CASSY HAD HOPES FOR A RETURN of her mother’s poor health so that she could stay home and nurse her in blessed obscurity. But the next morning, to her profound disappointment, Mrs. Austen arrived down in the parlor and pronounced herself well.
“What an excellent day it is out there! And I am pleased to report that I passed a good night and awoke feeling unusually robust. Now, Cassy, while your father and Jane are out, I think we should take a walk together, do you not agree?”
Cassy knew her agreement to be no more than a formality, and collected their bonnets.
“Oh, splendid,” said her mother, setting off from the threshold. “The tide is still low, and we can take to the strand. It is a pity that Dawlish does not yet have a more permanent promenade.” She squeezed Cassy’s arm. “We shall have to make sure that we seize every opportunity for walking and talking, eh? Let us not miss our chance.”
It was a dazzling day, all brilliant sun, clear air, and variegated blues. Cassy drank it in and prayed it be peaceful.
“Perfect conditions for bathing. Perhaps a good dipping will improve your sister’s spirits. We can but hope, we can but hope. That girl is all sharp edges at the moment, and it worries me greatly. Your father reported back to me on her conduct with our charming Mr. Hobday, and I do not mind telling you that I was most displeased. Of course your papa thought it amusing, which irked me yet further. His excessive indulgence does naught to alleviate things, and I have told him so often. But why she herself must endeavor to appear as unattractive as possible, that I do not understand.” She paused to take breath, and they greeted a few passing neighbors. “Mind, I have my own theory about Mr. Hobday.” Mrs. Austen’s voice did not drop, but merely transferred to its booming and audible whisper. “And that is, it is you, my dear, who have caught his eye.”
In her embarrassment, Cassy studied their feet as they took up walking again.
“His mother said something rather interesting to me on the way back from ch—Mr. Hobday!” Mrs. Austen stopped. “With what pleasure it is that we meet again. It did not occur to me as we set off this fine morning that we might be so fortunate. The coincidence is quite startling. Tell me, what accounts for you being out here today?”
“Mama.” Cassy, curtsying, was compelled to introduce a calm to the histrionics. “Mr. Hobday is staying here in the village. It can hardly be pure serendipity. Most of Dawlish is enjoying the weather.”
“I beg you, madam”—he bowed—“do not cheat me of such an effusive reception. It is not what I am used to, but must confess to finding it most pleasant.”
Mrs. Austen chuckled. “There. My daughter chiding me again, for no reason. You can be assured, Mr. Hobday, you can always expect a warm welcome from me. Now, which way are you headed? We are merely pottering in an aimless fashion. Perhaps you might like to accompany us for a while?”
“Mama.”
“How delightful. I, too, am only taking the air and enjoying the view while my mother takes her sea bath.” He turned and started to walk alongside them.
“Forgive me for being so personal, Mr. Hobday—it is my way, you will no doubt get used to it. People have to. I am too old to change now—but I must say that you are an exemplary son to your dear mother.”
“It had not occurred to me to be otherwise.”
“Nonetheless, not all young men can boast of such a clear sense of duty. Such filial devotion is a pleasure to witness. You remind me very much of my daughter here.” She patted Cassy with fondness. “She, too, is in possession of the most remarkable qualities.”
“Mother, I fear you are tiring,” Cassy put in quickly. “Perhaps you should rest on this bench for a while.” She settled Mrs. Austen. “Sir, please do not feel obliged to wait with us. Our progress is a little erratic, is it not, Mama? Oh!”
“You were correct, madam.” He smiled. “Your mother must indeed have been tired. She has fallen asleep at once.” He sat down beside her. “Please allow me to wait with you until she has recovered. I do not like to think of you alone.”
“That is kind, but, truly, I have no need of the company.”
“Then let me think only of my own pleasure.” He pulled his cane toward him and studied its top.
Cassy sat in silence and affected a calm, demure exterior that belied the raging torment within. A thin, warm summer breeze was all that held them apart. It played on her skin. Oh! He had only to reach out his hand and her senses would fire up, as they had fired up the first time she saw him. She quailed at the memory: that scalding, quicksilver flash … It was too much to bear. Her life was set, decisions made; her promise had been given, and still there came danger. She had maneuvered herself into a place of tranquility and believed she was settled. Why should her resolution come now under such heavy assault?
She determined to freeze him away. He might converse on any subject that pleased him—thoughts on the picturesque or peace with the French; his incomprehensible love of the fossil—but could hope for no sort of success. He would find it as blood from a stone.
