Lessons of Advantage

by michael sand

  As his great strides carried Mr Darcy rapidly away from Cheapside, his feelings rushed upon him in motion equally swift. Anger at Mrs Gardiner’s impertinence, (and her penetration of what he had thought an impenetrable reserve,) was soon succeeded by anger at himself. He had visited Gracechurch-street in search of comfort, and had drawn back when comfort was offered. He had valued the easy informality of the house — and met it with coldness. He had gone where he might hear Elizabeth Bennet spoken of, — in the hope (he could now acknowledge) of hearing her spoken of, — then balked at the mention of her name. Let him admit, too, that he had wanted to be told that he ought not to leave England, and had recoiled when this advice had been offered. Mrs Gardiner’s rehabilitation was soon complete, aided by a softening in her favour, the product of her resemblance to her niece in liveliness of manner. And was not Mrs Gardiner right! — How could he leave England with nothing settled? — How look upon picturesque scenery, when the image of Elizabeth Bennet was constantly before his mind?

  At the door of his house, he was informed by the butler that Lady Catherine de Bourgh had arrived in his absence, and was awaiting him in the drawing-room; and on entering the drawing-room a moment later, Darcy was astonished to behold his aunt, sitting at a low table, drinking tea, — for he had hardly been able to credit the man’s words. That Lady Catherine should violate her views on Sunday-travelling, and arrive unannounced, spoke an evil of great proportions; and he was under considerable alarm as he exclaimed,

  “My dear Aunt, tell me at once what has happened? It must be something grave to bring you here today.”

  “A grave matter, indeed, Darcy,” said Lady Catherine, setting down her cup with a clatter. “You must deny this evil rumour immediately!”

  Darcy’s alarm was instantly appeased. Though in doubt as to the purpose of her visit, he had only needed to hear his aunt speak to ascertain that it betokened no danger to any of their relations. Her distress was evidently for herself — though in what regard, he could not imagine. “I beg your pardon,” he said, speaking with the coolness that often succeeds unnecessary apprehension. “I have not the advantage of understanding. To what rumour do you refer?”

  “To the rumour of your marrying Miss Bennet, of course!”

  Darcy was not more surprised than confounded. “Miss Bennet was to marry his friend Mr Bingley.”

  “Not the eldest sister, the next one — that impertinent chit, Miss Eliza. A rumour has been spread abroad that you have made her an offer of marriage. I had it from Mrs Collins. — Of course, the Bennets are themselves the source of this scandalous falsehood. They have put it forth in the hope, I suppose, that you might feel obliged to fulfil expectations you have not raised. Naturally, I could not hear of such a thing without acting. I deigned to visit Miss Bennet myself this very day; and though I compelled her to admit that no engagement existed, she repulsed me with insolence when I demanded that a public denial be issued. Nor would she promise to refuse you, if you ever were so foolish as to make her an offer, — though I assured her that your family would never countenance so disgraceful a match, and would despise her for entering into it against their wishes. But the presumptuous girl actually aspires to fix your attentions! — And after the great condescension I shewed her last spring!”

  Mr Darcy looked as though he might not believe his ears. “You visited Miss Bennet? Do you mean to say, you actually went to Longbourn?”

  “I did! You know me, Darcy. I always speak my mind. I told Miss Bennet that she would never achieve her ambition — whatever rumours her family might set afloat.”

  Darcy’s brows grew black. “He did not believe (speaking with cold formality) that such a rumour was circulating. He had been in Hertfordshire until recently, and the report would certainly have come to his ears, if it had existed, — or his friend Bingley, living in the family, would have heard of it.”

  “I dare say Mr Bingley may be encouraging the match,” was Lady Catherine’s reply. “He is connecting himself none too well, and means to better the connection, if he can. At all events, we must act! The report must be universally contradicted.”

  “I beg to disagree. Contradiction will only bring any rumour to greater notice than it originally attained.”

