Chapter 5
“This is a pretty little place, is it not?” Caroline commented as the carriage drew near to Longbourn.
The manor house, though little more than half the size of Netherfield, was a handsome building, venerable with age and glorious with red and orange autumn ivy.
The drive, the park, and the house looked to be in good repair, and on the whole the place exuded an air of solidity: Longbourn had sat there for generations, and would witness generations more.
“It is,” Charles agreed eagerly. “The very picture of a country house. I wonder how long the Bennets have had it. It is older than Netherfield, of a certainty, and the leasing agent said that was built a century ago.”
“You ought to ask. Gentlemen are often happy to talk about how long their family have been landed, in my experience,” she replied with a smile as the equipage drew to a halt before the house.
Charles handed her down from the carriage and offered his arm, escorting her to the door.
Louisa had begged off the excursion at the last moment, pleading a headache, but promised most faithfully to attend the Gouldings’ dinner party on the morrow.
They had visited Lucas Lodge first. Caroline thought it had gone quite well.
Sir William and his wife remained overly verbose and entirely insipid, respectively, but there was not an ounce of harm in either of them, and she believed she could learn to tolerate their company with equanimity.
Miss Lucas was once again a pleasure to converse with, while her younger sister, outside the company of other silly young ladies, proved rather meek.
She had spent most of the visit staring wide-eyed at the Bingleys as though they were strange and wondrous creatures.
She had ventured only a single comment to Caroline, expressing her admiration for the beading on her reticule.
When Caroline offered to draw out the pattern for her, the girl was so overcome that she could only nod eagerly and leave her elder sister to express gratitude in words.
Longbourn was more finely appointed than Lucas Lodge, though it was still a simple country home.
The broad-faced, friendly housekeeper took their coats and escorted them to the parlour, where they found all the ladies of the house assembled.
Mrs Bennet greeted them eagerly and rather shrilly, but Charles’s easy and agreeable replies to her effusions had the happy effect of calming her somewhat.
Enough to spare Caroline’s ears, at least. She gave her greetings and allowed her brother to work his charms upon the company for a time.
It was astonishing, truly, how smiles bloomed in her brother’s wake.
Even people who openly disdained the origins of the Bingleys would happily speak with him if they met at a ball or a dinner, though they would never include him in their own invitations.
Here, in a much more complaisant society, the only barrier he was required to overcome was the behaviour of the rest of their party at the assembly.
By the time they sat down, Caroline felt that the residents of Longbourn were near to forgetting it entirely.
Charles was urged by their hostess to a seat between herself and Miss Bennet while Caroline was invited to place herself between Miss Elizabeth and Miss Mary.
Miss Catherine and Miss Lydia were sat upon a small chaise, whispering and giggling with each other and paying no attention at all to their guests.
Seeing the direction of her gaze, Miss Elizabeth smiled warmly and said, “Pray, Miss Bingley, forgive my youngest sisters for their lack of welcome. Their heads are still full of nothing but the sets they danced the night before last. For myself, I am delighted that you have come. I very much hoped you would.”
“My brother and I so enjoyed meeting you and your sister and Miss Lucas that we resolved nothing would do but that we visit as soon as might be. My sister intended to come as well, but unfortunately woke with a megrim.” Miss Elizabeth expressed her sympathy, and Caroline continued, “We stopped first at Lucas Lodge, and I have been charged to inform you that Sir William is planning a dinner for next week and Miss Lucas will expect you to grace the instrument at some point during the evening.”
“Had my vanity taken a musical turn, Charlotte would be the most invaluable friend,” Miss Elizabeth replied with a laugh. “But though I do enjoy music, I do not practise as I ought and am therefore quite an indifferent performer. Do you play, Miss Bingley?”
She acknowledged that she did. Miss Elizabeth then drew her sister Mary into the conversation, declaring that she was the most diligent of the Bennet sisters and practised every day without fail.
Miss Mary was serious of demeanour and awkward in her manners, but eager to speak of composers and more willing to attend to a guest than her younger sisters.
In this manner much of the time allotted for their call passed pleasantly away, and as the time to leave approached, she felt rather regretful that it must soon end.
The artful arrangement of tables to disguise the most worn parts of the carpet had not escaped her eye, and the neglect of the youngest Bennets raised a shadow of resentment in her breast, little though she expected she would have enjoyed conversing with them.
This was not the sort of place in which she would ever have thought she would spend an enjoyable visit, nor were these the sort of people she would have imagined could provide one.
Yet here she was, smiling and conversing easily with new acquaintances and—the youngest two aside—being made to feel as though her presence and friendship were greatly desired.
She had pursued acceptance for so long that to be handed it with a smile was as disorienting as it was heady.
