Jane and the Madness of Lord Byron jam-10 Read online

  Another hesitation. “I was inside the box here with the mare, after the young lady—Miss Twining as it was—left. I stepped outside for just the short while, like, to fetch a rope—I had to slip it round the foal’s head, and help the mare to birth it—and that’s when I see her. I didn’t see much more than that.”

  “When was the foal born?” I asked.

  “Ten minutes past two, by the stable clock, and thank the good Lord for it—the foal would’ve been dead if she’d taken much longer.”

  I gazed at the delicate ribs, rising and falling with blessed air. While the foal drew her first breath, Catherine Twining drew her last. It was a bitter conjunction.

  “And afterwards? When the mare and foal were comfortable?”

  “I stood outside and looked at the stars for a bit,” he answered, “then went to my bed. There were but a few hours till dawn, and foal or no, I’m expected at my work by six o’clock.”

  “Did anyone else cross the Pavilion grounds while you looked at the stars?” I asked.

  “Nobody but the Colonel.”

  “McMahon?” Mona said quickly.

  He shook his head. “Colonel Hanger. He’s an odd one, and no mistake. Never sleeps, playing cards until all hours, or striding about the grounds as tho’ all the imps of Satan be after ’im. Many’s the time he’s sat down on a barrel with Mr. Davy—he’s the Head Groom—day or night, to talk of horseflesh or race-meetings or such hunts as he’s had. But Mr. Davy was gone to bed. There was only me to talk to the Colonel that night.”

  “And did Colonel Hanger stay long?” I murmured, to keep the flow of reminiscence unstinted.

  The mare had abandoned Mona and was prodding Jem’s shoulder with her nose. He poured the bran mash carefully into a feedbag, and strapped it to her head before speaking again.

  “At first I thought he’d met with an accident, so wild did he look—tramping into the stable block with his boots and pantaloons soaked to the knees. But then I saw as how he was grinning, so all was well. Colonel Hanger, I says, you gave me quite a turn. He clapped me on the shoulder and laughed out loud, as tho’ he’d just won a packet at hazard or cards; and then he gave me a sovereign. To celebrate the safe delivery of the foal, he said.”

  His boots and pantaloons soaked to the knees.

  “Was it raining that night?” I asked pensively. “I cannot quite remember.”

  “No, ma’am. He’d fallen into the sea, he said, while walking along the Marine Parade after the Assembly. Lucky for him the tide was well out. He was foxed, I suppose—but the cold water soon put him to rights.”

  Mona and I had gone very still. I do not think either of us moved a muscle for an instant, or bothered even to breathe. The tide was well out. No one had even thought to remark upon the tides, at the hour of Catherine’s death. I had dismissed Caro Lamb, even, as unable to brave the water. But Catherine’s killer had walked out to Byron’s yacht, and fetched the hammock, with only a shallow depth to concern him.

  “What did the Colonel want here in the stables?” I asked, as casually as possible. “Surely he did not mean to ride at such an hour?”

  Jem grinned. “No, ma’am. Not that night—tho’ I’ve known him to gallop the Downs in pitch black before, and a wonder it is that either the Colonel or the horse came home. No—it was a large needle Old Hanger wanted, such as we use on the horse blankets—a needle and good, strong thread.”

  Chapter 28 Sentry Duty

  FRIDAY, 14 MAY 1813

  BRIGHTON, CONT.

  “OH, WHAT I WOULD NOT GIVE FOR LORD HAROLD AT THIS moment,” I said to Mona, compound of frustration and despair. “He should have known what sort of man Colonel Hanger is, and how he must be worked on!”

  We had thanked Jem for his interesting conversation with a shilling pressed into his palm, and an unspoken hope that he did not share our interview with Colonel Hanger—lest his life enjoy a very brief duration. I suspected, however, that without the posing of pertinent questions, Jem’s knowledge should remain locked in the stables; he was not the sort to offer intelligence unsolicited.

  “To be sure Uncle was acquainted with Hanger,” Mona said with a visible shudder. “They were both second sons, you know, and that is apt to make for fellow-feeling—tho’ I do not think you could find two more dissimilar men the length and breadth of England! I confess I cannot see my uncle emerging from the sea at dead of night, and requesting a needle and thread from the undergroom, so that he might sew up a dead body.”

