I Was Jane Austen's Best Friend

by Cora Harrison

  ‘What a charming man,’ enthuses Augusta once Thomas has fallen to the rear. ‘I do declare that I have not heard of him, but I am sure that he is a real hero at sea. Where is his ship docked?’

  ‘At Southampton.’ Cassandra obviously does not know the full story of Augusta’s letter.

  ‘Southampton! I can’t bear the word!’ Augusta shudders and then looks at me crossly. ‘Oh, Jenny, you sad, sad girl! What are we to do with you? I do declare, ma’am’ – now she addresses herself to Mrs Austen – ‘that I have not had a single night’s sleep – Edward-John will tell you – since that letter came from Lady Portsmouth.’

  ‘Lady Portsmouth?!’ exclaims Jane, and she turns and looks at me, her eyes wide with amazement.

  ‘Lady Portsmouth?’ echoes Mrs Austen.

  ‘Was your letter from Lady Portsmouth, Augusta?’ I say. Suddenly I lose all fear of her. Only one thing matters now, and that is Thomas. ‘Are you sure it was from Lady Portsmouth, Augusta?’

  ‘Yes, of course.’ Augusta sounds intensely annoyed. She turns away from me and towards my aunt. ‘I told you, ma’am, did I not? Lady Portsmouth wrote to me that when Jenny came to a ball at her house she recognized her. She saw her last February when she was staying with a friend in Southampton. They were all listening to the young lady of the house perform on the piano when Lady Portsmouth saw a young girl, all alone and unprotected, look in through the window. She imagined her to be some sort of streetwalker and went to close the shutters. What was her astonishment to see her at her own ball at Hurstbourne Park and to learn that she is related to me?! Of course, she wrote to me. After all, my mama is one of her close friends.’

  I look at Jane and she looks at me. She moves very close to me and squeezes my hand. Augusta looks at us with dislike.

  ‘You two seem very thick,’ she says disapprovingly.

  ‘Yes, we are,’ says Jane demurely. And then she can’t resist adding, ‘But I’m the thinner of the two …’ and smiling sweetly when Augusta looks puzzled.

  ‘Well, here we are in Steventon,’ interrupts Mrs Austen. ‘In another few minutes we will be at the parsonage and you will have a good cup of tea. That will restore your nerves. Charles,’ she says as the chaise goes through the gates, ‘you jump down and find the stableman for Captain Williams’s horse.’

  ‘No,’ says Jane. In her hurry to get out, she almost stumbles. ‘No, Mama, let Charles ride back up to Deane Gate Inn with the post boy to find out how the guard is. The surgeon should be there by now. He can bring us news; I’ll see to Captain Williams and his horse.’

  ‘Go straight into the house, Jane,’ says Mrs Austen sternly. ‘Tell Susan that we have arrived. Charles, you do what I told you.’

  Jane rolls her eyes at me, but she dares not disobey her mother. I stay sitting in the post-chaise until Thomas has gone into the stable.

  He still has not once looked at me.

  ‘You sit here opposite Jenny, Captain Williams; Cassandra, make room for your Cousin Augusta next to you; Edward-John, could you take the bottom of the table, please?’ Mrs Austen is back in control, beaming at me and adding in a loud whisper to Augusta: ‘Jenny and Captain Williams are great friends.’

  I feel as if I want to be sick, but reluctantly I take the indicated seat.

  Luckily Thomas doesn’t notice. He is busy chatting to Charles and promising him the first vacancy for a midshipman when he reaches fifteen years old.

  ‘There are just a few words that I would like to say first, dear Aunt.’ Edward-John is standing stiffly at the bottom of the table with a large black book in his hand, almost as if he is about to read prayers. ‘Captain Williams, sir,’ he continues, ‘your conduct, your gallantry, your courage, your quickness of thinking, your—’

  At this point Charles yawns and stretches out his hand towards the dish of buttered eggs. Cassandra gives him a sharp tap and an angry look, but Edward-John is too discomfited to go on for much longer. ‘But I weary my young cousin,’ he says, trying to get his dignity back. ‘May I just present to you, Captain Williams, this humble volume of my collected sermons?’ And then he bows ceremoniously. Thomas jumps up, but hardly seems to know what to do with the book once he has it in his hand.

