Chapter 30
MOST TRULY
That Charlotte and the colonel should miss the weddings of their friends and his cousin was not to be thought of, and so it was swiftly resolved that all three should marry on the same morning and share a wedding breakfast, to be hosted in the spacious ballroom at Netherfield.
The brides’ mothers were entirely overcome by their nerves at the thought of planning such a grand affair in only six weeks.
That Mary’s wedding would occur on the second of those weeks drove Mrs Bennet to previously unknown heights of agitation.
Having recovered themselves in a day or two, Mrs Bennet and Lady Lucas proceeded to disagree over every point, large and small.
Neither would give way on even the most trifling detail.
Meanwhile, the betrothed ladies, with the eager assistance of Kitty, Maria Lucas, and Georgiana Darcy, as well as occasional grudging commentary from Lydia, quietly planned the whole thing themselves.
They also ensured that the final arrangements for Mary’s day were attended to, and that at least half the talk at her own wedding breakfast was about her.
When the squabbling mothers were informed, a fortnight prior to the triple wedding, that they need not trouble themselves over the arrangements, they united at last—in criticising everything their daughters had done.
The arrangements held, however, for the gentlemen combined to insist that their brides have the wedding they wished, and neither lady was willing to upset the men who were so obligingly taking the young ladies off their hands.
Charlotte, Jane, and Elizabeth made much of the fact that they would be cousins, while Georgiana overflowed with the happiness of acquiring five sisters, Elizabeth and Kitty in particular.
Once Mary’s wedding had passed, and all hope of being the first of her sisters to marry was entirely vanquished, Lydia had managed to summon up some enthusiasm for the celebration, and even made some improvements to the decorations for the wedding breakfast.
Two pages were not enough to contain Mrs Beresford’s pleasure at the news that her heir would bring a kind and sensible wife to Jordan Abbey when he took up his place there, or to express her intention to love Charlotte as well as she loved Fitzwilliam.
The Gardiners, likewise, hurried to assure their nieces of their approval and delight, and to rejoice at knowing they would be settled with such excellent gentlemen.
There were those who greeted the news of these engagements with emotions other than joy, however.
Miss Bingley could hardly keep her countenance when called upon to welcome her future sister on a tour of Netherfield, and her civility to Mr Darcy was positively icy for some days.
He and his betrothed credited the thaw which followed this brief period to a wish of being on good terms with the inhabitants of Pemberley, whatever she privately thought of its mistress.
Lady Matlock replied to her son’s news with civil congratulations and a comment that she trusted he knew what he was about, and to her nephew similarly.
The earl’s responses to both were more heated, but not beyond the possibility of rapprochement.
Lady Catherine de Bourgh’s ire upon receiving word that Mr Darcy had engaged himself to someone other than her daughter was such as to drive her all the way to Hertfordshire in a scheme to end what she viewed as a travesty.
The scenes she enacted at Longbourn were unpleasant and entirely ridiculous, but she went away disappointed, to impose herself at Netherfield and try her nephew on the subject.
He sent her off with a firm refusal; between them, there would be no further congress for some months.
The lady’s displeasure drove Mr Collins and his wife back to Hertfordshire a full week before the wedding.
Elizabeth was pleased to find Mary quite content in her situation, and philosophical about the storm which her sister’s engagement to Mr Darcy had provoked.
Mary privately told Elizabeth that she was perfectly willing to endure a period of estrangement from Rosings, and though Mr Collins was troubled by his patroness’s ire, he was not so frantic as Elizabeth would have expected; his affection for Mary and Miss de Bourgh being sufficient to convince him that matters had worked out for the best. Further, he was not insensible of the value of a greater connexion to the Darcys, an insight Elizabeth credited to her sister.
Though Mr Bennet often joked that he should revoke his permission for Lizzy to marry, if only to retain some sense in the house a few months longer, the weddings proceeded without any interruption or commotion, save the cheer which arose when the couples exited the church.
