Jane Austen Made Me Do It (30 page)

She blushed and said, “Delighted.”

He offered Miss Mary his other arm. Miss Mary replied that she had dropped her handkerchief somewhere about and that she must look for it, but that they should not wait for her and that she would catch them up.

And so John Bennet and Jane Gardiner strolled along the country roads with the sun up above and the birds singing, and thought that life held no pleasures greater than this.

The combined effects of Miss Gardiner's prettiness, the loveliness of the day, his father's ill health, and his own recent accident rendered him vulnerable, and by the time he reached the Gardiners' gate he found that he had proposed.

With smiles and blushes Miss Gardiner accepted, and he was ushered inside to speak to her father.

What joy filled the Gardiners' household! Mrs. Gardiner danced round the room, crying, “Mistress of Longbourn!” whilst Mr. Gardiner cleared his throat and welcomed John to the family.

Mrs. Gardiner pressed him to stay to dinner, but John said he must go home and give his family the news.

The joy in the Bennet household was not unconfined. His parents received the news more soberly than Mr. and Mrs. Gardiner had done. There was no dancing around the room and no crows of delight.

“Well, well, she is a healthy girl and it is high time you were married; I suppose she will do,” said his father with resignation. “Miss Raistrick will be disappointed, but as long as Miss Gardiner does her duty and presents the estate with a son and heir within a year of becoming Mrs. Bennet, I will have no complaint to make.”

His mother said only, “I am glad it is settled. Now the Collinses will have to buy their own grandfather clock.”

 … And now the very same clock was striking, twenty-three years later, and he was no longer a young man thinking of his own marriage; instead it was his daughters' wedding day.

Where did the years go? he thought, as he watched them with pride.

There was no further time for reflection. The wedding breakfast was over and Mrs. Bingley and Mrs. Darcy were ready to depart.

“Oh, Mrs. Bingley, how happy you will be!” said Mrs. Bennet, embracing her eldest daughter. “And Lizzy,” she said. “Ten thousand a year!”

Elizabeth caught her father's eye and they both smiled. Elizabeth hung back as Mrs. Bennet followed Jane and Bingley to their carriage and Mr. Bennet claimed Elizabeth's hand.

“Well, Lizzy, so you are leaving us,” he said.

“Yes, Papa,” she said, clasping his hand in return.

“I could not let you go to anyone who did not deserve you, but Mr. Darcy truly loves you. You will be a very happy woman.”

“I know,” she said with a radiant smile.

“I will miss you. You must write to me often,” he said, and he even went so far as to say, “and I will endeavour to write back.”

There was time for no more. Mr. Darcy, waiting by the Darcy carriage, was growing impatient. Mr. Bennet let go of Elizabeth's
hand with reluctance and watched her running over to her husband with pride.

“Ah! What a wonderful morning!” said Mrs. Bennet as she joined him on the doorstep.

“Indeed,” said Mr. Bennet.

They waved until their daughters' carriages were out of sight, and then Mr. Bennet offered his arm to his wife.

She had not provided him with a son and heir, but she had provided him with a handsome number of daughters and she had unwittingly provided him with a great deal of entertainment as well.

It was as much as a man could ask for, he thought. He had nothing to complain of.

And with that he led his wife back inside.

J
ulie Morton pushed open the door to the staff room, bracing herself for the gust of cigarette smoke that wafted into her face. Books and handbag clutched to her chest, she made her way across the room, past the women who were not quite colleagues and certainly not friends, thankful that today was Friday and that in little over an hour she would be free for the weekend and Derek.

Ah, the wonders of the English language. Not free for Derek (she wasn't supplementing her meager salary by becoming a part-time courtesan, something certainly not expected at Cleverton High School for Girls) and not free of Derek—although of course if she was thinking in Latin, a certain ambiguity would exist. How about by, with, or from Derek? She really wasn't quite sure. Yes, she would be with him, and then pleasured by him, having received attentions from him—no wonder Catullus and the rest were drawn to erotic poetry. It was really the language's fault.

And she had a whole, lovely weekend to anticipate, a special weekend, so he had promised her.

She smiled a greeting at Miss Williams, the shy History teacher whom the girls despised for her heavy Welsh accent and dark-framed glasses as much as her timidity. Julie, with the knowledge that only a few years lay between her and the girls she taught, did her best to avoid becoming the recipient of girls' confidences and opinions on the other teachers, but their contempt for Miss Williams was plain on their faces.

“These gels,” Mrs. Henderson said. She was the only person Julie had met who pronounced the word to rhyme with “bells,” like an Oscar Wilde character.

“Oh, I know,” Miss Dickinson said.

The two of them, the queen bees of the common room, sat in their special chairs drawn close to the glowing bars of the electric fire, sipping from the china cups and saucers reserved for their exclusive use.
I hope you don't mind, dear, but that's Mrs. Henderson's chair … cup …
Julie had been saved from certain ruin by discreet whispers of reproof on her first venture into the common room.

She helped herself to a cup of instant coffee, adding milk from the bottle that stood nearby on the counter referred to as “the kitchen,” and settled on a chair midway between Mrs. Henderson and Miss Dickinson, and the two art teachers, who maintained a quiet conversation about where they should go at half-term; the Cotswolds, maybe? Edinburgh? Rather too far, they thought.

“These gels,” Mrs. Henderson repeated. “I don't know which is worse; first they're all mad about horses and now it's these young men, the ones with all the hair.”

