Jump to new as of June 5, 2002

Chapter 1: In My Time

I sat in my parents drawing room, spectacles poised on my nose hovering just a foot or so above my latest novel of intrigue, when, through the archway, my two younger sisters entered jabbering and chattering faster than an Ostrich fleeing to keep its feathers from being plucked.

"Mary? Oh, sweet Mary," Lydia beamed. "Come with Kitty and I and help us with our pianoforte lessons."

"Lydia," I barked, lowering my book. "I am quite done up with anything but reading at the moment. Another time, perhaps."

"Come, Mary," Kitty urged, putting her hand gently on the book and pulling ever so lightly. "Help your two sisters. You are so good at it. Come now, we are in desperate straights."

I rudely yanked the book away from Kitty's hand. The bothersome pair looked at each other and broke into laughter.

"You shall have to practice as I when I was your age."

Kitty pulled her shoulders back, pretended to put on spectacles, and morphed rudely into my persona. "I am seventeen...all grown up now. Lydia, you are but fourteen...and you, Kitty...a mere sixteen. I know everything about the pianoforte there is to know and there is everything for my two baby sisters to learn. So..." She swished a hand at Lydia, "...off with the both of you to learn it on your own, for you shall receive no help from wise old Mary."

Lydia and Kitty locked hands facing each other, bent forward smiling, and then leaned back in an exposition of laughter.

"If you will please go," I announced briskly, "I choose to be alone with my book."

Lydia snatched the book out of my hand, took several steps to the blazing hearth, and looked at the cover.

"What is so intriguing, Mary, that it cannot wait another minute?" Lydia looked at the cover and then made a wry face. "Oh...I had expected it to be something really important...say on the life of our beloved King George III, or the war for American Independence of two decades ago."

I sprang to my feet, stepped over to Lydia, and reached for my book. Lydia yanked it away and ran to the hearth. She held it close to the flames and acted in an over-dramatic fashion.

"One step closer, and I shall hurl it into the flames."

"Lydia!" I folded my arms beaming scorn at her. "Hand the book over to me this minute."

Kitty picked up Lydia's overdramatic demeanor and added to it by pretending to draw a sword from an imaginary sheath round her waist. "Not to worry, Maid Mary, I will retrieve your long lost love letters. Unhand that book now...you swine."

"Not until you call me a cad," Lydia answered in jest.

"Cad," Kitty accused.

"Well, I shall not do it at any rate." Lydia giggled, and then regained her character. "I made no idle threat, Sir Hairywhig. Pray, I will hurl Maid Mary's precious love letters from Prince Frog directly into those flames if you dare to take another step in my direction."

Kitty and Lydia exchanged challenging glares, and then Kitty took one step toward Lydia. Instantly, Lydia's hand went toward the fire.

"No!" I bellowed. "Stop this play and return my book immediately."

Lydia stopped moving the book and glared a challenge towards me. "You do not think I would do it, do you?"

"Yes," I pleaded, putting my hand out toward my baby sister. "Yes, I think you would. But. I beg you...do not."

"Ah, capitulation," Lydia chimed, pulling the book away from the fire and bringing it to me. She held it out, and as soon as my hand reached for it, she pulled it away and ran to the other side of me. As I turned and advanced on her, she back-peddled. We went almost one whole revolution round the drawing room during the following verbal exchange.

"Lydia, give me the book."

"I think not."

"Give it to me."

"No."

"Give it to me!"

Looking at the book as she was backing away, Lydia jeered at me. "First I want to see what it is."

"Lydia!"

"Feather in the Stream? Why are you reading a book about feathers?"

"Will you stop it?"

Kitty let out a roar of laughter. "Perhaps the book is about streams that get filled up with feathers."

"Maybe," Lydia began, holding the book closer to my reach, "it is a book about a feather merchant who spilled a load of feathers into the Thames."

I made a lunge and grabbed the book, which caused my two sisters to laugh with silly joy.

"You two get away now, and do not bother me for the rest of the day."

Kitty looked at Lydia and giggled. "I suppose that means we can bother her tonight."

"Most definitely," Lydia seconded.

