The Meaning of Night (32 page)

other.

I walked back to my desk, leaving my door slightly ajar. At length, I heard the

Senior Partner’s door open and the muffled sound of conversation as the two men passed

along the passage to the head of the stairs.

‘I’m obliged, Tredgold.’

‘Not at all, your Lordship,’ I heard Mr Tredgold reply. ‘Your instructions in this

matter are much appreciated, and shall be acted upon without delay.’

I sprang from my desk and went out into the passage.

‘Oh, pardon me,’ I said to the Senior Partner. ‘I did not realize.’

Mr Tredgold beamed at me. Lord Tansor’s face was expressionless at first, but

then he began to regard me more closely.

‘You seem familiar to me,’ he said.

‘This is Mr Edward Glapthorn,’ said Mr Tredgold. ‘The photographer.’

‘Ah, the photographer. Very good. Excellent work, Glapthorn. Excellent.’ Then

he turned to the Senior Partner, nodded his good-bye, and immediately descended the

stairs with short rapid steps. In the next moment he was gone.

‘I notice it is a fine day outside, Edward,’ said Mr Tredgold, smiling radiantly.

‘Perhaps you might like to join me for a little stroll?’

V

In the Temple Gardens

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Once away from the office, and having entered the Temple Gardens, Mr Tredgold

began to outline, in his usual circuitous and abstract way, a ‘little problem’ he had been

presented with.

‘Tell me, Edward,’ he began, ‘how extensive is your genealogical knowledge?’

‘I have some slight acquaintance with the subject,’ I replied.

‘I find, my dear Edward, that you have some slight acquaintance with most

subjects.’ He beamed, took out his red silk handkerchief, and proceeded to polish his

eye-glass as we walked.

‘Baronies by Writ, for instance. What can you tell me about them?’

‘I believe that such dignities are so called because they describe the old practice

of summoning men of distinction to sit in the King’s Parliament by the issuing of a

writ.’?

‘Correct!’ beamed Mr Tredgold. ‘Now, by several statements of law laid down

since Stuart times, these Baronies are held to be heritable by heirs general – that is to say,

through females as well as males. The present Lord Tansor’s peerage is just such a

Barony. Perhaps’, he continued, ‘it would be interesting to you, from an antiquarian point

of view, to have a brief account of Lord Tansor’s noble line?’

I said that nothing would give me greater pleasure, and begged him to proceed.

‘Very well – pray stop me if any of this is familiar to you – in the reign of Henry

III, Lord Maldwin Duport was a person of power and influence. Of Breton extraction, his

grandfather having come over with the Conqueror, he was memorably described in one of

the chronicles as “a man of iyrn and blud” – iron and blood. A dangerous and belligerent

man, we may perhaps assume, but one whose services were much in demand in those

uncertain and violent times. He was a great landowner, already a baron by tenure, holding

lands in Buckinghamshire, Bedfordshire, Warwickshire, and Northamptonshire, in

addition to other properties in the North and the West Country.

‘In December, 1264, Maldwin was summoned to attend the rebel Parliament

called by Simon de Montfort in the King’s name – Henry himself, along with his son,

Prince Edward, being then under lock and key following the Battle of Lewes. Maldwin

was subsequently summoned to Parliament in 1283, 1290, and 1295, and his successors

continued to be called into the next century and beyond. In the course of time, their

constant presence in Parliament was interpreted as constituting a peerage dignity deriving

from the 1264 Parliament, thus giving the Barony senior precedence, along with those of

Despencer and de Ros, in the English peerage.

‘The Lord Maldwin’s principal estate was the castle, or caput, of Tansor, in

Northamptonshire – a few miles to the south of the present Lord Tansor’s seat of

Evenwood – and so was summoned to Parliament as Malduino Portuensi de Tansor. Of

course the family has suffered many vicissitudes of fortune – especially during the

Commonwealth; but the Duports have generally married judiciously, and by the time of

George, the twenty-second Baron, at the beginning of the last century, they had risen to

that position of eminence and influence they still enjoy.

