"Can you at least give it a bit of consideration, Ma?" The girl was young, no older than twenty. Tears glistened in her eyes as she fought to keep calm. "I have been to every single ball for the past two seasons."

"And you will keep going to every single ball of every season till you succeed in finding a suitable match." Her mother was busy pulling and tightening the young girl's dress in various places, trying to decipher if it fit adequately.

Nancy Brooks stood in one of the shadowy corners of the dressing room of House Hilcrest, watching with a strange fascination as the young Emma Crauford tried to persuade her mother, Lady Crauford, to give her permission to not attend a certain ball. Part of her wanted to do nothing more than use her own persuasion skills—which she was sure were far better than Emma's—to make Lady Crauford listen to her daughter. Another part of her wanted to lash out at the young girl for being so meek and timid. Nancy thought that if she were in her place, she would never put up with any balls she didn't want to attend. She would not let anyone tell her what to do.

"Besides," Lady Crauford continued, "we are the ones hosting this ball. What would people think if the Crauford's own daughter didn't show up to this ball?"

"Nothing." Nancy was happy to notice that there was now a spark of anger in Emma's voice. "They would think nothing. And even if they did notice, why do you and Papa care so much?"

Lady Crauford sighed. "Emma," she said, with the air of explaining something to a little child, "you and your sister must have honorable marriages in upper-class families. This is the way it is, and there is nothing you or I can do to change that."

It was a well-known fact that Craufords did not have much money. Their social standing was only the result of their strong history as one of the oldest and proudest families of England.

"I don't want to marry any strange man I don't even care for."

It was then that Nancy decided she had heard enough. Clearing her throat, she stepped forward. The two women turned to look at her in surprise, as though they had forgotten she was still there.

"If the dress is all right, do I have your leave to depart, Lady Crauford?" Nancy said in her politest voice.

"It fits quite well." Lady Crauford stepped a few feet back to admire the dress on Emma's petite form. "Tell your mother I will be paying her a visit on the morrow. I would like a few more dresses before the month is over."

"I will let her know. Lady Emma," Nancy said as she bowed to the young girl. "Lady Crauford." She repeated the motion. Then she made her way to the door, making a concentrated effort not to break into a run. She walked down the large hallways and staircases and through the fancy doors of House Hilcrest, unable to stop herself from admiring the intricate designs carved into the wooden doors and window frames. When she reached the front door, she wrenched it open and stepped into the huge garden outside. It was full of tulips and daisies and other varieties of flowers whose names Nancy did not know. Squinting against the sunlight, she made her way down the pathway and began to walk home.

For Nancy Brooks, home was a small, shabby cottage at the end of a narrow cobbled alleyway in a busy part of Oxford, behind the stitching and laundry shop that her mother owned. The main street the the alleyway opened into, Josmead Street, was full of small shops, inns, taverns, and a few restaurants, so it was always bustling with people. Nancy's father had died when she was a little girl, and she had spent most of her childhood helping her mother run her shop. When she was not busy delivering freshly laundered clothes or newly stitched dresses to the middle- and upper-class families, she spent most of her time at the local library. She had taught herself Latin and Greek grammar, arithmetic and geography, algebra and geometry, and classical and world history. When she was younger and her father was alive, he had always said that with her caliber and quick grasp, she should be among the children attending Harrow or Eaton.

"Your mind is as good as theirs, if not better." He had said this so many times that, to this day, Nancy could close her eyes and almost hear his voice saying the words.

But she knew that even if her family did have enough money to send her to one of these prestigious schools, she still would not have been able to go, because these schools were not for girls. She thought that this, more than anything else, had contributed to making her so rebellious and headstrong. She had searched hundreds of books for an answer as to why women were not treated the same as men, but she could never find anything.

"Nancy!" The voice came from behind her, just as she was turning onto Josmead Street. Turning around, she saw a thin, lanky young boy peering out of one of the windows of the inn where he worked.

"Hullo, Mark," Nancy said, smiling genuinely. Mark was one of the few people her age who shared her love for books and literature. She had met him through a literary club meeting she had attended once when she was in London a few years previously. The club mostly consisted of older members, and they both had been the only youngsters there. After hours of discussing Charles Dickens, Matthew Arnold, and Robert Browning, they had been delighted to find they lived only a few minutes away from each other in Oxford.

"Who were you delivering to today?" Mark was grinning. He knew how much she hated taking clothes to the rich people, who never seemed to run out of money to buy more and more clothes.

