An Accomplished Woman (22 page)

My love to you in any
case,

Lydia

Edgar Buildings, Bath, Friday, 21 June Hugh Hanky Esq.

Dear Sir,

Your mother may have
informed you of my intention to remove to Bath for the summer: I write to
confirm the fact. Any communications should be sent to the direction on this
letter, until further notice. I hope it is unnecessary to add that
communications of a certain sort — requests for money, referred bills, &c.
— will not be acknowledged.

My business here is my
own: but it is as well to notify you that I anticipate a change in my personal
and material circumstances, which may have a bearing on our future relation.

In the meantime I
remain, &c,

Lewis Durrant

 My dear Lady
Eastmond,

We are just returned
from our first thorough exploration of Bath — that, is first for me: Lydia, of
course, finds no novelty in the place, but she is kind enough not to betray it
— and I must not neglect this opportunity of writing to you; to convey my
warmest wishes, and above all my thanks to you, for indulging my desire of
coming here. Also for your securing for me such an excellent friend and
protectress as Lydia. I shall be sure to be guided by her in all matters of
custom and conduct.

I like Bath extremely:
it seems to combine so many excellent qualities within a small compass. There
is something of Edinburgh in its look, but without the greyness and severity.
There are views of green hills and cliffs from almost every opening in the
streets, so that one does not feel entirely cut off from the country as in
London; but then as in London, there is every civilised amenity. There is not,
it appears, a great deal of company here, being the summer season — but for
myself I would never have guessed it: the town seems quite full. There are the
invalids, of course — the sight of whom inspires such pitiful reflections
—
but any number of
elegant well-looking people besides; and the abbey bells are forever ringing in
new arrivals — that is, those who come in a coach-and four, as Lydia tells me
—
and as you must know. It does seem to me a curious distinction — four horses
meriting this tribute; and Lydia was rather satirical about it, and wondered
what a clangour would be set up if Bonaparte’s cavalry entered the town. I
think she is a little Radical in some of her sentiments; and I did have to
remind her of the necessity of church attendance tomorrow; however, I know
there is no harm in it. And then though the chief entertainments, the Lower
Room assemblies, &c, do not begin until the autumn, there is still a great
deal going forward — music at the New Rooms, and a gala at Sydney Gardens, and
any amount of private balls and routs. And then there are the most agreeable
circulating-libraries, and shops such as one only sees in London — in short, I
do not anticipate we shall be bored for a moment.

We have paid our first
visit to the Pump Room: where, Lydia tells me, we were thoroughly quizzed, this
being an essential Bath amusement. She was for talking in French, and putting
our names down in the book as viscomtesses, but I was afraid I could not carry
it off. I felt I must complete the visit by drinking the waters: Lydia gently
advised against it, but I was determined: at the pump-bar I chose one of the
tallest glasses, and drank it off stoutly. I cannot say I found it pleasant.
Lydia remarked, in her candid way, that it seemed to her like drinking a gentleman’s
shaving-water; and then took me over to the windows overlooking the King’s
Bath, where there were numerous people immersed, and wearing peculiar caps and
smocks
—
more decent than comfortable; and Lydia said how odd it was that we should
drink the same water people had been bathing in. Certainly this made me
thoughtful for some time after.

I am sure I should tire
even your patience, dear Lady Eastmond, if I were to go on with everything I
have seen and done.
—
But I cannot omit this piece of news. Mr Allardyce left his card
this morning. I hope I am not so nonsensical as to be
very
agitated by
this circumstance; but nor can I be insensible to such a very prompt mark of
his regard — typical though it is of a gentleman who, I believe, is more
agreeable and estimable than any I have ever met.

I hear nothing of Mr
Beck. — But then he is perhaps less attentive to such conventions as
calling-cards.

We dine soon. — My dear
Lady Eastmond, please present my compliments to Sir Henry. I hope his old
indisposition is not rendering him too uncomfortable — nor you neither.

