The Skull and the Nightingale
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At length we were motioned to a halt. The moon, emerging from a cloud, showed us to be standing beside a long wall. It seemed an unpromising destination. I was aware of Crocker alighting from his chariot and, through the agency of Pike, getting us, his foot soldiers, positioned at short intervals along the wall. He himself took a central place. His stentorian command, ringing through the night air, enjoined us to set our shoulders to the brickwork and then push rhythmically against it in response to his further shouts, as though trying to budge a great wagon. All concerned fell uncomplainingly to this apparently futile task. We strained in unison, strained repeatedly – and strained to no effect. But after a number of such lunges there seemed, to my surprise, to be some slight sense of motion in the brickwork. We maintained our efforts till a distinct swaying ensued and eventually, to the accompaniment of a ragged cheer, an indeterminate length of the wall gave way completely, collapsing inwards with a rumbling crash.
Like many others, I went down with the wall, and had to stumble to my feet among broken bricks. There was a confusion of curses and a loud barking of dogs. The moon was now hidden by a cloud of dust. All present hastily dispersed as best they could, given the darkness, their drunken state and the shock of the fall. I found my way to Cathcart Street I know not how, my clothes filthy, my wig full of dirt, and one stocking soaked with blood.
Next morning I wondered at the course the evening had taken, and asked myself whose wall we had destroyed, and why. I also felt some astonishment that the wall had indeed collapsed. My uncertain conclusion was that the cause had to do with vibration, the faint movement communicated to the brickwork engendering a counter-movement.
Why Crocker should have organized this assault I cannot imagine. He appeared to be fairly sober throughout the evening, his freakish size perhaps rendering him resistant to the inebriating power of punch. Nor would I take him to be a belligerent man. I look forward to finding out more about him, and about the strange doings of the past night.
Yours, &c.
This escapade had left me rather the worse for wear. Not until the afternoon was I washed, dressed and restored to rights. A feeble explanation to Mrs Deacon concerning the state of my laundry – I had suffered an ‘unfortunate mishap’ – was received civilly, but with the hint of amusement that it deserved. It would not do for me to appear ridiculous again. I wished my landlady to think me a spirited gentleman of fashion, not a lout.
After taking a dish of tea I felt a little better. It seemed to me that the doings of the previous night, discreetly edited, might entertain my godfather. Lacking the energy to go out of doors, I settled down to compose what eventually became the letter here transcribed.
While doing so I conceived the idea of keeping a record of my entire correspondence with Mr Gilbert. My recollections being already somewhat misty, it seemed important that I should at least be clear as to what I had reported. I could not risk falling into self-contradiction. Fortunately I had preserved fragmentary drafts of my earlier epistles; now I pieced them together and re-wrote them as fair copies. Henceforward I would keep this archive up to date, as constituting my official memory.
Latimer and I had tacitly chosen to consider our pursuit of Kitty Brindley and Jane Page a joint enterprise. We returned to the theatre to see again the interlude that had pleased us and afterwards to dine once more with the principal performers. I enjoyed the little pastoral as much as before – in fact more, given my interest in the young shepherdess. There ensued, however, a distraction that I could not have foreseen.
We stayed to see the comedy that followed the interlude. In the course of it I happened to look from our box above the stage towards the audience at large, and noticed, in the second row, Sarah Ogden, sitting beside a man I could only assume to be her husband. I leaned back, out of their line of vision, but could not resist further glances in their direction. The top quarter of Ogden – all that was visible – suggested a thick-set, impassive man. Sarah was more responsive to the performance, but to me there seemed some constraint in her manner. I wondered if she had seen me and was discomfited by my proximity.
Our engagement after the performance – at which, as it seemed to me, Kitty was once more encouraging and Jane Page once more elusive – pushed this episode to the back of my mind. The following morning, however, it returned with vexing vividness. I found myself recalling my warmest interlude with Sarah, nearly three years previously, when she had been visibly stirred, perhaps even drawn a few steps along the path toward capitulation. Could the dull Ogden elicit such responses? I resolved that at some future time I would indeed resume my pursuit of her. The affair with Kitty Brindley I was willing to expose to my godfather’s curiosity. Here was a second narrative, a private one, of which I would tell him nothing.
