“A scant two years, yet I am well and settled. I hope I shall not move again soon.” Henry had taken this house after the death of Eliza, perhaps to escape the sad associations of his previous address. I knew that he would move again—soon. With his bank collapse, he would lose this house and its contents, leaving London forever. No more dinner parties, theater outings, and visits from his country relations; he would become a clergyman, and always be short of money. It was a strange feeling to know his future: distracting and a little melancholy.
“Ah, the others must be here.” He turned at the sound of voices in the hall. “A very quiet party; I hope that will suit. Just Mr. and Mrs. Tilson; they are my neighbors and practically family to me, my London family; my own is so country-bound. Except my sister Jane. She would live here if she could.”
“How singular,” I said. “And why is that?”
He seemed surprised. “She enjoys observing people. And here there is such a variety.”
“Did you ever think of making a home for her here after the death of your wife?” I asked, something I was curious about, but too personal a question for someone I had just met. I added: “But that is presumption on my part; she may well have her own household to look after.”
“She is unmarried,” he said. “But yes, she lives with my mother and other sister in Hampshire, so she is well settled as households go. I would not think of uprooting her, and they would not stand for it. Yet she comes here quite often; she will be here soon. Perhaps you would like to meet her.”
I bowed my head, hoping he meant it, but the Tilsons walked in before I could answer.
ABOUT HENRY’S AGE, THEY SEEMED OLDER. MR. TILSON WAS placid, ruddy, and obese. It amazed me, when we sat down to dinner, how much he ate. One moment, his plate was full and the next empty, but his progress was stately, never hasty or greedy. Mrs. Tilson was lean, pale, and worn-looking, as I knew the veteran of eleven live births. Her youngest would be about two.
At meeting us, they showed neither coolness nor warmth: my first experience with what I would later think of as standard English-gentry manners, my first sense that Henry was not like other people.
He and Liam carried the conversation at dinner. Drawn out by Henry, Liam told self-deprecating stories about our voyage from Jamaica: seasickness, storms, a narrow escape from pirates, our fleecing at the hands of innkeepers on the road from Bristol, where we had docked, our astonishment at the size and magnificence of London. As he went on, relaxed, earnest, almost na?ve, yet funny too, I realized how badly I’d underestimated Liam’s improvisational abilities.
Dinner was in two courses in the Georgian style, a table full of assorted dishes from which people served themselves whatever was nearest, until they had eaten to a stop. Then the manservant cleared the table and produced another set of dishes, similar to the first, except less meat-heavy and accompanied by white wine instead of red. The only person who drank a lot was Mr. Tilson, though it had no effect that I could see except making him redder.
After the second course was removed, a bottle of port and small dishes of dried fruits and nuts appeared, and we went on sitting. In the middle of a discussion on whether another war with the United States would be necessary—Henry and Mr. Tilson thought so; Liam was arguing against it—Mrs. Tilson gave me a fleeting look and stood up. It was time to withdraw and leave the men with the alcohol.
“We will let the gentlemen determine the course of peace or war,” Mrs. Tilson said, inclining her head and gliding out of the room, while I followed in her wake, and we were back in the drawing room, where I had started the evening.
She seated herself on one of the side chairs near the hearth, and I did the same.
The pause that followed felt long. She had said almost nothing at dinner, leaving me with no idea of what sort of person she was, or where I ought to start a conversation. Worse, I had no idea what sort of person I was. As Dr. Rachel Katzman, there were a million things I would have loved to ask her about: childbirth practices, natal care, hygiene, pediatric morbidity. As Miss Mary Ravenswood, I sat with my hands folded, all my words dried up.
“Your brother is quite droll, is he not?” Mrs. Tilson said. I wasn’t sure this was a good thing, but her little closed-mouth smile reassured me. “I have not been so well entertained since I gave up the theater.”
“What do you mean, you gave it up?”
“Simply that I stopped going.”
“And why was that?”
“It began to seem too frivolous. Incompatible with my duty as a Christian.”
I knew Jane Austen was friendly with Mrs. Tilson, who was a fervent Evangelical; I also knew Jane Austen, though serious about religion, went to the theater whenever possible. “I hope you will not think worse of me, madam, if I confess I am excited about the prospect of a little theatergoing, after so many years without the opportunity.”
“Dear Miss Ravenswood! You must enjoy your time in town. To be sure, you must.”
“And yet, not neglect my duties to my Savior,” I mumbled.
Mrs. Tilson brightened. “We read the Gospel and talk about it, my sisters and my older daughters and I, every week.” She added, “Perhaps you would care to join us?”
“Very much.” I wondered if she was being polite, or if this would actually happen.
We smiled at each other. Before I could think of how to change the subject, she said:
“Did I understand Dr. Ravenswood correctly, that this is your first visit to England? That you have lived all your lives in Jamaica?”
“It is my first. But my brother studied at Edinburgh, and went to London once or twice.”
“Of course, the Atlantic crossing was so dangerous.” The long war with France, which had complicated every kind of travel beyond the British Isles, had ended only that summer; people still seemed to be struggling to adjust to the notion of peace. She glanced at me; I felt the unspoken question. “Yet your parents did not think the climate unhealthy?”
“Our coffee plantation was in the mountains; it is temperate.” I paused. “Or is it the moral climate you refer to?”
“Miss Ravenswood!” She looked away. “I intended no disrespect.”
“I am grateful for your frankness.” She had given me my opening. “I must explain. My father, when still a young man, inherited from a cousin little known to him, and set out to see the property. What he saw convinced him to devote his life to improving the lives of those slaves that had fallen to his charge, and to their gradual manumission. It was the work of years. After his death, my brother and I resolved to sell the land and leave. If you know of life on that island, you can imagine my father’s efforts did not endear him to the other proprietors.”
“Indeed.” Her reaction was everything I’d hoped for; she had grown very still and attentive. “Mr. Austen did not tell us that.”
“We have tried to do it as quietly as such a thing could be done. We do not seek the world’s notice, nor fear its disapprobation. And yet, such a step—”
She took one of my hands in hers and looked into my eyes. “Miss Ravenswood! I understand perfectly.”
The door from the dining room opened and the gentlemen filed in. Conversation became general, and tea soon appeared. Mrs. Tilson, de facto hostess, presided.
“Will you take sugar?” she asked me.