First Impressions: A Novel of Old Books, Unexpected Love, and Jane Austen (5 page)

“T
HE GARDEN CLOSES
in a few minutes,” said Sophie to Eric, glancing at her watch. “It was nice of you to come.”

“I love the way the English tell people to go away,” said Eric with a laugh. “‘It was nice of you to come’ sounds so much more civilized than ‘Get out.’ Anyhow, your mother’s invited me to stay for a late supper.”

“I might have known.”

“It’s remarkable what a young man can catch around here with no more bait than a clean-shaven face and an admiration of viburnum.”

“I hate to tell you, but all it takes to wrangle an invitation from my mother is a Y chromosome and a pulse.”

“If you want me to leave, I’ll leave,” said Eric, grabbing Sophie by the hand and pulling her to a stop before they approached the spot where Mrs. Collingwood was chatting with the last of the visitors.

Sophie looked down at her hand held in his. It felt electric, and that both excited and frightened her.

“No,” she said. “Don’t leave. If you’ve charmed my mother, then you should stay.”

“I was hoping I might charm other members of the family.”

“Well my sister has a boyfriend at the moment and I don’t think you’re going to like my father,” said Sophie with a laugh.

“I gather
you
don’t like your father,” said Eric. “All conversational roads seem to lead back to that point.”

“It’s not that I don’t like him,” she said, dropping his hand and starting toward the house. “I’ve nothing against hunting and Barbour jackets; that’s just not my cup of tea. My cup is served in a cracked mug decorated like an old Penguin paperback.”

“Somehow I think there’s more to it than that,” said Eric, “but you don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to.”

They walked back toward the house in companionable silence until Eric said, “What is a late supper anyway? Is it different from dinner?”

“Supper is in the kitchen instead of the dining room and it means Mother doesn’t fix her hair and nobody changes clothes.”

“It’s a good thing I met you, Sophie Collingwood,” said Eric, following in her wake.

“I’m reserving judgment,” she said.

Sophie, Eric, Victoria, Mrs. Collingwood, and a few other guests had been sipping cocktails in the parlor for more than an hour when Sophie’s father finally appeared. He seemed determined that it be a very late supper indeed. By that time, Eric had charmed everyone, mostly with his American accent and his story of the “amazing coincidence” of having met Sophie on the Thames Path and then stopping by to view the sculpture only to discover the same “delightful young lady.”

“You didn’t tell me you already knew Eric,” said Sophie’s mother, pulling her to the side of the room where her father stood.

“You didn’t ask me,” said Sophie. “Besides, I wouldn’t say I know him.”

“He seems a nice enough chap,” said Mr. Collingwood. “What does he
do
in America?” Sophie knew her father meant how did he earn a living. Mr. Collingwood was a great admirer of those landed gentry who had married off their eldest sons to American heiresses.

“He’s a pig farmer, Father,” said Sophie. “He comes from a long line of pig farmers.”

“And is there money in that?” asked her father, oblivious to her sarcasm.

“I’m going to fix another drink,” she said.

At first she thought the meal might not be so bad. Her mother seemed to have tempered her opinion of Eric, on the advice of her husband, who was suspicious of the swine in Eric’s past, and was not thrusting him upon her quite so shamelessly. Mr. Collingwood was deep in conversation with another guest about the foxhunting ban. Eric ate his salad quietly across the wide table from Sophie, separated from her by a massive centerpiece of flowers from the garden; but on the rare occasions when he caught her eye, she detected a mischievous twinkle. The main course passed peacefully enough, as Eric chatted with Victoria, who sat to his left, about games the Collingwood girls had played when growing up at Bayfield. Not until Sophie’s father was serving the trifle did things begin to deteriorate.

“So, Mr. Collingwood. I hear you have quite a book collection here at Bayfield House,” said Eric, winking at Sophie. She did her best to silence him with a glance, but she had never perfected the necessary subtlety of expression, nor did she think Eric would have stopped if she had. “Do you use the library often?”

“Not often,” said her father with what Sophie knew was false politeness. “We have receptions there on occasion.”

“No,” said Eric, “I meant do you use the
books
often. It must be a pleasure to have such a fine collection at your fingertips.”

“‘Pleasure’ is not the word I would use,” said Mr. Collingwood in a low voice that was clearly intended to discourage Eric from further pursuit of the subject.

“And do you frequently add to the collection?” said Eric.

“Do I . . . ?” Mr. Collingwood could hardly have looked more shocked if Eric had asked him if he often performed human sacrifices in the parlor. “Do I
add
to the collection?”