  “Then you admit that such a report is being bruited about! Well! and is there any truth to it? — But there cannot be. It is impossible you should so forget yourself. You are to marry Anne! — Your mother and I planned the match; fortune and interest favour it; every principle of family position demands it. Are the high destinies of the Darcys and Fitzwilliams to be put aside by the upstart pretensions of a girl of inferior birth, wholly unallied with any one of importance in the world!”

  Darcy remembered then some hints Colonel Fitzwilliam had let fall during his last visit to Rosings. — “Has Lady Catherine named the day, &c. &c.” He had dismissed this as the Colonel’s joke, wishing to believe that the old idea of an union between the families had been allowed to lapse. He was evidently mistaken, and the misconception must be addressed. “You are in error, Aunt,” he said. “Much as I respect Miss de Bourgh, there is no likelihood of an engagement forming. Its having been spoken of in the past, is no adequate reason for its taking place now, considering all the factors which militate against it. If there were no other impediment, Anne’s perfect indifference — and my own — would be sufficient.”

  “Phoo! phoo! All that is nothing. Anne has never thought seriously on the subject, and will do as I tell her.”

  “But I will not. My mother may have wished for the match when we were children, but she should not wish for it now — if she had lived to see me grown, and knew my views on marriage.”

  Darcy had been giving the subject of marriage a great deal of consideration of late. That it was not a state to be entered with doubtful feelings, or for interested motives; that one should only marry for love — no other course being honourable or safe; that genuine love was founded not in caprice, but in nature, — on honourable views, on virtue, on similarity of tastes and sympathy of souls; — all this was deeply felt by him at that moment. How unpardonable, — how wicked, — to marry without affection; — anything was to be endured rather than that!

  Lady Catherine stared at her nephew in speaking amazement. “Then it is true, you are caught — caught by an awkward country girl, without style or elegance, — almost without beauty. She has made you forget what is owed to your lineage. To be going against the claims of duty and honour! — to be considering a connection which your family will be unanimous in disapproving! Think of her younger sister — only preserved from infamy by the bribes of her uncle and father. Is such a girl to be your sister — such a man as her abductor your brother? — Wickham, whose father was your father’s steward. Have you so little regard for your pride? You will be degraded in the eyes of the world. The alliance will be held a disgrace!”

  Till recently, the disgrace of a connection with Wickham might justly have been expected to work upon Darcy’s pride; but his acknowledgement of the secret connection already persisting between them, had made him proof against it. Nor could Lady Catherine’s reference to the enforced marriage between Wickham and Lydia succeed in giving him the disgust she anticipated. He knew better than she, whose bribes had brought it off!

  “You must be mad to be entertaining a scheme of such imprudence!” Lady Catherine continued, in tones of the greatest ill-usage. “You will be wounding the consequence of all your relations, and shaming them by a connection with people so decidedly inferior to themselves.”

  There was no shame, Mr Darcy believed, in marrying the daughter of a gentleman.

  “But what of her mother’s family? One uncle a pettifogging country attorney, and the other in trade! Are Pemberley and Rosings to suffer such degrading connections! If you pursue this insane course, you will earn the world’s contempt.”

  Darcy felt himself growing more angry every moment. That Lady Catherine’s disparagements of the Bennets were just such as he himself h
ad once employed, was the cause of shame as well as anger. But he was ashamed of more than himself: his aunt’s ill-breeding and arrogant assumption of superiority had never been so evident. (Elizabeth Bennet was not the only one with reason to blush for a relation!) However, he exerted himself to speak with composure. “If I were so fortunate as to attach Miss Bennet, the world’s contempt would mean nothing to me. In any event, no one who met her would join in the censure.”

  “Then you do intend to make Miss Bennet an offer of marriage! You are resolved upon such folly!”

  To the normal reserve Darcy felt towards revealing his feelings, was added an almost superstitious dread lest any articulation of hope should lead to its destruction; but he felt an equal abhorrence of denying them. “I am resolved only to act in what ever way I think proper.”

  “I am excessively annoyed, Darcy,” said Lady Catherine, rising in resentment. “I had thought to find you more reasonable; but it appears that you have no regard, either for your own credit or that of your family. Let me be rightly understood, (fixing her nephew with a glare); if you marry that shameless creature, she will not be noticed by any of your relations; — her name will never be so much as spoken by us; and I will never see you again!”

