Chapter Twenty-Two
Our heroine finally takes the waters; and Lady Dalrymple strikes a bargain with an uninvited, and not entirely welcome, guest.
AS THE DAYS PASSED, C.J. continued to assuage her recurring attacks of nausea by nibbling bits of candied ginger. She recalled having wondered when she first arrived at Lady Wickham’s town house how she would find out what to do when she got her period, not knowing the protocol for such things. But only once had she needed to avail herself of the rags that Mary kept in a drawstring bag, tucked away in a cupboard. She had arrived in Bath on the fifth of April 1801; Constable Mawl would never let her forget that day. It was now June. C.J. counted on her fingers, calculating the time. Perhaps her condition was related to anxiety. She had plenty of that to spare. On the other hand, she had never been pregnant and didn’t know exactly what to expect if she were. Mary, who had no inkling of C.J.’s secret, was certain that her condition was intestinal and could be alleviated if she joined Lady Dalrymple in taking the waters. A lengthy soak in the hot Kings Bath, followed by a quick plunge into the cold Queens Bath, should nicely do the trick, she was sure. And so thrice a week C.J. donned the ugly brown linen shift specially provided by the attendants and took the cure. Each time she went, she held out a hope of seeing Darlington there, but he had never given C.J. any indication of requiring the waters’ restorative properties. How she wished to tell him why she believed she needed to take them! How she yearned to see him! She did see many other couples besporting themselves with no heed paid to a ready audience of gawkers. What a horrid location for an assignation! The baths themselves, which resembled modern swimming pools of modest size, were nothing but public germ tanks where invalids of both genders mingled, regardless of infirmity. People with running sores and infections shared the same water as those with common colds, fevers, or contagious diseases such as consumption. C.J. wondered if the water was ever changed or filtered. The stench would have been palpable had not the attendants attempted to ameliorate it by floating pomanders of lavender and copper bowls filled with scented oils. The countess believed that her “niece” had taken to accompanying her of late simply to monitor her progressive return to good health. She was given no reason to suspect that anything was amiss with the girl’s own well-being, and C.J. did nothing to disabuse Lady Dalrymple of that notion.
MEANWHILE, IT APPEARED that Cassandra Jane Welles had benefactors in the unlikeliest places. It had been the brainchild of Bath resident John Palmer (the elder) to build a new theatre in Orchard Street to replace the old playhouse that had been erected nearby at the time of Beau Nash’s arrival some years earlier. The original theatre, built in 1705, was razed in 1737 (due to poor attendance) to make way for the Mineral Hospital. But Palmer felt that if a new playhouse were to be constructed, residents and visitors alike would throng to see the works of the Irishmen Richard Brinsley Sheridan and Oliver Goldsmith, his fellow Bath neighbors. Palmer was proven correct. His new theatre continued to increase in popularity, not merely with audiences, but among the actors themselves, who became eager to secure an engagement in the spa city that was now one of the most glittering jewels in the Georgian crown. In 1768, His Majesty granted the Orchard Street Theatre a license, and John Palmer’s playhouse was henceforth to be known as the Theatre Royal, Bath—such prestige having been previously conferred only on London’s fabled Drury Lane.
By the time Sarah Siddons made her debut there in 1778 in Sir John Vanbrugh’s comedy The Provok’d Husband, the Theatre Royal was already a raging success. It goes without saying that had C.J. Welles known of John Palmer, she would have freely acknowledged him a debt of gratitude for the creation of a most remarkable time-travel conveyance.
At the present moment, another, quite different, conveyance was pulling up alongside the façade of Leake’s bookseller’s emporium, adjacent to the post office. This one was the not-quite-literal “progeny” of brewer and theatrical manager John Palmer (the younger), who had taken it upon himself to address the issue of postal reform; his efforts resulted in the residents of the golden city of Bath receiving their letters and parcels from London a full day earlier than ever before. This pilgrimage, made by parcels and up to four passengers, took all of a fleet thirteen hours, necessitating a pair of horses, changed every six or eight miles. Each stop was made with equal alacrity, as the mailbags were ready for the driver upon his arrival; and the guard, who rode with the coachman on the box, would deposit the mail sacks from each destination in the boot of the carriage, permitting the driver to retain his position. Thus the journey could be effected with all due speed.
