A Most Lamentable Comedy (8 page)

Count Mikhail Orchovsky:
When those
muzhiki
at the bank are finished robbing me, I will take you to the steppes, where we shall ride in my troika, naked beneath the skins of bears I have killed with my bare hands, and I shall make love to you like a tiger . . .

The Earl of Ballyglenleary:
Och, ma’am, we’re an ancient family, and I the last of our clan, and under an ancient curse. ’Tis said only a bonnie lass bearing gold can break the curse, but I dinna ken the meaning of that. I canna offer for your hand, for I own only a crumbling romantic ruin, and now even my heart isna mine own . . .

In retrospect, I’m amazed any of the women believed me, particularly as the foreign accents of Orchovsky, Ballyglenleary, St Germain-d’Aubussy et al. tended to slip during amorous encounters. Did those women, who squandered their husband’s money on me as easily as they might patronise a milliner or jeweller, know they were dealing with a scoundrel – and not care? The best that can be said is that I did not leave a trail of broken hearts or bastards behind me. And, without boasting overmuch, I gave the ladies value for money – which brings me to another troubling thought about Caroline. I might be able to kiss her for fifteen minutes, but I doubt whether I could last as long in more intimate circumstances.

‘Oh, how delightful,’ trills one of the Misses Clark, interrupting my unhappy reflections. ‘Mrs Gibbons is to sing for us.’

Fanny Gibbons moves into the bright candlelight around the pianoforte. She looks particularly handsome tonight, and I can well believe she captured hearts and theatre audiences in London. Mrs Linsley seats herself at the pianoforte, removes a few bracelets and flexes her fingers. The two of them confer briefly, and then they begin.

I know the music, and Mrs Gibbons sings in the original Italian. It is as though she has read my mind.

‘
Che farò senza Euridice?

Dove andrò senza il mio ben?

Euridice! Euridice!
’

Her voice is remarkable, strong and clear, supremely eloquent. Something strange is happening to me, a tightness in the throat, a pricking sensation around my eyes. The golden light and Mrs Gibbons’ tawny-coloured gown blur before me.

Good God, I am about to burst into tears.

I stand, muttering an apology to my neighbours as the legs of my chair scrape on the floor. The drawing room has doors that stand open to the garden, and I flee outside, taking deep breaths of the air, fragrant with stock and wallflowers. I had forgotten the scents of an English garden, the long-shadowed clarity of an English summer evening. The sun has barely set and the air is soft and warm.

Behind me, Mrs Gibbons continues to sing of love, loss and despair.

I find my handkerchief and blow my nose.

There is an answering snort as someone else does the same.

I turn warily, hoping whoever it is has not observed my excessively emotional state.

‘Damned grass,’ says Lady Caroline Elmhurst. ‘It’s the same every time I come into the country. What are you doing here, Congrevance? Did the Misses Clark and Miss Egg-whatever-her-name-is tire of your charms?’

‘They bored me.’ I offer her my arm. ‘I’d rather be with you.’

She lays her fingertips on my arm and we stroll across the lawn. ‘Oh, certainly. Very pretty, sir. As I’m the only woman out here, of course you can make that claim.’

‘However, I feel it is only correct to tell you, Lady Caroline . . .’

She plucks a handkerchief from her sleeve and blows her nose in a long, protracted sort of way.

I clear my throat and continue, ‘I do not believe I shall ever fall in love again. You see, my heart was broken . . .’

She gives a final snort into the handkerchief and tucks it away. ‘I beg your pardon. I did not hear all you said.’

‘I was saying that as much as I enjoy female company, I regret I shall never love again, having known only one woman, an incomparable member of her sex, who . . .’ I pause, so she can ask me about my broken heart. No woman, in my experience, can pass up such a challenge.

She gives a loud sniff, but not one inspired by sentiment.

Guessing that her handkerchief must be flooded, I offer her mineheight="0et>

‘Thank you. I daresay you’ll get over her. One tends to.’ She blows her nose. ‘And you seem to amuse yourself quite well in the meantime. Why does your handkerchief have these initials?’

‘I shall have to reprimand my manservant. We stayed at a sorry sort of inn on the way here, where our linens were washed.’ I resolve not to lend any of my collection of mismatched handkerchiefs to this sharp-eyed woman again.

‘My maid does my linens when we travel. She’s very skilled with stains.’

While I would be quite happy to discuss the lady’s underlinen, this conversation is not proceeding exactly as I would have wished.

