Jane and the Genius of the Place jam-4 Page 3

  At my failure to reply, Mr. Bridges threw out his most engaging smile. “I might rescue you then in a dashing manner, my dear Miss Austen, and the both of us be celebrated throughout the country.”

  The determined silliness of these remarks was entirely in keeping with Mr. Bridges's character; but I adopted a tragic air, as befit a noble heroine. “Not even the prospect of rescue by yourself, sir, shall be deemed too great a sacrifice for my country. But tell me: How does my dearest sister in your wretched hands?”

  “Miss Cassandra Austen, when last I had the pleasure of meeting her over the breakfast table, was in excellent looks — tho' entirely cast down at the loss of this race-meeting. She was to remain at the Farm, you know, in attendance upon my sister Harriot, who cannot abide horses in any guise. I offered to smuggle Cassandra out of the house in my curricle, but she affected the vapours at the mere notion of such a scheme, and quitted the breakfast parlour directly.”

  I could not suppress a laugh at this telling picture.

  “You are in wine again, Edward, I am sure of it,” Lizzy said in mock exasperation. “Have you led him astray, Captain Woodford?”

  “I? Astray? Quite the reverse, I assure you.”

  “Mamma! Mamma! Only look — there is Mrs. Grey!”

  The Commodore momentarily forgotten, Fanny had jumped up from her seat and was craning for a view of the rail.

  “Sit dawn, Fanny,” Miss Sharpe whispered shrilly, with one hand on her charge's sash. “You will make of yourself a spectacle, child.”

  “Do observe, Mamma,” Fanny persisted, “she has gone quite forward in all the bustle, and intends to o'erlook the race. There is her scarlet habit, not far from Papa and my uncle.”

  I followed my niece's outflung arm and saw again the dashing figure, late of the perch phaeton. Mrs. Grey had abandoned her equipage and secured a place of advantage quite close to the rail. She was mounted, as though she meant to follow the heat on horseback.[7] Extraordinary! She should be the only lady in the midst of the crush, and exposed to every sort of coarse behaviour— for a race-meeting is hardly the most select, being at liberty to the common labourer as readily as a lord.

  But at least she displayed a little sense, in adopting a veil, the better to shield her countenance from the impertinent. Or perhaps the better to invite their gaze — for the black illusion netting, however suited to the disguise of her features, hung jauntily enough from the tricorn hat. Hers was a tall, womanly figure astride the mettlesome beast — the jet-black gelding I had last seen tied to the phaeton. However unseemly her behaviour, however determined her flaunting of convention, I could not fail to admire Mrs. Grey. And pity her, too. Such an one must be very rich, indeed — or very unhappy. Only the most extreme sense of liberty, or the utter depths of misery, could give spur to the sort of recklessness she displayed.

  “Come, Mr. Bridges,” Captain Woodford said, “we must bid the ladies adieu, or be denied our place at the rail.”

  These words had scarce fallen from his lips, when the blowing of a horn announced the horses arrived at the starter's mark, and a murmur of expectation arose from the assembled throng. Mr. Bridges surged forward towards the rail, Captain Woodford in pursuit; Fanny clambered onto the barouche box next to the coachman, Pratt; and even Lizzy gained something in animation.

  “They are off!” Fanny cried, “but I can see nothing — only a sea of hats, and the flash of horses' heads. Oh, you darling Commodore!”

  Despite myself, I caught something of the clamour of the moment, and rose to my feet, swaying slightly with the springs of the coach and Fanny's determined energy. A cloud of dust, turned gold in the August sun, announced the vanguard of the horses — they were fast upon our portion of the rail, and I thought that even my disinterested gaze might discern the Commodore's narrow Arab head vying for pride of place with a bay mare. Then, in a flash of scarlet, Mrs. Grey leapt the rail on her fleet black horse.

  A cry of “Mrs. Grey!” and “Huzzah!” seemed to break from an hundred throats, and that suddenly, every man in possession of a mount had thrust his way onto the course behind the lady. Like a company of mounted cavalry, top hats blown backwards by the wind, they pounded in the wake of the racing pack — and disappeared around the course's bend.

  “Good God!” ejaculated Miss Sharpe.

  I turned from the course to see the governess pale and trembling, her hazel eyes fixed on the dust-clouded rail. Presumably she was unaccustomed to such exploits.

