Page 33 of The Austen Affair

The entire house is in shambles with worry over George’s condition, leaving almost no time for me and Hugh to even consider the implications of our latest liaison—that he began it, or that I ended it.

He takes a walk into the village each day, hopeful for a letter from the electrical-machine purveyor, Dr. Beckworth, but each day he returns empty-handed and more despondent than the day before.

Aside from that daily pilgrimage, Hugh, Aunt Fanny, the nanny, and I do almost nothing but trade off shifts at George’s bedside, applying cool compresses to his forehead and encouraging him to drink tea and swallow spoonfuls of broth.

Mr. Balfour is particularly blue, as his ill-health means that Aunt Fanny will not allow him to visit George’s sickbed.

One afternoon, having just ceded our place in George’s room to Aunt Fanny, Hugh and I head downstairs to eat but spy Miss Crawford alone in the dining room.

She stands from her place at the table, eyes lit up with malice as they fix on me, and we—total cowards—immediately swerve left to enter the parlor instead.

There, Mr. Balfour is sitting by the fire, staring dully into the flames.

We join him at the hearth, me on the divan, Hugh pulling up a seat beside his wheelchair.

There is one particularly heartbreaking fact about Mr. Balfour: he cannot help but smile whenever he sees Hugh.

He reaches a liver-spotted hand out for his son’s, and Hugh allows him to take it, then places his free hand atop Mr. Balfour’s.

“George is improving, sir,” Hugh tells him, voice hoarse from reading aloud nonstop these past few days.

“I am not worried in the least,” Mr. Balfour says, though even I—far from the object of his attention—know from the painful expression on his face that he’s lying. “The good Lord already saw fit to save one of my sons from harm’s way. I do not fear for George in his merciful hands.”

“One moment,” Hugh says to Mr. Balfour. “I’ll be back in just one moment. I think there’s something we can do to lighten our hearts and pass the time while George makes his recovery.”

Hugh departs in the direction of the library, returning quickly with a stack of blank paper and an inkwell. He sits back beside Mr. Balfour and dips the quill tip, ready to transcribe. “Would you tell me about what your parents were like?” he asks.

The old man’s eyes sparkle. I can almost see cobwebs being blown off boxes in the attic of his memory. “My boy,” he says, voice croaky with emotion, “there is so much to say.”

Hand on my heart, I slip quietly from the parlor to allow them time alone together.

With a new determination, I head back toward the dining room and Miss Crawford’s righteously indignant company.

There I find Cecelia absorbed in a book of poetry written by John Donne.

Or she is pretending to be absorbed, because as I take a seat beside her she does not look up but merely continues turning the pages at a steady pace.

I lob a timid question at her. “Do you like poetry?”

Cecelia’s pale-blue eyes flick to me before returning to the page. “I like it well enough when there is no other material to be read.”

Not bad. Better than silence, I suppose. “You like Shakespeare, though?”

She does not look up at all this time, merely returning with a dry “William is fond of it, and I am fond of William, so I can find enjoyment in Shakespeare when I have to. I prefer his histories. I find the bard’s comedies laughable and his tragedies morose.”

I giggle at her statement, feeling like we’re finally making ground.

Cecelia closes her book, keeping one tapered index finger stuck in a page, and tilts her head inquisitively. “Why are you laughing?”

I blink at her, realizing too late that she wasn’t making a joke. “But is that not exactly what they’re supposed to be?”

At that, Cecelia actually rolls her eyes, which I’d never imagined a refined Regency lady doing.

Though, now, I am reconsidering. It’s possible that humans have been finding silent ways to express their contempt for other people since the dawn of time.

“I suppose you would like me to be a giggling fool or else a weeping mess. Or read children’s books, as I have heard you have been doing for George. ”

I take genuine offense at this. I can feel my nose wrinkling in indignation. “ Sense and Sensibility is not a children’s book. It’s a lovely romance. In fact, I think you might like it.”

“I doubt that,” Cecelia says, tone flat as a board. “I’m not quite the romantic I used to be.” She reopens her book and does not speak to me again for the next twenty minutes, by which time I decide to expeditiously retreat, for now.

I can make anybody like me with enough time. I’m a battering ram. I’ll wear her down with kindness.

Four days into George’s illness, I start to notice something suspicious. His fever has burned itself off, but his coughing has gotten louder, his sighs more melodramatic.

The truth dawns on me in a moment of blinding clarity. The little shit is faking it, because he likes all the attention. I should be angry, but my affection for him only skips upward into a higher frequency. If he’s well enough to be a faker, he’s well enough to tease.

I’ve gotten to the very tail end of Sense and Sensibility with him, and I break off midsentence in one of the final chapters to stare him down with an eagle eye.

George gives a pathetic cough into his pillow and nods at me to keep going. “What happens now? Lucy Steele and Mr. Ferrars are gone off. Is Elinor going to die an old maid?”

I shrug, closing the book. “You don’t want to hear it. You’re so tired.”

“I want to hear it!” he protests.

“No.” I shake my head, sighing with a heaviness to match his own. “No, it’s too sad. It will just upset you.”

George’s big brown eyes widen with fury. “I want to hear!”

I toss the book onto the bed, standing and stretching.

“I couldn’t possibly tell you the ending until you’re all better.

I couldn’t risk your health that way.” I cross over to the window, closing the curtains and dimming the sunlight from outside.

“In fact, I think I ought to be quiet and let you go to sleep.”

“But that’s boring.” George pouts, crawling for the book and trying in vain to hand it back to me from his place on the plush mattress.

