5
The Rose of Raby proved to be fiction; but it was at least easier to hold than Tanner’s Constitutional History of England. It was, moreover, the almost-respectable form of historical fiction which is merely history-with-conversation, so to speak. An imaginative biography rather than an imagined story. Evelyn Payne-Ellis, whoever she might be, had provided portraits and a family tree, and had made no attempt, it seemed, to what he and his cousin Laura used to call in their childhood ‘write forsoothly’. There were no ‘by our Ladys’, no ’nathelesses’ or ‘varlets’. It was an honest affair according to its lights.
And its lights were more illuminating than Mr Tanner.
Much more illuminating.
It was Grant’s belief that if you could not find out about a man, the next best way to arrive