"Get out!" I bellowed, pointing my book toward the archway entrance.

Lydia and Kitty looked at each other and broke into more laughter; but this time they danced to the archway and were gone in a flash.

After I returned to the easy chair and had the book firmly before my re-spectacled face, my two elder sisters stepped through the archway.

On entering, Jane turned and pointed out through the archway. "Pray, what has gotten into the two of them?"

"They seem quite normal to me," Elizabeth chided. "For them at any rate."

I looked up from my chair. "Now, what do you want?"

"Mary," Jane said offended. "Must you be so harsh?"

"Do not take offense, Jane," Elizabeth offered. "Remember...the two miniature monsters were just in here."

"What is it you want, sisters?" I said, toning it down considerably.

We came," Elizabeth began, "to bring you into Meryton to shop for your new ball dress. Jane and I are going to help you pick it out."

"I still have three weeks before the ball."

"Never put off until tomorrow, what can be purchased today," Jane chimed happily.

I put down my book. "You just like to shop."

"Come on, Mary," Elizabeth uttered excitedly. "This is your coming out ball. You must have the right gown if you are going to attract a man."

I placed the book before my nose hiding my face. "I do not want to come out. I would much rather stay in."

"We know," Jane whined. "And read...and read...and read..."

I thrust the book aside. "And what is wrong with reading?"

"Why read about men, when you can dance with them?" Elizabeth explained.

"I do not read about men," Mary pouted.

"And where, pray," Jane chuckled, "are you going to find a book about a woman?"

I stood up and thrust my book in Jane's face. "Here, pray, is one. It is about a woman your age, Lizzy, who was adopted and is searching for her real parents."

"My word," exclaimed Jane, "it is even written by a woman: Regina Kettering."

"No," Elizabeth said, taking the book from Jane. "It cannot be. A woman cannot publish in her own name." She glares at the cover. "By George, it is."

"Maybe Regina is a man," Jane offered seriously.

"Do not be nonsensical, Jane," Elizabeth barked. "When has any man been called Regina?"

"Maybe..." Jane paused to think a bit, allowing a smile to break across her face. "Perhaps a man is using a woman's name."

"What," Elizabeth spat. "That makes no sense at all."

"Pray, it makes perfect sense," Jane continued, "if a man was trying to win a female audience, what a better way to do it than to publish under a woman's name."

"That's preposterous," I snapped, snatching the book away and sitting down again. "I do not care who wrote the book as long as it interests me and I can read it. Now, be gone the both of you, as I will not entertain any propositions to go into Meryton. I still have three whole weeks to talk papa out of my going to the ball."

Jane turned to Elizabeth. "I think Mary is going to marry a book."

"A book?" Elizabeth choked in bewilderment. "I would dare say a whole library."

My two elder sisters laughed, spun round, and walked out of the drawing room. I harrumphed and went back to my reading.

That evening, just before I put my candle out for the night, I lay in my bed with my spectacles on and my nose plastered once again in the same book I was reading earlier in the day. Then came a knock on the door.

"Knock, knock," echoed Kitty's voice. "It is night, and Lydia and I am come to bother you again."

"Just like you instructed us to," Lydia said, breaking into instant laughter.

"Go...away!" I yelled.

The handle was turned, and the thud of the door meeting the deadbolt rang loud.

"Mary," Lydia said with a pout-riddled voice, "you've gone and bolted your door. Why?"

"To keep the pests out," I replied.

"You are no fun, Mary," Kitty's voiced echoed through the door and round the room.

"And that is just the way I like it," I answered.

There sounded three knocks on the door, and then came silence. Then there were three more, and again silence. After three more knocks, I reach to my nightstand table, snatched up the candlesnuffer, and threw it at the door.

"My...temper, temper," came Lydia's voice from behind the door. Then Kitty said something muffled and the girls started giggling escalating it into full-blown laughter in a matter of seconds.

"Get out of here!" I yelled. "Get out, get...out!"

"What a sour pussy willow you are, Mary. Come, Kitty, let us away to find some real sunshine."

