Post Captain (3 page)

Sophia, the eldest, was a tall girl with wide-set grey eyes, a broad, smooth forehead, and a wonderful sweetness of expression - soft fair hair, inclining to gold: an exquisite skin. She was a reserved creature, living much in an inward dream whose nature she did not communicate to anyone. Perhaps it was her mother's unprincipled rectitude that had given her this early disgust for adult life; but whether or no, she seemed very young for her twenty-seven years. There was nothing in the least degree affected or kittenish about this: rather a kind of ethereal quality - the quality of a sacrificial object. Iphigeneia before the letter. Her looks were very much admired; she was always elegant, and when she was in looks she was quite lovely. She spoke little, in company or out, but she was capable of a sudden dart of sharpness, of a remark that showed much more intelligence and reflection than would have been expected from her rudimentary education and her very quiet provincial life. These remarks had a much greater force, coming from an amiable, pliant, and as it were sleepy reserve, and before now they had startled men who did not know her well - men who had been prating away happily with the conscious superiority of their sex. They dimly grasped an underlying strength, and they connected it with her occasional expression of secret amusement, the relish of something that she did not choose to share.

Cecilia was more nearly her mother's daughter: a little goose with a round face and china-blue eyes, devoted to ornament and to crimping her yellow hair, shallow and. foolish almost to simplicity, but happy, full of cheerful noise, and not yet at all ill-natured. She dearly loved the company of men, men of any size or shape. Her younger sister Frances did not: she was indifferent to their admiration - a long-legged nymph, still given to whistling and shying stones at the squirrels in the walnut-tree. Here was all the pitilessness of youth intact; and she was perfectly entrancing, as a spectacle. She had her cousin Diana's black hair and great dark blue misty pools of eyes, but she was as unlike her sisters as though they belonged to another sex. All they had in common was youthful grace, a good deal of gaiety, splendid health, and ten thousand pounds apiece. -

With these attractions it was strange that none of them should have married, particularly as the marriage-bed was never far from Mrs Williams's mind. But the paucity of men, of eligible bachelors, in the neighbourhood, the disrupting effects of ten years of war, and Sophia's reluctance (she had had several offers) explained a great deal; the rest could be accounted for by Mrs Williams's avidity for a good marriage settlement, and by an unwillingness on the part of the local gentlemen to have her as a mother-in-law.

Whether Mrs Williams liked her daughters at all was doubtful: she loved them, of course, and had sacrificed everything for them', but there was not much room in her composition for liking - it was too much taken up with being right (Hast thou considered my servant Mrs Williams, that there is none like her in the earth, a perfect and an upright woman?), with being tired, and with being ill-used. Dr Vining, who had known her all her life and who had seen her children into the world, said that she did not; but even he, who cordially disliked her, admitted that she truly, whole-heartedly loved their interest. She might damp all their enthusiasms, drizzle grey disapproval from one year's end to another, and spoil even birthdays with bravely-supported headaches, but she would fight parents, trustees and lawyers like a tigress for 'an adequate provision'. Yet still she had three unmarried daughters, and it was something of a comfort to her to be able to attribute this to their being overshadowed by her niece. Indeed, this niece, Diana Villiers, was as good-looking in her way as Sophia. But how unlike these two ways were: Diana with her straight back and high-held head seemed quite tall, but when she stood next to her cousin, she came no higher than her ear, they both had natural grace in an eminent degree, but whereas Sophia's was a willowy, almost languorous flowing perfection of movement, Diana's had a quick, flashing rhythm - on those rare occasions when there was a ball within twenty miles of Mapes she danced superbly; and by candlelight her complexion was almost as good as Sophia's.

Mrs Villiers was a widow: she had been born, in the same year as Sophia, but what a different life she had led; at fifteen, after her mother's death, she had gone out to India to keep house for her expensive, raffish father, and she had lived there in splendid style even after her marriage to a penniless young man, her father's aide-dc-camp, for he had moved into their rambling great palace, where the addition of a husband and an extra score of servants passed unnoticed. It had been a foolish marriage on the emotional plane - both too passionate, strong, self-willed, and opposed in every way to do anything but tear one another to pieces - but from the worldly point of view there was a great deal to be said for it. It did bring her a handsome husband, and it might have brought her

a deer-park and ten thousand a year as well, for not only was Charles Villiers well-connected (one sickly life between him and a great estate) but he was intelligent, cultivated, unscrupulous and active - particularly gifted on the political side: the very man to make a brilliant career in India. A second Clive, maybe, and wealthy by the age of thirty-odd. But they were both killed in the same engagement against Tippoo Sahib, her father owing three lakhs of rupees and her husband nearly half that sum.

