The Beau and the Bluestocking: Romantic intrigue in Regency London Read online

  THE BEAU AND THE BLUESTOCKING

  Alice Chetwynd Ley

  Table of Contents

  Chapter I

  Chapter II

  Chapter III

  Chapter IV

  Chapter V

  Chapter VI

  Chapter VII

  Chapter VIII

  Chapter IX

  Chapter X

  Chapter XI

  Chapter XII

  Chapter XIII

  Chapter XIV

  Chapter XV

  Chapter XVI

  Chapter XVII

  Chapter VIII

  Chapter XIX

  Chapter XX

  Chapter XXI

  Chapter XXII

  Chapter XXIII

  A NOTE TO THE READER

  More Books by Alice Chetwynd Ley

  Chapter I

  Almack’s Assembly Rooms in King Street had nothing particularly to recommend them in the way of splendid interior decorations, appointments or hangings. The refreshments served there were, in the words of one disgusted young male visitor to town, positively shabby; small cakes, tea, and nothing more alcoholic than orgeat or lemonade. In spite of this, however, during the London season the Rooms were always filled with the flower of the town’s young ladies and the most eligible of its bachelors. The Marriage Mart, Almack’s was sometimes unkindly named, especially by those who for one reason or another were unable to obtain vouchers. For admission to this unpretentious place of entertainment was one of the most jealously guarded privileges.

  There were those whose welcome was assured and who had been attending the Assemblies for many years. Among these was Mrs Olivia Manbury, wife of Thomas Manbury, M.P., and a well-known fashionable hostess. On a certain evening in spring in the early 1780s, she was sitting in the ballroom with one of her married daughters, Lady Fothergill, closely studying one of the couples who were dancing, a slight frown of disapproval on her brow.

  There could have been nothing in the appearance of the pair to raise censure in the most critical eye. The girl was attractively dressed in a gown of straw-coloured silk embroidered with small pink flowers. She was young and graceful, with a heart-shaped face framed by dark curls, lustrous brown eyes and a dimpling smile which never failed to captivate the gentlemen. Her partner, too, was outstandingly personable and elegant in satin knee breeches and an impeccably cut coat of claret velvet. Yet more than one significant glance was turned in their direction; a fact which, though they gave no sign of it, did not escape the notice of either.

  Caroline Fothergill laughed softly. ‘You look uncommon put out, Mama, considering that Lydia’s partnered by one of the most eligible bachelors in the room.’

  ‘Eligible fiddlesticks! What does that signify when a man’s as accomplished a flirt as Devenish? You know as well as I do that he means nothing by it. Why, I’ve watched him paying attentions to a score of girls over the past few years, and just when everyone thinks he must be serious at last, off he goes to a new flirt! The most determined husband hunters have quite given him up — I heard Lady Guiting say the other day that she doubted if he would ever wed at all, and you know how persistent she can be on behalf of those four daughters of hers. Not unattractive girls, either,’ added Mrs Manbury, determined to be fair. ‘But without dowries, they can scarcely hope — however that is nothing to the purpose. I don’t care to see Lydia wasting her time on Devenish.’

  ‘I wouldn’t have said that she was,’ remarked Caroline, surveying her sister critically. ‘She appears to be enjoying herself — as well she may, because every other female of marriageable age in the room is casting her envious glances.’

  ‘More fools they!’ retorted Mrs Manbury.

  ‘Oh, I don’t know. Beau Devenish may not be the marrying kind, but his attentions are worth cultivating, all the same. He’s one of those rare men who know how to make a woman feel that she’s irresistible. Only see how Lydia sparkles! But you wouldn’t understand of course.’

  ‘You need not suppose, my dear Caroline,’ said Mrs Manbury, bridling a little, ‘that just because I am the mother of three grown girls — well, young women, if you like — I am therefore totally impervious to male charm. I am well aware of the satisfaction your sister must feel in being singled out for the attentions of such a man as Sir James Devenish. But I am afraid for her — afraid that she may make the mistake of taking him seriously, for one thing —’

  ‘What, Lydia lose her heart to him?’ asked Caroline cynically. ‘Mama, you must know her better than that — I doubt very much if she has a heart to lose.’

