Jane and the Man of the Cloth

by Stephanie Barron

  “Hibbs!” I shouted. The tumult of the storm continued unabated, making all attempt at conversation a dubious affair.

  “Yes, miss,” the man rejoined, turning from the wreckage of his rig.

  “My sister cannot remain here”

  “Don’t know as she ‘as much choice, beggin’ yer pardon, miss. The horses be gone, and the coach a fair ruin. Then there’s the matter o’ that there tree,” he said, tossing a look over his shoulder.

  I regained my feet and peered ahead into the tempest A massive trunk indeed lay full across the road, barring further passage. How unfortunate that it should be before us, rather than behind. But I comprehended, now, the reason for the horses’ terror and flight. We were any of us fortunate to be alive.

  “We cannot hope to shift it?”

  Hibbs shook his head in reply. “And with the nags run off—”

  “Then we must fetch assistance from some neighbouring farm,” I said with authority, and cast about me into the gloom. Misfortune could not have chosen a more desolate place to befall us. As far as the gaze might reach, the high downs roiled unimpeded to the sea. But wait—

  “Is not that a light, away there in the distance?”

  The postboy shrugged, and his brows lowered. “Happen it is. But you’ll not be finding help for the young lady at the Grange.”

  “And why ever not?”

  “They’re queer folk.”

  “Queer or no, they cannot refuse to help a lady in such distress,” I replied firmly, and turned to my father. Heedless of the rain that had completely soaked his hat, he stood at a little distance from my mother, who was bent over Cassandra in an attitude of despair. My sister’s condition, I saw at a glance, was unchanged. With such burdens of infirmity and age parcelled out among them, they should none of them be left too long in darkness and storm.

  “Sir,” I called, crossing to my father, “the postboy and I intend to seek aid from the farm whose lights you espy at a little distance. We shall hasten to return.”

  “But, Jane—my dear—had not /better go?” my father enquired doubtfully, and when I would insist, he added in a lowered tone, “For it cannot be proper to send you off into the night in the company of such a man. A complete stranger, and a hapless one, 1 fear; only look to what an impasse he has brought us!”

  “But thankfully, Father, he calls this country home; and may be of service in appealing to the inhabitants of the farm. And as to going yourself—would you leave three women alone and unprotected, on such a road, in such a state? Better that you should stand with my mother, and comfort her when you may.”

  I turned from him before he could reply—for, in truth, help should be long in coming, did my father go in search of it. He is an elderly gentleman whose pace is slow on the smoothest of roads, and in the best of light; and I paled to think of him attempting the downs in the present hour.

  “Come along, Hibbs,” 1 called to the postboy, who stood muttering under his breath over the ruin of his harness. ‘To the Grange it is, as fast as our feet may carry us.”

  I SHALL PASS OVER IN SILENCE THE RIGOURS OF THAT DAMPENING walk; how endless it seemed, the lights of the Grange receding ever before us through the rain; how our ankles were turned, and our clothes snagged, and our legs thoroughly wearied, well before we came to the narrow track through the meadow that led to a neat gate, and a stone pathway running up to a massive oak door, lit only by a smoking lanthorn. High Down Grange—for so, I have learnt, is its full name—was at one time a modest farmhouse, though now turned country manor; the home of a gendeman, by all appearances, while maintaining still its purpose as a center of agricultural endeavour. The house was wrapt in quiet, despite the storm, the fierceness of which had driven all sensible folk within doors; and my relief was so great, upon gaining the stoop, that I nearly sank to my knees in gratitude.

  The baying of a dog—nay, several dogs—announced our arrival, and then the beasts themselves rounded the corner of the house like a pack of wolves, slavering for our throats. I confess that I screamed, and clutched at poor Hibbs, who thrust me behind him and menaced the curs with a stout cudgel—taken up some time past as a walking stick, but performing now a dearer service.

  “Jasper! Fang! You there, Beelzebub! Heel! Heel, I say!”

