Pride, Prejudice, and Cheese Grits (Austen Takes the South)

by Mary Jane Hathaway

  His gaze stayed on the road ahead but his eyes narrowed. Shelby noticed the speedometer creeping higher.

  “I see your point. I admit I was wrong on the exact town, but it was a tiny detail.” She gasped. “A tiny detail? Forget that Flea Bite Creek is my hometown, just for a moment. As historians can we say anything just a ‘tiny detail’? It all matters. Otherwise we should just throw up our hands and start writing fiction.”

  He sighed deeply. “Fine, I agree. But maybe next time you can avoid barging into my class.” He seemed to consider the road ahead of them for a bit. His face was emotionless and he calmly flicked the setting on the air conditioning to high. “Attempting to undermine my authority was a petty way to get revenge for that review.”

  Shelby opened her mouth, shut it again. Revenge? “That’s not what I was doing. Look, I don’t how it is at Yale but we’re a little more relaxed here. We don’t draw and quarter the kids for bad classroom etiquette.” She clenched her hands in her lap, wondering if this was the moment where they started yelling at each other and she had to walk home.

  He turned and held her gaze for a few powerfully charged seconds. Then he seemed to come to a decision. “I’m sorry. That’s not who you are, is it? Someone who plots her revenge, I mean. And as for the kid, I may have overreacted,” he said simply.

  All the words she had been preparing to say slipped away.

  “Oh. Well, we all make mistakes. I suppose I could have had a word with you after class.”

  He glanced at her, his expression was inscrutable. “I’ve heard through the grapevine that some of the students think we planned it, sort of an opening day skit.”

  She started to laugh. “Excellent. One of those times that truth is stranger than fiction? Who would think two professors would dislike each other enough to air their grievances in front of a whole class?”

  “Yes, exactly. Let’s just hope it was a one time performance.” He turned to her, laughing. That perfect combination of dark brows and blue eyes, the thick hair that curled just slightly over his collar, the strong jaw and the shadow where he shaved- it broke over her with a force that made her breath catch. Her heart was beating so fast that she thought he might be able to hear it. Shelby realized she had forgotten her resolution to avoid looking directly into his face. She swallowed and quickly turned her head, pretending to look out the window at the scenery speeding by. He was engaged, that was what mattered.

  “Speaking of differences between the universities, why are you at Midlands?”

  “Is there something wrong with my school?” The tone she used was a warning he seemed to miss, or ignore.

  “You know Finch doesn’t like you. You said you went to grad school here and so he was probably your advisor?” She didn’t answer and he continued, “Sort of like in the Bible where it says a prophet doesn’t get any respect in his own lands, I think grad students should move on when they get their degrees. You’ll always be sub-par to him.”

  Her heart continued to beat a staccato rhythm but now it wasn’t from his good looks. Shelby was so angry she felt tears prick her eyes.“ And you would suggest I aim higher? Say, Yale?”

  He made a sound in his throat and said, “You know that’s not what I meant. But change might be good for you, for your career.”

  Not seeing any other way it could have been taken, Shelby gritted her teeth and reminded herself that they were only beginning the evening.

  The wail of an ambulance siren cut into her thoughts. Ransom swiftly maneuvered the car to the side of the road and it sped by.

  Shelby whispered a silent prayer for the poor people in need of emergency help. At the end, she raised her head and saw him glance at her.

  “What did you do there?” he asked, slowly turning back onto the highway.

  “What?”

  “Just now, when you were very quiet.”

  “Oh.” She blushed a little. “My second grade teacher taught us to say a prayer when an ambulance passes.”

  “And you think it helps?” His words were even but his mouth was a tight line.

  “I wouldn’t do it if I didn’t.”

  There was an awkward silence. With a sinking heart, Shelby realized she had the answer to her unspoken question about faith. She felt a momentary gratefulness for Rebecca. They lived so easily together. They didn’t have to explain or defend.

  “My mother taught me the same thing... But it’s been years since I did.”

  She nodded. It wasn’t so unusual to lose your childhood faith. Terribly sad, but not unusual.

  He continued. “I wonder if anyone said a prayer when my wife was hit by a half ton pick up truck.”

  She opened her mouth, but there weren’t any words that could express what she felt as she watched pain flow over his features.

  He ran a hand through his dark hair and let out a breath. “Sorry, I don’t know why I said that.”

  “No, it’s all right. It’s a natural thing to wonder.” She bit her lip, wishing she knew how much was too much, what words would bring him pain and which would comfort.

  “It’s been a long time since I wondered about it, really. Maybe it’s being back in the South, or being near my hometown, but I’ve thought about her more in the past few months than I have in a long time.”

  “Places do bring back strong memories.” She paused, considering whether asking a question was wise. “Was she from around here?”

  “Oxford. She sure was proud of her hometown. Fifth generation and thought there would be a sixth.” He stared out at the roadway, face impassive.

  Those words, so simply stated, cut through Shelby like a knife. How it must have felt for her parents to bury the child they thought would carry on their family’s history.

  “I’m sorry,” she said, wishing there was something more, something real she could offer.

