The Scandal of the Season (3 page)

But Martha said instead, “I do think that Mr. Caryll is very civil to you, Alexander. And he has a great regard for your family. The esteem of such a man is worth a good deal.” John Caryll was a Catholic landowner like Sir Anthony, whose estate, Ladyholt, was a short distance from Alexander's family home in Binfield. But Caryll's good opinion mattered very little to Alexander this afternoon.

He tried, however, to speak lightheartedly. “It is certain that the greatest magnifying glasses in the world are a man's own eyes, when they look upon his person,” he said. “But even in those, I appear not the great Alexander Mr. Caryll is so civil to, but that little Alexander the women laugh at.”

Martha gave Alexander's arm a squeeze as she kissed him good-bye. She wished that she could make him smile, and was sorry when it was Teresa who said, “You are in your sad dog pose today, I see, Alexander. Mind that you have cast it off before we meet again. I shall certainly not stand up to dance with a Great Dane caught in a fit of melancholy.”

Alexander straightened his back and stepped into Sir Anthony's carriage.

As he drove home, he reflected upon the situation in which the girls would find themselves in town. For all Teresa's pretended sophistication and Martha's good sense, Alexander knew that they had never lived in the world. London society would not give two pennies for a pair of pretty, high-bred girls without expectations. The fashionable world was a precarious enough place for the daughters of the very wealthy, who were prey to the designs of heartless young adventurers. But for lovely young women without a fortune, mixing with men who were bred to think that they had a right to every imaginable gratification, the danger would be serious indeed.

Though he had dismissed his father's fears about London, Alexander shuddered at the thought of the guest at the ambassador's masquerade, arriving at the ball for an evening of lighthearted pleasure: murdered by men who thought that they were killing a priest. An innocent bystander; perhaps he had passed by his assailants all night, feeling no shadow of suspicion. Even as the knife sliced into his throat, had he realized what had happened? But was he really the chance victim of an anti-Catholic crime—or had he, in truth, been a man with a secret?

A
lexander returned to find his house in darkness, save for a candle burning in the kitchen, where a little meal of bread and cheese had been left out. He warmed himself by sitting close to the oven. The clock sounded eleven, and he listened as its strokes echoed hollow through the empty house. He had expected to find his mother waiting up for him, but it seemed that nobody was awake. His candle's uncertain flame made long shadows on the walls, looming up around him like the grotesque fingers of a hand. He was reminded of nights toward the end of his illness, when he had lain awake in the silent house, stranded between the worlds of the living and the dead.

But once he was inside his little bedroom the candle burned steadily, lighting the familiar forms of his bed and books and fireplace. He undressed and sat wrapped in his nightgown before the low fire. They had not forgotten him, then. After a short time he took his candle over to the desk and began to look at the lines of the poem he was writing. For a few minutes he sat and worried at a couplet, crossing out a word, changing a rhyme, and then changing it back. But he pushed the paper away.

He could not remain here. This house, and his parents' elderly habits, the suffocating routine of their religion, even the countryside itself, with its chill and damp seeping into his bones—slowly but steadily these things would kill him. During his weeks in London last year he had been filled with more energy than he had imagined his meager frame could contain. But home again, he was growing increasingly feeble as the months went by.

Though he had scarcely acknowledged it until now, it had been Whiteknights that had kept him here; his pleasure in seeing Teresa and his hope of recovering the old, happy intimacy of their childhood. But how long would pleasure persist in the face of her new resistance? And soon she would be gone, Martha with her. Martha: so patient, and with so keen an understanding. The picture of his parents came to him, setting aside their own comforts for his sake; year upon year of deferring to his delicate health. The thought moved him to tears, but he knew that they could do nothing more for him—and he believed even they had begun to see it.

No matter that he was a Catholic. No matter that he was a cripple. Fear and doubt must not stop him. He would go to London and seek his fortune.

He seized a clean sheet of paper and wrote to John Caryll, asking him for a ride to the city in his carriage. He sealed the letter, and, taking up his pen once again, he began a second letter to Charles Jervas, asking if he might stay at his house in town. He told Jervas that the visit would be for about three weeks, but in his heart he knew that it would be much longer.

The next day he shrank from telling his parents what he had done, deciding instead to wait until the arrangements were certain.

He did not wait long. Caryll was delighted to get the letter, and wrote to say that they would be gone as soon as the roads were dry. And Jervas urged him to come as soon as he could and to stay for as long as he liked. At last, Alexander steeled himself to tell his father about the plan.

