Chapter 7 Whims and Inconsistencies #3
Her greatest vexation was that, in contrast to how much Mr Darcy must now hate her, she had begun to miss him.
She was weary of her family’s immodesty, wary of the militia, forbidden from engaging with Mr Bingley lest Jane call it flirtation and afraid to sigh within one hundred yards of Mr Greyson lest her mother call it love.
She felt desperately alone and fancied that some time spent with the astute, worldly, gentlemanly Mr Darcy would suit her very well indeed.
She began to comprehend that he was exactly the man who, in disposition and talents, would most suit her.
His understanding and temper, though unlike her own, would have answered all her wishes.
His arms wrapped around her would have soothed away all her ills.
Her fingers played an entirely erroneous chord, dissonant and grating.
“Your playing has not improved at all I see, Miss Bennet.”
Elizabeth gave a squeak of surprise and jumped an inch off her seat. How long Lady Catherine de Bourgh had stood in the doorway, regarding her with a disapproving sneer, she dared not suppose.
“Forgive me, Miss Elizabeth!” Hill called from the passageway beyond. “I could not persuade her ladyship to wait in the parlour.”
“I quite understand,” Elizabeth assured her, coming to her feet. “Be so good as to bring us some refreshments in there now, would you?”
“I do not care for refreshments,” Lady Catherine stated imperiously.
“Very well. I hope you will not begrudge me some. I have been practising very diligently.” Indicating that her visitor should follow, Elizabeth walked the short distance between the rooms and chose the seat farthest from any other in the room.
Lady Catherine’s lips thinned almost to the point of disappearing, but she nonetheless chose a seat and sat in it. “You can be at no loss, Miss Bennet, to understand the reason for my journey hither. Your own heart, your own conscience, must tell you why I come.”
“Indeed, you are mistaken, madam. I am quite unable to account for the honour of seeing you here,” Elizabeth lied.
“Miss Bennet,” replied her ladyship in an angry tone.
“You ought to know that I am not to be trifled with. A report of a most alarming nature reached me yesterday morning. I was told that you, that Miss Elizabeth Bennet, would, in all likelihood, be soon united to my nephew, Mr Darcy. I went immediately to London to have it confirmed as a scandalous falsehood. He was adamant there must have been some mistake, that no such rumour could possibly exist, but I instantly resolved on setting off for this place to have your word that you would never accept an offer of marriage from him.”
Elizabeth’s heart sank. She had visited him already! “If Mr Darcy has said no such rumour could exist, I wonder you took the trouble of coming so far.”
“He may have denied the existence of the rumour,” she replied with narrowed eyes, “but he would not—nay, he could not deny the foundation for it. I perfectly comprehended his feelings. He is infatuated. Your arts and allurements have drawn him in.”
“If that were the case, you could hardly expect me to refuse an offer, having gone to so much trouble to extort it from him.”
Lady Catherine sucked in a breath, coughed sharply and grew even more vexed. “Miss Bennet, do you know who I am? I have not been accustomed to such impertinence as this. I am almost the nearest relation Mr Darcy has in the world and am entitled to know all his dearest concerns.”
“But you are not entitled to know mine.”
“When your concerns begin to obtrude upon mine, then I most certainly am entitled to know them!” She leant forwards in her chair, piercing Elizabeth with an icy glare. “Because of his fascination for you, Mr Darcy has reneged on his engagement to my daughter. Now what have you to say?”
Elizabeth scarcely knew what to think but schooled herself to composure, for she would not satisfy Lady Catherine’s hope of intimidating her. “A decision not to marry Miss de Bourgh, if indeed such a decision has been made, is by no means proof that he will offer for me.”
“Do not be deliberately obtuse. Of course it is! Do you imagine me ignorant of the attention he showed you in Kent? He and his cousin have been intended for each other from their infancy, yet you, a woman of inferior birth and wholly unallied to the family, have caught his fancy, and my daughter has been forsaken!”
“That cannot be blamed on me! I have no control over Mr Darcy’s whims!”
“Regrettably, that is precisely what you do have, and I mean to see that you use it as duty and honour prescribe. Will you promise me never to enter into an engagement with him or act in any way that will prevent his marrying my daughter?”
Elizabeth’s head throbbed. “I am neither honour nor duty bound to do your bidding and can only pity Miss de Bourgh for being so. I shudder at what mortification will be hers when she is forced upon a man disinclined to the union. Have you no regard for sensibility?”