  He shrugged and turned with a look that seemed to say it didn’t matter, that it was all in the past. But whatever he had been planning to say, he decided against it. His eyes were dark with an old sadness. “Thank you,” he said, turning back to the road.

  She thought of how she noticed all the subtle changes in his face, and she thought about what it might mean and worry wrapped around her heart. She shivered, and he reached out to switch off the air conditioner.

  The sign for Collier House appeared on the side of the road. She’d been so sure she was supposed to approach this whole night with bold confidence but now she wondered for just a moment if it wasn’t too late to call the whole thing off.

  “And this is all the reply which I am to have the honor of expecting?”

  -Mr. Darcy

  Chapter Twenty Eight

  The road to the plantation home had been paved several years ago, a simple blacktop with no painted lines. A long line of oaks sheltered travelers along nearly a mile of winding driveway, curving up around a perfectly maintained lawn of several acres.

  Shelby couldn’t suppress a gasp as the house came into view. It was situated high on a rise, an enormous structure whose proportions alone were a statement of great wealth. A wide porch wrapped around the entire first and second story, with the third story placed squarely in the center of the building like a topping on a wedding cake. The symmetry of so many pillars, each rising from foundation to the top of the second floor, was overwhelming. Without the soft green grass of the hill and a row of mature maple trees behind the house that marked the edge of woods, the arrogance of the architecture would have been intolerable. But the gentle surroundings were the perfect compliment to the stately mansion. After giving the travelers their first glimpse of Collier House, the drive way continued to curve away around the east side of the hill.

  “I’ll skip the valet service, if you don’t mind, and park out here by the old dairy barn.” Ransom turned off the main drive and soon they were in front of a red brick structure that looked nothing like a dairy barn at all. Graceful lines and a gabled roof made the century’s old building seem like a transplant from the Englis
h countryside.

  “Did they actually keep cows in there?”

  He chuckled as he helped her step out of the low car. She carefully smoothed the bell-shaped skirt. The light breeze felt good against her flushed skin and she hoped her hair hadn’t started to make its way loose from Rebecca’s creation. She glanced up and shivered. The sky had turned ominously dark.

  “It was where they brought the milk and made cheeses. Now it’s been refurbished as a small guest house.”

  Shelby gazed up at main house and from her present vantage point it seemed like a giant with its back turned. A dark thundercloud was building steadily over the house like it was a made-to-order backdrop. A sudden niggle of nervousness went through her and her hand touched the pins in her hair, smoothing errant strands.

  “If you’d like, we can stop in the back entrance at one of the rest rooms,” he said. She wondered how many times Tasha checked her outfit before their big entrances.

  “No, I’m fine. Just a bit nervous.” She started up the path that led around to the front of Collier House. Aunt Junetta would love his manners, she thought. So thoughtful to offer a chance to check her make up and hair. But there wouldn’t be much she could do, other than call Rebecca to the rescue.

  The row of large maple trees they had glimpsed from the drive way formed a natural break between the outbuildings and the main house. They walked beneath them in silence.

  “I entered on the deep and woody way,” he said softly.

  “Dante’s Inferno? I think the famous ‘abandon all hope, ye who enter here’ might be more appropriate,” she said drily. A fat drop of rain landed on her bare shoulder.

  “That’s not very positive thinking, is it?” Ransom chuckled, thrusting his hands deep in his pockets. For just a moment she could see him walking up this hill many years before, as a small boy.

  “Maybe not, but it’s realistic and I’m nothing if not a realist.” She wondered if her hair was going to survive until they reached the house.

  “You don’t strike me as a realist at all. The way you speak out when you think there’s been an injustice. Those are the actions of an idealist.”

  He stopped for a moment and gazed up into the branches of a towering tree. “Now, who was he with? Beatrice? So, I’ll be Dante and you be Beatrice.” The rain came more quickly, pattering loudly on the canopy of leaves above.

  “Not to be contentious, but he was with his learned guide, Virgil.” Shelby suppressed a snort as an image of herself with a long white beard popped into her head. The stoccato sound of the rainfall grew louder. The smell of wet rock and the thick Kentucky grass filled the air. Somewhere over the hill was a pond or a creek, and she could hear bullfrogs singing to their mates.

  “Not that I don’t consider you highly educated but you bear a greater resemblance to the angelic Beatrice at this moment.” He didn’t seem to notice the heavy drops landing on his shoulders and hair as he smiled down at her.

  A flush of heat spread up her neck. He was standing very near and she titled her head back as her gaze searched his face. She barely registered the rain that dripped off the branches above them. An impulse raced through her to raise her hand and trace the deep dimple that marked one of his cheeks. She struggled to focus.

  “Poor Beatrice was impervious to the rain but I am not, so we’d better-“ She looked up then toward the house and marveled anew. Spotlights placed at the base of each pillar had been lit when dusk deepened and in a matter of minutes the house had changed from a forbidding monstrosity to an illuminated palace. The front door stood open, an immaculately dressed butler stood ready to receive them.

  Turning back, she was about to comment on the difference between night and day, between reality and fairy tales, when she saw his expression. His eyes seemed almost black in the darkening light and the lines around his mouth deepened. A feeling of intense anticipation pulsed through her as their eyes met.

