Chapter Twelve
Lydia Wickham, even with the absence of her husband, was a thoroughly confusing person to be around. Well aware of her status as a married woman, she carried herself with an air of superiority, but on the occasion she was denied something, her pettiness showed her youth.
She wasn’t a fan of sitting to read. Even her needlework suffered from her lack of focus, with loose stitches and hanging threads, as she barely looked down at her hands, preferring instead to swap gossip.
She was at her happiest when discussing others, or in town to observe people to gather gossip fodder for herself.
Lydia spent a token amount of time with her father but disappeared into Meryton at least once a day, often with Kitty in tow.
Any invitation offered to me felt disingenuous, so I opted to decline on account of my leg.
It certainly could have withstood a leisurely walk, but I was grateful for the easy excuse.
As much as I liked spending time with Kitty, I preferred to do so alone.
She felt less like my Kitty and more like the Kitty from Elizabeth’s childhood stories when Lydia was around to encourage her in frivolity and idle gossip.
Making the most of my invitation to borrow from Mr. Bennet’s library, I dug through his collection to unearth a book or two that would hold my attention and took them out to the garden. The next few days were spent like that, feeling the breeze tease my hair as I turned pages.
The nights were spent in Kitty’s arms.
We made sure to be in our own beds by the time we fell asleep, to be safe, but the time between taking our leave from the household and taking our leave from the realm of the waking was not wasted.
It felt wrong to be deliriously happy on a visit to a dying man, but I was.
The mood in the house was rarely one of melancholy.
Occasionally Mrs. Bennet would have to excuse herself, owing to a sudden burst of tears, and at least one of Mr. Bennet’s daughters would spend the evening sitting and talking with him, but his condition, though poor, seemed stable.
Longbourn House was full of people, and a house full of people would find it difficult not to be equally full of spirit. I had never enjoyed company more—from games of whist to being persuaded to play the piano of an evening, which Kitty encouraged at every given opportunity.
“Please,” she begged, “one song.”
The Bennets’ drawing room was not well suited to as many people as it currently held.
Extra seating had been dragged in from other rooms, but that still left too many people squashed together on one sofa, meaning no one could say anything about how close Kitty was sitting to me.
It was enjoyable but also left me susceptible to her best cajoling tactics as she grabbed my hand and whispered so close I could feel her breath against my cheek.
“Just one,” I warned her.
Elizabeth had sat at the piano stool in the absence of any other spare seat, but she quickly got up to swap with me, squeezing my shoulder as we passed.
“Play the one you wrote,” she encouraged me.
My cheeks went faintly pink at the very thought.
I knew it off by heart, of course, but it felt too private.
Besides, I had already decided it sounded better on the harpsichord than the pianoforte.
I instead opted for an easy, light tune, the kind of thing no one ever took issue with.
It was soft enough to melt into the background if everyone else wanted to continue a conversation, but they listened politely as I played the gentle melody.
The Bennets’ piano was ever so slightly out of tune, but not so much that anyone else would notice.
When the last note faded, there was a swell of polite applause I would usually have hated, but Kitty clapped the loudest, beaming with pride, and I let myself smile back.
She got to her feet and for a fleeting moment I imagined her coming over to reward me with a kiss, as if the very idea in front of her entire family wasn’t absurd.
Instead she brought her smile closer, where its power over me only increased, and leant against the wall beside the piano.
“Play the one you played at Pemberley, in your drawing room,” she insisted, asking for the same thing as Elizabeth.
“It isn’t good enough,” I said, although that was far from what I meant. It just felt too much like baring my soul.
“Please.” Kitty batted her eyes in a way that was probably supposed to be comic but was simply effective. “For me?”
She didn’t know that every time I played that song, it was for her. It existed only because it was for her. I had never found the time to tell her, and this definitely was not the best moment, but the least I could do was indulge her request to hear it.
It still did not sound quite right on a piano, especially one not wholly in tune, but Kitty lit up the second I played the first note, and that smile did not leave her face for the entire time I played.
I barely looked at the keys, relying on years of practise to guide me to them as I focused on her.
