A Surprising Visitor
CHAPTER NINETEEN
The days between Christmas and New Year’s Day passed slowly for Elizabeth, who carried Darcy’s scrap in her pocket, sharing the secret with no one—not even Jane, who sensed the quiet turmoil in her sister’s demeanor and wisely left her to weather it alone.
And so, Elizabeth spent the days with her family, distributing gifts on Boxing Day, calling on neighbors and visiting the town where all talk whirled around Jane’s good fortune.
And she stayed in the background with Mary and Kitty, content to make notes in her improvement journal—notes she could not quite explain.
She had copied three of her great-great-grandmother Philippa’s receipts along with her marginal notes: instructions for a foaming clotted-cream syllabub, delicate tart de Borage, and a violently pungent unguent for the winter chilblains made of mutton tallow and bruised elderberries.
And now she was sketching the arrangement of the drawing room, noting where each sister preferred to sit, which chair her father claimed as his own, and where Cleo had established her territory near the fire.
The music master, Mr. Moretti, had appeared on New Year’s Day, and Elizabeth suspected her mother was planning another social event. Every day had been thus, with the Lucases, the Longs, the Gouldings, and of course, their aunt and uncle with a procession of card games, mock theatre, etc.
Mary and Lydia sat at the piano, a four-handed duet with Mary valiantly attempting all four hands while Lydia missed all her notes to Mr. Moretti’s displeasure, his butter knife slicing the air in emphatic arcs.
Mr. Cecil stood over easels where Jane painted with delicate strokes, capturing the winter light through the window with serene watercolors, and Kitty created an abstract rendition of their cat Cleo, a grey tabby with a torn ear rendered against a grey background, with Mr. Cecil gently suggesting a hint of color to bring the otherwise monochromatic sketch to life.
And then, the sound of carriage wheels drew eyes to the window. Mrs. Bennet, predictably, was the first to react.
“Jane! Jane, look out the window! Mr. Bingley is returned! Oh, my poor heart! Where is the seed cake? Hill, bring the port and the Wedgwood—not the common blue set, the good one with the gold leaf! Jane, stand by the window where the light strikes your hair. Kitty, hide that monstrosity of a cat at once.”
Elizabeth suspected this visit was not exactly unplanned, as there had been whispers among the servants that Netherfield Park was being opened for the New Year, and Mrs. Bennet had been all aflutter, sending notes and pushing Mr. Bennet to call, but of course, after Bingley’s abrupt departure, it was determined not to raise Jane’s hopes.
However, Mamma would not be thwarted, and Elizabeth strongly suspected that Mr. Bennet, under relentless wifely siege, had quietly dispatched an inquiry.
Pride, after all, is a luxury easily relinquished when a newly-minted heiress graces the parlor.
Elizabeth caught Charlotte’s eye across the drawing room.
Charlotte, who had arrived an hour earlier and was quietly hemming a pillowcase, raised an eyebrow and returned to her needlework.
Her quiet presence had been a balm for Elizabeth, whose heart was as unsteady as the weather, which could not decide between snowing and thawing, and hence the Bingleys must have arrived when the roads were tolerable enough.
Mrs. Bennet bustled around the drawing room, pushing Jane to the window, and closing the pianoforte on Mary while Lydia pressed her nose against the window.
“Lizzy, put away that book. Mr. Moretti, you may stay, but please do not speak. Oh, where is your father? Mr. Bennet! Mr. Bennet! Mr. Bingley is here to renew his addresses, I am certain of it—why else would he return when the roads are barely passable?”
Mr. Bennet emerged from his study with a wry expression. “I heard you, my dear. I believe they heard you in Meryton. What is the commotion?”
“Mr. Bingley has arrived! And he is calling on us this very moment!”
“Then I suppose we must receive him.” Mr. Bennet caught Elizabeth’s eye and raised an eyebrow. She shrugged—I know nothing—and he settled into his chair with the air of a man preparing for an entertaining spectacle.
The door opened, and Hill announced, with admirable composure: “Mr. Bingley, Mr. Hurst, and Mrs. Hurst.”
And there he was—Charles Bingley, beaming like a man who had just discovered that Christmas had come again, his cheeks ruddy from the cold, his eyes already seeking out the one face in the room that mattered to him.
“Mrs. Bennet! Mr. Bennet! What a pleasure! I cannot tell you. We arrived only yesterday; the roads were abominable, but I could not stay away another day.”
Behind him, Mr. Hurst shuffled in, and Mrs. Hurst followed with a tight smile that suggested neither Hurst welcomed the excursion but was compelled by Bingley’s generous wine cellar and table settings.
