Chapter Eleven
Never in a million years, in a month of Sundays, in another time/space continuum, would Gabe ever be able to figure out the way Tess Hardy’s mind worked.
Admittedly, he had underestimated her. Or rather he’d labelled her as a woman of shallow preoccupations who was overly fixated on finding a partner.
Which was somewhat true but also didn’t even come close to adequately explaining the mental leaps and fantastical notions that governed her decision-making.
Why on earth had she decided to take Edward Rochester, the dour antihero of Charlotte Bronte’s Jane Eyre out for dim sum? Why did she think that was a good idea? Or that, indeed, he’d make a good date?
Gabe had already had several interactions with the man and had always found him objectionable. But now he googled the book, the character, the themes while he was waiting to be seated and was alarmed by what he found.
Maybe that was what Tess liked. The kind of man who locked up his wife in the family attic while laying siege to the vulnerable Jane Eyre, who as a governess was an employee and meant to be under his protection and beyond his heavy-handed advances.
Honestly, in this day and age, Jane would be straight on the phone to whatever agency had arranged her employment or, failing that, the Citizens Advice.
It took a while for Gabe to be seated. They didn’t want to waste even a two top on a single diner when they were so busy, but as soon as he sat down, he ordered a lot of food to make up for it. It helped that he had a weakness for dumplings.
Expertly wielding his chopsticks, Gabe dipped a perfect bite of crispy tofu into a mango sauce then a sweet chilli sauce and thought briefly of nineteenth-century trading routes, patterns of immigration and the positive impact they’d had on British cuisine.
Then, as he put his rusty Mandarin to use by challenging himself to read the specials on the menu without looking at the English translation, Gabe’s mind came to rest on the sixth-century BCE Chinese philosopher Lao Tzu, or rather his theory of Taoism, which promoted the belief of the importance of non-action and non-resistance in order to lead a more elevated, transformative life.
That is, to go with the flow. Maybe now that he had his library responsibilities as well as his academic career to manage, Gabe needed to go with the flow more, even if it went against his entire belief system.
He’d been trying to give them space to enjoy their date, but Gabe couldn’t help but glance over at Tess and Rochester.
Tess was someone who was definitely able to go with the flow.
She’d jumped straight into her Love Library adventures without even thinking about where she might land.
Currently she seemed to be having the time of her life.
She’d moved her chair so she was sitting next to the Neanderthal-browed ne’er-do-well, her hand on his as she gave him what looked like a tutorial in how to use chopsticks. She even managed to get him to crack a smile.
No. Gabe wasn’t going to look. He wasn’t here to observe, but rather to keep a very distant eye on proceedings to make sure that library property didn’t come to any harm.
Not that Rochester looked like he wanted to do a runner. He was now gazing at Tess in much the same way that a snake might look at a poor defenceless little bunny rabbit before pouncing.
Tess didn’t seem to mind. She was smiling and nodding.
So animated as she listened intently to everything that Rochester said.
Really giving the date her all. Trying her very best to put Rochester at ease, or as much at ease as he could be in a world that was two hundred calendar years and about two million light years away from his own time.
It was quite … endearing. Gabe liked to think he was a man of many achievements and accomplishments, but he couldn’t remember the last time that he’d given anything as much effort as Tess was giving this date.
Rochester said something to her and she shook her head. She was so vivacious. The kind of person who crackled with life. She held up her hand as she took out her phone. Checking her TikTok or whatever while she was on a date was less endearing.
Gabe turned his attention to his Sichuan crispy aubergine, then felt his own phone vibrate. However, he wasn’t on a date so it was perfectly all right to retrieve his phone from his breast pocket to see he had a message from …
TessHardy:
Urgent extraction needed!
Gabe looked over at their table, then with a sigh he flagged down a passing waiter.
‘I’m dreadfully sorry, but I have a family emergency.
Can I have this food … oh, and the food from that table over in the corner, yes, the one where that woman has just thrown a glass of water over that man, to go, and the bill for both? ’
Gabe reached their table as Rochester was rising to his feet. ‘You liked me well enough when you were enamoured of my station, my wealth, yet now you recoil from me as if I were some toad or ape,’ he enunciated icily.