“May I inquire after the health of your dear niece, Anna? I think of her often and that pleasant morning we enjoyed on the beach.”
This was not what she had been expecting. In her shock, Cassy softened to putty. “Thank you for remembering her, sir. She is quite well, I believe.”
“And I hope happy? There seemed a streak of melancholy, or perhaps insecurity, that was troubling to witness in a child of that age.”
“She lost her mother when still very small and is, I fear, scarred by it. Though I am surprised it should be perceived by a stranger.”
“Ah. The loss of a parent is a heavy burden to carry,” he said with a sigh, “especially in one so young.”
“Mrs. Hobday told us last year of your own bereavement, for which I am sorry.”
“Thank you, madam. My father was an excellent man, and is much missed. My mother was badly struck by the grief of it, and that explains our peripatetic existence. She found it too painful to stay in our family home for a while. But I think, and pray, that, her strength now recovered, we shall be returning this autumn to our estate.”
Cassy felt her mother twitch as that small but all-powerful word pierced through and pricked her innermost mind.
“For myself, I believe our mourning has gone on long enough. It is not only because I am keen to take up my inheritance, more that the pull of Derbyshire is too strong to resist.”
“Derbyshire!” exclaimed Cassy.
“Derbyshire?” In her excitement, Mrs. Austen clean forgot she was asleep.
“So you know it?” Mr. Hobday seemed pleased.
“Alas, not at all.” Cassy felt foolish. “It is just that my sister has it in her head the place is some sort of perfection.”
“Then your sister is a lady of great intuition. It is God’s own country, I sincerely believe.”
Mrs. Austen struggled to her feet. “And we would very much like to hear all about it, would we not, Cassy? Come now. Let us walk again.”
They both rose, on order.
“You can describe everything to us in the greatest of detail. We are country people ourselves, Mr. Hobday, with an excellent sense of the land. My daughter here is quite a hand with the poultry, although—dear me! How foolish—I suppose you have people for that, yes? Well, of course. An estate, I heard you say. Now, how many acres?”
The tide had turned. The thin spit of sand—so wide and firm on their outward journey—was still desperately holding out, as if it had a choice in its future. Though it knew, from experience, that the sea was bound to overcome it in time.
“Ah, that is extensive,” Mrs. Austen was saying. “And how much is farmland, and how much is park?”
Their return to the village had to be hurried. Cassy chose not to contribute to the conversation, but nobody noticed. Mrs. Austen had too many questions to ask of Mr. Hobday, and Mr. Hobday was all too keen to reply.
WITH THE EXCITEMENT OF CHARLES’S arrival, the family became introspective. They each, individually, preferred the company of Austens above any other. With enough of them assembled, there was no need for society. They were a party unto themselves. And if they could not all be together, then this, for the ladies, was the perfect arrangement. Among their brothers, they each had their favorites, but on Charles they both equally doted.
The evening was warm, preserving the memory of the heat of the day. Jane sat by the open window, reading aloud to them. A light breeze sauntered through and lifted the hair around her face.
“I say, your Thorpe is the devil of a bounder.” Charles jumped up and strode around the small parlor. He could never be still for long. “If that is the Oxford Man, I am grateful not to have gone there myself. I dare him to try and come onto my ship: We should have him run up the yardarm at once.”
Jane lowered her pages. “He never would be on your or any ship, Charles. Mr. Thorpe has neither the heart nor the head for it. We all know that our sailors are the very best of our men.”
“Hear, hear,” said Mr. Austen. “As the French now know to their cost.”
“You say that, and yet my sister here continues to insult me!” Charles retorted.
“I?” exclaimed Jane. “My dear Charles, you are surely teasing! What can I have done?”
“Is it not obvious? You will persist in writing these stories, full of splendid fellows of all different sorts, but never once have I heard one of your heroines to be blessed with a dashing sailor brother whom she admires and adores.”
“That is true.” Jane laughed. Cassy looked up from her sewing and smiled to see her sister so at ease. After a successful reading of her own work to the family, she glowed as she never glowed otherwise. “But to do so would defeat my own purposes. It would strike right through the narrative. You must see that if a young lady is so fortunate as to have her own dashing sailor brother, she is spoiled then for any other hero I could create for her. For how, with such an example in her own background, could she fall in love on dry land? No man could match him.”
“Aha!” Charles bounded over and knelt at her feet. “So that is why I return to find that you are still yet to be settled. Tell me, truthfully now.” He took her hand. “Is it as I fear? That you despair of finding a man who could match me?”
