Jane and the Twelve Days of Christmas (5 page)

“Then I shall snatch the raisins for you, Caroline,” my mother interjected.

And so, between scolds and caresses, we made our stately progress towards The Vyne. The house sits some three miles north of Basingstoke, and Steventon is at least another mile further west—we should be full an hour upon the road at our present pace.

How shall I describe The Vyne? I suppose from its initial aspect,
as one turns off the Sherborne St. John road half a mile past the village, into the long expanse of lane leading to the house. On every side are groupings of copses surrounded by empty meadows, the very sort of ground a man like William Chute must value for sport. He is Master of The Vyne Hunt, a distinction accorded him by his neighbours, in recognition of the fact that he has bred and maintained the best pack of foxhounds known in the entire country. But I was speaking of the great house—which deserves to be as admired as Hatfield or Stratfield Saye, both its neighbours. The Vyne has presided over this part of Hampshire since medieval times; sheltered Anne Boleyn and Henry VIII under its roof; holds the tomb of the first Speaker of Parliament; and gave up a Recusant traitor to execution in Queen Elizabeth’s Tower. The present family have no direct claim upon this illustrious history, The Vyne having passed through more ancient hands to modern cousins. But the house itself recalls vanished dignities. Its south front, complete with sweep and porch and flanking towers, is mellow Tudor brick; its north front is a Neoclassical dream, rising from a lake, with specimen trees dotted across its lawn. There is even a portico, all columns and pediment, designed by a disciple of Inigo Jones.

John Coachman pulled up his horses before the south porch and immediately two liveried footmen helped us from the carriage. In the interval required for our journey, the weak Christmas sun had vanished, and tho’ the hour was not much past two o’clock, a determined dusk appeared to be falling. The temperature had also plummeted. I placed an arm around Caroline’s shoulders and hurried her inside.

The entrance hall of The Vyne is one of the most remarkable sights in Hampshire, being deeper than it is wide, and almost entirely filled with an Adamesque staircase designed in the last century by the late John Chute—an aesthete, world traveller, sometime-architect, and bosom friend of Horace Walpole. As a member of the Strawberry
Hill Set (named for Walpole’s Gothick home), the vanished Chute placed Taste above everything—even the continuation of his family line. He spent his hours collecting antiquities and designing monuments for The Vyne’s famous chapel; and tho’ his fanciful fretwork of white-panelled steps still rises triumphantly at the centre of the house, the estate passed to a secondary line at John Chute’s death.

Caroline was staring open-mouthed at the staircase; the pillars and railings that defined it were wrapt with heavy garlands of holly and bay, tied up with gold silk ribbon. The scent of greens mingled with the smell of beeswax and clove. Having been treated to the delights of The Vyne these twenty years at least, I occupied myself in drawing off my gloves while the child stared.

“Is that a Yule log, Aunt Jane?” she enquired, pointing at the great oak trunk, twice Caroline’s girth, smouldering on the hearth.

“It is, my sweet. They will have lighted it last evening, I daresay. You may watch it burn down slowly whilst you are here.”

“Too slowly.” Beside me, Cassandra shivered; the heat provided by the log was prevented from reaching us by the quantity of architecture filling the middle of the room.

“Mrs. Austen! And all the Austens, exactly as I had hoped and desired! It is too good of you to travel across the country like this. I hope you find that our Christmas cheer is equal to expectation.” Elizabeth Chute is a handsome lady some five years older than I, whose snapping dark eyes and carefully arranged toilette proclaim the lady of Fashion. Today she wore cherry-red sarcenet, with a braided trim of chocolate, and a figured turban becomingly set in her dark hair. I first dined with the Chutes, some fifteen years since, and have danced in Eliza’s drawing-room—and I may say that on this occasion she appeared in as admirable looks, and as high a flow of spirits, as she had when a young bride in the full bloom of youth.

“Mrs. Chute,” I said warmly as she grasped my hands in both of hers. “A very happy Christmas.”

“Jane,” she murmured. “Do not affect formality with me, I beg, tho’ it has been an age since we met! Caroline, my dear, is that beautiful creature your very own? She is so cunningly turned out, I declare she shall throw all the other ladies into the shade! And now let us repair to a better fire—for the chill in this hall is impossible to dispel!”

