Sara Waters: Dancing with Mr Darcy: Stories Inspired by Jane Austen

Even a much-beloved sister, a best friend, could be deceived by the cheerful demeanour she had adopted, stifling the pangs of doubt that had begun to tease her even before they lit their candles and retired for the night.

For he is still stout. Improved, yet still raw. Callow. Nothing like some young men with whom she has danced or flirted in her time, in her youth. Nothing like the young men in that other world to which she sometimes withdraws, young men in whose quips and manners she has discerned a capacity for serious consideration of principles. Nothing like a certain gentleman at Sidmouth whose name may not be mentioned, whom she had met and perhaps loved, then mourned. Nothing like the clever, handsome, dashing brothers whose figures she has described and whose teachings and sayings she has recorded for use someday in as yet unwritten tales – and, yes, some she has written.

Harris Bigg-Wither has nothing to teach her. Will he ever possess the capacity to make her laugh? Has she the talent to make him laugh? Could he abide a wife who yearns secretly but, yes, ardently, for publication and acclaim? Is ‘irony’ a word in the Bigg-Wither lexicon? Has she the capacity, or the will, to embrace him? Can she accommodate his embrace?

Not fair! He is blameless in this affair. He is deserving of all her consideration, for his motives contain no hint of evil. Were he to be disappointed in his hopes after her assent, the fault must all be hers. The force of that argument does not elude her even as a new wave of self-reproach threatens to suffocate her.

She must wake Cassie at once. She must flee this room and this house. She must remove to some dark hidden corner of the world to shut herself away from decent society in misery and guilt. For misery is the state in which she now finds herself, awake in the darkness of this chamber.

Yes, she had said yes, and that simple word must be her undoing. All her musings on fortune, position and glory, all her ambitions must be forsaken; for she knows now that never – never in this life – can she become the wife of a man for whom she feels no strong regard, indeed no spark of true affection.

She wishes him well. She wishes him a partner worthy of his good heart and his simple, cheerful nature, one who will overlook the spots that linger on his countenance, who will not rue the vacancy of his expression when one of the company ventures a sally on the curate’s sermon, nor count the endless moments before a pun is grasped or the beauty of a line of music or poetry apprehended. She wishes him a partner with no need to have her nonsense grasped and esteemed – instantly.

She must lie still and silent beside Cassandra through the rest of this dark night. She must listen in sleepless disquiet to the rhythm of her sister’s even breathing. A suffering heart need make no sound. She has no wish to do a grievous injury to a worthy, innocent young man, one not at all deserving of such treatment. She must calm herself. She – fancying herself mistress of the well-turned phrase – must search for a formula by which she may unsay what she has said in a fashion that gives the least injury. She must prepare to sink herself in the regard of her friends and family and, worse, in her own regard. Whether relief or undoing awaits her with the sunrise, she dares not predict.

Upon waking, as the first glimmers of dawn sparkle through the draperies, Cassandra understands instantly. She comprehends the turmoil, the torture, the regret, all that she, Jane, had hidden before the punishment of the past night.

It is Cassandra who rings for the girl, Cassandra who relays the request from Jane for a private interview with Harris Bigg-Wither, Cassandra who begs the use of the carriage directly, without delay, to transport them from this place of disgrace to Steventon from whence brother James may see them back to Bath.

We should not suit, she tells him. I can proffer no other explanation, no other excuse. I apprehend that you have honoured me with your regard, but we should never suit. With all my soul, I wish you every happiness. You will surely find another, one day. I have every confidence that you will form an attachment with a woman more worthy, more deserving of your devotion and your goodness. I pray you will forgive my hasty assent, my thoughtless words; my stupid reply to so generous and respectable an offer, but we should not suit, truly we should not. I can only add, God bless you.

She can invent no more felicitous phrases as he regards her in dumb— Why can she not resist that harsh word? In dumb silence.

How cruel, how unforgivable to think in such terms!

A marriage without affection can hardly be an agreeable enterprise. To whom should she assign this sentiment? To Miss Elinor Dashwood, perhaps, or to the acerbic Mr Bennet, or another whose words echo in her ears, waiting to be written.

Cassandra has succeeded in begging the carriage. Their boxes are packed, her writing slope on the seat. How soon before she may record the details of this debacle before they slip from her mind? Not yet, not yet.

As she climbs into the carriage, she is embraced unselfishly, tearfully, by each of her friends, Elizabeth, Catherine, Alethea; their kind expressions show that they bear her no ill will. Harris has wisely absented himself from this farewell.

She does not look back as the carriage draws away from Manydown.

My inspiration: My story, set before the Austen women moved to Chawton, would never have been written if I had not seen Chawton for myself. Trained as a ‘new critic’ focused on textual analysis, I loved Jane Austen’s work but had largely ignored her life. I was unexpectedly moved seeing where she lived and wrote. I thought the intriguing blank in her life – her possible romantic and marital interests – might be credibly portrayed by a fictional foray into her consciousness that was supported by my appreciation of her style and the knowledge of her life that I acquired only after visiting Chawton.

A large income is the best recipe for happiness I ever heard of.

I mouth the words as I lean forward. Mansfield Park. My nipples shine pink and hard under yellow studio lights.

‘Lower, love.’

Mansfield Park. Mansfield Park, the third published of Jane Austen’s novels. Or was it fourth? Shit.

‘A bit to the left.’

The plastic shutter makes a loud click as it opens and shuts, and the noise rattles obnoxiously around the small studio. I try not to squint against the bright lights behind the fat photographer. The one today is particularly grotesque, with shreds of hair and a screwed-up face. I lie on a sheepskin rug and run through quotations in my head. The mind is its own place, and in itself can make a Heaven of Hell, a Hell of Heaven. Milton.

The photographer steps out from behind the camera and I am struck afresh by how hideous he is.

‘Brilliant. Lovely. That’s great. In fact,’ he grins broadly, ‘it’s… tit-tastic.’

Oh, fuck off. Fuck off and die, you fat old perv. I smile. Think of the house, and grin and bear it. Bare it. A few years modelling, and I’ll have enough to buy a flat. I’ll live there a few years then get tenants in. The way the market’s going, the rent should cover a mortgage on a house, maybe even a few quid in an ISA. Financial security is very underrated. Plus I’m paying for this university course, for which I can’t even bloody remember the facts. I’d like to say I didn’t finish school because of mitigating circumstances, family situations, but the truth is it was too much like hard work and I couldn’t be arsed. Now I’m paying £200 a month for my education. As Joni Mitchell said, you don’t know what you’ve got till it’s gone. Or Shakespeare. Nothing can come of nothing. King Lear, Act I. Shakespeare almost made me cry before the last exam. I had a big job on the same day and I sat in the bath the night before, face mask on, mouthing the words. To be, or not to be. That is the question. Whether ‘tis nobler in the mind to suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune… a blob of strawberry and mango oatmeal scrub fell into the water.