Chapter 13 #2
“Sanderson is coming too,” Kitty added. “We might even dance if Mary will play the right music and mother will let us roll back the carpet. Do tell her, Jane!”
“Of course you might, my pets,” announced their indulgent mother, sweeping ahead of them into the parlour. “No dirges, Mary, do you understand? My nerves cannot take it. Is that nice Mr Wickham coming too?”
“No, for he is dancing attendance upon Mary King,” Lydia replied unhappily.
“Or least upon her ten thousand pounds, Charlotte said,” Kitty added.
“You ought not to repeat such gossip,” Elizabeth reproved her. “If Mr Wickham has affection and respect for Miss King, I do not see why her ten thousand pounds need be brought into it.”
“Affection and respect? Ha! That would be impossible,” Lydia declared viciously. “Nasty, freckled little thing! Only her fortune could attract anyone, never mind a man as handsome and amiable as Wickham.”
“I believe that is your envy talking, Lydia,” Elizabeth told her. “You must not judge your favourite by your own worst impulses. I am sure Wickham’s intentions are honourable.”
“Don’t be so pious, Lizzy,” Lydia groaned. “You sound almost as bad as Mary, although not so awful as Mr Collins.”
“Go outside, Kitty and Lydia, and see whether the officers are on their way in the lane,” urged their mother. “I shall not ring for tea until you tell me they are here.”
As the younger girls rushed off eagerly in search of red coats, Mrs Bennet and Jane settled themselves on the sofa.
Jane took up some embroidery that she hoped to finish before leaving for London, but her mother was too much engaged with the business of matchmaking and gossip for any other employment.
“What a shame we will not have Lieutenant Wickham this afternoon,” Mrs Bennet tutted.
“He is so very easy to talk to, and he has suffered so very much at the hands of that awful Mr Darcy. First the will, and then the poor man’s chances at marriage.
How very unchristian Mr Darcy has shown himself to be!
I hope he gets his comeuppance in the end. ”
“George Wickham told you of all that himself?” Elizabeth questioned, a little surprised, given the sensitivity of the subject and her mother’s well-known garrulous tongue. “I am not sure we ought to be talking about it at all without his permission.”
“Fiddlesticks, Lizzy! The whole neighbourhood knows the story, and from Mr Wickham’s own lips too. There is no reason to be squeamish about it if he is not. Well, I only hope that Mary King accepts Mr Wickham’s hand, and he gets the fortune he deserves, despite Mr Darcy’s efforts.”
Elizabeth shifted uncomfortably, folding her arms and meeting Jane’s troubled gaze.
Her sister seemed not to like the conversation either, although Jane’s motives were likely nobler than her own.
Elizabeth could not deny that part of her reaction came from learning that George Wickham had told everyone the same story freely, rather than confiding only in her.
Had she really thought she was special? How silly she had been!
“Remember that Mr Darcy is a good friend of Lord Grantchester,” Elizabeth reminded her mother. The milder reproof seemed to have some effect.
“Of course. Jane, dear, do not think my views on Mr Darcy any slight on your betrothed. Lord Grantchester is the noblest of men, and I am sure he has only been taken in by Mr Darcy because of his kind heart.”
“Mother,” Elizabeth put in warningly.
“I will not say another word of Mr Darcy,” Mrs Bennet promised. “Now, Jane, tell me which dresses you are taking with you to London.”
As the conversation turned to fashions and fripperies, Elizabeth excused herself, saying that she wanted to check that her boots and Jane’s had all been polished for tomorrow. Outside the room, she almost walked straight into Mr Collins.
Elizabeth jumped back, doing her best to keep a civil smile on her face under what seemed a considerable provocation. Insufferable man! She might almost have thought him to be lurking about deliberately, but what he might mean by it was beyond her.
“Ah, Cousin Eliza. I was hoping to see you,” Mr Collins greeted her cordially, as though he had not noticed either their near-collision or her poorly concealed irritation. “I wished to speak to your father first, but the library is locked and there is no answer. I must assume he has gone out.”
“He does sometimes walk at this time of day,” Elizabeth said noncommittally, knowing that her father was presently hiding from all of them, but particularly Mr Collins. “Do excuse me, Mr Collins. I have preparations to make for our journey tomorrow.”
But when she walked briskly away towards the boot room, Elizabeth was surprised to find that Mr Collins followed her, all the while mopping at his damp brow with an already limp handkerchief.
