Jane and the Wandering Eye: Being the Third Jane Austen Mystery

by Stephanie Barron

  “It will require—forgive me—a certain subterfuge on your part.”

  “I am at your service, my lord.”

  “You will understand that any in the Trowbridge family must be known among the company. Even had Simon not been taken up in Portal’s death, our intimacy with the Conynghams—our attention to the Theatre Royal—must make us too familiar; and at present a tide of ill-feeling is directed against us all. But as for yourself—”

  “Of course. What would you have me do?”

  “I intend a visit to the wings upon the play’s conclusion. It is my hope that you might then create a small diversion—a faint, a mishap, something along the female line—that should draw the attention of the principal parties.”

  “And in the flurry, you shall investigate the manager’s rooms?”

  “Exactly.”

  I bowed my head to disguise a tide of mirth. “I have always dreamed of performing in the Theatre Royal, Lord Harold. To tread the boards was the dearest ambition of my vanished girlhood. I may hope to do you credit.”

  “You have never failed me yet. It will be something merely to parade you in the box.”

  There was a grimness to his tone I readily understood. All of Bath must be hoping for a glimpse of the notorious Trowbridges, so deeply and publicly embroiled in a violent murder; and the appearance of the Earl of Swithin in Bath must only fan the flames of speculation. “You hope, then, to show the scandal-mongers your bravest face?”

  “And damn their eyes.”

  “Sir!” I cried. It has not been my province to know much of swearing, however I may subject my creatures to it.8

  “Tut, tut, my dear Miss Austen—do not grow missish on me, after all we have sustained!” Trowbridge seized his greatcoat and gloves. “Expect me tomorrow at two, about the interrogation of Mr. Cosway!”

  1 This was (and remains) an exclusive men’s club.—Editor’s note.

  2 Eliza refers to the Honourable East India Company. The private trading consortium effectively ruled India throughout the eighteenth and part of the nineteenth centuries. Her birth in India and ties to Warren Hastings, the most influential and effective governor the company had ever appointed, probably account for her knowledge of its trade.—Editor’s note.

  3 Elizabeth Billington (1768-1818) was a celebrated soprano of Austen’s day, who usually appeared in Bath at concerts conducted by Vincenzo Rauzzini (died 1810). Despite her disclaimers, Austen attended these concerts often, as is evidenced in her letters. They were generally held on Wednesday evenings, so as not to conflict with the theater on Tuesdays and Thursdays, or the Assemblies on Mondays and Fridays.—Editor’s note.

  4 Green Park Buildings was newly built at the time of the Austens’ lease, and known for the high water table at its foundation; Jane herself rejected lodgings here as unsuitable in 1801, when her family first removed to Bath, but the high cost of their first home at No. 4 Sydney Place forced an eventual change.—Editor’s note.

  5 Jane’s encounter with Geoffrey Sidmouth is detailed in the second Austen journal, Jane and the Man of the Cloth. (New York: Bantam Books, 1997.)—Editor’s note.

  6 Westgate Buildings is best known as the home of Anne Elliot’s school friend, Mrs. Smith, in Persuasion. It was by 1804 considered an unhealthy and dangerous neighborhood, fronting the River Avon; rats, pickpockets, and prostitutes frequented it, and it would be ravaged by cholera in the 1830s.—Editor’s note.

  7 The criminal justice system of Austen’s time was somewhat cruder than our own. Defendants charged with capital crimes were presumed guilty until proven innocent.—Editor’s note.

  8 Here Jane may be thinking of Catherine Morland, in Northanger Abbey, a clergyman’s daughter much incommoded by a suitor’s swearing; or of Mary Crawford, an admiral’s niece in Mansfield Park, whose glancing familiarity with adultery, naval sodomy, and a sailor’s tongue is designed to shock her less sophisticated country circle.—Editor’s note.

  Chapter 5

  A Call in Camden Place

  Thursday,

  13 December 1804

  ~

  THE THEATRE ROYAL IN ORCHARD STREET IS HARDLY SO grand as Covent Garden or Drury Lane, being cramped and overheated in the extreme; its single entrance ensures a dreadful crush at the play’s commencement and close; and indeed, the space is so incommodious, as to have prompted the building of a new theatre in Beauford Square, immediately adjacent to Chandos Buildings, that is to open next season. But even the unfortunate nature of the present accommodation, and the possibility that my dress should be mussed, if not torn, in the attempt to gain my seat in Lord Harold’s box, could not dispel my intention of being as fine this evening as possible. Having condescended to escort a Miss Austen to the play, Lord Harold should not be suffered to blush for her appearance.