The Company allowed Diana her passage home and fifty pounds a year until she should remarry. She came back to England with a wardrobe of tropical clothes, a certain knowledge of the world, and almost nothing else. She came back, in effect, to the schoolroom, or something very like it. For she at once realized that her aunt meant to clamp down on her, to allow her no chance of queering her daughters' pitch; and as she had no money and nowhere else to go she determined to fit into this small slow world of the English countryside, with its fixed notions and its strange morality.

She was willing, she was obliged, to accept a protectorate, and from the beginning she resolved to be meek, cautious and retiring; she knew that other women would regard her as a menace, and she meant to give them no provocation. But her theory and her practice were sometimes at odds, and in any case Mrs Williams's idea of a protectorate was much more like a total annexation. She was afraid of Diana, and dared not push her too far, but she never gave up trying to gain a moral superiority, and it was striking to see how this essentially stupid woman, unhampered by any principle or by any sense of honour, managed to plant her needle where it hurt most.

This had been going on for years, and Diana's clandestine or at least unavowed excursions with Mr Savile's hounds had a purpose beyond satisfying her delight in riding. Returning now she met her cousin Cecilia in the hail, hurrying to look at her new bonnet in the pier-glass between the breakfast-room windows.

'Thou looks't like Antichrist in that lewd hat,' she said in a sombre voice, for the hounds had lost their fox and the only tolerable-looking man had vanished.

'Oh! Oh!' cried Cecilia, 'what a shocking thing to say! It's blasphemy, I'm sure. I declare I've never had such a shocking thing said to me since Jemmy Blagrove called me that rude word. I shall tell Mama.'

'Don't be a fool, Cissy. It's a quotation - literature - the Bible.'

'Oh. Well, I think it's very shocking. You are covered with mud, Di. Oh, you took my tricorne. Oh, what an ill-natured thing you are - I am sure you spoilt the feather. I shall tell Mama.' She snatched the hat, but finding it unhurt she softened and went on, 'Well: and so you had a dirty ride. You went along Gallipot Lane, I suppose. Did you see anything of the hunt? They were over there on Polcary all the morning with their horrid howling and yowling.'

'I saw them in the distance,' said Diana.

'You frightened me so with that dreadful thing you said about Jesus,' said Cecilia, blowing on the ostrich-feather, 'that I almost forgot the news. The Admiral is back!'

'Back already?'

'Yes. And he will be over this very afternoon. He sent Ned with his compliments and might he come with Mama's Berlin wool after dinner. Such fun! He will tell us all about these beautiful young men! Men, Diana!'

The family had scarcely gathered about their tea before Admiral Haddock walked in. He was only a yellow admiral, retired without hoisting his flag, and he had not been afloat since 1794, but he was their one authority on naval matters and he had been sadly missed ever since the unexpected arrival of a Captain Aubrey of the Navy -a captain who had taken Melbury Lodge and who was therefore within their sphere of influence, but about whom they knew nothing and upon whom (he being a bachelor) they, as ladies, could not call.

'Pray, Admiral,' said Mrs Williams, as soon as the Berlin wool had been faintly praised, peered at with narrowed eyes and pursed lips, and privately condemned as useless

- nothing like a match, in quality, colour or price. 'Pray, Admiral, tell us about this Captain Aubrey, who they say has taken Melbury Lodge.'

'Aubrey? Oh, yes,' said the Admiral, running his dry tongue over his dry lips, like a parrot, 'I know all about him. I have not met him, but I talked about him to people at the club and in the Admiralty, and when I came home I looked him up in the Navy List. He is a young fellow, only a master and commander, you know -'

'Do you mean he is pretending to be a captain?' cried Mrs Williams, perfectly willing to believe it.

