by Anne Morris
As a means of helping Bingley get over his unrequited romance, Darcy had him consider leasing an estate as a step before he actually purchased one. There was a great deal of discussion as to what county to consider. Bingley came from Yorkshire and immediately thought of his own county. Darcy pressed him to look at Hertfordshire, knowing why he did it. But Darcy explained to his friend about its proximity to London. Should Bingley decide he did not enjoy the gifts of mansion, estate, and shooting, Bingley would be close enough to London to enjoy the delights of Town. It was an argument which Bingley accepted without any suspicion of deceit from his friend. Somehow, Bingley landed on the lease of Netherfield Hall, two or three miles from Meryton and within proximity of Elizabeth Bennet.
Darcy was finally reunited with her even if it was through devious maneuvers. Elizabeth was just as lovely as he remembered. It had been difficult to help his friend settle into Netherfield and be in the area for over a se’ennight and yet not be able to seek her out. There was the bother of all of Bingley’s sisters and their families coming to visit to approve of the estate. Then Darcy waited for all of those calls from neighbors, waiting in particular for one who was late in coming. Mr. Bennet was not a man who impressed. But that connection meant Darcy was to see her—they were finally to meet again.
Now Elizabeth stood before him, her dark, intelligent eyes sparkling, and he thought with an equal admiration in return. Darcy thought, in some sense, that he had come home, as he stared into their depths. It was a feeling that was both welcome and challenging and made Darcy a little uncertain as to how he had gotten to this exact moment. What did he mean by all of this, now that they had their first meeting? Their set of dances ended too soon, and Darcy took her back to her family, bowed over her hand, and thanked her.
Her sisters looked at him eagerly, but he went back to his own party and asked Miss Bingley to dance. There was a certain safety in that, as Darcy could tune her out while he thought more about his feelings for Elizabeth Bennet.
***
Elizabeth could not help but feel (it was not merely thoughts, but feelings) that Mr. Darcy was partial to her. His looks, his comments, his smiles, all seemed focused on her. He spoke more than pleasantly; there was such a fondness in the way he talked about their time together in London. He eagerly asked about her family here; Elizabeth could not help but think, he admires me.
She wondered, does he love me? Has he come, has he really come because he loves me?
Elizabeth was interrupted, however, by her cousin, Mr. Collins, who applied for her hand. Elizabeth had her thoughts disrupted as she had to suffer through a half hour of mortifying dancing. She had not noticed how Jane had fared with this man as a partner, but Mr. Collins was the worst dancer. He spoke when he should have been dancing, would turn the wrong way, kick too enthusiastically, and Collins made her blush with embarrassment. Elizabeth fled from the dance floor without waiting for him to escort her to the side when their dance was over.
She could not seek out her sister, Mary, for it was Mary’s turn to next suffer Mr. Collins’ foolish ministrations. Elizabeth looked for Jane, but Jane was being led onto the dance floor by Mr. Bingley.
“Jane seems to have found favor,” remarked Charlotte as they both watched Mr. Bingley dancing with Jane.
“He asked you for the first set,” replied Elizabeth.
“Only because Papa was there at the door. Mr. Bingley was merely being polite. I think he preferred his second, Miss King, and now his third, your sister.”
“Charlotte!” cried Elizabeth. “What if he is merely a sociable man who loves to dance? How can you say which of his partners he prefers?”
“He is handsome and rich, Eliza. He may choose any girl in this room. That shall not be me. I am destined to be at the mercy of my brothers’ charity, and we all know it,” declared Charlotte. “I am plain and practically dowerless.”
“Surely there is a gentleman for you?” soothed Elizabeth.
“I have no romantic illusions, Eliza,” said her friend. “I know how to keep a house on a budget, so perhaps there is some man who wants a frugal wife. But you! How is it that this Mr. Darcy asked after you?”
Elizabeth found herself in the same position as she had with her sister, Mary, explaining how she had met Mr. Darcy in London, but that with her father’s letter to return home, and leaving in a rush, Elizabeth had not felt the need to discuss him.
