Chapter 5 #2
“It is generally understood that the woman in Netherfield’s lodge is Mr Darcy’s mistress.” Mr Collins shook his head sadly, as though she were but a foolish female. “Your innocence must, in part, explain your inability to comprehend—”
“It is only a rumour that she is his mistress!” she interrupted.
“Some believe it, and yet Sir William Lucas invites him, so how horrible could Mr Darcy be? None but me have spoken to Miss Darcy. She is no older than Lydia, and Mr Darcy must be closer to thirty than to twenty. I do not think Miss Darcy is out, let alone anyone’s mistress.
She is tall, like her brother. His hair and eyes are darker, but there are similarities in their appearance. The same nose, the same brow.”
“If she is not his mistress, why does she not stir from the lodge? She does not even attend church.” Mary paused, as though trying to recall an extract from a sermon. “The habit of seriousness and devotion in church produces a desirable effect on a lady’s conduct and temper.”
“My new acquaintance is unwell.” Elizabeth sighed sadly. “I think she is too ill even to attend church. She coughs often, has little strength, and she appears to have grown thin quickly. I fear she is dying from consumption.”
Mr Collins and his wife shared a horrified look.
“My dear cousin Elizabeth, if she is suffering from a wasting disease, you must wonder what illicit amours she has had to bring such a thing upon herself. No matter what our more lenient neighbours may do, you ought not to call on the inhabitants at Netherfield Lodge.”
“She is Mr Darcy’s sister! Their familial resemblance is striking. You cannot assume she is sick because of vice. I see nothing improper in my visiting a lonesome, ill girl who lives in my neighbourhood.”
“It is not your place to decide what is proper or not,” said Mr Collins gravely. “You are a female and living on our charity.”
Being dependent, being at another’s mercy, wounded her spirits daily.
If she cried from frustration, it would bring on another attack.
There was already a slowly building pain around her heart, a pressure squeezing her chest and throat.
She could not have visiting with Miss Darcy taken away from her.
I have already had so much of myself chipped away bit by bit every day I stay at Longbourn.
“Is it not unchristian to assume the worst of your neighbours?” Elizabeth asked Mary with a long look and one last hope to win her argument.
“I cannot believe that for all of your sermon reading and extracts that a woman in your superior position cannot show kindness to an ill woman. Longbourn should set an example to the neighbourhood, should it not?”
Mary straightened her shoulders and narrowed her eyes.
“Mr Collins, Providence has now placed Lizzy in a lower place, and perhaps by visiting with this girl, it allows her to feel a nobility that she is unlikely to ever have on her own account. It ought to be known that the Longbourn family encourages charity to the less fortunate.”
“Yes,” Elizabeth agreed. “It is my duty, is it not?” She would admit to whatever insult Mary made against her as long as she might come and go as she pleased. She had certainly not expected to appeal to any sort of feeling. She suspected the Collinses had none.
“My dear Mary, the rumours—”
“We ought not to let rumours supply the place of my—of our good sense. If Lizzy says this woman is Mr Darcy’s sister and not his mistress, we must believe her, because she knows we could forgive anything but falsehoods or obstinacy. A single woman’s dependent position is a precarious one.”
They both looked at her with expectant expressions. “Yes, to lie would be beneath my pride.” Elizabeth’s fingers were numb, and her legs felt weak. She had to conclude this interview and lie down before she collapsed in front of them.
“Well, Mary, perhaps by treating this girl with tenderness when sick—without making her a confidante, of course—would join to cousin Elizabeth’s pious example and go far in reforming this girl, in case she is prone to vice.
” His voiced raised in question as though Mr Collins was not sure of his own mind.
“Elizabeth may spend no more than two hours a day at Netherfield Lodge. Even if she is not his mistress, vice and dissipation can lead to wasting disease, they say.”
Good heavens, these two are fools without an original thought in their heads. Mr Collins is led by whoever spoke last, and Mary is guided by her own self-importance and what she remembers from Fordyce’s sermons.
They talked on amongst themselves, but Elizabeth only heard the sound of the pounding of her own heart. She felt faint and disconnected, as if she was entirely separate from the woman being called to task before Mr Collins’s desk. She would have to speak to Mr Jones.
