very good friends, Lady Susan and Alicia had a private language and habit of mind that can be described approximately by the term “humourous.” They liked to spoof the cant and sentiment of those conforming to Society’s insincere verities and the result could be coruscating. But to cite these remarks, out of their context and as if reflecting the true beliefs of two admirable women, is false-witness of the most damnable sort.

  Frederica Vernon had remained at Churchill while her mother was in London. Reginald DeCourcy had stayed also. A strange distance, a barrier, had risen between them, different than the wall of Reginald’s indifference before. On Frederica’s side a sense of guilt followed her betrayal of her mother and her own solemn promise in appealing to Reginald in the disloyal way she had done. Almost certainly it was this guilt and worry which took her to the Churchill church* that day.

  Frederica followed the path through the woods and brambles to get to the church, perhaps unwittingly seeking to punish herself as an occasional thorn pulled at her cloak or scratched her hand. The cloud-covered sky was dark and getting darker, threatening a downpour, with some drops beginning to fall before she reached the shelter of the small church.