Free Jane and the Wandering Eye by Stephanie Barron Page A

Leigh-Perrot was Mrs. Austen’s brother. He added the surname Per rot to Leigh in order to inherit the Perrot fortune. Although his principal seat was Scarlets, an estate of his wife’s in Berkshire, he spent half of every year in Paragon Buildings, Bath, for his health.—
Editor’s note.
8 Jane refers here to the most celebrated dandy of this period, George Bryan “Beau” Brummell (1778-1840), who set the trend in male dress.—
Editor’s note.
9 According to historian Roy Porter, both Maria and Richard Cosway indulged in the vogue for hypnotism, and subscribed to the lectures of John B. de Mainauduc, a pupil of the French Dr. Mesmer (1734-1815), who founded “animal magnetism.”—
Editors note.
10 Napoleon’s wholesale confiscation of great works of art throughout Europe, and their assemblage in Paris, had occasioned Maria Cosway’s project of recording for posterity every item in the newly opened Louvre. She embarked on the effort in late 1801. A proficient artist in her own right, Mrs. Cosway was at this time estranged from her husband. She did not return to England until 1817, when Cosway was in his dotage.—
Editor’s note.
11 While in Paris in the 1790s, Maria Cosway enchanted no less a personage than Thomas Jefferson, who is thought to have fallen (platonically) in love with her. The two corresponded for years after both had returned to their respective countries.—
Editor’s note.
12 The Prince of Wales illegally married the Catholic and twice-widowed Maria Fitzherbert in 1786. Ten years later he married his cousin, Caroline of Brunswick, who became the Princess of Wales. The Waleses were notoriously incompatible, and Mrs. Fitzherbert remained the Prince’s favorite.—
Editor’s note.
13 Carlton House was the Prince of Wales’s London residence. It now forms part of the British Museum.—
Editor’s note.
14 Astley’s Amphitheatre, which Jane visited on several occasions in the company of her brother Edward and his children, was a London riding arena that specialized in mounted shows, rather like a circus.—
Editor’s note.
15 George Engleheart (1750-1829) made a virtual profession of eye portrait painting, and broadened the fashion from the nobility of England down to the gentry and eventually, to the middle class.—
Editor’s note.

Chapter 4
The Eye in Question
     
    12 December 1804, cont.
~
    T HE E ARL OF S WITHIN, IN CONVERSE WITH M R. H UGH Conyngham! Were they, then, acquainted? And was it the actor alone who had drawn Lord Swithin in such haste to the Pump Room?
    I stood as though rooted to the broad plank floor, transfixed by a shaft of wintry light. It fell directly upon the Earl’s fair head, as though in benediction, and revealed him as a gentleman not above the middle height, but powerful in his frame and general air of address—a commanding figure, much hardened by sport and exercise, and tailored to within an inch of its life. Lord Swithin’s countenance might be said to be handsome, for there was not an ill-made feature in it, but for the coldness that lurked in his bright blue gaze and the suggestion of bitterness about the mouth. This was not a man to be lightly crossed—and I could not wonder that Lady Desdemona had fled to Bath, rather than brook the tide of rage occasioned by her refusal.
    “Jane!” Eliza hissed. “Pray turn your eyes away fromhis lordship, or we shall both be detected in the grossest vulgarity!”
    But I was insensible of Eliza’s anxious looks, so compelling were the Earl and his interlocutor. With heads drawn close together and a flow of speech that suggested some urgency of matter, the two men
must
be canvassing the murder in Laura Place.
    “Eliza,” I murmured, “is the Earl likely to recollect your acquaintance, so many years since in Bengal?”
    “I should think not,” she replied stoutly. “It was his mother, you know, who called upon mine. I do not think he was even born before we quitted India entirely.”
    “That is very well.