HANNAH Mr Peacock? [BERNARD looks round vaguely then checks over his shoulder for the missing Peacock, then recovers himself and turns on the Nightingale bonhomie.]
BERNARD Oh . . . hello! Hello. Miss Jarvis, of course. Such a pleasure. I was thrown for a moment?the photograph doesn't do you justice. HANNAH Photograph?
[Her shoes have got muddy and she is taking them off.]
BERNARD On the book. I'm sorry to have brought you indoors, but Lady Chloe kindly insisted she?
4. In a position of power. 7. A local newspaper. 'Just William books': series 5. Sussex University at Brighton. of 'schoolboy' novels by the best-selling children's 6. English novelist and short-story writer (1885? author Richmal Crompton (1890-1969). 1930), author of Women in Love (1920).
.
ARCADIA II.5 / 2767
HANNAH No matter?you would have muddied your shoes. BERNARD How thoughtful. And how kind of you to spare me a little of your time.
[He is overdoing it. She shoots him a glance.]
HANNAH Are you a journalist? BERNARD [Shocked.] No! HANNAH [Resuming.] I've been in the ha-ha,8 very squelchy. BERNARD [Unexpectedly.] Ha-hah! HANNAH What? BERNARD A theory of mine. Ha-hah, not ha-ha. If you were strolling down
the garden and all of a sudden the ground gave way at your feet, you're not going to go 'ha-ha', you're going to jump back and go 'ha-hah!', or more probably, 'Bloody 'ell!' . . . though personally I think old Murray was up the pole9 on that one?-in France, you know, 'ha-ha' is used to denote a strikingly ugly woman, a much more likely bet for something that keeps the cows off the lawn.
[This is not going well for BERNARD but he seems blithely unaware. HANNAH stares at him for a moment.]
HANNAH Mr Peacock, what can I do for you? BERNARD Well, to begin with, you can call me Bernard, which is my name. HANNAH Thank you.
[She goes to the garden door to bang her shoes together and scrape off the worst of the mud.]
BERNARD The book!?the book is a revelation! To see Caroline Lamb1 through your eyes is really like seeing her for the first time. I'm ashamed to say I never read her fiction, and how right you are, it's extraordinary stuff? Early Nineteenth is my period as much as anything is.
HANNAH You teach? BERNARD Yes. And write, like you, like we all, though I've never done anything
which has sold like Caro.2 HANNAH I don't teach. BERNARD No. All the more credit to you. To rehabilitate a forgotten writer, I
suppose you could say that's the main reason for an English don.3 HANNAH Not to teach? BERNARD Good God, no, let the brats sort it out for themselves. Anyway,
many congratulations. I expect someone will be bringing out Caroline
Lamb's oeuvre4 now? HANNAH Yes, I expect so. BERNARD How wonderful! Bravo! Simply as a document shedding reflected
light on the character of Lord Byron, it's bound to be? HANNAH Bernard. You did say Bernard, didn't you?
BERNARD I did.
HANNAH I'm putting my shoes on again. BERNARD Oh. You're not going to go out? HANNAH No, I'm going to kick you in the balls.
8. Ditch with a wall on its inner side below ground OED. level, forming a boundary to a lawn without inter-1. Novelist (1785-1828), best-known as the misrupting the view from the house. tress of Lord Byron (1788-1824). 9. James Murray (1837-1915), editor of the orig-2. Title of Hannah's biography. Cf. p. 2754, n. 2. inal Oxford English Dictionary. Bernard thinks him 3. Seep. 2753, n. 3. misguided?'up the [greasy] pole' (slang)?in the 4. A writer's body of work. pronunciation of 'ha-ha' recommended in his
.
276 8 / TOM STOPPARD
BERNARD Right. Point taken. Ezra Chater. HANNAH Ezra Chater. BERNARD Born Twickenham, Middlesex, 1778, author of two verse narra
tives, 'The Maid of Turkey', 1808, and 'The Couch of Eros', 1809. Nothing
known after 1809, disappears from view. HANNAH I see. And? BERNARD [Reaching for his hag.] There is a Sidley Park connection.
[He produces 'The Couch of Eros from the hag. He reads the inscription. ]
'To my friend Septimus Hodge, who stood up and gave his best on behalf of the Author?Ezra Chater, at Sidley Park, Derbyshire, April 10th 1809.'
[He gives her the hook. ]
I am in your hands. HANNAH 'The Couch of Eros'. Is it any good? BERNARD Quite surprising. HANNAH You think there's a book in him? BERNARD No, no?A monograph perhaps for the Journal of English Studies.
There's almost nothing on Chater, not a word in the DNB,5 of course?by
that time he'd been completely forgotten. HANNAH Family? BERNARD Zilch. There's only one other Chater in the British Library
