Chapter 41
The Wildcard
Quite to Elizabeth’s surprise, two days later Jane cornered her and Anne in the parlour for a serious discussion. Georgiana was at Rosings and the world had not come to an end, so Elizabeth was not inclined to worry.
That Jane had something on her mind was no surprise; that she allowed Anne into the discussion was. The two had not warmed to each other at all, but Jane seemed to find Anne’s presence desirable, or at least not something to be avoided.
“Lizzy, I may need your help one more time.”
“Only once?” Elizabeth asked, but Jane did not laugh.
“One last time. After that, I believe I shall depend on my future husband for all awkward conversations or take up the yoke myself.”
Elizabeth sighed, braced for what must come.
Jane paused a few moments, so Elizabeth volunteered, “You need not ask—I shall see to it.”
Relief washed over Jane’s face.
Anne frowned. “See to what?”
“Lizzy just volunteered to have a serious and awkward discussion with my mother about my wedding. Given the chance, she will take 6 months to arrange, and it will be—”
Jane ran out of words, so Anne assisted. “Vulgar, expensive, overblown, prideful, revelling in her own self-importance while entirely forgetting it is your wedding?”
Jane stared.
Anne said, “It requires no great leap. Your mother has more in common with mine than you might imagine. I know what you are dealing with. May I make a few suppositions?”
“By all means.”
“By preference, you would have a quiet ceremony with just bride, groom, family, best friends, and the most connected families. Your mother would lease St James and invite the Queen. Mrs Bennet has determined that your intended is a man of some consequence, so she thinks excess is the order of the day—a chance for her to celebrate her triumph in getting a daughter well married.”
Elizabeth laughed at the idea, but stopped short, unwilling to let that idea exist unchallenged in the world for long. “You seem to understand.”
Anne left her chair and joined Jane on the sofa, boldly taking her hand.
Elizabeth could certainly not fault Anne for her efforts to become close to Jane.
Might this break through the veil of reserve Jane showed her new friend, which Elizabeth frankly did not understand in the least?
If ever two women in the world should be the best of friends, Anne and Jane were perfect for the role.
Anne continued, “If I am correct, you see this wedding as a celebration of Jane Bennet joining her life to a good and honourable man who will love you and your children forever. It is a celebration of two people who were alone but, through sheer good fortune and an obstinate sister, will join in the holiest of unions.”
Jane blushed slightly but nodded pensively.
“Your mother, on the other hand, sees it as a celebration of her success in getting one daughter well married, and further securing her future. She cares little who the man is, so long as his importance is sufficient to increase her own consequence. She will exploit the opportunity for every ounce of pleasure she can get.”
Jane stared, jaw slack. She tried once or twice to speak, and finally gave up.
Elizabeth came to her rescue. “That was a brutal analysis—but essentially correct.”
“Lizzy, allow me to ask a question if I might. This will come back to our earlier discussions before you visited my cousin Georgiana and completely reversed the natural order of things in the Darcy family.”
Intrigued, Elizabeth said, “That is an… interesting turn of conversation.”
“Do not be timid, Little Frog.” Anne laughed. “I will not even put you in the pot or light the fire.”
Jane frowned in confusion, but Anne patted her hands.
“Do not be distressed, Jane. Lizzy and I are like metaphorical warriors. We can beat a metaphor to death then trample on the corpse with impunity.”
Jane said at last, “If you say so, Anne. Pray proceed… or shall I have tea while you torture the English language for another fortnight before you eventually get to the point, long after I cease listening?”
Anne laughed, and Elizabeth rejoiced as Jane’s true personality emerged. What would happen when they exposed Anne to Lydia? Elizabeth could probably sell tickets to the event, but she drew her attention back to the discussion at hand.
“Pray continue, Anne.”
“Let me ask you this—and I shall insist you make an estimate. I do not want you to show me your work, explain your reasoning, give lessons in mathematics, let your mind go into thought storms, or add any excessive verbiage. Simply sit and think until you have your best answer.”
Intrigued, Elizabeth nodded for her friend to continue.
