The Scandal of the Season (4 page)

Alexander studied the gentleman's outfit with interest. His boots were highly polished, and cut in a style that he instinctively recognized as belonging to the first fashion: coming halfway up his calves, with a smartly turned down cuff in a fine leather. Alexander guessed that he had just ridden from London. He was too well dressed to have come from the country. The man's surtout was firmly cut to his figure, with a vent for his sword, and long, low pockets that reached nearly to the hem of the garment. He realized with a sinking feeling that his own coats and their pockets were cut in a style that was no longer fashionable.

He observed the gentleman until the pair disappeared from sight, hoping to remember all the details of his attire. The surtout had a collar made from a dense, luxuriant fur, and as Alexander watched, the gentleman removed a glove and raised a hand to smooth the pelt around his neck. It was a controlled gesture, but commanding—as though he were touching the skin of an animal that he wished to restrain. It made Alexander imagine him stroking the sleek neck of his horse, showing that the beast belonged to him, and that he knew how to make it obey.

They drove on. Alexander decided that he had rather liked the way the man had been stroking his collar. He imagined himself, rich and self-assured, doing the same thing in front of Teresa, though she would probably only laugh at him for it.

Caryll interrupted his thoughts. “I think we shall be another hour at the most.”

“Where do you stay, sir?” Alexander asked, rousing himself.

“At my Lord Petre's house on Arlington Street,” came the reply.

Lord Petre, Alexander repeated to himself. Baron Petre of Ingatestone. Heir to one of the greatest Catholic families in England. “I believe that you once were Lord Petre's guardian, sir,” Alexander said.

“Until he came of age two years ago,” Caryll replied.

Alexander had met Lord Petre at John Caryll's house at Ladyholt once, when he could not have been more than eighteen or nineteen. It was not easily forgotten. Petre had been on his way to London, and Alexander remembered him jumping down from his horse, throwing the reins carelessly to a groom, and walking with a long, confident stride to greet Caryll and his wife. He had been very tall. Alexander was standing shyly to one side when at last Petre caught sight of him. How vividly he recalled his expression. He had started with surprise, and stared, and then tried to cover over his discomfort in vigorous talk. Alexander had been trying to stand so that his stooped back could not be seen. But of course it was impossible to hide it. In the country, his figure had become familiar, but in town scenes such as this would begin again. Others would look at him as Petre had once done.

“Is His Lordship presently in town?” Alexander asked.

“He remains in the country for the sport,” Caryll replied.

Alexander was glad that he would not have to meet the baron again. He wondered whether he had married—what a prize he would be considered. He tried to imagine the sort of woman Petre might fall in love with. She would be remarkable indeed.

He was about to ask Caryll whether Lord Petre had a wife, but the carriage gave a violent lurch and dropped onto the London streets. Its axles cracking as though they would break in half, they teetered and tumbled across the cobbles. The streets were filled with hackney carriages being driven in sudden stops and starts, loping from side to side on their loose springs, the passengers inside contorting themselves uncomfortably in an attempt to look dignified. Mud was splayed against the carriage sides and onto the window. Alexander began to feel ill.

It was very kind of John Caryll to imperil his carriage by bringing it into town, but Alexander found himself wishing that he was not always in the debt of one friend or another. He dreaded being the kind of man who needed favors; a person could only get so far by being an object of charity. Too much pity prevented a man from making enemies, and no one had ever become famous without also being pretty thoroughly envied and disliked.

When at last they drew up outside Jervas's town house, Jervas's butler rushed to help Alexander down, and he was pleased at the prospect of the good fire and excellent dinner waiting inside. He suspected indeed that part of his host Charles Jervas's delight in having guests was that it gave him an excuse always to be having another little something to eat and drink.

“Good afternoon, Hill,” Alexander said, putting a piece of silver into the servant's hand as he took his arm. Caryll drove away immediately, and Alexander allowed Hill to help him into the hallway.

