by Deryn Lake
One look was enough to confirm her worst recollections of Kitty — and to see that the gallant Captain had risen through the ranks. His florid complexion, bulging blue eye and too-ready, loud laugh were enough to reveal all.
“Ha, ha, ha,” he chortled, “a pleasure, Ma’am. I hope you’ll pay me the honour of accompanying the good lady and m’self to Vaux Hall Gardens. Booked a box in the hope of your esteemed company.”
Disliking the pair on sight, Sarah answered, “Thank you, Sir, but I would rather not. Let you and Kitty proceed together.”
“Nonsense,” Roderick replied heartily. “We wouldn’t hear of such a thing. Come, Lady Sarah, I won’t take no for an answer.”
Suddenly seeing the loneliness of her situation, Sarah changed her mind. After all, what harm could come of it when the eager Miss Kitty could scarcely keep her hands off the repellent fellow?
The box the Captain had secured was well placed and Sarah saw several people she knew, all of whom ostentatiously cut her dead. Cowed, she bent her head, her eyes filling with tears and wished herself far away.
“Now, now,” said the Captain jovially, “can’t have any of that. It don’t do for a lovely woman to be sad.” And he filled her glass with a bumper of champagne.
Sarah drank deeply and felt some of her good spirits return. Looking up once more, she saw Kitty waving frantically at Lord Cavendish who, with less fervour, was returning her greeting.
“La, the dear soul,” the foolish woman was gushing, “I’ve sore neglected him recently.” She gave the Captain a coy glance. “I’m duty bound to join Milord for a while. Pray excuse me.”
She rose to leave the box, then turned back, wagging a finger archly. “Now you’re not to be jealous, Roderick. I’ll not be long. Lady Sarah, I deliver my sweetheart into your good hands.”
“Well,” said the Captain as she disappeared, “alone at last, eh?”
“Yes, it would appear so.”
“Then would you care to stroll? The walkways here are the finest there are, at least in my view.”
Thinking that to admire the greenery would at least give them something to talk about, Sarah got to her feet. “Indeed yes, some fresh air would be pleasant.”
It was cold outside the box and she shivered. Bowing, the Captain offered his arm which, with certain trepidation, Sarah took, thinking it impolite to do otherwise. Thus, proceeding close together, he steered her in the direction of the Walks.
The gardens at Vaux Hall were indeed both spacious and beautiful, covering several acres and, charging only one shilling entry fee as they did, were more popular than the exclusive Ranelagh which demanded two shillings and sixpence, though that sum included tea and coffee. Another attraction of Vaux Hall was that together with the green walks, lit by lamps hung in the trees, it also had dark walks without illumination. Here lovers hastened. Sarah’s brother, the Duke of Richmond, had once diverted himself in these very walks with Miss Patty Rigby. And now, to her dismay, Sarah found that she was being firmly propelled in that direction, the Captain having one hand gripped hard beneath her elbow.
“Where are we going?” she said.
“Where I’ve wanted to be with you ever since I saw the inscription.”
“What inscription?”
Roderick winked an eye at her in the gloom. “You saucy girl, you.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Mr P., the actor, and Lady S.B., have more than once made offerings to Venus at this altar. ’Zounds, when I read that I fair burst into a sweat. I cast round for someone who knew you but the only one was the damnable Miss Kitty.”
“Oh, be off with you, you’re nothing but a bag of wind, Sir,” Sarah answered, instantly turning on her heel and marching away.
“I’ll give you wind!” the Captain answered, chasing after her heavy-footedly.
For answer, Sarah stuck out a pointed slipper and was rewarded by the sight of the military man crashing to the ground like a badly made skittle. Stunned, he lay still for a moment flat on his face then hauled himself up onto all fours puffing noisily as he did so. Unable to resist the temptation, Sarah delivered him a hearty kick.
With a roar, the Captain staggered to his feet and swung round to glare at Sarah, his hands grabbing for her. Alarmed by the menace in his bulging eyes, she let out a shriek, but the next second a black-cloaked figure appeared at a run from behind the hedge, taking them both by surprise.