 

He was sitting in a chair by the fire when Alexander broke the news, and, to Alexander's astonishment, he was not angry. As he turned to his son, his face was crushed with sadness.

“My dear boy,” he said, “how can I stop you? You are right; I know that you are right. You are the son of a tradesman. Yet you are to stay in the city at the house of a man who is an artist and a Protestant. London must be a changed place indeed, and were I to see it again I fear that I would not know it. Yours is a world that I can never be a part of. Go to town with John Caryll. Write your poems. I know that you dream of fame, I pray that you will find it, and I pray that you will be safe.”

His father's words affected Alexander far more than anger and resentment could have done. Deeply shaken, he thought for a moment to stay safe in Binfield, but he knew that he must go forward. For better or for worse, his future awaited him in London; it was there that he must put his talents to the test. He wanted the elation of success; it was time at last to confront the terrifying possibility of failure.

When Caryll arrived to collect him a few days later, Alexander was eager to be gone. Caryll shook his hand warmly, and put his arm about his shoulders in a hearty, paternal embrace.

“Good of you to let him go, ma'am; sir,” he said with a confidential nod to Alexander's parents, and Alexander was reminded that Caryll must be about his father's age. “Though who would choose to be in London if he could be here, eh? You shall see him back again in no time.” Alexander stepped away from Caryll's protective grip. Until now, he had thought very little about his patron except as the means by which he would get to London, and he was surprised to find that Caryll was much more forceful a personality than he had remembered. He knew that Caryll had a reputation for being adept politically; many years ago Caryll's uncle had been accused of Jacobite treason in a plot against the crown, and it had been he who had saved the family from losing everything.

“Did you read of the priest murdered in Shoreditch, Mr. Caryll?” Alexander's father asked him.

Caryll looked somber. “The dangers of the city are not yet past, sir,” he answered.

Alexander looked up sharply, the thought suddenly striking him that Caryll knew something more about this murder than he had let on. But Caryll's face revealed nothing.

When at last the farewells had been made and they were driving away, Alexander was overcome by a surge of exhilaration. The countryside was brightly iced in the rising sun: white frost and purple shadows were tucked into the snow, which lay in little hollows like fleece. The spell of dry weather had made the road hard and smooth. A vapor of dew rose from the ground with the warmth of the morning, and gathered about the feet of the cold sheep turned mournfully toward the pale sun. They passed a covert of oak trees at a merry clip, and the sound of the wheels startled a pair of deer who broke away across the open grass, their warm hooves stirring up a silver trail in the frost. Far, far in the distance Alexander glimpsed the spires of London, glinting as the first sun caught their sides.

“Well, how are you then, Alexander?” Caryll asked. “Keen enough to be in town, I'll wager. 'Tis a good while since your last visit. No need to hurry home. Your parents will do well enough without you.” He gave Alexander a playful shake, more like a friend than a father.

Alexander wondered why Caryll had spoken so differently to his parents about this sojourn in London. It was difficult to tell when Mr. Caryll was really being sincere. But he was eager to remain in Caryll's favor, so he said, “My father was apprehensive of this visit, but you calmed his fears adeptly.”

Caryll's reply was cold, however. “Do not forget, Alexander, the things your father and I saw in London,” he said. “Your generation did not witness the executions after Sir Edmund Berry Godfrey's murder. Men I had grown up with were torn into four in front of my eyes, while they still had breath in their bodies. The Protestants did not scruple to send fifty men to the gallows, merely for saying that the king's firstborn son had claim to the throne.”

Alexander blushed. “I fear that you found me impertinent, sir. I did see a pope-burning once, and I will never forget it. I am sorry for your rebuke.”

The scene, long pushed to the back of his memory, returned to him. It was just before his family had fled London. He had gone with his father to the docklands to see some linens that he wanted to buy for the shop. As they turned toward home they came upon a street entirely blocked by a crowd of men and women, pushing and jostling one another. One moment Alexander and his father were outside of the crowd, and at the next they were in the middle of it, swept along in the raucous tide of movement, its force too great to be resisted by his father's light frame.

His father had snatched his little son to his shoulders, and as he did so, Alexander saw a strange, costumed group at the front of the pack, which he thought at first was a party of friars and monks and priests, familiar to him from pictures in books about his own religion. But then he saw that they were holding tankards of ale, gripping each other in lewd embraces, laughing and shouting cruelly. Alexander's father struggled to get free from the mob. But he stumbled, and gave in to the surge of the crowd, which pushed them toward a village green where people were singing and dancing around a bonfire, bright with lashing flames. A band of musicians played jigs; dancers were writhing in a wild, drunken passion.