  “But that is just the point, Mona. I can,” I retorted. “And it is for that reason I wish devoutly he were with us still! There is nobody I should rely upon more to confront a villain. Lord Harold may have been the consummate gentleman, but he was capable of thinking like a rogue—and therefore, outwitted the worst of them.”

  She studied me with an oddly arrested look. “You were often in danger when you were with him, were you not? It was not all a pleasant turn around the Park?”

  “Your uncle was an agent of the Crown,” I said, taken aback. “I cannot recall that it was ever a pleasant turn around the Park. But what is that to the point? I am not Lord Harold, and I shall be reduced to a quaking jelly by a man of Colonel Hanger’s kidney; I knew it from the first moment I saw him, intent upon ravishing poor Catherine in the Regent’s conservatory. The fellow is evil, Mona.”

  At her exclamation, I supplied the history of our entertainment at the Pavilion, and the Colonel’s readiness to draw Henry’s cork, or challenge him to a duel. She listened acutely, evidencing neither shock nor dismay.

  “It is everywhere known, of course, that Hanger used to engage in very rum behaviour—procuring women for Prinny when they were both thirty years younger,” she observed. “It was he who helped to make the illegal marriage with Mrs. Fitzherbert, poor lady—only think of having such a man as witness to one’s wedding! And I do not doubt he has pulled Prinny out of countless scrapes that, were they made publick, should have greatly tarnished his honour. But I cannot think even Hanger should be fool enough to prey upon a child of fifteen, of good family—and drown her when she fought him, Jane.”

  “Someone certainly did so—and if not Hanger, then who? Recollect what the undergroom saw, Mona—and what he gave Hanger.”

  “Very well,” Mona rejoined, with her habitual air of calm amidst lunacy, “let us go and ask the villainous Colonel what use he found for needle and thread.”

  I stared at her.

  “I have known George Hanger this age,” she said impatiently. “I shall simply send in my card at the Regent’s front door, and enquire whether the Colonel is at home to visitors. If he remains as rapacious for a glimpse of the fair sex as you say, he is unlikely to send us away unanswered.”

  Her confidence was cool enough to suggest her uncle, after all; and thus I followed her without a murmur from the stable yard to the Pavilion’s entry. But George Hanger was not at home; he had gone, so we were informed, to play hazard at Raggett’s Club, and none could say when he was expected back again.[23]

  It was impossible for any lady to penetrate the sacred fastness of Raggett’s; we should have to wait for the Colonel to return the Countess of Swithin’s call.

  “It is a pity he prefers dice over cards,” Mona said thoughtfully as we achieved the Steyne, “else we might have set Swithin upon him. I can do nothing about that however, until we meet at dinner—and I am able to tell him all. No doubt he will think of something; I believe Swithin managed fellows of Hanger’s ilk with great success, when he was about the opium trade in China.”

  “I am sure of it,” I said. “But meanwhile, Lord Byron sits in Brighton Camp, under armed guard, for a murder he undoubtedly did not commit. We have no evidence to support our suspicions that Hanger drowned Catherine Twining and brought her corpse through the wine cellar’s tunnel to the King’s Arms—not a pair of trousers with the stains of salt water to their knees, nor a scrap of thread in Hanger’s pocket, that might be shown to match the hammock’s. We have no moti
ve beyond the fact that the man is an unconscionable roué. In sum, Mona—we have nothing that exonerates Lord Byron! Indeed, we have sunk him to his neck by forcing Caro Lamb to place him in the Pavilion itself, within moments of when Catherine Twining was last seen! I cannot think we have done your friend Lady Oxford any singular service.”

  “But that was never your object, Jane. You are animated by a desire for truth; and that we shall achieve—I feel certain.”

  “Whether Truth is the same as Justice, remains in doubt.”

  We proceeded towards the Castle, where I must part from her, but she stopped me at the entry.

