Chapter Fourteen #4
Elinor had promised Marianne, and more importantly, herself that she would get past her attachment to Edward and would not allow her opinion of the colonel to be shaded by the expectations and speculations of her mother, her sister, and apparently Lady Rebecca.
Even so, she could see that Lady Rebecca wished her to like the colonel, and the man himself was behaving with open and artless charm, making no secret of his desire for her good opinion.
He bore his sister’s teasing very cheerfully and seemed willing to make every manner of jest to put Elinor at ease.
When Lady Rebecca observed Miss Lucas fawning over Mr. Bingley, Elinor and her companions were already in a state of high humor.
Lady Rebecca began to mimic Miss Lucas’s preening, and Elinor had consumed enough wine to be vastly diverted.
But then she began to think of Edward, imagining Lucy Steele behaving in such a way toward him, as her cousins had informed her was the case in London.
When Lady Rebecca ushered Miss Lucas upstairs to refresh herself, Elinor was left to her own devices in speaking with the colonel, and the unpleasant turn of her thoughts rendered her sullen and silent.
Colonel Fitzwilliam studied her, a look of concern in his gaze.
“I hope you do not fret on your sister’s behalf, Miss Dashwood.
She appears recovered from the shock of her accidental mishap, and I daresay Bingley is pledging her his eternal gratitude for the timely disruption of Miss Lucas’s adulation. ”
Elinor forced her lips into a smile as she looked to the other end of the table, where Marianne was whispering to Mr. Bingley with the sort of animation that was generally reserved for people she actually liked.
Elinor knew her sister well enough to be sure that the wine had not been spilled accidentally, and yet she could not entirely disapprove of such pettiness.
Elinor had always been prone to restraint, even when there had been a great many tribulations to strain her equanimity.
The loss of her father, John’s indifference and Fanny’s avarice, her unrequited affection for Edward, and finally the revelation of Lucy Steele’s prior claim confided with so evident an intention to inflict pain – all this would have driven her to worse than spilling wine if she possessed Marianne’s passionate disposition.
And since discovering that Edward considered whatever had existed between them as now severed, Elinor felt something inside her ache to lash out, though every habitual instinct stifled this internal shriek.
“Miss Dashwood? Whatever can you be thinking? The look on your face is strangely ominous, and I am sure you have not heard a single word I have said.” The colonel gave an exaggerated pout, and Elinor required a moment to recall how to school her expression into something pleasant.
Though Elinor was not sure she had managed the smile she wished to offer him, the colonel repaid her with a brilliant grin.
“Here I thought I had done a creditable job of diverting you, but it was evidently all Rebecca’s triumph.
Tell me, Miss Dashwood, what you should best like to hear, for I am ready to oblige you in my sister’s absence. ”
Elinor pressed her lips together for fear she might tell the colonel that what she most desired was to scream, loudly and at length.
At last she felt herself smiling in earnest as she met his gaze, and she was overcome by a sense of gratitude that he should be so keen to please her, even as she wallowed in her private despair.
She was on the verge of urging him to carry on as he had done all evening, for she had thoroughly enjoyed the tales of his youthful antics and the impish mischief he had shared with his sister, until she had been plagued by the remembrance of her own troubles.
But before she could give him any reassurance that he had delighted her, Lady Lucas and Mrs. Bennet’s bickering began to overpower all other conversation on that end of the table.
Elinor had suspected Lady Rebecca was about some mischief in seating Mrs. Bennet so near to Lady Lucas.
Before Marianne spilled her wine, the two matrons had merely glared and grimaced at one another as they courted the officers’ attention for their daughters.
But as she began to bicker with Mrs. Bennet, Lady Lucas’s tone grew sharper and her voice louder.
It was impossible to ignore the woman, and neither could Elinor pretend that she did not hear as Lady Lucas snarled at Mrs. Bennet.
“It is ghastly enough that all five of your daughters are out at once, and now the older ones have dowries to flaunt! But even that is not the end of your determination to disoblige your neighbors, for you have brought two more unmarried young ladies into the neighborhood to poach from my poor girls!”