My dear Godfather,
I continue pertinacious in the pursuit of pleasure. This afternoon I took tea with Miss Brindley, tête-à-tête, at her lodgings in Rose Street.
It seems to me that in the negotiation that ensued we were both to be commended for the art with which we translated into euphemism what we knew to be a business transaction. I represented myself as a young fellow still making my way in the world, well provided for but (alas!) in no position to commit myself to a settled way of life. Miss Kitty’s sketch of her past was the stuff of a country ballad. She had left her native village for love of a soldier who had promised marriage but then deserted her. It would have gone hard for her had she not fallen in with Jane Page, who had secured her some trifling employment in the theatre. Since then she had advanced in her profession, and had hopes of rising further.
You may wish to know something of her appearance. In person she inclines to be slightly plump, but in that pleasing way that seems to be the effect of youthfulness only. She has large blue eyes, a clear complexion and a ready smile often followed, however, by a lowering of her eyes, as though she is in doubt that she may have been too forward. In manner she is open and candid, a quality in the fair sex that has always attracted me.
When considering her career in London she was thankful, she said, for her good fortune, because she could have fared far worse. On the other hand she had broken all ties with her parents, her prospects in the theatre were uncertain, and she could not but feel anxiety concerning her future. (When I referred, in studiously general terms, to the most notorious perils of her profession, she replied ‘What would I know of those, sir?’)
It was perhaps droll that we each affected simplicity while signalling to one another as directly as circling animals. Our attempted deceptions (and self-deceptions) were mutually apprehended and tolerated. The common ground to which we tiptoed our way was the fiction that we were like-minded innocents from the country, ill at ease in this unfeeling town. What Miss Brindley wants, of course, though she cannot say as much, is a wealthy husband, or failing that, as will most probably be the eventual case, a sufficiently wealthy protector. There are members of her profession who have achieved as much. My hope, and in effect my offer, was that at this early point in her career I could offer her a companionable and moderately remunerative apprenticeship for the future to which she aspires.
I have written more glibly than I feel, representing Miss Brindley, her charms and little stratagems, as also my own pursuit of her, with irony and a hint of derision. However, I have another perception of a warmer and more generous kind. After all there is a natural charm and even innocence in her disposition. I am surely not the first man to have had a conversation of this kind with her but, equally surely, I am by no means the twenty-first.
By the time we parted we had reached, as it seemed to me, an understanding as to the immediate future course of our relationship, and this with no hint of a leer, a smirk or a double entendre. The young lady will surely have observed that I was powerfully aroused by her; yet on quitting her apartment I ventured only to kiss her small hand.
When I come to do more you will hear further from
Yours, &c.
Mr Gilbert’s reply must have been written very soon after he had received my letter:
My dear Richard,
It would appear that you have been living a full and varied life in London, very much along the lines I would have hoped.
However I now feel the need to discuss with you directly certain issues arising from our project. I would be obliged, therefore, if at your earliest convenience you could arrange to pass a few days here at Fork Hill.
I remain, &c.
I took the coach the following morning.
6
So it was that I returned to Fork Hill House some six weeks after my previous visit. When I had shaken off the stupefaction of the journey, and washed the odours of it from my person, I felt flushed with vigour and ready to face any challenge that might lie in store. I was no mere supplicant, but a young man of some little consequence, Mr Gilbert’s personal emissary from the capital. The bedroom I had occupied in March had been prepared exactly as before, as though it were now reserved for my exclusive use. The servants greeted me with smiles of recognition, pleased that I remembered their names. Even the great dogs licked my hand and waved their tails in welcome. I was encouraged to have become, to this small extent, an accepted member of the household.
