Other Tales: Stories from the Ballad of Grégoire Darcy
Marsha Altman
Copyright 2011 by Laughing Man Publications
Smashwords Edition
Other Books by Marsha Altman
The Darcys and the Bingleys
The Plight of the Darcy Brothers
Mr. Darcy’s Great Escape
The Ballad of Grégoire Darcy
Contents
“Young Master Darcy”
“The Tale of the Brothers Maddox”
“Life in London; or, the Day Scenes of the Scoundrel Mugin and the Pure Young Miss Bingley”
Introduction
If you’re here, you’re here for three possible reasons:
- You’re a fan of my series, particular The Ballad of Grégoire Darcy, and would like to read short stories related to it.
- You have some interest in my writing but would like to sample it before you buy a full book.
- You click on every button that says “download” on your computer.
If you happen to be in the last category, that’s a habit you’ve got to break unless you have a special love of computer viruses and you’re building a special preservation colony for them on your desktop.
This is a short story collection related to my series which started with The Darcys and the Bingleys: Pride and Prejudice continues. Two stories take place before the events of the novels and involve characters of my own invention, and one story takes place during the events of my fourth novel and also largely features characters of my own invention. I can’t make them tremendously familiar to the casual reader over the course of a few paragraphs, so you won’t get the full benefit from the material that a more regular follower of my work would enjoy. I’ve helped you out as much as I can, but it is what it is. Enjoy!
I’d like to thank Brandy Scott, whom I always thank but really went out of her way to copy-edit this material when she definitely had more important things to do. Liza Dawson, Diana Finch, Jeff Gerecke, and several AAR (Association of Authors’ Reprensentatives) members deserve credit for inspiring me to self-publish this. And finally God, King of the Universe, thank you for creating Brandy Scott and Amazon, in that order.
Marsha Altman
July 2011
Young Master Darcy
Background
This story discusses characters who lived prior to the series – old Mr. Darcy, Fitzwilliam Darcy’s father, and his family. As Darcy revealed in Mr. Darcy’s Great Escape, his father Geoffrey Darcy (whom his son is named after) was not the original heir to Pemberley. He had an older brother named Gregory, who would have inherited, but when it was determined that he was mad, his death was faked and he was sent to live out his life alone on the Isle of Man and not stain the family reputation with his illness. This is a key moment in the life of the teenage Geoffrey Darcy, son of Henry Darcy, and future master of Pemberley and father to Fitzwilliam Darcy.
Young Master Darcy
Sometime in the early 1760’s.
“When’ll you’ll be out from under again?”
He buttoned his breeches with experienced deftness. “Such things are beyond my control,” he said, and kissed her goodbye. He did not want to make conversation – he never did. He found her accent jarring, even for a kitchen maid. Maybe she was right and he really was too genteel.
Geoffrey Darcy escaped the shooting box under cover of the early hours of night. It was only a short distance back up the hill to Pemberley, but it still made him long for London, where at least if he was missing for a time from his studies, he could find a suitable excuse, whereas there was nothing to do in Derbyshire. If his father was a lord, they would at least have to be there for session, but his father was a homebody, and so was his brother. Of course his brother had no other choice, but all the masters of Pemberley were known to be homebodies, not like the nearby Duke of Devonshire. When they were children they played together, but the social barrier became more obvious. Why were the d’Arcys still nobles and the Darcys were not? Some things he supposed he was not meant to understand.
As he entered the house, he noticed the door to his father’s study was still closed and the guard still outside it, meaning Henry Darcy, Master of Pemberley, was still at the ledgers. He was taking more and more meals in his study now, since their mother had died, and especially now that Gregory was no longer joining him to aid in the task of managing their various estates. Geoffrey, but fifteen, understood only that they were attempting to consolidate their estates by selling the ventures in the colonies, but beyond that, he was not privy. And why should he be? None of it concerned him – the second son, the lesser son.
He needed entertainment – further entertainment, anyway. A cup or two of gin would have to serve for the evening, but first he needed to straighten up, or at least make sure there wasn’t any dirt or hay on his coat. As he was making his way to his room, he noticed the door to Gregory’s room still closed and the light still out. Was he to sleep all day and night?
Geoffrey would have kept on had Dr. Wallace not emerged, a man with a twisted hunch of a back and a face that had a hard time portraying kindness. He was, however, His Majesty’s favorite psychical physician, and his opinion was trusted above all others, so he was employed for the Darcys. He bowed. “Master Geoffrey.”
“Dr. Wallace.”
He doctor walked out, carrying his bag. Apparently he meant to retire for the night. On a whim, Geoffrey waited for him to disappear down the bend and opened Gregory’s door, slipping into the darkness. “Gregory?”
A muffled cry was the only response.
“Gregory?” he said, and struck up the candle on the bed stand. The lack of an answer was quickly explained – Gregory was gagged with a cloth tied around his head. “God in heaven,” was Geoffrey’s response, and drew his pocketknife. “Hold still.” He cut the gag and Gregory took a deep breath, and with it, a whimper of pain. Again, the source was obvious. His right arm was still bleeding where it had been pierced, dripping slowly into the metal wash bin beneath it beside the bed he was tied to. Gregory had to be restrained to accept treatment – that was not unusual in the medical field. Even if he agreed to it – and this time, he did – he always reacted involuntarily in fright.
Still, he was bleeding. Geoffrey swallowed his revulsion. “If I cut your arm loose – will you be all right?”
“Oh God, yes,” his brother said, his voice so hoarse it was unrecognizable. “Please.”
He did not hesitate to take the key on the dresser and unshackle Gregory’s arm, not failing to notice the flesh was torn and bleeding where he had struggled against the unforgiving iron. “There.” He set the right arm down on Gregory’s chest. “Are you supposed to bleed all night?”
Gregory nodded.
“Do you want to?”
Gregory shook his head.
