Confessions of a Jane Austen Addict (6 page)

Eleven

A ctually, there’s nothing surprising about the wave of distrust that came over me when Edgeworth said good night. After all, when have I ever trusted the opposite sex? My reaction was self-preservation instinct, pure and simple.

I want to say good night to Mr. Mansfield, whom I find in a room I would have missed completely, had I not been curious about the door at the other end of a small room filled with huge vases and baskets of cut flowers. When I open the door, Mr. Mansfield is looking at a canvas, one of dozens that are hanging on the walls, propped up on easels, or stacked against the walls. There are drop cloths on the floor, and a table filled with paints and various other containers of pungent-smelling paint supplies.

I have an instant sensation of disorientation when I realize that the canvases are filled with abstract shapes and broad strokes of color and are mostly nonrepresentational. Did people do this kind of art in the early nineteenth century? Then again, if I can be here with my twenty-first-century mind, then I suppose other incongruities of history and art are possible, too. Still, I want to ask Mr. M about his art; what he does seems so delightfully out of place here, but I cannot reveal my ignorance.

He smiles at me and covers the canvas he had been examining. I’m overcome with curiosity, and I walk toward the easel and reach tentatively for the cloth that covers the painting.

“May I?” I say.

He raises an eyebrow, as if to gauge my seriousness, then removes the cloth, revealing a bold, cubist sort of work. Part of it looks semi-representational; I can make out something that might have been a self-portrait looking in several directions at once, and the rest just slashes and swirls of color.

“This is amazing.” I wish I knew something about this kind of art so that I can say something more intelligent.

“You needn’t try and spare my feelings.”

“But I like it.”

“Are you sure you are not experiencing the effects of breathing in the smells of this place? I do feel a bit strange sometimes myself, but then again it may be the flowers next door, the profusion of which is what sometimes turns my stomach, if truth be told.”

“There are rather a lot of them.”

“And still they do not do their office, for as you can see, or shall I say, smell, the aroma herein is every bit as forthright as it was before your mother hid me away behind an indoor garden. And my desire to immerse myself in it remains undiminished.” He smiles sheepishly. “We all have our weaknesses.”

Don’t I know it. I have a rush of kindred feeling for Mr. M, whose shamefaced attachment to his painting and his studio reminds me of my own ungovernable addiction to Jane Austen novels. Like Mr. M, I indulge alone. None of my friends knows that most of the sick days I’ve taken from work are not sick days, but Austen days. None of my friends knows that the new best-seller they bought me for Christmas or my birthday has usually been put aside half-read because I needed to get back to Pride and Prejudice or Sense and Sensibility for the twentieth time.

Until recently, not one of my friends even knew that I had gone so far as to join an organization of other Austen addicts; i.e., the Jane Austen Society of North America. That is, until Paula noticed a JASNA newsletter, addressed to me, in my bedroom. She hooted with laughter at a photograph of some of the members in Regency dress at a meeting, and then stopped short when she saw my unsmiling face.

Not that I have ever once attended a meeting of my fellow addicts. I am too afraid of exposing myself to such a literary group, who would no doubt think me unworthy because my entrée to Austen was via Colin Firth prancing around in tight pants for the BBC. So what if I ran out and bought all the novels and read every single one before I saw another film adaptation. A woman with a Jane Austen action figure, still in the box no less (because the box is the best part), would surely be shunned by such scholarly folk.

The truth is, I am more concerned about being in the company of people whose eccentricities might even surpass mine than I am about their superior academic qualifications. I mean, after all, at their annual meetings they actually dance at Regency balls, many dressed in costume, no less. Would meeting such people in the flesh hold up a mirror to my addiction, and would I be afraid of what I saw? And what if—God forbid—I gave in to temptation and went to one of those balls myself? Would I not only be reading Austen in secret on sick days, but also find myself doing so in an empire-waisted muslin? Is all that self-conscious rejection and closeted longing—no pun intended—what landed me in this fractured-Austen-novel of a world?

“Jane?” Mr. M’s voice snaps me out of my tailspin; his face is filled with concern. “Are you quite all right, my dear?”

I muster a smile. “Oh, yes.”

Mr. M replaces the cover on his painting. “Do sit down for a minute, if you can bear it.” He motions to a chair. “So, Jane, it appears you have made a conquest of Mr. Edgeworth.”

