Chapter Two-and-Twenty #2
“A novel. Pride and Prejudice, according to the title page. Late eighteenth or very early nineteenth century, I’d guesstimate.” (Not a guess; Austen drafted it in the 1790s and published in 1813, but I have no way to prove that to him.) “Based on the style and a few plot details.”
When he turns back to it, I sit down beside him, sometimes reading over his shoulder and relishing the story’s familiar pleasures, sometimes watching his obvious delight at encountering this masterpiece for the first time.
“Do you have any idea who wrote this?” he asks after maybe an hour of silent concentration. He reads fast; we’re already at Mr. Collins’s awful proposal in chapter nineteen.
I can only shake my head. I mean, of course I do, but in this universe Jane Austen is nobody, the never-married daughter of an obscure English clergyman. Even knowing exactly what I’m looking for, I can’t trace her through the historical record. There’s no way to connect that woman to this work.
“It’s extraordinary.” His voice has dropped to a reverent whisper.
A sharp rap at the door startles both of us. “Just guest services,” I tell him as I get up. But I squint through the peephole just in case.
Fisher is standing in the corridor cradling a bottle of champagne.
“I realized you can’t raincheck New Year’s Eve,” he tells me with a warm smile as I open the door.
As he holds out the bottle and moves to step past me into the room, he eyes me appreciatively, no doubt remembering how things played out the first time he saw me wearing his sweatshirt—as do I, every time I put it on. “What are you up to—? Oh.”
That’s the moment when he spots Geoff. Sitting on my bed.
“Elle?” He’s impossibly still, the only movement his eyes flitting between us. But his grip must have slackened; if I hadn’t already reached for the champagne, it would have gone crashing to the floor. “What the hell is going on here?”
“Nothing,” Geoff and I blurt out at the same time, which only makes us sound guilty.
“Not that either of us owes you an explanation,” Geoff adds, “but if you must know, you’ve interrupted two colleagues discussing a scholarly matter. Nothing more.”
“I was showing him a historical document I found,” I explain. “An early nineteenth-century novel. It’s”—everything—“nothing.”
Geoff twists the laptop as if to show him. “A career-altering discovery, that’s what it is.”
Somehow, that only makes Fisher angrier. “Christ.” When he turns to face me, I can’t escape the hurt in his eyes. “You promised.”
I did. And now guilt makes me defensive. “Nothing happened between me and Geoff,” I reiterate. “Do you—do you think I’m cheating on you?”
Fisher flinches like I’ve just slipped a knife between his ribs. “No, Elle.” His voice is soft. Dangerously soft, maybe—like that night on the phone. “That’s not what this is about.”
But I don’t believe him. After all, he can’t really be this angry about me showing Geoff a random file on my laptop, can he?
“Then what is it about?” I demand.
Fisher jerks his hard gaze from me to Geoff, as if he expects Geoff to explain.
Geoff looks bewildered and shrugs.
“I can’t—” Fisher begins, and then drags a hand through his hair and bites off the rest. It’s clear there’s something he’s itching to say but can’t, or more accurately, won’t.
“Maybe I should go,” Geoff says as he starts to set my laptop aside.
“Yes,” Fisher hisses.
At the same time, I say, “No.” The real problem here isn’t that Fisher doesn’t trust Geoff.
It’s that he doesn’t trust me.
A muscle ticks along Fisher’s jaw. “I was sitting there tonight, in my father’s hospital room, and all I could think about was you—how much I missed you. How much I—”
I’m pretty sure I know what his next words were going to be, before he stopped himself. What I don’t know is whether he won’t say he loves me in front of Geoff, or whether he’s no longer sure he loves me, period.
“I didn’t tell my mom where I was going when I left, just promised her I’d only be gone an hour.
Even then, she was terrified I was making a mistake by leaving.
” He looks me up and down again “Maybe she was right.” He strides toward the door, then tosses over his shoulder, “I’ll let you know when I’m back in Grantham. ”
My pulse hammers in my temples, driven by a chaotic mixture of panic and fury. “Why bother?” I snap back.
And then he’s gone.
Silence reigns for several minutes. All I can think of is that conversation Geoff and I had at the Grind.
You don’t know Fisher as well as you think you do.
I wonder … do you?
I could cry. But instead, I march toward Geoff, thrusting the bottle of champagne at his chest, trading it for my laptop.
“Open that,” I order him. With a nod, he gets up to fetch a couple of plastic cups from the top of the dresser as I sit down.
I hear the cork pop as I click on the Grantham College remote log-in app.
“What are you doing?” he asks, peering down at the screen as he hands me a fizzing cup.
“Uploading this to the database.”
“Oh, wow. That’s a big step, taking it public already.” He sits down beside me. “Are you sure?”
“Perfectly.” And it’s mostly not a lie. Yes, my impulsiveness has gotten me into trouble in the past, but how can this go wrong?
When the screen appears, he watches over my shoulder as I type:
Title: Pride and Prejudice
Authorship: anonymous [“By a Lady”]
Date: ?1817
“Why 1817?” he asks.
“It seems like a decent approximation,” I tell him. “Plus, it’s the number of this room.”
While the document loads, I finish my first glass and let Geoff refill it. Once the whole text is there, I scroll all the way to the end.
With the Gardiners they were always on the most intimate terms. Darcy, as well as Elizabeth, really loved them; and they were both ever sensible of the warmest gratitude towards the persons who, by bringing her into Derbyshire, had been the means of uniting them.
After Austen’s final word, I add my tag, [EB98], and click upload.
“Wait,” he says, scanning the screen. “Elizabeth and Mr. Darcy end up together?”
“Not very realistic, is it?” I remark wryly as I watch the little hourglass marking progress.
“No. Unlikely such a clever, free-spirited woman would fancy she’d found lasting happiness with someone so self-important and snobbish.”
I suspect he’s not only talking about Austen’s characters.
“In the real world,” I say, “they’d probably wind up like Mr. and Mrs. Bennet, two people who don’t understand each other, trapped in a loveless marriage.”
He laughs darkly. “Is there any other kind?” I think of Cassie and Bill as Geoff tips his drink toward mine; the cups meet with a soft tick of plastic against plastic. “Congrats, Elle! I predict this discovery is really going to make a splash.”