We gave up our wraps to the footmen and followed our hostess down a panelled passage. The Vyne’s remarkable reception rooms are very little altered from Tudor times, however much the Strawberry Hill Set might have wished otherwise. As I made my way through the large drawing-room, however, I saw it was filled with a colourful array of strangers—something our Steventon family could not have anticipated from Eliza’s missive. But there could be no turning back now; I must endure the gauntlet of critical eyes, with chin raised high.

My brother James, who led our parade, halted before William Chute, Eliza’s husband, and bowed; the two are old cronies these many years, their friendship having to do entirely with dogs, horses, and guns. Mr. Chute married his Eliza when she was three-and-twenty, a lady reared in comfortable circumstances and considerable elegance; he was four-and thirty, a trifling disparity at the time, and only lately come into his inheritance. Twenty years on, Elizabeth still appears to considerable advantage, enjoying all the blessings of health, prosperity, and high spirits—while William looks the full weight of his years, being much weathered from his persistent exposure to the out-of-doors. Tho’ he has spent the better part of the past two decades in Parliament, his acquaintance with London has given him no town bronze; he remains the affable and unaffected country gentleman he ever was.

The Chutes make an enviable picture: the lady so charming and gay, the master so mild and easy; it is a pity that they have no houseful of children to support them. But for all their good fortune, they were denied this single material blessing, and chose instead to adopt a distant relation—much as my own brother Edward was adopted by Sir Thomas Knight and his lady.
²
In the Chutes’ case, however, the choice fell upon a girl—one Caroline Wiggett, who came to The Vyne at the age of four. She is now a shy, blushing miss of fifteen, who retires with relief from her elders to the schoolroom whenever possible. She stepped forward on this occasion, however, and bobbed a curtsey to our Caroline in welcome. James-Edward hovered near the two, uncertain whether to treat Miss Wiggett as child or young lady.

“Let me make you known to each other,” Eliza declared in a ringing tone. “How ever am I to accomplish such a task, Mr. Chute, when we are so bewildered by numbers?”

“Leave ’em to present themselves,” he suggested.

She scowled at him in mock annoyance. “That should never do. Pray attend, dear friends! You have before you Mr. James Austen, rector of Steventon and vicar, I might add, of our own Sherborne St. John—we hope very much, Mr. Austen, that you will favour us with a short service of Evensong tonight, in the Chapel, in respect of the season.”

“I should be delighted, ma’am,” James said.

“Next to him is his excellent wife, Mrs. James Austen; his mother, Mrs. George Austen; and his sisters, Miss Austen and Miss Jane
Austen. The young people are Master James-Edward and Miss Caroline Austen.” Eliza drew breath. “I am afraid, Caroline, that I cannot present your doll.”

“Jemima,” she piped, and held up her treasure.

“Jemima,” Eliza repeated. “Allow me to make Lady Gambier known to your acquaintance—”

An aging woman, of considerable magnificence in dress, who inclined her head coldly at little Caroline.

“Her niece, Miss Gambier—”

A Fashionable miss in her late twenties, I should judge, and approaching the years of Danger. Tho’ fair-haired and blue-eyed, she was possessed of a something forbidding in her countenance.

“—and her nephew, Mr. Edward Gambier.”

The gentleman was just enough James-Edward’s senior, to figure as a possible hero: his curling locks guinea-gold, and his address assured.

“Gambier!” my mother cried. “But surely you must be connexions of our dear Admiral?”

“I am his wife,” Lady Gambier replied.

Admiral Gambier is known far beyond the Service, for he is called upon, from time to time, to intercede on such delicate matters as the Government has in train. Even now he is absent from England about the business of the American War—in parley at Ghent over the cessation of hostilities between the Crown and that upstart nation. But we have nearer reasons to regard him: my brother Frank has twice served under the Admiral’s flag, and Gambier’s favour has advanced Frank’s career. Indeed, all the Gambiers must be of consuming interest to our party, for Lady Gambier was born a Mathew—first cousin to poor Anne, James’s late lamented wife.

Beside me, James’s second wife was all alertness, quivering like a tightly-strung bow.

“I have two sons, both Post Captains, in the Royal Navy,” my mother said warmly, “and the elder has excellent cause to be grateful to the Admiral.”

“So kind,” Lady Gambier murmured indifferently.

