Chapter 32 #2
“Perhaps, but Miss Elizabeth has not yet mentioned it in her letters, and Bingley is not meticulous. It would not be beyond him to send word to his housekeeper a week beforehand to expect a party consisting of his future bride and her family. If Miss Bennet has not heard, I would prefer you be the one to break this news through her sister.”
An hour later Georgiana came to me with a letter in hand. “Might I read to you what I have written so far? I am not sure if I have struck the right tone.” When I nodded, she began.
Dear Elizabeth,
I have such happy news to share, at least I hope you will like it, for my brother and I have been invited to Netherfield Park as Mr Bingley’s guests this October. He is to marry a young lady from London and wishes to host a house party during the hunt…
Her eyes rose from the page in frank enquiry.
“I do not know how you could have written it any better. You stated the fact plainly and refrained from any assessment of the match or expressions of your approval of his choice. Well done. And now you must assure Miss Elizabeth that you expect to visit her family—and often—and that Colonel Fitzwilliam is to join us, and he has said so many favourable things—mentioning Miss Bennet in particular—that you will be delighted to include her as one of your friends or some such.”
“Is it true? Is he coming?”
“He is, and he intends to make himself a shield for the lady’s pride.
But let us not get too far ahead of ourselves.
First, we must get there and make your introduction to Miss Elizabeth’s family.
And in case you think she is being droll, I assure you, your friend does not exaggerate in her descriptions.
They are about as far from stiff and well-mannered as Lady Catherine is from wise and agreeable. ”
“Well,” Georgiana said with a look of naive complacence, “if you do not mind, then I do not either. Besides, I have never had a better friend than Elizabeth,”
“Stout words, my love. I hope I do not have to remind you of them. But yes, I have discovered I can overlook a great deal more than I used to.” Upon this boast of my growing talent for forbearance, I then recalled one particular instance in which my capacity for toleration had failed me entirely, and I said, “By the by, did I tell you I have ruptured relations with Lady Catherine?”
Thus, I broke the news to my sister that I had refused to marry Anne and cut ties besides.
At the time of the incident, I had not told her, primarily because I was still too used to thinking of her as a child, and more saliently, so much had happened since that horrific argument, the matter of explaining it to my sister had slipped my mind.
She pondered this development with a hint of maturity. “Is it unchristian of me to confess relief?”
Thinking of my unspoken intentions, I said, “I hope it is not, for we might yet endure some coldness from our mother’s family, and—as you say—if you do not mind, then I do not either.”
We travelled south on the designated day, and considering that the last time I had taken to the road with a mule and a bedroll, our caravan fairly mortified me.
There we went with two elegant coaches—one for the ladies should they wish privacy—both bedecked with liveried footman, pulled along smartly by matched teams of Belgian horses.
Behind us followed a curricle for my use in Hertfordshire, a large servant’s coach heavy with luggage, and strung behind all—though not too close to protect their lungs from the dust—pranced Windsor and my sister’s second horse, Paloma, together comprising a fair representation of the opulence of my stables.
A duke and duchess travelling from Windsor Castle to Blenheim Palace would have had no less comfort than we enjoyed.
Only my sister’s happiness kept me from reflecting too deeply upon the paradox of what constitutes reasonable comfort and upon what marker a man must settle the question of how much is too much.
She did not suffer the slightest reservations as was evidenced by how many trunks she felt were essential to her mission, and it was upon this point, I lightly teased her.
“Perhaps we should have hitched up a dray and a pair of oxen to accommodate your trunks,” I had said with a backwards glance at the parade that stretched out behind us. “You recall we are only visiting the country, do you not? I hope you have not outdone yourself.”
To this raillery, she replied with a dimpled cheek. “Elizabeth writes that Mrs Bennet is in high expectation of seeing my best dresses, and I do not mean to disappoint her. Besides, I have brought sheet music for Mary.”
“Enough to fill a separate trunk? My poor ears. What else? Did you bring last year’s dresses to pass out to Miss Elizabeth and her sisters like gifts from the poor box?”
“No, silly. You do realise if Mr Bingley is bringing Miss Johnson to see his country estate, he will likely give a ball for her, do you not? And there will be dinner parties and such, and above all, I do not intend to sit in Miss Bingley’s shade.”
I stared at her. “I have never heard such competitive nonsense from you .”
“Well, I used to be quite meek. But having been brought out, I came to realise that I do not particularly enjoy being talked to as if I am a stupid girl who must be led along. Besides which, I do not like the notion that Miss Bennet may be regarded by some as the loser in a contest, and I mean to show them all that, in my opinion at least, she is the superior lady.”
My reply was necessarily dry because she reminded me a touch of Lady Matlock. “And you plan to accomplish this through the benefice of your notice?”
She shrugged off my irony with plain-speaking. “I have no other means. It is a sad fact, but women are sometimes quite cruel, and if I am more elegantly dressed than anyone present and determined to pay one lady my particular attention—which is coveted because of it—then so be it.”
I absorbed this information with no small degree of surprise, which somewhat shook her rising confidence. “Your face tells me you do not approve,” she said in her small voice of last year.
“I do not dis approve. I am only wondering from whence came this knack of condescension, hmm?”
“You were gone for quite some time this summer,” she said with a little sniff.
“And I spent many days in conversation with Elizabeth to which you were not privy. From her I absorbed the fact of which I had been so unaware—I have more power than I think I do simply because we are wealthy and well-connected, and if I do not wield it, I risk being used by everyone for their own selfish ends for the rest of my life.”
“Surely, she did not say so outright?”
“Of course she did not. Only by contrast to her and her relations, I could not avoid knowing it. They do not put on any airs and graces, they do not truckle to my vanity, they are never sly, nor do they pretend to be other than who they truly are, which is to say they are genteel but not accustomed to such privileges as I take for granted. There was a distinction, you see, and what had been invisible was suddenly clear to me. If privilege is what I have been handed, then I should own it, should I not?”
“So long as you stay humble within yourself, you cannot go wrong,” I murmured, for I had travelled the same path much longer than she, and I had fallen victim to its perils.
Still, the subject was ripe for consideration, and over the course of those tedious days going from one stop to the next, I realised that to be a pompous prig or a righteous prude were two sides of one coin.
I must stop cowering against the fact I had many gifts heaped upon me from birth as much as I had to stop assuming I was owed such deference as I had come to expect.
Somewhere in the middle was the road for me, and I meant to try my hand at walking it while in the company of country society.