  “More than one unfortunate shall be unhorsed, Miss Sharpe, depend upon it,” I told her. “But do not trouble yourself on a fool's account. They are all very nearly insensible with drink, and shall not mind the bruising.”

  “Mrs. Grey shall keep her seat, never fear,” said Lizzy drily. “She will be safely home and established upon a sofa before the half of them have circled the field.”

  But Miss Sharpe seemed not to have attended to either of us. Her gaze was still fixed on the course, where the distant splash of scarlet proclaimed the sole woman at the head of the cavalcade. To discern much else was impossible; the Commodore, Josephine, and their competitors in the heat, were swallowed entire in a cloud of dust.

  “Are you quite well, Miss Sharpe?” I enquired gently. “You have grown too pale. Perhaps the heat has overcome you. It is well that we are very near to ending so tiresome an amusement — I am sure we should all prefer to be at home.”

  She sank back down into her seat, and drew a kerchief from her reticule. “Forgive me. A trifling unsteadiness

  The unmounted spectators, like my brothers, had commenced to run along the rail in pursuit of the pack; an idiot's errand, for the pack itself had very soon rounded the final bend of the course, and was bearing down upon the starter's mark. Our heads turned as one— the pounding of hooves announced the approaching triumph — and the bay mare Josephine swept foaming across the finish, with the Commodore hard on her heels.

  “Ohhh!” cried Fanny in disappointment.

  “Thank God it is over at last,” murmured her mother.

  And from the trembling Miss Sharpe, came something like a sob.

  IT WAS A CHASTENED AND DESPONDENT HENRY WHO rejoined the Godmersham party a half-hour later.

  “I am sure that some great mischief has befallen the poor beast.” He sagged against the seat cushions and accepted a glass of ginger beer. “He looked off in the near hind. Perhaps the weights—”

  “He looked off for the duration of the heat, my dear brother,” said Neddie sourly. He was quite winded, and much put out at the devil's chase he had run. “Although I confess my position was too poor to permit of a good view. We should better have gone mounted, like Mrs. Grey.”

  As tho' conjured by my brother's thought, the figure in scarlet pranced into view near the stylish perch phaeton. She dismounted with a flourish, and thrust the reins at her tyger. Behind her, at a discreet pace, advanced the filly Josephine and her jockey — both looking whipped by the very hounds of Hell, as perhaps they had been. It cannot be comfortable or easy to race in a determined heat, with most of Kent at one's heels.

  Mrs. Grey tossed a beautiful gold plate — Canterbury's Race Week prize — into the perch phaeton, with as much disregard as tho' it were a pair of old shoes. She handed a small leather coin pouch to the jockey, and reached a gloved hand to pat the filly's lathered flank. Then, with an insouciance possible only for one who moves under an hundred eyes, she stepped into her carriage, took up the reins, and snapped them smartly over the matched greys' necks. Several of the watching gentlemen cheered. The tyger touched his cap as she turned, his expression wooden; then he and the jockey led their mounts slowly through the milling crowd, in the direction of the stableyard.

  “What did I tell you?” Lizzy said languidly. “She shall be established on her sofa while the rest of us are still trapped on the Canterbury road. Detestable woman.”

  “Do not speak of her, pray.” Henry took a long draught. “My dear Eliza will have it that there is nothing lik
e a Frenchwoman for winning, you know — and I declare I begin to be of her opinion. Did you see that grey-eyed jade, Neddie, spurring her mount for all she was worth?”

  “I believe Mrs. Grey's eyes to be brown, Henry,” my brother absently replied.

  “Grey — brown — but upon my word, the Furies ain't in it! I might almost believe her to have cursed the Commodore as he rounded the rail. She has quite the look of the witch about her, however much she affects a veil.”

  “Now, Henry.” I patted his hand. “Let us have no conduct unbecoming to a gentleman. You are to be an example for the children, in this as in so many things. Your disappointment may serve as a cautionary chapter in the annals of the Sporting Life. I see the illustration now, in my mind's eye: A Gentleman Unbowed by the Vagaries of Fortune.”

  “—However driven upon the poorhouse,” he muttered, unreconciled.