  ‘Well, well, well,’ he says, ‘this is—’

  ‘Very weighty,’ interrupts Jane, picking up the dish of eggs and the serving spoon and walking around the back of the table.

  ‘Perhaps grace first?’ suggests Edward-John.

  Normally Mr Austen mutters a perfunctory, one-sentence grace before meals, so Jane does not sit down again, but holds the spoonful of eggs poised over Augusta’s plate. I am embarrassed and worried about Thomas, but I have to choke back a giggle at the expression on Jane’s face as Edward-John’s grace wanders on and on, going from giving thanks to God for the food that not one of us has yet touched to giving thanks to God who sent an angel to help us in our hour of peril this morning. Charles gives a great snort and then covers his face rapidly with a grubby handkerchief when Edward-John mentions the ‘angel’, and I can’t help glancing at Thomas. His brown eyes are dancing with amusement, and I feel myself getting very red when I realize that he has seen me looking at him.

  Mrs Austen, I see with satisfaction, when we are all eating our buttered eggs – and consoling ourselves, as Jane whispers in my ear, with the thought that Augusta has the coldest eggs of all – Mrs Austen does not like either of them. Augusta is very haughty and condescending, and Edward-John sounds a false flattering note, admiring all the battered out-of-fashion furniture in the parlour, but giving an occasional sly glance at his wife that shows that he does not mean his praise.

  I keep wondering what will happen after breakfast. The meal is an agony to me. I have no appetite for the food and every time I look up I can see Augusta looking at me with her pale eyes which are so like boiled gooseberries that I will never again eat that fruit without thinking of her.

  After breakfast will come the moment, I keep thinking to myself, and I wish that Charles will go on eating for a long time. However, he has stopped eating now and is telling Thomas all about his ambitions. Even in the middle of my misery I think that Thomas is being very nice to him. Mrs Austen rises to her feet and starts loading dishes rapidly on to a tray, obviously making sure that Edward-John doesn’t start on another long prayer.

  And then Augusta clears her throat.

  ‘Ahem!’ It is so loud that everyone stops and looks at her with interest.

  She smiles around, enjoying the moment, and then looks at me, her eyes as hard as glass.

  She has left it too long though. Before she can speak, Thomas gets to his feet with easy grace and bows to Mrs Austen.

  ‘I wonder, ma’am, if I might invite your niece to take a short walk with me. It’s such a fine day—’

  ‘It’s raining,’ Charles tells him bluntly.

  ‘Just a mizzle! My favourite weather! When you’re a sailor on my ship and you’ve spent as much time in the East Indies as I,’ he tells the delighted Charles, ‘then you’ll love our English mists.’ Thomas gives a half-glance towards the window and then holds out his arm to me. I take it. I am still very embarrassed about that letter, but anything is better than staying and having Augusta tell me that no matter what anyone says, she and Edward-John, as my guardian, are determined to send me to that boarding school, which has no holidays and where the girls are locked in their dormitories every night.

  ‘I’ll run and get your cloak and your bonnet.’ Jane thrusts the dish she is holding at Charles, who, with a quick glance at the back of his mother’s head, proceeds to lick the remains of the eggs from its sides.

  And then we are outside and the hall door is closed on the rest of the family.

  But still I can say nothing.

  I know that I am on the verge of tears and think it is better not to risk making any polite remarks about the weather or enquiries about his journey.

  ‘What’s the matter, Jenny? Don’t you like the rain? Let’s walk under
the trees here. Your bonnet will remain quite dry.’

  I tell him that the rain is nothing and I try to make my voice ordinary, but even I can hear how it shakes.

  ‘Take my arm,’ he says after a minute. ‘It’s slippery here with the wet moss on these paths.’

  I take his arm and begin to feel better. The damp air is fresh and clean and perfumed by the brilliantly white lilies of the valley that edge the path.

