Fordhook, Ealing
April 1833

Disaster strikes like an unforecasted storm on the morning of our eleventh lesson.

James is reading aloud from a pamphlet that he has brought, penned no doubt by the indefatigable Mr Lewis: ‘The brilliant accomplishment of good writing is as sterling gold, whose intrinsic value will remain unalterable through all the vicissitudes of life,’he is saying, as the library door creaks open. Fury the Second is on duty today; we are so used to her heavy-footed tread as she circles us that neither of us looks up. Then I become aware of a changed energy in the room – I am peculiarly sensitive to the moods of my mother, and I know before seeing her that it is she who is standing there. Her entire body is rigid with fury; here is Fury personified, and far more frightening and dreadful, for all that she is rather short.

James gets to his feet at once.

‘Mr Hopkins,’ says Mamma. ‘That sounded like an interesting piece that you were reading.’

He bows. ‘Yes, milady.’

‘You hold the accomplishment of writing in high regard.’

‘I do indeed.’

‘Which is, of course, why I hired you to tutor my daughter. Is it, or is it not the case, that you use a particular kind of ink, Mr Hopkins?’

‘Of... of ink, milady?’

‘I believe that you have claimed as much. Indelible blue-black writing ink, from a company called Stephens.’

James nods, defeated. Mamma continues, each word placed for maximum dramatic effect (she takes particular care over the word indelible). ‘Not many people use this ink, I believe. It is expensive, and has only relatively recently been made available.’

‘That is so.’

‘Then perhaps you will explain to me, Mr Hopkins, why it is that not only has an extensive spillage of this particular blue-black ink been discovered staining the wooden floorboards of one of the allotment buildings, but also a nightgown belonging to my daughter, that she ingeniously, but not ingeniously enough, hid behind her washstand?’

She is just too clever, my mother. Nothing escapes her; I realise now that my greatest sin – greater by far than whatever carnalities I have indulged in – has been presumption. I assumed that because Mamma wasn’t often actually here, because she tasked an array of Furies with watching over me while she herself alternated between rest cures and continued plans for social reform that, somehow, she wasn’t aware of what I was doing. I was wrong. I am guilty of presumption, and laziness besides; I should have visited the shed by daylight and washed away the ink, instead of moving the rug into a different place, hiding the stain, and hoping no one would notice.

My mother, gifted mathematician that she is, has put two and two together, and made four.

‘I have made enquiries,’ Mamma goes on. ‘The housemaid says that on at least two occasions she has noticed that Ada’s outdoor things were damp in the early morning. One of the teachers at the Academy recalls looking out of his window, late at night, and seeing what he thought was a candle somewhere in the grounds. ‘You should consider yourselves fortunate that you weren’t discovered on the spot by Mr Atlee.’ At this, she half closes her eyes and bites her lip, as though uttering a silent prayer.

‘N-n-nothing happened, milady, I assure you,’ stammers my tutor. I don’t look at him; I don’t look at either of them. In spite of the evidence, which is considerable, I wouldn’t have done what he has just done – admit guilt. I’d have come up with a story, something to explain the ink on my nightgown; I’d have denied all knowledge of the shed. But it’s too late now, and Mamma seems not at all pacified by James’ promise.

‘You are to leave this house immediately,’ she says.

He gathers his books with the speed of a wounded soldier, horseless and fleeing from the site of a battle that has been lost. Mamma escorts him out, one hand flared like a claw at the small of his back, as though she wishes she could push him over and send him sprawling down the front steps. I melt into the library shadows as they pass, neither of them casting a glance in my direction.

‘James,’ I whisper.

But it’s too late; he’s gone.

All the feeling in my body has turned to liquid; it bubbles up in my blood, riddling me with rage and frustration and a kind of flat, dull sense that, once again, Mamma has won...

Distantly, the front door slams; footsteps crunch; my banished tutor leaves Fordhook for the last time. My hands shrink into balls, my nails cutting into my palms, tears misting the corners of my vision.

‘Why must she always win?’ I say bitterly to the empty room. ‘It is as though she is my enemy, and not my mother.’

I wait for her to come back, but she doesn’t. It is beginning to rain; slow, lardy drops are gliding sluggishly down the pane, making a mockery of my tears. Why hasn’t she come back? Rather aimlessly, I leave the library, ears alert. Passing the drawing room, I hear the Furies, murmuring in shocked whispers.

‘All this time, my dear – all this time, why, under our very noses!’

‘Come, Selina. He seemed such a nice young man—’

‘It was Ada who led him astray.’

‘Now, now, we cannot be sure of that...’

‘But do we know what actually happened?’

‘He says... the young man claims that nothing improper took place...’

‘Oh, I find that very hard to believe!’