  The commanding voice came from the doorway, now streaming with light as the sturdy oak was unbarred. A lanthorn held high revealed a gendeman’s face—though a countenance most harshly-drawn, under a windswept mop of black hair. The master of High Down, I presumed; and masterly enough with his dark brows heavy and knit, his eyes glowing and fierce, and his nose as sharply hooked as a bird of prey’s. A man of middlish age, perhaps five-and-thirty, arrayed in knee breeches and a white shirt quite open at the collar, his stock being put aside as though he were in the act of retiring. His countenance was suffused with a most ungentlemanly rage—the violence of his great dogs, it seemed, being mirrored in the spirits of their master.

  “Who the Devil are you?” he cried, with a glower for the beasts, now cowering at his feet, and a glower for ourselves—and so Hibbs and I were welcomed to High Down Grange.

  “Miss Jane Austen, of Bath,” I replied, in a tone that betrayed a quaver.

  “Miss Jane Austen of Bath, and her merry man,” our host said caustically, with a look for poor Hibbs. “And what in God’s name brings you out on such a night? Some unholy pilgrimage?”5

  “A gentleman of better breeding and greater charity might have saved such questions for the comfort of his drawing-room,” I retorted, my patience thoroughly spent. The rain, though diminished to a fine drizzle, was still as wet; and its continued descent upon my drenched cap and shawl did nothing to improve my temper. “We are clearly driven to your door by the utmost extremity, sir, and if any alternative served, should never have troubled you longer—for you are undoubtedly lacking in the sensibilities of a true gentleman, and the assistance of a common labourer should be given with greater goodwill, I am sure.”

  “Undoubtedly,” he said, and though his lip curled cynically at the word, my tart rebuke appeared to soften him a little. His choler drained away, and I thought him about to speak in a more measured tone, when a small sound caused him to turn, and the rings of light emanating from the lamp he held shifted and welled like a tide of water across the darkened courtyard. I turned, and started in fright, and reached again for Hibbs’s arm; for we were held at bay by the business end of a very imposing blunderbuss, levelled in the hands of a stable boy—of malevolent intent, to judge by his aspect.

  ‘Put up the gun, Toby,” the master of High Down said gendy. “You need not be threatening a bedraggled woman. She looks harmless enough.”

  “She ain’t no woman, Mr. Sidmouth, sir. She’s a lady to you.” Hibbs’s hands were clenching and unclenching at his belt. That he kept a pistol there, for fear of highwaymen, I well knew; and that he had left it with my father, the better to safeguard the ladies, I surmised he very much regretted.

  “Be off wi’ ye,’ the boy said menacingly; but he lowered the blunderbuss, with evident mistrust. “‘re no more in a pack o’ spies, ye are. Be off, ‘fore I blows ye down the lane!”

  “Toby!” Mr. Sidmouth—for so I assumed him to be, as Hibbs had named him—strode swiftly from the doorway to the boy’s side, with nary a glance for ourselves. He pried the gun from Toby’s hands and turned him towards the back of the house, from whence he had appeared. “Tell Mary we’ve company, and then fetch Miss Seraphine, there’s a good fellow.”

  “Run ‘em off, Mr. Sid,” the boy said, by way of reply. “They’re here as ‘formers, I’ll lay my soul on’t.”

  A sound bussing on the bottom was his only answer, and the master of High Down turned once more to face us. “My apologies,” he told us. “The boy has yet to learn his manners.”

  “You astonish me.” My tone was dry. “And with such a paragon as yourself for instruction?”

  In the lamp’s glow, Sidmouth’s mouth tightened, and the black brows
lowered over his eyes. I felt sure that in a moment he should drive us down the hill with the butt of the gun, but instead, he drew breath and managed a smile. “Your reproof is well-placed, Miss Jane Austen of Bath,” he said. “I fear I have shown myself to disadvantage upon first meeting. Do not, I beg of you, take the instant for a portrait of the man. And now, I trust, you will do me the honour of entering High Down Grange? For it rains”—at this, he cast a look towards the heavens—“undoubtedly it rains.” There was an air of immense satisfaction about the man, that I was at a loss to understand; but mindful of my sister’s plight I wasted not another thought upon Mr. Sidmouth and his mysteries, and followed him into the house.

