Day 9
Jane woke early to paint. The neglected artist had begun to yawn again inside her, and she yearned to feed it.
With a brush in her hand, all the clunky, scattered thoughts drained out of her, sparing her from awareness of her sharp, pointy bits or the assaults of anxious memories, and she entered the artistic meditative state she hadn’t realized she’d been missing.
When she finally took a step back from her canvas, hours had somehow passed.
It seemed like a small miracle. Never before had she noticed that her fear of being alone dissolved while she was creating.
The process brought up an ability to be present with herself, the art reflecting her heart back, making her feel surrounded and supported.
“I am all astonishment,” whispered Jane.
Noticing her stomach rumble, she rang a maid to help her dress for the day and hurried down to the morning room, hoping to catch the last of breakfast. Waiting for her in an otherwise empty room was a cup of cold tea, some eggs and toast, and Mr. Nobley, holding two scripts.
He had the look of a long-suffering man.
Jane laughed. “I knew Aunt Saffronia would not mind.”
“As did I. And that is why I had preferred not to ask her.”
They sat in silence on the sofa, reading through the scripts side by side. It was a fairy-dusted romance of star-crossed lovers that was too sentimental for Jane even in her present state of extreme openheartedness. She snorted a laugh.
“It is not supposed to be a comedy,” he said.
“Oh, I know,” said Jane. “But it is when I imagine you speaking these lines.”
“Ah, there you are,” said Colonel Andrews, poking his head around the doorjamb. “Thespians, assemble! We are holding a script reading in the Ancient Druid Greenwood.”
“He means the conservatory,” said Mr. Nobley.
They rehearsed for hours in the sunny, many-paned room, the squat potted plants standing in for a tree-filled wilderness, before taking a break for a lavish tea service.
Colonel Andrews stepped forward as their director, arranging the blocking and making encouraging remarks, such as “Miss Charming, that line delivery was exquisite! A royal performance!”
“I happened to notice that Miss Charming has the most lines in the script,” Miss Heartwright said amiably. “How fortunate for her! And what a blessing for us all.”
And Mr. Nobley watched Jane. He had always seemed aware of her, of course. That was part of his character. But did she fancy that he was even more so now? And that in his side glances and half smiles gleamed a touch of slipped character, a break, a sliver of the man himself?
Oh, stop it, Jane told herself.
But then again, movie actors fall in love with each other on set all the time. Was it so outlandish to suppose it might happen to her?
Yes, it is, she answered herself. Stay focused. Have fun.
And, miraculously, she did. She bantered and laughed and smiled coyly over one shoulder.
Perhaps her morning painting had imbued her with a fresh energy and confidence, and there with Mr. Nobley, she felt relaxed.
In the past, Jane would’ve been so beset by stumbling doubts she’d have lost the capacity to enjoy his eyes on her.
But now, she looked right back at him. Here there was no anxiety, no what-ifs.
Just good clean nineteenth century flirtation.
After dinner, instead of meeting in the drawing room for cards and charades, the pairs put on coats and wandered into the pink-glowy evening to rehearse their individual scenes.
Jane and Mr. Nobley broke away from the others first, secreting themselves behind the house.
The theatrical efforts of the day had let a bit of Bohemia into Regency England, the usual strict social observances bending, the rehearsals allowing the couples an excuse to be alone and enjoy the exhilarating intimacy of the unobserved.
Mr. Nobley tested the grass for dampness before sitting and leaning back on his elbow in a reluctant recline. “ ‘Oh, to die here, alone and unloved . . . ’ ”
“That was pretty good,” said Jane. “You genuinely sounded in pain, but I think you could add a groan or two.”
Mr. Nobley groaned, though perhaps not as part of the theatrical.
“Perfect!” said Jane.
Mr. Nobley sat up and rested his head on his knee, laughing. “I cannot believe I let you coerce me into this. I had thus far managed to avoid doing a theatrical.”
“Oh, you don’t seem that sorry. I mean, you certainly are sorry, just not regretful . . .”
“Just do your part, please, Miss Erstwhile.”
