Jane Bites Back (7 page)

Jane stepped out and walked along the platform, the heels of her shoes clicking on the floor and her suitcase rolling behind her. Travel had become much easier since her day, but part of her missed the feeling of sophistication that had once accompanied it. Now people moved about so easily that some of the adventure seemed to have disappeared along with the inconveniences. Now it felt less like
traveling
and more like simply
going somewhere
.

As she ascended the escalator to the main concourse she noticed the boy from the train walking with his grandmother ahead of her. He turned back once and, seeing her following, pulled his grandmother quickly in a different direction. Jane cheerfully wondered how long he would have nightmares about the woman on the train, and at what point he would decide that she had never existed at all.

In the station’s cavernous main hall she stood for a moment,
feeling the sea of people moving around her. She sensed their excitement, their hurry, their anxiety and joy. It rippled through her like electricity. She’d forgotten what it felt like to be in a city, particularly one as glorious as New York. Now she shivered with anticipation. Despite the passing of two centuries, she still felt like the girl from the countryside coming to London for the first time.

She hurried outside, anxious to be on the streets and among the crowds. As she passed through the doors of the station she felt New York envelop her. Its cacophonous voice filled her ears and its breath blew cold on her skin. For a moment she stood absolutely still, her eyes and ears adjusting to the many different sensations that flooded her mind.

“Move it, lady.”

A man brushed by her, his head bent toward the ground and his hands thrust into the pockets of his coat. Jane laughed at his rudeness. It too was part of New York’s charm.

Settling into a taxicab, she could hardy believe she was in New York, on her way to a publisher’s office. All of her previous books had been represented by her brother Henry. Not only had she never once visited a publisher, they hadn’t even known it was her work they had published. But all that was about to change.

I wish Cassie were here
, she thought. She imagined sharing the city with her sister, seeing Cassandra’s face as she marveled at the buildings and people, hearing her voice as she chattered joyfully and reached for Jane’s hand, as she always had when they’d visited Henry at his house in London. She would, Jane thought, give anything to be able to see her beloved Cassie again.

The cab swerved in and out of the stream of traffic, ten minutes later pulling to a stop in front of the Browder Publishing
building. It towered into the winter sky, its gleaming black glass reflecting the snow that fell lazily from the clouds that crowned the city

She crossed the sidewalk with her suitcase and pushed through the revolving doors, entering a lobby lined with the blown-up, framed covers of some of the most popular books of the past few years. As she walked to the elevators she gazed at them, imagining her own cover hanging among them. Then, just as she reached the elevator bank, she saw that she already was. On the wall the cover of
The Jane Austen Workout Book
hung between the latest novels from a popular romance writer and the biggest name in thrillers.

Horrified, she gazed at the cover image—a pen-and-ink drawing of a woman (she gathered it was supposed to be her) wearing an Empire-waist dress and holding a small barbell in each hand. It was ghastly, and she found herself feeling sick to her stomach.

The ding of an arriving elevator blessedly distracted her, and she tore herself from the poster and entered the car. Selecting the button for the seventeenth floor, she stood with her eyes closed as she was lifted into the air.
Don’t think about it
, she told herself. But the image of the book’s cover remained in her mind.

When the elevator stopped, Jane stepped out into a brightly lit reception area. Behind a raised copper and glass desk a lovely young woman sat speaking into a headset. “I’d be happy to connect you with publicity,” she said. “One moment.” She touched a button on a telephone, then smiled at Jane. “How can I help you?”

“I’m here to see Kelly Littlejohn,” Jane said. “I have an appointment,” she added, fearing the young woman might not believe her.

“And you are?” asked the girl.

“Jane,” said Jane. “Jane Fairfax. I’m sorry.”

The girl nodded as if forgiving Jane, then touched the phone panel once again. “Olivia, it’s Chloe. Jane Fairfax is here to see Kelly.”

Olivia
, Jane thought.
Chloe
. They were such stylish names. She wondered if everyone in publishing was a stylish young woman with perfect hair and beautiful clothes and names that sounded like they belonged in her novels.
If the assistants are this lovely, I’m almost afraid to meet Kelly Littlejohn
.

“Kelly will be out in just a moment,” Chloe said. “You can have a seat over there.” With a nod of her head she indicated a smart leather couch against the wall.

Jane sat down, tucking her suitcase beside the couch. She was suddenly quite nervous, and didn’t know what to do with her hands. She heard Chloe laugh, and for a moment feared the young woman was laughing at her, before realizing that she had simply taken another call. She looked at her shoes.
How dreadful they are
, she thought.
What was I thinking?

She considered going to the restroom and changing (she had dressier shoes in her bag) but was interrupted by someone saying her name. She looked up and saw standing before her a handsome man of perhaps forty. He was dressed in a beautifully tailored suit of dark brown wool, and the knot in his red and gold patterned tie was perfectly dimpled. His hair, dark but silvering on the sides, was cut short, and Jane could smell the faint scent of violet, orange, and oak coming from him as he extended his hand.

“It’s a pleasure to finally meet you,” he said, his voice warm and deep. “I’m Kelly Littlejohn.”

Chapter 8

“K
ELLY
,” J
ANE REPEATED, TAKING THE PROFFERED HAND AND
feeling the strong fingers clasp hers. “Oh, no.”

“Is everything all right?” Kelly asked.

“No,” said Jane, blinking. “I mean yes. Everything’s fine. It’s just that I thought you were a woman.” Embarrassed, she spoke more quickly. “I don’t mean right
now
I thought you were a woman. I mean before I saw you. Because of your name. We’ve never spoken,” she concluded, feeling like an idiot. “May I just go out and come back in?” she asked.

