“Good night.” He went back to mount his horse.
“Lord Byron?” she said.
He looked up. “Yes?”
“What you said before, about coming to call upon me and the two of us going to town to ask more questions? You didn’t really mean that, did you?”
“I thought you didn’t want to accompany me,” he said. “I thought you didn’t wish to help, that you wanted your life planned out and not all full of horrid surprises.”
“Well, if we are planning it now…”
His smile widened. “I shall come early, then.”
“And for you, that means, what? Eleven-thirty?”
He laughed, climbing up onto his horse. “Likely about that, yes.”
“WHAT I DON’Tunderstand, however,” said Cassandra, who was pacing in the sitting room while Jane sat down on a couch and looked on, “is why you’ve agreed to help him tomorrow?”
Jane didn’t really know why she’d done that either. She did not think that she was trying to angle herself into some kind of sordid affair with Lord Byron. She wasn’t even enticed by that idea, infatuation notwithstanding. “I think it’s the puzzle of it, actually, as awful as that sounds.”
“The puzzle of what?” said Cassandra.
“Of what happened to poor Miss Seward,” said Jane. “That’s why it’s awful, of course. Turning someone’s death into a puzzle to solve, it’s abominable, but I do think that’s why I’m drawn to it. Oh, Cassandra, there are ever so many ragged edges to all of it. Anne Seward may have had a lover, but we don’t know who it is.Mr. Hardy may be lying about whether he was there last night. We don’t know if she was poisoned or not. I need to sew these all up, and then, once I have, I’ll be done with it.”
“Well,” said Cassandra, “I have to admit, it’s all very bewildering.”
“It is that,” said Jane. She shrugged. “Anyway, likely, Byron will drink too much tonight with Beaumont, and then not come tomorrow at all, and my expectations will be dashed.”
“Or you could just go out and solve the puzzle of it yourself, without him,” said Cassandra.
“Oh, of course,” said Jane. “And that would be just as good, all around. Why, I don’t even care if he comes by or not.”
Cassandra rounded on her, fixing her with a look full of a mixture of concern, horror, and the worst part—pity.
Jane looked away.
Maybe it was part of the reason to write the books, in the end. If you couldn’t have love in your actual life, you could imagine love. Writing about falling in love, it had to be nearly as good as actually doing it.
CHAPTER EIGHT
THE NEXT MORNING, Jane forced herself to work on reworking her epistolary novelFirst Impressionsinto a novel written from a narrative perspective. She needed the distraction, after all, because she found herself rather worried that, in fact, Byron would not arrive.
She found herself thinking through the way that would go, and hating it. She would be waiting for him at eleven o’clock, and he would not arrive. Then, it would be time for luncheon, and there would be no sign of him. By then, she would know, deep down, to give up on him entirely, but she would hold out a sliver of hope, which would be extinguished with every hour that passed, and she would eventually have to conclude he wasn’t coming at all.
She didn’t want this to happen, so she worked on the book, hoping that if she immersed herself in writing that she would not be paying much mind to the time.
But he came calling at quarter to eleven, actually, and he was shown into the sitting room, and Jane went down and Cassandra and her mother were there, and Byron was standing, grinning at her.
“No, as I’m saying, don’t ring for anything at all,” said Byron. “I am just here to collect Miss Jane. And, after all, there hasbeen a past incident involving my eating your household out of biscuits.”
“It is no trouble,” said Mrs. Austen. “We would be remiss if we didn’t offer our guests refreshment.”
“You have offered, and I have refused,” said Byron. “Miss Jane? Are you ready?”
“I am,” said Jane.
“I’ve brought two horses,” he said. “We can ride into town, if that pleases you?”
