Part 19 (2/2)
WE HAD NOT ACHIEVED OUR OBJECT-TO CORROBORATE Caro Lamb's tale, and enquire of Lord Byron why he had failed to follow Catherine Twining from the Pavilion on that fatal night-but we had in our possession a packet that might prove a love letter for Lady Oxford; and this was no end cheering to Desdemona, whose heart was softer than mine. Lady Oxford, she informed me, had taken to her bed on the strength of Byron's imprisonment-and must be cheered by some word from him. Caro Lamb's tale, and enquire of Lord Byron why he had failed to follow Catherine Twining from the Pavilion on that fatal night-but we had in our possession a packet that might prove a love letter for Lady Oxford; and this was no end cheering to Desdemona, whose heart was softer than mine. Lady Oxford, she informed me, had taken to her bed on the strength of Byron's imprisonment-and must be cheered by some word from him.
”Tho', do you know, Jane, that he had the presumption to charge her with unfaithfulness unfaithfulness at the a.s.sembly last evening! Was there ever anything more unjust?-When she has sacrificed so much for Byron's sake-and even now remains in Brighton solely out of consideration for him!” at the a.s.sembly last evening! Was there ever anything more unjust?-When she has sacrificed so much for Byron's sake-and even now remains in Brighton solely out of consideration for him!”
”Lady Oxford had better consider of her children,” I retorted, ”for I a.s.sume her husband has long since been forgot.”
”The Earl is not very memorable, that is true,” Mona said doubtfully, ”but whatever Jane Harley's sins may be, neglect is not one of them. I am sure that has all been on the other other side, for Oxford is very well cared for, and never troubles himself about Jane's side, for Oxford is very well cared for, and never troubles himself about Jane's affaires affaires-as he has had countless High Flyers in keeping!”
On such a point of mutual disagreement, as to the nature of marital happiness, it was as well to keep silent. I could only be thankful that Mona's domestic arrangements were not patterned along Harleian lines.
We emerged into the main thoroughfare of the Camp, and espied the Countess's groom walking her team and phaeton to an admiring audience of common foot soldiers. Among them, however, I noticed a glossy charger commanded by a captain with a familiar face-Captain Viscount Morley. The blond G.o.d who had danced his last with Catherine Twining at her fatal a.s.sembly looked haggard this afternoon; a riband of black c.r.a.pe was tied about his right arm. Had he attended Catherine's obsequies that morning?
”Thank you, Hinch,” Mona said as she approached her groom. ”Pray go to their heads.”
”Allow me to a.s.sist you, Countess.” Morley had dismounted, and tossed his reins to a brother officer; now he stood by the phaeton, offering his hand, and Mona, accepting it, sprang lightly into the carriage. Immediately, he turned to me with a smile, and offered to spring me into the other side. As Mona fingered the reins and the team tossed its heads, the Captain observed, ”A lovely pair! I envy you up behind them.”
”You should not, if you saw how the Countess drives,” I murmured.
Morley smiled. ”I have often observed her, in Hyde Park of a spring morning; and tho' I admit her to be a very das.h.i.+ng whip, I cannot think you in any danger, Miss-Forgive me, I have forgot your name.”
”Austen,” I said. ”And you are Captain Viscount Morley, I believe?”
”Got it in one.” He glanced at me ruefully as I ascended into the equipage. ”I must do better, next time we meet, Miss Austen. That was unconscionably rude.”
”Not at all,” I a.s.sured him. What boy of four-and-twenty, as I judged him at most to be, should concern himself with the name of a spinster seen once in a crowded room, whose dress proclaimed the dowd, and grieving mourner? ”But if I may presume upon our chance acquaintance-I observed your armband-may I ask whether you attended Miss Twining's funeral this morning?”
His gaze dropped. ”I did, so help me. To think that such a perfect being is laid into the earth-but forgive me. I should ask rather whether you knew her.”
”Pray, do not hide your sensibility on my my account. I was a little acquainted with Miss Twining.” account. I was a little acquainted with Miss Twining.”
”Ah! I had thought you a stranger to Brighton-a guest of the Countess's.”
”A visitor to Brighton only, to be sure-my home is in Hamps.h.i.+re-but I first met Miss Twining on the road from London, at Cuckfield.”
I deliberately tried this information on the Captain to see how he should react; and the change his countenance underwent was remarkable. He first paled, then flushed red.
”Miss Austen-” He hesitated. ”I collect that the Countess is intent upon driving home. Should you mind if I rode a little way beside your carriage? A dawdling escort might encourage her ladys.h.i.+p to curb her horses.”
”Then you shall earn my undying grat.i.tude,” I returned with a smile, ”and any indulgence you might name!”
The Captain remounted, Hinch swung himself up behind the phaeton, and the mettlesome chestnuts, given their heads, sprang forward with a lurch.
Until we were well out of the Camp, the talk must be all on Mona and Morley's side-of horseflesh and auctions at Tattersall's; the fate of a mutual acquaintance's hunters, when that acquaintance lost everything at loo and was forced to sell his stable. ”Six hundred guineas, Swithin says old Jepson paid, for that rawboned young'un,” Mona exclaimed. ”We must hope it's up to carrying Jepson's weight.”
