by J. L. Ashton
Bingley remembered childhood summers at their great uncle’s farm collecting eggs, plucking daisies, and riding ponies. Louisa and Caroline had been such agreeable playmates then. Now, with the former married these four years and the latter looking towards her fifth Season, they seemed merely grumpy and greedy. Not even the pretty countryside of Hertfordshire and the happy company of the two eldest Bennet sisters could delight them. My sisters are such unpleasant girls. Some people are not formed for happiness.
“Mr. Darcy!” A squeal of delight brought him back to the moment. As he had expected, Caroline greeted the news with great enthusiasm. “Oh, how wonderful! Finally, a taste of intelligent conversation and news of the ton.”
The Bennet sisters exchanged looks. Jane, the elder by two years, reached for her tea. Her eyes widened, her smile compensating for the narrowing of her sister’s expression. Miss Elizabeth looked up at her host and spoke in a cheerful voice. “Finally, Mr. Bingley, with the arrival of your friend, you and Mr. Hurst will have the advantage in numbers. Your friend brings you intelligent conversation, and you will reward him with the calming joys of Netherfield?”
Bingley, already conversant with his angel’s sister on the paucity of volumes in Netherfield’s library, chuckled. “Well, yes, I shall, Miss Elizabeth. We have fields to explore, fine steeds to ride, and at least a few birds to shoot and fish to catch. And if I know my friend, he will bring a box or two of books with him. He will likely carry a volume in each coat pocket as well.”
Miss Elizabeth seemed pleased by this intelligence. “So, Mr. Darcy is a wise gentleman who makes good use of his leisure.”
Now it was Caroline’s turn to narrow her eyes. “Mr. Darcy is the finest gentleman of our acquaintance. His estate in Derbyshire has no rival, his library no equal.”
“He would appear to be quite the fine gentleman,” Jane agreed.
Louisa gave her a tight smile. “He is, indeed. And suffering such a grievous loss.”
“Oh no!” Jane’s eyebrows furrowed and her hand went to her heart.
Bingley smiled sadly at the stricken beauty before glancing at his sisters and clearing his throat. “Darcy’s cousin, Miss Anne de Bourgh, died a fortnight ago. He has been assisting his aunt in her bereavement. Miss de Bourgh was her only child.”
“Oh, how tragic,” Jane gasped. Bingley winced and went to sit across from her. Her blue eyes looked so sad.
“So he is joining you here as a respite from his mourning,” Miss Elizabeth said. “That is kind of you to relieve him of his burden.” At the indelicate sound of a snort, her eyes shifted from Mr. Bingley to his eldest sister.
Louisa wore an amused expression as Caroline sipped her tea. “Yes, poor Mr. Darcy did lose his cousin, but his aunt lost her daughter and her chance for landed greatness. Uniting the fortunes was a great lure, and his aunt is reputedly quite persuasive.”
***
Elizabeth wondered whether Miss Bingley’s insincere smile resembled those in the etchings of Ceylonese crocodiles of which her uncle told tales to her little cousins.
“Oh, it was not a mercenary move by him,” Caroline added. “Mr. Darcy is the master of Pemberley. He is too good to form a false attachment.”
And apparently too rich. Elizabeth thought that Mr. Bingley’s sisters were authorities on falsity.
“His cousin…she was said to be loose in the head.”
“Caroline!”
“Oh, Charles, everyone knows she was not well. Lady Catherine simply wished for the match, and the Darcy lineage must continue on.”
Mr. Bingley jumped up from his seat and stalked over to the fireplace. He shook his head and spoke in a sharper voice than Elizabeth had imagined him capable.
“I must defend my friend from Caroline’s assertions! Darcy grew up with his cousin and was quite fond of her. In spite of her ill health, they were close friends. He and his family are grieved by her death.”
He smiled tightly, and glancing at Jane, his eyes softened. “I hope you will excuse me, Miss Bennet. Darcy has been a great friend to me, and I hope he will feel welcome here and take as much pleasure in the company as I have.”
