Chapter 32
AN UNEXPECTED VISITOR
The upshot of Mr Collins’s persistent preaching was that Mrs Bennet became very careful in how she spoke to Elizabeth, transferring all of her disappointment in the loss of the great house at Stoke to the accountability of Fanny and John Ashwood.
Mrs Long was the first to hear her mother’s revised opinions, a mere few days after Elizabeth returned to Longbourn. “I tell you, Matilda, poor Lizzy has been abused by that family, and I do not hesitate to say it. I would not allow a dog to live in that pathetic excuse for a dower house.”
‘Poor Lizzy’? Elizabeth turned to look at her mother, hardly able to believe her words.
Matilda Long appeared sceptical. “Did you not tell me that Lizzy was too stubborn for her own good, and that she ought to return to the big house at Stoke?” Mrs Long had no qualms about casting up Elizabeth’s flaws for the delectation of the company.
“If that is how you heard it, it is not what I meant,” Mrs Bennet cried.
“Lizzy has had to acquire a strong will to endure such ill treatment as she has received. She nursed old Ashwood through ailment after ailment, each spell worse than the one before it. He would not have lasted a month under the care of Fanny Ashwood, I vow. Obviously, Lizzy ought to have had a place of honour at Stoke, but with two such mean-spirited money-grubs as John and Fanny Ashwood, why should she go anywhere near them, much less live beneath their insults? They happily sent her to subsist in what is no better than a stable hut! Just go and look at that wreck they threw her into for yourself! If more folks paid attention, others would see what I am saying and know it for truth!”
The Mrs Longs of the neighbourhood enjoyed repeating such embellishments.
But it was not only Mrs Bennet who had, apparently, begun voicing a change of heart.
By all accounts, Miss Bingley had taken the field as Elizabeth’s greatest defender.
She let her disgust of Fanny and John Ashwood’s treatment of her new ‘dear’ friend be known far and wide to anyone who would listen—and many did.
Mrs Hurst was more civil in her discourse regarding the Ashwoods, but then, she did not have so many amends to make towards Elizabeth.
Most recently, Darcy, too, had been heard to agree vehemently with Miss Bingley, and where Darcy went, more than Bingleys followed.
News of Elizabeth’s return to Longbourn, and the Ashwoods’ underhandedness spread more rapidly than even the Bingleys’ invitations, and Longbourn’s best drawing room was refilled to the brim with callers each successive morning.
The impending ball was the excuse they all used, but mostly, everyone wished to hear for themselves the truth of Elizabeth’s ill treatment at the hands of the Ashwoods, and, Elizabeth often thought, were almost disappointed when she looked as she always had, instead of an emaciated, battered version of herself.
It was difficult to find the right balance of what to say in response.
The Ashwoods had treated her poorly; she did not like them.
But many of these people had not been blameless, either, withholding friendship on the basis of Fanny’s words, or her mother’s.
What was done, was done, and she hated dwelling on a past that was painful.
“I hardly see what the fuss is about,” she complained one morning, stopped, once again, from finishing a letter to her aunt and uncle Gardiner.
She wished to tell them of her new direction as well as the forthcoming nuptials, only to be interrupted by Mary informing her of the latest onslaught of callers awaiting her notice.
“The dower cottage’s condition was hardly a great secret.
Anyone could have seen its forlorn appearance before this—none of my situation is news.
And despite how dilapidated it is, the small part I lived in was sound enough. Uncle Gardiner made sure of it.”
“The fuss is about a collective guilty conscience,” Mary calmly replied.
“They are all ashamed of themselves. They rejoiced in appointing a new reigning queen of society when Fanny Ashwood acquired Stoke—they were all taken with her looks and fashionable clothing. Few listened to me or the Palmers defending you, but now they are remembering. Besides, nothing draws a greater crowd than the downfall of the mighty.”
“I suppose. I just hope it all blows over quickly.”
“Well,” Mary drawled. “I would not count on that. I have noticed a certain frequent visitor from Netherfield, who cannot seem to take his eyes from you, and whom Jane repeatedly sends to explore the far-off corners of our estate in your company. Really, how many times must I make excuses to abandon you two, and distract Mama from seeing what is right in front of her?”
Elizabeth smiled at her younger sister. “Sometimes I forget that you have grown older and wiser in the past few years.”
Mary’s expression grew brighter. “Is it true then? There is something there? I have hoped it for you, Lizzy.”