  ‘Come, come, that’s a hard thing to say of your sister! She’s a sensible girl, I know, and not likely to throw her bonnet over the windmill,’ replied Mrs Manbury, tacitly acknowledging the justice of these sisterly reflections. ‘But there are other evils. While Devenish flirts with her, it holds off more serious suitors — Calver, for instance, and Bedwyn.’

  ‘The Duke of Bedwyn?’ echoed Caroline, incredulously. ‘Mama, you would never promote a match between Lydia and that horrid old man?’

  Mrs Manbury glanced about her apprehensively. ‘Hush! Someone may hear you.’ Then in a lower tone, ‘Certainly I would. Lydia a Duchess, with a vast estate in Lincolnshire, besides two smaller country houses elsewhere, not to speak of the town house! And a fortune to match! I should be sadly lacking in my maternal duty if I didn’t make a push to secure such an establishment for her.’

  ‘Your maternal duty — oh, yes.’ Caroline’s mouth, which in repose tended to have a discontented droop, now twisted scornfully. ‘You mustn’t neglect that, as you exercised it so successfully on my own behalf.’

  Mrs Manbury shot her a suspicious glance. ‘I know you mean to be odiously sarcastic but nevertheless you must own that I chose what seemed best for you at the time. After all, how could we have known that within six years Stapleton would rise from a mere sub-lieutenant to the rank of Rear-Admiral, and moreover, come into a handsome fortune from his grandfather? Such accidents,’ she said, complainingly, ‘quite overthrow one’s most careful calculations. But it’s turned out well enough, Caroline. You are even better off financially than you would have been as Stapleton’s wife, and you have a title into the bargain.’

  ‘Do you ever consider, Mama, what I have lost?’

  Mrs Manbury looked for a moment into her daughter’s eyes, and felt vaguely uneasy at what she saw there.

  ‘Oh, some boy and girl nonsense of course.’ She spoke briskly. ‘But that soon goes, and then one is left with the harsh realities of life — how to keep up a respectable style of living on an insufficient income. Besides Fothergill is a good husband, is he not? He doesn’t womanise or gamble away his fortune —’

  ‘Oh, no. He has no extravagant vices. Our life is a model of domestic bliss. When we are neither entertaining nor being entertained — and fortunately that is seldom — he takes a glass or two of port after dinner, and we sit one each side of the fireplace, I with my needlework or a book, and he snoring fit to raise the rafters.’

  ‘Well so it is with all husbands. What would you have, my dear?’ Caroline shrugged, but made no reply. ‘I fear that in spite of six years of marriage and two children, you’re still a romantic schoolgirl. I only hope Lydia has more sense.’

  ‘Oh, yes, Lydia has sense — if that’s what you call sense, Mama. She’s not in the least romantic. She’s like you. I dare say she’ll be very willing to marry Bedwyn, and realise your fondest hopes. And she’ll have the advantage of never knowing what she’s missed.’

  ‘Really, you’re talk
ing very strangely tonight. I cannot understand you.’ Mrs Manbury glanced at her daughter again. ‘You haven’t been quarrelling with Fothergill, have you?’

  Caroline laughed harshly. ‘There’s not sufficient real feeling in our relationship to spark off a quarrel,’ she said bitterly. ‘But don’t let us speak any more of me and my concerns. Tell me how you go on with my cousin Alethea. Why isn’t she here tonight?’

  ‘She has gone to Montagu House with Miss Hannah More,’ replied Mrs Manbury, in tones of disapproval.

  ‘To see the Queen of the Bluestockings?’ asked Caroline, with a little more animation. ‘But why do you sound so disgruntled about that, Mama? There can be no possible objection to her visiting in such a respectable quarter, and, I may say, under the chaperonage of a lady of such high moral tone!’

  ‘Of course not. But it was not to cultivate Alethea’s bookish tendencies that my sister Newnham sent her to me. Her notion was to give the girl a little town polish and to see if I could put her in the way of making a suitable match. I promised to do what I could, for Cassandra is my only sister, and the girl’s my godchild. No one shall say I am lacking in family feeling. But things have been a little more difficult than I supposed.’