Everyone else in the room faded away until their applause at the end of the melody jolted me back to reality, reminding me that this moment was far from private.
I quickly evacuated the piano stool with a small curtsey to my audience, before stealing Kitty’s old space, now beside Elizabeth. It left Kitty to take the piano stool as a seat, but I wanted to put some distance between me and the instrument, and between me and her.
Elizabeth squeezed my arm as I sat down.
“That was beautiful. Even better than last I heard it. You’ve changed it a little?” she asked.
“Yes,” I admitted, but I added nothing further. From the knowing set to her smile and the way her eyes flicked over to Kitty, I didn’t need to.
I hoped that someone else would be persuaded to play, taking the burden of attention away, but Lydia managed to do that without the help of an instrument.
“There’s a town ball in Meryton at the end of the week,” she announced to the room at large from the armchair she had claimed for herself. “And I thought we all might go.”
There was a moment of silence where I was almost certain everyone else in the room was thinking the same thing—this was not a visit that ought to be celebrated. Mr. Bennet was still bedbound, and there was no clear answer to how his illness would end.
“Lydia,” Jane began gently, “I think that might be a little improper, given the circumstances.”
“But it might be our last chance!” Lydia protested. “Don’t we deserve a little fun?”
It was a callous way of looking at things, but she was right that they would all have to endure a lengthy period of mourning if Mr. Bennet passed. There would be nothing near the realm of fun for a while, and Lydia gave the impression of one who thrived off attention and merriment.
“I doubt Father would mind, if we asked,” Kitty added, not surprising anyone in her support of her sister’s idea. “And it would be nice to be able to dance.”
Her interest in turn piqued Mrs. Bennet’s.
“I think it’s a wonderful idea. It would be good to get you girls out of the house for a while,” she said, looking pointedly between her two unmarried daughters. “I imagine it would be a great comfort to your father if you were to find husbands.”
The implication of before he passes was unspoken but still clear in her thinly veiled attempt to guilt Kitty and Mary.
I bit back my grimace. An evening of watching Kitty dance with eligible bachelors was not the delight to me that it was to her mother.
I liked to watch her dance, but the constant threat of matrimony lingered in the back of my mind in a dark and ugly cloud, and I was keen to avoid reminders of it.
“I’m going to ask Father!” Lydia declared, jumping to her feet and rushing out of the room.
Elizabeth sighed. “I suppose it is good to see marriage has not changed her,” she said, sharing a look with Jane that suggested they had both hoped it would change her just a little.
“Are we really going to go dancing with Father so ill?” Jane frowned.
“If he allows it, then I suppose there’s no harm,” Elizabeth said. “I can see the appeal for him in some peace and quiet.”
“It’s perfectly peaceful here,” Mrs. Bennet protested, waving away her daughter’s words and either missing or ignoring the smothered smiles of everyone else in the room. She was responsible for a large proportion of the lack of peace, and she encouraged much of the rest.
It was not long later that Lydia thundered down the stairs, almost tripping as she burst into the room to announce that we had to attend the ball in Meryton, as it was their father’s fondest wish.
Elizabeth included me in the amused look she shared with Jane—Mr. Bennet was definitely seeking a little peace.
I considered trying to avoid the ball. My last attempt to act like a respectable young lady enjoying a night of dancing had ended with me bloodied and crying myself to sleep, and I was in no hurry to repeat the experience.
Only when I told Kitty I did not plan to go, her resulting pout was enough to pull at my heart.
“Please,” she begged, pressing a row of three fleeting kisses up my wrist. “I want you to come.”
“I have nothing to wear,” I tried to argue. When I’d packed for Meryton, dancing and merriment had not been amongst the likely activities. There was no evening gown in my luggage.
But Kitty was having none of the excuse.
“You are in a house that has, until recently, housed five young women. Do you honestly believe there will not be a dress for you to borrow?”
“Perhaps, but—”
“George, please,” she insisted. Her eyes were wide with deliberate intent to persuade. I both loved and hated that it was effective enough to work. “I will not be able to have a moment of fun without you.”
“Oh, really?” I said with a laugh. “All balls have been an utter bore until now, have they?”