“Yes. I’m sure you must frequent the auction houses and the antiquarian book fairs.”

“Tell me, young man, if you were swimming in the sea and there was a millstone tied round your neck, would you add another one?”

“I don’t swim,” said Eric. “Never learned.”

“That is entirely beside the point. The Bayfield House library is not something which I wish to add to; quite the contrary.” Sophie could see in her father’s expression that he was desperately trying to think of some new topic of conversation to introduce to avoid discussing family finances, and she was about to rescue him by mentioning the upcoming music festival at Chadlington, but Eric forged loudly on.

“Then I suppose your brother must add to the family collection. Sophie tells me he’s quite the bibliomaniac.”

“My brother?” spat Mr. Collingwood, now red in the face and clenching the spoon with which he had been dishing out the trifle as if it were a dagger he was about to wield on Eric. “Not that it’s any of your business, but my brother would have been a disappointment to his father and he is a disappointment to me. He has frittered away his inheritance on a flat full of worthless old books and has never contributed twopence to the upkeep of his family estate. Not that any of that gives you the right to call him a maniac. Now—trifle?”

He held a spoonful of trifle over Eric’s bowl and Sophie feared that if Eric said yes her father would hurl the pudding downward with such force that it would spatter everyone at that end of the table.

“Actually,” said Sophie, “Eric has to be going. Remember, Eric? You said you needed to be back in Oxford by eleven.”

“Why, look at the time,” said Eric, standing up. “I really am most grateful, Mrs. Collingwood. Mr. Collingwood, I hope we have a chance to continue our conversation sometime.”

Sophie’s father did not seem to have any idea how to respond to this comment, and Sophie grabbed Eric by the wrist and led him gently toward the door.

“Good night,” he said, waving to the table with his free hand.

A moment later, standing in the garden, Eric tried to pull her toward him. “Thanks for getting me out of there,” he said.

Sophie pushed him away and dropped his hand. “Why did you goad him on like that?” she said. “I told you what a sore subject the library is for my father.”

“I just showed your father for the buffoon he is. I thought you’d like it.”

“My father is not a buffoon.”

“He is a little. You practically said so yourself.”

“Right—
I
said so, not you. I’m allowed to call him that; you’re not.” Sophie was trying very hard to stay angry with Eric—it was unforgivable that he had made such a scene—but every time she pictured her father brandishing a spoon full of trifle like a weapon, she could feel laughter bubbling up inside.

“I just wanted to make you laugh. I mean, if you read Jane Austen you have to think that was funny. Your father is Thomas Palmer, right out of
Sense and Sensibility
.”

“My father is not Mr. Palmer,” insisted Sophie, but she giggled when she realized how apt the comparison was.

“You know who I’d really like to meet is your Uncle Bertram. I’m a bit of a book collector myself.”

“I suppose Uncle Bertram would know what to do with you,” said Sophie with a smile. She could just imagine her uncle’s laughter when she told him about Eric, her father, and the trifle.

“But I don’t suppose I ever will meet him,” he said, suddenly serious.

“I don’t suppose so,” she said with a sigh. “Listen, Eric, it was very nice of you to come out and pretend to like that awful sculpture and talk with me about books and everything, but it’s late and I’m exhausted, and now I have to go back inside and placate my father by telling him that Americans don’t understand manners or something like that. So maybe you’d better just go.”

“Kiss me.”

“I beg your pardon?”

“We’re two lovers of old novels in a garden in the moonlight. Kiss me.”

Sophie suddenly felt that she should like to do nothing more. So what if he was an ass now and then? He loved Jane Austen and he had driven all over Oxfordshire to find her and he made her laugh—and she had to admit he looked rather handsome with his hair cut.

“I thought you weren’t interested in getting me into bed.”

“I’m not. I’m interested in kissing you.”

“I’m not sure that’s a good idea.”

“Look, I’m leaving for France in the morning and then Italy and then back home to America. When I walk out of this garden we’ll never see each other again, but we’ll always remember that kiss on a warm summer night.”

“You’re incorrigible,” said Sophie, weakening.

“Kiss me.” He did not move toward her or try to take her hand. He just stood there in the moonlight that filtered through the leaves of the willow tree and said it one more time, so softly that the words themselves were like shadows. “Kiss me.” And Sophie raised herself up on her toes and gently pressed her lips to his. He did not embrace her or even touch her except with his lips. He only kissed her and she kissed him and her knees went weak and her heart raced and she thought for a moment that she saw fireworks. Then he pulled away and ran a hand through her hair and whispered, “Good-bye, Sophie.” When he was gone, she stood alone on the grass, shivering in spite of the warmth of the night, and wondering what the hell had just happened.

