Love & Friendship

by Whit Stillman

  “Ah, yes!” Susan agreed. “Thank Heaven for our religion! So important to us in this life, and especially in the next…”

  “Must we really wait? I entreat you to reconsider.”

  At the interview’s end Lady Susan asked Reginald to carry, on her behalf, a letter marked “strictly private” to Mrs. Johnson at Edward Street. The task would also give Reginald the opportunity to thank Alicia for her hospitality the prior evening.

  The Manwarings of Langford

  Lord and Lady Manwaring of Langford, important players in these events, have as yet only been fitfully mentioned. Lucy FitzSmith, an heiress who lost her parents at an early age, had been Mr. Johnson’s ward. Though she was not pretty of face, her silhouette was striking and just the sort to provoke the base passions of some men. So it was perhaps not solely her fortune which attracted Lord Manwaring.

  Edward Manwaring resembled Lady Susan’s late father, the Earl, in habits and manner if not looks. There could be no comparing the shape of their eyes, but they both had the aristocratic knack for losing whatever funds came to hand. Like Mrs. Cross’ late husband, Mr. Cross, Lord Manwaring “invested”—but his investments were in horses and cards rather than tottering Scottish banks or plummeting East India Company stock. The end result was the same, but Manwaring’s enjoyment was far more: Horses are beautiful, their speed striking, while worthless notes and certificates make poor souvenirs.

  Cards and the vagaries of chance have long fascinated the grand and, for us as boys, Lord Manwaring was grandeur defined, grandeur deified, evident in his every look and movement, even the fold of his clothes. As a friend of Uncle James and long resident at Martindale, he was often seen but rarely heard. This silent manner greatly impressed the young: One imagined great thoughts not being expressed; normally one’s elders speak too much. My young cousin Frederic Martin hero-worshipped Manwaring and even grew to resemble him physically—admiration and emulation sometimes having that effect.

  Whatever qualities Lord Manwaring did have were lost on Mr. Johnson, for whom order, propriety, and respectability were life’s objectives and from which he veered only once. Mr. Johnson was expert in detecting the irregularities on a balance-sheet, a circumstance not favourable for Miss FitzSmith’s suitor. The cult of “Respectability” now dominant in our land but then still in its infancy, has, in my view, little to do with our Christian faith. Mr. Johnson opposed his ward’s engagement from interested motives, matters of income, rent, and debt. Upon her marrying Manwaring he resolved to “throw her off” forever and this estrangement lasted well over two years.

  Lord Manwaring had not really minded his wife in the early months of their union; she, in turn, had been careful not to alienate him, even inviting his younger sister, Miss Maria, to stay at Langford. Though Miss Manwaring was not the easiest young lady with whom to get along, Lady Manwaring managed to do so. So perhaps it is true that it was Lady Susan’s sojourn at Langford that started the spiral into jealousy and unreason that finally put Lady Manwaring’s marriage, and mind, in jeopardy.

  The day before Lady Susan met with Reginald, Lady Manwaring had arrived in London with two servants in tow and her mind unhinged. The next afternoon she arrived at the Johnsons’ in Edward Street shockingly discomposed.

  “I’m in such a state! Excuse me, I don’t know what to say…” she said, a sob rising in her throat. “Is Mr. Johnson at home? I must speak with my Guardian!”

  “Yes, yes, of course. You poor dear! I’ll let him know you’re here.”

  Alicia led her into the salon and opened the door to Mr. Johnson’s library.

  “Lucy Manwaring is here to see you…”

  “Mr. Johnson!” Lady Manwaring howled and lunged past Alicia into the library. “You must help! You must help me! Manwaring’s left!”

  “Yes, please go in,” Alicia said and closed the door, but bent her ear to the conversation within:

  “Dear Lucy, please, calm yourself,” Mr. Johnson was saying. “Here, take a seat.”

  “He’s with her now!”

  “Tell me what’s happened.”

  “Manwaring’s left! He visits her!”

  Alicia was still leaning close to the door when William, the footman, entered.

  “Madam, Mr. DeCourcy.”

  Reginald appeared.