Geoffrey paced nervously. Gregory Darcy, in moments of sanity, was articulate, clever, a quick wit and an intelligent man. He could be a great oratory if he were not so impaired. He was the older one, the wiser one, the one who had helped Geoffrey along. To see him so defeated could not be anything but disheartening. “I should not do this.” He removed the flask from his coat and unscrewed the cap. “It’s whiskey. Not very strong.” He held it to his brother’s lips and let him sip. Gregory was easy to do so, even if he only took a single gulp.
“Bless you,” Gregory said. “You can go, if it pains you.”
He did, but Geoffrey didn’t say that. “Did Father see you like this?”
Gregory nodded.
“And he did nothing?”
“He just wishes me to be well, Geoffrey. It is the proper action,” he said, but his tone said otherwise.
Geoffrey hesitated, and lit another candle. His brother stank of blood and sweat. This was the future master of Pemberley? “Do not say a word,” he ordered, not that Gregory seemed so inclined. Slowly, he unshackled each limb, and helped Gregory sit up, but his brother had not the strength to do it, and leaned on Geoffrey’s shoulder. He had a few days’ worth of a young man’s beard. He was shivering and clutching his arm, which had stopped bleeding or at least was not obviously doing so. His clothing was tattered and stained.
“I do not believe the doctor is doing you any good,” Geoffrey announced. “I suspect his treatments are only making you worse.”
“When I say that, they say I am mad,” Gregory replied. “And I am mad, so I must not be believed. The opposite must be believed.”
“You were not like this when you began this set of treatments. You were a normal person – ”
“ – I was not.”
“ – with some peculiarities, I admit,” Geoffrey finished.
“Some,” Gregory chuckled. “Too many for the master of Pemberley.”
“Father is not dead yet.”
Gregory did not respond. What was going through his mind, Geoffrey could not imagine. He did not want to imagine it.
Geoffrey leaned his brother back against the pillows, and removed the basin of blood, tossing it out the window. There was a jar of water on the counter beside many medical instruments, and he took that and a clean cloth instead. “Let me see the wound.”
His brother moved in pain, though perhaps not entirely physical. The wound itself was very small, aside from all the bruises and scratches and sores on his body. When he positioned the light correctly, Geoffrey could see the scars from previous bleedings on his brother’s arm as he washed the wound and wrapped it.
“He’ll know,” Gregory said, referring to the doctor. “He’ll know and he will kill me.”
“He will not kill you, Gregory,” Geoffrey said, taking the same cloth and applying it to his face, wiping the sweat from his forehead. His brother had grey hairs coming in. He was seventeen, and he was going grey. “He is here to help. At the very least, he will not kill you.”
“I am not so sure.” He corrected himself. “E-Even if he means well. I really am trying. I am trying to get better but I just get worse. What does that mean?”
“I don’t know.” He didn’t know how to answer these questions. He was not the elder son, the better son. He wasn’t smart like Gregory. He wasn’t tutored like Gregory. He would go into the military or something and that would be it. Or maybe he would move to the colonies. “I don’t know anything.”
Gregory gave him a rare smile. “Then we are in the same boat.”
Geoffrey pulled up a chair and they shared the flask and memories. Gregory never had much of a head for alcohol, but was more than grateful for it. “Milk. It is all he lets me have. I am so sick of milk!” They laughed together like the old days, like he was well. Gregory was still capable of human conversation when it was pried out of him. In fact, he seemed to enjoy it. “What I would give to be left alone, a quiet house and a nice view.”
“And maybe a fine woman.”
“That is your dream, Geoff. Or perhaps multiple women. You would tire of the same one.”
Geoffrey watched his brother nod off. He did not re-shackle him. He tucked Gregory into his own bed, in the room that was his room but his prison, and left. Even though the night was still young by his standards and he had alcohol fueling his blood, he felt drained when he shut the door behind him.
The light was still on in his father’s study. He was granted entrance. “Father.”
Henry Darcy looked up from his ledger with only the briefest of glances. “Son.”
Geoffrey did not want to draw it out longer than it had to be. “I wish to be master of Pemberley.”
The scribbling of the pen stopped. That was the only motion that changed.
“I know Gregory came to you last summer about it,” Geoffrey said. “And I know that was the only reason he agreed to the treatments last summer, and again last week – because you wanted to try to make him better. But he isn’t. The doctor is only making him worse.” He did not wait for his father’s response. “Have you even visited him? Have you seen the sores on his back? Or the wounds on his arm, and not just from the bleeding?” He did not stop. “You are killing him.”
Even Henry Darcy, not known for great displays of emotion, could not remain unmoved by such a statement. “He is being treated.”
“He is being mistreated. Every time you do these treatments, whether he agrees or not, he gets worse and only recovers when the doctor leaves – and you well know it! How could you possibly not?” he said. “So he is not fit to run Pemberley. So his blood will taint the family line. Let that all be. Admit it and leave him at peace. I will take his place. You know I don’t wish it but I will do it for my brother.”
His father did not respond verbally for some time, pondering it, looking at his young son, the one he had always passed off as a mischief-maker. And Geoffrey could not deny it – he was not the most suitable person to assume a great position, but he could make himself be, if he had to. For Gregory. “You are serious.”
“I do not know a way to express it better. If I did, I would. Yes, I am most serious.”
“You will need training.”
“I know.”
“You will need to start showing responsibility, Geoffrey.”
“I know, Father.”
“None of this business with the maids and the servant girls.”
He hung his head. “I know, Father.”
“It is a large responsibility. The entire heritage of the Darcys will rest on you.”
“I know, Father. To the extent that I can, I know. But I do willingly accept this burden.” For Gregory.
His father was hesitant. “We shall see.”
Nonetheless, the doctor was dismissed in the morning, and predictably, Gregory recovered to his normal state, which was not a functioning person in terms of being sociable, but certainly he was no madman. Gregory thought he was, Father thought he was, the doctor thought he was, Geoffrey thought not. But he kept his mouth shut. Anything to make this work. Anything for Gregory.
