First Impressions: A Novel of Old Books, Unexpected Love, and Jane Austen

by Charlie Lovett

  “So you want to do what—drive to Hampshire in the morning?”

  “Not in the morning,” said Sophie. “Now.”

  “It’s midnight,” said Winston.

  “The perfect time to slip out of town without Smedley seeing us.”

  “Listen,” he said, “I don’t think you should go anywhere. If this Smedley character is as dangerous as he sounds, I don’t like the idea of your leaving this hotel room until we’ve taken care of him.”

  “Why do I think that’s not the only reason you want me to stay in this hotel room?” said Sophie, once again pressing her breasts into his bare back.

  “Let’s at least wait until morning.”

  “I can’t sleep,” she said, bouncing up off the bed.

  “I can.”

  “What’s the matter, did somebody tire you out?”

  “You could say that,” said Winston.

  “Fine,” said Sophie. “You sleep. I’m going to curl up in this chair and read some Jane Austen.” After all, Victoria would be there in the morning. Maybe she would join the expedition to Hampshire. She pulled the second edition of Mansfield’s book out of her bag on the bedside table and, surprised by her own brazenness, sashayed across the room, sure that Winston’s eyes were glued to her nakedness.

  “Jane Austen or Richard Mansfield?” said Winston, teasingly.

  Sophie slipped on a bathrobe she had tossed aside earlier and plopped down in one of the overstuffed armchairs. “Jane Austen,” she said emphatically.

  Hampshire, 1797

  THOUGH LORD WINTRINGHAM had made clear to Jane that his invitation to walk in Busbury Park whenever she wished had not expired with the death of Mr. Mansfield, Jane did not often avail herself of this privilege. Now, nearly a year after the death of her friend, she had come to Busbury on a painful errand. The November wind whipped across the fields as she approached Busbury House and turned down a short path to the chapel. Cassandra had urged her to wait for better weather, but Jane had protested that better weather was not likely to arrive for several months, and she felt her excursion to be of the most urgent nature. She refused, too, her sister’s offer of accompaniment, saying that this was a visit she needed to pay alone.

  Mr. Mansfield’s grave in the corner of the churchyard, though now covered with grass, still seemed fresh to Jane. The small white marker gleamed even in the absence of sunshine. She stood by him for several minutes, before pulling a letter out of her pocket. It was a letter which, only a few days ago, had been invested with such high hopes that it hardly seemed possible that it had brought Jane here under these circumstances. She had spent much of the spring and summer of 1797 writing the narrative version of First Impressions. As she read each chapter to her family they became more and more convinced that here, at last, lay Jane’s chance of publication. If people outside her family circle embraced her novel about Mr. Darcy and Eliza Bennet the way the Austens had, she had reflected that it was perhaps a stroke of luck that the original version of the story had never seen the light of day.

  She had finished the book—for even though it comprised nothing more than a sheaf of manuscript without printing or binding, she already thought of it as a book—in August, and since then had made such minor revisions to the story as had been suggested by her listeners. Her father, on rereading the entire manuscript in October, had proclaimed it as good as any novel in print and had undertaken to explore the possibility of its publication, which had given rise to the letter of which Jane now held a copy. Believing it to be the epistle that would launch her career as a published writer, she had insisted on copying it out before her father consigned the original to the post. She now unfolded the copy and read it to Mr. Mansfield.

  To Thomas Cadell, Publisher

  Sir—I have in my possession a manuscript novel, comprising three volumes, about the length of Miss Burney’s Evelina. As I am well aware of what consequence it is that a work of this sort should make its first appearance under a respectable name, I apply to you. I shall be much obliged, therefore, if you will inform me whether you choose to be concerned in it, what will be the expense of publishing it at the author’s risk, and what you will venture to advance for the property of it, if on perusal it is approved of. Should you give any encouragement, I will send you the work.

  I am, Sir, your humble servant,

  George Austen

  “Should you give any encouragement,” repeated Jane in a melancholy tone. Mr. Cadell certainly cannot be said to have given encouragement. He had declined the offer by return of post, bringing Jane’s dreams of publication to an abrupt conclusion. Mr. Austen had not allowed her to see Mr. Cadell’s reply to his letter, claiming that he had tossed it into the fire as soon as he had read the terse response declining to consider Jane’s work.

  “But declined it was,” she said to Mr. Mansfield. “And now I know not what to do. Am I to write stories only for the enjoyment of my own family? And if that is the case, ought not my time be better spent in some more fruitful endeavor? Serving the poor in some way, perhaps? I am, sir, in desperate need of your advice and yet you lie there cold and unresponsive.” Jane felt a tear course down her icy cheek. This was the moment, she thought, when she must decide once and for all whether to go on with her writing, to pursue it in the face of all rejection; or to lay aside her pen for some pursuit that might provide her with the opportunity to give lasting service to society rather than merely entertainment to her own family circle. She was inclining very much toward this latter option and expecting no interference in that decision from the corpse of Mr. Mansfield, when, as she knelt and laid a hand on his grave, she was suddenly struck by a recollection of the last time she had seen him.