  It is a simple-enough affair, rather reminiscent, at first glance, of dear Steventon,6 in its exposed beams and whitewashed walls. I imagined the upstairs rooms would have sloping floors, and dormer eaves, and all the comfort of age and use to recommend them—and as I sit here now, writing by the light of a single candle, in one such a room, I find my conjecture immediately proved. It is a house made for laughter and song and the fresh-blown scent of roses in the doorway, and that it is sadly lacking in all such delights, I readily discerned. For High Down Grange has been subject to decided neglect—the result, perhaps, of having no mistress. Geoffrey Sidmouth is a single man, prone, as are all such fellows, to thoughtlessness with regard to his surroundings, and to an overactive benevolence towards his hounds, his horses, and his hunting. Or so I surmise.

  The drawing-room eloquendy bespoke the want of a lady’s attention, in its shabby fittings and dusty aspect, and I wondered, as I stood uneasy upon the hearth, at the aforementioned Mary—was she cook, or housekeeper, or merely a slovenly attempt at both? And who should Miss Seraphine be?

  “Allow me to introduce myself,” Sidmouth said, in closing the door and crossing to the fire. “I am Geoffrey Sidmouth, and High Down Grange is my home—at present. I take it from Hibbs being your attendant, Miss Austen, that you are a traveller in these parts; and that his regrettably poor driving has unhorsed your equipage.”

  Hibbs glowered from his place near the doorway, all the anger of his outraged reputation hot upon his lips; but Sidmouth silenced him with a glance. “I have reason to regret that driving myself,” he mused. “I am surprised you have the courage to show your face here, man.” With that, the master’s eyes found the postboy’s and their gazes locked for an inscrutable instant; an instant that ended in Hibbs hanging his head.

  “Go to the kitchen until we have need of you,” Sidmouth said; and Hibbs quitted the room without another word.

  The master of High Down motioned me to a worn chair by the fire, and as I hesitated, surveying the soaking fabric of my gown, and certain it should leave a mark, he made a gesture of impatience and took me by the arm in a most forward manner. I had begun to regret poor Hibbs, when Sidmouth thrust me abrupdy towards the seat. “Forget the matter of your dress,” he said, not un-gentiy. “It shall be changed as soon as possible for another. Now, tell me of your affairs. You travel alone? From Bath to Lyme is a great distance for a lady, and without even her maid.”

  “Indeed, sir, I do not,” I said, all the memory of my recent trouble rushing full upon my mind. “I travel with those dearest to me in the world—and overcome, like myself, by a great misfortune. Having changed horses at Crewkerne, and acquired Hibbs as postboy, we thought to make Lyme this very e’en—and should have done so, but for the storm. We were, as you have surmised, overturned; and I fear my beloved sister is injured as a result She lies even now upon the verge of the road, and I am come to beg your assistance; for she cannot remain there. We are lost without your aid, Mr. Sidmouth, and every minute must be precious in such a cause.”

  To his credit, Sidmouth made for the door with alacrity, crying harshly for the stable boy Toby as he did; and I was allowed the sensation of exquisite relief, in having accomplished my mission without further enquiry, and in being able to enjoy the comforts of the chair by the fire, despite my sodden dress and aching feet In an instant the master of High Down had returned, followed by the unfortunate Hibbs.

  “I am sending this fellow and Toby in search of your sister immediately, Miss Austen, with the instruction that they are to convey her hither. There were others in your party, I believe?”

  “My father and mother, sir, of advanced years.”

  “I fear you shall none of you make Lyme tonight Hibbs tells me of a great tree, to which he credits the chaos of his horses, that lies across the road and bars all passage.” The curl in Sidmouth’s lip as he spoke these words, told all his opinion of Hibbs’s excuses, “four family shall be borne to High Down, and the hospitality of this house extended gladly to all.”

  “Thank you, sir,” I said, with a bow of my head. “You are very kind, and we are much obliged to your goodness.”

  “Think nothing of it I would that I could do more.

  And now, my man,”he said to Hibbs, as we heard the sound of a carriage being brought round to the door, “be off. Do everything to assure the Austens’ comfort, since you have already assured their distress. There are lap robes and warm bricks in the carriage/’

  “It may be that a waggon should serve better,” I broke in. “It might more easily cross the downs, should the road hither prove impassable. And, too, when I left my sister, she was as yet insensible from a blow to the head. She may be incapable of mounting the carriage steps, and my father is no longer strong enough to lift her.”

