Page 7 of A Fortune Most Fatal (Miss Austen Investigates #2)
CHAPTER SEVEN
Thursday is another bright, cloudless morning. Jane wears her pelisse, but she is too hot and regretting her choice before she reaches Godmersham Park and finds Mrs. Knight’s coach and six stationed in the gravel drive. Roger conveyed her in the phaeton as Neddy, having an early appointment with Sir William’s game, passed the previous evening at Goodnestone House. The two estates sit at the outer points of a squat triangle with Canterbury at the apex, meaning Jane must skirt the city and return on herself to escort Mrs. Knight there. She remains hopeful the excursion will afford her the opportunity to investigate Eleanor’s story. There must be someone in Canterbury who knows of Captain Fairbairn, and the Wilmots will have had good reason to turn against the girl. If Jane can seek out an introduction to either of these parties, she will be satisfied her visit has not been in vain. As for furthering her own composition, she has not explicitly been invited to read today—or invited at all, for that matter—but she has brought The Sisters in hope of exhibiting her accomplishments on their return. She instructs Roger to leave her writing box with Grace and proceeds towards the house, but Mrs. Knight’s coachman opens the door of his vehicle to reveal his mistress impatiently ensconced alone.
“Make haste, Miss Austen, if you will insist on accompanying me. The morning is already receding, and I have several important deeds to accomplish.”
“Is the Infanta not joining us?” Jane asks, as she clambers into the velvet-lined coach. After she volunteered to assist Mrs. Knight with her errands, Jane wondered if Neddy was right in predicting Eleanor would come too. The resolution that Eleanor should remain secluded from all male company presented itself as a symptom of some wider scheme to isolate Mrs. Knight from her friends. Now Jane is party to what may have prompted Eleanor’s distress, she cannot help considering it a sensitive precaution.
“I’m afraid my house guest is … How did you put it? Indisposed.” Mrs. Knight maintains her position in the centre of the forward-facing seat, forcing Jane to endure the journey backwards and risk carriage-sickness.
“I’m sorry to hear that.” Jane forces down a quip about how Eleanor must find it tiresome to be consumed with royal duties in such fair weather. She can already tell it is going to be a long day, and Mrs. Knight is in no humour for ribbing. Jane will have to employ the utmost discretion if she is to elicit any information from her or her friends. As the coach wobbles into motion, she extracts a tidy square of folded paper from her reticule. Mrs. Knight starts at the sight of it, recalling her reaction to the horrible missive from her mystery correspondent. “It’s a message from Neddy,” Jane reassures her, “detailing the progress, or lack thereof, of repairs to your perimeter wall. I believe he’s having trouble locating a bricklayer. They’ve all been lured away to London. And he gives his sincere apologies for not being able to oblige you today, but he had already pledged himself to Sir William.”
“He does have many demands on his time.” Mrs. Knight slips the letter, unopened, into a pocket and returns her hooded eyes to the expansive facade of her home. In her widow’s weeds, she is no more prepared than Jane for fine weather. Jane fears she will be forced to suffer the entire journey in stifling silence but, once they are out on the open road, Mrs. Knight begins an interrogation of her own. “Why is it you are not married yet, Miss Austen? You are certainly old enough.”
“I … I haven’t met anyone I find amiable enough to marry,” Jane lies, hating the insincerity of her own tongue. She would have liked to marry Tom, dearly. But she would not marry him without his family’s approval and to the detriment of both their futures. They would have grown to resent each other, and the slow heartbreak of seeing him live to regret his choice would have been worse than giving him up altogether. At least, that is what Jane tells herself in her bleakest moments.
Mrs. Knight narrows her eyes, considering Jane from across the carriage. “I had no idea Hampshire was so devoid of eligible gentlemen. It’s the war, I suppose.”
“I expect you’re going to tell me that any gentleman of means will do, and I need not trouble myself with liking him much.” Catherine Knatchbull, as Mrs. Knight was previously known, was the daughter of a humble rector and in her mid-twenties when she became the bride of Thomas Knight II, who himself had long surpassed forty. Despite the disparity in age, it was widely lauded as an excellent match: for she was handsome and, by then, he was rich. What two qualities could form a happier union?
Instead of responding immediately to Jane’s barb, Mrs. Knight turns towards the window. Her eyes mist as they fix on fields of gleaming buttercups speeding by. “Thomas was my saviour. My protector,” she says, after a while, in a low voice. “I thank God for sending him to me, and for every day He saw fit to grant us each other’s company. I was extremely fortunate to be blessed with such a husband. I do not know how I could have endured if I had been forced to accept a lesser man.”