  ‘Oh, indeed. Why?’

  ‘Well, for one thing, Lydia does not take to her cousin. They are very different in temperament, of course — that was only to be expected, with Alethea’s unorthodox upbringing. The only girl among a family of six boys, and educated by her father in exactly the same way as her brothers, from an early age! As you must know, Newnham is a prodigiously scholarly man of unworldly opinions — as I dare say a clergyman ought to be,’ added Mrs Manbury dubiously. ‘Though you would think well-to-do parents such as the Newnhams would make some push to give a girl an elegant education befitting her sex. Of course, she did spend the last few years at a school for girls managed by Miss Hannah More’s sisters at Bristol; but if only Cassandra had applied to me earlier, I would have directed her to Madame Clarke-Wyndham’s Seminary, where you three girls all received such a superior education.’

  ‘Only think what benefits she’s missed,’ commented Caroline wryly. ‘My skill at embroidery is well known, everyone agrees that my dancing is most graceful, and I can enter and dismount from a carriage as elegantly as any female in town!’

  ‘You may mock, but such things are more important to a female than being able to read Latin and Greek, or poring for hours over Shakespeare. Accomplishments of that kind,’ pronounced Mrs Manbury with authority, ‘won’t help any girl to get a husband — far from it, for men do not like females to be bookish. Indeed, if a girl knows where her interest lies, she will always contrive to appear a little more stupid than she actually is — certainly more so than the man she intends to marry.’

  ‘It would be difficult to appear more stupid than George.’

  ‘Upon my word, you are very severe on your husband! I am sure there’s no more amiable creature alive. He always attends to what you say, which is more than your Papa does to me, and at all times tries his best to please you. Really, Caroline, I don’t know what more you want.’

  Caroline stifled a yawn. ‘Perhaps I don’t know myself. But tell me more about my cousin Alethea.’

  ‘There’s little enough to tell, as she’s scarce been with us a se’ennight. She has some odd ways — only imagine, she reads your father’s newspaper, and attempts to talk to him of politics and the like! Even I myself would not venture so far, and it certainly seems odd in a young girl.’

  Caroline smiled, for once not unkindly. ‘And how does Papa take it?’

  ‘Oh, he seems amused. I am relieved to find him so disposed to be indulgent, for at first I feared he might be vexed. She does not scruple to express her opinions, you know, and Papa is not used to being contradicted. Well, what man is, in his own home? But I fancy that matters are vastly different in my sister Newnham’s household. We have rarely paid them visits, but on the few occasions when we’ve stayed at their home in Somerset, I remember being amazed at the freedom allowed in that way to the children. It seemed to me that my brother-in-law positively encouraged them to air their own views on any and every topic.’ Mrs Manbury shook her head decisively. ‘Such an upbringing cannot be other than harmful, in my opinion. Young people need to be given a firm sense of direction, and be taught to respect the views of those who are older and wiser than themselves.’

  ‘Perhaps so,’ replied Caroline, thoughtfully. ‘When you brought Alethea to see me, I must say I was quite taken with her, though. She’s unusually direct for a female, I admit, but she has no trace of arrogance or self-assertiveness. One cannot find any fault with her manners, either. She talked for several minutes to George’s old Aunt Berengaria, whom as a rule everyone ignores because she is such a tedious bore. Aunt B was singing her praises after you’d gone. She thought Alethea a pretty girl, she said, and so considerate to her elders.’

  ‘Pretty? I wouldn’t say so. She is nothing to Lydia, or to what you and Eleanor were at that age. Her figure is not unpleasing, and she has delicate features with a certain sweetness of expression, I grant you. But what man will be likely to send a glance in her direction while Lydia is in the same room? And that is another of the difficulties I am faced with in trying to find the girl a husband.’

  ‘Well, then, Mama, I can see only two alternatives before you. Either Alethea must remain a spinster, or else we must see to it that Lydia becomes engaged at the earliest possible moment.’