  “Jane, do you not think it remarkable that Byron failed to follow Miss Twining that night? I observed him, you know, throughout the evening—because of my particular concern for Lady Oxford’s heart. Byron was single-minded in his efforts to speak to Miss Twining. She was forced to elude him by dancing without cease. Not even the presence of her father at the Assembly could dissuade him. Captain Morley proved her protector for a time; and indeed, it was only after he exchanged words with his lordship that Byron desisted. And then, when Caro Lamb appeared, his lordship quitted the Rooms in high dudgeon—packed up his things at the Arms—and repaired to Caro’s rooms. He went so far as to invade the Pavilion—he succeeded in achieving Miss Twining’s presence—and yet, when she flew from him, he abruptly abandoned pursuit and proclaimed his verses to Caro Lamb instead! It is incomprehensible; in every respect, incomprehensible!”

  “He is hardly the most consistent of men—” I began.

  “But at present, he is very likely to be sober,” she said owlishly, “and that is so out of the common way where Byron is concerned, we ought to take advantage of it. Do you not agree this is the perfect time to speak with him—while he languishes alone in gaol, entirely without an audience? What do you say, Jane, to exercising my chestnuts?”

  AND SO I COMMITTED MYSELF ONCE MORE TO THE PERILS of the Countess’s beautiful horses and perch phaeton, and set off up the Lewes road in the direction of Brighton Camp. The team was decidedly fresh, having been eating their heads off in their stalls since Wednesday’s race-meeting; the equipage bowled along at a spanking pace through the bright noonday sun. We encountered considerable London traffic, and as Mona never hesitated to give the pair their heads, and pull out to pass the odd gig or farm cart, I expected at every moment to be overturned in the ditch. Apprehension throughout the whole quite robbed me of enjoyment, and I was for the most part unable to speak; but the Countess maintained a pleasant flow of conversation. This was purposefully innocuous, as she had her groom up behind her; within twenty minutes, I daresay, we were pulling up in the Camp. The groom jumped down and held the horses; he intended walking them, I believe, while we were occupied amidst the Barracks.

  “We ought to beg permission of the Camp Commandant to visit the gaol,” she said conversationally as we strolled along the muddy lane that served as main thoroughfare, surrounded on every side by red coats. “But I could not say where he is to be found. At Catherine Twining’s funeral, possibly—or about some military business.”

  “I should not like to violate the Hussars’ principles,” I replied, “but I think it should prove more efficient if we simply suborn Byron’s guards—and beg ignorance of convention later.”

  “I feel sure that is what Uncle would have done,” Mona agreed. “Let us enquire the way to the gaol.”

  She approached the first young officer we encountered, with remarkable boldness; but as she carried a hamper of provisions over her arm, and had changed her straw-coloured gown for a bottle-green carriage dress and matching high-poke bonnet, she looked suitably demure. I, in my mourning clothes, hovered on the fringe of the conversation; and as the officer raised his hat, and strode on, Mona turned to me with satisfaction.

  “Only think—that is young Norton, Lord Raleigh’s second son. I am a little acquainted with the family; what a lucky chance I should meet with him, first off! They are cousins eight times removed.”

  If there was a well-placed family in England to which Mona was not related, I should be very much surprized. “But does he know where Byron is to be found?”

  “His lordship is being held in the cells reserved for the drunk and disorderly. Young Norton says Byron’s arrival in the Camp last night was all that was extraordinary—once the constabulary were gone, several of the officers of the 10th gathered outside his lordship’s cell to toast his health, and Byron consented to declaim a number of lines of poetry. There is nothing like the Hussars, after all, for knowing how to live.”

  We hastened in the direction young Norton had indicated, passing in our way the chapel where Catherine Twining’s funeral had been held. It appeared emptied of life at this present, and I concluded the cold collation so essential to every passing must be laid out in Mr. Smalls’s quarters—or perhaps, as general interest in the family was so great—in the Officers’ Mess. There was no sign of Henry.

  Mona hesitated at a crossing of the way, then turned left. The cells for the drunk and disorderly were housed in a low-slung brick-and-stone building set apart from the barracks themselves, with a set of stocks raised before them. Two sentries stood at attention on either side of the sole door; narrow slits served for windows, placed high up in the walls, and they were barred. It must be airless and uncomfortable; but perhaps Lord Byron took consolation from his verse.

  “Jane,” the Countess murmured as we paused before the stocks, eyeing the sentries, “did your acquaintance with my uncle ever run to the penetration of gaols?”

