Chapter Twenty-Five
Netherfield
Darcy
“Jane is a lovely girl,” Mrs. Hurst began after the Bennet ladies had departed and the rest of the household had settled to dinner. “But that Miss Eliza is something of a character.”
Darcy, still full from the luncheon at Colonel Forster's, had settled for little more than soup and wine.
He was beginning to regret the choice, for this line of conversation resembled too many he had heard Bingley's sisters indulge in before, and he suspected he would need something considerably stronger than wine to endure it with patience.
“I thought I was the only one who noticed,” Miss Bingley said, pausing with her spoon halfway to her mouth.
“Jane is certainly beautiful, I grant you, though a little unrefined, as one might expect from a girl who has spent nearly all her life in the country. As for Miss Elizabeth, she is forward, opinionated, and entirely too pleased with her own cleverness for a young woman of her connexions.”
“Her connexions are perfectly respectable,” Bingley said, setting down his spoon with rather more force than the observation required. “And since we are speaking of the Bennets, I may as well tell you both plainly what I have been meaning to say for some time. I intend to marry Jane.”
Mrs. Hurst's brows rose sharply. “Surely you are joking, Charles.”
“I am not.”
“You have scarcely known her a month!” Mrs. Hurst stared at her brother in astonishment.
“The family has nothing whatever to recommend it. No connexions worth mentioning, a mother whose manners would disgrace a much lower household, and three younger sisters who behave as though they have never once been properly checked.”
“I am not marrying her mother or her sisters.” Bingley's usual good humour remained, but there was a firmness beneath it Darcy had seldom heard directed towards his sisters.
“I have never met a woman I admire half so much as Jane, and I do not intend to be talked out of it over dinner. I have not proposed to her yet, nor do I mean to for a little while. I should like our courtship to continue as it has before I ask her to make anything settled between us, but my own mind is made up. I tell you now because you are my sisters, and I thought you ought to know my intentions.”
Mrs. Hurst stared at him for a long moment before turning towards Darcy. “Surely, Mr. Darcy, you will speak some sense to your friend? He will listen to you, if he will listen to no one else.”
Darcy, who had been aware of the courtship but certainly not of Bingley's intention to propose, took a sip of wine as he regarded the sisters.
He was privately pleased that his friend had made up his mind without first consulting him.
Bingley had always placed considerable value upon Darcy's opinion, sometimes more than Darcy thought was good for him, but of late he had begun making his own decisions without feeling it necessary to seek Darcy's approval first.
Darcy liked the change exceedingly well.
“Whom Bingley chooses to love or marry is not my business to direct,” Darcy replied, setting down his glass.
“But since you ask my opinion plainly, I am inclined to support him. Miss Bennet comes from a respectable family. Her father is a sensible and well-read gentleman, and I have observed nothing in Miss Bennet herself which does not speak well of her.”
Miss Bingley's mouth curved into something between a smile and a sneer. “You appeal to the wrong man if you expect him to speak sense to Charles, Louisa. Can you not see how Mr. Darcy himself behaves whenever Miss Elizabeth is present?”
Darcy's gaze settled upon her at this. He had half expected Bingley's sisters to draw him into the argument sooner or later, and now that they had done so, he braced himself for whatever might follow.
“I begin to think Mrs. Bennet has managed matters remarkably well,” Caroline continued. “One daughter has secured Charles's attention, while another appears determined upon Mr. Darcy’s. Perhaps the Bennet ladies have simply set their sights upon both eligible gentlemen at Netherfield.”
“I do not see it that way in the least,” Darcy said, though something beneath the evenness of his voice had grown considerably colder.
“No, I do not suppose you would.” Miss Bingley's smile sharpened.
“Though I confess I cannot understand what you find so remarkable in Miss Elizabeth particularly. She carries herself as though she believes herself something quite out of the common way, and yet everyone can see that she is not even the beauty of the family, whatever airs she gives herself.”
“Miss Elizabeth gives herself very few airs,” Bingley interrupted.
Miss Bingley ignored him. “I have heard, in fact, that there was once another young woman in Meryton who resembled her so closely that the two were sometimes mistaken for sisters. Julia, I believe her name was.”
Darcy's attention sharpened perceptibly.
“Julia Harding,” Mrs. Hurst supplied. “I remember someone mentioning her at Lucas Lodge.”