I let out an awkward laugh. “I would hardly call it a conquest.”

“I know you, Jane. You are not the sort of girl who bestows her attentions idly. And there is a marked difference between your manners toward Mr. Edgeworth tonight and what I have observed on previous occasions.”

“Oh really?”

Mr. Mansfield peers at me over his glasses. “I daresay you are not joking me right now.”

“I would love to hear your perspective.”

He smiles. “I am quite fond of you, Jane. And I am not of a mind, as many parents are nowadays, to simply give a daughter in marriage to the highest bidder, without any regard to her feelings and wishes. Your mother may be well satisfied with your sister Clara’s marriage, but I am not. In truth, before I gave my consent I warned Clara against entering the marriage state without as great an affection for the man as she had for his fortune.”

He looks at me and raises an eyebrow. “Do not affect to be shocked, my dear. You know this to be so.”

“But what does any of this have to do with me?”

Mr. M takes off his glasses and starts polishing them with a cloth. “I am merely sharing my observations, which are that on previous occasions you spoke but little to Mr. Edgeworth, despite your mother’s various hints to be more talkative. Instead, you took every opportunity to engage yourself in conversation or activity with others, and almost seemed to avoid Mr. Edgeworth’s attentions. Your mother noticed this as well, and with great dissatisfaction, I might add. I can have no doubt that it is as clear to you as it is to me that your mother wishes to see you married to Mr. Edgeworth. And as I do not know you to be shy of conversation in general, I could therefore only conclude, until tonight, that is, that your manners while in company with Mr. Edgeworth were not the result of shyness but rather, at the very least, indifference.”

“And to what did you attribute my indifference?”

He shrugs. “Perhaps you find it inconceivable that a widower who truly loved his wife could possibly form a second attachment. However, your mother believes that you did like him, at least at first, and then changed toward him, quite unaccountably. Far be it from me to pretend to understand what goes on in a woman’s mind when it comes to matters of love. However, even I can see that your mind has taken a different turn tonight.”

“You mean you think I’m in love with Mr. Edgeworth just because I talked to him at dinner?”

“Your mother will choose to think so. As may Mr. Edgeworth. So if you are not inclined to raise expectations among your friends as to your becoming the second Mrs. Edgeworth, I suggest you refrain from encouraging him.” He pats my hand. “Not that I think there is anything improper in your behavior, my dear.”

“This is unbelievable.”

“Mr. Edgeworth appears to be an amiable, gentlemanlike sort of man. He is of a respectable family and from all reports appears to have a considerable fortune. These are important qualities, my dear, but unless you love the man, I fear you will never find happiness.”

“How could I love this person? I hardly even know him.”

Mr. Mansfield smiles and puts on his glasses. “I knew you would be open with me, Jane. Let us say no more about the matter. And let us hope that your mother’s fancies have not carried her too far away just yet. Or that Mr. Edgeworth does not declare himself before there is any chance of your manners toward him returning to their former state.”

“Oh, please. You’ve got to be kidding.”

He winks at me. And I laugh with relief.

Afterward, I lie in bed, unable to fall asleep, unable to get my conversation with Mr. M out of my mind. This isn’t another century; it’s another planet. All I do is have a nice chat with a guy over dinner and everyone’s ready to order wedding invitations. Talk about making assumptions.

If there’s anything I’ve learned as a single woman in search of that holy grail, a decent relationship, it’s that I have no right to assume anything. I have no right to assume I am in a relationship with a man, even if that man is someone I’m regularly sleeping with. I have no right to assume fidelity, not even from my fiancé. And if I were to sleep with someone new, I have no right to assume I’ll get so much as a hey-I-had-a-good-time-last-night phone call. If I’m lucky, he might spend five minutes with me two weeks later when I run into him at a party. Even Frank took months to use the dreaded “R” word; the “L” word took even longer. And now I’m to assume that a man I talked to at dinner, an absolute stranger, could be a matrimonial object if I don’t curb my conversational excesses? True, he isn’t exactly a stranger to Jane, but he’s certainly a stranger to me.

As is everyone else in this borrowed life. The thought makes me shiver, despite the warmth of the night. How can it be possible to inhabit a strange body, talk with a strange voice, and be saddled with the life history, environment, parents, and friends of that person, all of whom insist that you are not you? More important, how am I ever going to get back to who I really am?

