Stancliffe's Hotel
Charlotte Brontë
STANCLIFFE’S HOTEL
Edited by
Heather Glen
Contents
Dramatis Personae
Stancliffe’s Hotel
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CHARLOTTE BRONTË
Born 1816, Yorkshire, England
Died 1855, Yorkshire, England
‘Stancliffe’s Hotel’ was part of the ‘Angrian saga’ that Charlotte Brontë created in her adolescence and early twenties with her younger brother, Branwell. Together, they imagined the rich and dramatic world of Angria, ruled over by the dashing Duke of Zamorna. He is married to Mary Percy, whose father, the Lord of Northangerland, has recently led an unsuccessful rebellion against his son-in-law. ‘Stancliffe’s Hotel’, which Charlotte wrote in 1838, takes place after the rebellion has been crushed, when tensions are still running high in Zamorna City …
BRONTË IN PENGUIN CLASSICS
Tales of Angria
The Professor
Jane Eyre
Shirley
Villette
Dramatis Personae
Dance, Louisa Opera-singer who married Zamorna’s uncle, the Marquis of Wellesley, and later a Mr Vernon. She became mistress of Northangerland during his rebellion against Zamorna, and bore him a daughter. At the time of Stancliffe’s Hotel, she is mistress of Macara Lofty.
Enara, General Henri Fernando di Lord Lieutenant of the Province of Etrei.
Hartford, Lord Edward General in the Angrian army.
Lofty, Lord Macara One of Northangerland’s former allies.
Moore, Jane Angrian society beauty.
Northangerland Alexander Percy, Earl of Northangerland, father-in-law of Zamorna, once his ally and Prime Minister, then leader of the Republican Party, which attempted to displace him.
Percy, Edward Eldest son of Northangerland, a leading industrialist in Angria.
Percy, Mary Henrietta Northangerland’s daughter and Zamorna’s second wife, Duchess of Zamorna.
Percy, Sir William Second son of the Earl of Northangerland, half-brother to Mary Percy. A foppish young man.
Richton Sir John Flower, Viscount Richton, Verdopolitan Ambassador to Angria.
Rowley, Hannah Housekeeper at Charles Townshend’s lodgings.
Stuartville, Earl of Viscount Castlereagh, Lord Lieutenant of the Province of Zamorna.
Surena, Mr Charles Townshend’s landlord, a shopkeeper in Verdopolis.
Thornton, General Sir Wilson Bluff Yorkshireman, Lord Lieutenant of the Province of Calabar, married to Zamorna’s cousin, Julia Wellesley.
Townshend, Charles A cynical young dandy, narrator of Stancliffe’s Hotel.
Warner, Warner Howard Successor to Northangerland as Prime Minister of Angria.
Zamorna Arthur Augustus Adrian, Duke of Zamorna and King of Angria, a charismatic, amoral, Byronic figure, who is the hero of Charlotte Brontë’s Angrian writings.
Stancliffe’s Hotel
Charles Townshend pays a visit
to Louisa Dance’s house, and
finds Macara Lofty under
the influence of opium
‘Amen!’ Such was the sound, given in a short shout, which closed the evening service at Ebenezer Chapel. Mr Bromley rose from his knees. He had wrestled hard, and the sweat of his pious labours shone like oil upon his forehead. Fetching a deep breath and passing his handkerchief over his damp brow, the apostle sank back in his seat. Then, extending both brawny arms and resting them on the sides of the pulpit, with the yellow-spotted handkerchief dependent from one hand, he sat and watched the evacuation of the crowded galleries.
‘How oppressively hot the chapel has been to-night,’ said a soft voice to me, and a bonnet, bending forward, waved its ribbons against my face.
‘Aye, in two senses,’ was my answer. ‘Literally, as to atmosphere, and figuratively, as to zeal. Our brother has exercised with freedom, madam.’
‘Nonsense, Charles! I never can get into this slang! But come, the crowd is lessening at the gallery-door. I think we shall be able to make our way through it now, and I do long to get a breath of fresh air. Give me my shawl, Charles.’
The lady rose, and, while I carefully enveloped her in the shawl and boa which were to protect her from the night-air, she said, smiling persuasively, ‘You will escort me to my villa and sup with me on a radish and an egg.’ I answered by pressing the white hand over which she was just drawing a glove of French kid. She passed that hand through my arm and we left the gallery together.
A perfectly still and starlight night welcomed us as we quitted the steam and torches of the chapel. Threading our way quickly through the dispersing crowd at the door, we entered a well-known and oft-trod way, which in half an hour brought us from among the lighted shops and busy streets of our quartier to the deep shade and – at this hour – the unbroken retirement of the vale.
‘Charles,’ said my fair companion in her usual voice, half a whisper, half a murmur. ‘Charles, what a sweet night – a premature summer night! It only wants the moon to make it perfect – then I could see my villa. Those stars are not close enough to bring out the white front fully from its laurels. And yet I do see a light glittering there. Is it not from my drawing-room window?’
‘Probably,’ was my answer, and I said no more. Her ladyship’s softness is at times too surfeiting, more especially when she approaches the brink of the sentimental.
‘Charles,’ she pursued, in no wise abashed by my coolness. ‘How many fond recollections come on us at such a time as this! Where do you think my thoughts always stray on a summer night? What image do you think “a cloudless clime and starry skies” always suggests?’
‘Perhaps,’ said I, ‘that of the most noble Richard, Marquis of Wellesley, as you last saw him, reposing in gouty chair and stool, with eyelids gently closed by the influence of the pious libations in claret with which he has concluded the dinner of rice-currie, devilled turkey and guava.’
Louisa, instead of being offended, laughed with silver sound. ‘You are partly right,’ said she. ‘The figure you have described does indeed form a portion of my recollections. Now, will you finish the picture, or shall I do it in your stead?’
‘I resign the pencil into hands better qualified for its management,’ rejoined I.
‘Well, then, listen,’ continued the Marchioness. ‘Removed from the easy chair and cushioned foot-stool and from the slumbering occupant thereof, imagine a harp – that very harp which stands now in my boudoir. Imagine a woman, seated by it. I need not describe her: it is myself. She is not playing.
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