“Do they really have to drink port alone?” Miss Charming asked, pacing at double speed. “Can’t they come any faster?”
“Ah, here they are,” said Aunt Saffronia.
Jane smelled a mild waft of alcohol and tobacco sweep before them, and the gentlemen emerged triumphant—shiny colonel, glowering gentleman, soggy husband.
Aunt Saffronia proposed a game of whist to pass the evening. Miss Charming, seemingly bored of trying to seduce the Darcy out of Mr. Nobley, secured Colonel Andrews as a partner. Jane played opposite Aunt Saffronia. As for the rest of the party, Sir John drank from a crystal decanter (probably full of cherry Kool-Aid, Jane guessed), while Mr. Nobley read a book and generally ignored everybody.
Jane focused on the rules of whist, losing horribly. She felt like hand-washed laundry, rubbed and heavy and ready to belaid out to dry. Her sensitive brain never handled time changes well, and the cards and conversation and exhaustion melted together, making her dizzy. She looked around, trying to ground herself in her surroundings.
Mr. Nobley was still absorbed in his book. Colonel Andrews was grinning at her, his smile conscious of just how smoking hot he was. Encircling her were canary yellow walls, gaudy Georgian finery, the deliciously historical smell of furniture wax and kerosene. She looked down at herself, dressed in foreign fabric, cleavage encased in rust-colored organza, slippered feet resting on a Persian rug. She was completely ridiculous. But at the same time, she wanted to stomp the ground and squeal like a teenager just asked to prom. She was here!
And if this were an Austen novel, the characters would be up for a little banter about now. So often at a party, Jane felt anxiously unsure about what people wanted from her. At least here, she knew the rules. Hands gripped in her lap to hide their shaking, she cleared her throat.
“Mr. Nobley, Lady Templeton says Pembrook Park will host a ball in just under a fortnight. Do you enjoy a good dance?”
“Dancing I tolerate,” he answered in a dry tone. “I might say I enjoy agooddance, though I have never had one.”
“Scandalous!” said Aunt Saffronia. “You have danced in this drawing room several times, and I have seen you escort many a fine young lady onto a ballroom floor. Are you saying that none of those qualified as a good dance?”
“Madam, you may choose to understand my comments any way you like.”
Jane glared. He was, in his subtle manner, insulting dear Aunt Saffronia! Wait, no he wasn’t; they were both actorsplaying parts. Being inside the story was already way more surreal than she’d expected.
For one thing, if this were real, she’d find Mr. Nobley’s arrogance annoying and his self-absorption unbearably boring. The character deserved a good thrashing.
“I suppose the lack in all such occurrences was to be found in your partners, Mr. Nobley?” asked Jane.
Mr. Nobley thought. “In them, yes, and partly in myself. I cannot imagine a dance truly being enjoyable unless both partners find themselves equals in rank, grace, and aptitude, as well as naturally fond of each other.”
“One might say the same for conversation.”
“Indeed one might,” he said, turning in his chair to face her. “We are ill-fated in that our society demands we engage in unworthy conversations and dances in order to seem courteous, and yet such actions are ultimately vulgar.”
“But pray tell, Mr. Nobley,” said Jane, enthused, “how is one to find out if another is their equal in rank, grace, and aptitude, and how is one to discover a natural fondness, without first engaging in conversations and social gatherings? To put it in your own terms perhaps, would you say a hunter were vulgar when coursing through the fields and only dignified when actually shooting at prey?”
“I think she has you there, Nobley,” Colonel Andrews said with a laugh.
Mr. Nobley’s expression did not change. “A hunter need not spend hours with a pheasant to know it would make a good dinner. A pheasant is nothing more than what it seems, as are hens, foxes, and swans. People are no different. Some may need endless hours of prattle and prancing to know another’s purpose and worth. I should not.”
Jane turned her gaping mouth into a smile. “So, you can tell the worth, the merit, the nobility of a person at a glance?”
“And you cannot?” His expression held a mild challenge. “Can you tell me that within the first few moments of knowing each person in this room, you had not formed firm judgments of their character, which up to this very moment you have not questioned?”
She smiled ever so slightly. “I do hope that, in regard to at least one person here, my first impression will prove not to becompletelyaccurate.”
Mr. Nobley blinked. She held her soft smile. There was a tense silence, and then Colonel Andrews laughed again.
“Excellent. Most excellent. Never heard someone give old Nobley the what-for quite like that.” He slapped the table emphatically.
Miss Charming was staring between them, eyes wide. “Well, butter my arse and call me a biscuit, but I have no idea what all that was.” She tapped the table with hot pink lacquered nails. “Come on, Miss Erstwhile, it’s your turn, what-what.”
Jane played her card, and after a moment stole a glance at Mr. Nobley. He’d been watching her, and when he looked away, guilt betrayed his forced serenity. Sir John, a nearly empty glass trembling in his hand, snorted in his sleep and startled upright on the sofa. Jane heard Miss Charming say “Jolly good” with genuine joy and caught Colonel Andrews passing her a sly smile.
That night as Jane lay in her chemise under her canopy, a strange feeling uncurled in her middle. It was sweet, warm,and wispy like candle smoke and yet thrillingly inviting, and it had something to do with her conversation with Mr. Nobley.
Though she always felt much more capable in one-on-one conversations than in a crowd, she’d long daydreamed that inside an Austenian story, she might feel more like . . . well, like herself, perhaps. That in a nineteenth century drawing room, the tiny spark inside of her trembling to shine would finally burst out.
The warm, inviting feeling continued to uncurl, and she recognized it as hopeful anticipation. A brief worry tried to pop up and warn her that she was already in danger of falling for this place. If it was as wondrous as she’d hoped, then how could she ever leave it behind? But she quickly batted the worry away. Surely she could allow herself to enjoy it for a while and trust that by the end she would be fully disillusioned. Besides, for the first time that she could remember, she could not wait for tomorrow.
