Jane and the Madness of Lord Byron

Chapter 21 Mrs. Silchester’s Confidence

THURSDAY, 13 MAY 1813

BRIGHTON

THE RAIN THIS MORNING WAS TORRENTIAL, FORESTALLING all ventures out-of-doors; there would be no drives along the sea, no visits to picturesque ruins, no picnics on the Downs—and to my secret relief, no assaults upon bathing machines. Henry should spend the better part of the morning at Raggett’s Club, talking airily of his keen sense of the turf; I might do as I chose—whether my whims tended towards the patronage of a favoured linen-draper’s on North Street, or several hours’ indulgence of reading in my rooms. I debated the former: Of what use was the purchase of a gown that must be black? And should I be justified in securing a different colour at Henry’s expence, against a future freed of mourning? What, I asked myself, would Eliza do?

And therein had my answer.

Eliza should buy the most outré gown to be had in Brighton, in a shocking colour of silk that became her extremely, and complete the toilette with gloves, reticule, diaphanous shawl, and bonnet. Furthermore, she should sport the ensemble at the first opportunity—and the Regent’s invitation—and set the whole town on its ears.

La comtesse est morte. Vive la comtesse.

I drank the scalding tea that Betsy supplied, and smiled a little wryly at my vanished sister. I was not Eliza de Feuillide, and however much her unquenchable spirits had inspired my admiration in the past, the present demanded a less frivolous duty.

Tucked beneath the journal on my bedside table was a scrap of paper; the list of questions regarding Catherine’s death I had penned only yesterday. I glanced at it, then threw back the bedclothes, donned my wrapper—one of the few things I presently wear, along with my nightdress, that is thankfully not black—and settled into an armchair close to Betsy’s fire.

1. With whom did Catherine Twining dance at the Assembly, besides Mr. Smalls?

—I had yet to ascertain. Mrs. Silchester might supply the intelligence; but the most dependable source should be the Master of Ceremonies, a quelling gentleman by the name of Forth, who held the social world of Brighton in his thrall; and as today was Thursday—when, murder or no murder, the second Assembly of the week should be held, at the Old Ship—I knew where he might be found. Surely even a lady in mourning might be admitted to the ballroom, if her object is to interrogate the Master? I should have to secure my introduction to Mr. Forth from the Countess of Swithin. In Mona’s presence, even he must unbend.

2. When did Catherine arrive at the Pavilion in Caro Lamb’s care?

—I noted down the approximate time of one o’clock.

3. What was the purport of the ladies’ tête-à-tête?

—According to Caro Lamb, so that she might warn Miss Twining against Byron; but Catherine required no warning—she went in fear of the poet already. I scribbled, rather: so that Caro Lamb might learn every detail of her former lover’s passion for Miss Twining, and then toss her out into the street in a fury of jealousy. I could readily imagine her ladyship committing such an unpardonable act of rudeness; it explained her vagueness as to the time and manner of Catherine’s departure. But had she been jealous enough to observe the girl’s movements … lure her back into the grounds of the Pavilion … lead her down to the shingle, and force her head beneath the waves? Caro Lamb looked frail; but I had watched those supple hands on the reins of her flying horse, and guessed she commanded a wiry strength. I could not, however, imagine her ladyship trussing the body into a hammock stolen from Byron’s boat—which must be moored at a distance from the shingle, necessitating a midnight swim from a woman who had nearly drowned in those waters the day previous—much less carrying the shrouded body into the King’s Arms in the middle of the night. Could Caro have bought the aid and silence of Another?

4. When did Catherine quit the Pavilion?

—I might trust the undergroom’s testimony by the stable clock; she had been seen at three-quarters past one. But did she truly leave the grounds at that hour?

5. If the undergroom observed her walking towards the Steyne, how did she come by her death in the sea?

—It seemed certain Catherine had tarried in the shadow of the Pavilion long enough to be seized—or lured—down to the water. But by whom?