Then Alexander saw the most astonishing sight. In front of him was the Pope.

The man was seated in a chair, wearing a scarlet cassock and a triple crown, just as in the pictures. Beside him stood a figure whom Alexander did not recognize, but he thought it must be a king, and wondered if it were the King of England or of France. A third man climbed onto the stage, dressed in black, with two horns and a long black tail that hung from his waist. Alexander gasped. It was the Devil. The crowd cheered in excitement.

Alexander sat motionless, captivated by the wild light of the fire and the gleeful faces of the people. Suddenly two men pushed their way to the stage, carrying sacks that jumped about as they walked. The crowd screamed and shouted in delight—“Puss, puss,” they called—and Alexander realized that the bags were full of live cats. The men tore open the chests of the Pope and the King to shove the animals inside—the figures had been made from cloth. Alexander turned away in horror. Were the cats to be burned? Murdered, in cold blood. Unable to stop himself he looked back, and saw the Devil pushing the writhing mannequins onto the flames.

“No popery in England!” the Devil shouted, and the crowd gave another cheer. The light papers and clothing of the Pope and King caught fire, and Alexander heard the sound of high, anguished screams, which seemed to come from the very mouths of the two cloth men as the cats felt the blasting heat of the flames around them.

“No Catholics,” the crowd kept on shouting. “Bring in the Ten-Mile Act!” Alexander's father staggered back, pulling his son down from his shoulders and holding him tightly. His face was ashen.

“My God,” he gasped, breaking free from the mob at last. “We are not safe. I believe that we shall never be safe again.”

Afterward, his father had not spoken of what they had seen. But a few weeks later Alexander had woken in the night to loud noises and the sound of his father's voice raised in anger. His mother had come to comfort him, telling him that thieves had tried to break into the shop, and that his father had driven them away. But in the morning, Alexander's father had stared dumbly at the window-panes broken in and the filthy muck thrown across the shop floor. Some words were written on the wall: “No popery,” Alexander had read aloud. His parents had abandoned the house in which Alexander had spent his childhood, and his father had never returned to town.

But it was hard to imagine what his life would have been like had his family not gone to the country. Had they not lived in Binfield, he would never have known Sir Anthony—and would never have met Teresa. Strange that they should both be going to London now, filled alike—alike, as always—with hope and ambition. Yet of such different kinds. He hoped for glory. She longed to be introduced into the fashionable circle of their cousin Arabella, who had been described as the greatest beauty of her age. An extravagant phrase, Alexander thought, unlikely to be true. But even so, he would be curious to see her.

He noticed that they had reached the outskirts of the city. They passed an abandoned market garden and then a slaughterhouse, where a group of boys were fossicking in the yard for bits of offal to throw at passersby. The road was lined with deep ditches hiding unsavory sights from view: highwaymen and vagrants—perhaps even corpses, Alexander speculated. A tavern came into view, where a large group of people was waiting in the cold to board a coach.

He exerted himself to speak again to Caryll. “How glad I am not to be standing among them,” he said. “It is most kind of you, sir, to give me a seat in your carriage.”

“You will always be welcome to it, Alexander,” Caryll replied. “I am particularly glad that you do not board that coach, for you would soon find yourself very far from where you want to go. It is bound for Liverpool.”

“Liverpool!” Alexander exclaimed in astonishment. “What a wretchedly long way to be going,” he added. “They have days of travel ahead of them.”

“And that will be only the beginning. Some of them will surely sail on to Africa and the New World.”

“They say that vast fortunes are to be made from slaves, but I would not be part of it for anything,” Alexander said. “Think of spending so many months on a tiny, cramped boat; constantly ill, and uncertain as to whether one will see home again. I don't know how a man can bring himself to it.”

Caryll laughed. “And if it is so dreadful for the men, only think what it must be for the slaves! You are much better off in London, Alexander. I am glad to have brought you here.”

Just as Caryll finished speaking, Alexander's attention was caught by two fellows standing together in the stable yard nearby. One of them was ill-kempt—he had a five days' growth on his cheeks and chin, and was wearing an old cape and muddied boots. But the other was a gentleman, tall beside his companion, and holding the reins of a chestnut horse. This horse, as handsome as its rider, looked up alertly as Alexander's carriage approached, flicking a hind foot in a quick, authoritative movement.