Elizabeth barely noticed them as she watched Jane.
Her sister’s composure had not cracked—Jane was too well-bred for that—but her face softened, opened, and became luminous in a way that Elizabeth had not seen since that first assembly when they met.
“Mr. Bingley.” Jane rose and curtsied, her voice steady. “Welcome back to Hertfordshire.”
“Miss Bennet,” Bingley said, bowing, and his voice caught. “And the rest of the Miss Bennets, I am so pleased to see you again. So very elegant and joyous.”
Elizabeth and her sisters curtsied, and Mrs. Bennet fluttered.
“Come, come, you must sit. Mr. Hurst, there is a chair by the fire. Mrs. Hurst, how well you look. Hill, the Madeira, and Jane, dear, perhaps Mr. Bingley would like to see your watercolors? Mr. Cecil has been teaching the girls, and Jane’s work is quite exceptional. ”
Elizabeth sat beside Charlotte on the settee and watched the room rearrange itself.
Bingley appeared beside Jane on the sofa, his gaze not losing track of her, and Elizabeth could not help wondering if Jane’s position as the heiress of Longbourn had brought him back despite the slush on the road, accompanied by the Hursts for the barest of all propriety.
But she tucked the uncharitable thoughts away, exchanging the barest of glances with Charlotte, who no doubt suspected the same.
Lydia, who had lost even the empathic swipes of Mr. Moretti’s butter knife instruction, draped herself across the window seat and announced to anyone who would listen that she had not seen a red coat in a fortnight and her spirits were in serious peril.
“We had not expected company today,” Jane said, pouring tea with the grace of a woman who had not required Mrs. Beaumont’s tea-pouring lessons. “You must forgive us; we are mid-lesson. Mr. Moretti has only just arrived.”
“Oh, do not stop on our account!” Bingley said, his eyes never leaving Jane’s face. “We are great lovers of music; are we not, Louisa?”
“Charles is a great lover of every form of entertainment,” Louisa said. “Music, dancing, sport, conversation. He is exhausting.”
Mr. Moretti cleared his throat. “If I may, Mrs. Bennet, we had planned a small program for New Year’s Day. The young ladies have been preparing, and it would be a shame to waste their efforts.”
“A musicale!” Mrs. Bennet seized upon this with delight. “Yes, of course, we shall have a musicale. Mary, you were playing beautifully, continue at once. Jane, you must sing, and Kitty, your duet with Mary! And then the watercolors, yes, Mr. Cecil can unveil them properly.”
Elizabeth caught Mr. Cecil’s expression.
The art master was a quiet man who had not expected to be thrust into a public unveiling.
She suppressed a smile as he frowned at the unfinished work on the easels and retreated into a nook to rearrange the papers and select from the Bennet girls’ various sketches.
“I should be delighted to hear Miss Bennet sing,” Bingley said, settling into a chair with an excellent view of Jane. “I have thought of her voice often these past weeks.”
“And I of your dancing,” Lydia piped up. “Mr. Bingley, will you dance with me? Mary can play something lively, and we can have a proper reel.”
“Lydia!” Mrs. Bennet looked torn between mortification and opportunity. “We cannot have a reel in the drawing room.”
“Why not? We can move the furniture like we did when Mr. Darcy was here. Papa, tell Mamma we can dance.”
“I believe Mr. Moretti has opinions about dancing,” Mr. Bennet said mildly. “Perhaps we should consult him.”
Mr. Moretti, sensing an opportunity to display his versatility, produced a fiddle and began tuning it with theatrical flourish. “For dancing, we have the fiddle. For the musicale, the pianoforte. I am, as they say, a man of many talents.”
“Caroline would be horrified,” Mrs. Hurst observed to no one in particular. “A fiddle in the drawing room.”
“Miss Bingley is not here,” Bingley said cheerfully. “Her nerves would not tolerate winter travel, so she remained in London with our aunt. You shall have to be horrified enough for both of you, Louisa.”
Mrs. Hurst sniffed but said nothing further. Mr. Hurst had already found the most comfortable chair and appeared to be calculating how quickly he could fall asleep without being noticed.
And so Mr. Moretti fiddled, Mary played with great joy, and Lydia danced around the room with Kitty. Jane sang next, insisting that Elizabeth accompany her, and so Elizabeth set down her improvement journal and took her seat at the pianoforte.
Jane stood before the room, her hands folded and posture easy. She sang a setting of “Barbara Allen,” a folk tune. Her voice was not powerful, but it was clear, true, and heartbreaking in the way only Jane could produce.