“He must be in love with you!” asserted her friend.
“I wonder,” was Elizabeth’s reply. She did not wish to speculate on the nature of Mr. Darcy’s heart in an open assembly room. “However, I shall have to wait and see.”
The Bennet daughters were distinguished by the gentlemen from Netherfield as Mr. Bingley danced twice with Jane, and Mr. Darcy also asked Elizabeth to dance a second time.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
The next day opened up a new chapter for the Bennets as Mr. Darcy and Mr. Bingley called at Longbourn along with Mr. Bingley’s two sisters. Usually, only ladies made such calls after such an event as an assembly dance, but because of Mr. Darcy and Elizabeth’s prior acquaintance, he came. And perhaps because there was some admiration by Mr. Bingley for Jane Bennet, he called.
It was a very polite and remo]ved call on the part of the two sisters, Miss Bingley, and Mrs. Hurst, but a far livelier one on the part of the visiting gentlemen. Even though they mainly discussed local families or the nature of the local shooting (or the weather), it became undeniable, very quickly, that Miss Bingley was jealous of Mr. Darcy’s attentions to Elizabeth Bennet. Caroline Bingley watched Mr. Darcy fiercely as though a predator watching a prey (she did not seem the sort to be a mother watching over her young), and Miss Bingley hovered over every word Elizabeth said to him in return.
Miss Bingley had a strong opinion about having come to the country. She declared, “I’ve never done such a thing,” to anyone who would listen. “Usually I go to London for the little Season, but Charles had this idea of leasing an estate for the shooting, you know.”
She looked at a group of women who were well used to living with gentlemen who knew the exact days which constituted the shooting schedule in the year; women whose lives and social structure often revolved around it. The Bennet women did not express much sympathy in their faces or with their gestures for her remark which further incensed the young woman.
“I am pleased you have come to Meryton to keep your brother’s house,” offered Jane.
“We shall enjoy having such distinguished neighbors,” remarked Mrs. Bennet, who was a sociable, even encouraging hostess.
“May I say you are obviously women of superior rank,” asserted Mr. Collins, who broke into the conversation. “Your move here has done nothing but add to this lowly country village.” He was attempting to flatter the two women but only succeeded in insulting most of the people in the room. He offended those who lived in Meryton by undervaluing them, but the two women visitors did not take kindly by the attempts at flattery from this nobody of a man.
“We shall still enjoy having such neighbors as you, Miss Bennet, and you, Miss Eliza,” declared Miss Bingley turning to the two oldest. “I look forward to having you visit us at Netherfield,” she asserted, though that nicety cost her plenty, as her eyes bounced from Elizabeth over to Mr. Darcy, who had gone to stand at a window to take in the view.
“We have not had a settled place to call home since we were little girls—before we were sent away to seminary, you understand,” asserted Mrs. Hurst, who wished to underscore their education and wealth.
Mr. Bingley had been sitting by Jane. They had been speaking quietly, but he looked up. “It has been almost ten years since we were all living in Scarborough.” There was a brief discussion of Scarborough before the Netherfield party left, but not without Mr. Darcy bowing over Elizabeth’s hand and bestowing a heart-melting smile on her.
The sisters at Longbourn held their tongues about these visitors once they had left. Jane admired Mr. Bingley, but he was a new
acquaintance; she would not speak to her sisters or her stepmother about such things. In the past, Jane and Elizabeth had shared a closeness, but since their mother’s passing, Jane had been a little lost. Once she had assumed the role of mistress of the house, but had been demoted by her father’s remarriage. Jane must be wishing to have an establishment of her own, but to speak of it almost felt as if to curse herself from obtaining such happiness: a home of her own.
Mary asked one or two questions about Mr. Darcy, but Elizabeth remarked that he was more reserved than he had been in London which put off her younger sister from pursuing that line of inquiry.
***
Elizabeth saw him again the next day at a dinner hosted by the Lucas family where a large party of people was assembled. Colonel Forster came to speak to Elizabeth almost as soon as she had stepped foot in Lucas Lodge, though her eyes had swept the room to discover if Mr. Darcy was there. (The Netherfield party had not yet arrived).
