“But I had meant to return to London in the morning!”
“Poor sport, Henry! Consider the heat and stink of Town in such a season; and then, you know, nobody worth your notice is likely to be there.”
“No more they are,” he replied thoughtfully, “but Eliza is sure to have my head if I desert her in all the packing. We intended our removal for the end of July, you know — in time to join our friends in Scotland for the shooting months.”
“August is weeks away,” I said equably, “and if you stay in Hampshire, you might assist me in the treasure hunt.”
“Not the rubies, Jane?”
“Mamma will have discovered those before the month is out,” I told him dismissively. “No, Henry — it is Lord Harold’s papers I mean to find. I am convinced they are even now well hidden at Stonings.”
Chapter 16
If the Boot Fits
7 July 1809, cont.
It was a pleasant thing indeed to find dinner on the table at my return — a roasted capon, a bit of white fish Sally had got by proxy from Alton, and beans from Libby Cuttle’s garden—“her being that ashamed of herself, ma’am, when I told her how respectable you all were, and how good to me.” I guessed that the inclusion in our household of a Chawton girl born and bred, with all the hundred ties of obligation and habit that knit her close to the surrounding country, must prove a decided advantage. Sally Mitchell was worth ten times the notice of a Mr. Middleton, in being related to the dairy man, the sheep farmer on her mother’s side, and the fellow who mended tools from his cart each Wednesday; and to crown all, we should not be reduced to stratagems and subterfuge in order to buy bread from the baker each morning. Even Cassandra had interrogated the new housemaid and was satisfied — “for she is not unintelligent, and will prove a useful set of hands in the stillroom, Jane — which you must know I intend to establish as soon as Martha Lloyd is arrived from Kintbury. And I find Sally is not at all incommoded by dogs, which is an excellent thing, as Link means to learn all about the stillroom — don’t you, you cunning scamp?”
The stillroom meant Cassandra’s orange wine; I should have to profit from my association with the Great in the days remaining to me before Martha’s return, and drink deep of the claret they offered.
Henry sat down with us in the dining parlour, and we had just enough chairs for four disposed around the table. Tonight was our first evening spent entirely en famille since our arrival, and the first in many days that Cassandra had enjoyed in her own abode. For ten months she had been resident at Godmersham — and I had almost despaired of my sister’s ever returning, in the belief that Neddie must grow so dependant upon her as to regard her as another of his innumerable possessions. I had broached the subject only once in Kent, during my visit there the previous month; but Cassandra had averted her eyes, and after a little hesitation observed, “Dear Fanny is quite a woman, now. It cannot be a comfortable thing, to see her aunt sitting always in her mother’s place, and taking precedence. I flatter myself I have been useful among the little children — but with the boys soon to be returned to Winchester, and Fanny grown so capable. I cannot feel I am needed, Jane.”
That truth must be a sorrow to Cassandra, who has made a kind of life from devoting herself to her brothers, as tho’ the selflessness of her quiet ways must in some wise justify her having remained single when Tom Fowle died. We must each of us in our own way earn the keep we require of our brothers’ pockets.
“There is this comfort at least,” she concluded now. “Frank’s Mary must be confined at any moment — and I shall be much in demand at Rose Cottage in Lenton Street, once the second child is arrived. How fortunate that we are not above a mile from her door!”
My sister is exceptionally good, and accepts the cruel injustice of her lot without complaint or reversion to the hopes of former days; but with advancing age, I have observed Cassandra’s tendency to take pride in her very sublimation to the uses of others. I cannot admire it; it is too much like martyrdom. For my part, I have never been one to submit readily to denial.
“I wish that Mr. Thrace had been more exact in his intelligence regarding the necklace,” my mother mused pensively as she stabbed a chicken thigh with her fork. “I have devoted quite three hours to turning over the earth in the back garden, and have only blisters on my palms to show for it, Jane.”
“We must beg some cuttings from Miss Beckford’s garden at the Great House, Mamma, and have you plant while you dig,” I suggested. “Only this morning, she promised me a syringa and a plum sapling.”
“As we are to meet with Mr. Thrace on the morrow, Jane, perhaps you could ascertain more narrowly where the rubies were hidden,” Henry suggested with devilry in his eye. “I should not like all Mamma’s work to be wasted; and, too, there is the trouble of thieves in the neighbourhood. What if they should come again by night, and profit from our labour?”
“Mamma may hit them stoutly over the head with her shovel, and so make an end to the business,” I replied. Scarcely had these words been spoken than we heard a knock upon the outer door, and having failed to discern the approach of a visitor over the clamour of our own conversation, were at a loss to name the caller. I waited for Sally to answer the summons, while Cassandra said with obvious satisfaction, “That will be Neddie perhaps. He was to dine in Alton with Mr. Middleton, I believe, and will have escorted his tenant home.”
“Seems a foolish thing to do,” Henry observed, “when he might be comfortable with the port to be found in Barlow’s cellars.”
Mr. Prowting appeared in the dining-parlour doorway. Behind him, hat in hand, stood Mr. Jack Hinton.
“Good evening, Mrs. Austen. I must beg your sincere pardon for incommoding you at this hour,” the magistrate said, “but I am come on a matter of some urgency. May I beg leave once again to enter your cellar?”
“Of course, my dear Mr. Prowting. Of course. You have a particular point to ascertain regarding that foul murder, I must suppose.” My mother’s countenance was alive with interest; but Mr. Prowting did not explicate his business, and never should she have conjectured the true object of his urgency. “What a delightful surprise to see you again, Mr. Hinton! Had I known we were to have such a party, I should have invited you all to take pot-luck with us!”
The clergyman’s son stiffly bowed, and murmured some politeness. He should probably disdain to dine at so unfashionable an hour, and was as yet arrayed in his morning dress.
“I do not think you know my eldest daughter—” my mother began, when Mr. Prowting broke in abruptly.
“As I said, ma’am — it is a matter of some urgency.”
“Very well. Henry shall be happy to accompany you below.”
My brother had already laid down his napkin and made for the door.
At such a moment, I was not about to be confined abovestairs with the women, and silently went to request a candle of Sally. She stood by while the little troupe crossed her kitchen to the narrow stairs, her eyes round as buttons. Imagining, no doubt, that there was yet another corpse beneath her feet.
“A lanthorn, I think, Miss Austen — if you have not an oil lamp you may spare,” the magistrate suggested. I exchanged the candle for a lanthorn, at which Mr. Prowting gestured me politely down the stairs. With a stiff nod, he then herded Mr. Hinton before him. The gentleman was exceedingly pale, his eyes sparkling with an unnatural brilliancy, as tho’ at any moment he might succumb to a fit. Henry brought up the rear, his gaze acutely trained on Mr. Hinton. I had not neglected to relate the whole of Catherine Prowting’s story while my brother accompanied me home from Alton; and at the conclusion of it, Henry had declared that he would not be gone to London on the morrow for worlds.