‘Are you implying that I’m a gold-digger? How offensive! You were the one who was jawing on about your tea plantations and how much money they make.’ Tess threw an imploring look at Gabe. ‘Can you shove him back in the book? Please?’
Gabe could sympathise. ‘I can’t,’ he said apologetically. ‘Not here.’
‘You only had to refuse my patronage,’ Rochester continued, mopping at his trousers with the napkin.
‘You shouldn’t even have offered me your patronage. What about your poor wife? What about poor Jane Eyre?’
‘Jane Eyre! That drab sparrow.’ Rochester laughed hollowly. Gabe was beginning to dislike him in a new, very deep and profound way. ‘I envy her peace of mind, her clean conscience, her unpolluted memory, but no matter, for I will only despoil them. While you are a creature already despoiled.’
‘I can’t even …!’ Tess made an agitated jazz hands gesture. ‘Really not enjoying the nineteenth-century way of calling me a tart.’
‘You flaunt your buxom charms and …’
‘All right, that’s enough!’ Gabe snapped, though it was not at all right, as he came to stand in between them. Shielding Tess from Rochester’s lecherous gaze and his even more lecherous attentions. ‘Not another peep out of you, Rochester.’
‘You are a man of little consequence …’
‘Not another word!’ Gabe repeated grimly. The whole restaurant was looking at them. It seemed as if the entire kitchen staff had abandoned their stations to come out and gawp too.
Luckily Gabe’s server was hurrying over with the card reader. Gabe brandished his phone in its general direction …
‘Oh, shall we go halves?’ Tess asked, which was something that a woman who was very clearly not a gold-digger would say. Although paying for dinner was the least Gabe could do.
‘It’s fine,’ Gabe said thinly.
‘Well, I’ll put in a tip,’ Tess said, her hands still fluttering, her face flushed as if she thought the thinness in Gabe’s voice was directed at her when it absolutely wasn’t.
‘I won’t be ordered about and dragged from pillar to post like some lumpen beast of burden,’ Rochester insisted. He tried to sit down but only got in the way of another server who was parcelling up their largely uneaten food. ‘I was promised vittles and some female company.’
‘Time for us to go back to the library,’ Gabe said in a tone that he hoped was resolute. ‘Tess’s parents wouldn’t want her staying out too late.’
Then he winked at Tess and hoped that she’d be in on the joke. He also knew from bitter experience that the only way to deal with Rochester once his blood was up was to let him think that he was in control.
Tess huffed at the thought that her parents, or the parents of any thirty-something, independently living woman, would try to impose a curfew on her.
The huff was quite endearing too. But all she said was, ‘I’m so sorry for the aggro and the water,’ to the bemused-looking server who’d just packed her food as she stuffed a couple of bank notes into his hand.
‘Please don’t ban me. There have been times in my life when your soup dumplings have been my only friend. ’
The walk back to the library was largely uneventful.
Gabe made sure that he was between Rochester and Tess and that Rochester was on the road side, even though he complained about getting ‘gutter filth’ on his still-damp trousers.
The references to gutter filth were part of a whole polemic concerning the ills of modern society, of which there were many.
He was particularly unhappy about women having the vote.
‘No taxation without representation,’ Tess pointed out, but mostly she was quiet and seemed deep in thought as they worked their way through Soho.
Rochester was still pontificating (‘Next you’ll be telling me that you’ve granted suffrage to the lower orders, the peasant class’), because he really was a stuffed shirt, a bore, and wholly objectionable.
Mona didn’t need to be asked, she thrust their copy of Jane Eyre at Gabe as soon as he reached the Loans Desk. ‘What was he wanging on about this time? Women wearing trousers or how slavery is actually quite a good thing?’
‘Women and the working classes being allowed to vote,’ Gabe muttered and she grinned.
‘Oh, no, Sharma! I will not be contained for many a long hour yet,’ Rochester said as he caught sight of the book in Gabe’s hands. ‘Allow me some respite after …’
‘Restore!’ Gabe said quickly and desperately, and Rochester was gone in a cloud of grey glitter, leaving a scorch of soot and gunpowder in the air.
As Gabe locked the book and handed it back to Mona so she could reshelve it, it was humming slightly, as if Rochester was still ranting between its pages.
Tess leaned back against the desk and sighed in relief. ‘Reader, I didn’t marry him.’