“Yes, that was it. Miss Harding.” Caroline took another sip of wine. “Indeed, someone at Lucas Lodge claimed that, although she and Miss Elizabeth were remarkably alike, Miss Harding was generally considered the prettier of the two
Mrs. Hurst gave a small laugh. “I cannot imagine Miss Elizabeth enjoyed the comparison.”
“Nor can I.” Caroline's smile held a trace of satisfaction.
“A young woman so conscious of her own charms cannot have been delighted to find herself continually compared with a prettier friend. And then, rather conveniently, Miss Harding disappears from the neighbourhood altogether.” She lifted one shoulder.
“One ought not to give too much credit to gossip, of course, but it does make one wonder whether Miss Elizabeth's jealousy had some part in the suddenness of her friend's departure. Perhaps their celebrated devotion was rather more one-sided than Meryton chooses to remember.”
Darcy's spoon stopped halfway to his mouth.
He lowered it slowly, displeasure rising with such force that he was obliged to measure his response before speaking.
“I have not heard that account, and I confess I find it difficult to credit. I understand Miss Harding left Hertfordshire following a serious illness, not any quarrel with Miss Elizabeth. Surely your own sources, whatever they were, would have told you as much, had they troubled to mention the whole of it rather than the part more convenient to repeat.”
Miss Bingley's smile faltered. “You appear remarkably well informed on the subject, Mr. Darcy.”
“I have spoken with Miss Elizabeth of her friend.”
There was nothing in the admission that required concealment, nor was it a lie.
Though Darcy had read the letters Elizabeth intended for Miss Harding, Elizabeth herself had spoken to him of Julia upon Oakham Mount, and he had no reason to pretend otherwise.
Yet Miss Bingley's expression altered sufficiently to tell him that the intimacy implied by such a conversation had not escaped her.
“I see,” she said after a moment. “Then I daresay you have been given a considerably fuller history than the rest of us.”
“On a matter concerning Miss Elizabeth's closest friend, I should think Miss Elizabeth herself a more reliable authority than neighbourhood gossip.”
“I daresay you would.”
“I would.”
A brief silence followed.
Mr. Hurst, who had thus far shown considerably greater interest in his dinner than in anything being said around him, looked up from his plate. “I like the Bennets well enough myself. The younger one, Kitty, is it? She has a very fine laugh.”
Mrs. Hurst turned such a look upon her husband that even Hurst appeared to understand its meaning. He returned to his dinner without further comment.
Bingley reached for his wine with the unmistakable relief of a man who wished the subject finished. “Well, whatever anyone else thinks of it, I have said what I meant to say. I intend to marry Jane, if she will have me, and I do not intend to argue the matter further tonight.”
Mrs. Hurst gave an exasperated sigh, while Miss Bingley's expression suggested that Bingley had announced not a potential marriage, but a catastrophe.
Bingley drank from his glass before turning deliberately towards Darcy. “Forster means to have the officers out for a shooting party before the month is done. I told him you would likely be persuaded to join us.”
Darcy accepted the change of subject gladly enough, and within minutes Bingley had succeeded in drawing the conversation towards shooting and the merits of several neighbouring estates.
Darcy contributed when required, but his thoughts returned more than once to the conversation just ended.
Julia Harding's name had been spoken at Netherfield.
That alone ought not to have troubled him. Elizabeth had never concealed her friendship with Julia, and there was nothing extraordinary in a neighbourhood remembering a young woman who had lived among them and then departed unexpectedly.
What troubled him was how instinctively he had defended Elizabeth's account, and how easily he might have said more.
There were now two histories of Julia Harding in his possession. One Elizabeth had entrusted to him herself upon Oakham Mount, believing him entirely ignorant of her friend. The other had come to him months before, through letters never intended for his eyes.
Tonight, he had relied upon the first to conceal the second.
It was not a lie.
Darcy reminded himself rather severely that this did not necessarily make it honest.
~
The gentlemen retired unusually early that evening, the long afternoon at Colonel Forster's having left even Bingley disinclined to prolong the day. Mr. Hurst followed not long afterwards, leaving Caroline and Louisa together in the drawing room.
For several minutes Caroline said nothing. She had been unusually quiet since dinner, turning over a thought which had first presented itself as no more than an irritation and had since become something considerably more troublesome.
“Louisa,” she said at last, once they were alone, “did you notice what Mr. Darcy said at dinner?”