“And the screaming,” Miss Dickinson said. “It's not nice.”

“Thank goodness they don't scream in school,” Mrs. Henderson
said. She balanced her cigarette on her saucer. She gazed around the common room as a queen might regard her domain. “What do you think, Miss Morton? I don't see you screaming and behaving like a silly-billy.”

“I think their music is rather nice, but I …”

“I hope you don't mind taking detention tonight,” Miss Dickinson interrupted.

“Actually I—”

“You are the most junior member of the staff,” Miss Dickinson said as though the matter was settled. “And since you're taking a holiday on Monday, that will give you plenty of time over the weekend.”

“And drawing insects all over their exercise books,” Mrs. Henderson continued. “It's quite dreadful. Saying they're going to marry Tom, Dick, or Harry, or the one with the silly name. Singing those dreadful songs.”

“John, Paul, George, and Ringo,” Julie said.

They both turned and stared at her.

“Those are their names. Not Tom, Dick, and Harry.”

“It doesn't make any difference.” Mrs. Henderson blew a dignified smoke ring. “No one will remember who they are in a few weeks.”

Having got their attention, Julie continued, “I don't think I can take detention tonight, Miss Dickinson.”

“It's on the blackboard.”

“Oh, well, if it's on the blackboard,” Julie murmured, knowing her attempt at irony would be lost.

The blackboard, along with Mrs. Henderson and Miss Dickinson, formed the three components of staff room law. What was written there was the law, and the two teachers exercised an iron control over the eraser and chalk.

Sure enough, Julie's name was written there, a partner in punishment
along with those notorious outlaws of the upper fourth: Susan Castle, Catherine Brown, and Penelope Emory.

Julie glanced at her watch. If indeed her fate was sealed, she had better phone Derek, and that meant facing the Gorgon within the next seven minutes.

She slipped out of the staff room into the corridor. As she passed the cloakroom, a few girls, huddled among coats and scarves, gave her a look that was half guilt, half challenge. She wondered briefly what they were doing; rumor had it that copies of
Lady Chatterley's Lover
were circulating in the school again, well-thumbed pages destined to fall open at the dirty bits. She wished she could share with her students the irony and restless sensuality of Lesbia's sparrow, a far better introduction to the pleasures of the flesh, in her opinion, than the confused phallic mysticism of D. H. Lawrence.

And there would end her career as a teacher.

She tapped on the door of the office where Mrs. George, gatekeeper of both Miss Creegan, the headmistress, and of the school telephone, held sway.

“Hello. I'm terribly sorry, Mrs. George, but I need to ring someone up.”

“Very well, Miss Morton.” Mrs. George inclined her head graciously. “Please don't make a habit of it.”

Good Lord, it was like visiting the Pope. How long before Mrs. George extended a hand for supplicants to kiss? But instead, Mrs. George pushed forward a box with a slot in the top, an item Julie found particularly repellent. The box, made of a cheap, splintery wood, was slathered in a sickly yellow varnish and inscribed with the words

A nightmarish figure dressed in green and sporting ridiculous curly-toed shoes and a hideous grin pointed upward toward the slot. Since the box also bore the legend
A Souvenir from Penzance
, it was probably meant to represent a Cornish pixie.

Julie dutifully dropped a sixpence into the slot: highway robbery in her opinion. The first time she had used the phone and offered a threepenny bit, she had received another of those discreet whispered warnings in the staff room.
I do so hate to tell you, dear, but Mrs. George was rather upset about the money for your phone call.…

She suspected that Mrs. George's take had nothing to do with the phone bill but more to do with the ever-increasing assortment of china figurines, mostly sickly-sweet kittens, that adorned her otherwise empty desk. Empty, that is, except for the typewriter that Mrs. George now attacked with a small brush, daring any specks of dirt on the keys to give themselves up.

Julie dialed Derek's number.

He answered, his voice low and lazy. Jazz played in the background.

“Hello, it's Julie.”

“Darling. Just a mo. I'll turn this down.” A brief pause and the volume of the music dropped. “How lovely to hear your voice.”

“I'm afraid I'm going to be a bit late this evening. I have to take detention.”

“Oh, damn.”

“Yes.”

“Are you ringing from that old cow's office?”

“Yes, that's right.” She glanced at Mrs. George, who, her typewriter keys subdued, now flicked a soft yellow duster over the china kittens.

“How late?”

“Oh, about an hour.”

“Bugger. If we're to arrive in time for dinner, it won't give us time to go to bed first. Bit of a sexual wilderness at the parental home, you know.”

“The p—” she stopped herself before arousing Mrs. George's interest.

“Yes, darling. That's your surprise weekend. Mumsie can't wait to meet my fiancée.”

She paused, dumbfounded. “Oh. That is a surprise.”

“Well, we're sleeping together. Obviously we're going to get engaged.”

“Yes, but …”

“Look, darling, you're not the sort of girl who expects roses and moonlight and a bloke on his bended knee and all that sort of balls, are you? I think they have Granny's diamond ring knocking around somewhere at the house, so I'll find it for you. And then you can stop working at that wretched school when we're married. Teaching Latin to silly schoolgirls—what sort of job is that?”

“Oh, absolutely,” she said with a no-nonsense air, as much for Mrs. George's benefit as Derek's. “I'll see you at about six, then.

Bye.”

She hung up the phone, her heart pounding.

“Your young man, is it?” Mrs. George said, setting a china kitten straight.