Read Online Dancing With Mr. Darcy: Stories Inspired by Jane Austen and Chawton House Library by Sarah Waters - Free Book Online Page A

can’t help but rub off a little, you know.’
    He looked with love on these three extraordinary women – and had an overwhelming sense of there being four people in the room with him.
    ‘Maybe it’s being in Jane Austen’s house,’ he said, ‘but I have the oddest sensation—’
    ‘The end of Persuasion, right?’ Jean said. ‘You feel like we’re in it?’
    ‘I need to check the rooms before closing up,’ the lady said to Catherine – ‘would you care to join me?’ They both withdrew.
    Chris stepped forward, took Jean’s hand. Her cool palm pressed against his… no rings. He’d found her. He was 25 now, she was 31. She was probably still an English teacher – but not his. He loved her. So far so good – on his side.
    But what about hers?
    He took a deep breath. ‘I am half agony, half hope.’ She smiled. ‘You’re late,’
    she said. ‘But not too late.’

    My inspiration: In Jane Austen’s Persuasion I love the idea of finding again a love you thought was lost and wanted to recreate Captain Wentworth’s ‘half agony, half hope’ in a modern context. Captain Wentworth and his impassioned letter to Anne inspired the idea of a male viewpoint in my story. I also thought it would be fun to base the action at Jane Austen’s house in Chawton – albeit not Chawton House itself.

BROKEN WORDS
    Suzy Ceulan Hughes
    ‘So, how are things?’ he said.
    She held the lead rope loosely in one hand and scurried the fingers of the other through the pony’s mane. As he lifted a foot to remove the old shoe, the pony leant into her and rested its muzzle against her arm.
    ‘Life is good,’ she said. ‘Though I’m not sleeping very well.’
    At night, in the long hours, she was beset by ghosts and poisonous regrets. Why are they called the small hours, she thought, when they are so very long? To sleep, she had to turn her back to the north, to feel the weight of the mountain behind her, protecting her.
    ‘Have you tried counting sheep?’ he said.
    She gazed across the fields to the ridge of hills on the north side of the Dyfi. In the foreground, the grass dazzled green in the sunlight, polka-dotted white with sheep.
    ‘No,’ she said. ‘I can’t bear them. I’ve tried counting stars, but there are too many of them and I soon give up.’
    Her mother used to talk about stars. ‘You should count your lucky stars. Wish upon a falling star and your dreams will come true. It’s all in the stars.’ The star sayings went along with others. ‘You’ve made your bed, so you must lie in it. You can’t have your cake and eat it. When your time is up…’ It all made life seem rather hopeless. As though you occasionally had the power to choose and create bad things for yourself, but never anything good.
    Frost was lying in shaded pockets and on north-facing slopes. The pony’s feet steamed and its breath hovered in the air. In the village, smoke from the chimneys hung heavily, drifting in curling waves over the rooftops.
    ‘Perhaps I’ll try counting waves,’ she said. ‘I’ve always loved sleeping on boats, though it’s something I haven’t done for years.’
    Her father had had a boat. He had always had boats but, for a while, he had one with a proper cabin and sleeping berths. They would sail out to the islands and moor up for the night off one of the beaches. She had loved to swim in the ink-black sea, to watch the phosphorescence play around her barely visible legs. Her father never swam at night. He said somebody had to stay on board just in case. She had sometimes wondered about that. Just in case of what? At the time, it had never crossed her mind that it might be dangerous. To swim at night, out there.
    ‘I’m not sure I’d fancy that,’ he said.
    He stood at the pony’s left shoulder, his back towards its head, and bent over to lift its left foot and slip it between his legs, so that the back of the pony’s knee rested against the back of his, and its foot was cradled in his hand. The