Another preview of “Jane, Actually or Jane Austen’s Book Tour”

“You’re not Julia Roberts, Jane,” Melody said with clear frustration in her voice. Mary had to agree to a certain resemblance between the actress and the portrait that was emerging. But she was acting as Jane’s avatar and kept her mouth shut, or rather she spoke only what Jane told her to say.
“You have no idea what I looked like,” Mary said, speaking as Jane.

“This looks nothing like Cassandra’s portrait. Oh, you did not just roll your eyes me at me. Wait, Mary, did Jane tell you to roll your eyes?”

“She … I only do … she only did what I tell her. If you say it looks nothing like Cassandra’s painting then it is a marked improvement. Once there’s a cap and she adds some curls …”

“Then it will look like Julia Roberts with curly hair wearing a cap,” Melody said with finality. “Argh! Why is this so hard? And why do you end up looking like somebody else every time we do this?”
Mary waited for Jane’s reply, which was uncharacteristically slow in coming. “Because I can’t quite remember what I looked like,” she said finally, which Mary relayed.

“Oh! I … I uh, I hadn’t thought of that,” Melody said, all her frustration evaporated after that disclosure. “Hey, Barb, could you give us a minute alone?” she asked the computer artist, which was a bit of cheek for they were sitting in the woman’s cubicle.

“No problem. You two … or three … work it out; I’m going outside for a smoke,” the young woman said, collecting her purse. She left them alone and Melody said, “OK, campfire,” and from her voluminous purse she pulled out the small speakers she carried to plug into her AfterNet terminal.

Mary always felt uncomfortable about Melody’s campfires because by now she had become accustomed to acting as Jane’s avatar and felt a proprietary interest in being the author’s voice. She suspected that Melody similarly felt the loss of being Jane’s conduit, as evidenced by the fact that Melody still kept her own terminal to talk to Jane. However, if Melody insisted on addressing both her and Jane at the same time, perhaps the campfire was a good idea.

“OK, so maybe you might have mentioned this at some point Jane?” Melody asked, still disconcertingly looking at Mary. Mary looked up at the ceiling to remind Melody that it was her decision to talk to Jane directly.

“It isn’t … it’s something I hadn’t realized,” Jane replied through the speakers.

“How can you not know what you looked liked?” Melody asked. Melody’s words were more blunt than she had intended, but she was truly annoyed at the time they had wasted.

“I have not seen my face for almost two hundred years, Melody. And even when alive, I never saw my face reflected back to me with the frequency to which you’re accustomed. There were no photographs, no YouTube videos or facebook to remind me several times a day of my own appearance. And I only ever saw myself face on, in the mirror. Rarely did I ever see myself from the side. I am sorry for wasting your time.”

Mary felt the ache of Jane’s words, even through the flat tone of the terminal’s digitized voice.
“I’m sorry, Jane. I should have realized. This explains your reluctance with the project,” Melody said.

“No, it is not entirely … I tried to ignore my inability to recall my features and it … it may explain my dissatisfaction with Cassandra’s portrait. I truly do not know if it is accurate.”
Jane fell silent, as did Melody. Melody obviously felt embarrassed that she had forced this admission from Jane. And Mary could only imagine how sad it must be to forget your own face. The silence continued uncomfortably.

“Why don’t you just make something up, then?” Mary suggested.

“What?” Melody asked.

“Just make something up. Part of the problem is that Jane is trying to recall something she can’t, so she’s just picking famous faces. So instead we just ask your 3D artist to make up an attractive face with the appropriate dark, curly hair, hazel eyes and flawless complexion and we say that’s what you look like.”

“How is this possible?” Jane asked.

Mary was about to answer but Melody interrupted her. “That’s brilliant. You see it on cop shows all the time. They dig up a skull and some forensic artist makes a face from it. We could have Barb do the same thing.”

“I do not relish the idea of digging up my skull.”

“Sorry, that was a bad choice of words. I mean Barb just starts with a standard Northern European skull shape and works from there. We give her free rein.”

“But wouldn’t it be a lie?”