  “On several occasions,” I admitted.

  “Excellent. You shall know, then, how to go on.”

  I might have informed her ladyship that I had never breached a military gaol, but that seemed mere pettifogging at this point. So I drew breath and walked forward to attack the sentries. Mona followed with her hamper of food and wine.

  “Good afternoon, sirs,” I attempted.

  Both sentries continued to stare straight ahead. Neither returned my greeting.

  “This’ll be another of ’em,” the sentry on the right muttered to his fellow on the left.

  “Sure enough. Like flies to cream, ain’t it? I think I’ll be takin’ up poetry, I do. Nothing beats it for the ladies.”

  I glanced in consternation at Mona. She fluttered her hand, as tho’ encouraging a bashful bride to the altar.

  “I am Miss Austen, and this is the Countess of Swithin, whose husband is attempting to free Lord Byron. We have come this afternoon with food and … a quantity of writing paper … to succor him during imprisonment.”

  “A quantity of writin’ paper!” the sentry on the right spat out, and at last his eyes met mine. “Aye, his-prating-lordship has that enough. Whole rolls of the stuff’ve been sent through the wicket in that door, ma’am, with the compliments of near every lady in Brighton—in the ’ope as a sonnet’ll come back out, inscribed to Louisa or Elizabeth or Airy-bell. ’Nuff to turn a man’s stomach, it is.”

  “The paper is merely by-the-way,” Mona said indifferently. “If his lordship does not require it, of course I shall take it back again. But the provisions must be useful, I am sure. May we present them to his lordship?”

  “Present them?” The sentry on the left turned his head indignantly and glared at Mona. “The gentleman is wanted on a charge of murder, your la’ship! He is not a lion-tamer out of Astley’s Amphitheatre, nor yet the darling of the London stage! If you wish to see ’im, you cannot buy tickets—but by all means do attend ’is ’anging!”

  At those words, to my astonishment, Desdemona abruptly began to sob. So overcome was she, that the hamper was nearly dropped from her nerveless hands; she swiftly covered her face and cried her heart out. I moved to comfort her, my arm about her shoulders, and looked to the sentries in reproach. “Heartless! How can you speak so, to a lady that has known his lordship from the cradle!”

  The two men looked uncomfortable enough at the sight of Mona’s weeping; my words only incr
eased their chagrin. “Beggin’ yer pardon, ma’am, but you’ve no notion how many young ladies—shameless camp followers, most of ’em—’ave dallied by this sentry post and offered any amount of money or favours to be admitted to his lordship, private-like,” one said.

  “Some o’ the things they’re promising would tempt St. Peter, they would,” the other echoed.

  “That is not our object,” I said sternly—there is some benefit to being an aging spinster dressed in black; the sentries quailed as tho’ I had been their mamma—“our sole concern is Lord Byron’s health. He possesses a most delicate constitution. If you intend to hang him, you had better ensure that he lives long enough to stand his trial. Now, be sensible—and convey that hamper into his lordship with the compliments of the Earl and Countess of Swithin.”

  The sentry on the right—who could be no more, I guessed, than eighteen—saluted me as tho’ I had been an officer, and scurried to retrieve the basket from the ground where it lay. Carrying it gingerly, he first unlatched the wicket, and peered within Lord Byron’s cell; then said, in an aside to his fellow, “Writin’ again. ’E’s all over ink. And ’e’ll be askin’ to ’ave ’is pen mended again, just you wait an’ see. No pen-knives allowed the prisoners,” he added, for my benefit.

  “Naturally not,” I agreed with quelling coldness.

  The sentry unbarred the door, and carried the hamper within. After an interval of several moments, he reemerged with a packet of paper in his hands.

  “The prisoner thanks ye kindly fer yer consideration,” he said, as tho’ having got the words by rote, “and asks that you convey these pages to Lady Oxford. If he is to hang, Lord Byron says, it would be something to know as his verses is published.”

  I held out my hand for the pages; they had been enclosed in a cover, and sealed clumsily with the wax from Byron’s tallow candle. A letter? Or more lines from The Giaour?

  Mona subdued her sobbing to a few dying sniffles.