Chapter Fifty-Nine
Jane walked into Forsyth’s, a general shop that sold stamps and stationery on Stall Street. Forsyth himself sat at the counter and read from the newspaper. Jane dumped the bag of sugar on the counter. It had survived the journey from the twenty-first century, to her delight, alongside one ballpoint pen she had stuffed in her pocket at the last minute and which had enjoyed such prolific use over the past few days Jane had almost drained it of ink.
“How much will you give me?” Jane asked.
Forsyth looked up from his paper. He dipped a finger into the bag and tasted the white crystals. He scoffed. “Ten shillings.”
“I see you have perfected the art of the swindle,” Jane said.
Forsyth crossed his arms. “Fifteen.”
Jane huffed. “Perhaps Buxton’s prefers to purchase this.”
“Perhaps they do,” Forsyth said with a shrug.
Jane picked up the bag and began to walk from the shop.
“Very well. Twenty shillings,” he called after her.
“Eighty,” Jane said, turning.
“Sixty,” said Forsyth.
Jane smiled. “Deal.”
She exited Forsyth’s and pocketed her banknotes. Forsyth had paid her, relatively speaking, more than three hundred times what she had paid for the sugar in the twenty-first century. She puffed out her chest, proud of her first business deal. Sixty shillings would buy a year’s worth of ink and paper.
She stretched her right hand. She had written for four hours that morning and felt anxious to get home. Her mother had done her a service with her pyromancy. Jane remembered what she had written before word for word. But when it came to the task of rewriting, she hesitated to write the same. Since a young age, she had bit and scowled at the world through her prose; her characters always met with violent and farcical ends, saying crude and clever things. But now she found herself writing with sympathy for her heroines. Their triumphs came not at the expense of stupid companions but through curious items such as their own talents and dignity. The jokes remained; she still made fun—the world provided her with too much material to do otherwise. But she made fun of everything except love. What a soft head she was turning out to be.
Two young women stood in the street and snickered at Jane behind lace-gloved hands. In the wake of the Withers event and Jane’s temporary exit from the village, the concerned women of Bath fixed Jane as a hysteric. Their assertions, considering Jane’s behavior, probably held water. Every assembly shunned her; people pointed in the streets. Jane waved at the two women, which seemed to cause them great confusion, and walked on.
Jane turned the corner and smiled to herself. She dipped her hand into her pocket. She slipped the gold and turquoise ring off her middle finger and slid it onto the other one. She cradled her hand in a ball.
Had she made the right decision? Of course she had. She bent to tie her bootlace and wiped her eyes with a shaky hand.
And when, fourteen years later, she died on a settee in the sitting room of a rented house in Winchester, the last thing to go through her mind was Fred taking her hand the first time he danced with her.
But for now, Jane turned into Bennett Street and crossed the piazza. A crowd filed into Wood’s Rooms for the evening assembly. Married couples waited by the main doors, arm in arm. A trio of old men discussed France. A gaggle of young ladies gossiped with hope about their latest beaux. Jane weaved her way through them and turned for Pulteney Bridge, her face warmed by the sun of a pink and yellow sky.
About the Author
RACHEL GIVNEY is a writer and filmmaker originally from Sydney, currently based in Melbourne. She has worked on Offspring, The Warriors, McLeod’s Daughters, Rescue: Special Ops, and All Saints. Her films have been official selections at the Sydney Film Festival, Flickerfest, and many more. Jane in Love is her first book.
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Copyright
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
JANE IN LOVE. Copyright © 2020 by Rachel Givney. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
Cover design and illustration by Holly Ovenden
Originally published in Australia in 2020 by Penguin Australia.
FIRST U.S. EDITION
Digital Edition OCTOBER 2020 ISBN: 978-0-06-301909-6
Version 08262020
Print ISBN: 978-0-06-301908-9
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