  ‘I got your letter. Why were you so angry with me?’ His face is gentle but puzzled. ‘Did you think it was terribly rude of me to go away from the ball without telling you where I was going? I should have really, but I was so angry and so ashamed of my men. I don’t know whether you saw my sergeant come into the ballroom, looking for me. I was puzzled when I noticed him talking to Lieutenant Price and then I thought I’d better see what he wanted. He came to tell me that the boat crew were turning my ship into a drinking shop, with all sorts of terrible behaviour going on. I just wanted to sort it out straight away before anyone heard of the disgrace to the Bonaventure.’

  ‘What?!’ I’m sure I shriek the word before telling him the whole story of how I thought he was angry with me and had written to Augusta with the story of me in the midnight streets of Southampton.

  ‘What!’ His exclamation is even louder than mine, so I tell him quickly that now I know that it was Lady Portsmouth who wrote to Augusta. I tell him all about Augusta’s letter and about the boarding school in Bristol where there are no holidays and the girls are all locked into their dormitories at night.

  His eyes become very black and he begins to get so angry with Augusta that to distract him I say, ‘I wish I had asked Lieutenant Price. He could have told me where you’d gone, and then I would not have suspected you of writing that letter.’ (At least, I think that I might not have, though I don’t think I could have guessed that Lady Portsmouth knew my secret.)

  Thomas smiles then and he looks a little less angry.

  ‘Lieutenant Price,’ he says, ‘bless him – he would never have told you. This was a disgraceful thing to happen to our ship. He wanted to go himself, but I wouldn’t permit that. It was the business of the captain to sort this matter out.’

  I ask him what he did to the boat crew, and no sooner is the question out of my mouth than I’m sorry that I asked it. I had to shut my ears to Frank’s tales of floggings, but Thomas just says casually, ‘I stood over them for three days while they were on their hands and knees scrubbing everything that could be scrubbed and polishing everything that could be polished. I don’t think they’ll try that again in a hurry. Of course it was very boring for me, but it gave me a lot of time for thinking …’

  He pauses for a moment and then adds, ‘For thinking of you.’

  I say nothing – just fix my eyes on the raindrops glistening on the glossy green of a harts-tongue fern under the rhododendron bush. In the distance a cuckoo calls, and seconds later another replies.

  ‘Don’t you want to know what I was thinking?’ His voice is very low and very soft, but I feel it vibrate within me.

  ‘Yes,’ I say at last. He has stopped walking and I stop too. Just above our heads a tiny wren begins a piercingly sweet song. I lift my head to see it, and look straight into Thomas’s face. The air of calm authority seems to have gone from it, and his eyes are gentle and pleading. I remember Eliza’s words of advice. I cannot fail him now. Quickly I take off my bonnet. I feel that the deep rim of it forms a barrier between us. Now our faces are quite close, his bending over mine. I no longer hear the bird-song, just the sound of us both breathing in unison.

  ‘What I was thinking was that I was in love with you,’ he says in a voice that is barely audible to me. ‘I’ve been in love with you, I think, ever since that night when I met you at Southampton. There you were, a timid young girl, out by yourself at midnight in streets where no man would go without a sword or a pistol. You were terrified, and yet you kept going because you were determined to get help for your cousin. All the time that I was at sea I could not get you out of my head. I loved you then, and when we met again I loved you even more. When you told me how you nearly died, it frightened me. I realized then that I could not live without you. I felt that I would never be happy unless you were with me.’

  Thomas holds out his hand and I put my damp, cold one in his and am glad that this time no glove comes between us and that I can feel his warmth.

  ‘And what about you?’ He is smiling now. Even in the dim light under the trees I feel that he can, indeed, read my answer in my eyes.

  ‘I love you too.’ I’m pleased to hear how steady my voice sounds. ‘I love you and I think I too have loved you since we met in Southampton and you rescued me.’

  I force myself to go on. ‘And I love you because you are kind and gentle and noble and brave, and I would like to spend the rest of my life with you.’

  I bend down and pick a small pale primrose and before I straighten up I put it to my lips, and then I hand it to him. He puts it to his own lips and sticks it in his buttonhole. And then he takes me in his arms.

  ‘Will you marry me, Jenny?’ he says, and his lips are almost touching my ear.

  I turn my head so that my lips are at his ear, but when I speak the words ‘I will marry you’, they come out clear and confident.

  And then his lips come down on mine and our kiss lasts for a long time.