  It had been just a year ago, and she and Mr. Mansfield had sat for a few minutes in front of the dying fire in the gatehouse sitting room, waiting for the gig that would arrive to bear her friend away toward Croft and out of her life forever. Mr. Mansfield had confessed to feeling a weariness when anticipating the journey.

  “How I wish,” he had said, “that some enterprising young man would invent a form of transportation that would allow me to read while on a journey. The bumps of a carriage will not allow a book to stay in the same place long enough to accomplish the reading of a sentence, let alone a novel.”

  “You are a dreamer, Mr. Mansfield,” said Jane, smiling. “What do you imagine? A room that will glide smoothly across the landscape, bearing you to your destination?”

  “It is a consummation devoutly to be wished,” said Mr. Mansfield with a laugh. “Instead I’m afraid I shall be bounced and jostled for the next three days, and am likely to arrive in Croft not only dull in mind but bruised in body.”

  “I’m sure you will recover from your journey and be pleased to sit in your own study once more, surrounded by your own books.”

  “I fear, Miss Austen,” said Mr. Mansfield, “that recovery is not something that comes quickly at my age, and though the prospect of my own books is pleasing, the prospect of returning in a few weeks’ time to your company is more so. I do hope I shall be back soon. But until then, you must make me a promise.”

  “Anything, my friend.”

  “Promise me that, until we meet again, whenever that may be, you will not cease to write. You will not cease to strive to better yourself in that work for which I am sure the Lord meant you.”

  “Though we shall meet again before the year is over, I promise,” said Jane. “I shall do my best to make you proud in the tutelage and encouragement you have bestowed upon me, and I shall look upon what meager gifts I have as sent from God.”

  “Thank you,” said Mr. Mansfield, rising from his seat as they heard the gig approaching. “And Miss Austen.”

  “Yes, Mr. Mansfield?” But she never heard what he wanted to say, for at that moment the driver of the gig had come through the door and insisted that if they did not leave immediately, Mr. Man
sfield would miss his coach.

  She wondered now, at his grave, what he had wanted to tell her. For her part, she wished once more that she had found the opportunity to confess her love for him. It was a confession she bitterly regretted never having made. But that was no matter. She had promised him, she thought as the cold earth turned her hand numb. She had promised him to keep writing until they met again. Had he known, when he extracted that promise, that they would not meet again on this side of the great divide? It did not matter, she thought. She had made him a promise and she intended to keep it.

  When she returned to the rectory she tossed the crumpled copy of her father’s letter into the fire and went upstairs to write.

  Oxford, Present Day

  THE MORNING SUN had started shining through the gaps in the curtain when Sophie finished reading First Impressions for the second time. Winston was sleeping and she laid her three stolen artifacts next to each other on the coffee table. She sat in the armchair staring at them and wondering what to do next.

  What would Uncle Bertram do? Give everything to Winston and let him deal with it? Hold a press conference and become the thief who destroyed Jane Austen? Burn everything and tell Smedley that there was no longer a reason to stalk her? Sophie had it in her to steal books, but she didn’t think she had it in her to destroy them—especially these books. She knew they told a story, a remarkable story; she just wasn’t convinced she had every chapter lying on that table in front of her. She knew what Uncle Bertram would do. He wouldn’t rest until he knew the ending.

  —

  “IT’S VERY HARD TO read a book with all of your rubbish in it,” said Sophie one spring afternoon as she sat with her uncle on the narrow balcony of his flat. It was Easter holidays and she had decided to read something thick. Uncle Bertram had suggested David Copperfield, but his copy seemed to have a credit card receipt or a theater ticket marking a page at least once a chapter. And there were a lot of chapters.

  “You know, I think I liked you better before you turned fourteen,” said her uncle in a voice that betrayed his insincerity. “That’s not rubbish.”

  “It may not be rubbish,” said Sophie, “but every time I turn the page I end up in a fight with some old piece of paper that wants to blow off the balcony and into the street.”

  “It’s a battle worth waging,” said Uncle Bertram. “You know that every book tells a story, but every one of those bits of paper tells a story, too. I never kept a diary, you see. My books and my bookmarks are my diary. What have you got there?” he asked, indicating the slip of paper in Sophie’s hand.

  “It’s a ticket to The Winter’s Tale at the Royal Shakespeare Theatre,” said Sophie.

  “A matinee, right?”

  “Two o’clock.”

  “It was a perfect summer’s day in Stratford,” said Uncle Bertram. “When the play was over I sat down by the river and watched the swans and read the chapter where David walks to Dover. It’s always hard for me, that chapter, so it helped to be in such a beautiful place on such a lovely day. Whenever things started looking bleak for David, I could look up at the sun glimmering on the river and the white of the swans and the green of the grass and remember that he would be all right in the end. So you see, that bookmark reminds me of a special day. When I look at that bit of paper I’m back on that bench by the river feeling the warm breeze, and I’m also back with David on that cold road to Dover. So it’s a special bit of rubbish because it reminds me of a special day.”

  “But they can’t all be special,” protested Sophie.

  “Ah, that’s where you’re wrong, my dear. They each tell a story—it’s just not always easy to know what the story is.”