~End~
The Tale of the Brothers Maddox
Background
Brian Maddox is known in the series as a scoundrel, who lost his inheritance gambling and left his younger brother, Dr. Daniel Maddox, a pauper while Brian fled to the Continent for safety from his creditors. Brian raised Daniel after his mother and father died, and this story is an attempt to shed some light on their relationship during those troubled years, and why they have been so devoted to each other in the series.
The Tale of the Brothers Maddox
177_
Brian Maddox stared up at Mr. Smith, doing his very best to mask his confusion in front of the man who had been so close to his father. The fact of the matter was he understood very little of what the steward had said, and hoped to God in Heaven that the elderly Smith lived long enough to manage the estate for Brian to learn the massive sets of ledgers before him. Stewart Maddox had received a small inheritance as the second son of the earl, but he had managed it wisely and turned it into a substantial fortune to provide for his wife until her death and his sons’ education.
For all of his planning, Mr. Stewart Maddox had failed to predict his death.
How Brian’s life had changed with the failure of a wheel, when it broke and the axel collapsed, flinging his father’s body from the gig. Brian, who was sleeping, was dragged out of bed to identify his father in the carnage and make sure his remains were collected properly for a decent burial. It was such an exhausting experience that it consumed him until he walked back in the door of the townhouse and realized he had to tell Danny. He could have let Nurse do it, but he didn’t think it was right. Danny was ten; he deserved to hear it from a family member, now his only family member.
“Try not to cry,” Nurse advised him before he went in. “He needs you to be his father now.”
That notion was rather hard to swallow. So was everything else thrown at him over the course of the next few weeks, between organizing the funeral with his uncle, whom he had never met and was openly hostile to him, but at least willing to let Stewart Maddox be buried beside his wife in the family plot. There were the endless meetings with Mr. Smith, who did his best to impart the breadth of work that went into running their fortune. Thank God they did not own a country house, or it would have been even worse. And there was Danny. Brian briefly proposed the idea of the earl taking a partial guardianship over him, but the earl refused to have anything to do with either of them and was intent on making that very clear. They were, in effect, alone. They had their servants to care for them, but no one of their own blood.
The world was suddenly very small and its possibilities limited. Brian wanted to go to Oxford, but it was now out of the question. He couldn’t do that to Danny, who needed him home. He wanted to travel, and briefly considered taking his brother and leaving for the Continent, but the revolution in France did not put him at ease and it would all be very costly. No, it was best to stay, and adjust.
He hoped he would.
~
“Danny,” Brian said as he entered the library. “What did I say?” He pulled the book out of his brother’s hands, and held it up a normal distance away. “Why do you do that?”
“Because I want to see the words,” Danny replied.
“Then hold the book up like a normal person.”
His brother looked crushed. “I can’t see it from that far away.”
Brian did not like the feeling in the pit of his stomach. He looked at the book, with the letters perfectly legible. “You can’t see it? From here?”
“It’s blurry.”
Brian stepped away and held up his hand. “How many fingers am I holding up?”
“Two. Or three.”
“You can’t tell.”
Danny looked embarrassed and shook his head.
Brian sighed. “How long have you been hiding this from me?”
“I don’t know. It was gradual.” Daniel Maddox looked terrified, like he’d been struck. Brian never struck him, never even came close to doing so or indicating that he would, but somehow he wasn’t able to hide that he was overwhelmed and the last thing he needed was another concern. “I didn’t want you to worry about me.”
“Danny, what did we say? No secrets?” He still had to kneel a bit to get to his brother’s level. Danny’s voice had dropped but didn’t stay there, and he hadn’t had his growth spurt yet.
“No secrets.”
Danny would have to see a doctor, and that was that. A specialist, preferably. Hopefully it would be treatable.
He was not that hopeful.
~
A few years later Danny was taller than him, as tall as their father had been. Brian felt short just standing next to him, though it was still clear that he was the older brother.
Danny didn’t want to go to Eton or Harrow and Brian complied. The kids picked on him for his glasses and he was too gentle a soul to pick a fight with them. Brian remembered that age, when he was growing so fast he wasn’t comfortable in his own skin. It wasn’t so long ago, but it seemed like it. The years were being buried in finances and expenses and interest rates. His only pleasure was at White’s, where he could drink and eat and gamble in peace while a tutor sat with his little brother. At fourteen, Daniel Maddox was qualified to enter Cambridge, but he wanted another year to master Greek and Latin, as his studies at Cambridge would largely be mathematics. There were books everywhere in the townhouse; Brian never refused a request for more books.
Brian supposed he ought to take a wife. If she had a suitable inheritance, he could live more comfortably, but he couldn’t stand the culture of the haute Ton with their disapproving looks at his boyish spirits.
He was recovering from a particularly nasty hangover one afternoon when he moaned to his brother, “No one takes me seriously.”
“I take you seriously.”
“You’re not a lady.”
“Why do you want a lady to take you seriously? I thought you paid people to do that.”
Brian frowned. “How do you know?”
“I heard the servants talking about it.”
He sighed. He was going to have to have another talk with them. “Respectable women are different.” And he couldn’t stand them.
“They’re respectable.”
“Yes.”
“Why would you want someone who wasn’t?”
Brian managed a smile. “When you’re old enough – ”
Danny slammed his book shut. “I am old enough! Just because you’re older – ”
“Much older.” Or at least, it felt like it.
“ - doesn’t mean you’re Father! I liked you better as my brother.” Seething, Danny left the room, and Brian didn’t chase. Instead, he had another bottle of wine.
~
Another governess came and went. Miss Henderson was young and appealing, and she made sure that Brian knew it. He only realized later, in his drunken stupidity, that she had aspirations to become mistress of the house, far above her station. Fortunately her plans fell through when she did not increase, and Brian fired her (with a very generous settlement package not to tell Danny why she was leaving).