  “The poorhouse!” I smiled at him conspiratorially, and dropped my voice to a whisper. “Then take comfort, Henry. You shall not travel there alone. The excellent Mr. Bridges is to cheer your solitude, for he named the Commodore as the salvation of all his hopes.”

  “Am I then to encompass others in my ruin?” Henry groaned in mock despair. “The reproaches that shall be mine! And how am I to face Lady Bridges, his redoubtable mother? I suppose we may expect the unfortunate curate to wait upon us at Godmersham before the day is out?”

  “He had better wait upon Mrs. Grey,” said Neddie, who had caught something of our conversation. “She is undoubtedly more amenable to charity at present.”

  “A debt of honour is a debt of honour.” Lizzy picked desultorily at the points of her gloves. “No lady would forgive what a gentleman would exact; it does violence to the equality of the sexes.”

  “You have been reading that wretched Wollstonecraft again,” my brother said in exasperation. “I shall burn the volume tonight.”[8]

  “May we leave now, Papa?” Fanny implored. “I am most dreadfully hungry.”

  “Hungry!” Neddie searched in the depths of the picnic hamper. “And not a scrap of jellied chicken left for your fainting father? Scamp!” He pinched his favourite's dimpled cheek. “We shall take to the road directly I secure a draught of ale, Fanny. I have a thirst upon me that would parch the Stour itself.”

  And so he moved off, intent upon a tankard. Most of the gentlemen of the neighbourhood were roving about the meeting-grounds, exchanging tales of woe or victory; some had placed their money on Mrs. Grey's filly, others on Henry's horse, still others on one of the mounts deep in the pack, who had fared no better than the Commodore. A great deal of hearty laughter and slapping of backs ensued, for which I had little temper; I was fatigued and overheated myself, and longing to be out of my ravishing lilac habit.

  “There is my brother Edward,” Lizzy observed, “looking bound for the gallows before sunset. You have much to answer for, Henry; I am not sure I should admit you to Godmersham this e'en! Look at the poor fellow — so chapfallen and mumchance! Were it not for the support of Captain Woodford's arm, I doubt he could place one foot before the other!”

  And, indeed, Mr. Bridges looked very unwell. His countenance was flushed, his fashionable coiffure disarranged, and his cravat askew. He clutched at his head — which ached, no doubt, from an unfortunate blend of spirits and wine — and muttered indistinguishable words in Captain Woodford's ear. A glance for his sister, and it seemed as tho' he might approach our barouche — until a third man came up with him suddenly, and tore at Mr. Bridges's arm. He was a burly gentleman, with sweeping whiskers and a raffish air; a gentleman I knew of old. Denys Collingforth, of slim means and illiberal temper, who was held in general disfavour by the whole neighbourhood. We should have seen much of the Collingforths, had they proved more genteel, for they lived but a few miles from Godmersham, at Prior's Farm. He was fond of using his fists at the slightest provocation, and was even said to have struck his wife — the unfortunate Laetitia, whose carriage Mrs. Grey had entered only an hour or so before.

  I had seen Denys Collingforth in more than one unsavoury moment, during my many sojourns in Kent; and his present appearance argued the immediate precipitation of another. He twisted the sleeve of Mr. Bridges's elegant coat, all choler and ill-humour in a single motion.

  The curate gasped, and attempted to shake him off; but he succeeded only in securing both of Mr. Collingforth's hands firmly about his lapels. The gallant Captain Woodford attempted to intervene — and was thrust heavily to one side.

  “LizzyI” I half-rose from my seat. “What can Mr. Collingforth mean by such behaviour?”

  Her elegant head came swiftly round, and caught the scene at a glance. “Contemptible blackguard,” she spat out, “he will draw Edward's cork in a moment.”

  Not only the children had proved susceptible to Henry's fighting cant.

  And draw Mr. Bridges's cork, Collingforth did. A wide, swinging arc of his fist, and the curate fell backwards, blood spurting from his nose. Captain Woodford fell on his adversary immediately, and the three disappeared in a whirling knot of flailing limbs and brightly-coloured breeches. In a moment, however, Neddie had perceived the difficulty — he and Henry raced to the aid of their friends, along with half a dozen others who had no cause to love Collingforth; and the bully was deftly wrenched from the melee.