“I certainly despair of finding one so adept at playing the fool.” Jane batted him away. “But Charles, it is Cassy who betrays you. She has a new suitor, and is now far too grand to give thought to a subject as dreary as her dear sailor brother.”
Mrs. Austen sat up, giving a round chuckle.
Cassy dropped her needle and looked up again in horror. “Jane!”
“Oh, I am sorry. I have spoken in error. Ignore me, Charles. Cassy has, after all, no suitors. And I would particularly like to point out that she has no suitors who go by the name of Hobday. Specifically, Mr. Henry Hobday—”
“—who happens to be both exceedingly agreeable and heir to a Derbyshire estate,” joined in their mother.
“No, indeed. She has bewitched no gentleman who could answer to that description. No man at all.”
Cassy, blushing, was silent and resentful. She enjoyed these family jokes only when she herself was not the butt of them.
“You are making your sister uncomfortable, Jane,” Mr. Austen reproved. “And I must add that I have seen no evidence of this romance of which you speak.”
“That, Papa, is because it is a very deep secret. So deep that it is known only by all of Dawlish.”
“And Sidmouth?”
“Yes, you are right, Mother. I have heard there to be pockets of Sidmouth in which people talk of little else.”
“Oh, enough. Please,” Cassy begged. “You see, Charles, that Jane has become no less outrageous since your last visit. Her love of fiction has spread from the page and into our lives. I am sad to report that now she routinely spouts nonsense. We can no longer believe a word that comes out of her mouth.”
Charles, although he had been enjoying himself hugely, was never anything other than kind. He knew that it was the moment for a change of conversation, and with a captain’s skill he steered it away. He entertained them all with stories from his ship and descriptions of faraway places.
And the sun set on a parlor that was all familial contentment. Cassy, recovered now and calm, looked about her with love. Her father asked learned questions and basked in the detail of the son’s answers. Her mother rocked gently and smiled at her own thoughts. Cassy hoped that they were not straying into the district of Derbyshire, although she feared it most likely they were. And Jane? Jane looked happier and more alive than she had for months. Here in this room was all that her sister needed: good conversation in which she felt no inhibition; time and space to write, with an intelligent audience to listen; her family around her, with whom she could be her own self. These were the conditions upon which her happiness, or her equilibrium at least, depended. Were they altogether too much for a single woman to ask? Just these small things. She required nothing more.
IT DID NOT TAKE LONG for Charles to lose patience with Dawlish. As Jane had predicted, this gentle village did not offer enough distractions to detain him. He was a young man of great energy, who had been away at sea and had little hope of this peace lasting. He craved a summer of society: fashionable crowds; no doubt, too, fashionable ladies of his own age and regular assemblies at which he might meet them. With that in mind, the Austens agreed to remove themselves to Teignmouth forthwith.
The prospect brought Cassy enormous relief. Of course she had no craving for fashion or society, nor was this place too tame for her tastes—quite the opposite. For her, here lurked danger, and she had become almost desperate in her wish to escape it. She had feigned headaches, avoided calls, retreated to darkened rooms, and ignored the entreaties of her mother for as long as could possibly be tolerated. Her behavior was attracting attention, and all of it negative. For once Jane was left in peace to act as she pleased. Mrs. Austen had shifted her focus of maternal concern. Cassy, of all people, was her new problem now.
“And how are you today, child?” Her mother’s eyes narrowed as she peered over the breakfast table. “Recovered at last, I do hope?”
“Thank you, Mama. Perhaps I am a little better.” Cassy dared not say otherwise, and indeed, she did feel much calmer. Her sense of threat was diminishing. After all, what could possibly happen? They were to leave Dawlish the following morning.
“Splendid!” exclaimed Charles. “I suggest we three take our young legs out for a good walk, up over the cliffs and into the country beyond. What say you?”
“Nothing would delight me more,” Jane replied. “It has been such a sadness to me, having an invalid sister. You cannot know how I have suffered, Cass, left all alone. Let us take a good picnic, and we can celebrate your return.”
The matter was settled without waiting for Cassy’s agreement, and she was soon caught up in the flurry of necessary arrangements. Neither of her siblings could be trusted to remember all that they needed, and so, of course, she had to take over. There was an art to overseeing the composition of a good picnic. It happened to be one of her skills.
