Christina Dudley is such a clever author! This seemingly simple plot (let’s put on a play!) produced a tale of delicious complexity, and every part of it perfectly sensible.
Here’s the premise: Frances Barstow has grown up as a dependant of benevolent Lord Dere. Unlike her older siblings, however, she hasn’t pushed back against the hostility of Lord Dere’s niece-in-law, Mrs Markham Dere. In fact, she has gone out of her way to keep Mrs Dere contented, and now that Frances if of marriageable age, she is set to reap the reward. Mrs Dere and a friend with a daughter of similar age arrange a party, to which three eligible young men will be invited, and Frances will be expected to make a push to secure one of them for herself. And yes, Mrs Dere will do the choosing. Since Frances has no particular wish to marry yet, she’s thrust into a difficult situation – can she avoid being edged into a marriage against her will but still keep her sponsor happy?
The three young men have their own problems. One of them, Mr Midgecomb (or Midge) is in love with the friend’s daughter, Jane Eveleigh, but being of only ordinary appearance, he is always outshone by the extremely beautiful (not to mention charming and witty) Adam Hearne. To boost his own chances, he persuades Adam to pretend to be simple-minded. Adam, a consummate actor, isn’t averse, especially as he has no wish to marry himself. But when the invitation to the house party arrives, he finds he’s committed to his dumb act for several weeks – quite a challenge! But still, with so many people around them, they’ll be able to do some real acting, won’t they, and put on a performance of A Midsummer Night’s Dream?
There’s a lot going on here, with the swirling machinations of the two matchmakers, the waxing and waning friendship of the two young ladies as they compete (seriously or otherwise) for the attentions of the men, and the manoeuvrings of the men themselves. And all of it wrapped up in the preparations for the performance of the play, with readings, rehearsals, costume preparations and the like. Frances is hard-pressed to avoid entanglements without falling out with either her friend or her benefactress. And all the time, Frances and Adam are ever-so-slowly falling in love, even featuring an impulsive but still in character proposal, only held back by his assumed stupidity and the promises they’ve made to other people, intended to be helpful but now thrusting them deeper into deceit.
The whole situation blows up when Adam’s family history turns up to haunt him and everything goes pear-shaped. So many Regencies depend on manufactured tension to throw a spanner in the works, or even worse, the Great Misunderstanding, but the falling out here is real and serious. Offending Mrs Markham Dere, when the Barstows are entirely dependent on the goodwill of Lord Dere for the very roof over their heads is not something to be done lightly, and the whole village is dragged into the dispute.
It takes some time to disentangle all the pretence (and the reasons for it), but everything comes to a rousing conclusion in the end. I do have a small grumble, a personal reaction to Adam’s return and his final proposal. As written, there’s some edgy sparring between Frances and Adam, showing that she has not entirely forgiven his deception. He then sets about a thoroughly convoluted and teasing proposal, completely misleading her on some important points. Now, I can see that perhaps it was intended to demonstrate clever Adam as opposed to his falsely stupid persona, but to my mind it was both cruel to Frances, to keep her in suspense, and also dishonest. In my opinion, what was needed after all the deception was a totally honest (and humble) proposal, with a suitable amount of grovelling. All the clever stuff just made him seem arrogant, to my mind. But that’s a personal view, and perhaps I’m alone in that reaction.
Still, the matter was settled quickly enough once he stopped teasing her, and all ended satisfactorily. An excellent five stars (as usual).
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