‘Dearest Annabella is quite beside herself. She has gone to lie down, and we shan’t disturb her until morning.’

It is so like Mamma, I think, as I beat a retreat towards the kitchens, to be rendered prostrate by her own victory. I can just imagine her, lying flat on the coverlet, demanding a tincture of something, a cold compress. What about my feelings? Who is going to minister to me, in my moment of defeat? I am light-headed with self-pity. And rage. Without even really noticing the direction of my steps, I make for the boot room, where I put on my outer garments, my walking boots, and suddenly I am outside, in the rain, pulling my hood up over my head. I stride down the driveway, wanting to plant my footsteps in the exact spaces where James stepped not so very long ago, but the ground is slithery with mud. Where I am going? I think I decided the moment she sent my tutor away, although I didn’t know it at the time.

Didn’t I promise myself that where he went, I would follow? I meant it. I will follow him unto the ends of time, or failing that, to his house. The only slight problem being that I am not entirely sure where he lives. A walk across the fields, he said, but in which direction? Scanning my memory for snatches of half-forgotten conversations, I walk on. At the end of the lane is a forked path; where I would turn left for the parish church and Ealing Grove, I turn right, find a gate – I am sure that this is the way; I am sure he described it so – and climb over it, and find myself in a barren field. There is a path – well, more of a nettle-strewn track; I keep slipping on the ground, and realise that I am wearing someone else’s boots. A hollow marble-roll of thunder; the rain doubles. I can feel seams of droplets along my eyelashes. I start to wonder if I should turn back; but I don’t want to, for what is there to go home to? Furies, and lessons and disappointment? No: better to drown in this joyless field, on my own terms, than be subjected to a life that I no longer want to lead.

I cast myself as the heroine of my own tragic romance. As I trudge along the path, I can almost see the words unfolding on the page before me.

Ada, who had suffered most unjustly at the hands of the Furies – and, of course, her own mother too – was finally unable to bear the life that they had so painstakingly laid out for her. The storm was bitter; the rain sliced through the heavens like butter knives, and yet she felt nothing but freedom as she forged a path towards the humble house where her lover lived...

Carried away by my own composition, I walk smack into a gatepost, and let out a squeal of surprise. Looking about, I see houses: a small cluster of them, painted pale colours, with thatched roofs. There’s no one about, but by now it is raining so much that I wouldn’t expect to see anyone outside.

The Old Rectory. That’s it: that’s James’ house; I’m sure of it. Rain-drenched, riddled with so many emotions that they have all, by now, dissolved into one, I stand rather confusedly outside the door. An iron bell dangles from the lintel. I look up at it, hesitate, and then, instead, take hold of the door-knocker. But just as I’m about to knock on the door – a single tentative tap of brass – the door swings open and a woman looks out.

‘Can I help you?’ she says.

I open my mouth, incapable of speech, furious with myself for not utilising my slippery cross-field tramp to fashion for myself something to say at the end of it.

‘But... you are Ada Byron,’ says the woman, and I realise that she is James’ mother.

‘Your hands are the same,’ I say, through chattering teeth. ‘You... you have the same hands.’

‘Come inside,’ says the woman, perhaps not understanding this. ‘Come into the warmth.’

She draws me into a small room with a lit fire; the walls are crowded with oil paintings; a small harpsichord sits, loved-looking, in the corner. All at once I feel the pull of a home – not a rented mansion with a hundred uninhabited rooms – but a real, family home, where siblings share secrets at the end of a long day. Perhaps, I think, I can come and live here – at least until we are married. This woman looks as though she would make an excellent mother-in-law, and I shall be an exemplary daughter. They might not have very much money, but I shall be able to contribute plenty, I’m sure. If Mamma agrees to the marriage, that is. But at the thought of Mamma, the glass sphere of my daydream begins to acquire long fractures. She would never agree to the marriage. James Hopkins does not have a title; he has no land; he is not of my class... It will not matter that we love each other absolutely. She will not care.

‘Wait there, if you please,’ says the woman, motioning for me to make myself at ease, and disappears with a rustle of fabric. Not wanting to sit down, I stare into the fire, and then take in the colours of the walls, the furnishings, so that at least I will always be able to remember the house where James Hopkins lived.

When the woman returns, she is accompanied by a tall man with dark hair, broad shoulders and James’ upturned nose. Behind them, with the abashed tread of a child caught stealing, is James himself. For a moment, he looks at me, and then he looks away, as though it is too painful to meet my gaze. And I realise that short of running away, eloping, there is really nothing that we can do, James and I.

This entire affair has been a misadventure.

‘Miss Byron,’ says the tall man, who must be James’ father. ‘We must take you home.’