  “The carriage will have to do,” Sidmouth said shortly. “There is not a waggon to be had tonight. Hibbs must serve, should any lifting be necessary.”

  I wondered at such words, and at the obligations which could engage a farm’s waggons in such darkness and rain; and wondered still more at Sidmouth’s failure to go to my sister himself, when necessity pled so powerful a cause. But he turned away from me, and paced before the fire, seemingly lost in contemplation of the flames.

  “Cannot we send to Lyme for a surgeon, Mr Sidmouth?” I enquired anxiously, as a new thought struck me. “My sister, I fear, is gravely injured; no care should be spared, that might prove her salvation.”

  “A surgeon is utterly impossible.”

  “But why?” I was astounded. “I know that a tree bars the way into town, but could not a single horse pass where a larger conveyance might not?”

  “Did we send for the surgeon the entire night through, Miss Austen, we should assuredly find him already called out.”

  “But you cannot know this for a certainty!”

  “I fear that 1 can. I fear that I do” At that, Sidmouth braced himself against the mantel as though overcome by some powerful emotion, and I was utterly silenced.

  The painful pause in our discourse was broken by the turning of the doorknob, and the silent entrance of a woman so beautiful, that had I not heard the name Seraphine spoken already by Sidmouth himself, I am certain it should have sprung unbidden to my lips. There was that of the angel about her, in the graceful movement of her carriage, and her liquid gaze, and the unbound glory of her golden hair, that inspired one to imagine wings fluttering in the shadows to her back. And of a certainty, her appearance was not quite of this world—for though her face bore the lines of nobility, her clothing proclaimed her neither housemaid nor lady, but a common labourer of the fields. She was arrayed in a simple gown of nankeen, such as a milkmaid might wear; stout boots that had seen much use; and a flowing red cloak. An unlit lanthorn of a curious design—tall and cylindrical, and possessed of a spout—was in her right hand.

  “There you are at last,” Sidmouth said, with a touch of impatience.

  The angel made no reply, but awaited his command.

  ‘This is Miss Jane Austen.”

  Her gaze turned my way, as cold as the breath of a sepulchre. Then she looked her enquiry to Sidmouth. To my surprise, he broke into a torrent of French, a language with which I am somewhat familiar; but the rapidity of his speech left me quickly behind. A few words only I caught—dogs, and the b
ay, and perhaps the men; and then Seraphine was gesturing towards me, her lovely face overcome with suspicion, and Sidmouth abrupdy silencing her with a word. That it was an incomprehensible one to me—lascargon—made no difference to the angel. She turned on her heel in a swirl of red wool, and was as swiftly gone; and I drew a deep breath, and looked for an explanation to Sidmouth—who clearly intended to offer me none. His face was once more to the fire, and his hands clasped behind. As if sensible of my gaze, he roused himself, and met my eyes with a single long look; then he bowed, and made for the door.

  “Mr. Sidmouthr I cried.

  “Yes, Miss Austen?” He halted in the. very act of exiting, and offered a lifted eyebrow.

  “This is a very singular household indeed,” I burst out.

  “’Singular’ does not even begin to describe it,” Mr. Sid mouth replied, and left me to myself.

  I HAD NOT LONG TO AWAIT THE RETURN OF THE GRANGE’S CARRIAGE, and my anxious feet had sped me to the courtyard well before the horses were pulled up, and the coach door flung open, and my dear Cassandra laid gcndy on a settee before the fire. She was as colourless as a ghost, and I might even have believed her to have expired, but from the composure of my father in attending her.

  Sidmouth materialised in the drive with a sturdy farm woman behind, the very Mary whose slovenliness I had conjectured; she bore a steaming basin and a quantity of torn cloth, for the preparation of bandages, and I was soon relieved to find her possessed of a quiet efficiency. When she had bathed Cassandra’s wound, Sidmouth himself bent over my sister with an air of command that would not be gainsaid. His fingers probed the bones of her skull, and passed with delicate knowledge along her temple, so that she winced in her delirium, but showed no other sign of discomfort. My poor Cassandra! So lovely still, despite her suffering, that even Sidmouth could not fail to be moved!