He was still recovering from that disaster when his brother said, “Is my appointment with Dr. Hulbert soon?”
“In about a month, I believe. I can look it up for you. Why?”
“You’re going to be mad.”
“I’m not going to be mad.” He was slow to respond, on account of another hangover. “Why? You’ve been wearing your glasses.” That was what the specialist said. He had to wear his glasses or his sight would deteriorate. “Haven’t you?”
“Yes.” He added, “I didn’t want to worry you.”
“Worry me about what?”
Danny pointed to his eye. “This eye is blurry.”
“For how long?”
“I don’t know. It’s come on so gradually – ”
Brian groaned. “You are mad,” Danny said.
“No,” he replied. “I’m just – concerned.” Helpless, he would have said if he had any reason to be honest with Danny. “It’s all right. Dr. Hulbert will take care of it.”
~
Dr. Hulbert did not take care of it. He didn’t know how. He was not an expert on cataracts, but he knew that Daniel would lose vision in that eye if it wasn’t removed, and even then it was only a chance that he would still see with it. The expert was a professor in St. Andrews, who could perform the surgery.
“Is it dangerous?”
“Every surgery is dangerous, Mr. Maddox,” the doctor told him. “And it has a low success rate to just remove the lens, but it’s his only hope for that eye.”
Danny was fourteen. He did not deserve to be half-blind at fourteen. What if the other eye failed? “How do I get in contact with this surgeon?”
Dr. Sharp was out of London, but he was teaching at St. Andrews for a term, and it could not wait. It was the first time either of them was so far from London. Danny appreciated the beauty of the university until they were ushered in. Dr. Sharp was very formal. He didn’t bother to explain the surgery to Danny. He took Brian aside and said, “He’s very tall.”
“So?”
“I don’t have enough people to hold him down. Can you do it?”
He had to admit he could not.
“Then we’ll have to restrain him.” The doctor turned to Danny with a mug that was only about a quarter full. “Drink this, young man.”
Danny did as he was told. “Ugh. It’s disgusting. What is it?”
“Gin.”
“Gin? You’re giving him gin?” Brian said, but he saw their methodology very quickly. Danny was utterly cupshot within a few minutes, and much more compliant as they strapped him into the heavy wooden chair. He was even laughing as the assistants ushered Brian out, and shut the doors behind them.
He could hear the screams through the stone. He put his head against it and banged his forehead into the wall. He didn’t know what else to do but cry, but he could never do that. He had to be the strong one.
Danny was still drunk but in a much fouler mood when Brian came back in, his eye bandaged and another wrapped around his head to keep it in place. “Under no circumstances should it be removed until I see him next week,” Dr. Sharp said. Unlike kindly Dr. Hulbert, he was devoid of emotion, at least not in front of the crying man doubled-over in the chair.
“Look at you,” he said to his brother. “The mighty pirate.” Danny did not appreciate the humor.
They stayed at the hotel. Dr. Sharp prescribed laudanum for the recovery, and like everything else, it made Brian nervous. It was disquieting to see his brother in a trance, his voice slurred, unable to concentrate on the book Brian was reading to him. Even though the university sent a student surgeon to monitor him, Brian refused to leave his side, even though his throat was watering for some sort of liquor-related relief.
On the third day, they did not use laudanum. The surgeon wanted to, but went to administer the dose and could not rouse his patient. Danny had a fever. Brian called for a doctor, and paid him coins to bleed his brother. After watching the process, Brian excused himself to his own quarters to lose his stomach, and then returned as if nothing was amiss.
The second time, it was not as bad. He knew not the watch. The length of time it took was frustrating, and he held Danny’s hand. His brother was at times responsive, at other times not. The doctor judged him to be doing better because his forehead was not as hot and he had responded when they cut him, but he just looked paler and sicker to Brian. More bleeding was prescribed.
He knew the danger when Dr. Sharp came personally to check on his patient’s progress. He did not remove the bandage, but he did wipe away the pus and mucus around it. This time he was not unemotional; he was downright grim. “Has the fever ever gone down?”
“Briefly, on Friday, otherwise, no.” Brian swallowed. “He’s infected, isn’t he?”
“He could fight it. He’s young and healthy.”
Could was the operative word. More bleeding was prescribed.
After the doctors left, Brian called for a bottle of whiskey to be brought up. As the sun went down, he sat on the chair beside Danny’s sickbed, drinking from the bottle and holding his hand. “You have to fight it.” Danny’s hands were so cold. “God Damnit Danny, I can’t lose you. I may not be very good at this. You may deserve better than me. And I may sound selfish when I say that you have to stay alive because you’re all I have.” He brought Danny’s hand to his face and kissed it. “Please just pretend it’s Mother.” In his drunken haze, he said, “You don’t remember her, do you? She was the sweetest, most wonderful mother. I wish you’d known her better.” Daniel Maddox had known his mother for the four days between his birth and her death. “I wish life wasn’t so unkind to you. If you fight it, I promise you, it will get better. You’ll go to school and be a lawyer or a churchman or whatever you want ...” He trailed off with a sob. “I promise. Please say something. Just say one thing and I’ll feel so much better.”
But Danny was in no condition to say anything. In fact, he was barely breathing. He was so pale and motionless. Brian kept double-checking that he was breathing, that his heart was still beating. He didn’t sleep at all and was shaken when the doctor came that morning. In his disheveled form, still clutching his sacred bottle of whiskey, he shouted, “Get out.”
“Mr. Maddox, your brother needs – ”
“Every day you treat him and every day he gets worse, you quack. Get out.” Only the student physician was capable of physically holding him back from throttling the poor doctor who’d come to do his work. “Let my brother die in peace!” He hurled the bottle at him, but fortunately it missed and hit the very nice wallpaper.
The doctor took the notice. “You,” Brian said to the student. “Get out. You too.”
