Jane and the Madness of Lord Byron jam-10

by Stephanie Barron

  “Murderer!” the messenger on horseback was shouting as he galloped towards the Marine Pavilion. “Byron the murderer has escaped!”

  Chapter 31 Poetic Justice

  SATURDAY, 15 MAY 1813

  BRIGHTON, CONT.

  “HENRY!”

  I stood in the private parlour that divided my bedchamber from my brother’s, holding aloft a fresh candle—the one I had employed for reading being almost guttered—and knocked at his door. “Henry!”

  After an interval, he peered out, looking rather absurd, as I thought, in his nightcap and silk robe. I should rather it had been flannel, tho’ in general I despise the stuff—there is something profoundly comforting and home-like about flannel.

  “Did you hear the messenger?”

  “What messenger?”

  He groped towards one of the parlour’s chairs, eyes still blinded with sleep; he had not wasted so much time as to light a candle.

  “In the street below. A mounted rider—from Brighton Camp, as I presume, and bound for the Regent’s people. Byron has escaped!”

  “Oh, Lord.” Henry rubbed ineffectually at his head, loosing the cap and raking his grey hair into tufts. “He’ll have the whole country roused against him now! Men on foot with torches and dogs, constabulary horsed—and Byron cannot even run! What is the fool about, to be limping towards liberty?”

  “I only hope that he did not employ Mona’s pen-knife in his escape,” I fretted, “for she should never forgive herself.”

  “Mona’s pen—? No, do not explain—I should rather remain in ignorance,” Henry said. “But consider, Jane, how ill-advised—Flight cannot impress the magistrate with his lordship’s innocence!”

  “I think it may be guilt Byron prefers,” I said frantically. “A murderous aspect—particularly when it is assumed in the name of Justice—appears so much more romantic than a helpless one.”

  “What are you talking of, Jane?”

  “I know where Lord Byron will have gone.”

  “If he has any sense, he’ll have stolen a horse and raced up the London road by now.”

  “That is exactly where he shall not go. He means to avenge Catherine Twining’s murder—like the Giaour of his poem.”

  “The what?” Henry demanded blankly.

  “Never mind.” I thrust the telling sheet of paper into Henry’s hands. “Read this—and be so good as to put on your clothes. I mean to thwart his lordship, and I cannot go out in the dead of night alone.”

  MORE THAN OURSELVES WERE ABROAD BY THE TIME MY brother roused the Castle’s porter, and pled with the bewildered fellow to unbolt the door. The lackey would not promise to wait up for our return, until Henry informed him sternly that it was a matter of life and death—and pressed a guinea into his hand. Then we were out into the night.

  A party of horsemen were collecting on the Steyne; and as predicted, torches flamed about them, casting a livid glow upon cheek and brow. Rising behind them, the bulk of the Marine Pavilion showed lights in many windows, and the riding stables were also illuminated; was Caro Lamb aware of what had occurred? There was much hallooing and barking of orders from the assembling search party; and some of the common Brighton folk had gathered on foot to observe the bustle. I glimpsed the undergroom, Jem, with his arm about the shoulders of my chambermaid, Betsy—both looking watchful and expectant.

  “Wait a moment, Jane,” my brother said. “It would be as well to learn the latest intelligence.”

  He crossed swiftly to one of the mounted constables, and conversed with the man briefly; then, with a shrug of his shoulders and a faint laugh, turned back to me.

  “It seems his lordship was aided in his escape by a page from the Pavilion, who rode up to the gaol dressed in the Regent’s blue and buff livery,” Henry explained hurriedly. “The boy claimed to bear a reprieve for Byron, direct from His Royal Highness—and the sentries, upon reading it, released his lordship immediately. It was only once the Camp Commandant learnt what had occurred, and demanded to see the paper, that the Regent’s signature was perceived to be a forgery. By that time, of course, the two had cantered away.”

  “Caro Lamb!” I exclaimed. “That is entirely like her! She should commit every crime in the Kingdom to save her Genius—and never give two snaps of her fingers for what the Law might say.”

  “But to forge the Regent’s signature,” Henry returned in tones of shock, “must be a treasonous offence.”