‘This position, however, is now under threat – at least that is how the present Lord

Tansor interprets matters. The absence of an heir – I mean of a lineal heir, whether male

or female – has caused him great concern; and it is this lack, and the consequences that

may flow from it, that he feels may signal a decline in the family’s fortunes. His fear is

that the title and property could pass to a branch of the family in which, to put things in

his own terms, the qualities that have been so conspicuously demonstrated by successive

generations of his ancestors are lacking. His Lordship has certainly been singularly

unlucky. As you may know, the only son from his first marriage died when still a child,

and his present union has so far been without issue.’

He took out his handkerchief; but, rather than cleaning his eye-glass, used it

instead to mop his forehead. I noticed that he had coloured a little, and so asked if he

would prefer to move out of the sun, which, though low in the sky, was unusually intense

for the time of year.

‘By no means,’ he replied. ‘I like to feel the light of heaven on my face. Now

then, where was I? Yes. In a word, then, it appears that there is, at present, ahem, no male

heir of the direct line to Evenwood, which raises the distinct possibility that the title will

pass to a member of one of the collateral branches of the family, an outcome to which his

Lordship is deeply opposed.’

‘There are legitimate collateral claimants, then?’ I asked.

‘Oh yes,’ said Mr Tredgold. ‘His cousin and secretary, Mr Paul Carteret,? and, in

due course, Mr Carteret’s daughter. But, as I say, his Lordship’s aversion to collateral

succession is – well, entrenched and immovable. It is perhaps irrational, because the

Barony has reverted to collateral relatives on a number of occasions in its history, but

there it is. Come, I am a little tired of walking. Let us sit.’

Taking my arm, Mr Tredgold drew me to a bench in the corner of the Gardens.

‘There may yet, of course, be time for a satisfactory outcome to Lord Tansor’s

predicament in the normal course of events, as it were – it is considered possible by Lord

Tansor’s physician that her Ladyship might still be capable of conceiving an heir. I

believe these things have been known. But his Lordship is not prepared to put his trust in

Nature, and, after considering the matter carefully for several years, has finally come to a

decision. He has wisely rejected divorce, against which I strongly advised, there being no

other grounds than the lack of an heir, and it would go hard on his Lordship’s standing

and reputation to behave like some Eastern potentate and take such a step. He

understands this, and so has taken another tack.’

Pausing once again, he looked up at the radiant blue of the sky through the

branches of the tree under which we were seated and shielded his eyes with his hand

against the sun.

‘Another tack?’

‘Indeed. A somewhat unusual one. The adoption of an heir of his own choosing.’

I cannot describe what I felt on hearing these words. An heir of his own choosing?

I was Lord Tansor’s heir, of that I was sure. But because I could not prove my true

identity to the world, my place was now to be taken by another. Struggling hard to

maintain some appearance of composure, I began to experience the most peculiar

sensation, as if I was falling through great darkness into infinite space.

‘Are you well, Edward? You look a little pale.’

‘Perfectly well, thank you. Please go on.’

‘The firm has been charged with the task of modifying the provisions of Lord

Tansor’s will, by the addition of a codicil. The baronial title, of course, is a separate

matter: it must go whither the law dictates, to the next heir in line of succession, whether

direct or collateral; which of course means that Mr Paul Carteret, through his Duport

mother, may, as things presently stand, become the twenty-sixth Baron Tansor. I hope I

am not being too abstruse?’

‘By no means.’

‘Good. I wish you to be aware of the situation, as it pertains to his Lordship’s

present intentions. You do understand, don’t you Edward?’

It was such a curious question that I did not well know how to answer, but simply

nodded mutely.