Stepping from the light coach emblazoned with His Majesty’s crest was a ruddy-faced gentleman dressed in a quaintly grand manner: his elaborate white jabot foaming like a frothy meringue over his bright green coat and striped silk waistcoat. Puffing and winded from the mere exertion of descending from the Royal Mail, the person in question gave every indication of having once been handsome of face and figure, in possession at one time of a full head of wheat-blond hair—now tending to thinness—while his physique, once trim, had become rather thick waisted and stout. No doubt he had come to take the waters for his gouty left foot.
“Give a hand there! Caution, lad!” he boomed at one of the young scamps who made a penny or two by helping Royal Mail travelers with their baggage. The boy handed the wheezing wayfarer his valise, a weather-beaten brown leather affair that looked to the child as though it had seen as much abuse as its red-faced owner, who, he noted on receiving only a shilling’s tip, smelled of gin, tobacco, and garlic.
“Very nice. Very, verrah nice,” the man slurred, and one might have thought he was admiring the magnificent Gothic architecture of Bath Abbey, had it not been for the passing dairy maid whose buttresses were nearly as prominently displayed. The Marquess of Manwaring extended his hand toward the healthy young woman to sample her wares, but the girl was too quick for the besotted old sot.
“Just what do you think yer about, sirrah?” she demanded indignantly. “Manhandling a poor girl right out in the middle of the street!”
“Not manhandling, young lady. Manwaring. I’m a marquess,” the would-be violator belched.
“I don’t care if yer the bloody Prince of Wales!” the dairymaid exclaimed. “Yer a gouty old pervert, that’s what you are. I’ll thank ye to keep yer hands to yerself.”
The marquess felt a meaty hand clamp down upon his shoulder. “That’s my good coat,” he protested. “And I’ll thank you to keep your hands to yourself!”
“You are addressing a constable, sirrah.” Constable Mawl drew himself up to his full height of well over six feet. He loved playing to a crowd.
“Do you not know whom you address, Constable Mawl?” the gouty-footed man thundered theatrically. “I am the Marquess of Manwaring.”
“You’re also drunk and disorderly, your lordship,” asserted Mawl, taken down a peg by the realization that the marquess might have an influential friend or two who could easily put in an ill word, triggering the loss of his constabulary quicker than he could down a pint of ale on a hot summer afternoon.
“I am an actor!” the portly man proclaimed.
“And not a bad one,” murmured one of the Royal Mail passengers to one of the impromptu assemblage who had gathered to witness the show. “I saw him play Bob Acres in Newcastle. He’s no Garrick, mind you, but he did Sheridan proud.”
“His Dogberry in Bristol was well received,” piped up another passerby. “Shame his own family didn’t catch him in that role. He was never as good before or since.”
Constable Mawl, who prided himself on having ears, as well as eyes, affixed to the back of his head, addressed the crowd. “So you’ve heard of the stinkin’ bloke, ’ave you?” He waved his enormous hand in front of his face as if to fumigate the atmosphere. “If ’e’s as well known as you say he is, and being a marquess and all, I’m willing to release him upon his own re-cogni-zance, providing ’e’s got somewhere to lodge in Bath. But if I catch you acting like the town drunkard again, your lordship, it’s the jailhouse for you. Now go home, Maude,” he told the incensed dairymaid, as though she had encouraged the marquess’s drunken advances.
Albert Tobias, Lord Manwaring, was in need of a fortifying pint or two before setting off to visit his sister in the Royal Crescent. By the time he reached her doorstep, he practically fell over his own gouty foot, cursing a stone riser for surprising him.
“Here you go, lass,” he burped, thrusting a fistful of colorful ribbons at a stunned Mary Sykes, who had opened the door to admit him. The gift to the young serving girl, who he decided at first glance was rather pretty, though a bit too thin for his taste, was only the first of the extravagant tributes he had brought to grease the wheels of his sister’s generosity. By the time Collins had shown him to Lady Dalrymple’s front drawing room, the marquess-cum-actor, who had given the luggage boy outside the post office a paltry shilling, had bestowed a fistful of crowns upon her ladyship’s butler, and was about to present his sister with a bouquet of pastel-colored Belgian linen handkerchiefs, edged in lace tatted by the residents of the Beguinage in Bruges.