”Do you hunt, Miss Austen?” Morley politely enquired. We had achieved the main Brighton road, and he was obviously dawdling, keeping his handsome charger at something between a trot and a walk; I had never enjoyed a ride in Mona's phaeton so much.
”Sadly, I do not,” I replied, ”although I have many brothers who are addicted to sport. I rather wonder at your finding time to enter the field, Captain-do not your military duties take you much from England? I had heard you were at Talavera.”
”I had that honour, yes.” He dropped back from the carriage, and came round to ride beside me. ”I was used to hunt with the Duke of Beaufort's pack-but it has been at least three years since I have enjoyed a meeting.”
”-Having been perpetually fighting with Wellington in the Peninsula, I collect. Miss Twining also had a brother in the 10th, I believe-Richard Twining. Were you at all acquainted with him?”
”Indeed I was. We were tent-mates for a time. I thought poor Richard the best of fellows, and as fine a cavalry officer as ever lived. He was but nineteen when he was killed. I saw him fall.”
Mona gave a soft exclamation of sorrowful sympathy.
”It is extraordinary, is it not, that General Twining has lost both his children?” I said thoughtfully. ”Almost as tho' he had been marked out by Fate-or an avenging Fury.”
”There are some men who draw misfortune as surely as carrion draws the vulture,” he said in a taut voice. ”I valued Richard Twining exceedingly, Miss Austen-but if his father should meet with the most painful death imaginable, I should greet the news with relief, and raise a gla.s.s to Heaven on the strength of it! I say this, tho' he is is a senior officer.” a senior officer.”
”Strong words indeed, sir,” I said imperturbably. ”What has the General done to inspire such implacable resentment?”
”He had a wife, ma'am, before he possessed his children-and the misery he brought upon her head cannot fail to move any who once knew her, tho' she is many years now in her grave.”
I bowed to the Captain; his words were laden with honest emotion, and I detected no attempt at dissimulation, no effort to disguise his pa.s.sionate disregard for the General. If this young man were were determined to be the agent of his family's revenge upon the Twinings-and had sought to destroy the father by extinguis.h.i.+ng first his son, a companion in arms-and then his daughter, so trusting and young-Morley was exceedingly clever. A man who had much to hide, should have affected a careless cordiality towards the General-and I should have suspected his motives instantly. By exposing his unvarnished enmity, Morley appeared guileless; and I suspected him the more. determined to be the agent of his family's revenge upon the Twinings-and had sought to destroy the father by extinguis.h.i.+ng first his son, a companion in arms-and then his daughter, so trusting and young-Morley was exceedingly clever. A man who had much to hide, should have affected a careless cordiality towards the General-and I should have suspected his motives instantly. By exposing his unvarnished enmity, Morley appeared guileless; and I suspected him the more.
”But I blame myself for Miss Twining's murder,” he said, in a lowered voice. ”I spoke too freely, when I should not-I sought to protect and s.h.i.+eld her. Instead, I served only to incite her murderer to violence.”
”Unless you held her head under the waves, Captain, you cannot possibly claim guilt.”
He looked at me in swift dismay. ”I, drown Catherine Catherine? You will acquit me of such an atrocity, I hope, Miss Austen, when I tell you that it has been many months since I have known she was the only creature on earth capable of ensuring my happiness-and that, tho' she shrank from openly proclaiming an engagement, until she should be of age, I may say with confidence that she felt the same depth of regard for me.”
”Good G.o.d!” I said blankly. ”Do not tell me that the Earl of Derwent.w.a.ter's estates lie somewhere near Bath Bath?”
”My family has long been established in that part of the country, indeed,” the Captain returned with a faint air of curiosity.
Thus did my brother Henry's predicted appearance of a gallant Unknown, devoted to Miss Twining, come to pa.s.s-and as I had feared, entirely too late. A host of impressions swept over me. Catherine in love with a young officer. Catherine, sent home from school. Catherine, going in fear of disclosing her beloved's name Catherine in love with a young officer. Catherine, sent home from school. Catherine, going in fear of disclosing her beloved's name. But Morley was speaking, and I must attend.
”The fact of her brother having reposed his trust and friends.h.i.+p in me, early supported my suit; but many months of mutual esteem, and increasing knowledge of one another's character, established the true bond.”
”Then you have all my sympathy, Captain,” I said; but I studied his cla.s.sic profile in some doubt. ”How did you come to meet? Miss Twining was much of the year at school, I believe, in Bath?”
”She was-but at such a remove from the General, Catherine naturally felt herself to be free of inordinate restraint. She might receive visitors, under the eye of Miss Addams, the Headmistress. I first called last November, to deliver a letter I had long held in keeping-the final one penned by her brother. Richard had told me much of his beloved sister during our long campaigning in Spain.”
”Of course,” I murmured.
”From that beginning,” the Captain continued in a voice that wavered only a little, ”our attachment was constant and fervent. The knowledge that I was to be garrisoned in Brighton-where Catherine made her home-only increased our happiness-but we taught ourselves discretion, so as not to excite the animosity of her father.”
”You only danced the one dance with her, at Monday's a.s.sembly,” Mona observed.
The Captain turned his head. ”All subterfuge must be abhorrent; but I knew the General should make Catherine's life a misery if he suspected our mutual regard. An ancient scandal lies between our two families, which renders any marital tie repugnant to the General.”
”You were aware he intended to marry her to Mr. Hendred Smalls?” I asked.
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