“There will be tea in the parlour soon, Mr Collins. Some of the regiment’s officers will be calling on Lydia and Kitty this afternoon, and I dare say that Mary would welcome your company,” Elizabeth hinted broadly.
“It is only you with whom I wish to speak, Miss Elizabeth,” the young clergyman returned with a beaming smile. “It is only you who can settle the question burning in my heart.”
Opening the boot room door, Elizabeth went inside and began counting off the boots and shoes she was looking for, placing them all side by side on a low shelf where the maids might more easily collect them.
They would wear their country walking boots for the journey, and must pack their town walking boots and at least one pair of court shoes and one set of dancing slippers each…
“I see,” Elizabeth said gravely, though she did not.
Oddly, Mr Collins did not ask his question, but continued to linger by the door.
A hint of curiosity as to what her cousin meant to ask her rose up, but Elizabeth stuffed it firmly down.
It would not do to encourage him, or Mr Collins might speak until the sun went down.
Having now known her cousin for some weeks, Elizabeth knew that the question burning in his heart might easily be the correct mode of address for a bishop who was also the younger son of a duke, or the order in which a large family should enter a carriage, considering age and infirmity as well as seniority and personal preference on seating.
No matter — Elizabeth had her own minor concerns already.
Perhaps Jane should have two pairs of dancing slippers, or even three.
Like their mother, Elizabeth was keen for Jane to look her best. Jane herself was unresisting more than enthusiastic, which struck yet another worrying note in Elizabeth’s mind as the thought occurred to her.
Why did Jane not care more about her appearance at this important time? Didn’t women always want to look their best for the men they loved?
In the doorframe, Mr Collins was still burbling about the burning of his heart, although now Lady Catherine de Bourgh had been brought into the matter too, her views stated as being even more important to him than his own.
Elizabeth nodded vaguely and continued to consider both Jane’s shoes and her general wellbeing.
“…for this reason, I am determined that you, Cousin Elizabeth, must be the companion of my future life, my helpmeet, my wife…”
“What?!” Elizabeth exclaimed. She could only hope that her ears had deceived her. “Excuse me, Mr Collins. I must have misheard you. What did you say?”
Was Mr Collins really proposing to her in the boot cupboard at Longbourn?! The beatific smile on his pinkly glowing face seemed only to confirm an absurd and distasteful reality.
“While I thought you set on Mr Bingley, I held back,” said her cousin, “but then, I detected that any partiality for him lay only in your mother’s mind.
I heard you state this aloud with my own ears.
At that moment, I knew my path was clear.
It remains only for us to seek your parents’ blessing and we may be united, dear Cousin Elizabeth. ”
Elizabeth jumped back from the hand he extended towards her as though expecting her to clasp it.
“What are you…What about Mary?” she blurted out, almost too astonished by his peculiar declarations to speak.
“Mary? Why, what of her?” Mr Collins returned with evident puzzlement. “I am sure that all your sisters will wish us joy in our union, compensating as it does for the unavoidable harm that Longbourn’s entail must bring to your family.”
“Mr Collins, you forget yourself,” Elizabeth now told him more sternly, getting a firmer grip on herself and facing him down. “I thank you for the unexpected honour of your addresses, but we are not compatible as husband and wife and I must therefore refuse you. My sister Mary, however…”
“Mary?” he echoed again, no less baffled than before. “No, I cannot think that Cousin Mary can add anything useful at the present time and will stick to the matter at hand. You say that we are incompatible, Cousin, but you do not know me well enough yet to make that judgement.”
“That is all the more reason to refuse you, Mr Collins,” Elizabeth said, not troubling to keep her voice down.
She could no longer bring herself to care if anyone else should hear and come to investigate the source of this excruciatingly embarrassing argument, as long as it ended soon.
“We cannot make one another happy, and I cannot be your wife. Find a woman who can.”
“I don’t understand,” Mr Collins replied obstinately, applying his handkerchief to his forehead once more.
“Why should you refuse me on so little account? No other offer of marriage may ever me made to you, Cousin Elizabeth, regardless of your personal charms and your sister’s advantageous marriage. ”
Elizabeth took a deep breath, fearing what she might say if she spoke without restraint. “Be that as it may, we should not suit, and cannot marry.”
“But you must surely want a husband,” Mr Collins exclaimed in what seemed as much shock as horror. “I must take it that you have another man in mind.”