Chapter 4: Marlow revisited

Sergeant Robert Crawshay, being military trained to keep to a schedule, drew the coach up outside my house promptly at nine. Alas, neither Zinnia nor Becky had been schooled in a like manner and, coupled with their feminine inability to keep track of time, it was well after ten by the time we left Queen Street.
I had left a somewhat aggrieved Matilde behind. She had wanted to travel with us but I persuaded her to spend the day writing letters to send to Chateau Blanchard. I hoped either Patrick Jane, or Krish Armityge, or both, would call in to 18 Queen Street and entertain her in my absence. In fact I had sent my butler to Krish's lodging in Adam Street with a letter asking him to call. Thankfully Gerard De Pardieu, Baron d'Abbeville, saved the day by inviting Matilde and her companion/ladies maid, Violette, to accompany him to the Club Français on the morrow. He promised to introduce Matilde to compatriots of her own age who resided in London. I had no misgivings in permitting Matilde accept his invitation, knowing the Baron would behave with propriety and chaperone the two girls as faithfully as any Spanish duenna.
The club occupied premises in Grosvenor Square, a smart, expensive and decorous part of London, and I had no qualms allowing my ward to visit the establishment.

Matilde's companion/ladies maid, Violette Crozier, also recommended by the baron, had arrived at 18 Queen Street the previous day. The Crozier family had decamped from Paris to London soon after the execution of Louis XVI, as Monsieur Crozier's trade of silversmith had brought him into contact with aristocrats – and to the notice of the Paris mob. Madame Crozier gave birth to Violette nine months after reaching safety in London; presumably Monsieur et Madame Crozier had indulged in a celebratory gallop to mark their escape from La Terreur.

Much to my relief Matilde and Violette appeared to establish an instant rapport.

Becky and Zinnia's chattering of fashion, and of authors, and of plays being staged, soon sent me to join Rob Crawshay on the box of the coach.
I admired his effortless skill in driving a four-in-hand, which took many years practice to achieve the high standard he displayed. I asked how he had such a talent. He explained his father had been a Royal mail coach driver, and had instructed Rob in managing the reins of both four-in-hand and six-in-hand teams of horses from an early age."I intended following my father as a mail coach driver, and at the age of sixteen, under his supervision, had driven the London to Ipswich mail coach, a six horse team, several times."
"I understand the position of a Royal mail coach driver is highly prized, so why did you enlist?"
He gave a rueful smile. "For the usual reason a young man wishes to get as far, and as fast, from his village as possible. A girl claimed her yet unborn child to be mine. I admit to tumbling the lass ... many times ... as had plenty of others. I disputed the paternity of the child but did not stay for the birth to prove or disprove her claim. I took the King's shilling from a recruiting officer at the Royal Standard in Ipswich, the town of my birth, and enlisted in the Seventh Light Dragoons, as they were then titled, twenty years ago."
I calculated from the information Rob was aged thirty six, and had joined the army some eight years before I had. He continued with his story as we rolled along the Great West Road at an exhilarating pace.
"A year after my enlistment the regiment was in Holland fighting the French. The Netherlands is not good cavalry country, it is flat enough but we were always fetlock deep in mud and the going was always heavy. We had more fatalities from Marsh Fever than from the Frogs."

Rob had to concentrate closely on his driving as we negotiated the village of Brentford as there were several lanes and byways bisecting the Great West Road where farm carts and livestock crossed, giving scant consideration to the traffic progressing along the main road. They would have soon shifted themselves if a post horn had blasted them, but only mail coaches were permitted to sound a horn on the public highway, and we had to make do by shouts and gesticulations and weaving between the obstacles. Eventually we had an open road before us and Rob whipped up the team of horses to a fast trot.

"After service in Holland the regiment was posted to Ireland." He grinned in memory, and spoke in a mock Irish accent. "Shure, it was a foin toim Oi had there, begorrah. Many were the toimes Oi delved into a sweet colleen's fairy grotto, so Oi did, bejasus."
I hadn't heard the madge being described as a fairy grotto before, and filed it in my memory with the many other names given to a female's portal of pleasure: the main portal of pleasure that is, as there are two others of course.
Rob reverted to his own accent and continued."We were then sent to reinforce Sir John Moore's army in Spain, and not long after disembarking at Corunna found ourselves rear-guard, as the rest of the army retreated to the port, pursued by Napoleon with the whole of the Grand Army at their heels."
"You were at Corunna when Sir John received his mortal wound?"
"Aye, and a finer, more gracious gentleman I have rarely met. I was part of his burial party, as my troop had been detailed as his gallopers and guard. I confess I shed some tears when we shovelled earth over his noble countenance." He sighed at the memory of the loss of one of Britain's finest generals. "The regiment, or what was left of it ... we had a hundred or so men drowned when their transport vessel foundered off Cornwall on the way home ... was brought up to strength, first in Kent and then in Ireland, where we again availed ourselves of the delightful local girls. The regiment returned to Spain in eighteen twelve, but did little more than outpost and reconnaissance work until the Battle of the Pyrenees. We were not of much use in those mountains, but the Seventh served with distinction at Orthes and Toulouse."
"I was at the former but not the latter, our division being directed towards Bordeaux instead."
"I wish to God we had been sent there also, for after the battle of Toulouse we learned the war had ended while we were still dying in front of the fortifications of the city."
By now we had reached the junction of the Great West Road with the Portsmouth road and I thought it high time we made a stop, both for our own comfort and to rest the team. Rob drove into the Cross Inn, and while I handed the ladies down from the carriage and then led them into the dining room, he had the horses rubbed down and watered.