6. Where was Lord Byron at the time?

—Walking with his friend Scrope Davies and his valet towards Church Street, along the very route Miss Twining should have adopted on her way home. Were the three men conspirators? Had one killed her, and the others observed it—agreeing, out of loyalty or avarice, to lie on each other’s behalf? Of Davies I could believe mendacity possible; but the valet owed Byron no particular loyalty—he must live among his fellows in Brighton for years to come, long after Byron should be forgot; he might hang for his lies, were they discovered; in sum, the man named Chaunce had too much to lose and too little to gain. I could not think conspiracy likely.

7. Colonel George Hanger?

He was the Regent’s guest, and might have observed Catherine Twining’s arrival with Caro Lamb—and her solitary departure. Did he think to finish his attempted rape by the water line, and grow too violent when Catherine screamed? Did Catherine scream—and if so, did anyone hear it?

I sighed. There were a number of enquiries to be made at the Marine Pavilion—and I could wish them to have been made anywhere else. One does not easily put pointed questions to Royalty and its circle. Henry would have to work a miracle with his acquaintance, Lord Moira or Colonel McMahon, to secure an interview on that exalted ground.

8. General Twining? Mr. Hendred Smalls?

—The General claimed to have left the Assembly at eleven o’clock Monday evening, leaving his daughter to the care of Mrs. Silchester. One could assume Hendred Smalls quitted the place at the same hour—perhaps even letting down his friend in Church Street before proceeding in a hack chaise to his lodgings at Brighton Camp; but what if the cleric had lingered? I had an absurd idea of the moist-handed gentleman conceiving a jealous passion against Lord Byron; of lurking in sight of the Assembly Rooms; observing the departure of Miss Twining for the Pavilion; and at a quarter to two in the morning, halting the young lady in her path with a confused declaration of suspicious love. Even an absurd fellow may have feelings; even a bald and aging cleric may be moved to violent passion. I must endeavour to learn the movements of Mr. Smalls on the night in question.

9. What did Lady Caroline Lamb do after Catherine left her?

—Bathe; sleep; stay up until dawn writing a screed to Byron … or pursue her rival down to the water’s edge? Would any of the Pavilion’s servants be likely to know? Had Caro Lamb brought her personal maid?

10. When did the General discover that his daughter never returned home Monday night—and did he sound an alarum?

—The General claimed to have learnt the news at five o’clock in the morning, from his daughter’s maid, who had every reason to be truthful; he then stated he had alerted the Brighton constabulary that Catherine had very probably been abducted again by Lord Byron. While the General may be pardoned for leaping to such a conclusion, he appears not to have considered asking first at Mrs. Silchester’s for Catherine, who might easily have spent the night with her chaperon. A mere omission in his testimony, or something else?

11. How could a body be carried into the King’s Arms in the dead of night without being seen?

—There was absolutely nothing I could put down beneath this question. I had no idea how to answer it. Neither, it would seem, did the magistrate nor coroner—for not a single point of information had touched upon the subject at the inquest. The body had been found in Byron’s bed, therefore it had been brought into the Arms; but everyone connected with the enquiry appeared content to ignore the question of HOW.

12. Did anyone at the Arms hear a disturbance in Byron’s rooms? Query: Who was lodged next to Byron?

—I glanced towards my streaming windows; it would certainly rain all day. Perhaps dear Henry would consent to escort me to a nuncheon at the King’s Arms; he should have little else to do.

And finally:

13. Who, among the respectable and the highborn of Brighton, hates Lord Byron to the point of madness?

—The poet himself had promised to supply me with a list; but I doubted, once restored to sobriety, he should recollect the offer. I need not wait for it. The tendency of the question was this: Who hated Byron enough to make him look guilty of murder, solely in order to see him hang? In this framing of Catherine’s death, she might have been anybody—a mere convenience, as victim. General Twining, of course, had every reason to hate Lord Byron; but that should hardly urge him to murder his daughter. Mr. Hendred Smalls was capable, perhaps, of a jealous rage—but of the subsequent black joke, the hammock from the Giaour, and the sodden gift of his cherished bride in Byron’s bed? I could not think him capable; I judged him to lack the necessary subtlety of mind. Lady Oxford was brilliant enough to fashion the scheme, but had known nothing of her lover’s unfaithfulness, and was in London at the time. Caro Lamb … I had already judged Caro entirely equal to such devious ploys, and heedless enough to execute them. But if she drowned her rival, how had the body been deposited in the King’s Arms ?