The Bingleys resided at Netherfield for only three months before they visited Pemberley with the intent of seeking an estate in the area.
Miss Bingley and the Hursts had gone to London for the Season shortly after the wedding, but this only made Mrs Bennet more comfortable visiting almost daily, to congratulate her daughter on her good fortune and suggest improvements to the house and to Jane’s running of it.
With the Bingleys came Kitty and Mr Bennet, and when they departed, after fruitlessly scouring Derbyshire and the surrounding counties for an available estate that was not in terrible disrepair, Kitty remained with the Darcys.
In the autumn, Darcy was able to write to his friend with word of a suitable situation, newly available due to the decease of the master and his heir’s permanent residence in the Canadas.
He and Elizabeth had toured it and thought the land fine and the house merely in need of updating. Would they like to visit and see it?
They certainly would. Snowdrop Hall was some two hundred years old, sturdily built and well-tended by the family which had held it all that time, and under thirty miles from Pemberley.
It was only a little larger than Netherfield, putting the asking price within Bingley’s means.
Jane loved the house from the moment she stepped inside, and Bingley’s confidence in his friend’s assessment of the land was so firm that he made an offer the same day.
Within the month, he became a landed gentleman.
The Darcys did not attend the full social Season in town, which coincided with the first months of their marriage, though they did travel south with the Bingleys after the purchase of Snowdrop Hall and make an appearance in London for three weeks before the approach of winter called them home.
The following spring allowed the cream of English society to at last get a good look at the country nobody who had inveigled Mr Darcy of Pemberley into marriage.
Lady Matlock had warmed to Elizabeth over the course of the year, and proved an invaluable ally as Elizabeth took her place in her husband’s sphere.
In the beginning, there was significant resistance to her entry into their ranks, but it was not very long before those who had not greatly coveted Darcy for themselves or a young relation allowed that the pair were really attached to each other, and that there was nothing at all wanting in Mrs Darcy’s manners or her person.
Those who had most wished to connect themselves to the Darcy name and fortune through marriage to the young master of Pemberley were slower to thaw, but even among their number, few continued to insist that some form of subterfuge had created the match.
Miss Bingley, sensible of the advantage of her brother’s close connexion to the Darcys, had, in the year since the wedding, set aside her pique at Mr Darcy’s choice and made herself very agreeable to the couple.
That her brother was now Mr Darcy’s brother featured in almost every conversation of which she was a part that Season, and her self-congratulation over the joining of their families was such as to hint that she had brought about the matches herself.
But few in society were willing to completely forget that she had openly sought quite a different match, and her falsely professed delight in the acquaintance of Mrs Darcy made her the object of no little mockery among those she most wished to impress.
Darcy and Elizabeth were civil to her for the Bingleys’ sake, and Darcy continued to lend her his consequence in hopes that she might marry, preferably to someone situated far from both Derbyshire and London.
In this, at least, there was partial success to be had.
Though there was no hint of the sort of splendid match she had hoped to make, at the end of the Season she was in receipt of an offer from a respectable barrister, who was distantly connected to a Scottish earldom and wished for a wealthy wife to improve his style of living.
The connexion to Mr Darcy, who counted a judge as a great-uncle, was no doubt also in his mind when he made his proposals.
She elected to accept rather than face another Season at four and twenty, competing against girls of eighteen for the best matches.
Georgiana and Kitty made their London debuts the following year.
Kitty was entirely ready to fall in love, and two dances and a dinner with Mr Woodmore, the modestly wealthy, modestly handsome, and very sensible heir to a baronet, were sufficient to claim her heart.
The young man required a little more time to equal her feelings, but he caught up with her before she even considered falling into despair.
They were well-matched in much the way Elizabeth and Darcy were; her liveliness and cheer brightened his life, while his steadiness gave hers the firm foundation she had never had at Longbourn.
Georgiana would endure two more Seasons before she met the companion of her future life, and their acquaintance was not formed in London.