Lady Catherine scoffed disdainfully. “I am more concerned with her security. My daughter requires a husband who will be considerate of her delicate constitution, who has consequence enough to elevate her reputation despite her absence from Town, who will manage her estate properly in the interests of her heirs. Do you suppose the world brims over with such men? Good, conscientious, distinguished men? It does not!”
Her ladyship’s voice became more hoarse the louder it grew.
“Equally, my nephew requires a wife who will bring credit to his name, not ostracise him from the sphere in which he was brought up. A connection with you must discredit him in the eyes of everybody. The alliance would be a disgrace, and you must be the one to prevent it, since he is so bewitched by you, he will hear no reason on the subject.”
Elizabeth’s heart pounded in consonance with her head.
“I do not see that you have given me good reason to do so. So far, you have catalogued Mr Darcy’s virtues, informed me that he has denounced all other engagements and impressed upon me the depth of his regard.
It seems to me your ladyship has rather come to commend the union. ”
“This is not to be borne!” Lady Catherine struggled out of her chair, sucking in great wheezy breaths of outrage as she stalked to stand before her.
“Do not deceive yourself into a belief that I will ever recede. I shall not…” Her tirade faltered.
She frowned and peered more closely at Elizabeth’s countenance. “Heaven and earth, what is that?”
Elizabeth sighed quietly, surprised it had gone unnoticed this long, notwithstanding her artfully arranged hair. “A bruise, ma’am.”
Lady Catherine recoiled. “On your face? How does one come by such a thing?”
“I acquired this one in Meryton.”
“And you claim to be a gentlewoman? Never in all my days have I seen the like!”
“I believe it is yet to gain favour in London. Perhaps next Season?”
Lady Catherine’s eyes grew flinty. “Your impudence has lost all its charm, Miss Bennet. I insist you tell me how you came to be injured thus.”
“I was struck.”
“You have been brawling?”
“I hardly think brawling is—”
“And this is what my nephew plans to inflict upon us! Are the shades of Pemberley to be thus polluted?”
Elizabeth stood up. “Lady Catherine, I have nothing more to say, and my head pains me. I beg to be importuned no further.”
“You have yet to give me your word.”
“True, and behaviour such as this will never induce me to give it. You had much better go, for you are wasting your time with me.” She strode to the door, leant upon it for a moment while a wave of dizziness passed, then continued to the front of the house.
Lady Catherine followed, barking demands and invective all the way to the front door. “I take no leave of you, Miss Bennet,” she concluded as she swept past and climbed into her awaiting carriage. “I send no compliments to your family, you deserve no such attention.”
Elizabeth returned to the house without troubling herself to reply.
The walls swam about her, and she clutched the back of a chair with one hand and her head with the other.
She was inordinately grateful when Hill came to her aid, helping her to bed, giving her a measure of the tincture prescribed by Mr Oates and mercifully agreeing to conceal the extraordinary visit from the rest of the family.
Left alone, Elizabeth almost immediately succumbed to sleep, unable to reflect clearly on any of what had been said whilst her head throbbed thus.
Lucid or not, however, thoughts of Mr Darcy were still foremost in her mind as she drifted off, and though that was not an unusual occurrence, this was the first occasion such thoughts had ever been accompanied by hope.
Monday 1 June 1812, Hertfordshire
Mr Bennet had been uncommonly concerned at the prospect of Elizabeth walking to Meryton this day.
Her rapid recovery notwithstanding, he did not think it wise for her to be venturing so far so soon.
Nevertheless, she would not be deterred, and when his offer of the carriage had also fallen on deaf ears, he had taken the unprecedented decision to accompany her and her sisters on their walk.
Thus, they had all—excepting Lydia and Mrs Bennet, who tarried abed—enjoyed an agreeable morning in town.
Now almost home, he regarded Elizabeth with pride.
The majority of their sojourn had been passed accepting well wishes from the good folk of Meryton, which spoke volumes as to the esteem she evidently commanded.
As they approached the house, he patted her hand where it rested upon his arm.
“You are a good girl, Lizzy. I am heartily pleased you are recovered.”
Elizabeth smiled at him but had not the time to respond before the door was swept open and Hill appeared with the news that Mr Bingley waited upon them in the parlour.