  Muttering an oath, he retired to nurse his wounds. A man I did not recognise — I suppose I may call him a gentleman — threw an arm about his shoulders and said something softly into his ear. The newcomer was dressed all in black, and wore an expression of contempt on his countenance; but his words seemed to calm his friend.

  “There'll be the Devil to pay,” Collingforth shouted at Mr. Bridges's dusty back; and then shaking his fist, he moved off through the crowd towards his shabby black chaise.

  If his wife was within, she did not dare to show her face.

  “Well, Lizzy,” my brother said as he pulled himself into the barouche, “I believe it is time we turned towards home. This meeting is become almost a brawl, and I will not have Fanny treated to such scenes.”

  Lizzy's answer, did she contemplate one, was forestalled by a fearful cry. It was a man's voice, torn with suffering and revulsion, as though he looked upon the face of evil and knew it for his own. It came from somewhere behind us.

  I turned, aghast, to enquire of Neddie, and saw my own confusion mirrored in my brother's countenance. And then our entire party was on its feet, and the gentlemen had sprung from the barouche, all fatigue and acrimony forgotten. A crowd had gathered at the open door of Collingforth's chaise. I looked, and then turned swiftly to gather Fanny to my breast. Death is not a sight for the young, however sporting-minded.

  For spilling from the carriage doorway, arms out-flung in supplication, was the figure of a woman. Her streaming hair was dark, her eyes were staring, and tho' the veil and scarlet habit had been torn from her body, leaving her pale and child-like in a simple cotton shift, I knew her instantly for Mrs. Grey.

  And knew, with a chill at my heart, that she would never ride again.

  Chapter 2

  An Act of War

  19 August 1805, cont'd.

  “GOOD GOD! MRS. GREY, IN COLLINGFORTH'S CHAISE.” Neddie threw his elegant top hat into our barouche, and hastened towards the gruesome scene. Henry was hard on his heels.

  “Mamma!” Fanny slipped from my grasp. “What has happened to Mrs. Grey? And why is she lying so, in her shift? Does she suffer from a fit?”

  Mrs. Grey's face was contorted, her lips thrust apart, and her tongue protuberant; around her neck was a length of red ribbon, such as once must have bound up her long black hair. She had certainly been strangled with it. To gaze upon her was terrible — so much beauty turned horrible in an instant, and utterly beyond salvation.

  With a choked cry from the seat opposite, Anne Sharpe fainted dead away.

  “Sit dawn, Fanny.” Lizzy clutched at her daughter's sash and tugged on it firmly. “If anyone is suffering from a fit, it is your go
verness, child — and who can wonder, with a charge so troublesome as yourself? Endeavour to behave with a little decorum, while Aunt Jane secures Miss Sharpe's vinaigrette.”

  I had already scrambled about the carriage in search of such an item, and found it at last in a little travelling case of Fanny's, tricked out with such necessaries as a lady might require. Extra handkerchiefs, a roll of sticking plaster, tiny scissors, and a packet of threaded needles— and, joy of joys, the crystal flacon filled with smelling salts. I waved it under the governess's nose, and watched her snort like Henry's champion.

  Fanny was all concern in a moment, and hovered over Miss Sharpe like a little mother; the governess looked quite ill, indeed, but protested that she was entirely well, and struggled to sit upright with something like her usual composure. She accepted a glass of tepid cordial, but kept her face studiously averted from the Colling-forth chaise.

  For my part, I felt no compunction in regarding the interesting scene unfolding to the rear. My brother had not leapt to the dead woman's side merely from an excess of chivalry — no, in the present instance, such a mark of active concern was absolutely required. The Lord Lieutenant of Kent himself had appointed my brother Justice of the Peace — a capacity in which Neddie had served barely six months. It was an honour without recompense (for gentlemen are never offered the insult of remuneration, as a more common magistrate in Town might be), and tedious in its general description, but quite suited to a man of Neddie's talents and inclination. For tho' my brother has assumed the polish of Fashion — tho' he has moved in the best circles from the age of sixteen, made the Grand Tour with unimpeachable grace, and imbibed all the follies, indulgences, and vices of Society as mother's milk — he was nonetheless reared in a country parsonage, by a father whose chief values lay in application and industry. Possessed now of great estates — and stewards to manage them; of numerous children — and phalanxes of servants, Neddie should decline into peevishness and indolence, without the care of public office as diversion.