A few seconds after the pattering of feet in the hall and the giggling subsided, I breathed a sigh of relief and leaned back on my pillow to reenter the world that Miss Regina Kettering had created.

Five minutes later, there came another knock on my door. I ignored it. Then another knock sounded, only louder. Again, I ignored it. After a louder knock still, I closed my book and gave the door my fiercest glare.

"Mary? It is Lizzy. Jane and I wanted to tell you before we went to bed, that Mrs. Weatherstone had the most lovely gown in her shop window...and it looked just to be your size."

"I do not care, Lizzy, for I am not going to the ball."

"Not even to play the pianoforte?"

"No, Jane, not even to play the pianoforte. Now, leave me please, I am about to go off to sleep."

"But we saw the light on and..."

"The light will be out shortly. Goodnight Jane. Good-night Lizzy."

After a long pause, I reopened my book.

"Are you sure you will not reconsider..."

"Oh, I wish I had no sisters at all so that I could read in peace!" As Elizabeth was talking, I began to read aloud. " 'Supporting herself with the post, Zoe climbed up on the topmost rail of the bridge and precariously teetered back and forth trying to decide when to leap. At that moment, she knew that nothing would change her mind-that up to that point, her life had been a complete waste. Had she died in childbirth, she figured that she, everyone she had ever known, and the whole world would have been better off. Now she was going to make amends. She was going to make everything right as it should have been sixteen years ago.'"

"Mary," Jane's voice overrode her for a second. "Stop ignoring us. The proper gown is essential..."

I continued to read: " 'She took a step over the brink and allowed her other foot to follow. Immediately she started down and for an instant there was a relief growing in her body that she had never known before. During that one second flashed events-horrible events, not of the past, but of possible events of the future filled with pain and suffering she would not have to endure. It lightened her soul and brought her peace for the first time.' "

"Mary! Mary!" Elizabeth's voice yelled. "Listen to reason. You will never talk papa out of..."

I started reading louder: " 'Also in that second there was an image of her father-an earlier father than the beast that had visited her that night. It was a man so far in her past and distant in her memory that she could only feel his goodness. It was that last thought, as her body started its descent to her watery grave that made something snap. Suddenly, she no longer wanted to die. She wanted to survive and make another go of it, for if there was a father in her past of such goodness, then that meant that there must be other men in the world with the same demeanor and decorum.

" 'I take it back!' Zoe screamed inside her head. 'I do not want to die!' "

I paused and listened. There was not a sound coming from my door. I put my book on the nightstand, snuffed out the candle with my fingers, and turned over to enter my dreams in hopes of being able to rescue Miss Kettering's Zoe from the jaws of suicide.

Chapter 2: A New Century

"W-P-P-A...in Philadelphia," sang out a chorus.

"Aaaaaand...good morning in the city of brotherly love and happy April Fool's. It's six in the A.M. and time for a quick check on traffic."

I opened my eyes and stared at an unfamiliar darkness.

"What you got out there, Big Tim in chopper eight."

"Well, Randy, it's a bit early for the world's largest parking lot to be jammed, but look for the Schuykill Expressway to jam up like it does every morning at around seven. Right now, however, it's a clear as the top of Randy's bald head. All the bridges leading into downtown Philadelphia look clear as well. Tune in a little later. By that time we should have our usual mess. Right now, though...it's a little early."

"Thanks Tim. Thanks for the hair remark as well."

I sat up and looked in the direction of the voice. "Who is there? Who is in my room?" My clearing eyesight finally zeroed in on a little box with red glowing numbers. I watched it as the 6:00 changed to 6:01.

"Okay," the box continued. "Now, it's on to Theresa and the weather outlook for today."

"Thank you, Tim. I know it's just turned April, but you're going to need your winter coats again today. That stubborn Arctic air mass is still dominating our weather. However, the good news is...the sun will be shining all the live long day...you know...like in the song."

I threw my feet over the side of the bed, pulled my nightgown down below my knees, and looked at the little red lights.

"Hello? Is anyone there?" Picking up the box, it continued to talk. I looked round the other side of it, under it, and on top of it. "How in the world are you talking? What manner of instrument is this?" I dropped it on the floor and then the room fell into silence. "Was that all I had to do: drop it?"