An hour later and we set off on the last leg of our journey, a matter of some sixteen miles, and I had hopes at arriving at The Bear in Maidenhead by four in the afternoon at the latest. Once again I joined Rob up on the driver's box.
"You said you'd been wounded at Waterloo, yet seem to have full use of all your limbs?"
He laughed, a trifle ruefully I thought. "I was actually wounded at Genappe during the withdrawal from Quatre Bras, but no one, not even those who fought at Quatre Bras and Waterloo, have ever heard of the place."
"During the retreat from Quatre Bras I remember marching through a village which might have been Genappe." I said.
"The Household and Union brigades, assisted by the Seventh, held the village while keeping the pursuing French cavalry at bay, and thereby allowing the safe passage of the left wing of our army. " Rob said, his face animated as he recounted his story. "I was in Major Hodge's squadron, and we fought a regiment of Polish lancers to a standstill. Lancers are damned difficult to get to grips with, and it was the first time we had come across those prickly gentlemen." He grinned crookedly. "Once we had determined a way past the points of their lances they were easy meat. Unfortunately we had to learn the hard way how to outwit them, and I got a lance head in my right arm during my education. Now I cannot hold a sword properly in my right hand, although I can manage reins, and women, well enough." He grinned. "I am actually left handed, and both write and shoot with my left, and can deliver a killing blow with a sword held in that hand. However the army had trained me to use my right arm for delivering a sword cut, and when the regiment returned to England I was discharged." He stared ahead, a look of sadness on his face, which after a moment brightened. "The Colonel-in-Chief of the Seventh is the Earl of Uxbridge, or Marquess of Anglesey as he is now, and he gave twenty guineas to every man of the regiment discharged through wounds. My troop captain, Rupert de Villiers, another fine and generous gentleman, also gave me ten guineas so I had enough money to start as a self-employed cab driver."
"You were still with your regiment at Waterloo, not in the rear of the battle line with the sawbones?"
He nodded. "My wound was nothing compared to some my comrades suffered. I thought at first it was just a gash, which the surgeon stitched up in no time at all. Later, at Mont Saint Jean, when I used my sword in my right hand I found it weak, lacking the strength to hold the hilt firm enough to slice off a Frenchie's head." Rob guffawed. "I soon changed hands and severed many heads, and although my failure to abide by the manual of arms would have had me flogged under normal conditions the battle of Waterloo could not be considered in any way normal." His face filled with sorrow. "Besides, we had few officers left in the regiment to bring me to book for failure to comply with regimental orders."

We were now traversing Hounslow Heath, and I recognised the stand of spruce and larch which hid the duelling ground to the right of the road; the place where I had shot dead Jarvis Braxton-Clark. I had not known at the time he was married to Caroline, the woman with whom I had made passionate love the night before. We rode in silence for the next few miles, both Rob and I thinking on our past lives.

The clock on St Luke's church tower showed ten minutes after four as we pulled into the forecourt of The Bear at Maidenhead. I escorted the ladies into the hostelry and booked two rooms for two nights, while Rob unloaded our luggage. He then drove the coach into the livery stables and the ostlers helped him unharness the horses. While he saw to their comfort I saw to the comfort of the humans, and ordered dinner for the four of us.
"Do you intend the coachman to eat with us, Jack?" Zinnia's question took me by surprise.
"Yes, of course. Rob Crawshay is a fine fellow who fought for his country and shed his blood at Waterloo. Why should he not join us?"
"Your invitation may cause him some embarrassment. He may feel uncomfortable dining with those whom he might consider gentry." She had made a valid point, and I amended the order to three dinners in the dining room, and a meal to be set up in the Inn's kitchen for Rob.
Before dinner Zinnia wrote a letter to the Shelleys to inform them of our intended visit the following morning, and gave the reason for the visit 'to discuss an important matter of authentication'. She assumed they would understand the purpose of our call on them, and depending on how they reacted to her letter — they might say they were indisposed, or going to be away all day, or just fail to respond — would give us some idea of their guilt. A post boy was dispatched to Marlow, some six miles upriver from Maidenhead, as soon as the letter had been sealed, and we fully expected a reply by the time we had finished dinner, which we did.

Zinnia had addressed the letter to Mary Shelley, who wrote back to say they would be delighted to meet us, especially as they would be leaving in a week's time to travel to Europe. The damp weather of England was causing Percy distress and effecting his health, and they hoped to settle in a drier, warmer clime.
"It would seem Mary at least had no hand in the plagiarism." Zinnia said. "She is a dear sweet woman, and neither I nor Becky could ever think she would be party to such an action."
I kept my own counsel. I agreed Mary Shelley was a dear sweet woman, but she was absolutely besotted with her husband, and any woman would act out of character if asked to do so by a husband she adored.