‘Have you visited Otterwell’s maze?’ I ask.

‘Not yet. I shall ask Will to take me, as he can find his way to the centre and back again.’

‘Ah, Lady Caroline, I should quite like to take you there myself.’

‘I’m sure you would.’ She flicks the handkerchief in my direction, a flirtatious gesture that loses its impact with the soggy nature of the item.

‘Call me Nick,’ I blurt out. No one has called me that in years.

She loosens her hand from my arm. ‘I don’t believe we should be on such intimate terms, Mr Congrevance. I shall return to the house now.’

I bow. ‘Very well, Lady Elmhurst.’

She nods in a dignified fashion, an effect spoiled immediately after by another wetly unabashed nose-blow, and stuffs the handkerchief, now somewhat the worse for wear, back into my hand.

I watch her walk away, feeling confused and not altogether happy. She wears a gown much the same colour as the evening sky, a soft grey-mauve – I wonder if she wore it during her period of mourning, although I doubt it had a neckline then low enough to show her charms in such a spectacular manner. Rosettes and a line of ruffles around the hem produce a soft, intimate rustle as she moves.

The first star of the evening, Venus, has appeared. Apparently she does not shine on me.

I wander through the garden, which is cultivated by Otterwell in old-fashioned Elizabethan style – stiff formal hedges, paths and beds; no romantic vistas or wildernesses here – until the light begins to fail. As I turn back (it would not be courteous to be gone for too long), I see a woman leaning against a plinth in the centre of a rose garden, so still I think she is a statue. In the fading light her gown is a tawny russet, a shade or two darker than her hair. She turns as I approach, one hand resting against the plinth, on which is set a sundial. Fallen petals scent the air, lying pale on the ground.

‘Mrs Gibbons.’ I bow. ‘Do you conemplate the passing of time?’

She smiles, but there is something melancholy in her face. ‘Something of the sort, Mr Congrevance. Do you return to the house now?’

‘I should be happy to escort you.’ I offer my arm.

She slips her hand into the crook of my elbow. ‘I should be angry with you, sir. You left when I sang.’

‘Yes, I did. I beg your forgiveness. Your singing moved me greatly.’

‘Ah, of course, you understood the Italian.’

‘I would have understood whatever language you sang in, Mrs Gibbons.’

‘Very pretty,’ she says, much as Caroline did.

‘That may be, but it is the truth. Why were you out alone?’

‘Oh, the others are somewhere near. To tell the truth, Mr Congrevance, I craved solitude. Sometimes singing makes me sad. I miss the stage and wonder whether I made a mistake in retiring when I did.’

‘Do you think you’d return to the theatre?’

‘I don’t know. It is . . . complicated.’ She stops and looks at me. ‘I find you interesting, Mr Congrevance. I’ve known a great many people playing roles of one sort or another, and I suspect you are not what you seem. Oh, you’re very good at it – I was quite surprised by your talents as an actor today – but . . .’

And then I do something foolish. She is the wrong woman, and God knows I have no designs on her. At the same time I am unhappy and unsettled and I have spent several hours of the day flirting with her. Above all, there is also the issue of stopping her mouth and distracting her before she produces further revelations. I bend my head and kiss her. She tenses in surprise and kisses me back – not the frenzied grappling I experienced with Caroline, but the curious, intimate exploration of strangers, our arms slipping around each other; strangers who have played with a slight attraction to each other and have each been alone for too long.

A roar of anger interrupts us.

Mr Nicholas Congrevance

T
he mild and scholarly Mr Thomas Darrowby hauls me away by the shoulders and aims a wild blow in my direction. ‘You scoundrel, sir!’

I duck to avoid his blow, and he almost falls over.

‘For Christ’s sake, Tom!’ Fanny Gibbons says, blushing deep red.

‘Tell me, for God’s sake, he did not . . . did not . . .’ He makes a grab for her hands, and she swats him away as though he were a particularly annoying sort of fly.

‘It was a
kiss
, Tom. That was all.’ She pats his arm. ‘Calm yourself.’

He looks even angrier, as any man would if a woman spoke to him in that way and under such circumstances, and turns back to me, fists clenched. We’re about the same height – he carries a little more weight, but I think I’m faster on my feet. ‘You have insulted the lady, sir.’

‘Then I beg her pardon, sir.’ I bow to Fanny. ‘Forgive me, madam.’

‘Fanny, did he force his attentions on you?’

