Black Gold (37 page)
“Leave Charlie with me. Go back to his mother. With time and your help, she may see what she needs to do with her life.”
“I hope so.” Eyes brimming with tears, the old nurse embraced the boy. “God be with you, Charlie.”
“Thank you, Betty,” he said carefully, and walked with her to the door.
***
It was noon and the sun had broken through the clouds when the coach finally set out for London. Anne, Paul, and Charlie sat inside. Georges rode outside as guard, a musket resting by his knee. Harriet Ware had come to wave good-bye. She and Anne spoke for a few minutes while the coach was being loaded. Sir Harry's death had given Harriet pain, but also a sense of relief. She had decided to stay in Bath at least through the present season.
As the coach rolled through the lush green countryside of Wiltshire, Paul drew a letter from his pocket and handed it to Anne. “Madame Gagnon forwarded it to me this morning. From Comtesse Marie in Paris.”
Settling back with the letter, Anne learned that Sylvie de Chanteclerc was still under the comtesse's care at Chateau Beaumont. Anne paused at the final paragraph:
Yesterday, though, I noticed improvement. Michou has joined those who take turns attending Sylvie every hour of the day. When I entered the room, she was looking over Michou's shoulder while she sketched birds feeding outside the window. Today, I saw Sylvie with crayon and pad, sitting next to Michou who was teaching her how to draw the birds. She was smiling! My heart leaped for joy.
Anne looked up from the letter. “There's a glimmer of hope for Sylvie.” She leaned toward Paul. “Don't chide yourself that you couldn't bring Captain Fitzroy back. That lay beyond your control. You've done what duty required of you in Bath.” She nodded toward Charlie, who had fallen asleep, the book in his lap, his head resting on Paul's shoulder. “And you've gone beyond the call of duty for him and for Jeffery.”
“The baron will be disappointed but I can cope with that.”
Something else was bothering him, she sensed.
He began anxiously searching her face. “When will you return to Paris? I'll keep this coach for the trip from London to Dover. Will you ride with me?” He paused, opened his mouth as if to say more, then looked away.
Anne grew concerned. “I beg your pardon, Paul. May I ask what's on your mind?”
He flushed with embarrassment. “Anne Cartier's on my mind. I can think of little else. It's almost a year since we met at Wimbledon in the Quaker's parlor. The sight of you brought back memories of our summers together at Chateau Beaumont before I went off to the American war. In hindsight, I believe I may have lost my heart to you already then.” He leaned forward and took her hand. “Will you marry me, Anne?”
Anne's throat tightened. She spoke in a whisper. “We need to come to an understanding.”
In response to a nudge, Paul glanced down at Charlie awake now, who pointed to a picture in his book. Paul examined the picture with a show of interest that satisfied Charlie, then turned to Anne. At first his voice quavered, then grew strong. “I want you to be my companion, friend, lover. I want us to walk through life together, arm in arm.”
Old anxieties rushed to her mind. “How much does it matter to you what others, particularly your relatives, will think of you marrying a commoner, an actress, a Protestant?”
“Some of them despaired of me long ago.” He smiled wryly. “This will confirm their worst fears. I've taken leave of my senses, they will say. I've dishonored the family's name and foolishly imperiled my career.” His chin rose a little higher. The smile vanished. “But enlightened men and women will judge me, and you, on our merits. And that's what matters.”
Anne fell tensely silent. Her love for Paul clamored for their union, but she was less sure than he that his family's predictable opposition to their union could be so easily disregarded. And, her spirit still bristled at the unjust laws and conventions of marriage. Now was a crucial moment, full of danger and risk. But, after knowing Paul for a year, often in circumstances that severely tested his character, she believed she could trust him to be fair and true, as well as loving.
She gazed at him tenderly. “I shall marry you, Paul, first at my church in Hampstead and then at yours in Paris.”
“Agreed, with all my heart.” His face brightened. A great weight seemed to lift from his chest.
For a moment she entertained an afterthought. “I wonder if Baron Breteuil would allow you and Georges to stay for a few days at my grandfather's home in Hampstead. He would enjoy talking about guns and horsesâand getting to know you better. I need time to gather my things. And, we must speak to the vicar at Saint John's.”
“The baron would gladly agree to the delay, I shall assume, and Georges and I would be delighted.” Suddenly, Charlie stirred, shifted his position. Paul put an arm around his thin shoulders and gazed out the window at men and horses turning the fertile soil, rich with the promise of spring. A look of contentment came over his face.
Anne sat back, adjusting easily to the rocking motion of the coach, and to the prospects of a new life in Paris.
