CHAPTER 12
A Proper Gift
Mr. Darcy’s note came two mornings after Elizabeth had resolved that Cotton Lane should be inspected, and was so exactly what a professional letter ought to be that she read it first with attention, and then again with pleasure.
It was not a long note. Mr. Darcy, she was beginning to discover, did not waste ink in proving himself clever where accuracy would do.
He had examined the papers sufficiently, he wrote, to perceive that Cotton Lane’s chief difficulties lay not in any single lease, but in the disagreement between written obligations and tolerated habit.
The repair clauses were uneven; Mr. Harding’s position required clarification; Mrs. Bell’s complaint of damp could not be judged from paper alone; old Mr. Greeves’s arrears had been indulged long enough to become almost a custom; and the yard behind number seven appeared to be used by persons whose legal right to it was, at best, indistinct.
Elizabeth sat back in her chair and smiled.
“Mrs. Doddridge.”
“Yes, miss.”
“Mr. Darcy has discovered Cotton Lane.”
Mrs. Doddridge, who was seated near the fire with a strip of grey braid in one hand and one of Pom-Pom’s little coats in the other, received this intelligence with the calm due to distant events.
“Yes, miss.”
“He says it must be inspected.”
“Yes, miss.”
“And he has found Harding.”
Mrs. Doddridge looked up.
“Has he, miss?”
“In the papers, I mean. Not bodily. Though I dare say the bodily discovery will follow, and prove less agreeable to Mr. Harding.”
“Yes, miss.”
Elizabeth returned to the note. It was a good hand, plain and firm, with no flourish beyond what the letters required.
Even that pleased her. She had grown up among men of business who wrote as though legibility were a moral principle; and while she had always found Mr. Hartwood’s rounded script comforting, and Mr. Beaker’s figures superior to most sermons in their power of discouraging sin, Mr. Darcy’s writing had a quality distinct from either.
It suggested attention held under command.
This was, perhaps, a great deal to conclude from an inspection of ink.
Still, Elizabeth concluded it.
The note recommended no alteration until the properties had been seen.
He suggested that she should not attend without a companion and that, if she desired to be present, Mr. Hartwood should be informed beforehand, so no tenant might afterwards pretend ignorance of the authority under which the inspection was made.
That was very proper.
Almost oppressively proper.
Elizabeth liked it extremely.
“He does not flatter,” she observed.
“No, miss.”
“He does not assume that because I own the place I understand it.”
“No, miss.”
“He also does not assume that because I am a young woman I cannot understand it.”
Mrs. Doddridge considered this with the degree of animation she usually reserved for a difficult buttonhole.
“No, miss.”
“That is rarer.”
“Yes, miss.”
Pom-Pom, who lay upon a cushion in his grey morning wrapper and had been watching the proceedings with one eye open, gave a faint huff, as if proper legal caution were all very well but could hardly justify disturbing a household before noon.
“You need not attend Cotton Lane,” Elizabeth told him.
Pom-Pom closed his eye again, relieved from public service.
Elizabeth drew paper toward her and began a reply.
Cotton Lane, though increasingly interesting, could wait until Thursday next.
It had endured bad leases, uncertain repairs, doubtful arrears, the weather, and Mr. Harding’s elastic recollection for longer than Elizabeth liked to contemplate; one more week could not materially bring down its walls.
Thursday would also allow Mr. Hartwood and Mr. Beaker to be informed, Mrs. Doddridge to prepare herself for a street unlikely to admire her, and Mr. Darcy to finish whatever preliminary notes he wished to make before being confronted with actual brick, damp, and humanity.
She wrote accordingly.
Mr. Darcy,
I am obliged by your observations on Cotton Lane, and agree that inspection must precede any alteration in the leases.
Mrs. Doddridge and I may attend on Thursday next, if that morning is consistent with your engagements.
I shall inform Mr. Hartwood and Mr. Beaker, that the matter may proceed with all necessary propriety.
She stopped there, sanded nothing, and read it over.
Excellent. Sober. Exact. A model of business correspondence.
Mrs. Marwood would not have objected to it. Mr. Beaker might even have approved, though he would probably have removed one comma on principle.
Elizabeth had just dipped her pen again when Mrs. Albright entered with another letter upon a small tray.
“From Longbourn, miss.”
Elizabeth looked up.
Mrs. Albright’s face, as always, gave no counsel. It was one of her finest qualities. She could announce death, dinner, fire, or a tradesman with the same calm evidence that these things had occurred and must now be managed.