  “Oh, good day.”

  “Mr. DeCourcy!”

  Though taken aback by Reginald’s inopportune arrival, she moved quickly to intercept him.

  “What a surprise to see you!” she said. “So kind of you to call.”

  “I must thank you for last evening,” Reginald said, “for setting matters right. Lady Susan has explained everything. I’m ashamed to have spoken as I did. It was foolish of me—”

  “No, no, not at all—most sympathetic,” Alicia said, manoeuvring to block his further advance. “But you didn’t have to come to thank me; courtesy did not dictate it.”

  “In fact it’s not my sole motive: Lady Susan has entrusted me with a letter for you.”

  Reginald proffered it with an elegant gesture.

  “‘Strictly private,’” Alicia read. “How intriguing.”

  At this point a scarcely-human, high-pitched plaint pierced the door.

  “Has an animal been injured?!” Reginald asked in alarm.

  “Private theatricals. Medea,” Alicia said, citing the Greek play.* “They perform next week but prefer not to be watched rehearsing,” she added while escorting him towards the door, away from the library. “Thank you again for the charming evening.”

  At precisely this moment Lady Manwaring burst from the library, followed by Mr. Johnson.

  “She’s with him now!” she wailed. “This can’t continue! It mustn’t—”

  “Lucy, please don’t!” Mr. Johnson urged. “Stay here, rest, recover your equanimity—”

  “Equanimity!? They’re together now!” Lady Manwaring grasped Mr. Johnson’s hands. “I implore you—come with me, talk with Manwaring, reason with him. As my Guardian, won’t you help?—”

  “Even if I found them, what good could be done?”

  Alicia stepped in their direction, “Yes, heed Mr. Johnson, his counsel is excellent in such matters—”

  “What have you? A letter in her hand?!” Lady Manwaring shrieked and lunged to snatch it from her.

  “Return that letter, Madam!” Reginald exclaimed. “It is not for you.”

  Lady Manwaring was already breaking the letter’s seal.

  “Lucy, no!” Mr. Johnson called. Both gentlemen still adhered to the code of respecting the confidentiality of correspondence—just before disgracefully abandoning it.

  With a quick movement Reginald took the letter from Lady Manwaring.

  “Excuse me, Madam, but I believe you were on the verge of making a grave error. You are Lady Manwaring? Lady Manwaring of Langford? You have undoubtedly recognized your friend Lady Vernon’s hand and assumed the letter is for you—”

  “My friend? You think that lady is my friend?! She’s with my husband now; as we speak, he visits her!”

  “That is impossible, Madam. I have just left her; she is entirely alone, even her servant sent off.”

  “Owen!” Lady Manwaring called.

  Another Johnson footman led Lady Manwaring’s servant into the drawing room.

  “Owen, come here,” she said. “Stand here. Tell this gentleman what you saw.”

  “Your Ladyship…” Owen looked at a loss.

  “Repeat to him what you told me.”

  Obediently Owen turned to address Reginald.

  “Well, Sir, Lady Susan sent her servant away, and then you left. And a few minutes later Lord Manwaring arrived and was received by her Ladyship.”

  “Alone?” Reginald asked, shaken.

  “Yes, Sir, I believe so. No one else came or went.”

  Lady Manwaring snatched the letter from Reginald and started devouring it like a voracious beast. (Many years later Mrs. Johnson described the scene to me, saying she remem
bered it as if it were “the day before yesterday.” This evocative expression has stayed with me over the years.)

  “No—stop, Madam! The letter is for Mrs. Johnson only!”

  “Here,” Lady Manwaring said, reading: “‘I send Reginald with this letter—keep him there all evening if you can; Manwaring comes this very hour.’”

  “That’s not possible,” Reginald protested.

  “I must stop this!” Lady Manwaring turned again to Mr. Johnson: “Please, Sir, come with me.”

  “What could possibly be gained? It could even be dangerous; this is a matter for your solicitors.” Mr. Johnson turned to Alicia: “Mrs. Johnson, this goes beyond what I could imagine: You promised to give up all contact with this woman.”