‘Good again. The title, then, is not in Lord Tansor’s gift. But what his Lordship

possesses materially – including Evenwood, the greatest and noblest of all his

possessions – is his to bestow, subject to certain legal procedures, on whomsoever he

wishes – as is, in a specific sense, the Duport name. He has therefore taken a decision of

great consequence. He has separated the baronial dignity, conferred by the writ that

summoned Lord Maldwin Duport to Parliament in 1264, from the material interests the

family has subsequently garnered to itself, resolving that the future title-holder will

inherit little but the dignity. His Lordship desires that all the entailed property he himself

inherited, as well as those possessions specifically bequeathed to him by his father,

should be left to his nominated heir.’

‘And has Lord Tansor made his nomination?’

‘He has.’

Mr Tredgold paused. His china-blue eyes met mine.

‘It is to be Mr Phoebus Rainsford Daunt, the poet. You may have seen the reviews

of his new volume.? It has, I believe, been very well received.’

Mr Tredgold was explaining the Daunt family’s connexion with the Duports

through the present Mrs Daunt, but his words went unheeded. There are moments in life

when one begins to discern, it may be dimly and uncertainly at first, the lineaments of

deliberate design in what had once appeared random and fortuitous. This was such a

moment. What had been taken from me by Daunt’s youthful treachery, I now saw, had

been the precursor of greater loss to come, of which he was the unconscious agent. I was

mesmerised by the bitter humour of it all, and could not suppress a mirthless smile.

‘Is something amusing you, Edward?’ asked Mr Tredgold.

‘By no means,’ I replied, quickly assuming an expression of concern, which

indeed I did not need to manufacture.

‘As I was saying, Lord Tansor intends, by breaking the entail, that Mr Daunt will

succeed to the possession of Evenwood, and of all the other property he inherited from

his father, on condition of his assuming the Duport name and arms on his Lordship’s

death.’

‘And is it in Lord Tansor’s power to do all this?’

‘Assuredly. The property he inherited from his father is his to dispose of as he

wishes. It will be be necessary for his Lordship to sign a deed of recovery for the entailed

property and enrol it in Chancery before he can bequeath this portion of his inheritance to

Mr Daunt; but this is a relatively straightforward procedure, and is indeed already in

hand.’?

The air had taken on a slight chill as the mid-afternoon sun began to wane.

We had been nearly two hours in the Gardens – two hours that changed my life

forever.

‘Mr Phoebus Daunt’s prospects are rosy indeed,’ I said, as carelessly as I could,

though I was burning inside with anxiety and anger. ‘A most fortunate young man.

Already a distinguished poet, and with expectations before too long of succeeding to

Lord Tansor’s wealth and possessions, and to Evenwood itself.’

‘Expectations, yes,’ said Mr Tredgold, ‘though one might perhaps wish to qualify

them. Pro tempore, and until the codicil is executed, Mr Daunt remains the prospective

heir of his Lordship’s property. But Lord Tansor is fit and robust, his present union may

yet be productive of a child; and of course the birth of an heir of the blood, unlikely

though that is, would change everything, and would then bring about a revocation of the

proposed provisions. And who knows what else the future may hold? Nothing is certain.’

He gave me another most curious look, as if he wished me to understand

something he was unable to say explicitly. For a moment or two we sat looking at each

other in awkward silence. Then he stood up and smiled.

‘But you are right, of course. As things presently stand, you may say that Mr

Phoebus Daunt is indeed a most fortunate young man. He has already received ample

demonstrations of Lord Tansor’s regard for him, and soon he is to be formally anointed,

if I may so put it, as his Lordship’s legal heir. When the day comes, if it should come, Mr

Daunt, though he will not be the twenty-sixth Baron Tansor, will be a very powerful man

indeed.’

Mr Tredgold continued to speak, but my thoughts were elsewhere. If I failed to

prove I was Lord Tansor’s lawfully begotten heir, what would then remain? Desolation

and despair, mitigated only by the bitter solace of revenge. Then I would have a great

work before me: to deny him what I had been denied, using all necessary means, at

whatever cost.

We left the Gardens, and began to make our way back to Paternoster-row.