Twelve

I am no closer to an answer at breakfast than I was the night before. Mrs. Mansfield is all smiles, which are only briefly interrupted when she comments that I look a bit pale. But when I eat a little breakfast, she tells me that my complexion is already improving. That’s right, Mrs. M. Hot chocolate is the new revolution in skin care.

“Mr. Edgeworth is expected any moment, and when he comes I will remark on how fine the weather is today and how pleasant it would be for the three of us to take a walk around the grounds.”

Yeah, yeah. Whatever. Maybe chocolate is good for the skin in this reality. And has no carbs. Perhaps there is a God after all.

Mrs. M dabs her mouth with a napkin. “Mr. Edgeworth will of course express his willingness to escort us. I will, however, develop a sudden headache. Quiet and solitude being the best medicine, I will decide to stay inside and insist that you and he go on without me.”

She smiles smugly and spreads some jam on her toast. What an accomplishment, to get me alone with prime marriage material. If she only knew how many men I’ve been alone with. And what I’ve done with them. Ah yes, Mrs. M. I can just see you reaching for your smelling salts. I smile at the thought.

At which she says, “I am glad to see the idea does not displease you. You will, of course, be attentive to Mr. Edgeworth today and show him every courtesy.”

“Whatever you say, darling.” I get up and make a mock curtsey. “And now I would like to get a head start on that walk until our guest arrives. With your permission, of course.”

“Saucy, aren’t you,” she says with a sneer. “Mind you keep to the house, Jane. I want you here as soon as Mr. Edgeworth arrives.”

I salute like a good soldier. “Yes, ma’am.”

As I stroll through the shrubbery, something Anna said keeps repeating in my mind. Something she gleaned from one of her creepy friends in her meditation class or from one of the endless parade of new-age practitioners she pays to dissect her aura, polish her crystals, or give her house an energy cleaning. Frankly, she’d be better off spending her money on getting her house cleaned the good old-fashioned physical-plane sort of way, because it’s an absolute sty. What she said was something about trusting that everything, no matter how horrible it might seem at that moment, ultimately turns out to be a blessing. It’s odd that I remember her saying what she did, because I usually tune out her well-meaning platitudes.

Now I know why I remember this particular so-called truth, because that’s just what she said to me right after I discovered that Frank had slept with Amy. It was a blessing, she proclaimed, that his infidelity came out before, rather than after the wedding. I know she was right, but at the time all I could think about was how I was going to endure the humiliation of informing everyone I’d invited that there would be no wedding, including returning wedding gifts to those eager guests who’d wanted first pick at the registry. But, she insisted, it was a blessing to be saved from an illusion; I mean, I could have married that illusion, right?

But how about the fact that I wanted my day of illusion—just one measly day; was that too much to ask? Was it too much to wish I’d been spared the truth until after the wedding, until after I got to be queen of the ball in a white satin dress? It was my illusion, damn it, and Frank had cheated me out of it. He had cheated me out of reaching that milestone in my life, that public proof of my worth. How much nicer it would sound if I could say, “I’m divorced. It just didn’t work out,” than, “I’m single. I’ve never been married.”

That I am now attempting to derive comfort from Anna’s words is proof of my desperation. How can it be a blessing to be stuck in some time warp where everyone thinks I’m someone I’m not and everyone who does know who I am hasn’t even been born yet?

Blessing or no, I have to muster all the positive thinking I can. I don’t have the luxury of retreating to my room and crawling under the covers like I do at home. They’d just think I’m “unwell” again and start sending for trout-faced doctors with dirty knives. I have to be positive. I have to believe I’ll find my way back, even if right now I have no idea how. I will stop obsessing. I will enjoy this walk, I will enjoy the grass and trees and flowers and stop worrying about how long I’ll be stuck here—oh God, what if it’s forever?—I will not allow myself to entertain that thought. Yeah, right. I’m not only entertaining that thought, I’m taking it out to dinner and a movie. I’m here, for however long, real or unreal, time travel or insanity. It feels real, therefore it is. Or something like that. The goal is to focus on the now and figure out how to reclaim the past. Or the parallel. Or my sanity.