“What are the odds that I would have eventually escaped my mother and my situation without your help—say within the year?”
Startled, Elizabeth started to speak, but Anne held up her hand. “No! Pray give your answer in the mathematical form. Pretend you must give it to me in writing, and you are incapable of writing anything but numbers.”
Lizzy giggled. “Are colons or slashes acceptable?”
Anne arched an eyebrow—acknowledgement of the jest, tempered by the plain assertion that it was the last prevarication or cleverness she would tolerate.
Elizabeth thought for a while, and answered as best she could.
“You would have broken out eventually, since there was nothing actually wrong with you, but within a year—I would judge the odds around 20-30%--certainly, no better than 50%.”
“I give it 10%.”
“Now, another similar question but with years of empirical observation.”
“Go on,” Elizabeth said sceptically.
“Based on years of experience, what are the odds that you will talk to your mother and deliver the result Jane seeks?”
Elizabeth raised an eyebrow, thought a minute, and sighed resignedly.
“I judge my chances 10-20%. Jane’s 1%. My father’s 0.1%. Uncle Gardiner’s about the same as mine; Aunt Gardiner’s 0, since she has too much sense to even try. Therefore, I believe the best we can hope for is 20%, but I must try.”
Jane’s face fell, but she squared her shoulders.
“We need to improve that, or we will wed from London. In fact, before you returned, we nearly committed to it.”
Anne squeezed Jane’s hand.
“I apologise, Jane. Lizzy failed to mention that she was bringing me to live in a family of ne’er-do-well quitters.”
Jane gasped and fixed Anne with the eldest Miss Bennet’s rough equivalent of a Gorgon stare. Anne remained unmoved.
Elizabeth forestalled an argument. “Are you implying that we are not resilient enough, Anne?”
“No, Elizabeth—there is no we in this equation. You are too enamoured with your perceived role in the family. Remind me again, you are Mistress of—”
Elizabeth ducked her head and grumbled, “Awkward conversations.”
“So, your duty to your sister leads you to the inevitable conclusion that you must accept a less than 20% chance.”
Elizabeth snapped her head up. “Suggest an alternative.”
“Let me ask a question. You asserted my chances of success with my mother were 10%, though in fact, I believe you estimated only my odds of trying. Let me ask this—what were the chances of your working on my mother successfully, once you had read my diaries and understood the terrain?”
Elizabeth startled; she had not thought the problem through. She sat down and considered furiously for a moment.
“I never thought about it, but there were significant risks to my chosen course. I felt honour bound to help, but not necessarily to do what I did. I could have simply given you my analysis and let you fend for yourself.”
“And why did you not do that?”
“Well… while I did not calculate the odds per se, I judged that just telling you my conclusions would have very little chance of success, but if I presented it, the probability of success was worth the risk. I would say my chances of success when I walked into Rosings were 50-60%.”
Anne jumped from the sofa beside Jane and grabbed Elizabeth’s hands.
“Very well. You are almost there. Think about how that idea can be applied to Jane’s wedding.”
Elizabeth’s mind remained inconveniently blank. She was still deep in thought when Jane started laughing.
“Ah, Lizzy, Lizzy, Lizzy. You could misplace your nose were it not attached to your face. For the smartest person I know, you can certainly be a flibbertigibbet at times.”
Shaking her head, Elizabeth started to speak, but Jane interrupted. “Look at it this way. Rosings was a static environment for a decade. It was shaken up by introducing a wildcard—something different, no?”
Elizabeth nodded, not at all certain what Jane meant.
“I suspect Anne just volunteered to bring our mother into the fold. Anne is now officially in charge of my wedding, or at least the part that involves bringing our mother to heel; and if that fails, she is to have charge of everything. Mother has met her match!”
Elizabeth paused and started laughing. Anne had little hope of success, but she could always drag Lady Catherine into the battle if necessary. Elizabeth was just happy to have one less awkward conversation before her.
Later, Mr and Mrs Gardiner peered into the parlour to discover whether any escapees from Bedlam had been installed within; but, finding only the three silliest girls in England, they left well enough alone.