  In the heated circumstance it would have been difficult for Alicia to explain the private language of joke and facetiousness the two friends shared. Instead she fell back on what has been termed the “lunacy defence”: representing Lady Susan as demented, her letter senseless.

  “I have no idea what she writes!” Alicia said. “She’s gone mad!”

  “I’m sorry to say, my dear,” her husband icily replied, “the Atlantic passage is very cold this time of year.”

  Alicia looked stunned; Lucy Manwaring rescued her from more searching interrogation by resuming her hysterical crying and fleeing the room.

  As soon as she could, Alicia left by carriage for Lady Susan’s rooms on Upper Seymour Street. Lady Susan had descended to greet her.

  “Agonies, my dear!” Mrs. Johnson exclaimed.

  “What’s happened?”

  “The worst circumstances imaginable. Disaster—”

  “Disaster’?”

  “Mr. DeCourcy arrived precisely when he should not have—Lucy Manwaring had just forced herself into Mr. Johnson’s study to sob her woes.”

  “Has she no pride, no self-respect?”

  “None. What an impression she makes—bursting from Mr. Johnson’s library wailing like a struck child. Seeing the letter in your handwriting, she tore it from Reginald to read aloud—”

  “No!”

  “Yes. ‘Manwaring comes this very hour’!”

  Lady Susan turned to lead the way upstairs, but the friends were in such natural sympathy they fell in together and climbed in unison.

  “And Reginald heard that?”

  “He read it himself.”

  Lady Susan looked amazed.

  “How ungentlemanly! Shocking! I can’t believe it.”

  “Yes,” Alicia agreed. “Very shocking.”

  “A gentleman, entrusted with correspondence marked ‘private,’ reads it regardless—and then, because of some confidential remarks, the obloquy is mine! But who has acted badly in this affair? Only you and I stand innocent of reading other people’s correspondence!”

  “Unluckily Lady Manwaring also wormed out of her servant that Manwaring visited you in private.”

  “Oh.” Lady Susan was briefly silenced. “Facts are horrid things!”

  They continued up the stairs and, within several steps, Lady Susan had recovered her equanimity. “Don’t worry. I’ll make my story good with Reginald. He’ll be a little enraged at first but I vow that, by dinner tomorrow, all will be well.”

  Alicia looked more doubtful.

  “I’m not sure… He was with Mr. Johnson when I left. Forgive me for saying it but… I dread to imagine what’s being said in your disfavour…”

  At this point, rather than worry for herself, Lady Susan was characteristically concerned for her friend:

  “What a mistake you made marrying Mr. Johnson, my dear: too old to be governable, too young to die!”

  There is an idiomatic expression which dates not from that era, but from our own, predicated on knowledge of man’s bipedism: “Then the other shoe dropped.” As regards Reginald “the other shoe” dropped the next day when he came to pay his final call upon Lady Susan. She was writing at her escritoire when her maid showed Reginald into the drawing room. He announced himself icily: “Good evening, Madam.”

  “Finally you come.”

  “Only to bid you farewell.”

  Lady Susan received this with a smile: “What do you mean?”

  “I think you must know.”

  “No,” she said.

  “The spell is broken. All is revealed. I now see you as you are.”

  “Charming, but I’m starting to find this manner of yours irritating.”

  “Since I left yesterday I’ve received such a mortifying account of the true facts of your history as to make clear the absolute necessity of an immediate and eternal separation between us.”

  “You make me laugh.” But she did not, in fact, laugh.

  “You can’t doubt to what I allude.”

  “I do doubt. Have I ever concealed anything from you? I’m utterly bewildered.”

  “Langford,” Reginald said, almost in a groan. “Langford… Langford. The word alone should be sufficient.”

  “No, it is not… The word ‘Langford’ is not of such potent intelligence for me.”

  Reginald remained silent and pacing.

  “You agitate me beyond expression! Such moodiness and suspicion are not, I think, worthy of a young man of your distinction.”

  “It is from Lady Manwaring herself that I’ve learned the truth.”

  “‘The truth’? What possible connection can there be between Lady Manwaring and ‘truth’? She’s entirely deranged. You must have seen that.”