“Welcome back to town, sir,” Hill said. “Mighty chilly today.”

What a civilized place Charles Jervas's house was, Alexander thought as he walked inside: elegantly furnished, with a robust masculine taste; excellent paintings in the hall and the reception rooms; a good cook and fine servants; and a light studio at the top of the house where Jervas painted. It was exactly what a gentleman's establishment should be. As Charles walked down the handsome staircase to greet him, Alexander felt a smart of envy. Jervas was wearing a housecoat with velvet slippers and no wig, and he extended his hand to his friend with the kind of easy, unconscious confidence that was born of good breeding and a happy life.

“My dear Pope!” he exclaimed. “How was your journey? I've been marching about the house all morning, warming it until it feels like the Indies, imagining that you would scarcely be alive when you arrived.”

“My health was never better, Jervas,” Alexander replied, untruthfully. He felt that Jervas had a tendency to lay the hostly performance on a bit thick. He and his friends conducted themselves with a seductive charm, which had the simultaneous effect of making their guests understand how very much less charming they were themselves.

“Come, you were a dead man not two weeks ago,” Jervas insisted.

Alexander was about to reply scornfully that Jervas was exaggerating, but he checked himself. His host spoke with such a pleasant manner, and yet with the polish of a person unmistakably from town. It made Alexander determined to prove his own sophistication. “In that case, my dear Jervas, I must be the Messiah,” he said. “For I am perfectly resurrected in body and spirit.”

“I cannot believe you, Pope—but I will indulge you,” Charles conceded at last, with a smile of goodwill toward his friend.

Alexander removed the silk cushion against which Charles had propped him on his little chaise.

“You keep a mighty fire, Jervas,” he said.

“Well, why not?” his friend replied, settling his own cushion more comfortably. “I am not bred for country pleasures. My idea of life is to have as much to do with English men, and as little to do with English weather, as the present age can afford. A fine table, capital wine, first-rate plays, and the best conversation: that is all I have to ask. Rusticity is the worst of affectations. If one can spend the week in silk stockings and dancing shoes, eating asparagus, who would ever wish for the foot of mud and frost that cakes our country in misery—or think of the wretched sods who tramp about in it?”

“Sitting as a guest in your house, Jervas, I should say that you have more sense than any man alive,” Alexander answered.

Jervas noted Alexander's studied manner with a smile, realizing that his young friend must have been told that elegant phrasing was the fashion in London conversation. He decided not to tease Alexander about it, guessing that he would soon learn to modify his speech. “You flatter me, and you know it,” Jervas said instead. “But you must admit, Pope, that modern luxury deserves its good reputation. I have, for example, recently acquired a tap. I now have running water inside the house, guaranteed except in the worst of frosts! What say you to that?”

“I say that your habits of luxury will be checked by the expense of a houseguest who will never leave,” Alexander replied with a smile.

“Come, you must have a glass of my wine,” Jervas was saying. “I had my man bring it up especially for your arrival. Your being here has given me a chance to open it, but I will not drink alone.”

Without waiting for his footman, Jervas picked two glasses up from the sideboard in one hand, and splashed the burgundy into each. The wine folded against the side of the crystal, catching the light from the fire as it was poured. Jervas handed one of the glasses to Alexander, and raised his own.

“To the pleasures of the season,” he said, and they drank together.

Their dinner consisted of a fish, plenty of good beef, and an excellent cheese. Alexander asked Jervas if he would show him his paintings in the studio after they had dined.

The servants were preparing to take away the plates, and Jervas was rising to lead Alexander to the top of the house, when they heard a visitor in the hallway. Jervas rushed forward at the prospect of offering his services as a host once again.

“Douglass!” he called to the handsome gentleman who now entered his dining room. “What are you about? What excuse can you give for arriving too late for dinner and too early for tea?”

“A very simple one, Jervas,” the friend replied. “I dined in Westminster at noon, and I am to take tea in Piccadilly. But I could not pass by your house without visiting.”