“Please bring Mr. Darcy to call at Longbourn. My family will make him feel welcome,” Elizabeth said warmly. She felt Miss Bingley’s eyes on her, but she maintained a steady smile for her host.
Mr. Bingley nodded, bowed slightly, and—apologising that he had left his steward waiting too long in his study—left the room.
The sisters of Longbourn sat quite still as they absorbed the looks exchanged between Mrs. Hurst and Miss Bingley. Small talk on future events in town filled the minutes until the clock rang half past five, and Elizabeth and Miss Bingley swiftly sought their escapes.
As the Bennets rode home in Netherfield’s carriage and raindrops splashed on the roof above them, Jane shook her head. “Oh, Lizzy, I believe this Mr. Darcy is the same gentleman mentioned by my cousin.”
“Mr. Collins, the man who will not leave?” Elizabeth muttered under her breath. Oh, how she wished the olive branch he was extending to her family would snap and send him tumbling back to his parsonage.
“He told us about his patroness’s daughter who was betrothed to her cousin, the master of Pemberley. The poor, heartbroken man must be Mr. Darcy.”
Elizabeth took Jane’s hand. “It is sad, Jane. We know so little, though, about the situation, and Miss Bingley had quite a different point to make.”
“Lizzy, be kind! Mr. Bingley’s friend is in mourning. He has lost his cousin, his betrothed.”
Elizabeth gave her sister a weak smile. Although she could not help her aversion to Miss Bingley, she recognised that she had been harsh in assuming any gentleman the fashionable lady admired must be of similar character. Her eldest sister saw only the good in their neighbour, and Elizabeth knew their arrival home would bring a deluge of questions from another sister about the “lovely and fearsome Miss Bingley.”
Elizabeth marvelled at Kitty’s fascination with the lady. Yes, she granted that Miss Bingley was a rather pretty woman who dressed in expensive, well-tailored gowns and had access to, and relied on, every manner of feather, bead, and trim to emphasise her charms. But Kitty had not stopped praising the lady’s “most handsome appearance” since the moment they were introduced a few weeks prior. Elizabeth recognised that Kitty was young and had not been exposed to the larger world of society, but to Elizabeth, her younger sister’s object of admiration was not worthy of such esteem.
In fact, she felt it curious and unfortunate that Kitty was so taken with Miss Bingley, because Elizabeth had formed a quite different opinion. She had taken note of the lady’s eye rolling and flared nostrils when others extolled the virtues of country living. She had listened patiently to the lady’s observations on the failings of the grass and foliage, tea service, window views, cheeses, animals, fashions, merchants, society, and the tradespeople of Meryton and its “inferior” countryside.
London, of course, held all that was of interest and importance: the shops and tea rooms, the promenades and society. Even the flowers and trees of the city’s parks were brighter, larger, and more colourful. Elizabeth was sceptical that Miss Bingley would spare a glance for nature’s beauty, but perhaps she judged her unfairly. She did feel sympathy for her brother’s friend; after all, Mr. Darcy had suffered a great and terrible loss. Yet Mr. Collins had provided them with a slightly different view of the dead bride-to-be and her heartbroken groom.
Indeed, since his arrival three days earlier, their cousin had regaled them with tales of the great and wondrous Rosings and its excellent and revered occupants. He had spoken at length—yet with a curious lack of detail—of the demise of Lady Catherine de Bourgh’s only daughter. He had described the lost heiress as the jewel of Kent, a beauty of vast talents who was to be married to her illustrious cousin and to unite their great es
tates.
He mourned for his extraordinary patroness who, left alone and bereft, had cried out, “She is dead to me!” and refused his attempts at pastoral counsel. Mr. Collins intoned solemnly that Lady Catherine chose to grieve alone. “Leave me and the parsonage to grieve in peace,” she had ordered him. And so he had. He carried little to recommend him to his relations but platitudes and parables, rambling biblical references, harsh admonitions, and a huge appetite for whatever emerged from his host’s kitchens. He paid for the hospitality by sharing the minimal knowledge he had gleaned, sprinkled with ill-considered speculations and hypotheses, about the sad end of the future mistress of Rosings and Pemberley.