I looked round, but the darkness kept me from seeing very much of my room. Stars twinkled in through a window I could have sworn was not in the same position it was before I went to sleep. I reached for my night table and groped for the candle. There seemed to be many objects on it, but none I could identify as a candle. I got out of bed and looked towards my hearth, but saw not a glow.

Then, under my bedroom door, I saw a faint glow beneath it. Going to it, I realizing that the bolt was gone and the door was differently configured. Once it was open, I saw a bright white light down the hall. Then a figure turned the corner and temporarily blocked the majority of the brightness.

I shielded my eyes to see the figure. When the woman drew even with me, I stared up at her extra height.

"Come on, Mary," she said in an English accent similar to my own. "Get a move on. Don't just stand there. Turn on your light and get ready for school."

"Light?" I said, confused as ever. "I searched for my candle, but it seems to have disappeared."

"Candle? Are you burning candles in here?" The woman pushed past me and reached round the side of the door. There was a clicking sound, and then there was too much light in the room. I hurriedly covered my eyes.

"What...what...what is that?" I stammered.

"What is what? Mary Bennet, stop fooling around and get ready." The woman went into a little room and suddenly it was flooded with light. Then there came the sound of rushing water followed seconds later by the woman coming out of the little room. "You're going to miss your bus like you did yesterday, and if you miss it, I'm not going to take you to school. You can just walk and be late."

"Whatever are you talking about? Who are you?"

"Jesus, Mary, mother of Christ, I can't wait till you graduate next month and go off to college. It will be nice not having any children about. Please don't make these last weeks difficult. Will you do that for your mother?"

"If I can locate her. Have you seen her about?"

"Yes, I saw her in the mirror just this morning. Very funny, Mary."

"You are not my mother. I am afraid that I am at a loss. This room...the brightness...I need to go to the privy."

"Mary, you know we haven't used that word since we came to America. They call it a bathroom here."

"I will be right back, and then we can figure out what on earth is going on." I started for the hallway.

"Where are you going, Mary?"

"To the privy."

The woman pointed to the little room with the water sounds. "The loo is in there."

"In there? Surely, you jest. Oh, I forgot, I must have it emptied." I went to my bed and got on my knees. After glancing under it, I stood up and looked at the woman. "Where is my chamber pot? I know I used it last night."

"Chamber pot? What do you think this is, Mary, Victorian England?"

"Victorian?"

"Queen Victoria...you remember her?"

"Are you sure you don't mean Queen Elizabeth."

"Look, take your bath, get dressed, and I'll have breakfast for you downstairs." The woman started for the door.

"Do you have the hip tub?"

The woman froze and turned round. "The hip tub? What is that? Your bath is being drawn in there." She pointed to the little room. "Just shut off the water and jump in." With that, the woman turned and was out the door.

I looked round my room, and saw that it was filled with many strange objects. On a bureau I saw several upright drawings that were so real that, from where I stood, they seemed to be exact renditions of the people they must have been taken from. Going closer, I confirmed the high degree of art. Never before had I seen such fine drawings. No strokes of any kind were detectable-and they were drawn in color.

I picked up one that was of a girl my age. The girl was seated at a table with a cake in front of her. Many people her own age were seated round the table, and on a long placard hung on the wall behind her it read, "Happy Birthday Mary Bennet." I gazed at another drawing beside it containing the same girl. Standing on either side of her was the woman who was just in the room and a man who looked to be in his early forties. They were sitting on rocks in front of an immense canyon. The writing on the bottom of the drawing read, 'The Grand Canyon.'

Then my eyes were drawn to a large bookshelf. Going to it, I read the titles. Several were by a woman name Jane Austen and had titles like Sense and Sensibility, Pride and Prejudice and Mansfield Park. There were also several by a man named Charles Dickens. When I removed another book, I opened its cover and the title page read, Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontė, and at the bottom was printed the year 1847.

