Liam gave me a sideways look, a flash of startled blue. “Is that how you see me? A cold-eyed cynic?”
“I didn’t say that! He was all about acting, you’ll recall.”
“I do recall.”
We went on in a silence that lasted so long I began to wonder if I had offended him; there really was no figuring him out.
“Why does it surprise you?” I finally said. “We’re a little like Henry and Mary Crawford, don’t you think? Barging into their lives, with our money and our alien notions, stirring the pot? Trying to seduce them? Of course, with nobler motives.”
Liam gave me a look: long, amused. “It hadn’t occurred to me, no.”
“I always used to think,” I began, “if there was ever any clue at all to Jane Austen the person hidden in her work, it’s in Mansfield Park. In that duality between Fanny and Mary. Dutiful and humble, or witty and amoral—it’s like the struggle that was taking place inside her.”
“And now that you’ve met her?”
“Now I am more confused than ever.”
Another silence fell, more comfortable. “We’ve just got to get Cassandra on our side,” I said at last. In that moment it did not seem impossible; we’d done so many hard things already. “I think Jane likes me a little by now. And she definitely likes you.”
This was truer than I wanted to admit. I thought of the trusting gaze she’d turned on Liam as she explained the awkwardness surrounding the Dr. Baillie problem; it was like I was not even in the room, the way they had been looking at each other. Perhaps biographers would never puzzle over her flirtatious asides about Mr. Haden in the letters from this period, because they would no longer be there. Maybe the letters would tell instead of one Dr. Ravenswood, and his conscientious attendance on Henry during his illness.
“Does she, do you think?”
He sounded so solemnly unsure of this that I could not help myself: I laughed. For once unafraid of being overheard being unladylike, I threw my head back and roared. The release of tension felt so good I couldn’t stop; one laugh caused another. I snorted and gasped, my face contorted, until my stomach hurt, and until Liam, who’d first looked at me in dismay, was laughing too.
CHAPTER 8
OCTOBER 26
23 Hans Place
USHERED INTO HENRY’S DRAWING ROOM, WE FOUND JANE THERE with one more brother for us to meet: Edward, now surnamed Knight, because inheriting the fortune of the rich, childless relatives who’d adopted him required taking their name. I’ve always been intrigued by this: a boy removed from his parents and elevated in rank, like Frank Churchill in Emma, and curious about how his siblings felt. Happy to have such an important brother, or envious at not having been chosen? Did they cry for missing him, when he was gone? Did he for them?
After the reception from Cassandra and James the day before, I was ready for the worst, but Edward Knight surprised me.
“Miss Ravenswood, I am delighted to meet you at last!” I found my hand in his—how had that happened? He was blond, pink, and beefy, seeming from another gene pool than the olive-toned, sharp-nosed Austens I’d met so far. “Jane has told me so much of your kindness to dear Henry during his illness.” His blue eyes were soft; they looked into mine as if, for this moment at least, no one else existed in the world. I began to understand why the Knights had picked him. “And the good doctor—charmed, charmed,” he said, turning to Liam. “I must thank you for all your trouble, your solicitous care.”
“’Tis nothing, sir, I am happy to do what I can.”
“Do not take offense at my urging to call in Dr. Baillie. He saved the life of a friend of mine a few years ago, snatching him from the very jaws of death. Since, I have maintained the highest opinion of him, and when I heard Henry was so ill I could not—But it is not intended as any disrespect to you.”
Liam inclined his head. “And not taken as such. I am sure we will find we are in accord. Has the doctor been here this morning?” he asked Jane.
“He is there now. Along with Mr. Haden and my sister, and my brother James. The sickroom can barely accommodate the patient. Will you join the crush?”
“How is he?” Liam asked her.
“He continues better. It is almost a social occasion—a levee—and Henry fits the role of the Sun King as if born to it.”
“Jane, what nonsense you do talk sometimes. Our new friends will think you serious.”
“They know better. Will you join them there, Dr. Ravenswood?”
“If you wish it.” Their eyes met, and he stood up. “I am yours to command.” With a bow, he left the room.
There was a moment’s pause as we three looked at each other, and then Jane said, “Wait, I forgot—if you will forgive me, Miss Ravenswood—” She rose and hurried out of the room after Liam, leaving me alone with Edward Knight.
He gave no sign of there being anything odd about her abrupt departure, merely smiled and said: “Jane says you grew up in the tropics. What a change you must find London!”
“An agreeable one, though.” I studied this example of the landed gentry, thinking I might not get another opportunity. Edward had in one sense made his sister’s literary life possible, since he’d provided the cottage in Chawton where she now lived. It was Jane’s first permanent home after an unsettled, impecunious decade of moving around with her parents and sister in the wake of her father’s retirement, and later his death: a season in Bath, stays at the seaside, long visits with friends and relations, not a life conducive to writing. Once established in a routine, she made up for lost time, though I’d always wondered why he had not done something sooner. “Have you traveled much yourself?” I asked him.
“Oh! When I was young. Now I have too many responsibilities to venture far from home.”
James, looking no more pleased with his life then he had yesterday, walked in, sank into a chair, glanced over at Edward, and gave me a nod. “Miss Ravenswood.” His sharp brown eyes took me in, up and down; I had an impression of being examined as if I were an exotic creature at Astley’s Amphitheatre.
Cassandra, just behind him, greeted me less curtly than James had, if no more warmly, and said, “But what of Jane? Was she not here?”
“She was,” I said, since no one else seemed inclined to answer.
“She is unaccountable,” Cassandra said, sitting down and looking around the room, her air as dissatisfied as her brother’s. “Have you been in London long, Miss Ravenswood?”
“Since September.”
“And you aim to settle here?”
“I am sure I cannot say yet, madam.”
“Perhaps you have some family you will need to visit elsewhere in England?”
Having no reply to this, I merely inclined my head. The barrage of abrupt questions was rude, as we both knew. James looked maliciously amused, while his brother was harder to read.
“I think—” Edward began, but Cassandra was continuing:
“Jane was not able to tell me much about your family.”