“Mr. Maddox, please.”
“I don’t want any of you here. I don’t want you touching him.”
“If he isn’t treated – ”
“He’ll die. And if he is treated, he’ll die. So I’ll spare my brother some agony. Get out!”
Suddenly he was alone. Even the servants made their escape to the outer chambers. It was so still and quiet, except for his heavy breathing. “Maid!” He banged on the door. “Maid!” He couldn’t find the bell to ring. She came, but kept her distance. “Bring water. Clean water! The stuff you use for the tea. And some towels.”
“Yes, sir.”
She handed them over to him. The water had obviously just been boiled, as it was still quite warm when he put the towel in and dragged it gently across his brother’s forehead. “Does that feel better?” When the bandage got in the way, he tore it off. “There. Enough of this nonsense.”
It was the first time he saw the eye, encrusted in dried mucus, all green. Yet the area was so small. It wasn’t fair. His brother didn’t deserve to die from something like this. “Don’t flinch,” he said. “Or try not to.” Danny of course did not as he slowly worked at removing the layers with the wet towels, wiping away all of the sweat and anything that didn’t seem to belong there. Beneath it was a deceptively clean eyelid that he didn’t dare open, but he did apply the hot towel.
Danny did flinch. “Don’t –” Brian said before he realized it was his brother’s first movement in days. “All right. Flinch all you want. I know it hurts.” There was some limited movement as he finished the job, and applied a clean cloth over the area. “There. Now at least you look like a more respectable pirate.”
He slept very uncomfortably in the chair beside him, largely passed out until the knocking at the door became so insistent that he had to bring himself to his feet and answer it. “If it’s a doctor, I want nothing to do with you.”
It was the maid. “Do you need more water, sir?”
The kindness in her voice woke him. “Yes. Yes, thank you.” He opened the door further to allow her entrance, and she changed the water and the stack of towels. “Thank you.”
“Should I bring up soup for the master, sir?”
“Yes. Why not?”
He was not aware of the time until Danny stirred, and he looked at his watch. Danny could barely open the unobstructed eye.
“Drink,” Brian said, practically forcing the soup down his throat. “Do you like it? Is it any good? I’ve not tasted it.”
Danny nodded, and closed his eye.
His fever went down and finally abated entirely. Brian found him sitting up, the cloth removed, looking at the paper. “I need my glasses.”
Brian fetched them for him.
“I can see.” He closed his good eye. “I can still see.” With a certain charming innocence he looked up and said, “How long was I out?”
~
It was several years later before they discussed Saint Andrews, brother to brother. Danny had completed his undergraduate work in Cambridge and earned a Fellowship, but he wanted to study medicine in Paris. He had already bought the books, which were of course in French. Brian didn’t even know he was looking up eye surgery until Danny told him, and it was then that Brian admitted how close he had come to death. He slowly and with much pestering admitted the entirety of the experience, including his argument with the doctors treating him.
Danny was not upset. Instead, he was interested. He knew he was going blind – there was no need to discuss that. They had never formally told him, but he had reached the conclusion and eventually Brian and Dr. Hulbert stopped denying it.
Though surprised that his brother was interested in such a gruesome and unrewarding profession, Brian would not deny him anything and even encouraged it. When Danny left for France, he felt light, like a burden had been lifted off his shoulders. Later, when he was alone in their townhouse, it sunk to the pit of his stomach, a lonely hole waiting to be filled. Nothing, he thought with relief, that another night at the club couldn’t satisfy.
~End~
Life in London; or, the Day Scenes of the Scoundrel Mugin and the Pure Young Miss Bingley
Background
This story takes place during the events of The Ballad of Grégoire Darcy, while the Japanese ex-con Mugin is living with Brian and Nadezhda Maddox but before he takes Georgiana Bingley to the boxing match in the book.
Life in London; or, the Day Scenes of the Scoundrel Mugin and the Pure Young Miss Bingley
1817
“Water!”
The silver ladle clanged against the rim of the copper tub, and minutes later, a servant appeared with a fresh pot of hot water, placing it at the foot of the tub. The scoundrel and ne’er-do-well Mugin, an established trickster, thief, and all-around rake, was only satisfied when he scooped out the steaming water and used the dinner implement to pour it over his head and down his shoulders.
A good Englishman would have been satisfied with lukewarm water poured on him by a servant, but Mugin was no Englishman and he certainly wasn’t good. Though most mistook him for a Chinese immigrant, his slightly olive complexion betrayed him as Japanese, not from the main island but from the outer island, where indigenous people still roamed. He spoke to the servants in English, a language he could speak passably well, but often didn’t lower himself to speak a barbarian tongue when not absolutely necessary. As a result, the majority of people heard him speak only a pidgin English and assumed it was a fault of intelligence, and he did not care what they thought.
A good morning bath was not quite a cure for a hangover, but it worked just enough to be worthwhile, and Mugin was trying to set an example. The English barely bathed enough as it was, in his opinion. Mugin tried not to contemplate bad smells and focused on the rapidly-cooling water when there was a knock at the door. “Mugin!”
The voice was the only male in the household not terrified of him, the merchant Brian-chan, who knew hunting down his guest and interrupting him was the best way to wrangle him into something, so Mugin didn’t say anything or even look surprised when Brian burst in. Unlike his fellow countrymen, Brian was dressed in a blue kimono, though he had to ruin it with a white handkerchief tied around his neck to avoid exposing his throat. He waddled in, Mugin having been alerted to his presence by his footsteps in the hallway. An old injury made Brian walk in a crooked fashion, one leg shuffling a bit behind the other in a distinctive fashion.
Mugin briefly contemplated if he’d done anything recently that Brian would be upset about, and decided that Brian knew about none of those incidents, so it was likely something else.
“I’m going to London,” Brian said in Japanese. “Would you like to come?”
“What about Nadi-sama?”