Mr Gilbert was, as ever, politely formal, but I sensed a suppressed excitement underlying the courtesies. His glance was more restless, his words came more quickly.
‘We must talk,’ he said, ‘and at some little length – but not for a day or two.’
The change I felt in myself was mirrored in my godfather’s estate. The garden in front of the house was a blaze of spring flowers, golden and red. At the rear the expanse of his land was no longer held at bay by a palisade of black branches but merged into a surrounding sea of green leaves. I wandered out, as before, towards those woods, exulting in the clean air and warm sunshine. In the fields there were scores of white lambs, cropping the grass alongside their dams. Here was a true pastoral scene, where my Kitty would have been at home as shepherdess. Bird songs trilled around and above me, a sound I had scarcely heard in London, and I was inhaling the sweet scents of growth rather than the stench of refuse. If this was the healthy life, as I felt it to be, then surely London, with its din and stink, might threaten illness, mental if not physical. My mind seemed clearer here.
Borrowing a horse from my godfather’s stable I rode out to explore the surrounding countryside, something I had never attempted before. It was a fertile, secluded region, the nearest town being five miles away. To ride again was a release – how much more pleasing to be in partnership with a horse than to have it haul your carriage like a slave.
I was happy to amble at random, thinking about the days ahead. What conversational manner should I adopt when talking to my godfather? My former style – deference with an occasional glint of spirit – seemed inadequate to the changed situation. Too much in that vein and he might conclude that I lacked the mischief to be a bold participant in London life. Should I speak more freely, even suggestively? I would need to stay alert and be guided by Mr Gilbert’s response.
I rode through Fork Hill itself, a straggling hamlet a mile from my godfather’s house. Passing the churchyard I heard my name called, and looked around to see Mr Thorpe, the clergyman I had met on my previous visit. I dismounted to shake his hand, and we stood conversing in the shade of a huge oak tree, while my horse grazed the verge.
In the open air, fresh from hauling a fallen gravestone upright – his task when he had seen me – he looked younger and more vigorous than I had previously taken him to be. And so I told him, emboldened by the fact that he seemed a friendly fellow, pleased to enjoy the distraction of a chat. When I asked him whether he did not find life in a secluded parsonage a little dull, he gave the question thought.
‘I would once have done so. At Oxford I was considered a lively spark. But since coming here I have been at pains to accept my destined place.’
I pursued the point, perhaps in tactless terms: ‘Is that not rather as though a butterfly should become a caterpillar?’
Thorpe did not take offence: ‘Better a healthy caterpillar than a bedraggled butterfly. I hope to marry one day. My wife will be a parson’s wife, and my children will be a parson’s children. Then the transformation will be complete.’
When he hinted a question concerning my own prospects I said something to the effect that these were at the mercy of my godfather.
Thorpe nodded. ‘I understand you. In these parts we are all beholden to Mr Gilbert, and must study to deserve his good opinion.’
We smiled, in mutual understanding, and I parted from him cordially, pleased to have found a possible ally in this unknown territory.
Within three days of my arrival my godfather again hosted a dinner. To my surprise the guests were as before, save only that Thorpe was absent. Although bored by the prospect of the evening ahead I was on balance not displeased: if I came to be seen by Mr Gilbert’s neighbours as a familiar member of the household he could not easily cast me aside.
I had hoped to play the courteous listener, but found myself more than once thrust into prominence. Mr Hurlock, as witlessly noisy as before, assailed me with his raillery. He questioned me about the pleasures of London life, brushing aside my demurrals.
‘Don’t believe the boy!’ he cried out. ‘I say don’t believe him! Does he look like a monk? He does not! There he sits, a handsome enough piece of young flesh. Never tell me there haven’t been women in the case. The town teems with ’em. Covent Garden, Drury Lane: there the ladies gather, and there the young men swarm about ’em like lice in a wig. Don’t tell us you haven’t been there, young man!’
My godfather made an ill-judged attempt to turn the current of the rant: ‘I believe you may have visited such places yourself, in your time.’