They set out. This was the first time she had taken the air in more than a week, and her senses could only delight in it. Yes, the sun was behind clouds and the wind was a little fresh, but then, were these not the perfect conditions for walking? And she could think of no better companions than her sister and this brother. They proceeded along the seafront, turned, followed the brook up to the village, and by now Cassy’s spirits were completely restored. She was laughing and happy—any onlooker would have to presume carefree—when the others stopped and looked around. As if they were waiting.
“What is it?” she asked of them. “I assure you we need nothing more for the picnic. We have all we could possibly want.”
“There he comes!” Charles raised his hand and his voice. “Hobday, my good fellow. Here we are. Delighted you could join us. What a fine day we have for our outing.”
“Good day to you all.” Mr. Hobday lifted his hat. “And I am equally delighted to be invited. Ladies. Miss Austen, my particular pleasure. I have not seen you about lately. I do hope you are well?”
“Thank you, sir,” Cassy stammered. Her curtsy was not all it should be. She was not quite in control of her limbs.
“Capital!” Charles exclaimed with great satisfaction, as if all was well in the world. “Let us sally. I am told that if we take this stream as our guide, then a picturesque splendor awaits us. Tell me, Hobday, where do you stand on this picturesque business? Not sure I quite grasp it myself.”
The men strode ahead, and Cassy hung back. She did not want to hear Mr. Hobday’s opinions, on that or any other matter, for fear they might meet her approval. A morning of mutual agreement would prove most unhelpful. Better to live in ignorance, and hope him to be stupid and wrong.
“Do you mind terribly?” Jane, walking with her, put a hand on her arm.
“Yes, Jane. I mind very much.”
“It was all Charles’s doing.”
“Of which you knew nothing?”
“No,” Jane conceded, trying to be serious, but too cheerful for that. “Of which I knew all, and in which I could not see any malice. While you have been sickening with—well, whatever it is that has sickened you—the two have become friendly. Charles seems to like him exceedingly well.”
Another conquest, Cassy thought irritably. Why could he not just leave all well alone?
“Indeed, no one can find any sort of fault with your Mr. Hobday. It seems he is the very model of masculine perfection. The universe has met and agreed upon it. It is all most infuriating.” Jane sighed. “You know that, as a woman of many faults, I abhor faultlessness in others. What is there to be done with them if they cannot change or improve?”
Cassy laughed. “You are faultless in my eyes.”
“No, I do not think so. But you do bear me better than anyone else ever could.” Peace was made between them. “My dear Cass, it is you who are faultless, or as close to it as I could tolerate. You deserve something better than this wretched future of ours. This denial of yourself is completely absurd.”
“Jane! Why must you make such drama from nothing? Our future is not wretched. We have our parents—at least for the moment, God willing. We have five fine brothers who will never neglect us. Most important of all, we have each other—unless or until you meet someone good enough. And even then, I should not starve.”
“Not to starve! Is that your ambition? ‘Here lies Cassandra Austen. She did not starve.’” Jane’s mocking tone at once became grave. “I have no crystal ball and cannot say yet exactly what will become of us, but this much is certain: We must be poor. We must, in no time, be old. We must find ourselves become objects of pity or—worse, even!—comedy. This must be my fate, and though I dread it, I have now reached acceptance. But it does not have to be your own. Cass, you are so dear to me. I love you above all. But we do not have to live as one. We are two different women. I beg you”—she stopped and grabbed Cassy’s hands—“if you are offered some means of escape, do not refuse it.”
“How goes it back there? Is it not splendid out here today?”
The gentlemen had paused their walking so that the ladies could catch up.
“Indeed!” cried Jane. “We are loving it, are we not, Sister? We were just celebrating our own good fortune, to be surrounded by such spectacular beauty on this particular day. How blessed are we? Our hearts runneth over! What an excellent scheme to come out here. What excellent men you both are to think of it. Our gratitude is so great as to be beyond all expression!”
This was such un-Jane-like behavior that Charles, rather letting the side down, barked with delight. “What say you to that, Hobday? Not effusive enough, to my mind. Do you not agree?”
“Very poor, indeed.” Mr. Hobday was smiling. “Most wanting, as a response to such excellence as ours. I am starting to fear that your sister is hardly grateful at all.”
“Perhaps you should offer up a sonnet or two, Jane? In praise of us. That might be appropriate.”
“A mere sonnet? Too short, and too easy. I demand an epic poem, Miss Jane, long and heavy, very much in the Romantic style. If it could be delivered to my chambers sometime this evening?”
“I shall start composing at once. On Dawlish, it is to be called.”
