And we shall both return to England invincible.

 Chapter 8

The Man Who Drank Deep

5 July 1809, cont.

The George Inn sits in the very midst of Alton’s High Street, not far from its rival, The Swan, where Mr. Chizzlewit had undertaken to lodge. I had quitted Mr. Barlow’s house only yesterday morning in Joseph’s pony trap; but a revolution of thought and feeling had occurred in the interval that far outstripped a single turn of the globe. I left the George an impoverished and dependant relation; I returned but four-and-twenty hours later an Heiress who had excited the Notice of the Great. Moreover, I had discovered a body — one mysteriously dead; and this must always lend a lady distinction. Mr. Barlow himself handed me down from Mr. Prowting’s gig, and bowed over my hand to the admiration of a group of tradesmen gathered especially for the coroner’s panel. The escort of a local magistrate could only add to my consequence.

“I’ve put the crowner in the back parlour as Mr. Austen always uses come Quarter Day,” Mr. Barlow confided to me in an undertone. “I hope as it will suit. I do not know what Mr. Munro may be accustomed to, in Basingstoke.”

This being a market town where any number of London parties were used to change their post horses, at a quantity of inns bearing the names of Wheatsheaf, Angel, Maidenhead, and Crown, I did not wonder at Mr. Barlow’s quailing before so awful a figure as a Basingstoke man; but I bestowed upon the publican a smile and said, “Any room my brother elects as adequate for his business cannot possibly disappoint.”

We were ushered within, and conducted through the public room to a chamber at the rear of the building, where Mr. Barlow had set a scrubbed oak table and an arrangement of chairs. Always a hospitable man, he had placed a jug of ale on a serving tray and provided a baker’s dozen of glasses for Mr. Munro’s Chosen. These individuals were standing about uneasily near the plank table, waiting for the coroner to appear — and uncertain whether it was permissible to drink the ale until he did. Half the chairs provided for those of us who came to gawk were already filled with people of the town. There was a little bustle of expectation when we entered the room — a glancing at Mr. Prowting and myself, and a muttered communication behind gloved hands — and then the noise died away, and I was conveyed to a seat conveniently near what I judged to be Munro’s chair.

Only one other woman was present in the room: perhaps four-and-twenty years of age, with reddish-blond hair tied in a knot on her head, a worn gown that might once have been red, and a black shawl about her shoulders. From the look of her face, she had been weeping; some relative of the dead man’s, then — his widow perhaps. She was quite alone, and the townsfolk preserved a cordon of distance around her, tho’ seating was scarce.

In the opposite row, not five feet from where I was placed, sat Mr. Middleton and his young friend Julian Thrace. Both rose at my appearance and bowed politely. A third gentleman, unknown to me, made another of their party. A slight figure of unremarkable aspect, he was the sort of man who should rarely excite a lady’s interest; and yet a slow flush suffused his countenance as he met my gaze. A poet, perhaps, ill-suited to the public eye — but my study of the gentleman was curtailed by the approach of Mr. Middleton.

“I am surprised but gratified to find you here, Miss Austen,”

he said heartily. “You are come as your brother’s proxy, no doubt. Such attention does you credit; we must hope the exertion is not overpowering.”

“I attempted to dissuade the lady,” Mr. Prowting assured him, “but Miss Austen is firm where she sees her duty.”

“And why not? It is her home that has been violated, after all.”

“Indeed, sir — I believe it is poor Shafto French we must regard as the injured party.” I offered Middleton my hand, and he bent over it with swift gallantry. As when I had first encountered him on horseback a few hours before, I was struck by his vigour — remarkable in a gentleman of advancing years. He must be of an age with the magistrate, but from his general air of health, might have been Mr. Prowting’s son.

“You will observe Jack Hinton behind me,” Middleton confided. “Thrace and I fell in with him here in town, and carried him along from a scandalous desire for gossip. I shall make him acquainted with Miss Austen, eh? We shall all meet tomorrow evening in any case, at the Great House. I have asked Hinton and his sister to dine.”

Mr. Prowting glanced at me doubtfully.

“I should like to meet. a man of whom I have heard so much,” I said evenly.

But Mr. Hinton was studiously engrossed in conversation with Julian Thrace, and avoiding all our gaze. His intent was to offer the cut indirect — a glancing insult, and one that might be ascribed simply to diffidence or poor manners. I, however, saw a purpose in his actions: Hinton meant to publish his petty wars against the Austens before all of Alton.

Mr. Middleton frowned and looked perplexed.

“There will be time enough tomorrow for introductions,” I suggested. “The coroner’s panel looks to be upon the point of convention.”

It had been impossible for the proceedings to begin without Mr. Prowting’s presence, but the coroner had awaited only the magistrate’s arrival to make his entrance. A door in the far wall, communicating to a lesser room beyond our own, was opened discreetly and quietly and the man himself strode towards the chair. I liked his looks immediately: he was neatly and elegantly dressed in black superfine and pantaloons; his face was clean-shaven; his gaze direct and uncritical as it roamed the room. I detected intelligence in his wide brow, and an eloquence in the fingers that bespoke the natural philosopher. I was pleasantly surprised. Mr. Munro was something above my usual experience of coroners.

He inclined his head to the assembly, glanced towards the men lounging about the perimeter of the room, and said without preamble: “Have you a foreman?”

“Ellis Watson, sir,” returned a grey-haired fellow as he stepped forward, cap in hand.

“Very well, Mr. Watson, you may urge your panel to take their places. As coroner for Basingstoke, Steventon, and Alton, I call this inquest to order. We are convened to discover the manner of death of one Shafto French, labourer and free man of Alton, and you are each of you charged with the most solemn duty of judging whether Deceased met his end by misadventure, malice aforethought, or his own hand. Mr. Watson, will you come and be sworn?”

Beside me Mr. Prowting sighed heavily, but not with boredom; rather, it was a settling into the familiar and the comforting, a small animal noise akin to a horse in its stable. The magistrate’s gaze was fixed on his colleague, but no hint of his thoughts could be read on his visage. I wondered, fleetingly, if I had taken the full measure of Mr. Prowting. It was possible a brain of some subtlety worked behind his country façade. The members of the panel, having placed their hands on Mr. Munro’s Bible, were led in single file to the adjacent room from which the coroner had entered. Here, no doubt, the mortal remains of Shafto French reposed, and must be viewed by those charged with determining how the poor man had died. I should have liked to ask Mr. Prowting whether the physician had troubled to anatomise the body, or whether consideration for the feelings of the man’s wife had prevented this excursion into Science — but I was confident the magistrate would regard such a question as grossly unsuited to the experience and sensibility of a lady.[9] I must trust to the proceedings to unfold what intelligence they would.