Rather, on a visit with her brother and Elizabeth to the Fitzwilliams’ Jordan Abbey, she came to know Reverend the Honourable Matthew Grenville, third son of the Earl of Warwick, recently elevated to the role of canon under the Bishop of Coventry, who was visiting his family nearby.
Theirs was an extended courtship, conducted largely through mutual visits to Warwickshire when the clergyman could be spared from his duties, and arranged through a willing conspiracy of Colonel and Mrs Fitzwilliam with Lady Amelia Grenville, Mr Grenville’s younger sister, who yet resided at the family home.
They married some twenty months after their first meeting.
At the wedding breakfast, Darcy was heard to say that he could not have borne to relinquish his sister to anyone less worthy.
Though Lydia had gained a hint of maturity through the events of that momentous autumn and winter, she was Lydia still: unabashed, fearless, constantly seeking to be the centre of whatever was passing at the moment.
In time came her opportunity to mortify all her family and expose herself to the censure and ridicule of society, by eloping with a captain of the cavalry, the improvident second son of a gentleman from Surrey.
Fortunately for the credit of her relations, their flight to Scotland ended in a wedding over the anvil.
Darcy and Fitzwilliam assisted Captain Stevens in his profession, while Lydia’s sisters sometimes made her little gifts of coin from their own funds, for his income was never quite sufficient to the support of two such heedless persons.
Of Wickham, nothing was heard for several years, until his colonel wrote to Fitzwilliam that the man had been warned away from a nabob’s daughter by way of a beating administered by his menservants.
A broken arm had been set badly, taken an infection, and carried him away.
Upon receiving the news, Darcy took a quiet hour to lament the man’s wasted potential and thereafter thought of him infrequently and with no great emotion.
The union of Colonel Fitzwilliam and Charlotte Lucas may not have been so passionate as the Darcys’, nor so tender as the Bingleys’, but they were nonetheless very happy together.
The affection and respect which subsisted between them on their wedding day grew with each succeeding instance in which they mutually chose to honour and care for the other.
Their home was an orderly, cheerful place, in which they raised four clever, amiable children.
Jane and her Charles remained entirely besotted with each other, though they did eventually learn not to speak exclusively with each other for more than a few minutes at a time when in company.
Jane did not find childbearing as easy as her mother had, producing only three children over the course of twelve years.
As these were two sons to continue the Bingley name and one daughter for the family to dote upon, even Mrs Bennet was satisfied.
As for Elizabeth and Darcy, they were as perfectly happy as mere mortals can be.
Two such strong characters could not live always in harmony, but their early stumbles and misjudgments had made them careful with each other’s feelings, and they found that a short period of reflection in different parts of the house, followed by a rational conversation, served to resolve even the most fraught disagreement.
From them, their six children learnt to balance reason and sensibility, to embrace both responsibility and joy.
In tending to the households of several estates and their attendant concerns, the house in London, the Darcy family’s charitable interests, and her growing family, Elizabeth found satisfying outlets for her talents and energies.
She was constantly engaged in the improvement of something or other, and well-pleased to know that her efforts bettered many lives.
She enjoyed their annual time in London, largely for the opportunities to attend the theatre and spend time with her Gardiner relations, though she had her share of friends there, as well.
She retained, however, a firm preference for the country, and like her husband, was happiest at Pemberley.
Through his marriage, Darcy found relief from much of what was disagreeable to him in society; he was no longer pursued by every Miss and Mama with an eye to Pemberley’s coffers, which made his appearances in London much more bearable.
And when the clamour of an overcrowded place made his head ache and swim, there was always the soft hand on his arm and the beloved voice to draw his attention from the racket.
With Elizabeth by his side, he was easier in any situation, and this did not escape the notice of society.
His aloofness was transformed into a becoming reserve, his pride into dignity.
It was often remarked that while he had always been good and respectable, following his marriage, he had become most truly the gentleman.