Page 78 of Confounding Oaths
“Erica,” Miss Mitchelmore chided, “stop staring, it’s rude.”
Miss Penworthy did not stop staring.
“Erica,” Miss Mitchelmore repeated.
“Miss Caesar,” Miss Penworthy began, “I don’t suppose you would like to take a turn about the room? And perhaps stop somewhere discreet along the way?”
Seeing no alternative, Miss Mitchelmore retrieved a pin from a nearby cushion and jabbed Miss Penworthy on the arm. “Erica.”
“Sorry”—a shimmer was fading from Miss Penworthy’s eyes, and she shook her head as if clearing water from her ears—“don’t know what came over me. But you do both look lovely.”
Conditioned to respond positively to any compliment, even from ladies, the Misses Caesar smiled and bobbed curtseys in response, and settled into the group, which was forming a rough circle around Miss Bickle.
“Ahem,” she said. She wasn’t actually clearing her throat, but she enjoyed sayingahem.“Welcome to the seventeenth Anonymous Lady Author ofSense and SensibilityAvidreadermeet. This is a space where we avid readers of the works of the anonymous lady author ofSense and Sensibilitycan share our thoughts, theories, and avrections.”
Miss Anne looked grave. “Will it be terribly inconvenient if we haven’t brought anything? I had only a little notice and wasn’t quite sure what an avid reader fiction was meant to look like.”
“It’s all right,” Miss Mitchelmore reassured her, “Lizzie and Erica will have quite enough material for all of us.”
This was Miss Penworthy’s cue to begin. “On which subject, I do indeed have a new story to share.” She stood, collected a sheaf of papers, and began to read. “‘The Other Bennet Girl:Kitty-dash-Caroline, Kitty-dash-Charlotte, Kitty-dash-Original-Lady-Character, Cordial-Acquaintances-to-Intimate-Relations, Antagonistic-Acquaintances-to-Intimate-Relations.’”
“Is this preamble really necessary?” asked Miss Mitchelmore. “You do it every time and we’re all here so I don’t know who it’s in aid of.”
Miss Bickle gave her friend a look of endlessly patient incomprehension. “The categories make it easier to find stories you might like. So I could say to Erica, ‘I very much enjoyed your recent Antagonistic-Acquaintances-to-Intimate-Relations story, do you have any more like it?’”
“And I could say, ‘Yes, I have several,’” added Miss Penworthy.
Miss Mitchelmore looked at the piles of documents at Miss Penworthy’s side. “That, at least, does not surprise me.”
“You know.” Miss Bickle was already drifting onto another tangent. “It is such a shame that Lady Georgiana has never been able to attend one of these gatherings. It’s so queer that she keeps having other commitments.”
Miss Anne, who had come to the avidreadermeet to hear stories, not to discuss her cousin’s lover’s social engagements, looked up at Miss Penworthy prettily. “Perhaps you could continue reading for us?”
And Miss Penworthy needed no further encouragement. “‘The distaste Miss Kitty Bennet had felt at Caroline Bingley’s mistreatment of her sister,’” she began, “‘was matched only by the yearning she felt as …’”
I shall leave off the rest of this narrative. You are here for my definitely completely true story that I have compiled through great personal exertion. I will not share these pages with lesser scribblers. Suffice to say that Miss Penworthy’s tale was carefully constructed, enthusiastically delivered, and contained a number of details thatthe anonymous lady author ofSense and Sensibilityhad necessarily elided for fear of the censors.
That tale was followed by the third story in Miss Bickle’sFanny Price Investigates,in which the eponymous lady, having successfully resolved the murder of George Wickham in the previous volume, was asked by a dashing Yeoman Warder to investigate the theft of the crown jewels.
I personally found the piece extremely entertaining, although Miss Mitchelmore declared it to be slightly overcomplicated, and Miss Caesar questioned its connectedness to the wider works of the anonymous lady author.
“I confess,” Miss Bickle conceded, “that Fanny Price, Lady Investigator may have diverged slightly from her origins.”
Seized by the instinct to say something more positive, Miss Anne observed that although she had found the plot a little hard to follow, the dashing Yeoman Warder had been exceptionally dashing, and that seemed to be the most important thing.
Mr. Caesar was absent, but in his stead I was forced to wonder if Miss Bickle was, perhaps, a secret genius. Because the segue from this into a wider discussion of gentlemen, dashing gentlemen, and at last military gentlemen was seamless.
“I think one of the more interesting things we might learn,” Miss Bickle said, settling down in front of the unseasonably roaring fire that she insisted on having at every avidreadermeet, “from the works of the anonymous lady author ofSense and Sensibilityis that gentlemen are notalwaysto be trusted.”
“Not worth the bother at all,” agreed Miss Penworthy.
Miss Mitchelmore frowned. “Perfectly reasonable as a sex. Often unpleasant as individuals.”
Unfortunately, Miss Anne took quite the wrong message from this. “Very true. For example, Mr. Bygrave provedveryinconstantin his affections. But I have now caught the eye of a more seasoned officer, and I expect him to be much the better choice.”
Miss Caesar glared at her sister as only a young woman made entirely from glass can glare. “Mr. Bygrave has proven very constant tome,Anne. Perhaps we simply have more compatible temperaments.”
“Perhaps you placed him under anenchantment.” Miss Anne had been sitting quietly throughout the reading of the avrections and was now slipping into an airing of grievances.