Too much thinking never solved anything.

A rustling on the path behind me makes me jump. I turn, and I am face-to-face with Edgeworth.

“Hello,” I say, practically tripping over my hem in my confusion, then trying to act nonchalant by casually leaning on a tree trunk but missing it by a hair, the result being that Edgeworth grabs one of my flailing arms and narrowly stops me from falling on my ass.

“Well then,” I say, checking my dress for tears, “that was elegant.”

He bows. “I apologize for startling you. It was my fault entirely.”

I smile at him. “I beg to differ.”

I could just imagine Frank taking the blame for one of my blunders. Not in a million years, let alone two centuries. He was always telling me how clumsy I was, and delighted in recounting stories of my latest klutz-fest to anyone who’d listen. And his laugh, that condescending look, was nothing like the good-natured smile on Edgeworth’s face. It reminds me of how Wes smiled at me when I dropped an entire tray of baked ziti on the floor. He not only helped me clean up the mess, he also told Frank he was a jerk for having a laugh at my expense.

“Are you hurt, Miss Mansfield?”

“Just my pride.”

His eyes sparkle. “I am glad you are materially unscathed.” He offers me his arm. “Shall we take a turn together?”

Why not. His hair looks more golden in the sun, and his eyes are now emerald instead of hazel. More like Wes’s eyes. That’s ridiculous; they’re nothing like Wes’s eyes.

“Your mother has charged me to tell you that she is suffering from a sudden headache. She asked that I accompany you on your walk so that she might recover in quiet and solitude.”

“Poor Mrs. M,” I say, hardly able to keep a straight face.

Edgeworth’s eyes twinkle with amusement. My parting suspicions of him last night were probably just my defense mechanisms working overtime. It’s no wonder my mind’s confused; not only am I dealing with this time warp situation, but I’m also simply not used to feeling so at ease with a man I’ve just met, regardless of time period. Except for Wes, that is, but he was my boyfriend’s friend when I met him, and not an attractive single man, so it’s not the same thing. When faced with an available man I find attractive, I usually spend half the time planning my words in my head and the other half being hyperconscious of my body language. With Edgeworth there is almost none of that.

There is a stone bench on one of the gravel paths, and Edgeworth asks me if I would like to sit for a few minutes.

“Sure,” I say, but when I meet his eyes I can see something is wrong.

He looks down at his boots. “I must speak with you.”

I can feel the blood drain from my face. Why is my stomach doing flip-flops?

He raises his eyes to mine. “Allow me to express what is weighing upon my mind.”

I nod, my heart pounding so hard I can almost hear it.

“For a time I hoped—no, I believed we had an understanding. But then your manner changed so markedly. And, as you would not speak to me of it, I was left to conclude that my sister had had a hand in it. I am well aware that Mary has never forgiven me for the service I did her, though I know to her feelings it was no service at all.”

He pauses for a moment, wiping the palms of his hands on his trouser legs. I have, of course, no idea what he’s talking about.

“And then your accident. You know not how I longed to speak to your parents. But I dared not divulge to them what you appeared no longer to acknowledge as true. Then, when you recovered, I was determined to make you see me differently. I know not what I hoped to achieve; to change your dislike to indifference, perhaps. If more was possible, I could not let myself hope for it. But now I see a change; I mean, I hope I am not mistaken in believing that you do not dislike my company. That is a beginning, is it not?” “I—”

“Yes?”

“I guess I’m not sure what kind of misunderstanding—and I’m sorry if I was…I mean, I’m not sure I understand what—” “Let me be clear, then,” he says, enfolding my hands in his. “If you consent to be my wife, Jane, I promise to devote every waking moment to being worthy of your trust.”

He looks so intense, so serious. What am I supposed to say? What do you say to a man you are supposed to know but don’t but he proposes to you anyway and he lives in a different time period? I peruse my mental catalogue of Jane Austen dialogue for possibilities. Emma’s I have no thoughts of matrimony at present might lead Edgeworth to attribute it, like Mr. Collins, to my wishing to increase his love by suspense, according to the usual practice of elegant females. And Emma’s Believe me, sir, I am far, very far, from gratified in being the object of such professions is far too harsh. As is Lizzy Bennet’s You could not have made me the offer of your hand in any possible way that would have tempted me to accept it. Even if I wanted to say yes, I couldn’t expect Jane Austen to do all the work. After all, what did Emma say to Mr. Knightley? Just what she ought, of course.