Mrs. Chute had turned already to a handsome gentleman of perhaps thirty, whose dress and looks proclaimed him a prosperous man of Town. A gentleman of independent fortune—perhaps a political crony of William Chute’s, I thought; and was thus surprized to learn that “Mr. L’Anglois is my husband’s confidential secretary.”

Eliza pronounced the name
Langles
, but I guessed it was properly
Langwah
, in the French stile—which explained the man’s air of elegance. The French carry refinement in their veins.

“Mr. Raphael West,” Eliza said, “I know you have already met.”

Raphael West? I performed my curtsey to the gentleman, who had hung back throughout the introductions. His right hand clasped a book, its place marked with one finger; his expression was all wearied tolerance. I noticed that he was dressed in deepest mourning. A near loss, then, and a recent one.

“We are entirely indebted to Mr. West, indeed,” my mother said. “You will know, Lady Gambier, that we suffered an accident in our equipage yesterday—and Mr. West sacrificed his own comfort, that we might be conveyed safely to the parsonage.”

“I beg your pardon, Mamma,” I broke in. “Mr. West we may have encountered—but to meet Mr. Raphael West is something else entirely! Am I correct, sir, that you an artist—and the son of Mr. Benjamin West?”

“You have found me out, Miss Austen,” he replied with a bow.

“I was privileged to see your father’s
Christ Rejected
by the Elders while in Town this past September. It is the only representation of our Saviour that has ever contented me.”

“My father shall be honoured to hear it.” Again I was conscious of that too-close scrutiny from Mr. West’s eyes; I understood, now, the discipline that authorised it. He was trained to look past one’s countenance, and take the measure of muscle and bone.

“Raphael West?” Mary edged forward, her right hand dramatically at her throat. She slipped her left arm around young Caroline’s shoulders, a tender gesture I had never witnessed before, and pulled the child close in a melting maternal pose. “It is an honour to meet you, sir. I have long admired your father’s portrait of you as an infant—held in the arms of your mother! Can there be anything more eternal than the bond between a woman and her child?”

“If so, ma’am, I have yet to encounter it,” he said; but I detected a satiric glint in his eye. Who knew, indeed, the nature of his relations with his parents? The assumptions of the world are rife with hypocrisy.

“Pish!” The voice was high-pitched and verging on the hysteric; the comment was accompanied by a snapping of the fingers. “If we are to talk of fame, West, we have to look no further than Miss Austen herself! Dear Lady, where have you been hiding yourself this age? In a garret, the better to scribble your outrageous nonsense?”

It must, it could only be, Mr. Thomas-Vere Chute, William’s brother. I had but to revolve the thought, and the creature was upon me. He availed himself of my hand and bent low, his lips almost grazing my skin.

A vanished age might have called Thomas-Vere a Macaroni. Ours contents itself with the term
dandy
. Tho’ a recipient of Holy Orders and ostensibly dedicated to the Church, Thomas-Vere is more properly known as an Aesthete. He is an enthusiast of opera, an ardent follower of Kean and Siddons, and a devotée of Dress in all its extremes of Fashion. When he bows, a quantity of fobs and
seals jingle at his waistcoat; the shoulders of his jacket are padded with buckram; and it is whispered that he even pads his hose—the better to fill out his spindly shanks. The most severe of his afflictions is a quizzing-glass, which he thinks to employ to devastating effect, putting all his acquaintance out of countenance. Add to this a penchant for wigs, and a valet who delights in arranging them, and you have a picture of the man.

As he murmured over my hand, I observed Cassandra to roll her eyes; Mr. West’s lips quirked ironically.

“Look to your secrets, West,” Thomas-Vere declared in an exaggerated whisper as he straightened from his caresses. “We have admitted a Celebrated Authoress into our midst, and before her penetrating eye all is revealed. We owe the very novel you hold to Miss Austen’s pen. Set it down immediately, I beg! The lady’s wit is more dangerous than a basketful of adders!”

My eyes strayed to the book in Mr. West’s hand and the gold lettering on its spine. It was the second volume of
Mansfield Park
—and he had read fully half of it. I flushed. If the Chutes’ guests were formerly ignorant of my secret, they were now all alive to its possibilities. A novelist, scrutinising their every word and gesture, in order to ape them! It was not to be borne. No one should dare to come near me for the remainder of the holiday.