“Nadezhda is not in the best of moods,” Brian said. He was the only one who could pronounce his wife’s name. “And feeling a bit under the weather. It might be wise to give her some space.”
The English – and maybe all gaijin, but Mugin only knew the English well enough to say – were very good at not saying what they wanted to say. They were also remarkable prudes. But an invitation was an invitation. “Fine. But let me finish. And send up more water!”
Brian lived in a country house with his wife and servants, not far from the city of London, which Mugin was told was as big as Edo, perhaps bigger. It was certainly filthier, below even Mugin’s lowered standards of good hygiene, but it was full of women and drink, neither of which Mugin was much opposed to. He dressed quickly after his bath, slid into his geta and tied his sun-hat made of palm leaves to his head before joining Brian in the ‘gig.’ Before coming to England, Mugin had never ridden a horse or had any expectations to; horses were for samurai and daimyos, not convicts. After some lessons, he still trusted his own feet more than the creatures that were either too wild or too tame.
“I have business with Bingley,” Brian said in English. His trading partner was a rather silly orange-haired man much wealthier than himself. They were related through marriage. “I don’t know how long it will take.”
“I’ll find a way to amuse myself,” Mugin replied.
“Don’t get into too much trouble. The Bow Street Runners are serious these days.”
“But they’re not very good runners,” Mugin said, with some knowledge on the subject of London’s police force. Brian believed it and laughed.
London was less orderly than Edo, and a lot smellier. It also seemed to have no functioning police force, only fat old men with lanterns and clubs, which amused Mugin quite a bit. The trip to Bingley-san’s house wasn’t long, and the ride too bumpy to doze in. People stopped in the streets to stare at him, and he found he could cause a little scare just by staring right back.
Brian implied once that Bingley-san was a little eccentric. He kept a pet Monkey and he collected Indian, Chinese, and Japanese trinkets with a wild fanaticism, but otherwise Mugin didn’t see what the concern was about. He spoke a little Japanese and sometimes he tried his Chinese on Mugin, but always butchered the pronunciation. This morning he was still eating breakfast (the English ate a lot, something to Mugin’s liking) and invited them to join him. “Mr. Maddox. Mugin-san.”
He started talking about some local news that Westerners cared about, and Mugin stopped listening. He ignored the ridiculous saucer to his tea cup and the unnecessary handle and picked it up by the base. Bingley-san’s was one of the few places that seemed to have palatable tea. When he had his fill, he wandered off, something the Westerners never seemed to mind.
Bingley-san’s wife was in the north with the rest of the family, so there were only servants around. He was told not to bow back when they stopped to bow to him, but he found this uncomfortably rude, and not in the manner of being rude of which he was a fan. He bowed back most of the time, which served to confuse the servants. So what? He couldn’t be held responsible for clearing up the bewilderment of gaijin.
He followed the sounds of the violin, a string instrument like a shamisen, and opened the door to another room of confounding decorations to see Georgie-chan immediately drop the instrument. “Mugin-san!” In her excitement, it took her an extra moment to curtsey, the little dip women did instead of bowing. In children it was cute, but in older women who were not going to bother to cover up their chest anyway, it was a tease.
“Mr. Muginsen,” said Georgiana Bingley’s current governess. Mugin did not bother to learn the names of all of them when they were so quickly dismissed or quit. Usually the latter. “I’m afraid you are interrupting our lesson – ”
“I’m done!” Georgie declared, setting her instrument down on the table for emphasis. “Besides, my fingers hurt.”
“Why you learn violin? Want be geisha?”
“What’s a geisha, Mugin-san?”
“Entertainer,” he said. “Also, whore.”
“Mr. Muginsen!”
Mugin ignored the governess and Georgie giggled; this was of course the correct thing to say to impress her. Georgie was less easy to impress than when he knew her as a little kid – she was twelve now, because ages mattered a lot to Westerners. Mugin didn’t know his own age, and had never thought much of the subject until his new Western friends brought it up. He was probably older than thirty now. “Gomen.” (Sorry) He bowed to the governess, but he didn’t mean it, and she didn’t understand him. “I leave you to geisha lessons.”
He shuffled back as if he was going to leave, but of course Georgie stopped him. “Don’t go! We’re going out today, are we not?”
“For fittings, Miss Bingley, which are hardly appropriate – ”
“And the gardens. And can two poor females walk the streets of London unescorted? Come, let’s ask Papa.” She took the governess’s arm and dragged her into the dining room. Bingley did not look too surprised at the minor scene. He pushed his chattering monkey away from his plate and waited for his daughter to speak her peace. “Papa. Mr. Maddox.” She curtseyed. “Papa, were you not discussing the rash of awful thieves mugging women in the streets near Piccadilly last night?”
Bingley had the expression of someone who knew he was being cornered. “Yes, I might have said something to that effect.”
“And would Mugin-san not be a better guard against thieves than our footmen?”
“Takes one to know one,” Brian said, a charge Mugin would not begin to deny. “Let her go on this one, Charles. Even if she is robbed, she’ll get her money back.”
“Would be more fun,” Mugin added. Westerners were so slow.
Mr. Bingley straightened up, wanting to assert his authority as master of his own house. “There’s to be no trouble.”
“No trouble,” Mugin repeated.
“And no ... displays.”
Mugin decided that at the end of the day, he would say he did not understand that word. “Hai.” (Yes)
“You’re guarding my daughter and Mrs. Lambert and nothing else.” Bingley looked at his business partner. “What are you laughing about?”
“Nothing.” Brian focused on trying not to laugh harder.
Georgie had to get all dressed up, with a wide-brimmed hat and gloves and all kinds of unnecessary clothing to indicate she was not yet available for marriage arrangements, which the Englishmen called “out.” And then she had to go shopping for more clothes, something she did not much enjoy, with her governess, whom she did not much care for. These were all things she’d already told Mugin, and she brightened at the prospect of him accompanying them.
