Bath Tangle

all her life! Rotherham told me you ought not to live here, and he is quite right.”

“Much he knows!” said Serena scornfully.

“But he does know, Serena. I have seen how much it rubs you, and it’s no wonder! I wish it were possible for us both to go away!”

“But—” Serena stopped suddenly. “Good God, what a pair of goosecaps we are!” she exclaimed. “Why—oh, why the devil don’t we go away? It has been intolerable here ever since Christmas. You have been unwell, I have been cross, and the plain truth is that we are finding life a dead bore. We will go away!”

“But we could not!” gasped Fanny. “Not to London, while we are in mourning! I know Mama would say I ought not!”

“Not to London, no! We could very well go to Bath, however.”

Fanny’s eyes widened. “Bath?”

“Yes! And not even your mama will think it improper, because you will go there on the advice of Dr Cliffe, to drink the waters! We will hire a house for six months or so, and if we cannot go to the Assemblies, at least there will be the libraries, and the Pump Room, and—”

“Serena!” breathed Fanny, awed.

Serena laughed at her. “Well? Shall we do it?”

“Oh, Serena, yes! Milsom Street—the shops—the London coach coming in—the Sydney Gardens—!”

“And some faces other than our own to look at!”

“Yes, indeed! Oh, what a delightful scheme! Now, where,” said Fanny, her woes forgotten, “should you like to hire a house? And how must we set about it?”

6

The removal to Bath having been decided upon, nothing remained but to choose between lodgings there, or a furnished house. Fanny, unaccustomed to arranging such matters, would have wasted weeks in indecision, but it was otherwise with Serena. It was she who entered into all the negotiations, she who knew what would best suit them. Fanny had nothing to do but to agree; and if asked what were her own inclinations she could only say that she would like to do whatever Serena thought most proper. So Serena, remarking that to keep five indoor servants in idleness for several months would be a false economy, discarded all ideas of renting lodgings, and dispatched Lybster to Bath to inspect the various houses recommended by the agent. This resulted in Fanny’s signing a contract to hire, for six months, a house in Laura Place, which Lybster pronounced to be the most eligible of all he had seen. By the middle of March all the furniture at the Dower House was shrouded in holland covers, and Spenborough, who had spared no pains to assist the ladies in all the troublesome details of removal (even lending the late Earl’s enormous and antiquated travelling coach for the transport of servants and baggage), was able to heave a sigh of rather guilty relief.

Since Milverley lay only some twenty-five miles from Bath, the ladies accomplished the journey in the barouche. Fanny, fortified on the road by smelling-salts, declared that she had never made a journey more comfortably, and, instead of retiring instantly to bed to nurse a sick headache, was able, on their arrival in Laura Place, not only to inspect the house, but to change her dress for dinner, and to discuss with Serena the exciting news contained in a letter from Lady Theresa, which was found awaiting her. The Princess Charlotte was engaged to Leopold of Saxe-Coburg!

This was just the kind of news which Fanny enjoyed. Nothing could be more interesting than the approaching nuptials of the heiress presumptive to the throne; and when the heiress had already made a considerable stir by breaking her engagement to the Prince of Orange the new contract could not but provide food for a good deal of speculation. Fanny was not acquainted with the Princess, who had been kept very close; but she had met Prince Leopold during the rather premature Peace Celebrations in 1814: indeed, she was sure he had been present at the great rout-party they had given at Spenborough House for so many of the foreign notables. Did not Serena recall a handsome young man in that alarming Grandduchess’s train? She was persuaded he must be all that was most amiable; it was no wonder that the Princess should have preferred him to the Prince of Orange. Did not Serena agree that it must be a love-match?

“So my aunt informs us,” said Serena. “It seems not to be a match of the Prince Regent’s seeking, at all events. Indeed, it would be wonderful if it were! It may be very romantic—though I thought the young man a trifle dull, myself!—but a Saxe-Coburg can’t be considered any great thing for such an heiress! A younger son, too!”

But Fanny insisted that this was even an advantage, since a Prince without a principality would be content to live in England, instead, like the Prince of Orange, of insisting on taking the Princess Charlotte to live for some part of the year in his own domains. As for his being dull, she thought Serena judged too harshly. For her part, she liked his dignified manners, his air of grave reflection; and had felt, on the only occasion when she had met him, that the young Prince of Orange was nothing more than a rattle. And with such an undistinguished face and figure!

To read all the information about Prince Leopold’s career and his manifold perfections which was printed in the various newspapers and journals became one of each day’s first objects for Fanny. However little she might have to say on the subject of Brougham’s extraordinary attack on the Prince Regent, with its disastrous consequences to his Party, she had plenty to say on the shabby nature of the dukedom conferred on Prince Leopold, and perused with painstaking thoroughness all seven Articles of the proposed Marriage Settlement.

Bath was well provided with libraries, and these were considered to be among its most agreeable lounges. Most of them provided their subscribers with all the new English and French publications, monthly reviews, and other magazines, all the London papers, and some of the French ones. Fanny divided her patronage between Duffield’s, in Milsom Street, and Meyler & Sons, which conveniently adjoined the Great Pump Room. Here, every morning, she dutifully drank the waters, declaring that she derived immense benefit from them. Serena agreed to this, with suitable gravity, but thought privately that the orchestra, which discoursed music there, the shops in the more modish streets, and the constant procession of new faces, were of even greater benefit to her spirits.

Apart from one or two elderly persons, who had been acquainted either with the first Lady Spenborough, or with Lady Claypole, they had no acquaintance in the town. It was no longer a resort of high fashion, though still a very prosperous and genteel watering-place; and the most notable person to be encountered was Madame D’Arblay, who had been residing there all the winter. Fanny once found herself standing beside her at the ribbon counter in a shop on Gay Street, and was very much awed. The celebrated authoress had bought nothing more uncommon than an ell of black sarsenet ribbon; and nobody, Fanny assured Serena, could have supposed from her manners or her appearance that she had ever done anything out of the common way. Fanny had longed for the courage to introduce herself. “For Evelina, you know, was quite my favourite book, and I’m sure I was persuaded I could never love any gentleman one tenth as much as I loved Lord Orville!”

“What a pity you did not tell her so! I daresay she would have been very much pleased,” Serena said.

“Yes, but I thought she might have wished me rather to have spoken about her last book,” said Fanny naively. “Do you recall that author who dined with us once, and was affronted because your dear papa praised his first book, and never said a word about his others? And I couldn’t have talked to Miss Burney about The Wanderer, because it was so tedious I gave it up after the first volume!”

Upon their first coming to Bath, Serena had written both their names in the subscription books at the Lower and the New Assembly Rooms. Fanny was doubtful of the propriety of this, but the worldly-wise Serena said: “Depend upon it, my dear, it would be foolish to do otherwise! In such a place as this it never does to offend the susceptibilities of the Masters of Ceremonies. We shan’t, of course, go to the balls, or even to the Card Assemblies, but after we have been in mourning for six months we might, I think, go to the concerts, if we wished.”

Fanny submitted, and soon found that her comfort was increased by the goodwill of Mr Guynette of the Lower Rooms, and Mr King of the Upper. Neither of these gentlemen delayed to pay a call of ceremony upon the distinguished ladies in Laura Place, and each rivalled the other in civility. Had the Dowager Countess been as old as Mrs Piozzi, Bath’s latest resident, the visits would have been made; but the zealous gentlemen might not have felt it to be so incumbent upon them to render her so many little attentions, or to keep her so meticulously informed of