“You blackguard,” yelled the stranger. “Take that, Sir, on your lousy pate, Sir,” and there was a thwack as an ebony cane descended hard on Roderick Shaw’s thinning ginger curls.
“Eh?” cried the Captain in surprise and then, soundlessly, descended in a heap at Sarah’s feet. Stepping over a long leg which extended across the pathway she shook her head, all the breath out of her, and turned to look at her rescuer, her eyes growing wide at the sight of him. Tall, slim, extremely pale, with an aquiline nose and dark red hair worn very straight, the man could have come straight from a canvas by Titian. There was also something vaguely familiar about his face.
“Do I know you, Sir?” Sarah asked, taking his offered arm as together they swung off back down the pathway leaving the Captain sprawled on the ground, groaning slightly.
“Gordon,” said Sarah’s rescuer, with a bow, “William Gordon, at your service.”
“Lord William Gordon?”
“The same.”
“Then I believe we are related, remote cousins in fact. I am Sarah Bunbury.”
If he had heard of her naughty reputation, Lord William gave no sign of it, merely kissing her proffered hand.
“Well, well, in what strange circumstances does one catch up with one’s family!”
Sarah glanced back over her shoulder. “Should we send someone to his assistance.”
The lordling let out a howl of laughter. “Why? Let him rot, filthy old fart catcher.”
He was obviously a highly unorthodox young man for all his classical looks.
“Very well,” said Sarah, amused.
“Good. Now, may I take you home? I’m sure you’ve had enough of Vaux Hall Gardens for one evening.”
“It would be a pleasure,” she answered, and meant it in every way. A pleasure to be in his company, to be looked after, to be treated like a respectable woman.
“I think you should know,” she said, as the carriage door closed behind them and they headed for Privy Garden, “that I have a fierce reputation.”
Lord William smiled in the darkness. “I’m not altogether surprised, my dear.”
Suddenly, the funny side of the situation, of life, of everything, struck Sarah so forcibly that she cracked with laughter. With tears streaming down her face she turned to her cousin.
“I’m full of ’em you know. Surprises I mean.”
“I can’t wait to find out,” answered William and in the faint light drooped an elegant eyelid.
*
She had kept a journal ever since she was a girl and now Sarah poured out her thoughts into it.
What hand of Fate brought me to the pleasure gardens on the very night Lord William Gordon should be there? The Moment we met we were drawn together like two Magnets. Already I feel that I have encountered the other Half of my Soul. I have put the past Behind Me and started a new life devoted entirely to Him who is already Dearer to Me than that Life itself.
The language was flowery, she realised it, but Sarah in writing such things had spoken from the heart. In the moodily romantic person of her distant cousin she felt certain she had, at last, met the man destiny had intended for her.
He had seen her back to her home that night, bowed and taken his leave, but the very next day Lord William had called.
For neither of them had ever known anything quite like it. To Lord William, Sarah was the most lovely woman on whom he had ever set his eyes. At twenty-three, a year younger than he was, he thought her figure perfect, her face and colouring divine. Added to this was her unique ability to make love. Deciding
, very sensibly, that her previous experience had only served to make her better for him, William forgot all about Sarah’s past and merely concentrated on the entrancing present.
She thought him divine, with the looks and beauty of a Venetian, for the first time here was a man who truly loved her and whom she could love in return without constraint.
Briefly parted at Christmas, when she and Sir Charles had visited Barton together for the sake of convention, the lovers renewed their affair in January. Yet, though their trysts were kept secret, behind the closed doors of the Long Acre house, tongues were already beginning to wag.
“I see Lady Sarah’s at it again,” said Lady Mary Coke to George Selwyn.
“At what?”
“You know very well what. Bawdy behaviour I believe it’s called. What a slut that woman is.”
The old hypocrite sighed heavily. “Yes, indeed. I fear it will be my sad duty to write to poor Carlisle informing him of the worst.”
“You can tell him from me he’s better off without her. Of all the randy women I’ve ever met, Sarah Bunbury leads the field.”
“Should I tell him that too?”
“Pray do so.”