"The Craufords." Nancy rolled her eyes. "I had to witness the little Crauford girl trying to convince her mother to not make her finish out the 'season'". She made quotation marks in the air with her fingers as she said the last word.

"What a nightmare." Mark pretended to look horrified. "Say, did you know that Persuasion will be released next month?"

"Hmm, yes, but what I'm really looking forward to is Northanger Abbey." Nancy's all-time favorite was, and always had been, Jane Austen. She had read and reread Pride and Prejudice and Emma. Her two new novels, Persuasion and Northanger Abbey, were to be released this year. Nancy liked to buy first-hand copies of all her books, so she had been saving up from the small allowance her mother gave her every month for helping out in the shop. "I am in a bit of a hurry, Mark. I'll see you soon." She waved good-bye.

When she arrived home, her mother was in the middle of one of her angry fits.

"You used the wrong border for this dress!" she bellowed at one of the stitching women. "Can't you see it's the wrong color? How can there be a dark green border on a sky blue dress?"

Nancy sighed and tried to silently make her way toward the back of the shop so she could get into the cottage and to her room unnoticed. However, she was out of luck today. Just like every day, she thought bitterly.

"Where do you think you're off to?" her mother demanded. "You still have one more package to deliver."

"Where to, Mama?" Nancy asked, sighing again.

"Look at the address on the package." Her mother turned back to the stitching women. Nancy walked over to the shelf where the packages ready for delivery were set. Her eyes fell on the mirror in the small dressing room, whose door stood ajar. She stopped for a second to smoothen her hair, which was frizzy because of the weather. Nancy had long, curly red hair that fell below her shoulders. Her eyes were bright green, her skin was pale, and she was not particularly tall, but she had a long neck, which gave her the impression of being taller than she actually was. She was wearing a dark blue skirt and a matching blouse. Even though they were poor, Nancy usually got to wear nice clothes because of her mother's shop. She got to keep all the clothes that were stitched the wrong way or were stitched as samples. She ran her fingers through her hair in an attempt to tame it and then turned her attention to the package.

Jonathan Gale, Oxford University.

Nancy sighed. If there was anything she hated more than delivering clothes to spoiled young ladies and rich old women, it was delivering laundered clothes to the boys at Oxford. Nancy had always dreamed of studying at Oxford one day. She had read about it in books and heard about it through people at inns and taverns, but she wanted to experience it herself. She wanted to walk down those hallways she had always heard about and attend lectures by all those professors who had travelled the world and had so much knowledge to impart. But of course she couldn't, simply because of her gender. She grabbed the package and made her way to the door. Outside, she saw a carriage pull up and the coachman help a wealthy looking woman get down. A young girl, who was Nancy's age, followed. Nancy assumed she was the wealthy woman's daughter. They crossed Nancy while entering her mother's shop, and Nancy heard her mother ushering them into the customers' room, away from all the mess of unstitched clothes and washers.

It was times like these—when she saw girls her age from rich families being escorted everywhere by their mothers or brothers or other chaperons—that she was actually happy she grew up in a poor family without a male relative to take care of her, as was the custom. She had more freedom than most girls her age, and therefore, she believed she also learned a lot more than most girls her age. How much could one hope to expand their minds if they were under constant supervision?

As she was walking, she saw one of the shopkeepers, Harry, from a nearby shop trotting away on a horse. She called out to him and asked if he could give her a ride. She wanted to get this work done as soon as possible. When they reached the university gates, she hopped off the horse and waved good-bye to Harry as she walked up to one of the guards. He nodded at her in recognition—she had been here a few times recently—and let her in.

She walked down the wide roads that led to the main campus. The front desk where she usually left the packages was empty today. She considered just leaving the clothes there, but she knew they might get lost and that then she would have to face her mother's wrath. Then she heard distant shouting from somewhere within the building. Curious, she walked down the hallway toward the left. Soon, she found herself in the main academic building. There were classrooms all around her, and she could hear the sounds of professors and students. She saw a few boys walking by, looking at her curiously. It must be rare to see a girl around here, she thought. She followed the sound of the shouting and walked up a large marble staircase.

When she reached the second landing, she saw that the commotion was coming from outside one of the doors that led to the balcony. Cautiously, she walked toward the door, not wanting to draw attention to herself.

What she saw when she walked outside made her heart stop beating.

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