The book fell from my hand and I stepped back and stared down at it. I knew that it was 1796. In fact, when I went to bed last, it was March 31, 1796. I selected another book and looked it over. Inside one of the first few pages was a tiny letter 'c' with a circle round it and the date 1998.

Instantly that book fell from my hand and came to land on top of the Jane Eyre book. I had to stop and think. The books had felt real in my hands. If this was a dream, it was the most vivid and detailed I ever had. Yet, the only other possibility was that I had come forward in time to at least the year 1998 and probably further than that.

Looking at the books one last time, I drank in all the strange titles until I saw one that I knew. At the very end, partially pulled out, was easily the oldest book there. Drawing it the rest of the way out, I opened its cover and read the title page: Feather in the Stream by Regina Kettering. The date of publication was the same as my own copy: 1791. Whoever this future Mary Bennet was, she liked this book as well as I.

Now, I reasoned, given the choice of dreaming or somehow being transferred ahead in time, I, the 18th century Mary Bennet, decided to go with the latter as most plausible. If I was wrong, then I was dreaming, and it would all be in good fun. I set my mind to accepting things as they came to me, and to see either what the future held, or how inventive my imagination could be.

Spying a large table with a mirror, I went there and gazed into it. Much to my surprise, it was not my face staring back, and that was when I decided that I very well may be dreaming. I started handling the strange objects on the table. There were bottles filled with liquids-perfumes I guessed. Then I picked up a cylinder and pulled on it. A sheath of it came off, and under it was another cylinder with a red tip. The tip looked like it was made of something other than metal, so I touched it carefully. To my amazement, the redness transferred itself to my fingertip. I brought it to my nose and sniffed. It smelled like a perfume.

How silly I thought. A perfume the shows like the mark of banished Cain. Who would wear such a perfume? Putting the sheath back over it, I decided to go into the little room where the water sounds were still echoing.

As soon as I got inside, I saw a white hip tub that was actually attached to the wall. Water was streaming out of a metal spout, but what really unnerved me was that the level of the water was almost to the brim of the tub.

Jumping to my knees, I looked for a mechanism to cease the watery flow. Just above the spout was a spherical object with a silvery translucence about its nature. Spying a large cup on a white basin behind me, I snatched it up and dipped it into the water. Standing up, I tried to decide where to deposit it. Looking into the basin, I saw it had a similar spout that was not spilling forth water, with a hole in the bottom of the basin. I poured the water into the basin and watched to my relief as the water disappeared down the hole.

Suddenly, something occurred to me which caused me to look under the basin to see if the water came out underneath only to spill on the floor. To my relief, the floor was dry. Then I noticed a long silver cylinder that went from the bottom of the basin to the floor and I reasoned it must have continued below it to carry the water out of the house.

What a clever invention, I praised, until I realized the water in the hip tub was in grave danger of being all over the floor. I rapidly bailed the water from it into the basin as fast as I could, but very quickly realized that I was not removing it faster than it came in through the spout.

Reasoning that there had to be a way to turn off the flow, I looked at the sphere again. Just then a hand reached past me, grabbed the sphere and angled it upward. The flow ceased immediately.

"Mary, you need to pay more attention to what you're doing."

When I looked up, I saw the same woman.

"Yes, Mama."

The woman reached down into the water and turned a silver leaver located below the spout downward. Immediately there was a sound of the water draining. "Mama? You stopped calling me that when we moved here from London a month ago. You said you were going to Americanize it to 'Mom' so you could be more like American children.

"Well, Mama, I decided that being English suits me very well, as it were."

"Good. I thought it a bit preposterous. Now, hurry. You have to be ready by seven fifteen." The woman left the little room while I was looking down into the water. When the level of the water was more to my liking, I turned the lever up and the flow ceased.

"This is marvelous," I said aloud softly. "To take a bath, all one has to do is turn on the spout, fill the tub, and turn it off. When I'm done, all I have to do is let it run out at the bottom. No more heating buckets of water on the hearth, carrying them up the stairs, and pouring them into the tub...and I can have as much water as I like. And not carrying buckets of dirty water downstairs to toss outside...oh, I think I am going to like...the twenty-first century?"

