When we eventually descended for supper, Jane warned me to be on guard against Mr Hart’s emotional tricks and not to let him traverse my moat. She seemed intent on using castle metaphors as if we were in a battle. But I supposed we were, and I should don my armour if I wanted to come out of this unscathed.
Almost at once, I was in the thick of the fray. Mr Hart flirted brazenly during supper in the dining hall, giving me amorous looks and bestowing outrageous compliments that would have made me laugh if Lucinda had not been glowering into her soup. As it was, I had to deflect andignore his comments until I was exhausted.
Moving to the parlour, I hoped he would leave off, but he had worse stratagems up his sleeve.
‘I thought I might read a passage aloud from a book I am enjoying,’ he announced, standing by the fireplace.
‘Oh yes, do. If it is what I think it is, then it will be very pleasing,’ said Mr Smith-Withers, rubbing his hands together.
I assumed that he was going to read something spooky to scare Lucinda witless, but he remarked, ‘You should also find it very pleasing, Mrs Fitzroy, since I saw you perusing the volume enthusiastically in the library.’ This made me extremely wary. My suspicions were confirmed when he whipped out a book with a black leather cover out of his pocket, and I knew it all too well:Teaching Molly.
Blood throbbed in my temple as he flipped slowly through it, looking for a specific passage, humming and harring to make me squirm.Oh no, please do not let him read the chase scene in Molly’s chamber!I thought, panicking.Anything but that!
Finding the place he wanted, Mr Hart cleared his throat theatrically and read, ‘After several weeks, he became accustomed to Molly’s coy glances when she served him supper. Though no one else at the table noticed anythingamiss, it was like a secret game between them. He began to learn too that she gave signals meant only for him. Placing a bread roll on a plate to his left meant that she would be amenable to a visit; to the right meant she was not. As it had been three nights since he had last visited her, he was hoping the bread would be on the left. “Left, left, left,” he prayed as she approached. And under the table, he felt himself growing—’
I leapt up from the sofa and ripped the book out of Mr Hart’s hands. ‘That will be quite enough of that, thank you very much!’
Mr Smith-Withers guffawed, and Mr Hart smirked at me. ‘Oh, come now, Mrs Fitzroy. I was just getting to the good part.’ He stretched out a hand and wiggled his long fingers. ‘Give it back and let me read some more. It is most entertaining.’
‘No, I will not,’ I replied, hiding the book behind me.
‘Why will you not give Mr Hart the book, Aunty Fliss?’ asked Lucinda plaintively from the sofa. ‘I want to hear what happens next ...’
‘It is rather boorish, dearest. Mr Hart has not given any thought to its suitability for his present audience.’
I gave him a chilly smile, and he bowed, his eyes glinting.
‘Oh, well. Then maybe Aunt Jane can read to us from her new novel? Since she has it right therein front of her,’ said Lucy.
‘Miss Austen, writing a novel?’ said Mr Smith-Withers. ‘Well, I never!’
Lucy clapped her hands. ‘Oh yes, she is such a good writer! Mr Smith-Withers, you will find it even more pleasing than Mr Hart’s book.’
‘I very much doubt that,’ I heard him say under his breath, and Mr Hart grinned.
Jane, who had been writing steadily at the table over by the window throughout this exchange, now lifted her head. ‘Pardon?’
Chapter 18
With much prompting and coercing from Lucy and me, Jane finally agreed to do a reading. ‘The story is by no means complete,’ she said, standing by the fire, clutching her pages. ‘And this part has been roughly written so it needs severe editing—’
‘Yes, yes, we understand. Afterwards, perhaps we can return tomybook,’ interrupted Mr Hart.
He looked across at me, sitting in the armchair. ButTeaching Mollywas well out of sight beneath my derriere and would be following the flowers out the window later on.
Jane cleared her throat and, looking slightly worried, proceeded to read out a scene in which her impressionable main character meets an obnoxious young man. It was subtly disguised hyperbole, but she had obviously borrowed from Mr Hart’s propensity for empty flattery and Mr Smith-Withers’s tendency to talk himself up. It was brilliantly funny, and I had to bite my lip to stop myself from laughing.
‘Well,well,’ said Mr Hart, looking surprised and a little disconcerted when she had finished. ‘That sounds like it will be a very ... interesting ... novel.’
‘Thank you,’ said Jane with a nod. ‘It is actually a cautionary tale, so young women can avoid forming attachments with unsuitable men.’
Mr Hart exchanged a glance with Mr Smith-Withers, and the two of them said nothing.
Oh, Jane, I thought worriedly.Why did you have to go and say that? Now they know that you know too!
I made a show of yawning. ‘I think it is time for bed.’
‘But it is still early,’ Lucinda complained.
