Free Jane Austen Stole My Boyfriend by Cora Harrison

was only fourteen years old and how lucky he had been to marry such a wonderful woman as his wife.
    ‘I had just to add Perrot to the name of Leigh, and there I was in clover for the rest of my life,’ he said.
    I smiled back at him and took a quick peep over my shoulder. Jane and Harry were now quite a long way behind us. Wouldn’t it be wonderful, I thought, if Harry had a rich great-uncle
somewhere who would leave him an estate? I kept remembering what Eliza had said about the Digweeds – good family, birth and breeding, but no money .
    ‘Oh, a brass band! Let’s go and listen to it.’ I dragged my uncle across the grass. Harry and Jane would find plenty of quiet benches and little nooks where they could sit and
talk together while my uncle’s attention was on the splendid noise that the huge instruments were making.
    After lunch, Jane and I went to visit Eliza. My two aunts were planning a visit to the shops at Milsom Street, so we all walked together down George Street, then down Gay Street, Aunt
Leigh-Perrot pointing out various Bath notables. Then we were in lovely Queen’s Square, with its stately buildings shining in the afternoon sun and the pretty poplar trees casting long
shadows.
    ‘You fixed that up with Harry, didn’t you, Jane?’ I asked when we parted from my aunts at the corner of Wood Street and crossed over to the bottom quarter of Queen’s
Square. A couple of young men, racing their gigs, passed us and Jane, making no reply to my question, said that she was sure they were both young lords and that she could see by the eyes of the
second one that he had fallen madly in love with her. This made us both giggle and we quickened our pace almost to a run.
    Then we knocked on the door of number 13 and were immediately shown up to Eliza’s lodging by a fat woman in mourning clothes, who had a little black kitten running behind her. On the way
up I teased Jane about arranging to meet Harry at the Pump Room, but she just smiled mysteriously. I wondered whether that had been a secret meeting – and if so, did Jane carry out her plan
of kissing him???????
    Eliza was only just getting dressed, but she looked quite at home. Gowns peeped from closets and presses, frilly petticoats spilled from half-open drawers and the surface of her dressing table
was almost completely covered with her possessions. While Jane was relating an account of our morning, including the appearance of Harry Digweed, I sat on the bed and made a list in my mind of
everything that Eliza had there.
    This is the list:
    A small box of pomade
    A glass bottle full of little holes for sprinkling powder
    A powder puff on a delicate pale blue saucer
    Four scent bottles
    A small glass of wine
    A hand mirror
    Four candles in silver candlesticks.
    A tray of breath-scenting lozenges
    A miniature of her little son, Hastings (but none of her husband, Monsieur le Comte)
    A glass dish with a pearl necklace coiled in it
    Strips of lip-reddening crimson-coloured leather
    A set of ivory manicure sticks
    A lace handkerchief
    A fan (of course)

    That’s all that I can remember I think there could have been a dozen more items, but my attention was distracted by a soft knock on the door and a strange-looking woman
sidled in.
    ‘Ah, Phylly,’ said Eliza. She jumped up and made a big fuss of her, introducing her and making sure that Phylly had a comfortable chair to sit on.
    Philadelphia Walters is about the same age as Eliza (though no one would have guessed as she looks ten years older). She is only about thirty, I think. She is also Mr Austen’s niece, but
this time through his stepbrother, William-Hampson Walters. She is an unmarried lady who lives with her elderly parents in a small village in Kent, a strange little person, who was dressed in a
very dowdy, old-fashioned gown. She has an odd habit of putting her head on one side and looking at you with very bright beady eyes, which makes her look rather mouse-like or perhaps more like a