“Oh, yes, of course, forgive me. I can’t imagine why I’m taking so long, it’s just that there’s something so appealing about you there on the ground, at my feet—”
He tackled her. He actually leaped up, grabbed her around the waist, and pulled her to the ground. She screeched as she thudded down on top of him.
His hands stiffened. “Whoops,” he said.
“You did not just do that.” She barely moved as she spoke. She barely breathed. She was so aware of the sturdy expanse of him beneath her, their bodies touching at a hundred different points.
He looked around for witnesses. “You are right, I did not just do that. But if I had, I was driven to it; no court in the world would convict me. We had better keep rehearsing, someone might come by.”
“I would, but you’re still holding me.” His hands were on her waist. They were gorgeous, thick-fingered, large. She liked them there.
“So they are.” He looked at her. He breathed in.
His forehead tensed as if he was trying to think of words for his thoughts, as if he was engaged in some sublime inner battle that was provoked by how perfectly beautiful she was.
Even if that was entirely Jane’s romantic speculation, they were on the ground, touching, frozen, staring at each other.
Even the trees were holding their breath.
“I—” Jane started to say without knowing what words would come next.
Her entire body was warm and starting to throb with the effort of holding still, and yet some part of her shouted a warning that she must act nonchalant, that it would be catastrophe if she let on how much he affected her. “I, um—”
Mr. Nobley shook his head, as if to save her from that. He apologized and helped her to her feet, and then plopped back onto the ground, as his character was still in the throes of death.
“Shall we resume?”
“Right, okay,” she said, suppressing the shiver rising up from the base of her spine.
“We were near the end . . . ‘Oh, Antonio!’ ” She knelt beside him, carefully pulling the hem of her skirt above her knee to keep from pressing it against the grass.
She patted his chest. “You are gravely wounded. And groaning so impressively! Let me hold you and you can die in my arms, because traditionally, death and unrequited love are a romantic pairing.”
“Those aren’t the lines,” he said through his teeth, as though an actual audience might overhear their practice.
“They’re better than. It’s hardly Shakespeare.”
“Right. So, I am mortally wounded and lie dying in your arms . . . et cetera, et cetera, and I use this moment to exclaim my sudden, dramatic love—I cherish you more than farms love rain, than night loves the moon, and so on, I am magically revived, and then . . .”
He pulled her upright and they stood facing each other, her hands in his.
Again with the held breaths, the locked gazes, first horizontal, now vertical.
It was almost too much to bear. Jane wanted to stay in that moment with him so much, her belly ached with the desire.
All the air was gone around her except the atmosphere trembling between their bodies.
She leaned into it, into him. She didn’t look away.
It was easier not to feel embarrassment, because it wasn’t real.
Their characters were having a romantic moment.
Mr. Nobley didn’t need to know that very real Jane was experiencing an intense and very real yearning.
Mr. Nobley’s gaze shifted from her eyes to her lips. Would he kiss her now? She would frankly love to add that stage direction to the play. But then, as if reluctantly, he looked down to her fingers held in his own.
“Your hands are cold,” he said.
She waited. They had never practiced this end part, and the flimsy script gave no guidance, such as, Please just kiss the girl already! She leaned in a tiny bit. He warmed her hands.
“So . . .” she said.
“I suppose we know our scene, more or less,” he said.
Wasn’t he going to kiss her? No, it seemed nobody ever kissed in Regency England. So what was happening? And what did it mean to fall in love in Austenland anyway? Jane stepped back, the weird anxiety of his nearness making her heart beat so hard it hurt.
“Should we return? Maybe the others are already back in the drawing room.”
“Right. Of course,” he said, though he seemed a little sorry.
The evening had pulled down over them, laying chill like morning dew on her arms, right through her clothes and into her center. Though she was wearing her wool pelisse, she shivered as they walked back to the house. He gave her his coat, so long it brushed the ground around her feet.
“This theatrical hasn’t been as bad as you expected,” Jane said.
“Not so bad. In fact, I have found it preferable to other so-called amusements, such as charades or croquet.”
“You make any entertainment sound like taking cod liver oil.”