  After that, Sophie often made it a game to guess the story of a particular bookmark. “This receipt for towels from John Lewis is to remind you that you walked over the Embankment into the Thames because you were so enthralled with chapter twenty-seven,” she said the next day.

  Uncle Bertram threw his head back and laughed. “Now I’ve learned something from you,” he said. “My little bookmarks can tell a different story to every person who finds them.”

  “Yes, but my story isn’t true,” said Sophie.

  “But truth and a good story are not always the same thing, now, are they?”

  —

  SOPHIE WISHED VERY MUCH that the objects in front of her would tell both the truth and a good story—and to her a good story was one in which Jane Austen was the heroine, not the villain. She finally put the letter and the St. John’s copy of Allegorical Stories into her handbag, settled back into the armchair, and began reading First Impressions yet again. As she turned the first few pages, she felt overwhelmed with sadness that although this book had belonged to her uncle, there were no bookmarks. Every one of those thousands of stories stuck between the pages of his books was gone now, tossed into the rubbish bins of dozens of booksellers like so much worthless refuse. To Sophie, those receipts and tickets and takeaway menus were worth more than the books themselves, and even if she repurchased every book Uncle Bertram had ever owned, she would never have those stories.

  In this melancholy mood, she flipped the pages of First Impressions to her favorite letter.

  My Dear Miss Bennet,

  I am recently parted from my aunt who gives me such an account of her visit to Longbourn as to encourage me to believe that a similar journey of my own might not be wholly unwelcome by yourself. I entreat you not to trifle with me, but declare to you in all sincerity that my affections and wishes are unchanged from what they were last April. If your feelings are equally unaltered, I beg you to tell me so at once by return of post, and you shall never hear a word from me again. If, on the contrary, I have correctly understood the implications of my aunt’s narrative, I should very much like to pay a visit to Longbourn to discuss with you, and with your father, a matter of great importance.

  Yours,

  Fitzwilliam Darcy

  Sophie loved this letter, even more than the corresponding scene in Pride and Prejudice. There was something about imagining Darcy being forced to wait for a reply that touched her deeply. She could imagine him standing at the door of Pemberley every day when the post arrived, his heart racing with hope—the great and noble Fitzwilliam Darcy turned into an anxious child by love.

  She wondered if Jane Austen, or Richard Mansfield, or perhaps both of them were trying to tell her something about love. Winston was fun, but she couldn’t imagine waiting by the door for a letter from him. She couldn’t imagine him writing a letter, for that matter, not like Eric did. She knew she did not love Winston—not yet anyway—but what was wrong with a little casual sex? She read the letter again and tried to imagine what it would feel like to be so desperate for a response that you would drop all sense of dignity and propriety and dash from the house at the first sight of the postman. She remembered the leap in her chest she would feel whenever she received a letter from Uncle Bertram as a little girl—that was certainly love, but it was different. Poor Mr. Darcy, standing on the steps of Pemberley in the rain, waiting and hoping—how she envied him that perfect conviction that he had found the one. She saw him turning back toward the house, the letters in his hand lacking any communication from Eliza. He trudged through the rain without thought for his health or his appearance, already counting the hours until the next post.

  —

  SOPHIE AWOKE FEELING STIFF and confused. Mr. Darcy had disappeared and had been replaced by a ringing cell phone on the coffee table. She had not meant to fall asleep.

  “Hello,” Sophie mumbled.

  “Soph, it’s Tori. I’m on the train. Should be in Oxford in about twenty minutes.”

  “I’m at the Randolph,” said Sophie. “Room four sixteen. You can walk from the station.”

  “The Randolph?”

  “I’ll explain when you get here,” said Sophie.

  Winston was neith
er in the four-poster bed nor in the shower. On the counter in the bathroom he had left her a toothbrush and toothpaste, no doubt obtained from the front desk, and a note written on a sheet of crisp ivory Randolph Hotel stationery.

  Darling Sophie,

  I told you I wanted you to stay out of danger and I meant it. I think I know how I can lure this Smedley fellow into the open and wheedle a confession out of him. It shouldn’t take more than a few hours. I’ll call you this afternoon. In the meantime, stay put and order room service. It’s on me. I’m afraid I had to borrow your car and of course I had to take the book with me, but all should be back safely by dinnertime.

  Yours,

  Winston

  She dashed back to the coffee table, where she had left the copy of Little Allegories and a Cautionary Tale. It was gone. Damn him! It was one thing to take her car without asking, but to take her book—even if it wasn’t really hers—that Sophie couldn’t forgive. Had Winston been playing her all along to get his hands on the book? Was he really stupid enough to think she would sit in a hotel room eating room service while he confronted the bastard who killed her uncle? He’s either a shit or a moron, she thought. She crossed to the bedside table and opened her handbag. Even though Winston had taken her car keys, he had left both the St. John’s copy of Mansfield’s book and the Jane Austen letter it contained. If he was a crook, he wasn’t a very smart one, thought Sophie. Luckily Victoria was on the way. Victoria, the woman of action—and action was what was required.

  “Change of plans,” said Sophie when she got Victoria back on the phone. “I need a car. That is, we need a car. Can you take the train up to Kingham and come back with the Land Rover?”