However, when it came to it, George Selwyn could not bring himself to be quite so unkind, and in his letter of 26th February, 1768, merely said it was the consensus of opinion that Lord William Gordon had better leave town.
“And what’s Bunbury doing about it all?” asked Lady Mary, voicing what everyone else was thinking.
“He’s washed his hands of her, or so it’s said.”
“I think the man is damnable decent to have put up with all he has.”
“Hear, hear.”
And so the spring went on, full of cruelty and gossip, Sarah’s husband throwing himself into life with his racing cronies while she and William, more passionately devoted than ever, passed each day with lovemaking and laughter. Yet of all that halcyon period, that season of showers and champagne, there was one day in particular that for many many reasons, some of them with hindsight, remained in Sarah’s mind for all time to come.
It being an unseasonably warm March, the lovers had taken a picnic into the countryside round Chelsea village. Lying on rugs, drinking half pint bumpers as was the fashion, they had stared at one another without speaking.
“I wonder what the future will bring,” she said finally, thinking aloud.
William had turned his handsome eyes on her. “As long as it contains you I frankly don’t care. All I want is that we should stay together.”
Sarah had become serious. “But, sweetheart, how can it? I am married to Sir Charles Bunbury. In the end I have to answer as his wife.”
“There is such a thing as divorce, you know.”
“Oh, but what agony to achieve.” A new idea had occurred to Sarah. “I suppose we could always elope,” she’d said, and then remembering Lauzun, wished she had not spoken.
But unlike the Frenchman, William’s features had brightened. “What a splendid plan, such a heroic concept. Two lovers together against the world, united in the eyes of God but sinners for all that.”
“So you would give up everything for me?”
“Willingly,” William answered, composing his somewhat sombre features into a steadfast look. “Name the place, name the hour, and I am your servant.”
It was everything that Sarah could have wished to hear and she later made love to him with enormous fervour, savouring the feel of him as if she were the violin and he the bow sweeping strongly in and out of her, a maestro indeed. Looking up at him, his brow bedewed with the sweat of lovemaking, his straight hair ruffled by his ruthless movements, Sarah believed she had never felt any sensation so intensely and, when she reached the climax, thought that never again could such a feeling be repeated. There seemed something very special about it, as if some shattering event had taken place, and she thought about it for the rest of that golden day and deep into the night.
“Today,” she wrote in her secret journal, “I surely achieved the height of Human experience. When Lord W.G. was within —” Sarah had blushed as she wrote such a deliciously daring thing “— I felt that I was joined to him completely; with Body, Soul and Mind. Yet all had an air of innocence, as if he were Adam and I Eve, robustly Together before the appearance of Satan’s serpent.”
Yet even those words could not adequately express what she had felt. There had been something so very special about that particular congress that she knew no way in which to describe so fine and so sublime a sensation. Yet it was as well, perhaps, that she did not. The writings in her diary were the most daring and quite the most dangerous statements Sarah had ever written. Nervous, almost, that such a thing should ever be discovered, she placed her journal under lock and key before retiring to bed to dream of her lover.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Avebury, as always, proved to be a safe harbour, a source of healing, and Sidonie was only too glad that she had taken a few days off from her schedule to spend time with her parents. She hadn’t been home since Christmas, nor seen them since the Purcell Room concert, and her feelings of pleasure to be back in their wonderful old house were acute. Using her own key, bowling through the front door, Sidonie called out, “Hello. Where are you?”
As always, she was immediately swept up into their lives. George Brooks, now retired, gave up a great deal of time to the Citizens Advice Bureau, while Jane continued with her painting, though with very little sign of improvement, Sidonie thought wryly. It was as if they lived in another world, another time almost, hardly touched by depression or upheaval, or the fact that beyond their beloved home and garden lay an ugly place obsessed with drugs, crime and general beastliness. But Sidonie dwelt on none of those aspects, just glad to be with them, away from the ever increasing pressures of her professional life.
“There’s an auction in Marlborough that might interest you,” said Jane on their first evening together.
“Oh really? Why’s that?”
“The catalogue advertised some papers connected with Holland House, Kensington. Part of a private collection.”