When he entered the lodge that felt more like a prison than home and saw the empty sofa in the drawing room, Darcy’s heart dropped, and for a terrifying moment, he feared his sister had died while he was at Ramsgate.
Within a moment, his rational powers were his own again, and he was on his way to Georgiana’s bedchamber when he caught sight of someone through the window.
Darcy ran around the house to see his sister leaning heavily on the arm of another woman as they made their way through the sunny garden.
“Have you run mad?” he called to Georgiana, who started in surprise.
He reached them in a few strides and put an arm around his sister, forcing the stranger to step away.
“You will make yourself weary and strain your lungs.” He had not recognised Miss Bennet at first. “What to heaven are you doing here?”
Her eyes widened slightly, but she did not draw back. “You are abominably rude to your guests.”
“I am perfectly hospitable and generous to my welcomed guests, madam. Why are you here, and why are you provoking my sister?”
“She is not provoking me,” Georgiana pleaded. “She has kept company with me nearly every morning that you were away.”
“Then she ought to know, by now, what little strength you have.” He turned to scowl at Miss Bennet. “Can you not see how ill Miss Darcy is?”
“I can, and I also see that a little exercise will do her good. She chose to come out. A walk in the garden is not so violent or so long as to create exhaustion. And if she wishes to rest, she need only say.”
“If she wishes to rest or to walk, she has no need of your company. Good day, Miss Bennet.”
To his lasting shock, Miss Bennet did not return his curt bow with a curtsey and leave.
She crossed her arms, arched an eyebrow, and her dark eyes struck him with a cold glare.
“If exercise is solitary, it is generally attended with less advantage than when enjoyed with pleasant company—and your sister has assured me that she enjoys my companionship. I will not leave unless Miss Darcy sends me away.”
He looked at his sister, at her sunken eyes and pallid skin, but she was looking at Miss Bennet with an expression of longing he did not understand. “Georgiana, you cannot wish to suffer the disagreeable presence of this stranger?”
“Mr Jones said exercise should be out of doors and as regular as I can manage, and . . . and my spirits kept high, and being with Miss Bennet is a pleasure, not a task. Please, Fitzwilliam?”
While his jaw slackened, the interloper added, “And you have been gone for a week and left your sister friendless and abandoned.”
“I am returned now, and when Miss Darcy wishes to walk, she will do so with me.”
“And so Miss Darcy must forgo the advantage of fresh air and exercise when her brother is engaged or away on business or does not feel in the mood? I enjoy my conversations with—”
“Conversations! What empty, noisy, trivial chatter can the sister-in-law of a man too dull-witted to play whist and worth less than two thousand a year provide to Miss Darcy?”
“You do not improve on further acquaintance!”
“I do not want to further our acquaintance!”
“Your arguing fatigues me,” a voice murmured. “I should like us to return to the house.”
They turned in unison to look at Georgiana, and then back at one another.
Her sharp eyes stayed on his, and Darcy did not so much as blink.
An argument of a thousand words took place in a silence of two seconds.
They would tend to Georgiana with all appearance of amicable friendship, but their dislike was mutual.
Darcy glared at Miss Bennet, even after his sister linked their arms so the three of them entered the house together.
He seethed in silent annoyance as he watched this woman settle his sister into a chair, ring for more of the draught for her cough, bring her a footstool, and then sit by her side and offer to read.
“No, I will fall asleep if you read to me now. Perhaps I could attend to your conversation.” Her voice lifted hopefully. “Fitzwilliam has just returned home, and he is a great reader. You could talk of books or travelling or staying at home. Anything would interest me.”
With a conscious look and a flat tone, Miss Bennet asked him if his business had been concluded to his satisfaction, and Darcy replied in a voice of forced politeness that it had.
After a pause, and a smile that was for his sister’s benefit, she asked if he intended to renew his lease on the lodge.
“It is always preferable to have a family firmly settled in a neighbourhood.”
“My plans are not fixed.” Miss Bennet made no answer and appeared to leave the trouble of finding a subject up to him.
He could take the hint, however much he disliked it.
“You cannot have a strong attachment to this neighbourhood and Hertfordshire. I understand you spend the winter in town with your sister.”