  “She should argue, with complete sang-froid, that to do anything less should be traitorous to the dictates of her heart—and might even win clemency from a Prince who saw fit to marry two women bigamously. But enough about Caro—We must hurry, Henry, or it shall be too late.”

  As we achieved Church Street, I observed Scrope Davies’s lodgings to be as well-lit as tho’ for a ball. That would be, no doubt, where the little page in blue and buff would be regaling her court with her adventures. No doubt Caro had expected a flight by water, in Byron’s yacht, perhaps—the two of them sailing romantically out into the darkened sea, their destination Greece or Turkey. It had not turned out like that; but then, Caro’s plans rarely bore fruit, and never corresponded to the elaborate phantasies she spun. She would be busy already, I guessed, at spinning another—

  We were bound for a different abode, one that stood still shuttered in darkness, but for the faint glow emanating from a side window, that suggested one was awake, and keeping vigil at the house’s rear—

  Henry strode up the path to General Twining’s door, and pounded on the oak. To our surprize, it gave way with a reverberating shudder—it had been ajar, and trembled on its hinges. My brother glanced at me wordlessly; I nodded, and he stepped across the threshold. The entry hall was in darkness.

  “General Twining!” Henry called.

  “Suddley?” I attempted.

  No answering voice came. But there were footfalls—a curious, sickening, dragging gait that betrayed the club foot. It was approaching us.

  I clutched at Henry’s sleeve.

  He groped, in turn, for a taper that ought to lie on the entry hall table. But there was no way to light it.

  A dark head, faintly backlit by the pale glow spilling over the threshold of the rear room, appeared suddenly before us; I was reminded of General Twining’s habit of materialising at the far end of the passage. That must be where his book room lay.

  “The General will receive you now,” Byron said with a bow, “but do not expect to speak with him overmuch; he is unequal to all explanation.”

  I could not make out his countenance or read his looks in the darkness of the passage; but in the throb of his voice, in the very current of suppressed violence his still form conveyed, I read the truth. Every pore of my being was alive to his; that was Byron’s inimitable power. “Dear God,” I whispered. “You have killed him, then. We are too late.”

  Byron advanced towards us silently; Henry raised the taper as tho’ it were a weapon. His lordship stopped perhaps a yard from where we stood. At last I could see his eyes glittering in the faint light, and the pallid gleam of his countenance.

  “Killed him?” he repeated contemptuously. “He did not die by my hand. That was unnecessary; there are such men on earth, Miss Austen, who are mortal to themselves.” He stepped closer, all the intensity of his look fixed upon mine, and my rebellious pulse quickened. “But how did you come here?” he demanded. “What unknown seraph whispered my truth into your ears?”

  By way of answer, I drew breath and recited the words I had read only a half-hour before, in the comfort of my Castle bedroom:

  Thy victims ere they yet expire

  Shall know the demon for their sire,

  As cursing thee, thou cursing them,

  Thy flowers are withered on the stem.

  But one that for thy crime must fall,

  The youngest, most beloved of all,

  Shall bless thee with a father’s name—

  That word shall wrap thy heart in Flame!

  “Ah,”
Byron said acidly. “The Giaour. It is an excellent tale, is it not? So replete with exotic detail—so vivid with Attic life! All of London shall read it, and exclaim at the barbarous customs that obtain in the East!”

  “And in Brighton,” I supplied.

  “Exactly so, Miss Austen. And now—if you will forgive me—I stand in need of whiskey.” He made as if to limp past us, but Henry seized him by the arm.

  “You cannot quit this place, Byron,” he said wonderingly. “Are you out of your senses? The entire town is raised against you!”

  “If the entire town wishes to speak with me, I shall be at Davies’s house,” the poet said wearily. “In the meanwhile, you might offer the entire town the General’s last letter.”

  He shook off my brother’s hand, and pushed his way through the open door.

  We let him go.

  Then we glanced at each other and walked side by side towards the faint light spilling from the back room.