Lady Dalrymple was taking tea with Lady Oliver when Collins interrupted their light repast to inform her ladyship that the Marquess of Manwaring desired an audience with her. Euphoria’s fury at Lady Oliver’s attempt to insinuate a godchild into her nephew’s affections in place of Miss Welles had ultimately given way to a desire to confront her formidable opponent. At present, the rift between the two former bosom friends appeared irreparable, with Lady Dalrymple accusing her old girlhood playmate of betrayal, appealing to her own comprehension of such disloyalty by deigning to dredge up Lady Oliver’s unspeakable past. As Augusta’s own unhappy history was not above reproach, how dare she condemn Miss Welles for having a scandal in her family!
But Lady Oliver, who was not yet prepared to reveal her hand by disclosing the raft of intelligence she had been receiving from her diligent and vigilant spy, Saunders, simply held fast to the unsuitability of a match between the Earl of Darlington and Lady Dalrymple’s impoverished soi-disant niece, “Miss Welles.”
“The girl has neither fortune nor reputation to recommend her. You cannot, other than in your extravagant flights of fancy, overlook the inadvisability of my nephew’s forging an alliance with a young woman who has had neither a proper upbringing and education nor introduction and exposure to society.”
“It is to my niece’s credit that she is not a pale, overweaned weakling who knows naught but needlework and natters on about bonnets,” the countess argued. Seeing that she was making little headway in her suit, Lady Dalrymple elected to aim for her guest’s jugular vein. “Rest assured, Cassandra will not make the sort of wife that a man of the earl’s breeding and intelligence soon tires of, compelling him to seek happiness in more fascinating pastures.”
The countess could have been alluding to any number of arranged marriages among the aristocracy of the era; however, owing to her own lurid and unhappy past, Lady Oliver was keenly aware that Lady Dalrymple’s reference was deliberately targeted at her. Drawing herself up to her full height, she glowered at her hostess. “Please call for my carriage, Lady Dalrymple. There is nothing further to be said between us. Convey my compliments to your cook for an exemplary afternoon tea.” Lady Oliver nearly collided with Lady Dalrymple’s brother in her haste to leave the drawing room.
A theatrically practiced voice boomed, “The influence of women is only successful when it is indirect. So long as they confine themselves to country houses, the dining room table, the boudoir, and the bedroom, I make no objection. The better a woman speaks, the more embarrassing I always find it. It makes me feel quite uncomfortable.”
“Then you did not have to listen at the keyhole,” the marquess’s sister said tartly, her expression as sour as the lemon juice she was straining into her tea. “Charming words for a man who, in his profession as an actor, spends a good deal of time in the company of the fairer—and soberer—sex. What brings you to Bath, Albert?”
The marquess-turned-thespian assumed a classical pose and declaimed:
“Of all the gay Places the World can afford,
By Gentle and Simple for Pastime ador’d,
Fine Balls and Fine Concerts, fine Building and Springs,
Fine Walks, and fine Views, and a Thousand fine Things,
Not to mention the sweet Situation and Air,
What Place, my dear Sister, with Bath can compare?”
“I preferred the panegyric when Anstey penned it,” Lady Dalrymple said, calling her brother’s bluff. “And Christopher Anstey wrote ‘mother,’ not ‘sister.’ ”
Manwaring puckered his lips and gave his sister a jovial look. “Can’t even win for trying.” When he bestowed a sloppy kiss on the countess’s rouged cheek, she could smell the gin on his breath.
“Actually, I’m in a bit of a spot, Euphie,” the marquess hiccuped, helping himself to a cup of tea. He produced a silver flask from the pocket of his coat and enhanced the brew with the addition of a dram of whisky covertly acquired from a friend at the newly opened Chivas distillery.
In no mood to spar with her sponging brother, particularly after her argument with Augusta Oliver, the countess deftly removed a savory biscuit from her brother’s hand and fed it to an appreciative Newton. “No good. ’E’s up to no good,” warned the prescient parrot.