Yours very
affectionately

Phoebe

Lydia would have been
guilty of an untruth if she had pretended no curiosity to see at last the two
gentlemen on whose account she was prepared to endure a summer in Bath. While
she had privately christened them Mr A and Mr B — and in her less patient
moments was even wont to think of them as two peas in a pod — she was far from
indifferent at the prospect of meeting them. One at least must soon be expected
at Sydney Place: Mr Robert Allardyce’s card would, in form, be followed by Mr
Robert Allardyce. The very first rap at their street-door, the Monday after
their arrival, sent Phoebe rushing to the drawing-room windows, and even Lydia
had to resist the urge to follow.

‘Oh! Oh, it is Mr
Durrant,’ Phoebe said, and was good-natured enough to hide her disappointment.

For her part Lydia,
after less than a week’s residence in Bath, was already sufficiently wistful
for home — its employments, its comforts, its associations — to feel a certain
lift of the heart at that name. Their last meeting had been, even for them,
less than cordial: still, when Mr Durrant walked in he did bring a little of
Heystead with him, as well as a refreshing absence of Bath elegancies.

‘Miss Templeton — Miss
Rae — how d’ye do — miserably hot, is it not?’ was the extent of his
compliments, and he sat down looking very strained and cross, as if, instead of
choosing to pay a morning-visit, he had been summoned there against his will at
some unearthly hour. He was dressed exactly as in the country, in well-worn
riding-coat and unpolished top-boots, and his restless eyes took in the
dimensions and furnishings of the room with a baleful lack of interest. ‘I saw
your names in the book. You’re comfortably situated, I hope.’

‘Very much so, thank
you,’ Lydia answered. ‘And you, Mr Durrant?’

‘Oh —’ he shrugged ‘—
Bath is much of a muchness, is it not? I have been above a week in a suite of
rooms in Edgar Buildings: there is an idiot woman learning singing next door
and the chimney smokes, but all in all they will do.’

‘I am so very glad to
hear it. And do you have a large circle of acquaintance in Bath, Mr Durrant?’

He allowed her a small
sharp smile. ‘That is how we are talking, is it? Well, I suppose we must, now
we are here. In truth I know hardly a soul; but I am on nodding and simpering
terms with a good many people already, so I may conclude I am going on pretty
well. Perhaps, though, I should be a little more pushing, and lay on a
turtle-dinner at the White Hart for two dozen choice cultivable boobies — what
say you, Miss Rae?’

‘I have never eaten
turtle,’ Phoebe said, in her serious way, ‘and do not think I could fancy it: the
manner of cooking it seems so very cruel. Of course it is always cruel in a
way, when we kill a pig or sheep for eating, but it seems different somehow.
Which perhaps makes me a hypocrite.’

‘Lord, if that were the
extent of hypocrisy in the world, we should do well,’ he said. ‘But I do see a
kinder way to slaughter our meat: drive the pig or sheep on to the South Parade
of a summer Sunday, and the beast will very soon die quietly of boredom.’

Mr Durrant was obviously
both bored, and ill at ease; and Lydia was sorely tempted, despite Phoebe’s
presence, to twit him on the bullish confidence with which he had embarked on
his enterprise, and to query whether he was equal to the further tedium of
finding a bride. But she was not entirely without sympathy for him: she at
least had Phoebe for company; and when he had sat out his half-hour, exhausted
his mechanical civilities, and gone away again, Phoebe seemed to manifest
something of the same feeling, asking after a thoughtful minute: ‘Lydia, shall
we entertain here at all, do you suppose?’

‘I see no reason why we
should not, on a small scale. We might give a dinner, or even —’ she got the
detestable words out ‘— a card-party.’

‘Oh, yes, I don’t mean anything
grand. Something like a dinner would do very well. I thought it would be nice
to invite Mr Durrant.’

‘It would certainly be a
nice thing to do, as I fear he is a little at a loss: whether the experience
would be nice, for you or me, is a different matter.’

‘Oh, I think I am used
to his manner now. It is indeed surprising that he has chosen to come to Bath —
not that I know him very well, of course: only that it does not seem to suit
him.’