In the stores themselves, which seemed endless, Mugin was left to sit near the door as they went inside to have fabrics measured, because everything had to be made new and perfectly fitting. He sat by the glass window, where the nervous proprietor gave him awful tea that would have been better as just hot water and tried to avoid gawking at him, and on the second try, ale. Mugin was instructed to keep his shoes on in English shops, instructions he occasionally ignored but mostly obeyed because their floors were filthy.
Two fat ladies entered, closing their umbrellas even though it wasn’t raining, and one of them gasped. “Oh! My husband has just returned from the Orient!” She approached Mugin and curtseyed, then said something that sounded like a greeting in Mandarin, which he didn’t speak.
“I don’t speak Mandarin,” he said in Japanese, which delighted them both so much that he thought one of them might pop.
“Do you ... speak English?” the second lady said, in a loud, haltering tone.
“No,” he lied, again in Japanese.
“Does that mean yes?”
“He would have answered us in English, you old fool!”
“Fat fool,” he said. “I assume you’re here to buy new dresses because you ate your old ones.”
“Mugin-san!” Georgie shouted from behind the curtain. “Are you insulting someone out there?”
She knew him too well. It was eerie sometimes, as if they knew each other in past lives. “Iie.” (No) Like her father, Georgie-chan was very good with languages.
“You’re lying!” she said back.
“Miss Bingley, don’t shout. It’s rude.”
“Everything I want to do is rude!” Georgie emerged from behind the screens in a huff. Mugin couldn’t blame her. Everything she did was terribly not fun, especially with the governess around. Mugin did not know anything particular about Mrs. Lambert – he would not keep track of all of the governesses Georgie managed to go through
At the young girl’s insistence they traveled to the Gardens for some fresh air, though no air in the city could be considered fresh. At least there were roads of trees and well-worn dirt paths, though with the crowd of people they were never very far from noise. Children younger than her, mostly boys, played with wild abandon while young couples sought some privacy and found none.
“I saw him last night,” Mugin said, pointing to a man with his head raised high in the fashion Western gaijin called ‘proper’ escorting a woman who looked dashingly innocent. “But not with her.” Sometimes he remembered not to say these things in front of Georgie after some thorough instructions from Brian-chan on the subject, backed up by the more authoritative wife Nadi-sama, but he couldn’t be bothered to censor himself. Georgie’s Japanese was only so good, anyway. “English men – multiple wives is no, yes?”
“Of course not!” Mrs. Lambert was horrified, but she was always horrified at something. It seemed to be the job of a governess. Mugin honestly did not know what else they were for. “Mr. Muginsen! Do they have such barbaric customs in your country?”
“I can no take even one wife! Aiaiaiai!” He swung his head back and forth at the horrendous notion. Georgie giggled.
“Respectable men marry. As do respectable ladies,” Mrs. Lambert said, raising her chin in that dismissive fashion.
“You marry?”
“I was married, Mr. Muginsen. Not that it could possibly be your business – ”
“Husband run away?”
Georgie held back her laughter with a gloved hand over her mouth as her governess answered, “He died, Mr. Muginsen.”
“Oh. Gomen nasai.” He bowed to her. Even he knew when to act appropriately.
“We take marriage very seriously in England, Mr. Muginsen.”
“Hai.”
“We
don’t just do whatever we please.”
There was a lot he could say to that, and he knew Georgie was looking for him to say something, but he had a promise to Brian-chan and he occasionally kept promises so he held his tongue. “Hai.”
There were fantastically ugly stone structures in the gardens, particularly the “China House” with looked like no style Mugin could recall, and he’d lived in China. People were always seeking money in exchange for entertainment. This time there was a big red tent set up near the pavilion.
“Just a shilling to see the elephant! A very live elephant! A mere half-shilling for children under five!”
“I want to see the elephant,” Georgie screamed, then remembered her manners. “Mrs. Lambert, can we please see the elephant?”
“It’s probably a filthy creature. They have it under a tent! But I suppose you’ll never let me hear the end of it ...”
She was right – the animal was fantastically filthy, as was the tent in general, and they charged an additional shilling for flowers to hold to one’s nose. The elephant was all the way from Northern India, or so the story went, and the gentle beast was used by the great Mughal princes for transportation, and their armies as warrior animals. This animal in particular did not look much like a stately horse or a warrior, but he did look furious. It was huge, with leathery skin, and all its stumps of feet were chained together and to pegs in the ground. Mugin had seen zoos before, and caged animals, but not quite in these conditions.
Georgie disobeyed both her governess and the animal’s owner by walking right to it and putting her fine white glove on the spot under its eye. Its long nose swung back and forth, but it did not attempt to charge. The elephant was happier than anyone was with the arrangement.
“Miss Bingley! You’ll ruin your gloves!”
Mugin rolled his eyes and waited for Georgie to return to their side of the tent as the workers tried to hurry them out of it. She grabbed Mugin’s arm with one very stained glove. “He doesn’t seem very happy.”
“No.”
“We should do something,” she said.
He looked at the elephant, then back and her, and knelt so he was closer to her height and further from Mrs. Lambert’s ears. “Your father is rich, but not that rich.”
“He could never buy it! Mama barely allows Monkey in the house.”
He debated the other obvious plan in his head. “It’s just going to run around a bit, then maybe someone will shoot it.”
“Can you ride an elephant?”
The correct answer was ‘no’ but it wasn’t one he gave to Georgie very often. “You ask too much of me,” he said, patting her on the shoulder. “Distract the guard. We will meet at the entrance.”