The following day we arrived in Marlow at about ten in the morning. Rob pulled the coach up outside Albion House, allowing Zinnia, Becky and me to disembark before driving to the Swan Inn to await our return. It had been decided I was to remain in the background to any discussion, my presence serving as a warning should the matter not be resolved to our satisfaction then further, more robust action would follow.
Before Zinnia could pull the doorbell of Albion House the door opened and Mary Shelley, her step-sister Claire Clairemont, and a female I did not know, but who was exceedingly easy on the eye, came out. Each bore a child in her arms; fortunately all three babes seemed to be fast asleep.
"We are taking the children for a walk to Marlow Lock. There is a refreshment kiosk adjacent and we can spend a pleasant time watching the boats navigating the lock." Mary informed us. She turned to Becky. "Percy is in his study, and bids you join him and discuss the differences between you. He thinks it best only you are at the meeting, and Zinnia and Major Greenaway are invited to accompany us ladies."
I was most perturbed at this announcement. "Shall my sister be chaperoned while in your husband's company, Madam?"
She answered, with some asperity. "I assure you your sister's reputation will not be compromised as our housemaid is presently in the house." She continued in a more friendly a tone of voice. "It does you credit you are so sensible to a lady's reputation, but you need not fear any aspersions being cast on your sister's."
Claire Clairemont muttered something that I couldn't hear but Becky did, and the look she threw Miss Clairemont would have felled an ox.

Becky agreed to the meeting with Shelley and the rest of us moved off towards the lock. The third female was introduced to Zinnia and me as Elise Foggi, a Swiss miss employed as the Shelleys nursemaid. Zinnia gave me a knowing glance which informed me this was the same Swiss, or Italian, lass Shelley had lusted after when in Geneva in 1816. Fact of the matter was that the child being carried by Claire Clairemont, Allegra, was said to be the love child of Byron, or maybe Shelley. Opinion differed as to who the father really was, but as Fanny Imlay, a half-sister of Mary Shelley, had committed suicide over a failed love affair with Shelley, and was rumoured to be with child when she died, one can see there was a deal of 'rascality' rampant in the Shelley orbit.

I had no wish to be among a bunch of women clacking like hens, with the chance of all three offspring wakening to scream their lungs out at the same time, so made an excuse to repair to the Swan Inn, where I sat and talked with Rob.
"I thought you would prefer the company of those four quite agreeable looking ladies to that of an old soldier, Major."
I saw the gleam of mirth in his eye. "True, all four are most comely, but I have something to discuss with you."
He finished his tankard and wiped his mouth, then looked expectantly at me. Robert Crawshay was a man to whom I had instantly warmed. He reminded me of Woodrow Allen in many respects, and I confess the loss of Woody still bore heavily on my soul. I would probably never find a comrade and companion as close to me as Woodrow had been — a friend since my schooldays and a brother- in- arms in the Sixty Ninth Foot, which we had joined on the same day — but I was confident Rob Crawshay would come close enough.
"I should like to engage you as both manservant and coachman." I saw him begin to reply and held up my hand to stop him. "When I say 'manservant' I mean more of a companion, who would also act as a valet, wait at my table, and in fact turn his hand to anything. My last such employee was foully murdered, but his death has been avenged. Woodrow Allen and I considered ourselves more than master and servant – I would like to think you and I could reach a similar understanding."
He sat silently for some time before answering. "I can tell, by the way you address me and in the way you treat the servants you meet, you are a fair and considerate man. However I have been my own master since leaving the army, and being at another's behest would be galling after these years. That being said I do miss the comradery of military life, and now live a solitary life when working and at rest. There is also the fact my diet now consists largely of pease pudding, which may be nourishing and cheap but can be quite unappetizing over time, and to sit down to a meal prepared by a proper cook would be welcome." His face showed his indecision.
"I tell you what, Rob. After our return to London tomorrow take time to consider the offer, then present yourself at eighteen Queen Street when you make a decision. Even if you decide not to take up my proposition I will still require you as a coach man from time to time."
"Thank you Major. That is a fair deal, and I will do as you suggest."
We had another tankard of ale each and spoke no more of the offer of employment but rather swapped anecdotes of our time in Spain and at Waterloo.
The time passed pleasantly and it was with some surprise I looked at my pocket watch to learn we had been at Marlow for nigh on three hours. It was then I noticed Becky leave the Shelleys house. She stood by the door motionless, and from where I was sitting it seemed if she was weeping. I stood up and she saw me and waved, then walked towards me, her face wreathed in smiles. I must have mistaken her tears for those of joy.
"Percy has agreed Mary and l shall collaborate on the second edition of Frankenstein'. When it is published in about a year's time it will bear both our names." She said, obviously deliriously happy with the result of her discussion with Shelley.