Kelly laughed. “It’s all right,” he said. “It’s not the first time someone has thought that. You should see how many query letters I get addressed to Ms. Littlejohn.” He glanced at her suitcase. “Let me take that for you,” he said.

“Oh, I can—” Jane began.

“I insist,” Kelly said, flashing a smile that lit up his whole face.

“All right,” Jane acquiesced, blushing as Kelly bent to take the case by the handle.
Stop behaving like a schoolgirl
, she scolded herself.

She followed Kelly as he held open the door. “After you,” he said, and again she couldn’t help thinking about how dashing he was.
A true gentleman
.

They walked down a hallway lined with offices. Inside each one an editor sat at a desk, peering at a computer screen. Jane glanced at their faces as she passed by. They all looked impossibly young, not at all like editors in her time, most of whom had been men well into the second half of their lives who peered out at the world from behind thick spectacles, their eyes ruined from years of reading in inadequate light, and their fingers perpetually ink-stained and chapped from constantly turning the pages of manuscripts.

“Here we are,” Kelly said, entering a corner office. “Welcome to my castle.”

The room was not terribly large. A desk, piled high with folders and what Jane assumed were manuscripts, sat in front of a bank of windows that looked out on the street. The floor too was covered with stacks of manuscripts, and one whole wall was taken up by shelves filled with books. Jane, relieved to see evidence of the publishing world she had always imagined, felt herself relax.

“It’s not much, but it’s all mine,” Kelly said. “Please, have a seat.”

Jane took one of the two chairs across from Kelly’s desk. She looked around the room, trying very hard not to stare at him. “Do you have to read all of these?” she asked, indicating the mountains of manuscripts.

“My assistant reads most of them first,” he answered. “But I try to look at everything. I like to make decisions for myself.”

Jane wondered if her manuscript had languished among the paper, and how Kelly had come to rescue it from the crowd.

“It’s something of a miracle that anything gets published at all,” said Kelly, as if reading her thoughts. “Especially an unsolicited manuscript such as yours. May I ask why you don’t use an agent?”

“It never occurred to me,” Jane answered truthfully.

Kelly laughed, shaking his head. “I must tell you, it’s refreshing to meet an author whose sole goal in life is to be published. Most authors come in here and I can tell that what they really want is to be famous. I don’t get that from you, or from your book.”

She wondered what Kelly would say if he knew that she was already one of the world’s most famous authors, was in fact arguably the most popular writer of all time. And that she very badly wanted to be published again.

“Most of them want to be Stephen King or Danielle Steele,” Kelly remarked. “I don’t know when authors went from being storytellers to being celebrities, but more and more I think we cast writers rather than publish them.”

Jane was nodding as she looked around the office. Then she noticed a book resting atop a pile on the corner of Kelly’s desk. Her heart sank.

Kelly’s eyes followed her gaze. “Oh, that,” he said, sighing. “This is exactly what I mean,” he added as he held up a copy of
The Jane Austen Workout Book
. “Ridiculous, isn’t it? But I guarantee you we’ll sell a hundred thousand copies.” He looked at the cover and snorted. “Austen would roll over in her grave,” he said.

“Indeed,” said Jane, chuckling with relief.

“You’re British,” Kelly said.

“Pardon?” said Jane. She was still staring at the image of herself on the book’s cover.

“Your accent,” Kelly said. “It’s British.”

“Oh,” said Jane. “Yes, it is.”

“How long have you lived in America?” Kelly asked.

Jane laughed lightly. “It seems like a hundred years. My parents moved here when I was quite young,” she added quickly.

“I thought there was a British sensibility to your writing,” said Kelly. “I think that’s what attracted me to it. I’m a bit of an Anglophile.” He smiled again. “Sometimes I think I was born in the wrong century.”

“I know just what you mean,” Jane said.

“You must be hungry after your trip,” Kelly said. “Shall we have lunch?”

“That would be lovely,” Jane replied.

Kelly stood and retrieved his coat from the back of the office door. “You can leave your suitcase here,” he told Jane. “We’ll come back before I send you off to the hotel.”

They took the elevator down to the lobby, and as they walked outside Kelly said, “Is this your first time in New York?”

“I’ve been here once before,” Jane said. “But it was a long time ago.”
Before there were cars on the streets
, she thought.
And long before you were born
.

They walked several blocks until they arrived at a restaurant. Stepping inside, Jane found herself in a reasonable replica of a French bistro.

“Now then,” Kelly said after a waiter had brought them two glasses of merlot, “let’s talk about your book.”

“I’m very glad you like it,” said Jane.

“I don’t just like it,” Kelly replied. “I love it. In fact, I haven’t been this excited about a book in a long time.”

Jane felt herself blush with pride. “That’s kind of you to say.”

Kelly shook his head. “I mean it,” he said. “There’s something about it that’s timeless. People don’t write books like yours anymore. Especially for women. Now it’s all about middle-aged women going to Bermuda and falling in love with twenty-two-year-old surfing instructors, or young women working at fashion magazines and whatnot. I wonder sometimes if people would even recognize a quality book if they were given one.” He waved his hand around. “But your book is actually
about
something.”

“Thank you,” Jane said. She was slightly embarrassed by Kelly’s effusive praise, although hearing it was not at all unpleasant after so many years of disappointment. “I feel it’s important that a book make people think
and
feel.”