“Maybe a little, but who’s to know. And the only one who can really object to it is you. I mean do you?”

“Well, I confess I am vain enough to not want to be represented in a poor light.”

“Being your agent, I also would not want you to be hideous; it could negatively impact book sales. We just can’t make you too gorgeous.”

When Barb returned, the concept was proposed to her. The 25-year-old tattooed computer artist with the spiky black hair seemed to listen with disinterest as they explained their proposal. With her right hand, she was doing something with her computer, apparently searching for a file, while with her left hand she was playing with the ring pierced through her left eyebrow.

Melody’s patience was evaporating as she tried to explain the concept. “You can feel free to do what you want because you can just make an idealized portrait … excuse me, are you listening to me?”

“Maybe something like this?” Barb asked, after she had finally found the file she sought and double clicked it. The window that opened caught the attention of Melody, Mary and Jane.

“Oh my God, that’s perfect,” Mary said, and then felt guilty because it was Jane’s decision and shouldn’t try to influence her.

“The nose is … prominent,” Melody said.

You should talk, Mary thought. But Jane said, “No, it is the Austen nose, Melody.”

“It’s still a little big,” Melody countered.

“Then how about this one?” Barb asked. She opened another file and the same image appeared, except for a slightly less prominent nose.

“Now that’s more like it,” Melody said. “I like that.”

“But how is this possible?” Jane asked.

“Yes, why didn’t you show us these before?” Melody demanded.

“Well, A, that’s not what you asked for. You wanted to reproduce what Jane Austen looked like when alive. And B, my boss said I shouldn’t show you work I did on my own time.”

“You did these on your own time?” Jane asked.

“Yeah, as soon as I heard you’d been found, I mean identified. I’ve been a fan since high school, ever since Pride and Prejudice,” she said, the last with some defiance.

Melody, Mary and Jane looked at this pierced, tattooed, fierce young woman professing her love for Jane. Apparently the incongruity was not lost on Barb.

“I know I don’t look like a Janeite, but I fell in love with Elizabeth and Darcy all the same, Miss Austen. Then I read all your books, but I probably still like P&P the best.”

“But what prompted you to create these?”

“It was that horrible portrait of you they discovered, the pencil sketch with the cat. I thought you looked awful and nothing like Cassandra’s portrait, which I actually sort of like. Everyone was going on about the new portrait and I thought I could do better. I’d always imagined what you’d looked like, especially when you were my age. Without any piercings, I mean. I tried to base it on your family resemblance—that’s the one with the nose—but I didn’t like that one so I modified it to what I wanted you to look like.” She broke eye contact and looked down, “How’d I do?”

“It’s lovely,” Jane said. “I can’t honestly say that’s exactly what I looked like, but I certainly wish I had.”

“You look like Emma,” Melody said.

“Beg pardon?” Jane asked. “Do you mean by this I look like Gwyneth Paltrow?”

“No, don’t be facetious, Jane. No I mean you look like fun. You’ve got that look I always imagined Emma would have, an expectation that the world would offer you amusement and you were looking forward to it.”

Jane paused before answering. “I think that at this age … I still did expect that of the world, before we moved to Bath and before my father died.”

None of the women said anything after that until Mary said privately to Jane through her own terminal, “Well that was a downer, Jane. You might want to lighten the mood.”

Jane could not reply to Mary directly for fear that Melody’s terminal might translate her response. Instead she said to them all: “I think your portrait is perfect Barb, with the exception that you have shown me outdoors and I would not be without a cap or bonnet. I suggest a light cap, no more than a wisp for modesty.”

“And do you think we can make her eye color a little more hazel?” Melody asked.

“Oh, that is important Melody,” Jane agreed.

“And do you not think that as she seems to be sitting out of doors with not even a little shawl that she looks like she might be a little cold,” Barb asked with a querulous voice that Melody and Jane appreciated.

“Hush, Mr. Woodhouse,” Jane said to Barb, who smiled, pleased that her reference had not been lost. Then Barb turned back to computer and muttered under her breath: “Clients, sheesh.”