  I own but three gowns that are suitable for evening engagements—a sapphire muslin;1 a white lawn with puffed sleeves; and the aforementioned peach silk, as yet in pieces with my fashionable modiste. It was this I determined to wear—it being in the latest style, with a square neck sloping down slightly to the bosom; an underskirt of cream-coloured sarcenet; and negligible capped sleeves, very slightly off the shoulder. It was the gown most likely to do me credit—and so to Madame LeBlanc’s in Bath Street I went, immediately after breakfast this morning.

  The poor woman wrung her hands, and declared my request impossible to fulfil; the gown could hardly be pieced within a fortnight; but at the last, upon receiving the intelligence that I was to be on public view in the Wilborough box—to which all eyes in the theatre should undoubtedly be turned—she consented to set three of her seamstresses to making up the gown.

  I consulted her clock—perceived it to lack yet a half-hour until noon—and hastened my steps towards the White Hart. I must visit Eliza before receiving Lord Harold, and on so fine a morning I should be lucky to find the little Comtesse within doors.2 Were I in her place, and free of all obligation in a city wholly given over to pleasure, I should take a turn in Sydney Gardens, or promenade about the Crescent, or commission Henry to hire a carriage for a drive about the countryside.

  And upon achieving the White Hart, my premonitions were rewarded, as such fears usually are, in finding the Austen rooms deserted of even the little dog, Pug. I turned away in some annoyance, and determined to look into the Pump Room on the chance of finding her—when a light step was heard upon the stair, and Eliza’s delicious laugh wafted towards the ceiling.

  “Good gracious, my lord, are you so determined in flattery? I have not heard its equal since I quitted Versailles. You are too wicked for Bath—you shall put the gentle invalids to flight in their chairs—and I shall not rest easy until you have secured your lodgings and left us in peace!”

  An indistinct murmur of male conversation—another musical laugh—and the little Comtesse tripped gaily towards her rooms, an enormous muff upon her delicate hand, and a fine glow of spirits animating her countenance.

  “Jane!” she cried, and halted on the landing. “But how very fortunate! I was intending to come in search of you; and now you have saved me the trouble. But then, you are always saving me a vast deal of trouble, are you not? A delightful quality in a relation.”

  “Good morning, Eliza,” I rejoined. “You look excessively well. Some handsome rogue has been turning your head, I fancy.”

  “Only the Earl of Swithin,” she confided mischievously. “How I love the proximity of an inn! I shall be quite desolate when he goes into Laura Place.”

  “Laura Place? Lord Swithin intends a visit to Lady Desdemona?”

  “He intends to land in her very lap, my dear. The Earl is taking the residence opposite the Dowager’s for the remainder of his stay.”

  “Such impertinence!”

  “—for a man of Swithin’s position and means, to hire a house in one of the most distinguished squares in town? I do not understand you, Jane. Camden Place might possess a smarter air, of course, but—” Eliza swept past me and opened the door to h
er room.

  “Eliza! Only consider of it! To perch like a bird of prey upon the stoop of a lady who has refused him! Surely Lord Swithin’s arrogance admits of some limit!”

  “But perhaps not his taste for abuse. One might wonder why he comes to Bath at all.” She threw down her muff and gave her spencer into the maid’s keeping. “Never fear the machinations of the Earl, my dear Jane. Now your Lord Harold is come to be gay in this splendid watering-place, I cannot find anything in Swithin to frighten Lady Desdemona.”

  “He is not my Lord Harold,” I retorted crossly, “but if I were the Earl, I should hesitate before invading the gentleman’s square.”

  Eliza’s smile widened. “So he is come! I heard the rumour in the Pump Room. And have you seen Trowbridge, Jane? Is he bent upon the routing of his nephew’s enemies? Shall you have a chance of engaging your energies in the matter? I own, I am excessively hopeful of some diversion in that quarter—there was nothing like the Scargrave business a few winters back, for wonderfully piquing the senses, and varying the dull routine of the day-to-day! Even Henry dined out on the strength of your particulars for weeks on end!”