Jane catches her breath, thrown off guard by Mrs. Knight’s declaration. She is certainly a formidable woman, but she is just a woman. And in this moment, with her fingers resting on her mourning brooch and her mind clearly dwelling on her late husband, she is as vulnerable as any other. In the past, Jane had never known her to exhibit anything but the most tremendous kindness towards Neddy. Mr. and Mrs. Austen would not have released their son to the care of a couple who lacked affection, no matter how wealthy they promised to make him. It is most distressing that she should grow cold towards her adoptive son now. The only explanation Jane can fathom for her doing so is that Eleanor is manipulating Mrs. Knight’s grief to her own advantage. She will discover what the girl’s game is, before they are all made losers.
No sooner do they arrive in Canterbury than Jane is assaulted with the hopeless naivety of her plan. The city must be thrice the size of Winchester, with its majestic cathedral, ruined Norman castle, and variety of irregular timber-framed buildings occupying any nook left over by Church or king. As Mr. Blackall warned, the cobbled streets heave with soldiers standing on guard to defend Kent from Bonaparte’s forces. The insignia of more regiments than Jane can count pass in a blur as the carriage makes its way through the confusing jumble of passageways. Even if she could escape Mrs. Knight’s notice, she could hardly go up to an unknown officer and ask if he knows the whereabouts of a “Captain Fairbairn.” She risks making herself look like a jilted country girl, forced to search for her errant lover in desperate need of making him pay for the consequences of their illicit tryst.
Mrs. Knight thumps on the door of the coach, and it draws to a halt as they emerge into a wide thoroughfare. A long crowd of people, from cheerful market girls shucking oysters to ragged pilgrims serene at having reached their holy destination, stretches endlessly in both directions. “I’ll conduct my business here on the high street first,” she says, as Armand hands her down from the carriage. “After that, I have an appointment with my lawyer. It should not take much more than an hour, two at most, leaving us time to call at Briar Farm on our way home.”
Armand nods to the footman sitting on the rumble seat and then, instead of remaining with the vehicle, follows Jane and his mistress into the mixed multitude. His blunderbuss is tucked into his wide leather belt. Jane frets he will blow away his kneecap but Mrs. Knight doesn’t so much as bat an eyelid at the enormous gun reaching halfway down his leg. Instead, the widow warns Jane to remain in close step and beware of pickpockets. Jane’s eyes latch on to the colourful displays in the procession of shops for some landmark to cling to in the eventuality she is lost. Alas, if the milliner sells her coquelicot confection, Jane will never find her way back to the coach. “Are we not to call on your friends the Wilmots?”
“No,” replies Mrs. Knight, without drawing a breath.
“You risk appearing impolite if they discover you have visited Canterbury without paying your respects. Especially as you so rarely come to town.”
“I do not require instruction on my social obligations from you, Miss Austen.”
But Jane is unwilling to abandon her ambition of questioning at least one person of interest while she is in the city. The street is so congested—surely everyone in the locality is employed in walking up and down it. “Then I expect there’s a high probability we’ll meet with either Dr. Wilmot or his wife while we’re about our errands.”
“I sincerely hope not. The last people one wishes to happen across when one is in town are one’s friends.” Mrs. Knight scowls as she leads Jane towards a draper’s shop. Once inside, the widow issues decisive orders on her own account, then sighs impatiently as Jane compares the most inexpensive bolts of muslin and records every detail of her expenditure in her pocketbook.
Jane had hoped, since this was her first independent foray into society, her father might despatch her with a long letter full of tender sentiments and paternal advice covering every practical or moral dilemma she might encounter, as he did for Frank and Charles when they went to sea. Instead, he sat her down and gave her a lesson in bookkeeping. During her time away, Jane must account for every penny incurred on her behalf, from her laundry to her postage, and before she returns, Mr. Austen will send a draft for the exact amount. Should it exceed the five pounds he has awarded her quarterly since she came of age, he will simply subtract the surplus from her next instalment.
As she is tallying up, Jane attempts to calculate the cost of Mrs. Knight’s commissions. While a length of silk long enough to suggest a new pelisse is not enough to obliterate Neddy’s inheritance, even if it is shot through with regal purple, it is evidence of the insidious control Eleanor has over Mrs. Knight. Unfortunately, Jane’s indecision over which of the many Indian cottons might prove of sufficient quality to satisfy her sister-in-law, while remaining cheap enough to appease her father, prevented her from being able to account for the full list of Mrs. Knight’s purchases.