  Darcy stepped to the bell-rope, and when the servant entered, ordered up his visitor’s carriage. As Lady Catherine was on the point of passing from the room, —

  “Let me be rightly understood, Aunt,” he said, anger proclaiming itself in him, (as always,) not by heightened accents, but in a voice ominously quiet. “If my relations are blind to Miss Bennet’s worth, their prejudice shall be their reward. But if any were so unmannerly as to treat with disrespect the woman I chose to make my wife, I should not wish to see them.”

  Darcy remained sitting long after Lady Catherine departed. The room grew dark, but he did not call for candles. His anger with his aunt was by no means over. — It was evident that her purpose in so unexpectedly descending upon Longbourn, had been to frighten Miss Bennet into conforming to her will. He burned with shame, imagining the disgust she must have been giving rise to! — What mischief might not be accruing from this visit! Miss Bennet might even believe that she had come as an emissary from himself!

  His esteem for his aunt, which had been in decline under the growing conviction of her deficiencies, was now utterly sunk. How could he have borne for so long the insolence of her imagined superiority! — It must have been impossible, had he not supported a like insolence in himself. His own behaviour had been equally overbearing, equally insensible of the feelings of others. What had Lady Catherine said of Miss Bennet's family that he had not said! — He remembered the arrogance of the proposal he had made Miss Bennet at Hunsford — his willingness to overlook her family’s condition — “so decidedly inferior to his own!” How could any woman of feeling forgive such behaviour! He had only to look at his aunt to see how he must appear to Elizabeth Bennet. He would never again act with such mistaken pride! — that had been his resolution, when Elizabeth’s rejection had brought him to a better understanding of himself. This resolution might have come too late, but he would strive to maintain it.

  The reader should not think that Darcy had grown so humble as to believe himself the least of God’s creatures; he knew himself blessed not only with superior fortune, but superior understanding — if only he would not abuse it. But some advantageous humbling there had been — some recognition that he was possessed of the same weaknesses which beset the rest of humanity.

  All this while, a ray of light had been striving to break through the gloom of Darcy’s meditations. Miss Bennet had acknowledged that no engagement existed between them, but she would not promise Lady Catherine to reject him if he proposed again. He had been almost afraid to consider the implications of that refusal. Now, with as much composure as he could command, Darcy wondered whether this was grounds for hope. “If she had decided against me, she would have told Lady Catherine so. Her honesty, her openness would have obliged her to do so, in spite of the temptation my aunt might offer to the exercise of impertinence. — Not that Miss Bennet is impertinent. What dull people call impertinence is just her playful spirit and liveliness of mind!” — (conveniently forgetting that he had once been of the same opinion himself.)

  But was a report of their engagement truly in circulation? (It secretly heartened him that anyone should think he and Elizabeth Bennet were to marry!) How might such a report have been started? Lady Catherine had named Mrs Collins as her informant, and he remembered that as Charlotte Lucas, she had been Miss Bennet’s particular friend. Could she possess private knowledge of her views? — Was it possible that some hint favourable to himself had been let fall? — or, at least, of her not being utterly determined against him?

  At that moment, Darcy could not have said which was the stronger — his mounting hopes, or the fear of allowing himself to entertain them.

  Chapter Ten

  It was many hours before Elizabeth’s composure recovered from the effects of Lady Catherine’s visit. As the first of the various evils likely to be produced by it, Elizabeth anxiously feared the inquiries of her family, which must be astonished at so august a person’s arriving at their house unannounced. If it were learned that her Ladyship had come solely to interfere in her supposed engagement with Mr Darcy, the delicacy of her position in regard to that gentleman, — and the irrationality of her hopes, — must be exposed. But her family were less prone to conjecture on the cause of this visit than might have been expected, quite satisfied that “Her Ladyship must have been passing through, and called to bring Lizzy news of Mrs Collins;” and to think it “Very gracious of her.” Though thankful for the credulity which saved her from having to invent some explanation, Elizabeth felt some irrational resentment that the great issues so influencing her thoughts made not the slightest impression upon theirs. To be expecting that others must be thinking on the same subjects as oneself, and discovering that they are not, is an advantageous lesson on the narrowness of every one’s particular concerns; — a reminder of how little important, in the minds of other people, are the things which loom so large in our own; but it is not gratifying.