Lydia had felt it right,
for some reason, only to touch barely on Mr Durrant’s purpose in Bath to
Phoebe; and yet, after all, he had made no secret of it — quite the reverse.
‘Certainly it is not, as it were, his natural habitat; but as others come here
seeking a remedy for ill-health, so Mr Durrant has come to seek a remedy for
his solitary state.’

‘Oh!’

That ‘oh’, and the
searching look that accompanied it, lingered a good deal longer than Lydia
liked. ‘Well, now, it is not so very strange,’ she said briskly. ‘Mr Durrant is
still a relatively young man: he has a great care for the future of his estate,
which as it stands is entailed to a rather unpromising nephew: so he concludes
it is high time for him to marry. I wish everyone approached these matters so
sensibly.’

That last sounded
unfortunately pointed; but Phoebe was wrapped in thought. ‘Well,’ she said
finally, with the waking-from-sleep look that deep reflection produced in her,
‘I feel sure he will have no difficulty in that: no difficulty whatsoever.’

‘My dear Phoebe, never
tell me you think to add a third string to your bow.’

The flippancy was really
the spray from a little wave of irritation; but Phoebe was grave. ‘Oh, Lydia,
pray don’t suppose that I — really that was not my meaning. And as for my bow,
I wish only to — to reduce the number of strings, if you see what I mean.’

‘I do, indeed I do,’
Lydia said, pressing her arm. ‘And now, as it continues so fine, should we not
take our walk?’

I shall return from
Bath, she thought as she put on her bonnet, a magnificent athlete with the
hindquarters of a greyhound. For never was there so much walking. Strenuous
walking too, so many of the streets, especially in the Upper Town, being steep;
but for that same reason a carriage was more a hindrance than an amenity,
unless of the light high-perch kind, which required a good hand at the ribbons.
Walking — or rather strolling — was a social requirement here: there was no
being at Bath without sauntering about the Parades, or (most dismally for
Lydia) the lawns before the Royal Crescent, Sunday afternoons being appointed
particularly appropriate for this most vacant and stultifying exercise.

But for Lydia walking
was a requirement of a more urgent character. To walk meant to be out of the
house in Sydney Place: which was perfectly acceptable, perfectly comfortable to
return to, eat in, sleep in — but which resembled to her mind, if she were too
long confined there, a well-appointed prison. Her fingers itched for music, but
there was no instrument: the trouble and expense of hiring a pianoforte for
their short stay was excessive, and she was besides here to be of service to
Phoebe, not to indulge her own enjoyments: still the lack was keenly felt.
Walking at least brought her to the excellent circulating-libraries of Milsom
Street — oases for the parched mind, where there were not only books but all
the latest newspapers, periodicals and reviews; even if she created a certain
stir by actually reading them, instead of using them as accessories for
lounging in her best dress. Walking varied the scene: failing everything else,
it supplied her with people to watch. (A dangerous development this, however:
would she turn into a Bath quiz, an old tea-drinking quadrille-playing tabby,
speculating on this one’s breeding and that one’s fortune?) And walking tired
her — preventing that flat, wide-eyed repose in the dead middle of her bed that
had characterised her first few nights: wondering what she was doing here, and
listening to the watchman cry the hour:
twelve of the clock, and only
another eleven hours before you go back to the Pump Room, amble about, and
despair of existence.
He did not say this, of course, he only seemed to.

Remorse: as they stepped
out into the sunshine, Phoebe’s face was lit with such a reciprocal glow of
cheerful anticipation that Lydia mentally threw a handful of ashes on herself.
Spoiled and selfish. Could she not for once be happy in another’s happiness?
(Dear God, even the phrase faintly nauseated her.) Perhaps thirty had been more
of a milestone than she recognised. Perhaps her spirit was already beginning
its transformation into a sour, wrinkled, crab-apple thing. Perhaps what she
saw as the emptiness of Bath life was really an emptiness within herself.

Alternatively, perhaps
she had drunk too much Madeira last evening. Her hands were a little shaky —
and the invariable other symptom of over-indulgence was an apocalyptic mood.
She entertained a theory about some of the prophetic books of the Bible having
been written after a bumper of rather rough Canaanite red, but it was not for
Phoebe’s ears.