Meals had become a test of endurance for some members of the Bennet family. Rather than receiving enlightened titbits and stories from a cousin who had seen a bit of the world and spent time with people of quality, the family’s patience was burdened with discourse about Mr. Collins’s palate and digestion, the food that filled his plate, and details on meals enjoyed in the past and hoped for in the future.
It was, in reality, rather mortifying. Since his arrival after a fortnight of visiting his spinster aunts in Epsom, Mr. Collins had conspicuously been unable to contain his effusions over the meals produced in Longbourn’s kitchen. His raptures, which ever so awkwardly skirted insult to the efforts of his aunts Millicent and Lavinia and to the cooks labouring for the great Lady Catherine, seemed to increase with his girth. He was a large, imposing young man and growing larger. Lydia predicted that a violent, untidy explosion would occur at any moment as a result of his appetite.
When the sisters arrived home from Netherfield, they espied the dreaded Mr. Collins hovering near the kitchen doorway. From one grinning reptile to another. Elizabeth had felt trapped during the past few days of rain with nowhere to go for undisturbed thought or private conversation. When a visit to the Lucases’ or tea with the Bingley sisters proved the zenith of intelligent discussion, she knew things were dire. A glance at the tired, angry expressions on her younger sisters’ faces made it clear that their afternoon had been spent in close company with their eager-to-converse cousin. Mary, even paler than was common, was bent over a hymnal. Lydia looked more vexed than usual; her nostrils flared alarmingly like Miss Bingley’s. Kitty’s face spoke of weary melancholy. Elizabeth sighed quietly at the smallness of her company.
As Elizabeth and Jane put away their pelisses and hats, Lydia and Kitty drew near. Kitty enquired after Miss Bingley, whether the lady had asked after her, what colour dress she wore, and what was served at tea. Elizabeth provided short replies that Kitty greeted with enormous sighs.
“I wish I, too, had been invited to tea with Miss Bingley.”
Jane and Elizabeth traded looks. They had noted Kitty’s plaintive expression when the invitation to tea arrived addressed only to them and agreed it was best to let Kitty’s interest run its course. After all, she had always loved fashion and frippery, and she rarely saw such fine examples of it in Meryton. When Miss Bingley went back to London, Kitty’s life would resume all its ordinariness.
Their youngest sister had other concerns to share. Mr. Collins’s buttons, noted Lydia the Wise, were near to popping. Elizabeth reminded her again that a young lady’s eyes belonged elsewhere—in a proper place. Thus commenced more whinging about the ache in Kitty’s neck and the strain on Lydia’s eyes from looking up at the tall, ungainly man.
Lydia seemed particularly displeased with the small size of their cousin’s head set atop such a large body. She had made the mistake of mentioning it the day before in the presence of her Aunt Phillips, who had tittered for five minutes on how a small-headed man boded well for both his mother and his wife. Mrs. Bennet had joined in the hysterical, knowing laughter while her daughters exchanged the uncomfortable glances of innocents. Elizabeth despised the few moments when her mother and aunt held the advantage in knowledge. It occurred rarely, but when it did, the Gardiner sisters relished their superiority. Elizabeth had tucked away a sudden, unnerving recognition of their resemblance to the Bingley sisters.
***
Mr. Collins smiled upon seeing Cousins Jane and Elizabeth enter the house. He had considered both as suitable for marriage—one kind, serene, and beautiful; the other charming, bright, and frightfully clever—but until he knew when he could return to his parsonage, he feared raising their hopes. ’Tis a better thing in the eyes of God to be true and kind. And to enjoy the gustatory glories of Mrs. Bennet’s table.
Already he could hear her voice rising above the others. “Mr. Bingley’s particular friend is arriving tomorrow. He comes to our neighbourhood for rest and sport.” She nodded at her husband, who maintained a steady focus on his book. “He is said to be a great man of the ton. It speaks well for us and for him that he visits Hertfordshire even if he will be dull with all of his resting.”
“A great man?” Mr. Bennet exclaimed. “Would that make him a learned man, a man with whom I can play chess, or a man of great capacity for drink and riding? I wonder at your definition of a great man, Mrs. Bennet.”
