Jane Actually

buying a hotdog from a pushcart cost little.
    But finally her wobbly legs gave out and so by El 2 they headed back to where she’d left her car. Stephen felt happy that he’d spent the day with Mary, even though it meant that he’d have to work all day Sunday to finish grading papers. He always loved showing off Chicago to out-of-towners and the fact that he’d spent the day with Jane Austen’s avatar made it extra enjoyable.
    By agreement, however, he’d refrained from asking her any questions about Jane Austen. So he’d learned Mary was a struggling acting student who was now making more money than she’d ever dreamed of making, but in a role destined to go uncredited. He learned of her family and her childhood and her hopes and fears and he’d done his best to find her fascinating, which was an easy task, but all during their tour he’d been dying to know one thing.
    “What’s she like?” he finally blurted out on the El, unable to contain himself any longer.
    “Wow, you held out a lot longer than I ever thought you would,” she said.
    “You don’t mind?”
    “How can I mind? I was more fascinating than Jane Austen for all of two hours,” Mary said with a smile.
    Stephen looked at her in the dying sunlight that flashed upon her face whenever the train moved between buildings. She looked like a film star in a silent movie and he stared at her, forgetting he’d asked her a question.
    “So, do you want to know what she’s like?” Mary prompted him.
    The question broke the spell and he nodded his head.
    “Well, she’s like the best older sister there ever was, although I admit that since I’m not close to my older sister, I’m just guessing. She’s really funny and … you know the person in the meeting who sits there quietly and you don’t think they’re paying attention? And then they say something that completely skewers the pompous ass that’s talking—that’s Jane.
    “And she can be so prim and proper because she still talks like the books, you know, but then you realize she’s seen it all. You Janeites worship her as the spinster from Hampshire with her little studies of people, but you just can’t know the woman from that.”
    “Little travelled, never married,” Stephen said.
    “What?”
    “Sorry, it’s a dismissive description of Jane Austen boiled down from Henry Austen’s little biography of her. The family, after her death, really emphasized her Godliness and frugality and even temper. Henry called hers a life of little event, and maybe it was up until the time she died.”
    “Yeah, I guess so, but that’s the thing about the afterlife, isn’t it. You just keep adding to your knowledge and experience of life, for the rest of eternity. Oh, isn’t this our stop?”
    However Stephen was already rising, confirming it was their stop and the conversation was interrupted as they exited the train and the station and walked down to ground level.
    “Well, I’m happy to hear Austen isn’t the simple spinster, but that’s just confirming what I’d thought all along. It’s always galled me when critics say, ‘She just wrote what she knew,’ as if that isn’t a great compliment. She knew people and their emotions and made them real, like no one before her.”
    “I wish you could know her like I do,” Mary said, “not that I know that much about her life when alive. She keeps that to herself, but she certainly shares her observations and opinions about the here and now. And she knows a lot about everything, which I suppose is a consequence of being around for so long. She follows the news obsessively. Actually, she can be a bit of a bore about the news and is always giving me grief that I don’t know anything about politics—and I’m talking US politics here. She has a lot of opinions about our peace keeping mission in India.”
    They had reached Mary’s rental car in the parking lot and Mary looked back at Stephen, who had a faraway look in his eyes. She recognized that look.
    “Oh, you haven’t heard a word I’ve said. You’ve got that look.”
    “Huh? What look?”
    “That ‘I’d love to ask Jane Austen about … ’ look. You’ve been dreaming up a million questions to ask her, haven’t you?”
    They were back in the car and Stephen’s expression confirmed his guilt. “OK, busted. I’m sorry, it’s just … yeah, I have so many questions. I’m sorry, I should have been thinking how much I enjoyed the afternoon … with you.”
    She hadn’t