Jervas turned toward Alexander, who had also risen from his seat at the table. “Allow me to present my young friend Alexander Pope, just arrived from Binfield,” said Jervas. “Douglass is lately returned from abroad,” he added.

Douglass looked startled at the sight of Alexander, but said quickly, “Binfield! You came by the Windsor road, I imagine.”

Alexander nodded.

“Pope,” Douglass repeated. “A good Romish name, sir.”

Alexander's heart sank at the remark—the very first person he met in London had raised the matter of his religion. And yet something about Douglass's tone of voice made Alexander look at him more closely. Was it possible that this man could have another reason for asking about his name?

As though he sensed Alexander's curiosity, Douglass spoke again. “I come to issue an invitation to Tuesday evening's masquerade at the Spring Garden,” he said with a smile. “I need not tell you, Jervas, what these nights are generally like, and I leave it up to Mr. Pope to envision a gathering at which every man and woman imagines that they are disguised beyond the possibility of recognition.”

Jervas laughed, and said that he was longing to attend.

Alexander murmured that he would do his utmost to construct the spectacle.

“He need hardly imagine it, Douglass, for he is soon to see it for himself,” cried Jervas, covering over Alexander's diffidence. “But come! I am about to show Mr. Pope my new paintings. Will you come upstairs, too?”

Douglass said that he would, and threw his gloves down onto a chair in the hall, where his greatcoat was already lying. As they walked up the stairs, Douglass turned to Alexander. “How did you find the road today?” he asked. “Very wet, I daresay, at this time of year.”

“On the contrary,” said Alexander, looking at him closely again. “It was dry, and not at all crowded. The hard frost has kept the roads in excellent repair, and the sportsmen in the country.”

Jervas interrupted with delight, oblivious of Alexander's wary tone. “Speak not to Douglass of hard frosts and sportsmen!” he said. “I do not believe this man has left town for the country since we were at school. Frosts and thaws are of no account to him, as I do not think he has chased after a deer or shot at a bird in his life.”

“Charles is quite right,” said Douglass, glancing into a room where a large looking glass was hanging just inside the door. Alexander watched as he made an adjustment to his cuffs. Then, as though he could not help a small gesture of arrogance, he lifted a hand to his neck and smoothed his collar. Seeing it, Alexander drew in his breath sharply, and the men's eyes met in the glass of the mirror. At first Douglass's expression was blank, but, as Alexander stared at him, a shadow of comprehension crossed his features. He recovered quickly.

“Nothing would induce me to leave town at this time of year,” Douglass said. “I cannot bear the damp of an English country house. In my mind's eye the road to London is always wet in the winter, and since that is the only eye with which I shall ever see it, wet it remains.”

With this they reached the door of the studio, and the sight of Jervas's pictures distracted Alexander from his fledgling thoughts about Douglass.

The room was just as he had remembered: a delightful miscellany of drawings and pictures brought back from the Continent, half-finished canvases, a pair of busts from Rome, and a figure that he had found in Greece. There was a considerably larger number of paintings by Jervas himself than there had been on his last visit, all of them of grand-looking people whom Alexander took to be Jervas's patrons. His friend must be doing well.

“These are not
likenesses,
Jervas!” Alexander exclaimed. “No woman made of flesh and blood resembles these divine creatures. Your patrons must be paying you very handsomely indeed!”

But Douglass cut in across him. “Here is a picture of my Lord Petre, and very like. Do you know that family much, Jervas?”

Alexander looked at the picture that Douglass had pointed out, and saw that it was indeed the boy who had paid a visit to Caryll several years earlier. But he was now unmistakably a man, with no lingering disparity between the freshness of his face and the commanding court dress that he wore for the portrait. It was a good painting. The expression on Lord Petre's face was what made it memorable, thought Alexander—detached from the setting in which Jervas had placed him—seemingly scornful of the rich brocade fabric that he wore. He looked out from the canvas with an assured, ironic gaze that Alexander couldn't help but admire.