Jane Bites Back

quesadilla on it and hurried it into the nonfunctioning oven behind them. Then she removed a completed quesadilla from the top rack and displayed it to the audience. “Doesn’t it look great?” she asked.

“I just loooooove Mexican food!” Joy proclaimed, while Chef Juan smiled crookedly and flicked a stray piece of cheese from his fingers onto the carpet.

It was all over a minute later. As soon as the stage manager called break, Jane rushed offstage. Away from the lights she felt a little better. She had just started back toward the greenroom to get some water when Joy walked by.

“Goddamn knife,” she muttered as she went past. “Why didn’t somebody tell me it was sharp?”

The smell of blood trailed Joy like the tail of a kite. Jane’s nose twitched. She really had to get something to eat. She watched as Joy went into her dressing room. Then she looked around. Everyone involved with the show seemed to be busy. Even Comfort was signing autographs and talking to some audience members. Jane looked again at Joy’s dressing room door.

I’ll just have a little something, she told herself. Just to tide me over.

Chapter 25

She looked at the page before her. Line after line of words written in her hand covered the creamy paper. It had taken her the better part of the evening to compose them. Now, in the light of the fire, she read them to herself. They were fine words, filled with meaning and beauty, and they brought her story to a most satisfying conclusion.

—Jane Austen, Constance, manuscript

It was raining lightly when Jane arrived at La Maison Des Trois Soeurs in the French Quarter. The damp air carried a faintly swampy smell, which, combined with the warmth of the day, made Jane feel as if she were wrapped in a very wet wool sweater. Worst of all, it was doing nothing for her hair, which hung limply around her shoulders.

She paid the cabdriver and carried her two bags into the hotel. At the check-in desk a round-faced young man wearing small steel-rimmed eyeglasses greeted her with a sleepy “Afternoon. May I help you?”

“I’m checking in,” Jane informed him. She gave him her name and waited as he looked through an old- fashioned ledger book filled with handwritten notations. There wasn’t a computer in sight, she noted. In fact, everything in the lobby was a hundred years out of date. Gaslights flickered on the walls, and the solid wood furniture squatted atop the well-worn carpets like enormous beasts wearing pink velvet saddles. It’s really quite lovely, Jane thought.

“Here we are,” the clerk said, making a star next to what Jane assumed was her reservation in the book. “I see that you’re in town for the conference.”

Jane nodded. “Are there many of us staying here?” she asked.

“A few,” the man answered. “Most of the attendees stay at the conference hotel. But some like to stay here because it’s more out of the way. Also, they enjoy the authentic atmosphere.”

“It certainly is lovely,” Jane remarked as she was handed an actual key instead of the electronic card she was used to getting in hotels. Like everything else in La Maison des Trois Soeurs, it was old, its metal worn smooth from unknown fingers.

“You’re in room number nine,” said the clerk. “It’s through the drawing room and up the stairs. Second floor. Would you like some help with your bags?”

Jane shook her head. “I can manage,” she said. “But thank you.”

“I’m Luke,” the man said. “Let me know if there’s anything you need.”

Slipping the key into her pocket, Jane picked up her bags and walked through the lobby and up the stairs to the second-floor landing. The stairs continued up to the third floor, but a hallway lined with doors stretched out to the right. Jane walked along it until she came to a door with a small brass 9 affixed to its mullion. The key in her pocket fit neatly into the waiting keyhole, and the door swung open with only the faintest groan of protest.

The room was larger than she’d expected. Against one wall was a brass bed covered with an antique quilt in the traditional Jacob’s ladder pattern, all in shades of blue. Directly opposite it was a dresser with a large mirror atop it, as well as a comfortable-looking armchair upholstered in deep blue. To the left a door led into what Jane assumed was the bathroom. The far wall was lined with floor-to-ceiling windows, all of which were shut against the rain. Outside was a small balcony of wrought iron that looked over the street below.

Placing one suitcase on the bed and the other beside the dresser, Jane went to the windows and opened one of them. The rain had slowed and now steam was rising from the cobblestones below. The smell of earth and rot was stronger now, but not unpleasant. It’s as if the whole city is decomposing, Jane thought.

She had not been in New Orleans in almost a century. She’d once known several of her kind who lived there, but she’d ceased corresponding with them long ago. At first their obsession with the past had appealed to her, particularly as things in the world were changing so quickly at that time, making her feel as if the world she knew was disappearing. But eventually she’d tired of their mannered speech and morbid fascination with sleeping in coffins and holding masquerade balls, and had bid them adieu. She was certain that they lived here still, but she had no intention of looking for them. They would only depress her.

She returned to the bed and opened the suitcase. Another shopping excursion in Chicago prior to leaving had provided her with more clothes and other necessities. Removing several items of clothing, she hung them in the narrow closet. She was just carrying her toiletry bag into the bathroom when the chirping of her cell phone interrupted the quiet. Jane retrieved it from where she’d laid it on the dresser.

“Hello?”

“Ms. Fairfax,” said a woman’s voice, “this is Farrah Rubenstein. From Entertainment Weekly,” she added when Jane didn’t reply.

“Yes,” said Jane, startled. She knew who Farrah was. She just hadn’t expected to hear her voice. You’re supposed to be dead, she thought. “It’s good to hear from you,” she told the waiting reporter.

“I’m sorry to bother you,” Farrah said, apparently oblivious to any surprise in Jane’s voice. “I just have a couple of follow-up questions about the book.”

Jane sat on the edge of the bed. “Of course,” she said. She very badly wanted to ask the young woman if she was okay. Like, have you had any urges to bite people in the neck? she thought. But she couldn’t say anything without admitting that something peculiar had occurred, and part of her didn’t want Farrah to know that she had left her stowed beneath the bed while she went shopping. She noticed that she was holding in her hand the red blouse she’d purchased, and she shoved it beneath one of the pillows on the bed lest Farrah somehow know she had it.

“Okay,” said Farrah. “I forgot to ask you if the names of your characters are meant to symbolize anything.”

Jane answered the question, not listening to a word she was saying. Farrah had several more questions, all of which Jane replied to in the same way. She couldn’t get the image of the girl lying on the hotel room bed, her eyes staring up lifelessly at the ceiling, out of her mind. What had happened to her?

“Farrah,” she said when she could stand it no longer, “are you feeling all right?”

“Me?” said Farrah. “Yes. Why?”

“Just asking,” Jane said, thinking quickly. “I seem to have caught a little bug while I was in Chicago. I think it was the air in the hotel. I wondered if you had experienced any … symptoms after our meeting.”

“No,” said Farrah. “In fact, I feel great. Maybe you’re sensitive,” she added helpfully.

“Maybe,” Jane agreed.

Farrah started to ask Jane a question about the plot of her novel. “You’re sure you