“I am rather more concerned with what Charles said.” Mrs. Hurst looked up from the fire. “Of all the young women he might have met in London, with families and connexions suitable to his own, he means to settle upon the daughter of an obscure country gentleman.”
“I cannot believe he will actually do it.” Caroline shook her head. “He has known her scarcely a month. Once we return to town and he is among sensible society again, I daresay he will recover himself.”
“He seemed remarkably decided for a man expected to recover himself.”
Caroline frowned at that unwelcome observation. “Charles has always been easily carried away. But I was speaking of Mr. Darcy. Did you hear what he said about Miss Harding?”
“Mr. Darcy said several things at dinner. You will have to be more particular.”
“He knew why she left Hertfordshire. He knew she had been ill, and he knew there had been no quarrel between her and Miss Eliza.”
“He told you how. Miss Eliza spoke to him of her.”
“Yes.” Caroline's frown deepened. “So he said.”
Louisa regarded her more closely. “Surely you do not imagine Mr. Darcy lied about it?”
“No, of course not. That is not what troubles me.” Caroline rose and crossed towards the fire. “After I first heard Miss Harding mentioned at Lucas Lodge, I had some enquiries made. I wanted to know whether there was any truth in what had been said of her resemblance to Miss Eliza.”
Mrs. Hurst laughed. “Of course you did.”
“There is nothing amusing in wishing to know whether a story is true.”
“Not at all. Particularly when the story concerns a woman Mr. Darcy admires.”
Caroline ignored this. “Miss Harding did not merely leave Hertfordshire. She was taken to Somerset.”
Mrs. Hurst's brow furrowed, plainly confused by what her sister was implying. “And?”
Caroline turned. “Where was Mr. Darcy when Charles wrote asking him to come to Netherfield?”
There was a brief silence.
“Somerset,” Louisa said at last.
“Precisely.”
“Caroline, Somerset is a county, not a drawing room. Two people may occupy it without ever setting eyes upon one another.”
“I am perfectly aware of that.”
“Then I cannot imagine what you are suggesting.”
“That is precisely what vexes me. I do not know.” Caroline began to pace slowly before the fire. “But there are too many peculiarities in Mr. Darcy's behaviour for me to believe there is nothing behind them.”
Louisa's amusement returned. “You are determined to discover a mystery because Mr. Darcy admires a woman you do not.”
“Admires her?” Caroline stopped and stared at her sister. “Louisa, you have known Mr. Darcy nearly as long as I have. How often have you seen him behave towards a woman as he has behaved towards Miss Elizabeth?”
Mrs. Hurst did not immediately answer.
“At the assembly, Sir William spoke her name and Mr. Darcy looked at her as though he had been struck. I saw it. He stared at her.”
“Perhaps he thought her pretty.”
“Mr. Darcy has seen pretty women before.”
“Then perhaps he thought her very pretty.”
Caroline gave her an impatient look. “Within minutes he asked her to dance.”
“He has danced before.”
“Three sets, Louisa.”
That silenced her sister for another moment.
Caroline returned to her chair. “Mr. Darcy, who can pass an entire evening in a ballroom without troubling himself to smile at half the women introduced to him, comes directly from Somerset into Hertfordshire and, upon his first introduction to an unknown country girl, dances three sets with her. Since then he has called repeatedly at Longbourn, sought her company whenever they meet, walked with her, danced with her again at Lucas Lodge, and apparently received confidences concerning this particular friend of hers.”
“When you arrange everything in that order, I grant you it sounds curious.”
“I have arranged nothing. Those are the facts.”
Louisa considered her for a moment. “And what do you suppose they mean?”
Caroline was silent.
That was the difficulty. She could see the pieces plainly enough, but she could not discover how they fitted together.
“I do not know,” she admitted at last. “But I no longer believe Mr. Darcy's interest in Miss Elizabeth began at the Meryton assembly.”
Mrs. Hurst gave a short laugh. “Then where do you imagine it began?”
“Somerset.” Caroline looked into the fire, dissatisfied even as she said it. “Perhaps he encountered Miss Harding there. Perhaps she spoke of Miss Elizabeth to him, or perhaps there is some other connexion I have not yet discovered. I do not know.”
“And you mean to discover it?”
Caroline's gaze returned to the flames. “I should very much like to.”
And that, she thought, was reason enough to begin.