Charlotte Lucas came up and joined her. Elizabeth was so impatient as she waited for Mr. Darcy to appear that she was not quite sure what topics she, Charlotte, and the colonel of the militia regiment discussed. She suspected he was asking about hosting a regimental ball (which would delight many of the ladies thereabouts), but Colonel Forster had probably picked the two women in Meryton who were the most indifferent to the idea.
Murmurs made her turn her head, and Elizabeth looked to see that Mr. Darcy was there with his friends. She watched as he greeted his host and hostess; Elizabeth was anxious to speak to him. But then she was surprised as her cousin, Mr. Collins (who she was continually forgetting was part of her own party), walked right up to him. While Mr. Darcy’s greeting of Mr. Collins was quiet, Elizabeth could hear her cousin’s responses drift over the crowd of people.
“I found out, sir, by a singular accident that you are a relation to my patroness. How wonderfully these sort of things occur! I must tell you that your aunt, Lady Catherine de Bourgh, and your cousin, Anne, were both in excellent health when I left Rosings but a few days ago, sir. You must allow me to apologize for my ignorance of this connection. Had I known, I would have come to speak to you beforehand, and at greater length, to be sure!”
Mr. Darcy bore with the odious man through his long speech; nodding and saying something in return. Mr. Collins launched into another speech but chose to tone down the volume of his words, so this time Elizabeth could not hear what Collins had to say. But finally, her cousin bowed and walked off, and Mr. Darcy turned his eyes towards her. He walked over to claim her.
Mr. Darcy stood just on the edge of her little party, waiting for an opportunity to interrupt, when Colonel Forster finally concluded, “I will consider a ball.” Mr. Darcy then stepped up. Charlotte smiled, said something about going to help her mother and left the two of them alone.
“Were you that interested in our discussion about a regimental ball?” Elizabeth asked as he offered her his arm, and they began to move about the room. There were various groupings of people, and it was such a large party that it was difficult to find an area where they could speak, tete-a-tete, without being open to having someone else join them. It was both their unspoken wish to talk together, tete-a-tete.
“Any opinion of yours is one that I wish to hear,” Darcy said gently.
“Even about a ball,” she teased.
“A ball would provide me another opportunity to dance with you again,” was his reply. “I have tasted such a pleasure and now would wish to have it repeated.”
“That is another pretty compliment, Mr. Darcy. I recall you giving me a rather pretty one, one day, when you escorted Lady Emma and me around Town to do nothing but shop. It must surely have been a tedious day for you.”
“No,” Mr. Darcy announced abruptly. “Not when I had the pleasure of your company, Miss Bennet.”
He had not the bother of holding reins, nor did she have the trouble of looking around the edge of a bonnet; they could seek each other’s eyes and stare at each other like love-sick fools.
“There you are, Darcy!” declared a voice. They turned to see Miss Bingley staring at them. Caroline just barely acknowledged Elizabeth with a short nod, but without verbally greeting her. “Lady Lucas has asked me to perform at the pianoforte. I thought you should come turn pages for me.”
“No,” Darcy whispered under his breath, as he was torn with being polite and walking away from Elizabeth. He had no wish to go turn pages for Caroline Bingley. But Darcy wondered how to turn her down politely.
“You should go,” Elizabeth told him. She still had hold of his arm, but Elizabeth reached with her free hand in that intimate gesture she had used before, placing it on top of his coat sleeve. “Go turn pages for Miss Bingley. The evening is still young.”
Miss Bingley’s eyes flared with a sense of triumph at getting her way, though Caroline did not realize that she had already lost.
Miss Bingley played and sang well. It was what she had learned at the women’s seminary, what she and her sisters had been trained to do: sing and play with precision. Caroline Bingley was succeeded by Mary Bennet, who (along with Elizabeth) was the only other Bennet daughter who played. Mary worked hard at learning how to play the pianoforte so she could have an additional accomplishment. Mary’s public performances were stiff and not as polished as Miss Bingley’s. Another young woman came to perform after Mary. She sang two songs quite out of tune before calls rang out for some dancing in one corner of the drawing-room.
