Chapter 5 Coincidence - Elizabeth #2
I had to admit she had a point. We had never met anyone of the first circles, aside from her brief introduction to Mr Tall-Dark-Handsome-and-Disagreeable. We would probably have better luck speculating on the actions of a Frenchman.
“What should we do? You know for a fact you were in the right with his sister. He owes you!”
“Are you certain you want to depend on his good will?” she asked in resignation, which was a fair point. Much as we loved our stories of dashing heroines, in the bulk of situations the advantage lay with Goliath.
“What should we do?”
She considered it for some time, and I prodded her.
“You only have a few minutes until your dance with Mr Handsome-and-amiable. The way I see it, we need to either brazen it out and see what the man is made of or urgently visit the Gardiners.”
“Running from the man seems childish,” she said, and I nodded.
“I did nothing wrong!” she added vehemently.
“We are not entirely without protection,” I replied, attempting to calm her.
“Only mostly,” she said, referring to our father’s legendary indolence.
I had to imagine he would stick up for us, but ladies’ reputations were peculiar, and while our mother was entirely predictable, our father was not.
For all we knew, Papa might just decide the man had compromised Jane and she should marry him, or he might confront the man on his behaviour and cause some other type of problem.
Most likely, he would just make a joke of it and do nothing except tease Jane.
We just could not know, although the odds strongly favoured the do-nothing-except-tease theory.
“Let us return to the dance and see if he recognises you. If not, it should be easy enough to avoid him most of the time. Charlotte says he will only be here a couple of months. In the meantime, we can see how he behaves and decide whether he is trustworthy or not. Mama thinks he is most disagreeable because he did not prostrate himself at my feet, but I suspect he is just being sensible. I would not dance at Mama’s command either. ”
“That seems reasonable,” Jane said, satisfied to have Mr Bingley’s attention momentarily, and equally content to have a plan.
“Let us see how he behaves when he is not surprised by finding his sister among the hordes of a coaching station or being accosted by a matchmaking mama five minutes after entering a strange room. It is difficult to imagine an easier social situation than a public assembly, so we shall know his character by his manners across the evening. I will have it well sketched before four dances are complete.”
I was not certain one could measure a man’s worth by his manners but had to admit it was all we were likely to get soon, and truer than not.
The rest of the evening did not confirm our worst fears, but neither did it make us desirous of becoming better acquainted with Mr High-and-Mighty.
That surprisingly left me feeling disappointed.
He appeared an interesting character study, and I thought I could listen to his voice for hours if he were in a good mood (or even bad), but I doubted I would get the chance.
Mr Bingley had soon made himself acquainted with all the principal people in the room; he was lively and unreserved, danced every dance, was angry that the ball closed so early, and talked of giving one himself at Netherfield. Such amiable qualities must speak for themselves.
He even danced twice with Jane and once with me, which showed him to be sensible as well as handsome—especially since he spent the bulk of our dance speaking of Jane (with my none-too-subtle encouragement).
You do not learn much with one evening, but my mother did seem to be right for once.
He had all the appearance of being smitten.
We held our exuberance in check. He would not be the first man to fall in love with a pretty girl for a fortnight before becoming aware of our situation, and unfortunately, he was not likely to be the last. Flirting and matrimony were two very different things, and there's many a slip 'twixt the cup and the lip.
What a contrast between him and his friend!
Mr Darcy danced only once with Mrs Hurst and once with Miss Bingley, declined being introduced to any other lady, and spent the rest of the evening walking about the room, speaking occasionally to one of his own party.
His character was decided. He was the proudest, most disagreeable man in the world, and everybody hoped that he would never come there again.
To add insult to injury, Mr Bingley tried his best, in a jovial and teasing manner that I quite enjoyed, to get the man to dance with someone-anyone-anyone at all. As fate would have it, someone turned out to be me.
Mr Bingley said about Jane (quite jovially in my opinion), "Oh! She is the most beautiful creature I ever beheld! But there is one of her sisters sitting down just behind you, who is very pretty, and I dare say very agreeable. Do let me ask my partner to introduce you."
The man looked at me coldly and turned back to his friend.
"She is tolerable, but not handsome enough to tempt me; I am in no humour at present to give consequence to young ladies who are slighted by other men.
You had better return to your partner and enjoy her smiles, for you are wasting your time with me. "
With that, my mind firmly cemented three opinions.
The first was that Mr Bingley was the most amiable gentleman, and quite perfect for Jane, aside from his poor taste in friends and sisters.
The second was that I might well have to agree with my mother for the first time in my life.
Mr Darcy was the most ill-tempered man in the world, and his prior reaction to Jane was probably typical.
He was, unfortunately, still the handsomest and best-sounding man I had ever met, but that was worth about as much as Lydia’s being the tallest.
The third was that Jane was probably safe because the lunkhead was half-blind, three-quarters-stupid, and probably two-thirds deaf, since he either assumed I had not heard him or did not care.
I was half-tempted to sink his local reputation even further by telling my mother or Lady Lucas about the slight, but I held my tongue.
Jane might make something with Mr Bingley, and there was no real reason to tempt fate.
Injuring the reputation of his good friend seemed a poor way to recommend our family, and we had enough impediments without my adding fuel to the fire.
I was embarrassed enough as it was. With the greatest confidence in the plan, I decided to ignore him until the end of time.
Since he planned to ignore all and sundry, chiefly myself, I judged my chances of never speaking to the dolt quite auspicious.