The Mischief of the Mistletoe: A Pink Carnation Christmas

BOOK: The Mischief of the Mistletoe: A Pink Carnation Christmas
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Table of Contents
 
 
A
LSO BY
L
AUREN
W
ILLIG
The Secret History of the Pink Carnation
The Masque of the Black Tulip
The Deception of the Emerald Ring
The Seduction of the Crimson Rose
The Temptation of the Night Jasmine
The Betrayal of the Blood Lily
DUTTON
Published by Penguin Group (USA) Inc.
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England; Penguin Ireland, 25 St. Stephen's Green, Dublin 2, Ireland (a division of Penguin Books
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Penguin Books Ltd, Registered Offices: 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England
 
Published by Dutton, a member of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.
 
First printing, November 2010
 
Copyright © 2010 by Lauren Willig
All rights reserved
 
REGISTERED TRADEMARK—MARCA REGISTRADA
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING-IN-PUBLICATION DATA
Willig, Lauren.
The mischief of the mistletoe / Lauren Willig. p. cm.
eISBN : 978-1-101-44470-2
1. Women teachers—Fiction. 2. Girl's schools—Fiction. 3. Austen, Jane, 1775-1817—Fiction. 4. England—Social life and customs—19th century—Fiction. 5. Christmas stories. I. Title.
PS3623.I575M57 2010
813'.6—dc22 2010011703
 
Set in Granjon
 
PUBLISHER'S NOTE
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
 
Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise), without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.
 
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For my Tweedos
(You know who you are)
&
For all of you
who asked for a book about Turnip
A note for readers of the Pink Carnation series: the action of this book begins after
The Seduction of the Crimson Rose,
but before
The Temptation of the Night Jasmine.
Miss Jane Austen to Miss Arabella Dempsey
 
 
 
Sydney Place, Bath,
25 November, 1803
 
My dear Arabella,
 
Your letter took me quite by surprise this morning. I believe I drank too much wine last night; I know not else how to account for the shaking of my hand today, unless it be the shock of your news. You will kindly make allowance therefore for any indistinctness of writing by attributing it to this venial error.
We are all delighted at the prospect of having you again among us, but under such circumstances! What has the world come to when elderly aunts are so profligate of their fortunes as to squander them on half-pay officers? It saddens me to see you disappointed in your expectations, however much you may claim you expected nothing of the sort. A pretty piece of work your Aunt Osborne has made of it!
Mr. Hoare straightaway said that a woman should not be trusted with money; that your aunt ought to have settled something on you as soon as her husband died. To my remark that that would have been to trust you with money, and you a woman, too, he had nothing to say. . . . But I must say no more on this subject.
What must I tell you of your sisters? Truth or falsehood? I will try the former and you may choose for yourself another time. . . . Margaret you will find assiduously courting all accomplishments except that of good humor. As for Olivia, I suspect she does not exist; every time I call, her head is in a book, leaving only a set of limbs sprawled on the hearthrug. I have hopes for Lavinia, who goes on as a young lady of fifteen ought to do, admired and admiring, but for a certain boisterousness of spirit that time and care will cure.
Your father was to have dined with us today, but the weather was so cold he dared not venture forth.
You deserve a longer letter than this, but it is my unhappy fate to seldom treat people so well as they deserve. God bless you! And may God speed your journey to Bath.
 
Yours very affectionately,
J. Austen
Everybody's love.
Bath
December 1803
“ ‘So Emma,' said he, ‘you are quite the stranger at home. It must seem odd enough for you to be here. A pretty piece of work your Aunt Turner has made of it! By heaven! . . . What a blow it must have been upon you! To find yourself, instead of heiress of eight or nine thousand pounds, sent back a weight upon your family, without a sixpence. . . . After keeping you from your family for such a length of time as must do away all natural affection . . . you are returned upon their hands without a sixpence.' ”
 
—
Jane Austen,
The Watsons
 
“ ‘Poverty is a great evil, but to a woman of education and feeling it ought not, it cannot be the greatest. I would rather be a teacher at a school (and I can think of nothing worse) than marry a man I did not like.'
 
‘I would rather do anything than be a teacher at a school,' said her sister.”
 
—Jane Austen,
The Watsons
Chapter 1
I
am for teaching,” announced Miss Arabella Dempsey.
Her grand pronouncement fell decidedly flat. It was hard to make grand pronouncements while struggling uphill on a steep road against a stiff wind, and even harder when the wind chose that moment to thrust your bonnet ribbons between your teeth. Arabella tasted wet satin and old dye.
“For what?” asked Miss Jane Austen, swiping at her own bonnet ribbons as the wind blew them into her face.
So much for grand pronouncements. “I intend to apply for a position at Miss Climpson's Select Seminary for Young Ladies. There's a position open for a junior instructress.” There. It was out. Short, simple, to the point.
Jane screwed up her face against the wind. At least, Arabella hoped it was against the wind. “Are you quite sure?”
Sure? Arabella had never been less sure of anything in her life. “Absolutely.”
Jane hitched her pile of books up under one arm and shoved her ribbons back into place. “If you rest for a moment, perhaps the impulse will pass,” she suggested.
“It's not an impulse. It's a considered opinion.”
“Not considered enough. Have you ever been inside a young ladies' academy?”
Arabella made a face at the top of Jane's bonneted head. It was very hard having an argument with someone when all you could see was the crown of her hat. Jane might be several years her senior, but she was also several inches shorter. The combination of the two put Arabella at a distinct disadvantage.
Six years older, Jane had always been as much an older sibling as a playmate, telling stories and bandaging bruised knees. Arabella's father had been at one time a pupil of Mr. Austen's at Oxford, when Mr. Austen had been a young proctor at St. John's. Back in the golden days of childhood, Arabella's father's parish had lain not far from Steventon, and both books and children had been exchanged back and forth between the two households.
BOOK: The Mischief of the Mistletoe: A Pink Carnation Christmas
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