Darcy had watched this mixture of activities with a certain unease and discomfort, though his friend Bingley seemed perfectly happy with whatever was occurring so long as he had the Jane Bennet by his side. That lady had the distinction of already being his favorite.
But Darcy thought about his own consideration of what country life meant to him when he was home at Pemberley. He realized that he did not leave his estate much when he was there. Darcy did not socialize with many of the neighboring families. Pemberley was a vast estate; it was many miles to travel to his nearest neighbor. It had not the same sense of familiarity as this place, with small estates of perhaps only one hundred or two hundred acres when Pemberley was twenty times them in size.
But his friend Bingley was comfortable anywhere, and here also included Elizabeth.
Darcy wanted to find Elizabeth again after he did his duty as Miss Bingley’s page turner. Caroline Bingley requested some refreshments, and while Darcy went to get her a glass of wine and passed it over with a little bow, he made his escape. Elizabeth had been standing and watching her sister, Mary, play at the instrument when he found her.
Elizabeth was hesitant as she stood next to Mr. Darcy. They had not recaptured the rapport which they had enjoyed in London those final days. She wondered if it was because the spark between them needed to be sustained and had been lost, but now that they had found each other it could not be reignited? Or was it because the setting was different, and they needed to discover how to find each other again? Here, in the country, he could not call on her each morning, or take her for long rides in the park (just the two of them) in the afternoon. Mr. Darcy could not be by her side in the evening with that freedom which they had enjoyed in London. Here they were constrained with the rules set by country society.
It was autumn and the shooting season. Gentlemen did not make social calls in the country in the mornings—they went shooting. Men spent their time out of doors. They might make an appearance at teatime, but there was no park in Meryton for long rides. No real time to talk in the evenings, like before. Here, they were forever being interrupted, sometimes innocently with someone coming to join them like neighbors did, but oftentimes Miss Bingley made a third (an unwelcome third), just when they had found a corner within which to sit and talk.
Over the next few days, even though it was apparent that Mr. Darcy was seeking out Elizabeth, they never had more than five or ten minutes together before they were parted in some fashion. It was not enough time for wooing. They both felt cheated.
&n
bsp; ***
One afternoon, Charlotte and Maria Lucas invited all of the Bennet sisters to come to tea, but her stepmother asked Elizabeth to remain behind, which was an unusual occurrence. Besides the one discussion the day before her wedding, Mrs. Bennet had not spoken much to Elizabeth. Mrs. Bennet had taken Jane in-hand by asking her to help with responsibilities in the household. And she had taken Catherine and Lydia to hand in a role as a mother, but Elizabeth and Mary had been left to govern themselves.
Elizabeth was not invited into Mrs. Bennet’s sitting room, but they sat in the drawing-room with a cup of tea. Elizabeth found herself having being solicited—to the point of being grilled—about Mr. Darcy’s intentions and asked about Elizabeth’s opinion as to him as a potential husband. It was very awkward. It would have been awkward had Mrs. Bennet been her mother, though Elizabeth suspected that if her mother had lived, she would have been out canvassing the neighborhood and promoting the match in every way she thought appropriate.
Elizabeth had to appreciate the more subtle way that her stepmother was handling the topic. But she had to confess that there was no understanding between Mr. Darcy and herself which seemed to surprise her stepmother who believed there was. As Elizabeth had explained both to Mary and Charlotte, they had merely been acquainted in London, and that was all (at least all Elizabeth wished to discuss for now).
“You will let me know if I need to speak to your father,” had been Mrs. Bennet’s final words to her. Elizabeth thought about that as she walked away. Had the new Mrs. Bennet become so integral a part in their lives that their father had vacated any responsibility at having to paying attention to his daughters’ prospects for marriage?
The other Bennet sisters got caught walking home from Lucas Lodge in a downpour and were thoroughly soaked by the time they got home. There were calls for baths and glowing fires to warm them up and ensure that none of them came down with a cold.