Edgeworth’s squeezing my hands snaps me out of search mode. “Allow me to interpret this interesting silence as a favorable reply?”

Oh my God. He is practically quoting Mr. Elton verbatim, and Emma hasn’t even been written yet.

He raises my hands to his lips, but I extricate them before he can seal the deal. “I don’t mean to be rude, but—are you out of your mind?” And with that I am rushing down the gravel path as fast as I can without drawing attention from any of the nosy servants who might be working outside.

What freaks me out more than Edgeworth’s anachronistic quoting of Austen is the fact that I’ve just been passionately proposed to. When has any man ever spoken to me like that? Not Frank, whose drunken mumblings of “Okay, you win—let’s get married” could hardly count as a proposal, let alone a declaration of love. But I was so starved for a commitment that all I could feel was gratitude the next morning that he didn’t plead temporary alcohol poisoning. As for any talk of wedding plans, “Just leave me out of it,” he said. “I’ll show up, but that’s where my participation ends.”

Understatement. When not affecting the demeanor of a condemned man on his way to the gallows—or hooking up with the cake designer—Frank took every opportunity to condemn the institution of marriage as an affront to free will and a means of subjugating women. These professed attitudes were, of course, entirely inconsistent with his habitual manipulations that I fold his laundry, unclog the milk steamer on his espresso machine, or upgrade his software. “You’re so much more computer-literate than I am,” he’d plead, though as I discovered one night while checking my email on his computer, he had no problem bookmarking and presumably logging on to longlankychicks.com and various other tall-thin-naked-girl websites, which were all in a neat and tidy folder.

Boots crunch the gravel path behind me. “Have I offended you?” Edgeworth says, out of breath.

“Absolutely not. I just…” Suddenly I am unable to form words. There’s so much vulnerability in those emerald eyes, so much pent-up emotion in that clenched jaw that for a moment I am actually tempted to say yes, I’ll marry you. Just take me right here and rip my bodice from my heaving bosom.

Suddenly I am seized by an explosion of laughter, complete with snorts and gasps and doubling over. I’m not stuck inside someone else’s life. I’m stuck inside a romance novel with pretensions to Jane Austen.

“Dearest, sweetest Jane,” says Edgeworth, raising my hand to his lips. “You have made me the happiest of men.”

Apparently he’s interpreting my mirth as an affirmative.

“Whoa,” I say, still giggling at the thought of Edgeworth posing on the cover of a romance novel with embossed gold lettering, like the ones my mother always had on her nightstand. “I won’t deny I’m attracted, but don’t you think this is way too fast? I mean, I haven’t even slept with you.”

Edgeworth drops my hand, his face instantly red.

“That is cruel, Jane.”

“What?”

The ensuing pause feels endless.

“You’re angry,” I say.

“I am not angry.” He paces back and forth, shaking his head, and then kicks a tree trunk with his boot. He winces in pain, clenching his fists.

Definitely not angry.

“This is madness. Absolute madness.”

My mouth goes dry. Calm down, he doesn’t mean it literally. Nevertheless, laughing like a hyena and making lewd jokes is clearly not the safest mode of behavior for someone in my position.

“Can you tell me, Jane, how two people who once understood each other perfectly could come to this?”

“I wish I could tell you,” I say, struggling to sound like the Jane he knows. Or thinks he knows. “But the truth is, sir, that I have not the honor of understanding what you mean.”

“Ah. I will not pretend I do not understand you.”

“And I will not pretend that I do.”

“You do me a great injustice. Granted, I am a man of eight-and-thirty, and I am no saint. But can you truly believe such a dishonorable portrait of me?”

Trying to figure out this conversation is like trying to do the New York Times crossword puzzle with half the words in Swahili. But I don’t have to understand it. I just have to sound like I do.

“I don’t—I do not know what I believe. Nor do I know what ‘dishonorable portrait’ you are talking about.”

His brows lift, then his eyes scan my face, searching for what? The truth? I watch as his face shifts from distrust to puzzlement, and finally, a relaxed sort of calm. “I must confess I do not understand you, but I am relieved that you do not seem to think ill of me.”