My tea was cold, my fingers cramped, and my mind disordered. I thrust aside my pen in frustration, and put on my blacks for breakfast.

“IF YOU WISH TO SAUNTER DOWN TO NORTH STREET,” Henry urged over the last of his toast, “I am happy to procure a chair for your use, Jane, and even walk alongside it until the modiste is achieved. That was an excellent notion of yours, that I should frank you in a new gown; for without your kind solicitude for my health, I should never have come to Brighton at all—or engaged in so advantageous a wager.”

“It is remarkable, is it not, how unforeseen are the consequences of benevolence?” I returned. “I shall be urging you to adopt my slightest whim in future, Henry, from a desire to see you rich. But you need not accompany me to the modiste; I have been dressing myself for donkey’s years, you know.”

“Not in Brighton. Do you expect Madame La Fanchette to extend credit to a complete stranger?” He drew his purse from within his coat. “Here is a draught on my bank, Jane—if you require anything over, I daresay the woman should consent to send the bill to the Castle with her compliments.”

Fifty pounds. When Henry said my bank, he meant his bank—and the signature of the proprietor of Austen & Tilson over the draught should be all I required to win Madame La Fanchette’s confidence. But fifty pounds? I had existed an entire twelvemonth on as much. I stared at my brother in awe; whatever one might say of the evils born of gambling, stinginess was not one of them.

“Henry—are you entirely sure—”

He gestured me away, his colour heightened. “This is nothing, Jane. Recollect that I shall not be dressing Eliza in future—who cost me four times that whenever she entered a modiste.”

We were both of us silent an instant; my throat constricted. Trust Henry to suggest that I did him a kindness by accepting of his winnings.

“Is there anything else you require of me, Jane?”

“Only to meet me at the King’s Arms for a nuncheon,” I replied recovering. “Perhaps one o’clock?”

“I should be delighted. I don’t know how it is—but even so elegant a table as the Castle’s begins to grow tiresome after several days. And you will be wanting, of course, to put your questions to the publican.”

Wise Henry.

“Or his bootboys.”

“Just so. One o’clock it is.”

He threw down his napkin and left me quite happily to my own devices—the sort of freedom that is almost never afforded me in the more crowded household at Chawton. I think I should be content to travel with Henry forever, did his luck hold out.

THERE WAS ALREADY A KNOT OF FASHIONABLE LADIES AT Madame La Fanchette’s, in North Street, all of them a little breathless from having walked hurriedly along the paving in the rain, umbrellas held high. Three of them were young matrons, consumed with talk of children and measles; one was a mamma with a young, fair-haired daughter, just out, from her looks, which were compounded of hesitancy and exuberant conceit; and the last was Mrs. Silchester.

“I cannot be so presumptuous as to go into full mourning,” she murmured from among her floating veils, when I had greeted her, “for that is most truly the province of family, and however I may have cherished dear Catherine as another daughter—tho’ I attempted to supply her dear mother’s place—I cannot claim so near a connexion. I thought it not unpardonable, however, to put on some grey. The funeral, you know, is to be tomorrow at ten o’clock—Mr. Hendred Smalls is to lead the service—and tho’ as a lady I shall not, of course, be in attendance, I should not like to be remiss in any mark of respect on the occasion. What is your opinion, Miss Austen?”

I assured her most earnestly that grey—whether charcoal or dove—must always be unexceptionable.

“I am most partial to lavender,” Mrs. Silchester pursued doubtfully, “and cloth of silver for evening—you do not think either would offend?”

On no account could so conservative a choice offend, I insisted—but would Mrs. Silchester prefer that I review the gowns in question?

This was officiousness in the extreme from a relative stranger; but the lady appeared to require reassurance. Her reference to Catherine Twining’s mother had recalled certain phrases of the General’s I should dearly wish explained. I determined to profit from the happy chance that had thrown us together this morning, and put my questions to Mrs. Silchester while half her mind was distracted by millinery.