“Being sick is boring, Georgie,” I tell him, refusing to turn around from the window to stop him from seeing my growing smirk. “But when you’re all better, I’ll tell you all about Marianne’s grisly death scene.”

George’s voice shoots up several octaves in his excitement. “ Grisly death scene? ”

I stroll to the door, and his arm springs out to reach for me. “I’m really feeling much better!”

Upon George’s return to the prime of health, relief whistles through the house like a strong wind.

Happiness restored to the permanent residents, Mr. Crawford seizes upon the opportunity to raise everyone’s spirits yet further.

“It is time,” he announces over breakfast the next morning, tossing a small book of Shakespeare onto the table between us, “to return to our little theater scheme!”

I reach across a plate of toast and pick up the slight tome, with its brick-red cloth board and the bright, metallic lettering of the title. “ Twelfth Night, ” I say, for the benefit of the group.

Mr. Crawford takes his seat beside me, showcasing that wide grin again.

“The play is the thing, and in this case, it is just the thing! A comedy is what is needed to air out the rooms in this house after several days of dusty concern. And I should think we could acquaint ourselves well with the text and inquire into the local village for performers for the bit parts.”

I pass the book down the line to Hugh, whose hand has extended wordlessly, casually toward me.

My cheeks pink. I like this version of us—the version that communicates without thinking.

It is the sort of gesture that might pass between two people living together, brewing coffee at their Formica kitchen counter.

I notice that he has another wax-sealed letter to Elias Beckworth on the table before him.

He mentioned the previous day that perhaps the first letter had gotten lost in the mail, seeing as it was posted right before that tremendous rainstorm.

He said it almost hopefully, like it would improve his spirits for there to be a rational reason why Dr. Beckworth hasn’t responded yet.

Though I personally wonder if the reason Dr. Beckworth hasn’t gotten back to us is because he’s a bit more like me than he is like Hugh.

He perhaps doesn’t see mail correspondence as the best use of his time and lets such things pile up.

Concerning. I should know: nobody wants to pin their best hopes for time travel on a disorganized mess.

My eyes linger approvingly on the strong yet graceful lines of his hand.

He’s wearing a gold signet ring—the necessary accessory of any Regency gentleman—on his pinky, and I cannot help but admire how well it looks on him.

Still, small clues tell me that Hugh Balfour is not quite his usual rigid self.

Black ink dots the pads of his fingers, and I suspect he must have gotten dressed in a hurry, because the cuff of his sleeve is uncharacteristically out of order, giving him an attractively rakish look.

Sort of like a pirate in a swashbuckling silent film.

“Give,” I tell him, reaching for his sleeve. He lends me his wrist without question, and I reaffix the cuff neatly. His dark eyes comb my face, and I respond with a quirked smile. “Yes?”

“Nothing,” he says. “Thank you.”

“Happy to help,” I murmur back.

“I was thinking,” Mr. Crawford interjects, louder, to gain our attention back again, “that perhaps the party might indulge me the favor of allowing me to try my hand at Duke Orsino. I think I shall be able to summon sufficient gravitas for the role.”

Hugh’s eyes cut to Mr. Crawford as if he is an insignificant fly.

“You may do whatever it is you want, Mr. Crawford. I’m afraid I’ve been looking forward to continuing on my current venture.

You may have heard that I am recording my father’s memoirs for posterity? I will not have time for theatricals.”

Mr. Crawford inclines his head, wearing a smile that unnerves me—at once sadistic and supercilious.

I can sense a true and startling hatred for Hugh behind those eyes, though he has tried his best to conceal it.

He must know the details of his sister’s difficult circumstances. There’s no other explanation.

“Of course, Mr. Balfour,” Mr. Crawford purrs, “I would not dream of disrupting such important work. And yet I insist you allow yourself some leisure time. Do join us in a smaller role. Sebastian, perhaps. He is lost at sea for much of the play, and thus cannot be much of an imposition.”

Hugh’s broad shoulders twitch ever so slightly up in dull agreement. “Fine by me, sir.”

“And you, Mrs. Bright,” Mr. Crawford says, his eyes reanimating as he fixes them on me, “must favor us with your interpretation of Viola.”

I straighten up, surprised and pleased. I am not some Shakespearean scholar, but I am an actress at heart, and an actress always knows the lead’s name when she hears it.

Hugh’s mouth tightens into a line. “Wouldn’t Miss Crawford be a better Viola?”

I scoff, turning my head to Hugh. I am heartily offended.

Is this part of our ongoing plan to be as nice to Cecelia as possible, or is he really doubting my credentials for the leading-lady part yet again ?

He waves off my inquisitive expression like another buzzing fly.

“Sebastian and Viola are twins,” he points out.

Mr. Crawford simpers, “Yes, but you did not want to be heavily involved. And Cecelia is no good for comedy, a tool which Viola must have in her arsenal. No, no, Cecelia is our Olivia, and make no mistake.”

Miss Crawford does not reply—she so rarely seems to speak. Instead, she merely picks at her breakfast, turning her pert nose away from the ongoing conversation, as if none of this concerns her overmuch.

I lean an elbow on the table and fix Hugh with a shit-eating grin. “The casting director disregards your complaints yet again, Mr. Balfour. I simply do persist in landing roles you think me woefully unqualified for.”

Hugh, scowling, makes sustained eye contact with me. I begin a staring contest, raising my eyebrows to a comically high level, until I gradually see the lines around his eyes soften. He’s fighting back a laugh, I know. But his dignity will not let it escape so easily.