I went back into my bedroom and stood before a full-length mirror. Removing my long nightshirt, I stared at my drawers. How strange it was seeing my drawers on another girl...who by chance happened to have the same name as I. Coming forward in time had not altered the clothing I wore. The drawers were of the design of my period in history. Now, I was to see what sort of clothing the new century held.

I removed my drawers and carried them and the nightgown to a closet. Opening the door, I found the closet went back very far, but it was dark inside. I looked at the brightly burning globe on the bedroom ceiling, and then at the ceiling inside the closet. The one in the closet was much smaller, and there was a string hanging down that was just within my grasp. I stretched up, took hold of the string, and pulled it. The globe burst into brightness so fast that it caught me off guard. I thrust a hand over my eyes, and had to wait for several seconds until I saw a darker colour in my mind.

"It is magic," I murmured to myself. "Simply magic."

I went to the back of the closet and found several boxes. Discovering a green one that was empty, I placed my 18th century night attire in it, determined not to use it again until I could get back to my time.

Coming out of the closet, I went for the bureau and opened several drawers. Everything in it looked strange and different, so I decided to take my bath first and then worry about getting dressed later. I went into the little room and climbed into the water.

Looking for some sort of container for soap, I discovered a green block sitting in a recessed shelf in the wall next to me. I picked it up and smelled it. Immediately I flew it from my face, and held it at arms length.

"What a wretched, horrid, perfume smell," I exclaimed, setting it down again.. Looking round some more, I saw a bottle that read, 'Head and Shoulders Shampoo.' I looked at the top and saw it was not open. Sensing that the top would come off somehow, I played with it until I discovered that it turned. After I had it open, I held it to my nose.

"Much better. It still smells a bit unusual, but it is at least not so awfully strong." I poured some in one hand and began rubbing it all over my body.

When I was finished rinsing off in the water, I got out and looked for something to dry myself with. On a rack on the wall were huge fluffy-looking squares of cloth. I grabbed one and started wiping my body. When I was good and dry, I looked for the privy, for I could not hold my water another minute. Only two other contraptions were in the little room: a tall compartment with a glass door, and a seat that had a cover. I went to the seat and raised it. Inside was a bowl full of water.

"Oh, my. They do it in water? Why, it is nothing more than a giant chamber pot with a seat." I looked round at the base of it and saw that it was attached to the floor. "How on earth do they empty it?"

I turned and looked at the enclosed glass case, went to it, and opened the door. There was a white, wide, round spout above head level and a pair of handles about belly high. I reasoned that water must come out of the spout, but one look at the floor confused me. There was an opening covered by a small grating with holes in it. If water ran from that spout, then it exited down through the grating and therefore could never fill up the glass case.

I went back to the tub, scooped up some of my dirty bathwater in the cup and brought it to the glass case. Pouring the water freely onto the grating, I very quickly watched it disappear down through it.

Shrugging my shoulders, I stepped into the glass case, squatted over the grating, and let go. When I was through, I went back to the tub and scooped some of the water in the cup, ran it over my hand, and rubbed myself. Then I dried myself with my large fluffy cloth.

I went into the bedroom and opened the top bureau drawer. Rummaging through silky garments, I finally chose one of the few that was white and held it up. It was frightfully small and frail, but I could tell by the leg holes that it was meant to be a form of drawers. I slipped them on and then looked down at them. They seemed to be a bit baggy in front and tight in the back. Removing them, I turned them round, and slipped them on again.

"There," I chirped happily. "That seems a good fit, but they are terribly thin. It is as though I am wearing nothing at all."

I felt up and down my private area. "Where on earth is the opening? Do not tell me they remove the whole undergarment."

I shrugged my shoulders and dug back into the drawer to look for wrapping material. Not finding any in any of the drawers, I finally pulled out a very strange looking garment. Holding it up by what appeared to be a strap, it had two distinctive cups.

"Oh, no. I do not believe it. They don't strap down the bosom...they wear this? For heavens sake, they will protrude for the whole world to notice."