Presently we were joined by Madame La Fanchette herself, a strong-featured, rail-thin woman with a pronounced Yorkshire accent who had certainly never seen Paris; her toilette, however, was the last word in elegant severity, and I imagined I should be happy in anything her workrooms might fashion for Henry’s fifty pounds. At the snap of her fingers, a bevy of young women appeared to exhibit the latest modes, all of them nicely suited to a lady of Mrs. Silchester’s station in life; Madame was familiar with her clients’ tastes.

“You will not have visited any of the warehouses,” the modiste mused, “but I may be able to supply you with a lavender silk—only observe, Miss Austen,” she said with polite acknowledgement as an assistant brought forth the bolt for my inspection, “as the weave is that fine, and the colour not too sharp.”

“It might almost be grey, in a certain light,” I admitted. “I cannot think this to be objectionable. One so dislikes to go in darker shades during the summer months—which are nearly upon us.”

“I take it you’ve recently lost a close relation,” she said, with an assessing glance at my black gown. “The workmanship is not without merit.”

“A Frenchwoman who resides in London made it for me,” I said carelessly. “Have you a clear dove sarcenet or perhaps a slate-blue twill, for Mrs. Silchester’s walking dress?”

Indeed Madame La Fanchette had; and while she discussed necklines and sleeves, and ordered her assistant to measure Mrs. Silchester’s waist, I looked on as tho’ granting opinions to an acquaintance was all the joy I required. Mrs. Silchester’s countenance, which had been suffused with anxiety, gradually relaxed under the combined ministrations of Madame and myself—there is nothing like ordering one’s clothes to lift a lady’s spirits, after all—and when at last we had arrived at the coveted cloth of silver, with a beaded hem and matching headdress, her spirits were entirely restored.

Madame promised faithfully to send round the lavender silk on the morrow, with the rest of the gowns to follow; then turned her blunt features upon me. Was there anything Miss Austen required?

I saw, to my regret, that the hour was now too advanced to permit of my own frivolity and a nuncheon with Henry, and informed Madame of the unfortunate fact of a previous engagement—promised to return at the first opportunity—and accompanied Mrs. Silchester as she quitted the establishment.

“I must assume that tho’ we cannot attend the funeral itself,” I observed as we walked back along North Street in the direction of the Steyne, “that we ought, in good conscience, to pay a call of condolence upon the General at the conclusion of the service. Surely there will be any number of Brighton’s notables who shall do the same?”

Mrs. Silchester hesitated. “In truth, the General lives so quietly—and tho’ commanding respect, has never sought a broad acquaintance among the first families in the town—I cannot undertake to say whether he shall be receiving or not. However,”—and she squared her shoulders a little—“that shall not prevent me from paying a call. I hope that I know what is due to that poor lost darling, tho’ her father may not. I hope I am conscious of what her mother should have wished, on the occasion.”

Here was my opening. “She died some years since, I collect?”

“When Catherine was but three years old, and her brother seven. Richard had already been sent away to school, of course, and Catherine was in the care of her nurse when Lydia … but that is ancient history, my dear Miss Austen, and cannot be of interest to yourself.”

“I hope you will not think me inquisitive,” I returned with an air of apology, “but the General was so indiscreet as to speak of his late wife in a manner I found rather shocking. I attempted to pay a call on him only yesterday, to offer my sympathy at the loss of his daughter; but he refused to admit me, and so far forgot himself as to declare that the sins of the mother had been visited upon the child. Naturally, I could not know what to think. I ascribed it to the excesses of grief.”

“Ye-es,” Mrs. Silchester said hesitantly, “tho’ with my knowledge of the General, I should be inclined to call it spite rather than sorrow. You will forgive me for speaking frankly, Miss Austen—the General is not an amiable man. Dear Lydia was quite otherwise—possessed of perhaps too much sensibility, indeed—and a more ill-sorted pair I never hope to encounter again.”

“The marriage was unhappy?”

“She fell in love with a red coat, I fear—and never gave a thought to the nature of the gentleman who wore it.”

“Many ladies might say the same, to their infinite misfortune,” I offered piously.

“But few with poor Lydia’s result.”

Poor Lydia. It might be a veritable quotation from my own pen.

And as we walked towards the King’s Arms and my expected nuncheon, Mrs. Silchester shared her friend’s sad history.