Chapter Twenty-Two
Birdsong
Morning brought with it some insights for Elizabeth.
The ground lay pale and hard under the night’s gift of rime, and the sky hung leaden above.
There was not yet any snow, but the air was pregnant with the possibility of it and her spirits were down.
Neither had she slept soundly, and in lieu of her accustomed walk before breakfast, she pulled her blankets more tightly across her body and returned to her uneasy sleep.
“I say, Lizzy, this is most unlike you!” Papa teased as he observed her at her breakfast. “I have never seen you take coffee before; is this an unladylike habit, of which I must break you, learned at your uncle’s knee? Must I take him to task for it?”
“No indeed, Papa,” she stirred a spoon of sugar into the dark and bitter brew.
“‘Tis not a habit, but merely an antidote of one morning only for my tiredness. I shan’t require more than tea on the morrow, and it was certainly not due to any corruption on the part of Uncle Gardiner.” Nay, rather it was my aunt who taught me that coffee awakens the mind when sleep was absent.
She kept these musings silent and offered a light laugh instead.
“I am glad to hear it, for it would not do to call out my favourite brother on account of a morning drink, and the trouble to check you hardly seems like time well spent, for we all know you do as you wish.” He paused to take his own cup, which he put to his lips to drink.
“It is chilly today, I believe. Winter is fast upon us.” His eyes drifted to the window and out to the frozen world beyond.
“It cannot be pleasant for those without proper shelter. I wonder if I ought to leave some blankets and bread in the outbuildings. Perhaps some kindling for a fire.”
Elizabeth put down her cup. Never before, in all of her twenty years, had she heard Papa express concern for those caught unaware in the cold.
Whatever had possessed him to think of it now?
It must only be his friends—for the one named Etienne had called him mon ami—that had sparked such thoughts.
Were they out in the cold woods, without food or shelter?
Was it concern for the Frenchmen that had held Papa's attention the day before, as he had sat in the wilderness staring out at the trees?
Why, she wondered, could they not remain where they had been for so many weeks?
Likewise, was that storage room above her own not safe, either for the Frenchmen or for her own family?
There seemed no answers to these questions, and so she agreed with her father that it would a most Christian and charitable thing to do, to provide these necessities for those without.
The cause of Jane’s distress was also revealed when the morning mail was brought in. The maid placed the silver tray at Mama’s side and bobbed away when the mistress of Longbourn sorted through the pile thereupon.
“Oh, look, Jane, a letter for you! Can it be from Miss Bingley, do you think? It was most unkind of her to leave the way she did, and with scarcely a word!”
Lizzy had not been returned long enough to notice whether the Bingley siblings were about in society, and she had been too absorbed in her own sad thoughts to try to draw Jane out the previous day.
Now she wondered whether there had been some outing, from which Miss Bingley had abandoned Jane, or made her return home alone, or some other such cut.
But no! For when Jane read her letter and Lizzy understood the meaning of it, she found the truth was much worse.
“She writes that their decision to return to London had been some while in the planning—oh, why did Mr. Bingley say nothing to me of this?—and that now they have settled that they have no plans to return to Netherfield at all!”
“What can this be?” Lizzy was shocked at the news.
“Mr. Bingley returned to London four days ago,” Lydia interrupted, “and nobody knew it until they had departed, for it was done so suddenly! La! But I would love to be able to make such alterations in my life!” She gave a deep sigh and intoned in a dramatic voice, “Oh darling, how tedious the country is this week! We must return to Town, for there are entertainments every night, and balls where the officers dance. Do let us return this very day!” She collapsed back into her chair in a rush of very improper laughter. “Oh, how droll that would be!”
“Is it true, Jane?” Lizzy asked quietly. “Have they gone without a word?”
Jane nodded. “I believed, at first, they had only gone for Christmas, and would be back before long, but now...” She did not weep, nor even frown, but her usual smile was tinged with sadness, and Lizzy knew her sister’s heart was breaking.
There was little time to commiserate, and though she tried to engage her sister to talk, Lizzy herself was still too unsettled about Charlotte’s dreadful decision to give Jane the due she deserved.
Furthermore, within a few short days the entire Gardiner family was expected at Longbourn for Christmas, and the nursery must be prepared for their four children, which activity took up a great deal of time and energy, leaving little for contemplating any matters of the heart.
Christmas came and departed and with it, the Gardiners and their children, and still there was no word from Miss Bingley, nor any message from her brother to Papa.
Elizabeth had hoped for a brief note, or some recollection of their friendship, but it was as if the acquaintance had never been.
She had held no similar expectation for a note from Mr. Darcy, and in one respect she was correct, for no such letter appeared.
It would have been most inappropriate had there been one, she understood.
They were not engaged, nor even acknowledged to be courting, although she was still uncertain as to their exact relationship.
“Rejected suitor still holding hope” might not be uncommonly rare in the world, but neither was it a status to be boasted about at balls.
She did, nevertheless, receive an indication that she was not forgotten.
Her aunt and uncle had brought with them the expected Christmas presents for the family, and with hers was included a second small box.
“Do not open this with your family, Lizzy,” her aunt warned her, “for there is nothing similar for the others and I would not wish to arouse suspicions or engender bad feelings.”
This second box held a tiny model of a horse made of clockwork, each joint and leg and hoof a separate piece of machinery, connected with cams and cogs and levers.
The horse was mounted upon a small stand, and when the key attached thereto was wound and released, it galloped in its place with uncannily natural movements, all the while a melody played on the tiny music box in the base, that she recognised as The Black Nag from Mr. Playford’s books.
She was entranced as she watched the clockwork pieces turn and spin, recreating the movements of a living horse on this silhouette of metal.
“How delightful!” Mrs. Gardiner had requested to be present when Lizzy opened the box, and Lizzy could not deny her. “I had suspected some such treasure, but not anything so perfect as that!”
There had been no card included in the gift, “lest anybody find it and make assumptions,” her aunt explained.
But she then revealed it to be a gift from Mr. Mendel and Mr. Darcy both, the first having the almost-completed toy set aside for a gentleman who changed his mind shortly before the gift was to be completed, and the second having seen it and immediately deciding that it would do for no one as well as Miss Elizabeth.
Lizzy strongly believed that Mr. Darcy had compensated the clockmaker very well for his small toy, and she would treasure it always as coming from him.
Even should he not renew his addresses and they never meet again, she would cherish the time she had called him friend.
“Perhaps,” Aunt Gardiner murmured, “you might thank him in person, for I know he wishes to see you again. When such a man as that sets his mind to something, he finds a way to see it done.”
Three days after Christmas, the Gardiners returned to London, and a week after that Charlotte married Mr. Collins in the local church.
Lizzy had struggled to understand her friend’s insistence upon proceeding with the marriage, for nothing—no security or status or promise of a home—could entice her to spend the rest of her days with Mr. Collins.
By the time the morning was over, however, Charlotte had become Mrs. Collins and had bid farewell to her family and friends as she departed with her husband for Kent.
How quiet the neighbourhood would now be!
Jane had not regained her spirits, the cheerful Gardiner children and their charming parents had departed, and now Charlotte, too, was gone from their midst. The short days were followed by long nights, during which the mantle of melancholy weighed upon Lizzy’s shoulders, just as a mantle of snow now lay upon the frozen earth outside.
There was no repetition of the noises from the tower room, nor did any footprints appear in the snow outside the library where the secret door opened into the world.
Papa remained quiet and wistful, and on more than one occasion Lizzy heard him inquire of the servants and the stable grooms whether there was any sign that the blankets and firewood in the outbuildings had been used.