Elizabeth found she liked Miss Bingley just as much on this second meeting as on the first. There was a becoming reserve to the lady’s manner which promised that the unfolding of her character would not be the work of a moment.
That she, like her brother, was willing to be pleased by those she met here was a great virtue, and Elizabeth felt that if she added to this an enjoyment of books and of laughter, they should be very great friends indeed.
When Mrs Bennet summoned Mary to convey some late instruction to Cook regarding their dinner, Elizabeth seized the opportunity to discover what she might.
“Tell me, Miss Bingley, do you enjoy books? I can see we are destined to be friends, but I am afraid we can only be excellent friends if you are at least moderately enamoured of the written word,” she said sportively.
Miss Bingley gave a restrained smile, though the twinkle in her eye hinted at a greater enjoyment than she fully expressed.
“I am fond of poetry, and of a well-written travel narrative. Some can be exceedingly dull, but when related in a lively manner, I very much enjoy reading of strange places and the people, customs, and sights to be found there.”
“Jane and I are both readers of poetry, though on that subject Jane is the most knowledgeable,” Elizabeth replied cheerfully. “I have only attempted two travel narratives and found them entirely soporific, but if you will recommend a good one, I shall give them another chance.”
Miss Bingley readily supplied two titles, one regarding a lady’s three-year residence in India with her military husband, and the other an account of an exploration of the eastern Canada coast by a Scottish gentleman.
She expressed regret that she had not either volume with her to lend.
“If poetry is not your preferred subject,” she added afterwards, “what do you most enjoy reading?”
“Oh, I adore a good novel. Mind, I comprehend a great deal in the word ‘good’!” She laughed. “It must make me laugh, or else it must make me think. Some few manage both, while a fair number cannot accomplish either.”
“I read several novels when I was in school,” Miss Bingley offered diffidently.
“The other girls were wild for them, but I cannot say I saw much in them. There was something engaging there, to be sure, but at the end I always rather felt that some extremely silly people had been rewarded far beyond their desserts, and that a great deal of what had transpired beggared credulity.”
“I understand you,” Elizabeth assured her.
“I enjoy a bit of fancy as much as the next person, I think, but for me it must be dealt with a light hand or the tale must be almost entirely fanciful, else I cannot enjoy it. Too even a mixture of the mythic and the mundane leaves me torn between the two, unable to settle. And you may despise me for it if you dare,” she said confidentially, “but I cannot abide a stupid lady served up as someone I ought to admire and envy! Faugh! Give me a witty, sensible heroine and I will read of her a dozen times over rather than seek novelty in swooning misses.”
Miss Bingley leant forwards slightly and, in a similarly confiding tone, said, “I have never swooned in my life, not even when I learnt of my parents’ deaths.
I cannot imagine doing so simply because some fellow may have proved himself unworthy of my regard.
Name me a novel where the heroine does nothing of the sort, Miss Elizabeth, and I shall read it as soon as ever I may. ”
Elizabeth laughed delightedly. “My dear Miss Bingley, I have half a dozen titles in mind. Pray allow me to consider them, and in a day or two, I shall name at least one I believe best suited to entertain you.”
“I look forward to it,” Miss Bingley declared sincerely.
They had been on the cusp of departing, having stayed only a little longer than they strictly ought, when Mrs Bennet distracted Charles with a question about Netherfield, claiming that it was something ‘dear Jane’ had wondered about when they learnt the place was to have tenants once more.
Caroline understood that the lady wished to keep her eldest daughter within his sight a little longer, and as Charles was perfectly happy to answer her while gazing upon Miss Bennet’s pretty, blushing face, she schooled herself to patience and examined the portrait which hung near the parlour door.
Its subject was a handsome woman of about five and thirty, clad in the heavy fashions of a century ago. She had dark hair and blue eyes and gazed out of the canvas with an expression that hinted at amusement.
“My grandfather’s grandmother, Philippa Catesby Bennet,” Miss Elizabeth commented, appearing at Caroline’s elbow.
“Daughter of a baronet and thus quite the most illustrious of my forebears. Her husband died only a few years into their marriage, and she ran the estate herself for almost twenty years until her eldest son came of age. She left no diaries, only account books, but I think she must have been rather remarkable.”
“I can only agree,” Caroline replied, studying the painting once more.
She had not the slightest notion who her grandfather’s grandmother had been.
It was likely she had been illiterate. It struck her powerfully that while her ancestors had been working the land, or fishing, or perhaps laying the stones of Scarborough, Miss Elizabeth’s had been here.
In this house, passing time in this room.
Marrying the daughters of baronets. Sitting for portraits.
Keeping account books. It was as keen an illustration of the disparity in their lineages as could be imagined.
She knew she would think often of that moment and its attendant revelation in the coming days and weeks, for it marked the addition of understanding to the acceptance of the reality of her family’s position which she had lately gained.