  “Eliza, Eliza—”

  She collapsed upon one of the inn’s hard wooden chairs and breathed a sigh of relief. “Lord, Jane! I do find that length of stair a trial!”

  “Did you hurry less rapidly into speech, you might have breath enough for a thousand such!”

  “And yet it would never do to lodge in the ground-floor chambers,” she continued thoughtfully. “Such noise and smoke—and only last evening, a woman gave birth in the kitchens, if you will credit it!”

  “You would affect the complaints of the aged, my dear, to confuse your husband’s family—the better to conduct your flirtations unmolested,” I scolded her fondly. “Do not attempt to prevaricate with me. I see the cunning of your design, and know it for a sham; you have never been in better looks, and I warrant you are well aware of it. For certainly the Earl of Swithin has not allowed your beauty to go unremarked.”

  She laughed, and reached a tentative hand to her hair. Though it had been cropped grotesquely in the late summer, it was now growing out, the short curls caught up behind and the whole surmounted with a band across the forehead, àla grecque. I should feel silly in emulating such a style myself, and thought it better suited to a girl half Eliza’s age; but I could not deny it quite became her delicate features.

  “Are you famished, Jane? Shall I send for cold meat and cheese?”

  “For yourself, by all means—but do not trouble about me. I must be away directly, and tarry only to beg of you a favour, Eliza.”

  She sat up immediately. “But of course. Anything within my power.”

  “Might you see your way clear, I wonder, to penning a note of introduction on my behalf?”

  “Nothing should be easier. But to whom? For your acquaintance in Bath must be larger than my own.”

  “Mr. Richard Cosway.”

  “Richard Cosway!” Eliza exclaimed. “Jane, you astonish me! Can you possibly desire to spend so fine a morning in the company of so tedious a man?”

  “But I had thought him a painter of the first water.”

  “He is.”

  “And a renowned collector.”

  “As to that—”

  “I greatly desire to consult him, Eliza, on a matter of some personal importance.” This was no more than the truth, and I might utter the words without a pang.

  “I perceive your method, Jane,” the Comtesse observed with a roguish twinkle. “You intend that Mr. Richard Cosway shall so admire your fine eyes, that he shall not be gainsaid in taking their likeness. I see how it shall be. In a very little while Lord Harold Trowbridge will be the talk of the ton, for the pretty token he wears upon his waistcoat. But I warn you, Jane—Mr. Cosway’s services are dearly bought.”

  “I have no intention of sitting for my likeness,” I protested, “merely of enquiring as to Mr. Cosway’s method and usual fees.” It must be impossible to invoke the curious pendant Lord Kinsfell had found on the murdered Portal’s breast without explaining the nature of its discovery—and such frankness, even to Eliza, was beyond my power.

  “I might come with you, did you spare me an hour,” Eliza said, with an eye to the parlour clock. “Eccentric though Cosway is, his conversation at least bears the charm of absurdity; and I should dearly love a glimpse of his rooms in Camden Place.”

  But the little Comtesse’s company, in general so welcome, should quite incommode me in the present instance; for Lord Harold’s making of the party a third, should confirm her worst invention. I started up and laid a hand to hers.

  “That is impossible, Eliza—I mean to say—I am engaged to—to—”

  “—Walk out with an unnamed gentleman in some secluded grove of Sydney Gardens? La, Jane, you are a secretive soul! I shall not presume to o’erlisten your conference with Mr. Cosway for a thousand pounds. But I expect a glimpse of your token in private, once he has seized the likeness. Your eyes are so similar to my dearest Henry’s, that I doubt not I shall find the portrait ravishing.”

  She rose, and crossed to a travelling desk propped up on a table, and drew forth some paper and a pen. A few lines sufficed to commend her respects to Mr. Cosway, and beg of him the indulgence of a few moments on behalf of her sister, Miss Austen, whose acquaintance he might remember having made in the Pump Room yesterday. It closed with some very pretty, though insincere, compliments upon his taste and person, and begged that the sender should be remembered to his wife when next he corresponded with dear Maria.