Elinor felt the heat of mortification on her face, though at the far end of the table, Marianne remained oblivious to the altercation taking place.
Mrs. Bennet made some shrill reply to Lady Lucas, who was staring pointedly at Elinor and relishing her discomfort.
The officers were laughing nervously at the indecorous exchange, but the colonel looked livid.
“This is hardly appropriate, Madam,” he said to Lady Lucas, but this only incensed her further. She and Mrs. Bennet continued to hiss their venom at one another, and Elinor was sure she heard her name spoken, but she was consumed by her own distress.
Her eyes could not seem to focus, her head spun with dizziness, her heart raced, and she was unbearably warm.
Elinor could think only of her urgent need to be away; she stood and fled the room, scarcely aware of herself until she was in a cool, dimly lit room, seated on a sofa and weeping into the palms of her hands.
And then there was a hand on her shoulder, and Elinor leaned into the comforting touch. But it was not her sister, nor her mother; it was the colonel she clung to. She flinched and then froze, her tears ebbing away for a moment before she once again succumbed to her wretchedness.
Colonel Fitzwilliam’s eyes shone in the candlelight and his movements were slow and deliberate as he lowered her hands from her face and then brushed the tears from her cheeks with his fingers. Elinor sucked in a sharp breath at his touch and he withdrew, reaching for a handkerchief to offer her.
“Miss Dashwood,” he said, his voice soft and low. “Can that termagant’s effrontery really have distressed you so? I had thought you too sensible to be affected by such nonsense.”
As Elinor dabbed her face with his handkerchief, her lips twitched into a smile at his gentle teasing. “I ought not to have….”
She trembled as she fought the urge to sob again, and the colonel moved closer to her.
He extended his hand, and she began to place the handkerchief in his upturned palm when his fingers curled around hers.
“I know it is not Lady Lucas’s petty complaints that distress you.
Your self-possession is admirable, but there is sometimes an impenetrable air of tragedy about you that I cannot but wonder at. ”
Elinor looked down at her hand in his. She wanted to cling to it, to close her eyes and savor the small indulgence of such an intimacy, but she could not allow herself to be caught up in such fancy. She slid her fingers from his grasp, and his hand moved to rest once more on her shoulder.
“Has your sister not told you my history? I am sure Marianne made her aware of every particular.” Elinor spoke without any resentment at her sister’s indiscretion; at present it was a relief that she may be understood.
“I am interested in what you have to say,” the colonel murmured.
Elinor breathed out a bitter laugh. “And I promised my sister so faithfully that I would enjoy myself this evening. Despite her behavior, I understand Lady Lucas’s frustration, the fear she must have for her daughters – ere long I shall be the same burden on my family – only it has been such a day that any unkindness was destined to wound me more than it should. ”
“And why is that? Has it to do with… of course my sister informed me of….”
Elinor’s fingers twitched in her lap, as if wanting to reach her bare hand out to his once more.
“Yes, my ill-fated attachment. He is promised to another and has seen my cousins in London – he is acquainted with your cousin Mr. Darcy, in fact. Edward’s pernicious mother has learned of Jane’s fortune, and that she will inherit Longbourn.
I had once thought it some consolation that I could respect him for honoring his commitment, his principles, but now I believe he will bend to his mother’s mercenary schemes. ”
Colonel Fitzwilliam inhaled sharply, his posture stiffening. “This cad who wooed you while betrothed to another will now court your own cousin, and with mercenary intent?” His voice dripped with disdain, and it showed on his visage. “Your brother ought to call him out!”
“My half-brother? John would never do such a thing.”
Something dark shaded the colonel’s face for a moment, but then he smiled at Elinor. “I hear your cousin Miss Elizabeth has the temerity to deliver impressive set-downs.”
“I do not wish Edward any ill, I am only very sorry for every particular. He must have some reason for yielding to his mother’s demands, and I know it shall weigh on him.”
“Have you no compassion for yourself, Miss Dashwood? Are none of your tears for your own misery, but only for others? I should not be half so generous if my heart were broken.”