  General Twining was in dress uniform, seated at his writing desk as tho’ sleeping, his head resting on his arms; but a pool of dark blood flowing from one temple shattered the illusion of dreaming peace. His eyes were open, and dreadfully fixed; their last sight, I must suppose, had been the portrait of a young officer of the 10th Hussars that hung over the mantelpiece—his son and heir, Richard, killed in the Peninsula.

  “Observe, Jane.” Henry reached for a folded sheet of hot-pressed paper, which had been sealed with wax and the General’s ring. “It is inscribed to Sir Harding Cross.”

  “His confession, no doubt.” Another sheet had lain beneath it—and this hand I recognised. It was Byron’s.

  Yes, Leila sleeps beneath the wave,

  But his shall be a redder grave;

  Her spirit pointed well the steel

  Which taught that felon heart to feel.

  I watched my time, I leagued with

  these, The traitor in his turn to seize;

  My wrath is wreaked, the deed is done,

  And now I go,—but go alone.

  Chapter 32 The Corsair

  SATURDAY, 15 MAY> 1813

  BRIGHTON, CONT.

  HENRY INSISTED UPON REMAINING WITH GENERAL TWINING’S body, the letter replaced in its position on the desk, while I walked swiftly back in the direction of Marine Parade in order to rouse the Earl of Swithin’s household. It was for Charles Swithin, we thought, to inform Sir Harding Cross that his case of murder was done—so that the magistrate might have the reading of Twining’s sealed letter before anyone else should find it. That it had been dictated to the General by Lord Byron, and probably at gun point, I never doubted; whether his lordship or the General’s hand eventually despatched the pistol’s ball into the General’s brain, I do not care to consider over-long. The duelling pistol was the General’s own—and antique enough to have accounted for the death of his wife’s lover, nearly fifteen years since. It was found on the floor near the General’s chair; and coupled with the confessional letter, was enough for Old HardCross to proclaim the death self-murder, and to acquit Lord Byron of any charges in the drowning of Catherine Twining. As for Byron’s part in the General’s scandalous end—so far as Sir Harding knew, his lordship had never been more than near the place, having repaired to his friend Mr. Davies’s lodgings the very instant his amorous page effected his release from Brighton Camp.

  When the contents of the General’s letter were related to me the following morning, over a late breakfast at No. 21, Marine Parade, they were much as I had suspected: The General confessed to having drowned his daughter in a fit of drunken rage. After Captain the Viscount Morley knocked him senseless outside the Pavilion’s doors, the General had regained his wits in time to observe Lord Byron entering the Pavilion. When Catherine exited a few moments later, in evident agitation, her father had followed her out of the courtyard. He had confronted her on the Steyne with his suspicions—that she had disgraced herself like a common trollop with Lord Byron. He then informed her, with evident glee, that her indiscretions should never dishonour her father again—that he had agreed that very night to give her hand in marriage to Mr. Hendred Smalls. In return, Catherine declared that her heart already belonged to Captain Morley—and that she should rather be dead than marry anyone else.

  It was this honest expression of feeling that inflamed the General against his own flesh and blood. In his right mind, of course, he might only have struck the girl, and carried her home to live out a miserable existence confined to her rooms. In his drunken state, however, he was deaf to all reason. He had declared that she should have her dearest wish—and dragged her towards the shingle, where he thrust her head beneath the waves.

  It was a dreadful history; and I suspect that the General’s old friend, Colonel Hanger—in having plied his former comrade with Port that night—bears much of the responsibility for Catherine’s death. I am certain it was indeed Hanger, discovering the corpse in one of his solitary midnight strolls, who hit upon the excellent joke of sewing Catherine Twining into a shroud formed of the Giaour’s hammock—and deposited Catherine in what he assumed to be Byron’s bed.

  The Colonel, of course, cannot be accused, approached, or touched—he remains the Regent’s friend, and enjoys a Royal protection. But I confess I hate the very sight of him.

  What might have been the General’s sentiments the following morning, when he awoke to a brain restored from drink, a full sense of the horror of his crime, and the intelligence that his daughter’s remains had been discovered in such circumstances, can only be guessed at; his confessional letter is silent upon all points. His cowardice, however, in allowing another man to bear the brunt of suspicion and guilt, to the very threshold of the gibbet, must acquit the world of the slightest impulse towards sympathy.