Sidonie felt an instant excitement. “I wonder what they are. Can we go to it?”
“I was hoping you’d say that. There’s a mirror I want to bid for.”
“Oh, good.”
Marlborough on a Friday morning was bustling with shoppers and tourists, and the auction rooms, despite the ongoing recession, were thronged with dealers, as well as the usual collection of people who went to sales just to watch, mixed amongst those genuinely interested in bidding. The Holland House Papers turned out to be Lot 216 and, highly intrigued, Sidonie went to look at them.
There was a collection of letters, all carefully preserved in plastic sheets, some of which bore the signature of Henry Fox. Two were signed “Caroline” and there was one each from Emily and Louisa. But the thing that caught Sidonie’s eye and to which she felt herself irresistibly drawn was what appeared to be a diary. Opening it at the first page, she read, “Sarah Lennox — Her Journal, February 25th, 1755, Kildare House, Dublin. Her tenth Birthday.” Sidonie banged it shut, holding the leather-bound book tight to her chest, realising that she was gasping.
“What is it?” asked Jane curiously. “You look as if you’ve seen a ghost.”
“I have in a way. You know I told you I’ve made a study of the people who used to live in Holland House, particularly Sarah Lennox.”
“Yes?”
“I can’t believe my eyes, but this is her diary. My God, I’ve simply got to have it.”
Her mother reacted superbly, just as if she were in a film, and Sidonie could have kissed her. Sliding her eyes round the room, Jane said, “Don’t look excited. There are dealers everywhere. Act nonchalantly.”
Her daughter burst out laughing. “I’ll do my best, but this is a find in a million. Thank goodness you spotted it.”
“Walk away,” answered Jane from the corner of her mouth. “There’s a Lovejoy staring at us.”
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br /> “Oh, Lord!” said Sidonie, and got the giggles.
As it transpired there were only two other people bidding against her; the Lovejoy figure, his attention obviously aroused by Sidonie’s, and a dry-as-dust bald-headed man with no sense of humour, whom the musician guessed came from a museum. An American woman in check trousers and a plastic rain hat entered the bidding earlier on, obviously wanting to buy a piece of English history, but dropped out at £100. The museum man went to £500 and stopped, by which time the dealer had lost interest. Sidonie, raising her hand and winking at the auctioneer, this last done to amuse her mother, became the owner of the Holland House papers at £505.
*
Longing though she was to read Sarah’s journal from cover to cover, Sidonie resisted. Avebury was home, and home meant eating and drinking and gossip, and she had come to see her parents not stick her nose in a book. Very conscious of the fact she hadn’t visited them for a long time, Sidonie charmed the guests at a dinner party Jane gave that evening, consciously acting the part of a celebrity which she felt sure her mother wanted, then playing the piano afterwards. So it was late when she finally got into bed.
Intending to read only a few pages, Sidonie began, finding it difficult at first to decipher the eighteenth-century script. But as soon as she had mastered it she was hooked. Vividly, from the thoughts of an inquisitive child through to the observations of a teenage girl, Sarah’s life was conjured up by the vibrant words.
‘Lovejoy didn’t know what he was missing,’ she thought. ‘This is the past as it really was lived.’
I am quite determined I shall write to Lady Susan I did not Love H.M. but merely liked him, despite the Fact it is not true. Though he is a Man of neither Sense, Good Nature, nor Honesty, I was quite set to love him.
“My God,” said Sidonie softly, “the real story at last.” And then her blood ran cold.
Such a thing happened that I scare know how to explain it. It had snowed heavily for some time but Today, the Weather being not so fierce, we went into the Grounds. There, whilst sitting in The Wildernesse, Charles James being tamed sufficient long to stare as well, I beheld a Creature that up until that moment I had regarded as a Servant or Wench, having seen her before about the House and Gardens and though, remarking on her Strangeness, had thought little more of it. But today, having perceived the Creature gazing rudely, I gave chase. My Quarry escaped within the whirl of Flakes but yet I remarked there was something uncanny in her Demeanour, as if she be Spirit or Phantom and not formed of Mortal Flesh.