She hesitates and looks at me. I remember Linsley saying Fanny and Darrowby had found every excuse in the world not to resolve their relationship, and that the two of them needed a push in the right direction.

In a split second, I decide what I must do. ‘Of course not!’ I say in a loud, blustering tone. ‘She’s only an
actress
, after all. You saw how she flung herself at me at the rehearsal today.’

‘Oh!’ Fanny looks at me, uncertain, and then at Darrowby. ‘Tom, I—’

‘You – you foreign bastard!’

I’m tempted to laugh, but another of Darrowby’s wild swings catches me in the ribs and I drop to one knee, clutching my side. I lurch back to my feet again.

My gaze meets that of Caroline, who stands a few feet away. Apparently she did not go indoors as I thought. Is she jealous?

‘It really doesn’t mean anything to Congrevance,’ Caroline says. ‘He was inviting me into the maze but a quarter-hour ago, Darrowby.’

‘You blackguard!’ Darrowby rushes at me again, but this time I step aside and he blunders into a shrub. As he extricates himself, picking leaves from his waistcoat, he splutters, ‘I demand satisfaction, sir!’

Excellent. Now Fanny will see him as a hero.

Instead she takes Caroline’s arm, and the two ladies regard me with contempt and Darrowby with what appears to be kindly pity.

‘I suppose men can’t help it,’ Caroline says.

‘Probably not. Caro, I rather fancy some of the little cakes we had with tea in the drawing room. Shall we see if there are any left?’

I have never been so embarrassed in my life, and Darrowby blushes bright red at Fanny’s indifference. She gives us one last amused glance. ‘I trust neither of you will do anything foolish.’

height="0em" width="27" align="justify">‘Hit me!’ I mutter to Darrowby.

‘What?’

‘Hit me. You’re losing her interest.’ I brace myself. ‘Thumb outside your fist, Darrowby, you’ll break a bone else.’ I’m not thinking too clearly, but my reasoning goes something like this: Fanny will be impressed by Darrowby’s manly strength and his ardent defence of her honour; Caroline will dart forward with a cry of distress as I fall.

Stars burst at the side of my head, and the gardens and evening sky wheel in a crazy spiral.

‘A beefsteak should do the trick nicely, sir.’

To my disappointment, the face that leans over mine as I regain my senses is that of Barton. He helps me to my feet, brushing grass from my coat. My eye is rapidly tightening and closing, my cheekbone throbbing.

‘Where are they?’

My question is answered as I see that Darrowby stands nearby. Of the two women there is no sign.

‘I’m dreadfully sorry,’ I say to Darrowby. ‘Maybe I should have hit you. In any case, I had no business kissing Mrs Gibbons. My apologies, sir.’

He utters a long sigh. ‘Possibly I should kiss her more myself. Women are so difficult, aren’t they? You never really know what they want you to do. But what went wrong? I shouldn’t be asking for your advice. I was about to challenge you to a duel.’

‘You may still do so if you wish.’

‘Not much point, Congrevance, if the women aren’t to know about it. Besides, we have no disinterested parties for seconds.’ He examines his knuckles and flexes his fingers. ‘I hope I can still write.’

‘I’ll set you right up, sir, if you come along with us,’ Barton offers. ‘Or, if you wish, I’ll get out the false beard . . .’

I shake my head. Not the false beard of which Barton is so fond and that he has assumed for a number of roles – seconds in duels, doctors, priests, et cetera.

What a failure. Not only have we subverted the code of honour, but we have lost the two ladies to dessert – Darrowby’s timing was not of the best, as by the time he struck his blow they had turned away, arm in arm. Doubtless, if they discussed us at all, it was only to comment on what fools we were.

She doesn’t care. I should abandon the pursuit. I’ll leave tomorrow.

Beside me, Darrowby sighs. ‘Congrevance, tell me. Do you think Mrs Gibbons is entirely indifferent to me?’

‘Of course not.’ My words ring with false heartiness.

At rehearsal the next morning, further humiliation awaits.

Otterwell sweeps into the hall, clad in a long flowing garment and crowned with peacock feathers that nod above his bald head. ‘Costumes, gentlemen!’

He ushers us into the chamber assigned as the gentlemen’s tiring room and gestures to a large chest. ‘You shall be dressed in the ancient classical style. Mr Linsley will advise you on the fitting of the costumes.’ After Otterwell has left – doubtless he intends to visit the ladies’ tiring room on some pretext – with some trepidation we pick through the garments in the chest, which emits a musty smell; I suspect mice have made their homes in it at some point.