Jane Austen Stole My Boyfriend (9 page)

At that moment there was a tap on the door and in came the chambermaid with a can of hot water.

‘Good morning, Miss Jenny,’ she said with a quick bob of a curtsy. ‘I’m Rosalie. Here is your hot water.’

‘Do you know where Miss Jane is, Rosalie?’ I felt rather grand as I took the can from her.

‘Lord, miss, no. Isn’t she still in bed?’ She seemed a bit shocked when she peered behind the curtains, but by now I guessed that Jane had got up early, washed in cold water
and had gone downstairs, or even outside. I told Rosalie not to worry as Jane had probably gone to talk to my uncle.

When I came down to the breakfast parlour, however, there was no one there. Then I heard Jane’s laugh floating up the stairs from the kitchen. For a minute I hesitated. I wasn’t sure
that my uncle and aunt would like me going down there, but then I thought there would be no harm in it.

Jane was sitting on the kitchen windowsill chatting happily to Franklin, the black servant of the Leigh-Perrots. He looked a bit embarrassed when he saw me and said that he had to go and see
about the breakfast. So Jane and I walked back up to the hallway and Jane opened the front door and we looked down at the busy street where every kind of vehicle – gigs, barouches, landaus,
even a mail coach – seemed either to be going up the hill towards the London road or else down the hill towards the centre of Bath.

‘Let’s go for a walk and see if we can find Queen’s Square,’ said Jane. ‘We’ll give Eliza a surprise. I bet she is still in bed.’

‘Better not – it will be breakfast in a few minutes,’ I said with a backwards glance to where maids and a footman and Franklin, of course, were tripping to and fro with dishes
and trays.

‘Come on, girls,’ called our uncle from the stairs. ‘Look at them, Franklin! They can’t wait to get out to see Bath. They don’t even want their
breakfast.’

‘Bath is a fine city for two beautiful young ladies,’ said Franklin. ‘They will be the belles of the ball, Mr Leigh-Perrot, won’t they?’

‘And you’ve been invited to a party tonight,’ said Uncle Leigh-Perrot. ‘Friends of ours, the Forsters, are giving a party for their granddaughter who has just left
school.’

Mrs Austen and Mrs Leigh-Perrot were whispering together on the window seat when we came into the breakfast parlour. They stopped as soon as they saw us. Mrs Austen looked out of the window in a
careless way, but Mrs Leigh-Perrot narrowed her eyes and surveyed me from the tip of my shoes to the knot of curls on the top of my head. And then she smiled broadly like a crocodile that has seen
something tasty, remarked Jane afterwards when we went upstairs after breakfast to fetch our parasols before walking to the Pump Room with our uncle.

Bath is so beautiful, I thought, as Jane and I, with our uncle between us, walked down through the fine streets, which were lined with buildings made of honey-coloured stone. Our uncle was very
kind to us, leading us down Gay Street and pointing out Queen’s Square, with its fine houses surrounding a lawn and trees in the centre. The blinds were still firmly drawn in the upper
windows of number 13, and we guessed that Eliza was still sleeping.

Then we went down Milsom Street, where we were shown all the fine shops, with windows full of gowns and charming bonnets behind bow-fronted glass. Our uncle expected us to spend a long time
looking at these, but Jane seemed anxious to press on and kept asking how far the Pump Room was and trying to get him to walk a little faster.

The Pump Room was down near the splendid abbey. The heavy wooden doors were set wide open and we passed between the two sets of stone columns and went into a huge room, full of people even at
this early time of the day. There were some benches at the side of the room, but apart from these the Pump Room was empty of furniture. This was just as well as there seemed to be hundreds of
people there. There were men and women in almost equal numbers; the women were mostly walking about in twos and threes, glancing at each other’s bonnets, and the men were exchanging
newspapers. There were two fireplaces, one at the top and the other at the bottom of the room, but on this fine morning very few people were bothering about them.

‘Let’s have a drink of the water,’ said our uncle, and he guided us over to where there was a giant urn with another more elegant urn on top of it. Water flowed continuously
from the four taps on the top of the urn and he handed me a mugful. It tasted disgusting, I thought – warm and with a strange flavour and a smell of old eggs. I drank it down politely and
listened to his lecture on how good it was, but Jane barely tasted hers and told him that anyway she was never ill.

She seemed more interested in the large clock at the side of the room which Uncle told her had been standing in that very place for over eighty years. It showed ten o’clock and the hour
struck just as he finished speaking. Jane’s eyes went to the door. For a moment I was puzzled. Surely she did not expect Eliza to be up as early as this, but then I saw a tall figure block
the sunlight for a moment and realized who she was waiting for.