“Papa,” Jane said softly, as close to a reprimand as Mr. Collins had heard her speak. “Mr. Bingley says that Mr. Darcy is a gentleman in mourning, in need of quiet diversion.”
“Indeed,” her father replied. “Sadly, we’ve nothing to Almack’s, but our hills roll gently, Mr. Piper’s shop carries every shade of hair ribbon, and there is many a bird waiting to be shot for the supper table.”
Cousins Lydia and Kitty snickered while Elizabeth lowered her head to hide a smile. Their mother looked peevish from Mr. Bennet’s words but remained silent, observing Hill as she carried in the trays.
“Mr. Darcy? Mr. Darcy is coming here, to Hertfordshire?” Mr. Collins’s eyes gleamed in excitement. “How singular.” He eyed the platters of meat and roasted turnips being set just an arm’s length away. “As he is Miss de Bourgh’s cousin, his mourning period is over. As the bereft betrothed, however, he will be in need of my counsel. I must go to him. Ecclesiastes is in order.”
Jane spoke and saved him from further musings. “Sir, you made the acquaintance of Mr. Darcy at the funeral for Miss de Bourgh?”
“Uh, no, I did not, Cousin Jane. There was no funeral service.”
“You did not conduct one?” Elizabeth asked. “There was no more than a simple gathering of the family?”
Mr. Collins lowered his fork and shook his head.
Mary, listening intently, seemed especially grieved. “Was there not a Christian burial?”
Mr. Collins frowned. “A troublesome infection, Cousin Mary. Not a soul entered Rosings, and no family members were permitted to honour the memory of the dear, departed Miss de Bourgh. I believe she is laid to rest in the family tomb with prayers said by a visiting bishop.”
“Did you meet this bishop and discuss scripture, Mr. Collins?” Mary enquired.
He glanced away from her piercing stare. “No…the infection, of course, affected proper social calls.”
“But…”
“How dull this conversation has become, Mary, with all this talk of death and mourning,” Mrs. Bennet said with disinterest. “More potatoes, Mr. Collins?”
“Mama, have you been listening?” Lydia interjected. “Mr. Bingley’s friend is very rich, and he may be very handsome.”
Mrs. Bennet looked at Mr. Collins. “Mr. Bingley’s friend is the widower you mentioned?”
“Mr. Darcy is the master of Pemberley, Mama, the man of whom our cousin has spoken,” Elizabeth said while Mr. Collins piled another slice of roast on his already full plate.
“The Grieving Groom?” Mrs. Bennet asked, her eyes alight with wild fancy.
“Groom-to-be,” Mr. Collins corrected, pausing in his exertions. “He loved his cousin dearly, but her heart gave out and broke his before the banns could be read.”
“Her heart?” Mr. Bennet enquired
. “Was it not a troublesome infection, as you said? Or was it the pox? Or mayhap scurvy?” He leaned back and surveyed the table, his eyes resting on Elizabeth. “I sense a mystery on our doorstep.”
Chapter Three
The streets of Meryton were quiet when Darcy rode in. He glanced about at the shops: the milliner, the apothecary, the blacksmith. Nothing here was remarkably different from any other small country town. There was a beautiful grouping of chestnut trees down the way and benches for conversation placed under the arching branches. He heard the voices of laughing children and turned to watch two small boys chasing a butterfly.
“Thomas! Henry! Stop!”
Darcy observed a woman hastening after the pair. “That might well be the last butterfly of the season,” she admonished them in a cheerful voice. “It lives so short a life; let it fly freely and enjoy this day.”
He smiled. When she was a little girl, Georgiana had loved to chase butterflies as well. He did not recall scolding his sister for it, but he had not been a maternal figure, and she had always been a well-behaved, obedient child.
“But we wish to capture it for our collection!”
“Not while it is still alive, Henry,” the lady said gently. She brushed some dirt off the smaller boy’s sleeve, re-settled the older one’s cap, and took their hands. “Your father will be waiting for us. I wonder whether he might have filled his pockets with a sweet or two for his clean, well-behaved sons.”