Coming to the river,
Phoebe lingered at the shops that lined Pulteney Bridge: she sought a
stationer’s, and had heard of a good one here. She wanted a small calfskin
writing-book. ‘Only for jottings,’ as she said, going in; but Lydia had a
strong suspicion, at once fond, melancholy and amused, that she meant to
diarise in it. (Lydia remembered as a girl keeping a diary for a while, but she
had caught herself out in so many lies in it that she had left off.) Presently
Phoebe emerged from the stationer’s satisfied, with parcel in hand; and the
next moment promised the even greater satisfaction of having something to write
in the precious book, as she delightedly cried: ‘Mr Allardyce!’

Lydia was surprised to
find that Mr Allardyce was merely one of a group of people chatting outside the
print-maker’s shop, on whom she had been idly resting her gaze while she
waited. (Why surprising? — perhaps because his appearance had been so much a
matter of anticipation: still one could hardly expect him to descend from on
high, or burst out of a large drum.) He turned, made his excuses, and detached
himself from the group: not alone, however: a very handsome young woman was on
his arm.

For an instant Lydia
feared that the diary was not only going to be used, but miserably filled. But
the mutual smiles reassured her even before Phoebe’s excited words: ‘Oh, Lydia,
let me introduce — Mr Allardyce, Miss Allardyce — my very good friend Miss
Templeton.’ Lydia remembered now, from Phoebe’s account of her London season,
that there had been a sister, naturally every bit as agreeable as Mr A himself.

While the usual
compliments and exchanges were going on — including amiable wonder at their
running into each other like this, as if in Bath it were possible not to, short
of digging a hole and climbing in it — there was time for a preliminary
assessment of Robert Allardyce, and of Phoebe’s response to him. Miss Allardyce
was a decided beauty: which perhaps accounted for her brother, of similar
colouring and stature, appearing beside her no more than a moderately
good-looking man — well-dressed, slim, fair, with a keen and intelligent and
rather long face. As for Phoebe, she throbbed with such shy excitement, and
hung with such devoted attention on his every word and look, that Lydia would
have supposed her ready to approach the altar with him at that very moment, if
she had not known that Phoebe was simultaneously in love with another man
altogether.

‘And are you comfortably
settled at Sydney Place?’ Mr Allardyce was entirely the gentleman, and careful to
include both Lydia and Phoebe in his glance of enquiry. ‘After leaving my card
I was all for calling on you at once — but Juliet reminded me that there can be
nothing worse than being plagued with callers when one’s bags are only just
unpacked.’

‘Oh! we are perfectly
settled — indeed you need not scruple—’ faltered Phoebe, with an anxious smile
at Lydia. Too forward? Too backward? Lydia gave her a calm look. This was
Phoebe’s ground, and she must learn to take possession of it.

‘And are you quite well
now, Miss Rae?’ put in Miss Allardyce. ‘You had such a very bad cold when you
left London; and though we called on Lady Eastmond some days later, and
received a good report of you, we were quite concerned.’

‘Absolutely well, I
thank you — never better. The country soon set me up — it is a very good air in
Lincolnshire, as Miss Templeton will tell you. Miss Templeton is god-daughter
to Lady Eastmond, and of the same country. Oh, I am thoroughly well, indeed.’
And she demonstrated it with her most brilliant smile, the effect of which on
Mr Allardyce was plain: or, rather, plain to the observant eye. For where
Phoebe’s look was habitually intent, Mr Allardyce’s seemed the opposite: there
was no actual reserve, but he seemed to hold his own expressions, like an opera-glass
or a vizard-mask, at a little distance.

‘I hope the Bath air may
agree with you as well,’ he said. ‘I am never convinced that its situation,
ringed by hills, is of the healthiest, for all its reputation. Though to be
sure there is variety in its climate: for it is either raining, or too hot.’

‘These are the arguments
with which he loves to tease our mother,’ smiled Miss Allardyce, who had the
same well-bred inclusive manner as her brother, ‘for she would think of living
nowhere else.’

‘I am afraid she
believes I have been corrupted by foreign parts,’ Mr Allardyce said, ‘and my
only hope of redemption is never to go abroad again.’