Georgie went to her appointed task, and began to demand her money back because there were no elephant rides available, and the word ‘ride’ excited the small crowd enough that Mugin slid beneath the elephant, pulled out the wooden stakes holding the chains together, and leapt onto the animal’s back. “Go!” He kicked its massive body with his heel, which barely made an impression but was enough to aggravate the riled-up animal, who took off at first with a hesitant forward before a gallop, if the movement the creature made could ever be considered a gallop. Mugin had to grab the ears to hold on as it took down the tent, tramping it and all the equipment beneath it. Had they the time and the privacy, Mugin would have explained at length that he was not, in fact, a samurai, and therefore had no reason to know how to ride a horse, and it was not something one could pick up as quickly as he needed to with an elephant. The elephant stopped only to drink from the muddy water behind the tent, and when others approached him, to spray them extensively with it, then took off for the water of the man-made lake. Mugin found a ready tree and grabbed the overhanging branch, much happier to be in the trees than on the back of a rampaging beast. He also knew the value of not being caught.
The elephant was not, in fact, shot – either no one had a gun, or the elephant had simply calmed down enough by being in the water when they reached it that no attempt at approach was made, and the entertainers continued their earlier service by charging people to get close while the elephant remained in the water. Mugin made his way through the trees, not landing on the ground until he was far from the scene and closer to the entrance. Georgie was waiting, along with her governess, who was covered in mud and slime from the pit.
“Mr. Muginsen! I should report you,” she said, even though Georgie would never let that happen. “My clothes are ruined!”
“Brown good color for you,” he said. “Look nice.”
“I cannot be expected to possibly put up with – ”
“Then leave,” Georgie said. “No one wants you here.”
“Miss Bingley!”
“Is rude,” Mugin said. “Go get clean. Nice lady get clean.” He patted Georgie on the head, which was increasingly ridiculous as she got taller. “I take Georgie home. Guard her with life!” He bowed to Mrs. Lambert. “Very serious, Rambert-sama!”
“If she isn’t home by – ”
“I hara-kiri,” he said. “Kill myself. Regain honor.”
Mrs. Lambert could not respond to that, so she said to Georgie, “I expect the best from you, Miss Bingley.”
Georgie curtseyed, and the governess departed. “I thought she would never leave.”
“Patience,” Mugin said. “Good thing to have.”
“Would you really commit hara-kiri if something happened to me?”
He shrugged. “Depends on how good my excuse is. And I’m very good with excuses.” He took her hand. He was still considerably taller than her, especially in his geta sandals. “Where do you want to go?”
“Somewhere I’m not supposed to.”
“Ah, see I make all these promises to Brian-chan – ”
“Mugin-san!”
“And your father.”
“I won’t tell.”
“But you must be a respectable young lady!” he said, and it took her a moment to realize he was mocking her. “Not for today maybe. Come.” They passed a market – a far less fashionable one, with cast-off clothing. Mugin put a grimy cap on her. “There. Do you have money?”
“Uncle Brian says you have a lot of gambling money.”
“This is not about my money! This is about your money!” And he’d spent most of his gambling money. They picked out a long blue coat that covered her almost entirely and when Georgie put her hair up under the cap, she could pass for a boy – for a few years yet. “Where do you want to go?”
“Where do men go all day?”
“Some of those places, I can’t take you,” Mugin said. “No arguments. And no drinking for you.”
“I can hold my liquor better than my cousins!”
“But you are so small,” he said, which earned him a frustrated scowl. “Come.”
They passed through the crowded streets, where everyone was selling something, from pears to dog meat – would gaijin eat anything? He asked Georgie, but she turned up her nose at the idea, so there was some hope for her. Her disguise worked perfectly because everyone paid attention to the Japanese man in a silk kimono and wooden shoes and no one paid attention to the urchin-like English boy at his side. Georgie knew the respectable areas better, and pointed out the famous churches (ugly stone buildings), the palaces where important daimyo lords met (an ugly stone building), and the private clubs where the same daimyos spent their days, though she wasn’t quite sure what went on in them, only that White’s was the best and her Uncle Darcy was a member there, and her cousin Brian-san was forbidden at all but the newest ones. Mugin could have pointed out numerous whorehouses but did not do so – even with his promise to Brian, he still knew Georgie was a little girl, if a much bigger one than when he met her.
“Thomas-san!” It was a stroke of luck running into someone he knew, but someone who owed him something. The fat little man nearly jumped, walking stick and all, when he saw Mugin approaching, his face red in his high white collar that seemed to be choking him.
The Englishman recovered quickly, and bowed elaborately. “Mr. Mugin.”
“George-chan, him Thomas-san. Bow now,” he reminded Georgiana, who bowed instead of curtseyed. “Thomas-san good friend.”
Thomas removed a handkerchief because the ones around his neck weren’t good enough and wiped his forehead nervously. “I would hardly call us good friends ... acquaintances certainly – good acquaintances!”
“Owes me,” Mugin said to Georgie, but not explain the incident further than to say. “Don’t make geisha mad.” Actually it was more about the lady of the house, bawds as they were called by the English, and her burly doorman who were the most upset at the situation, the least understanding about lines of credit, and like most other Westerners, too slow to chase someone out a window – not that the bovine bawd could have fit. But again, this was not a story for Georgie. “Thomas-san – you gentleman, yes?”
“I do fancy myself one,” Thomas said, which was a strange thing to say, because he dressed like one and acted like one and as far as Mugin could tell, either you were or you weren’t, and it had to do with how much money your father had. Georgie once tried to explain class to him, saying her grandfather was a merchant but her father was a gentleman, but being of no class himself, he could never be bothered with it all. “May I assist you with something?”
“Gentlemen go to club,” Mugin said. “You go to club? White’s?” He looked to Georgie.
“Brook’s. The like,” she said. Her voice was high but Thomas didn’t notice.
“Yes, of course, I have a membership – but you must understand, these things are tightly restricted – ”
“Mmmmm. Like dress on – ”
“ – but I could show you the lower floor! Distinguished guests are permitted,” Thomas rushed to say. “And they would give you tea, certainly. A bit of a cultural experience for you, I imagine. You are not from China, you said?”
“Japan.”
Download this book for your ebook reader.
(Pages 1-31 show above.)