“Make sure you include that millwheel down there,” Charles put in. “I feel rather poetic m’self when I look at it: Sort of … moving like time … sort of thing.”
His sisters erupted in mirth. “Charles, you are hopeless.”
“Well, what about that old fellow in the field, tilling the soil? Dashed backbreaking stuff, that is.”
“Ah, Austen,” Mr. Hobday cautioned, “you are failing to appreciate the relationship between the peasant and the poet. I am afraid that whatever his pain or his misery, whether his children be dead or his belly roaring with hunger, poetry can record only his unaffected happiness.”
“You see?” Jane cried. “Mr. Hobday understands the craft perfectly. I think I shall not bother with people at all in my epic. They always appear to me too complicated and ridiculous. I shall get caught up in their dramas, and it will interrupt my flow. Mind,” she added, glancing sideways. “Do you see how that shaft of light falls upon the face of my sister? That might be worth a line or two.”
“Oh, surely a stanza all to itself?” Mr. Hobday smiled at Cassy. Cassy blushed back. Then Jane and Charles walked off at high speed.
And they were left there, alone, on the hillside. The sea sparkled beneath. The clouds of the morning had cleared, and the sun seemed to bless them. There were no other walkers around.
“WHAT HAPPENED?” JANE BLEW into their bedroom. “Tell me, Cassy, now! Did he speak?”
Cassy lay on the bed, willing her heart to calm down. Her bonnet lay abandoned on the floor; her hair was all over her face. “He spoke.” She turned on her side, away from her sister, and wept.
“And? Well?” Jane leaped onto the bed and grabbed her shoulders. “Your answer? What was your answer?”
“I refused him.” Her words were muffled into the pillow.
“Refused him?” Jane screamed.
“Hush, Jane. Mama is downstairs.” Oh, her poor mama! She must never hear of this. “Yes. I refused him. I do not appreciate you conspiring to leave me so undefended. But there.” She sat up and wiped her face with her handkerchief. “’Tis done.”
Jane got up and began to pace around the bedroom. “I do not, I cannot understand you. What fault could you possibly find with him? What more could you ask for? A match like that, at your time of life—it is a story almost beyond fiction!” She stared out of the window, silent for a moment; then she returned and took her sister in her arms. “Please, at least, do try and explain,” she begged tenderly.
“I—I…” Tears fell again. “I cannot marry him. It is impossible. I promised Tom I would not.”
“Tom?” Jane was now genuinely puzzled. “But Tom had no knowledge of your Mr. Hobday.”
“On our last day in Kintbury, just before he left. We were in church.” Cassy struggled. She had never before admitted this. “In front of the altar. We stood before God, Jane. And I promised him, faithfully, I would marry him or I would marry no man at all.”
Jane pulled back in horror. “And Tom dared ask that of you?”
“No. Of course he did not. He begged that I not feel beholden.” She blew her nose. “But beholden I most surely am. I cannot go back on my word. I should be punished again.”
“Cassandra! Punished, indeed. Punished again? What is this Old Testament nonsense? Who is this cruel God of whom you speak? I have a mind to call in Papa.”
“Our parents must never know any of this!” Cassy was urgent. “They will not forgive me. And it would be useless. I shall not change my mind.”
The sisters lay down together then. Jane held Cassy tight in her arms while she sobbed until she was calm.
Presently, when it was safe, she could not resist asking: “Pray, Cass. Tell me all that he said to you. Did he ask well?”
Cassy pulled back and smiled. “You will not be surprised to hear that he asked perfectly. He has loved me since the first time he set eyes on me. He was good enough to pay homage to my beauty, but only in passing. He spoke more of intelligence, mind, and spirit and my, well…”
“Go on.”
“… character and—what he takes at least—its excellence. That he has perceived a gift for improving the lives of those I have around me.” She flicked her hand as if to brush away such a fancy. “Though how he has come to that conclusion I really cannot say.”
“He is right, though. You do, my love. And here was a man capable of seeing it.” Jane sighed. “How did he take your refusal?”
“Oh, perfectly, of course. He was grim but respectful. He did not try to persuade me. Though he did beg for permission to write in the future.”
“And you granted that?”
“Yes, though I now deeply regret it. In the moment—Oh, Jane! It was dreadful—it seemed the least I could do.”
“So he still must have hope.” Jane brightened. “He could ask again.” She got up, collected herself, and went to rejoin the family, to tell them that the headaches had returned, that she had seen for herself how much Cassy suffered.
Her report must have been accepted without question. Cassy stayed in her room and was left alone.