“I hope that we shall meet again before you quit these shores,” I told Mr. Ord as I halted before my gate.

He raised his hat and smiled engagingly. “At Mrs. Challoner’s, perhaps.”

Chapter 17

A Coven of Conspirators

31 October 1808, cont.

I had read nearly half of MARMION, and had reached the passage where Constance, the perjured nun — who is travelling in her lover’s train disguised as a page — is betrayed to her convent and walled up alive in penance for her sins. So engrossing was Sir Walter’s tale that I barely discerned Phebe’s voice, announcing Lord Harold Trowbridge. It appeared, from our maidservant’s expression, that she had ceased to find anything very extraordinary in the Rogue’s descent upon Castle Square. As she stood in the doorway, however, she threw me a speaking glance in respect of my crumpled black gown, and the ineffectual arrangement of hair that had sufficed for a morning at home. I thrust Marmion hastily behind a cushion, dabbed at my chignon with vague hands, and rose to greet his lordship.

“Miss Austen — I hope I find you well?”

He bowed, his countenance expressionless, and Phebe hastily closed the parlour door on our tête-à- tête. The news that I was closeted with Lord Harold, I thought despairingly, should be in my mother’s ears within the instant.

“I am quite well. Pray sit down.”

“I cannot stay — I have come only to enquire

whether you know aught of my man Orlando’s movements this morning.”

“Orlando?” I repeated in bewilderment. “I last saw him at the Water Gate Quay yesterday evening. That would have been at — oh, half-past five o’clock.”

“I am aware that he was so good as to convey you and Miss Lloyd from the Abbey to Southampton, following a mishap among the ruins — for Orlando left a note in our rooms at the Dolphin Inn, relating the entire history. Of Orlando himself, however, I have seen nothing since my return from Netley Lodge last night. I dined alone; and when I retired, he still had not appeared. Naturally I grew anxious.”

As Lord Harold usually dined at the fashionable hour of seven o’clock, I understood from this that he had spent a good deal of the day in Mrs. Challoner’s company. Before I could reply, however, the parlour door opened to admit my mother — who came forward with an expression of welcome, her arms outstretched.

“My dear Lord Harold! What a pleasure it always is to find you in Castle Square, to be sure!”

“Mrs. Austen — your humble servant.” He bowed correctly. “I hope I find you well?”

“Very well, indeed! Though it has been more than two years since we have met, I flatter myself that I have not enjoyed more than an hour’s discomfort from ill-health in the interval!”

As the good lady had spent more than half the attested period in her rooms, complaining of a wealth of injuries to body and soul, I found this blithe testament difficult to support; but forbore to argue.

“And how well you are looking, I declare! Always the man of Fashion! Though I observe that you are in mourning like ourselves. My condolences on the passing of your mother.”

“Thank you, ma’am.” Lord Harold’s expression was wooden. That he longed to see my parent returned to her needlework in an adjoining parlour was evident; but propriety insisted otherwise.

“May I offer you a cordial, my lord? A glass of brandy, perhaps?” my mother cried. “I am sure that Jane would benefit from a little ratafia, for she is undoubtedly looking peaked, from the effects of too much excitement and grief — she was quite devoted to our late Mrs. Austen, you know, and is so unselfish in her dedication to those she loves, that I declare she has quite gone into the grave with her! Can you perhaps conspire with me, my lord, to return our dear Jane to the bloom of health? We were so very grateful that you offered her an airing in your chaise — exactly suited to restoring the roses to a girl’s cheeks!”

As I had long since left my girlhood behind, along with the roses to which my mother referred, this last was injurious to my dignity.

“Mamma,” I said with studied patience, “would you be so good as to fetch a glass of brandy for Lord Harold?”

“I should be infinitely obliged,” he concurred.

“Oh — certainly! And perhaps just a spot of ratafia for the ladies—”

She sped from the room, and in her wake I closed the door firmly. Frank, to my certain knowledge, had drained the last of the brandy before his removal to the Isle of Wight; and my mother should be forced to send Phebe to a local tavern in search of another.

“Orlando gave no indication of his direction in the note he left yesterday?” I enquired of Lord Harold.

“Not a word.” He took a restless turn before the fire, his expression troubled. “We had no need of messages, for the progress of our campaign was understood. At my arrival in Southampton last week, I let my man know that I was capable of valeting myself, and that his exertions were better devoted to work of a more subtle nature. Having spent most of Sunday secreted in the subterranean passage, Orlando was to follow Mr. Ord at his departure from Netley Lodge, and observe where the young man went — to whom he spoke — and all that he did in Southampton.”

“Mr. Ord!”

“Yes, Mr. Ord!” his lordship spat contemptuously.

“There can be no one else so well-placed to communicate Mrs. Challoner’s commands to a host of subordinates throughout the South. Ord was in Sophia’s company when I appeared, unwanted and illreceived, at her door — and he remained there until I quitted the Lodge two hours later. I have no notion of when that insufferable puppy was at length torn from his lady’s leading-strings, but I am certain that Orlando will have followed him. And Orlando has vanished.”

“Vanished!”

“Do not make a practice, I beg, of repeating my every word in tones of shock and admiration. There are ladies, to be sure, who regard such a ploy as the highest form of flattery — but you are not one of them.”

“I met Mr. Ord a few hours since, at Hall’s Circulating Library. He was so good as to escort me home.”

“And were his gloves stained with blood?”

“They appeared clean enough. His countenance, I may attest, was devoid of the desperate agitation that should characterise one who has kidnapped a blameless valet. But Mr. Ord is a perplexing fellow—

his appearance is angelic, yet his performance on horseback is suggestive of the very Devil; he looks the gentleman, and yet professes to spring from no higher a station than Able Seaman.”

“I beg your pardon?”

“He claims to be the child of a widowed woman named Ord, long deceased, and to have been supported in infancy by her brother, also named Ord, whose rank in the Royal Navy was confined to Able.”

“I cannot credit such a tale! He looks — and conducts himself — as a man of Fashion!”

“I am perfectly of your opinion, my lord.”

“The presumptious young dog has received an education, Jane! He has done the Grand Tour — which comes at considerable expence, from so remote a locale as Baltimore!”

“Well do I know it. And yet he related this humble history this morning, without the slightest hint of self-consciousness. He was born in Hampshire, and removed first to Spain, and then, at the age of four, to Maryland. His air of gentility we must impute to his mother’s patron, a certain Charles Carroll—”

“—of Carrollton?” Lord Harold interrupted.

“I believe that is what Mr. Ord said.”

“Good God!” the Rogue exclaimed. “Jane! Do you not comprehend what this means?”

“No, my lord. I do not.”

“Charles Carroll was the sole Catholic gentleman of the Colonies among the signers of the Declaration of Independence! Charles Carroll’s uncle was Archbishop John Carroll — a Jesuit, and the first head of the Catholic Church in America. I met the fellow some once or twice while he lurked in England — a great favorite of Mrs. Fitzherbert’s. She regarded him, I believe, in the nature of a confessor, and sought his absolution for her alliance with the Prince.”