  Another teazing puzzle was how the report, which had reached Lady Catherine’s ears, should have come into existence. It seemed unlikely that the Lucases could have caught some hint which her own family had missed. Perhaps they had simply thought that with his best friend marrying her sister, they must be frequently thrown together, — and with some people, what was conjectured one moment, might be believed the next. But Elizabeth was chiefly concerned with the steps which Lady Catherine might now be taking. Dissatisfied with her response, she might hope for a better from Mr Darcy; and if she had had the temerity to come to Longbourn, she would certainly not baulk at applying to her nephew in London. How Darcy might react, Elizabeth could not guess. Lady Catherine would be attacking him on his weakest side, of family pride; she might play successfully upon that pride to make him agree with her about the evils attendant on a connection with her family. If so, Lady Catherine’s intervening might set the crown on his decision not to seek her out again. The thought was cause of anger, — that he should take pride in what was the mere chance of birth, when he had so much juster cause for pride in the charitable compassion, and sense of justice, which had manifested themselves in his reparations towards Jane and Lydia. “If his family’s opinion means more to him than I do, I have enough pride myself not to regret him. He will be no great loss!” — These were brave words, but they could not disguise the admission that she loved him.

  There had been a time when she had not loved him — when she had felt very much the reverse. How had so great a change come about? — Perhaps it had originated with their meeting at Pemberley, and her grateful perception that he had forgiven her unjust and discourteous speech at Hunsford; and with his evident intention of shewing himself to her in a better light, through his attentions to herself and her relations. — “Or perhaps,” she thought, “ — since mot
ives of interest are never lacking to the ingenuity of man, — it was my first viewing that palatial estate, of which I might have been mistress!” But there was that which could not be laughed away. She had long dreamt of a man who would be worthy of her love: whose manners would be equal in heart and understanding; whose superiority of parts would have received the improvement of information; who possessed delicacy as well as strength of mind, grace and spirit united. She had found that man in Mr Darcy: he was all that her fancy had delineated as capable of attaching her.

  Some authorities, Mr Richardson among them, assert that a woman should never declare her love for a man — even to herself! — until that man has declared his love for her. Elizabeth was prepared to defy those authorities: “Were women such puppets as only came to life when men pulled their strings?” Men and women’s spheres might differ, but — like the poor beetle and the giant, — they suffer the same corporal pangs. Was not this also true of the emotions? Did not each possess the same right of suffering there? Elizabeth thought she might soon be called upon to exercise this right. “If he does not soon return to Netherfield,” she said to herself, “I shall know what to think.”

  Elizabeth was coming down stairs the morning after Lady Catherine’s visit, when her father called her into his library. Mr Bennet was holding a letter in his hand, and at the sight, all her fears returned with a rush. Had Lady Catherine written to demand from her father the public denial which she had refused to give? — What exposures, — what vexatious explanations this would entail! Or — her thoughts leapt — might Mr Darcy have written to ask for her hand? — But the notion was absurd: Mr Darcy would never behave in such a way. Then a more horrific idea struck her: the letter might originate from Mr Darcy, but its purpose might be to assure her father that the rumours of an engagement between them, of which his aunt had informed him, were false! Exhausted from the tax upon her emotions which this series of conjecture had imposed, it was with relief that Elizabeth discovered the writer of the letter to be Mr Collins. Mention of the rumour could not now be avoided, for his purpose in writing was to warn his relations against exposing themselves to her Ladyship’s wrath by seeking to connect themselves above their station. But as her father (with high glee) read out the formal phrases and studied language in which their cousin expressed himself, Elizabeth realized how fortunate she was in the letter’s deriving from that source. Disposed only to see Mr Collins’s absurdity, Mr Bennet gave no thought to the possibility of the report’s being true.