Harry Digweed seemed to be very ill at ease as he pushed his way through the crowd, trying not to tread on the various wildly yapping small dogs that fashionable ladies had attached to very long
leads. I thought of him in the woods and fields of Steventon with his well-trained black pointer and felt sorry for him. He seemed like a fish out of water in this perfumed world of fine
gentlefolk. He had seen us though, and he was coming towards us.

‘Let’s go and write your mother’s name in the list of new arrivals,’ proposed Uncle.

‘You go, dear Uncle,’ said Jane demurely. ‘I would like just to rest here on the bench for a moment and gaze on this great clock.’

‘I’ll go with you, Uncle,’ I volunteered. After all, there could be nothing wrong in Jane greeting an acquaintance in this crowded room. Even if there were private talk between
them, no one could overhear with the music from the orchestra playing in the gallery above and the buzz of hundreds of voices.

By the time Uncle had finished putting our details in the huge visitors’ book that lay, ready opened, on an ornate stand, Jane was making her way towards us, followed by Harry. I noticed a
finely dressed young gentleman lift his quizzing glass and eye Harry’s breeches with a sneering smile on his lips. I suddenly felt very sorry for Harry and experienced a great rush of loyalty
towards him.

Uncle,’ I said excitedly, ‘that young man is the son of one of Mr Austen’s greatest friends, Mr Digweed of Steventon Manor.’ I did not add that the Digweeds only rented
the manor from the Austens’ cousin in Kent, but perhaps even if I had it would have made no difference to one of Mr Leigh-Perrot’s generous, hospitable nature.

Jane did everything beautifully, introducing Harry and explaining that he was staying for a couple of nights in Bath and had come here to drink the waters and, to his surprise, saw us. It seemed
a little unlikely that a young and extremely healthy-looking man like Harry would have bothered to come to drink the waters in Bath, but our uncle was not suspicious. He greeted Harry with great
cordiality, inviting him to join us in a turn around Sydney Gardens and then to come back to the house and have some lunch with us.

Harry agreed to the walk in Sydney Gardens, but declined the lunch – rightly so, I thought, as Mrs Austen would have been a little suspicious about his turning up.

‘I am going to the ball at the Assembly Rooms tomorrow night,’ he said in stilted tones, which showed that Jane had carefully coached him. ‘I hope to have the pleasure of
seeing you all there.’

‘Isn’t that wonderful?’ said nice Uncle James. ‘Well, girls, at least you will know one young man there. You will have to share him between you though.’

And I smiled at him sweetly and hugged my secret to me. Wait until Uncle sees my Thomas, I thought exultantly, and when we went into Sydney Gardens I engaged him in conversation in order to give
Jane and Harry some time together. My uncle was very unsuspecting and was only too pleased to tell me all about his fine property in Berkshire. And he told me the whole story of how a rich
great-uncle, Thomas Perrot, had left him the estate when he was only fourteen years old and how lucky he had been to marry such a wonderful woman as his wife.

‘I had just to add Perrot to the name of Leigh, and there I was in clover for the rest of my life,’ he said.

I smiled back at him and took a quick peep over my shoulder. Jane and Harry were now quite a long way behind us. Wouldn’t it be wonderful, I thought, if Harry had a rich great-uncle
somewhere who would leave him an estate? I kept remembering what Eliza had said about the Digweeds –
good family, birth and breeding, but no money
.

‘Oh, a brass band! Let’s go and listen to it.’ I dragged my uncle across the grass. Harry and Jane would find plenty of quiet benches and little nooks where they could sit and
talk together while my uncle’s attention was on the splendid noise that the huge instruments were making.

After lunch, Jane and I went to visit Eliza. My two aunts were planning a visit to the shops at Milsom Street, so we all walked together down George Street, then down Gay Street, Aunt
Leigh-Perrot pointing out various Bath notables. Then we were in lovely Queen’s Square, with its stately buildings shining in the afternoon sun and the pretty poplar trees casting long
shadows.

‘You fixed that up with Harry, didn’t you, Jane?’ I asked when we parted from my aunts at the corner of Wood Street and crossed over to the bottom quarter of Queen’s
Square. A couple of young men, racing their gigs, passed us and Jane, making no reply to my question, said that she was sure they were both young lords and that she could see by the eyes of the
second one that he had fallen madly in love with her. This made us both giggle and we quickened our pace almost to a run.

Then we knocked on the door of number 13 and were immediately shown up to Eliza’s lodging by a fat woman in mourning clothes, who had a little black kitten running behind her. On the way
up I teased Jane about arranging to meet Harry at the Pump Room, but she just smiled mysteriously. I wondered whether that had been a secret meeting – and if so, did Jane carry out her plan
of kissing him???????