The fear that Eleanor is controlling Mrs. Knight from afar is further heightened when they arrive at a warren-like set of rooms in Burgate, and the widow instructs Jane to wait in the outer lobby while she converses with her lawyer, Mr. Furley, in private. Still hot from their visits to various merchants, and hotter still from the agitation that she is sitting idly by while Mrs. Knight reconsiders the terms of her will, Jane twists and turns in the collapsed seat of a leather armchair. The clerk, a young man of about her age, studiously ignores her in favour of scraping his nib too hard across the page of his ledger. Mrs. Knight’s business must be of a sensitive nature for her to exclude Jane from it so deliberately. She stares at the closed door to Mr. Furley’s office, willing her eyes to absorb what her ears cannot. At last, the violence of the clerk’s inscriptions prove too much for his pen to sustain and, as he steps into an anteroom to retrieve another, Jane resorts to pressing her ear to the keyhole.
“My dear madam, I must protest. You cannot give up so much to enrich another,” says Mr. Furley, causing Jane to lay her palm over her heart. Can Elizabeth’s worst fears be justified? Is Mrs. Knight really planning an act of unbridled generosity towards her beleaguered princess? She curses herself for volunteering to come in Neddy’s stead. If he were here, he would be able to stop this madness.
“On the contrary, I will retain everything necessary for my ease and comfort.”
“But the scheme you propose would greatly reduce your circumstances.”
“I assure you, the circumstances attached to large, landed possessions are entirely lost on me at present.” This is even worse than Jane suspected. Neddy’s mother is not rewriting her will to favour Eleanor, she is planning to surrender her wealth while she lives.
“Then you are certain?”
“I am.”
“And forgive me, ma’am, but no one is placing undue pressure on you to pursue this course of action? By the terms of Mr. Knight’s will—”
“I am familiar with my late husband’s instructions, but this is how I am resolved to act and you cannot deny it is within my power to do so.”
“Even so, I see no reason for such haste. Return to me in a month’s time, and we’ll discuss it further.” Even Mrs. Knight’s lawyer is determined to save her from her imprudence.
“Mr. Furley, if you cannot do as I describe I will take my custom elsewhere.”
“There is nothing I can say to persuade you otherwise?”
“Indeed, it is the fondest wish of my heart.” Jane rears back at Mrs. Knight’s words. What cruel, unnatural mother could cut out her son and embrace a stranger before him? Neddy has spent the last two decades proving himself deserving of the Knights’ affections. Eleanor appeared less than a fortnight ago and shows every symptom of being a manipulative liar. Is this punishment for an imagined slight towards her? Can Mrs. Knight be so angry with Neddy for refusing to escort her to Canterbury when she had the ill-grace to turn him away from Godmersham Park?
“With an estate of such magnitude, it will take some time to execute the transfer …”
“I will give you a month, and no longer.”
Jane springs upright as the door swings open, leaving her face to face with the room’s occupants. The widow’s cheeks suffuse with colour. “Were you spying on me?”
“I … I dropped a pin,” Jane stutters, still trying to slow her racing heart. She must have misheard, yet it was perfectly clear. Mr. Furley is drawing up a contract to transfer Mrs. Knight’s possessions. In a month’s time, the fortune Neddy has been raised to expect as his own will be released to another. The widow is so taken in by Eleanor’s ruse, that she will reduce her own circumstances to elevate her.
“And I suppose it just happened to roll to the foot of the door?” Mrs. Knight does not wait to hear Jane’s answer. Instead, she barges past the returning clerk, jostling a stack of papers out of his hands and sending them fanning out across the floorboards. From within his office, Jane catches the eye of Mr. Furley. His slack features attest that he is as bewildered as she is by Mrs. Knight’s rash determination to impoverish herself and her son.
What delusions can be motivating her to act in a manner so detrimental to herself and her family? How will Jane tell Elizabeth, or Neddy, that his mother is indeed resolved to behave so treacherously towards them? Elizabeth’s health is not strong enough to bear the confirmation of her greatest fears, and Neddy would be heartbroken by Mrs. Knight’s shock betrayal. Will Mr. and Mrs. Austen ever be able to assuage their consciences when they realise they parted with their son for naught? How will Cassandra cope when Jane explains they can no longer rely on their brother and must do whatever is necessary to decrease the burden on their ageing parents? Jane’s only hope is to remain by Mrs. Knight’s side, preventing her from her own folly, until she can unmask Eleanor and break the malevolent hold she wields over the Austens’ benefactress.