J
ANE WAS NOT RETURNED
to Hampshire above twenty-four hours before she ventured to Busbury Park and found Mr. Mansfield just setting out on his afternoon constitutional. “I confess, as pleased as I am to see you, that I am sorry to hear that the Dashwoods have been so neglected these past weeks,” he said.

“I assure you, Mr. Mansfield, now that I am back in your company, they shall not be neglected until their story is complete.” Jane had not confessed her epiphany about her feelings toward him. There would be time for that later. Now she wanted nothing more than to talk about literature and feel that connection of the intellect she had missed so in Kent.

“I hope, though you will not neglect the Dashwoods, as you say, that you will still have time to visit a poor old man with few friends and empty days.”

“You paint a self-portrait of much pathos, Mr. Mansfield,” said Jane with a smile, “but despite your exaggerations, I assure you I shall return to you as often as the Dashwoods allow me.”

—

AS AUTUMN CAME
to Hampshire and the weather turned cool, Jane and Mr. Mansfield often curtailed their walks, instead taking tea by the fire in the sitting room of the gatehouse. Jane was writing more quickly now, as her novel rushed toward its denouement, and her reading often took up nearly the whole of her visit. By the beginning of October she had almost finished, and, as she wished to prolong the pleasure of reading, she was delighted with a sudden turn in the weather—a last bit of summer warmth before the grip of autumn became unbreakable—that allowed them to take a lengthy walk around the grounds.

“I was shocked when you read yesterday of the marriage of Mr. Ferrars,” said Mr. Mansfield as they turned in to a walk between two rows of oaks. “I had thought for certain that Elinor and Mr. Ferrars were destined for one another, but I see it is not to be.”

“The story is not finished, Mr. Mansfield.”

“Yes, but Mr. Ferrars has married a young and healthy woman in Lucy Steele, and even if you were to kill her off, Elinor Dashwood should be no man’s second choice.”

“Mr. Mansfield, I suspect that you are trying to get me to tell you the ending. I certainly would not do so, even if I knew it myself.”

“While I believe, Miss Austen, that you are within your rights as a novelist to withhold the end until it is the end, I cannot believe that, so near the conclusion of your tale, you yourself do not know the fates of all involved.”

“Am I a novelist, Mr. Mansfield?” Jane had never been called such, but found that she rather liked the appellation.

“Certainly one who writes novels is a novelist—I believe even that great lexicographer Mr. Johnson would define you as such.”

“But I can claim no true novels to my credit. No words of mine have been set in type or printed on paper or bound in covers.”

“Do you imagine, Miss Austen, that a novel is a novel only when it is set in type and bound in covers?”

“I imagine exactly that, Mr. Mansfield. Surely you would not call Christopher Wren an architect if he had merely dashed out some worthless sketches that were never turned into buildings.”

“You cannot think that what you have written is nothing but worthless sketches.”

“They are worthless if no one pays me for them,” said Jane. “Is that not Mr. Johnson’s definition?”

“Indeed it is not,” said Mr. Mansfield. “Unless I am very much mistaken, Mr. Johnson’s definition of worthless is ‘having no value.’”

“And what value do my sketches have?”

“Anything that brings pleasure to others has inestimable value,” said Mr. Mansfield. “And your novel has brought great pleasure not only to me, but to all at the rectory who have the joy of hearing you read. But we are straying far from your question. You asked if you are a novelist. Let me ask you this, Miss Austen. Are you able to prevent yourself from writing?”

“Indeed not. I find that my stories will not cease to crowd all other thoughts from my mind until I have committed them to paper.”

“And do you have the utmost respect for both the truth of your characters and the emotions of your readers?”

“Though I cannot claim to have readers in the traditional sense, I believe that I do.”

“Then, Miss Austen, let there be no doubt about it—you are a novelist.”

They walked a little farther in silence as Jane digested this proclamation. “Do you know, Mr. Mansfield,” she said, “how Mr. Johnson defines the word ‘novel’?”

“Indeed I do,” he said. “‘A small tale, generally of love.’”

“‘A small tale,’” said Jane. “Novel writing seems an altogether less intimidating occupation when one considers that one only need produce a small tale.”

“And that brings us back to my grave concern about the fate of Elinor and Mr. Ferrars. For I can see no way that their tale can be of love. You must tell me what you contemplate for them.”

But Jane merely tossed her head, smiled, and remarked, “How lovely it is here in the walk with the leaves turning.”