'No, no,' said Admiral Haddock impatiently. 'We always call commanders Captain So-and-So in the Navy. Real captains, full captains, we call post-captains - we say a man is made post when he is appointed to a sixth-rate or better, an eight-and-twenty, say, or a thirty-two-gun frigate. A post-ship, my dear Madam.'

'Oh, indeed,' said Mrs Williams, nodding her head and looking wise.

'Only a commander: but he did most uncommon well in the Mediterranean. Lord Keith gave him cruise after cruise in that little old quarter-decked brig we took from the Spaniards in ninety-five, and he played Old Harry with the shipping up and down the coast. There were times when he well-nigh filled the Lazaretto Reach in Mahon with his prizes - Lucky Jack Aubrey, they called him. He must have cleared a pretty penny - a most elegant penny indeed. And he it was who took the Cacafuego! The very man,' said the Admiral with some triumph, gazing round the circle of blank faces. After a moment's pause of unbroken stupidity on their part he shook his head, saying, 'You never even heard of the engagement, I collect?'

No, they had not. They were sorry to say that they had not heard of the Cacafuego - was it the same as the Battle of St Vincent? Perhaps it had happened when they were so busy with the strawberries. They had put up two hundred pots.

'Well, the Cacafuego was a Spanish xebec-frigate of two and thirty guns, and he went for her in this little fourteen-gun sloop, fought her to a standstill, and carried her into Minorca. Such an action! The service rang with it. And if it had not been for some legal quirk about her papers, she being lent to the Barcelona merchants and not commanded by her regular captain, which meant that technically she was not for the moment a king's ship but a privateer, he would have been made post and given command of her. Perhaps knighted too. But as it was - there being wheels within wheels, as I will explain at another time, for it is not really suitable for young ladies - she was not bought into the service; and so far he has not been given his step. What is more, I do not think he ever will be. He is a vile ranting dog of a Tory, to be sure - or at least his father is but even so, it was shameful. He may not be quite the thing, but I intend to take particular notice of him - shall call tomorrow - to mark my sense of the action: and of the injustice.'

'So he is not quite the thing, sir?' asked Cecilia.

'Why no, my dear, he is not. Not at all the thing, they tell me. Dashing he may be! indeed, he is; but disciplined - pah! That is the trouble with so many of your young fellows, and it will never do in the service- will never do for St Vincent. Many complaints about his lack of discipline - independence - disobeying orders. No future in the service for that kind of officer, above all with St Vincent at the Admiralty. And then I fear he may not attend to the fifth commandment quite as he should.' The girls' faces took on an inward look as they privately ran over the Decalogue: in order of intelligence a little frown appeared on each as its owner reached the part about Sunday travelling, and then cleared as they carried on to the commandment the Admiral had certainly intended. 'There was a great deal of talk about Mrs - about a superior officer's wife, and they say that was at the bottom of the matter. A sad rake, I fear; and undisciplined, which is far worse. You may say what you please about old Jarvie, but he will not brook undisciplined conduct. And he does not love a Tory, either.'

'Is Old Jarvie a naval word for the Evil One, sir?' asked Cecilia.

The admiral rubbed his hands. 'He is Earl St Vincent, my dear, the First Lord of the Admiralty.'

At the mention of authority Mrs Williams looked grave and respectful; and after a reverent pause she said, 'I believe you mentioned Captain Aubrey's father, Admiral?'

'Yes. He is that General Aubrey who made such a din by flogging the Whig candidate at Hinton.'

'How very disgraceful. But surely, to flog a member of parliament he must be a man of considerable estate?'

'Only moderate, ma'am. A moderate little place the other side of Woolhampton; and much encumbered, they tell me. My cousin Hanmer knows him well.'

'And is Captain Aubrey the only son?'

'Yes, ma'am. Though by the bye he has a new mother-in-law: the general married a girl from the village some months ago. She is said to be a fine sprightly young woman.'

'Good heavens, how wicked!' said Mrs Williams. 'But I presume there is no danger? I presume the general is of a certain age?'

'Not at all, ma'am,' said the admiral. 'He cannot be much more than sixty-five. Were I in Captain Aubrey's shoes, I should be most uneasy.'

Mrs Williams brightened. 'Poor young man,' she said placidly. 'I quite feel for him, I protest.'