I tried to put it on. After determining that the metal clasps were not radically different from the metal snaps on a corset, I tried reaching round my back to clasp them. Next, I stood before the full-length mirror and looked at the reflection of the other Mary over my shoulder as I tried to clasp it. Failing that, I turned to face the mirror and held the appalling garment in my hand.

"There has to be a way." After more scrutiny, I got an idea. I put the garment round my chest backwards with the clasps in front, clasped them in place, and then spun the garment round bringing the bosom side to the front. All I had to do then was to pull the cups up over my breasts.

"There," I exclaimed gleefully to myself in the mirror. "I am sure a 21st century woman can do it behind her back, but I got the job done nonetheless." Just then, my modern mother came through the door.

"What? Mary Bennet...it's a quarter till seven and you only got as far as bra and panties?"

I pointed to my drawers. "Bra?" When I received no response, I continued. "Panties?"

"Yes, Panties. What have you been doing all this time?"

Still pointing at the drawers, I smiled weakly. "There is no hole in them."

"Of course there is no hole. If there were, I would expect you to throw them out. Now, get into your closet and pick out your clothes for today."

I walked into the closet, as my future mother stepped into the little room with the tub. As I looked over the strange garments, I saw a lot of pants and figured that maybe there was a brother who shared the modern Mary Bennet's closet. When I did find a few skirts and dresses, they looked horribly revealing. Then, as I got to the back of the closet, I smiled with recognition.

"Mary. Come here, please."

I abandoned my find, and went into the little room. "Yes, Mama?"

"You left your bathwater."

"Are you not going to have a bath...and maybe papa as well?"

"So, what does that have to do with your bathwater?"

"I left it for you to get in."

"Mary, if you think you are going to plead illness to stay home from school, you have another thing coming." My new mother reached under the spout and pushed the lever down causing the water to begin to drain away, then she turned to me.

"You've got five minutes to dress, and then you are going to have to wolf down your breakfast if you are going to catch the seven fifteen bus. Your book bag is in the parlour. Now hurry up."

"I know what I am going to wear, Mama, but when does brother need to get in to get his clothing."

My mother wagged a finger in my face. "You can't plead insanity, either. You're going to school today and that's that...and if you don't hurry, you are going to walk."

"I like walking...but...whose pants are in my closet...papa's?"

Getting huffy, the woman began to bellow slightly. "Those are your jeans. Your father's pants are in his closet, and you never had a brother. Do you have the world straight now? Can you start getting ready for school?"

"Would that I were in a hurry, I could be done on the double-quick."

"Mary...you're reading too many Jane Austen novels. You shouldn't let it go to your head that she wrote a character who had the same name as you. Marys and Bennets are quite common, you know."

I filed that away for future reference. Apparently there was a character as well as a 21st century girl with the same name. I understood why the mother could see no difference between the modern Mary Bennet and me, for she probably saw what I saw in the mirror: her real daughter. Now, how was something like that possible in a world where one person can go forward in time? Perhaps, if it were a dream, then the fact that anything can happen in a dream without reason or logic is explanation enough. Whether it was a dream or reality, however, would have to remain a mystery-for now at least.

"Mama, I searched every drawer and was unable to discover a corset."

"Mary, what has gotten into you. Stop acting like a character from a Regency book. Get dressed and I want you downstairs in five minutes." Mrs. Bennet thrust a threatening finger in my face. "Five minutes, do you hear?"

Mama Bennet left the room and I went into the closet to retrieve the dress I had found hanging in the back. I brought it out and laid it on the bed that my new mother had made for me. Then I went into the closet again and looked for some petticoats. Hanging there was the familiar petticoat of the kind I was accustomed to wearing, so, I snatched it up and came into the room putting it on.

The dress was perfect: a high-waisted muslin chemise gown, long to the floor, slightly trained, with short puffy sleeves that went halfway to the elbow. The crimson ribbon I tied just under my bosom was offset nicely by the beige color of the dress. There even was a maroon and beige matching handbag.

Going into the closet again, I found a bonnet on the shelf and put it on. Satisfied after looking into the full-length mirror, I stepped out of my room, hopefully a little more prepared to take on the new century.