Spluttering wine, Hurlock exploded into a laugh.
‘You may believe it, Mr Gilbert. You may well believe it, sir! I’ve gone belly to belly in many a London garret.’
By now the embarrassment around the table, particularly in the countenance of his wife, was such as to be perceived even by Hurlock. He extricated himself as best he could: ‘That was in my plundering days, before I was married. Long before I was married!’
He let out his bark of laughter, but laughed alone. My godfather changed the topic.
‘Mr Quentin, I hear that you may be contemplating a visit to London?’
There was a silence, and I saw that Mrs Quentin, who was sitting opposite me, had flushed. With an effort, her husband spoke out: ‘I have been obliged to plan such a visit. It is not what I want or can afford, but it must be undertaken. My wife requires the services of a skilful dentist, such as cannot be found in these parts. We must seek help in London.’
There were murmurs of sympathy, but I could see that the unfortunate Mrs Quentin was on the verge of tears, whether at the prospect of the dental ordeal or from the mortification of hearing her plight publicly discussed. To ease the situation I launched into a lively monologue about recent advances in dental knowledge, and new devices that had become available. I spoke with knowledge, because the previous month Latimer’s uncle had had the last of his teeth extracted and a set of false ones installed. I did not, of course, allude to the discomfort he had suffered, nor to the resulting unnaturalness of his facial expression. Mr Quentin seemed interested in what I had said, asking a number of questions, and his wife recovered her composure.
As the talk became general I hoped to subside into the background, but was again thwarted. Mr Gilbert asked me to repeat, for Mr Yardley’s benefit, my account of the London frog-swallower. I obliged the company as best I could. The ladies grimaced but Yardley nodded and clicked his tongue. He gave it as his opinion that a bellyful of water would be no very forbidding environment for a frog, save only in respect of its warmth, uncomfortable for a cold-blooded amphibian.
Towards the end of the meal my godfather engaged with Mrs Hurlock on the subject of music, reminding her that in years gone by he had sometimes heard her sing. To my surprise the buxom lady became positively animated on this theme, recalling the names of several of her favourite pieces. When, in a polite show of interest, I seconded her admiration for Handel’s ‘Say not to me I am unkind’, Mr Gilbert promptly proposed that she and I should sing it together. Having no desire to perform in this company, and little confidence in the abilities of Mrs Hurlock, I would gladly have refused, but she responded eagerly, and the Quentins politely supported the proposal. It would have seemed churlish in me not to oblige. I was influenced also by the reaction of Mr Hurlock, whose over-fed face expressed blank disgust. It would be a pleasure to irritate him further.
To my surprise our impromptu duet proved creditable. Mrs Hurlock’s voice, although not strong, was sweet and true, and I was able to adapt my own performance to it. We were warmly applauded, particularly by my godfather. Mrs Hurlock, redeemed from anonymity, quite blushed with pleasure, in what must once have been her girlish manner. Her husband was the one person present who listened with hostility and clapped perfunctorily. Plainly he would have been happier at a cock-fight. When the ladies had left us he emptied two large bumpers in brisk succession and lapsed into a doze. Quentin remained subdued, but Yardley, prompted by my godfather, talked about the ingenious construction of birds’ nests, claiming that certain instinctive animal capacities might amount to something akin to human thought. He was interrupted by Hurlock, who woke from his sleep crying out at random: ‘Say nothing of Spain! The only enemy we need fear is the Pope of Rome!’
When our party dispersed my godfather and I went out upon the terrace to bid farewell to the guests. Mrs Quentin shyly thanked me for providing her a little reassurance concerning her forthcoming trials. Mrs Hurlock expressed the hope that we might sing together once more on some future occasion. Her husband, half asleep, was muttering and stumbling. A bright moon turned the lawns to silver and gleamed on the roofs of the carriages as they rattled away along the drive. Mr Gilbert and I watched them till they were out of sight and we were alone together on the silent terrace.