“Thank you.”
Elizabeth took the letter, and all at once Cotton Lane, Mr. Harding, Thursday next, and the admirable arrangement of a professional morning retreated half a pace.
Jane’s hand.
She knew it immediately.
There were many letters from Longbourn which one opened as one might lift the lid from a basket in which some uncertain creature had been left too long.
Jane’s were not among them. Jane never wrote to seize, complain, accuse, or arrange.
Her letters had the gentleness of her person, and the danger of making Elizabeth feel more tender than was convenient.
She broke the seal.
My dearest Lizzy,
I do not know how to write what I wish to tell you without seeming happier than I ought, though I am very happy indeed.
The day is now fixed, and if nothing should occur to alter it, we are to be married on the second Thursday of next month.
Mama has scarcely been quiet since the matter was settled, Lydia and Kitty are in ecstasies, and Mary has said many serious and affectionate things which I am sure she means kindly, though I do not always understand them at first hearing.
My father says little, but I hope does not feel little, and Charles is as good as ever you believed him.
I wish very much that you were nearer me just now; and yet I will not say anything to press you toward Longbourn, because I know very well it cannot be comfortable to you in the present state of things, and I would not have you come where you cannot be easy merely because I love you.
But Charles intends, after the New Year, to come to town for some weeks, and I hope then we may see you very often.
If one home has ceased to suit you, I should be so glad if another might answer better.
Pray write soon, and tell me that you are well, and whether Lord Pomington has recovered his spirits after his great adventure.
Charles laughs at me for asking after the dog in the same letter in which I announce my marriage, but I say he is a very material part of your establishment and must therefore be included in all serious correspondence.
Ever your most affectionate,
Jane
Elizabeth folded the letter slowly.
Then she unfolded it and read the middle again.
I would not have you come where you cannot be easy merely because I love you.
There it was: Jane’s whole heart, in one line, offering affection without making a prison of it.
Longbourn had never known how to do that. Longbourn loved loudly, needed constantly, remembered advantage quickly, and called its claims feeling. Jane, somehow, had grown up in the middle of all that noise and learned to make room.
Elizabeth rose, crossed the room once, and came back.
Mrs. Doddridge did not ask. Mrs. Doddridge possessed, among her many forms of dull usefulness, the invaluable capacity to let feeling have its minute without chasing it about the carpet.
Pom-Pom sneezed.
Elizabeth looked down at him.
“You are fortunate,” she said. “You have no sisters to shame you by being consistently superior.”
Pom-Pom blinked once.
“No,” said Mrs. Doddridge.
“No. Only me.”
This answer restored Elizabeth’s balance more than sympathy could have done.
She sat again, Jane’s letter in her hand.
The wedding was fixed. Next month. The second Thursday.
Soon enough to make Mrs. Bennet insupportable, Lydia and Kitty wild, Mary improving, Mr. Bennet evasive, and Jane happy in a manner so quiet that half the household would mistake it for readiness to be interrupted.
Jane must have something.
Not money, which would say too little and invite too much discussion. Not lace, nor shawls, nor any pretty thing that might be worn once, admired twice, and then laid aside. Jane’s new life deserved something more durable: an article of use, beauty, and daily recurrence.
A tea service, Elizabeth decided.
Jane would pour from it in her own drawing-room. Mr. Bingley would admire it because Jane used it. Guests would see it without being assaulted by ornament. It would belong not to the wedding-day’s noise, but to the quiet mornings and ordinary kindnesses after it.
That was the right gift.
“Mrs. Doddridge,” said Elizabeth, with decision, “Jane must have silver.”
“Yes, miss.”
“A tea service, I think.”
“Yes, miss.”
“Not too large. She is not marrying a bishop.”
“No, miss.”
“Nor too small. Mr. Bingley is fond of company, and Jane will never refuse a guest if there is a chair and a cup in the house.”
“No, miss.”
“Handsome, but not foolish. Useful, but not plain. Good enough to last. And engraved simply.”
“Yes, miss.”
Elizabeth felt better immediately. Happiness, if respected, ought not to be answered merely by exclamation.
It ought to have weight, form, and use. Jane would have something of Elizabeth’s choosing in the life she was about to begin; not a gift for display, but for mornings, callers, confidences, and the small ceremonies by which a household becomes itself.
The question was where to go, what to choose, and how to avoid being praised into bad judgment by a man with silver to sell.