  “There! If that does not melt the miscreant’s heart, and win you a triumphant place in his studio and salon, I have grossly misjudged my powers.” Eliza folded the note and sealed it with a wafer. “Go with grace and fortune, my dear—and trust me to speak not a word!”

  CAMDEN PLACE HOLDS A LOFTY, DIGNIFIED POSITION ON the south-east slope of Beacon Hill, such as becomes a man of consequence. It was built some fifteen years ago or more, and the building abruptly halted by the inconvenience of a series of landslips in the area. That part of the Crescent sited upon solid rock is at present habitable, but presents a ludicrous facade to the world’s view, in having fourteen houses erected to the left of the central pediment, and only four to the right. The north-east pavilion remains, a picturesque ruin perched atop a crag of rock, in mute testament to the triumph of nature over the ingenuity of man.3

  The fractured Crescent takes its name from the Marquis of Camden, whose elephant crest surmounts the keystone of nearly every residence’s door, as though an entire herd had condescended to winter in Bath. As I laboured up the long approach by Lord Harold’s side, glorying in the exercise, I contemplated the nature of lodgers and lodgings. The precarious ground of Camden Place might readily serve as metaphor, for all in mankind that prefer false grandeur to a more stable propriety.4

  “An excellent morning for exercise, Miss Austen.”

  “Indeed it is, my lord.”

  “I had considered employing my curricle, or perhaps a brace of chairs—but reflected that neither man nor beast, when burdened with ourselves, should be expected to labour the length of such a hill. I felt certain you would feel the same.”

  “Are you possessed, then, of prescience as regards my thoughts and feelings?”

  Lord Harold cast me a knowing look. “I flatter myself otherwise. You remain one of the few ladies whose thoughts I cannot read. But perhaps, having found a virtue in this once before, I prolong the effect for the sake of my enjoyment, when, in fact, it is no more than illusion.”

  “Then pray tell me of what I am considering now”

  “You are abusing me for a very unhandsome escort, in having failed to procure either a carriage or a chair, for the salvation of your half-boots,” he rejoined.

  “Your illusion may be sustained yet a little while,” I replied with satisfaction. “I was considering, rather, the Earl of Swithin’s intended removal to a residence opposite your own.”
/>
  “That minor intelligence is circulating about all of Bath, I fancy,” Lord Harold observed, “even as the Earl’s carters were circulating about Laura Place this morning. Lord Swithin’s descent has not escaped my notice—nor, I might add, the fact that any wheeled traffic must immediately come to a halt, when Laura Place is choked with even the slightest conveyance. For though the streets in the newer part of town may command a wider breadth than those within the old walls, they remain sadly narrow; and any might come to blows over the rights of passage. The night of Her Grace’s rout, the assemblage of chairs must have considerably clogged the square.”

  “I believe they did.”

  “And thus inspired by the Earl’s display, I embarked upon my enquiries among the chairmen not long after breakfast.”

  “Excellent despatch, my lord. You adventured Stall Street?”5

  “Both the stand near the Pump Room and the one closer to the Abbey. I questioned every chairman present, to no avail; of those who had indeed been in Laura Place two nights ago, none could recall an altercation with a waggon or carriage; and so I turned my steps to the Gravel Walk.”

  “The better to contemplate the problem?”

  “The better to examine the chairmen in their resting huts along Queen Place Parade, my dear.6 There were ten fellows at least, quite splendid in their blue greatcoats and peaked caps, divided between the two fires and blowing upon their chapped fingers.”

  I stopped a moment, from as strong a desire to draw breath in the midst of my exertions, as to pay heed to Lord Harold’s words. “And what did they tell you, my lord?”

  “Amidst much contradiction, abuse, and bestowing of oaths—and a remarkable expense of coin, I might add—something of no little worth. One of the chairmen—a broad Irishman who stood well back in the crowd attending the end of my mother’s rout—claims to have seen something to our advantage. He will have it that an open carriage attempted to pass through Laura Place in the wee hours of Wednesday morning; and after hesitating some moments, the driver was forced to descend to the horses’ heads, and back his pair the length of the street. The chairmen closest to Her Grace’s door were unlikely to have observed the debacle—which accounts for the ignorance of the men I questioned in Stall Street.”