“Our betrothal will be announced the night of the ball, and is a great secret until then, if you please.”
Mary threw her arms around Elizabeth. “Oh, I am so happy!” she cried. “And I hope you will not mind that I am also selfishly glad. Milton’s parents will be that much more approving when they hear of it.”
“Have they been disapproving, dear? You have not said anything, and so I did not like to mention him.”
“They have counselled him to wait until I am older, and until he is, but they are very well off, and plainly hope he will change his mind. His curacy does not pay much, and I know that at the heart of their concern is that I bring very little to the marriage. I still bring very little, but a brother in Mr Darcy is a wonderful something more, is it not?”
Elizabeth smiled at this. “He is indeed a wonderful something more, and not simply because of his fortune. I am in love for the first time in my life, Mary, and I almost cannot believe it.”
“I am glad, Lizzy. It does not seem quite fair, does it? That I should meet Milton so early, while you had to wait so long?”
Elizabeth thought of the gangly Milton Palmer—and that many would say the age of twenty was not a long wait at all—and smiled again. “Wonderful ‘something mores’ are always worth the wait.”
Rejuvenated by the conversation with her sister, it was with a spring in her step that Elizabeth went downstairs; however, a new visitor had entered the Bennets’ drawing room since Mary had gone to fetch her: a sharp-eyed, tall, distinguished man with silvering hair.
Mrs Hill and Mama stood gaping at him, while Mrs Harrington and Lady Lucas gawped from their chairs.
Another descriptor for him was ‘elegant’; stylishly dressed in expensive travelling clothes, he wore a pleasant expression that scrupulously ignored the open stares surrounding him.
Elizabeth looked at Jane and Mr Collins enquiringly. Mr Collins appeared to be frozen in place.
“Oh, um, Lizzy…I mean, Elizabeth,” Jane corrected herself, blushing faintly and stuttering with an embarrassment unusual to her.
“Your lordship, my sister, Mrs Elizabeth Ashwood. Elizabeth, this is Lord Matlock, Earl of Matlock, and Mr Darcy’s uncle.
He is um, looking for his nephew, whom he believed might be visiting here. ”
“My deepest apologies,” the earl said swiftly. “I did not mean to come charging in, without even an introduction. When I arrived at Netherfield only to find him gone, and heard he might be here, I took your direction and came. He is not expecting me, you see. It was to be a surprise.”
No doubt, Elizabeth thought. “I am happy to meet you, your lordship. Please, come near the fire and be warmed from your journey. Can we offer you refreshment?”
At her words, the tableau surrounding him seemed to un-freeze; Mrs Hill took his coat, gloves, and hat, Mr Collins found his voice at last, welcoming him to Longbourn with an over-hearty greeting, and Mama tittered nervously.
Elizabeth led the earl to the seat nearest the fire, took the chair beside him, and conversed on the usual topics one discussed with a stranger—the weather, the roads—while the rest of the company looked on, still round-eyed and, for the most part, speechless.
Mrs Hill brought out a sherry trifle—which had probably been meant for dinner that evening—and Elizabeth helped Jane serve their awed visitors with as much cheer and aplomb as she could manage.
After several minutes of such casual dialogue, the earl made a polite gesture towards the windows.
“Mrs Ashwood, there seemed to be a prettyish kind of a little wilderness on one side of your lawn. After such a wearisome journey as my old bones have undertaken this morning, I should be exceedingly obliged if we might take a turn in it, if you would favour me with your company.”
“Go, my dear sister,” cried Mr Collins, “and show his lordship about the different walks. I think he will be pleased with the garden’s new design, even if we have yet to see its anticipated blooms.”
Elizabeth obeyed this directive, and, running into her own room for sturdier shoes and outdoor wear, soon attended her noble guest downstairs and into the garden.
Once upon a time, Elizabeth might have been as awed as her family by the sudden presence of an earl in Longbourn’s drawing room—or at least as curious.
But she was no longer a young miss who knew only of dancing and diversions.
She had run a large household, entertained her husband’s company, and buried that husband after many a trying illness.
Mr Ashwood had not been titled, but like Mr Darcy, was a gentleman of a fine and illustrious family.
She had not hosted earls, but there had been titles and prominent guests.
She was incapable of pretending that this was a visit of happenstance.
“I believe we have already exhausted all the common civilities, and I am certain you have more important things to do today than furnish compliments to the garden. Please, sir, feel free to address to me your concerns. You must have some.”