  “Her servant witnessed Manwaring’s visits here.”

  “That servant, Owen, is notoriously defective in understanding. Did Owen explain what prompted Manwaring’s visits? Their entirely innocent and blameless nature?”

  “If you recall the regard I had for you, you must realize the agony I felt reading your words.”

  “Then I would advise you to stop reading other people’s correspondence! Alicia has a droll humour. Everything we write is inverted and in-joke; she delights in curious phrasing only we can decipher. Of course it would seem outlandish or shocking to others—we don’t expect others to read our correspondence and don’t put things for their benefit.”

  This exactly matches what I understood and have explained regarding the conversations and correspondence between Alicia and Lady Susan. So much for those who doubted my account!

  Lady Susan continued: “Manwaring only visited me as his wife’s friend—”

  “‘Friend’?” Reginald rudely replied. “She herself denies that.”

  “Of course—I was her friend when she was sane, her great enemy since. Manwaring only left Langford to escape her deranged suspicions. In granting him an interview my sole motive was to persuade him to return to her, to see what might be done to ease the poor woman’s mind—”

  “But why ‘alone’? Why did you arrange to see him alone?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “You sent away your servant.”

  “You can’t divine my motive there?” Lady Susan looked quickly to see if the door were closed before continuing. “Servants have ears, with the unfortunate tendency to repeat whatever they imagine they hear. I dreaded injuring the poor lady’s reputation still further.”

  Maud, the young woman Lady Susan had engaged as parlour maid during her London stay, just then did have her ear to the door but, hearing Lady Susan’s words, prudently withdrew; she later confessed this to my uncle’s valet. Meanwhile the truth of Lady Susan’s observation cannot be overstated: Great care should be taken as to what is said before servants, even when they are apparently distant. This remains true to our day.

  “You imagine I could accept such an explanation?” Reginald asked, as disbelieving now as he was credulous before.

  “I can only tell you what I know to be true.”

  “Did you succeed?”

  “What?”

  “Did you convince Manwaring to return to his wife?”

  “Yes, I did. But it seems her judgement is too deteriorated to allow it. Her suspi
cious and jealous state is not of a nature to accept reassurance.”

  “You forget, I saw the letter with my own eyes—”

  “No, I don’t forget. I greatly resent it—a fault you compounded by misinterpreting what you should never have seen. Do you think I would confide a letter to a third party if I thought its contents in any way dangerous? Haven’t I already explained everything which the ill-nature of the world might interpret in my disfavour? What could so stagger your esteem for me now? After all we’ve discussed and meant to one another, that you would again doubt my intentions, my actions, my word…”

  To this Reginald remained silent.

  “I’m sorry, Reginald. I’ve reflected deeply upon this: I cannot marry a man of an untrusting disposition. I cannot have it.”

  “What?”

  “We cannot marry. Whatever commitment there was between us is severed; any connection impossible.”

  “What are you saying?” Reginald asked, stunned by her changed tone, a slight tremulousness in his voice.

  “Mistrust does not bode well for any union. I have a great regard for you—yes, a passionate one. But that I must master. It’s not tolerable to be constantly made to defend oneself.”

  Reginald stood still for a time, then, eyes watering, bowed and left.

  Parklands was located in the west of Kent, reached by carriage without difficulty, so the extreme fatigue and low spirits Reginald DeCourcy exhibited upon his return might be ascribed to factors other than a tiring journey. His arrival was a soulagement* for his mother, though; she hurried to find Catherine to impart the news.

  “Catherine! Catherine!” Lady DeCourcy called, approaching the stairway as Catherine descended it. “Reginald’s returned!”

  “He’s here?”

  “Yes, he’s just gone to find your father.”

  “It’s not—”

  “No, the most happy news—our fears were in vain.”

  “What?”

  “The engagement’s off!”

  “How?”

  “Lady Susan broke it off herself.”

  “She did?” Catherine looked apprehensive.

  “Reginald is most cast down. But I trust he will recover before too long and—dare we say—cast his look elsewhere?”