Bath in 1786 was a city of some 30,000 inhabitants. Since Roman times it had been a health resort, noted for its mineral hot springs. In the eighteenth century it developed into Britain's premier spa, offering in addition to its water a full program of amusements: gambling, music, theater, sport. Affluent visitors came from all over Europe. The 1780s were a period of robust growth. Edith Sitwell offers an elegant introduction to the eighteenth-century city in her
Bath
, London: National Trust, 1987. For a more scholarly treatment, read Peter Borsay,
The Image of Georgian Bath, 1700-2000: Towns, Heritage, and History
, New York: Oxford University Press, 2000. Walter W. Ison's
The Georgian Buildings of Bath from 1700 to 1830
, London: Faber & Faber, 1990, is a rich source of architectural plans, illustrations, and maps.
Combe Park in
Black Gold
is a thinly fictional representation of Prior Park, one of Bath's greatest landmarks. Robert Allen [1693-1764], a wealthy, self-made business man and organizer of Britain's postal system, conceived a house in the Palladian style and placed it adjacent to his quarries of Bath stone. It was completed by the middle of the eighteenth century.
In the nineteenth century the wings of the house were much enlarged and the central building received the addition of an italianate stairway to the portico on the north front. Sir Harry's tennis hall in
Black Gold
is on the site of a gymnasium, added to Prior Park in the 1830s.
The combe [rhymes with room] at Prior Park is a steep narrow valley extending from the ridge, a short distance above the country house, down to the Avon. In this valley Allen laid out an English landscape garden, then one of the finest in the country. It commands a splendid view of the city to the north.
Prior Park during Allen's lifetime was the center of a lively social and cultural life. Among his many guests were the poet Alexander Pope and the novelist Henry Fielding. Following Allen's death, his property passed to his niece, Gertrude, who sold the furnishings and leased out the buildings. In 1785 she moved back and was living there at the time of
Black Gold.
Subsequently, Prior Park has had a checkered history, including two disastrous fires, the significant alteration of its interior spaces, and the neglect of the park. Since the 1830s its buildings have housed a Roman Catholic school, presently Prior Park College, which has beautifully restored the main building. Allen's quarry lies buried beneath the cricket field. The National Trust owns the park and has undertaken to bring it back to its former glory.
***
In the eighteenth century, despite sporadic condemnation by magistrates, bare-knuckle boxing became a popular sport and adopted the rules and other conventions that are found in the “battle” between Lord Jeff and Tom Futrell.
In the 1780s the sport also became fashionable and its champions, such as Dan Mendoza, were celebrities. Futrell
did
fight in the presence of the Prince of Wales and many other dignitaries. Victor in twenty matches, he was beaten by John Jackson, who resembles the fictional Lord Jeff in his quality of decent, modest gentleman, as well as in his physical strength and skillful style of fighting. The chief difference between them lay in their skin color and social condition.
Lord Jeff also bears a physical resemblance to Tom Molineaux, a freed American slave and a giant of heroic strength, who fought for the British championship in 1810. For a popular account of the sport, see Bohun Lynch,
The Prize Ring
, London: Country Life, 1925.
At the time of
Black Gold
there were 35,000 blacks living in London and several thousand more in Liverpool, Bristol, and Bath. Many were slaves, or fugitive slaves, or freed from slavery. Most worked as grooms or domestic servants, sometimes for distinguished personalities, such as Dr. Samuel Johnson. Despite the Common Law's principle that a slave becomes free the moment he lands in Britain, the courts continued to treat slaves as property and affirm the right of owners to recover fugitives.
For an overview of the transatlantic slave trade, read Hugh Thomas,
The Story of the Atlantic Slave Trade, 1440-1870.
New York: Simon & Schuster, 1997. Slavery in Britain is discussed by Gretchen Gerzina,
Black London: Life Before Emancipation
, New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 1995, and by James Walvin,
Black Ivory: A History of British Slavery
, London: HarperCollins, 1992.
***
Gainsborough's painting of Elizabeth Linley and her brother Tom (1768) is one of the treasures of the Clark Art Institute in Williamstown, Massachusetts. In 1784 the painter sold it to John Sackville, the Third Duke of Dorset. Poetic license has placed it in Harriet's apartment. In 1787 it was most likely in the ducal residence at Knole Park, Sevenoaks, Kent, unless its owner brought it with him to Paris, where he was British ambassador to the French court.
***
Gambling was a scourge of eighteenth-century society. Mr. John Twycross and Richard Wetenall did in fact operate a gambling house on Alfred Street near the Upper Assembly Rooms. On April 11, 1787, the magistrates closed down the house and brought the two men to trial. They were convicted with great fanfare and initially fined 1800 pounds. Powerful hands worked on their behalf behind the scenes, and the fines were reduced to 550 pounds. Whether they resumed their profession is not known, but gambling continued unabated in Bath.
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