“Thank you, Newton.” Lady Dalrymple slid open the door of the gilded cage and reached in, so her pet could hop onto her jeweled finger. “When that quack surgeon Dr. Cleland recommended nearly twenty-five years ago that you take up gambling as a distraction from the gout, he neglected to inform you that such a ‘cure’ might become addictive. Your last episode at the gaming tables has reached the ears of everyone in Bath,” the countess remarked to her brother. “A man named Newman, I believe.”
“If he had not been cheating at faro, he would not have gone and hanged himself,” Albert remarked laconically. “I was not the one who was contriving to win by dishonest means.”
“No, not this time,” Lady Dalrymple replied. “Nevertheless, Mr. Newman’s untimely demise has created quite a scandal, regardless of the circumstances. Your role in his sudden departure from this earth has been widely speculated upon. Once again, your behavior has sorely tested your family, which is beholden by both blood and duty to defend your actions.”
The marquess tippled directly from his flask and wiped his mouth with one of his sister’s yellow damask serviettes. “I believed the man was cheating at cards. I merely pinned his hand to the table with a serving fork and remarked quite pointedly, ‘Sir, if you have not a card hidden under that hand, I apologize.’ I believe the unfortunate result quite decided the question.”
Ordinarily, Lady Dalrymple was not the judgmental sort. But Lady Oliver’s objection to the marquess as a potential new father-in-law for Lord Darlington enforced Euphoria’s resolve to remove all impediments to her “niece’s” nuptials. She, more than anyone, would have been quick to acknowledge Manwaring’s unsuitability to mix in polite society, but Albert was her brother, and therefore bore defending.
The Marquess of Manwaring rested his head in his hands. “I’m sunk, Euphie,” he admitted, then began to sob uncontrollably. “It’s not the liquor talking. My debts . . . I can no longer manage ’em. The creditors have been beating down m’door.” He pointed a stubby finger at his unfashionable green coat. “Even me tailors. I may have to decamp to the Continent to escape ’em.” Albert was about to reach once more for his silver flask when he caught his sister’s disapproving eye and slid it back into his pocket. “I thought by touring the provinces, I would be away from London long enough for them to forget. But they won’t have me anymore.”
“Who won’t, Albert?”
“Bristol. Newcastle. York. Leeds. Not until I sober myself up, they say. So I’ve got no income, you see.”
“Then perhaps you could take up some more lucrative pursuit in order to discharge your debts,” the countess counseled. “Three years ago Rowlandson found himself in similar straits when his commissions for portraiture fell off, so he took up caricature. It’s one and the same, if you ask me. His watercolor series on The Comforts of Bath have made him rather more than comfortable. I have a set of prints myself. They’re quite amusing if one’s sense of humor is as colorful as his illustrations.”
Albert looked at the rug and shuffled his feet. Lady Dalrymple noticed the shabby condition of his brown leather shoes.
Her ladyship released an exasperated sigh. “Do you expect me to discharge your debts for you? Portly and I rescued you for years, and never once have you shown an ounce of gratitude. You are everything that is wrong with the aristocracy, Bertie: you’re an advantage taker. You take and take and expect that everything you receive is your due.”
“Well, I’m choking on that silver spoon now, Euphie.”
“I can’t say as you don’t deserve to.”
“I’ll make it up to you this time,” Albert begged, blowing his nose phlegmatically into one of the linen tea towels. “If you could see your way to lending me a few thousand . . . I’ll do anything you ask.”
The countess gave her brother a long, hard look. A project was formulating in her mind that she was not yet ready to give voice to. So she gave a little “harrumph” instead, then installed herself at her escritoire and wrote out a draft for a modest amount, blotting the ink dry before handing the check to her brother. “This will see you set up at one of the better hotels in Bath,” she told him. “Try the White Hart Inn near the Abbey first. You will be so good as to stay there until you hear from me again.”
The marquess gave his sister a sloppy, grateful kiss on her rouged cheek. “You won’t regret it, Euphie.”
Lady Dalrymple touched her handkerchief to her face with the same motion she had used to blot the check. “I shall see what can be done about putting your thespian talents to use once more,” she said. “Good afternoon, Bertie.”