  ‘Nothing would please me more than to see your sister betrothed — to someone suitable, of course. But only tell me how it is to be achieved while she persists in permitting Devenish to flirt with her in that outrageous way?’

  Chapter II

  If Almack’s Assembly Rooms could have been described as the hub of fashionable London, Mrs Elizabeth Montagu’s new house in Portman Square was the centre of the literary set. This was no recent event. For more than twenty years the ‘Queen of the Bluestockings’, as she had once been dubbed, had gathered about her in her former house in Hill Street, a coterie of writers, painters and actors which included some of the foremost names of the day. Dr Johnson had come regularly to her soirees until a recent disagreement between them about Lord Lyttleton’s work. Goldsmith, Sheridan and David Garrick had rubbed shoulders there with the brilliant Charles James Fox, Gibbon the historian and Adam Smith the economist; Sir Joshua Reynolds was a frequent visitor, while of late years the talented novelist Miss Fanny Burney and the more sober Hannah More had joined the Bas Bleu circle.

  Informality was the keynote of these gatherings. There was no strict etiquette in dress (hence the blue stockings, which were frequently worn with informal attire), and no elaborate refreshments were served. Coffee, chocolate or tea with simple food were all that was offered. Conversation was the purpose of the meetings, and it was allowed to develop spontaneously with one exception — no one must ever talk politics. Card playing too, was banned; but in such brilliant company, who could wish for cards?

  Certainly not Miss Alethea Newnham, who came a little diffidently to join this brilliant company under the chaperonage of Miss Hannah More. Alethea was nineteen, and it was not so very long since she had been a pupil at the excellent Seminary for young ladies kept by Miss More’s sisters in Bristol.

  Although she looked almost childlike in her white gown with the deep blue sash as she curtseyed shyly to the lady of the house, her intelligent grey eyes took in every detail of the much-talked-of Elizabeth Montagu’s appearance. Mrs Montagu was now turned sixty, but did not look her age. She was tall and slim, with a fine-featured countenance set off by dark brown hair with no traces of grey in it, and Alethea noticed how small and white her hands were, with long tapering fingers. She greeted the young visitor graciously, taking the trouble to introduce her to several of the company who were nearest at hand.

  ‘And Miss Burney,’ said Mrs Montagu, ‘you must certainly meet Miss Burney. Have you read her latest novel?’

  �
�No, ma’am, I fear it hasn’t come in my way as yet,’ admitted Alethea regretfully. ‘But I’ve read Evelina, and I enjoyed it very much.’

  ‘Ah, you must certainly read Cecilia. You may perhaps not have much time for reading novels, when there is so much else to be read. But let me recommend you to take them with you on long coach journeys, to help while away the tedium. I always do so myself.’

  Alethea agreed that this was a very good notion.

  ‘Are you staying with Miss More?’ continued her hostess.

  ‘No, ma’am, with my aunt Mrs Manbury, in Curzon Street.’

  Elizabeth Montagu nodded. ‘Ah, yes, Mrs Manbury. Then you will certainly not lack for entertainment during your stay. She is one of London’s most fashionable hostesses.’

  Alethea smiled. ‘Very true ma’am. I am quite overcome by the number of balls and parties which I’m told we are to attend, more particularly as I’m not very used to such diversions at home in Somerset.’

  ‘But you will enjoy them all, just the same, I’m sure. I know I did so at your age.’

  ‘I mean to enjoy everything,’ replied Alethea, for the first time forgetting her awe of this great lady and allowing her natural manner to show through. ‘One always welcomes experience of the world.’

  ‘Well spoken, my dear. And if you feel that you need a change now and then from the polite chit-chat of such affairs, you must come and join our circle here. Conversation is an art, and therefore not easy to practise while dancing. Well, I must leave you now, but I will bring you to Miss Burney as soon as I can find her in all this press of people.’

  She nodded graciously and passed on, leaving Alethea and Miss More with the group to whom she had introduced them. One of these people, a soberly attired gentleman in his late thirties, turned to address a few polite remarks to Alethea before finding chairs for Miss More and herself. He sat down near to them; and as Miss More soon fell into conversation with a lady on her other side, he continued to talk to Alethea.