  “I must say, Jane, that you are very poorly repaid for all your efforts on Lady Oxford’s behalf,” Mona observed as she crumbled a roll and sipped at her tea, “for she left Brighton last night before Byron’s escape was even heard of; and never thought to thank you. I am ashamed of Jane Harley, I confess; tho’ in truth I cannot blame her. Lord Byron would try a saint.”

  “Then let us hope Lady Oxford exerts her considerable energies in sailing past Gibraltar,” I replied, “and that Lord Byron is left to enslave another lady with his verse and his caprice.” If I felt a slight wistfulness at failing to bid the poet adieu, I ruthlessly suppressed it. I did not approve Lord Byron, I should never judge his character as worthy of respect—but it is something, indeed, to have won the esteem of such a writer. I shall not judge myself too harshly for exulting in his privileged knowledge—or his flattering regard.

  “If Lady Oxford does not know how to repay Jane’s exertions,” my brother interjected, “I certainly do. You came here for the restorative powers of Brighton; and thus far, have enjoyed none of them. Tomorrow you shall bathe in the sea, with the aid of a dipper and a machine—”

  I confess I squeaked at this, from both pleasure and dread.

  “—but today, you will spend the whole morning at Madame La Fanchette’s, in purchasing a modish gown in any colour but black. There remains a quantity of winnings that must be spent.”

  Lady Swithin clapped her hands, and I jumped up to hug my brother; he truly is such an excellent Henry.

  SILK THE COLOUR OF WINE, LORD HAROLD’S GHOST HAD urged; an opinion seconded by Mr. Forth, the redoubtable Master of Brighton, who had gone so far as to name the wine claret. Madame La Fanchette possessed no less than three bolts of a suitable shade—one a sarcenet, one a French twill, and the last a silk so gloriously rich I might fancy myself a figure in the Regent’s Chinese gallery, as precious an objet d’art as the porcelains he collected. My practical soul counseled the selection of French twill—as serviceable as it was fashionable; I reluctantly weighed the claims of stout sarcenet; but another voice—neither Lord Harold’s nor Mr. Forth’s—whispered me nay.

  Let it be the taffeta, my dearest Jane.

  And I caught a snatch of laughter tinkling as
bells, remote and beguiling as birdsong.

  Eliza. She was with me still, and I was returned on the instant to Sloane Street, her soul flying away from me without a backwards look. My eyes pricked at unexpected tears, despite the blandishments of Madame La Fanchette, the furls of cloth sliding between my gloved fingers, the dulcet chatter of Lady Swithin as she turned the plates of a fashion magazine. My breath drew in on a sob, quickly stifled.

  Forgive, the butterfly shade murmured. You know what Byron is. You felt it, I am sure. The response, so involuntary, of every nerve. A woman might sell her soul for such an instant of glory.

  Of course I had felt it.

  Regret. Regret.

  Forgive.

  Of course you are forgiven, Eliza—and never forgotten. Never.

  “Jane?” Mona said gently. “Are you unwell?”

  I blinked back my tears, and fumbled in my reticule for one of Manon’s black-edged kerchiefs. It was Mona, however, who handed me her own—embroidered with the flourishing script of entwined initials, Wilborough and Swithin.

  “In all this bustle of murder and accusation,” she said softly, “I had almost forgot you were mourning.”

  I smiled at her. How extraordinary it was that I should find again this acquaintance of long ago, this connexion unlooked for to my roguish lord; how extraordinary that in Eliza’s passing, I should discover a friend.

  “I believe,” I said firmly, “that I shall take the claret-coloured silk. A ball-gown with demi-train, in the very latest mode, Madame—and a headdress to match.”

  Eliza should have countenanced no less.

  It was as we were leaving Madame La Fanchette’s some three hours later—I, smug in the knowledge of having ordered a becoming gown for evening wear, Mona in possession of a very fetching carriage dress that should become her dashing perch phaeton to perfection—that we espied Lady Caroline Lamb, bound for the New Road.