  It didn’t matter what he’d written about her. She didn’t care if he got every fact about her hometown wrong. All the departmental drama in the world couldn’t come between them. Nothing mattered except the two of them. It seemed so perfect, so right, to be standing here with him under the trees.

  But it wasn’t right. Tasha should be standing here, watching him lower his head, eyes locked on hers. Then those words he spoken in the car, about not having prayed in years, flashed through her mind.

  Shelby took an instinctive step back, feeling like she had stepped out of the warm sun into a frigid shadow. The charged atmosphere was broken by her movement, replaced by a dull throb of energy.

  Ransom shook his head as if to clear it then offered his arm.“It’s tapering off. Shall we make a run for the door?”

  “Please, before my hair decides to return to its true form.” She placed her hand on his arm, surprised by the hard muscles that moved underneath.

  He turned back to the house and the gravel crunched under their feet as they hurried to the green double doors. The pretty sandals slowed her progress and she stopped twice to remove a small stone.

  The butler led them through the entry way and a straight backed young man appeared to take any coats or purses to the cloak room. She wished she had brought a wrap. After the storm passed, the cool air would settle on them like a damp towel, although for the moment her skin was flushed with heat.

  The highly polished granite floor echoed with each step as they entered the great room, the enormous chandeliers sparkled in the light. The windows were festooned with deep green leaved garlands and bunches of tiny white berries, the heady smell of jasmine mixed with the sounds of people busy in conversation. The crowd of people slowly turned as one as they entered. Silence descended layer by layer until there was only a small group left unaware toward the back of the room. A loud, husky voiced woman broke off mid sentence when she realized everyone had stopped to observe the new arrivals.

  Shelby had a mad urge to break out in laughter and she forced herself to remain calm. Ransom’s arm felt tense under her hand but his face was utterly bland.

  “Ransom, dear, there you are.” His aunt swept through the guests like they were sheets hung on a backyard laundry line. She wore a long, gray silk column gown with a silver fur wrap, her hands encased in matching gloves to the elbows. Her large rings flashed in the light, and several elaborate jeweled cuffs adorned her wrists.

  “Aunt Margaret.” Ransom leaned down and pecked the unnaturally smooth cheek. Her small, dark eyes never wavered from Shelby’s face.

  She smiled, her tiny white teeth bearing traces of coral lipstick reminded Shelby of a shark after a feeding frenzy. “And the girl from Flea Bite Creek, if I’m not mistaken.”

  “Shelby Roswell, it’s a pleasure to finally meet you, ” Shelby said, her throat almost closing around the words.

  His aunt made no response, her expression was icy.

  “Ransom, you must find Arlene Tower. She’s been very anxious to clarify some points you made in that last paper. She seems to be under the impression that you believe the Southern constitution has distinct similarities to the present Republican party line.”

  “And I do. I’ll be sure to find her sometime this evening. First we’re going to find the drinks, if you don’t mind.” He said, his expression mild.

  “As you wish.” She turned back to Shelby and cocked her head to one side, her stunning silver hair looked like a cresting wave. “What an interesting choice of a dress. Are you sure you won’t be cold?” Then she smiled languidly and turned to greet another guest who had been hovering a few feet away.

  Shelby resisted the sudden urge to chuck her beaded clutch at the back of Margaret’s head. Ransom turned her toward the far side of the room, where a full bar stood. “Well, that didn’t go too badly,” she said, sarcasm coloring her words.

  “I hope you’re not thinking we should leave. First of all, I’ve already see two editors you might be interested in meeting. Secondly, we’ve already attracted too much attention to slip out unnoticed.
You don’t strike me as a woman who runs away from conflict. ”

  He lowered his voice and whispered close to her ear. “Sorry about the Flea Bite Creek comment. Not many people can hold on to their dignity when my aunt starts in on them.” His breath was cool and tickled her neck.

  “You just think I was holding on to my dignity. Truthfully, I didn’t know what to say,” she whispered back. And she didn’t mind the reference to her home town at all. As they passed, a young woman flicked her eyes down Shelby’s outfit and turned quickly to her friend, whispering conspiratorially. She wished with every passing second that she was wearing something more sensible, like her trusty navy dress, which was much bigger than this slip of fabric.

  “So, you can rebut criticism in front of hundreds but get tongue tied by my aunt?”

  “I wasn’t expecting her to be...” She paused, checking her words. With money, the family name, and the mansion, apparently good manners are optional.

  “I was caught off-guard,” she said simply.

  He chuckled, the sound cut into her. “You should have spent more time preparing to defend yourself.”

  Shelby straightened her shoulders, wondering if he was enjoying this. Maybe needling the aunt was the real purpose of their date. A movement caught her eye and she turned in time to see David Whitcomb walking away from the drinks table. She was sure he had seen her, in fact, had been approaching them, but had turned the other way.

  Good. She had enough on her plate without adding some crazy to it.

  “What would you like? White wine? Champagne? A mixed drink?”

  “Actually, some lemon lime soda is fine.” She needed her wits about her tonight. Frowning, she wondered if he would have anything. Probably one drink wouldn’t be a problem, but he was driving.