‘The night is mild,’ said he. ‘And the time has come for us to talk. I think we might sit out here for a while. Would you be so good as to fetch the port.’
I did so without a word, my heart beating faster. Mr Gilbert and I sat on either side of a small table. He took a sip of port and stared out across the moonlit garden. When he spoke it was with the air of a man embarking on a difficult topic.
‘I should have said either less or more in my letter. I am now resolved to say more.’
I drank a little port myself, to give him space.
He continued, with his eyes still looking into the distance: ‘You have known me only as the person I am at present. I have been several others. Some with a sturdier figure. They are now gone.’
He turned to me, his voice suddenly sharp.
‘You have met my neighbours, and no doubt think them, as I do, a pitiful crew. Mrs Quentin with her rotting teeth; the sottish Hurlock, who has all but lost the power of thought.’
I half-heartedly made to demur, but he over-rode me.
‘Yet such people were the local beauties, the local blades. Mrs Hurlock in particular – Anna Halliday, as she was – attracted much admiration. She is greatly altered. You may not now believe that I admired her myself.’ He smiled thinly. ‘Hurlock was in pursuit of her – Hurlock, the great buck of the county, but a fool. I might easily have won her – she preferred my company. What, you may ask, was the stumbling block?’
I shook my head.
‘Let me tell you. I looked past what she was, and saw what she would be – saw the matron in the maid. It was wisdom of a kind, but of the wrong kind – that of an older man. This was not the only such opportunity that I missed. I was confident that my time would come, but it never did. In terms of marriage, in terms of passion, it never did.’
Unexpectedly Mr Gilbert changed his tone, surprising me with a compliment: ‘You conducted yourself with credit this evening. I observed you closely. You were polite to Hurlock, attentive to Yardley, good-natured in your concern for Mrs Quentin. You sang pleasingly. Yet you were detached. You were forming judgements. The young man I saw was the young man who writes me letters.’
He turned to interrogate me.
‘How would you describe yourself? I see that you are courteous, shrewd, amiable. What other qualities would you claim?’
I knew that my answer should be no less forthright than the question.
‘Let me set aside false modesty. I am physically vigorous. I cannot claim to be a scholar, but I am reflective and read quite widely. I can adapt myself to most kinds of company. I am sensual, probably to a fault. By temperament I am cheerful and amiably disposed, but I can have darker moods – even fits of rage.’
Mr Gilbert nodded, as though I had said nothing to surprise him.
‘You are not afraid to take risks?’
‘No.’
‘You have a relish for unusual situations?’
‘Yes.’
‘Can you be ruthless?’
This question called for a little thought.
‘I believe I can.’
I wondered at these questions. Was I to be asked to stage a robbery, or an assassination? But Mr Gilbert let the matter drop as suddenly as he had broached it, and poured more port. One of his great black dogs padded silently from the house and laid his head on my godfather’s knee. I felt at ease – even exhilarated. What a singular exchange this was, under the stars, our words punctuated by stirrings of twigs in the breeze or the occasional scuttling of a rabbit. Where would it take us next? In the moonlight my godfather, with his pale face and small wig, had a ghostly luminosity that seemed to render him more dominant. Fondling the dog’s ears he spoke again, this time ruminatively: ‘I lost another neighbour, Squire Warhurst, last year. By all accounts he died a good death, praying to the last. He was confident of admission to Heaven, and Parson Thorpe endorsed that expectation. His soul may be there as we speak. Yet the man was a bully, a glutton and a hell-bent whoremonger till mending his ways at fifty, following a stroke. If Warhurst has been saved I can feel guardedly optimistic as to my own prospects.’
He broke off: ‘You suspect that I am facetious?’
‘To be candid, sir, I was not sure.’
My godfather smiled faintly. ‘I am not sure myself. But seriously, or half-seriously, I reflect that the years and capacities I have left are insufficient for me to emulate this man’s sinfulness, even if I wished to do so. May I not, then, indulge myself a little? A very little?’