  Eventually we walk on and everything is even more exciting than a ball, because it is just the two of us and we are talking about our future.

  We will get married in June – that’s the plan. A June wedding, and I will wear roses in my hair.

  And I will visit his uncle and his sister.

  They will love me, Thomas says. He has told them all about me, and they are looking forward to my visit.

  And he will show me his ship at Southampton. He tells me all about it and about the new sails that he has ordered.

  And by the time we come back indoors, it is almost time for dinner. Frank and John Portal are there, talking to Edward-John about the sport that they had in the woods at Laverstoke House. Augusta gives me a long look, but I just look at Thomas. Suddenly I have lost all fear of my sister-in-law.

  Mrs Austen and Cassandra are looking at me too – perhaps waiting for something to be said.

  We have it all planned though. Thomas is going to ask my uncle for my hand. That is the way it is going to be done. We have discussed it – Thomas and I – and we feel that will be best. Edward-John will be a little in awe of his uncle, who has been a clergyman for so long.

  Although I want everyone to know about us, to know that Thomas and I will be getting married, and it seems a long time to wait until tomorrow morning when Mr Austen and Henry will arrive, still we have our whole lives ahead of us.

  ‘Ahem! Jenny,’ says Augusta.

  But at the same moment Mrs Austen says, ‘Jenny dear, run upstairs and change your shoes and stockings. We don’t want you to catch cold.’

  ‘I’ll go with her,’ says Jane quickly.

  We both escape and run up the stairs.

  ‘Well?’ says Jane as soon as the door is safely closed behind us.

  ‘Yes!’ I say.

  Sunday, 10 April 1791

  It is six o’clock of the morning. I am still dressed in my nightcap and wrapper, but I have got out of bed and put some more wood on our fire. There is just enough light from the flames for me to see the words that I write.

  These are the last pages in my journal. They will be happy pages. I’m glad of that, because it began sadly and I want it to end joyfully.

  Thomas loves me.

  He loves me and he wants to marry me.

  And no one except Jane knows about it yet.

  But soon after breakfast everyone will know about the splendid future in front of me.

  ‘Don’t worry about anything. Everything will be fine. I have a very high opinion of your uncle and your aunt is a woman of great common sense — I like the way she got Augusta and Edward-Jo
hn out of our way for the whole evening by proposing a visit to the Lefroys.’ Thomas said this to me last night before going up to share Frank’s bedroom for the night. The guest room had to be given over to Augusta and Edward-John, but Frank was very pleased to be able to offer Henry’s bed to a naval officer. He and Charles had even disappeared upstairs to make sure that everything was ‘shipshape’, as he put it, so there was no one on the stairs at the time when Thomas kissed me goodnight.

  ‘I’ve an idea,’ said Jane when we were talking in bed last night. ‘Your Thomas has to go on his voyage to the East Indies and you will miss him, so you will need diversion. When the pupils are on their holidays, we’ll ask Mama to take us both to Bath for a little break. We can stay with her rich brother, my Uncle Leigh-Perrot. Bath is full of romance. And of course, since you’ll be a betrothed young lady, you’ll be able to find me a fine young beau so that I can become engaged also. We’ll have a great time at Bath, going to balls and private parties and even perhaps getting some new gowns made.’

  I assured her that she would be the heroine of the next story about Jane and Jenny and she remarked: ‘If I am to be the heroine, something will throw a hero in my way. I’m sure I’ll get plenty of material for a new novel out of it all.’

  ‘I think secretly you are more interested in writing novels than in finding a young man, Jane.’ I smiled fondly at my cousin.

  Jane wasn’t listening. She had a thoughtful look on her face. She took her writing desk out of the drawer, set it on the table, and then she dipped her quill in the inkhorn.

  ‘What are you writing now?’ I asked, going across to look over her shoulder. Jane is not like me: her writing is never private.

  ‘I’m writing a happy ending,’ said Jane with great seriousness. ‘I have decided what every good novel needs is a happy ending and this one will probably come in useful for me one day. I thought it up while you were talking about Thomas and about how happy you are feeling. I want to put it down before I forget it.’ She wrote for a moment and then said, ‘Listen to this.’