Chapter 2
Once again, the little runaway seemed to have disappeared, though with her small stature it must be easy enough for her to hide herself away when she wished.
The house itself had grown rather crowded, and he was forced to give up his search when the sonorous voice of the butler rang through the rooms announcing the arrival of the newlyweds.
He allowed the gathered throng to greet them before he stepped forward himself to do the same.
Darcy gave him a slap on the back and invited him to join them in enjoying the fantastical gathering of comestibles which Mrs. Bennet proudly crowed that her cook had been assisted in producing by Darcy’s own French chef from London.
Lingley gave his friend a dry look, to which Darcy responded with a shrug.
Plates appeared as they settled at a table in the sitting room beside many of the neighborhood ladies.
“Well, Darcy,” Lingley declared as he enjoyed a fine merlot, “I have never seen such a thing as your wedding day. Tell me, is this exchanging of cattle a common practice in Hertfordshire, or is it a northern idea?”
Darcy rolled his eyes, but his bright-eyed bride giggled brightly and asked, “Do you not pay a bride price where you are from?”
“No, indeed,” he replied. “In Kent, where my family has resided for many generations, the only exchange between marriage partners that I am aware of is the dowry. Though, to be truthful, this is the first wedding I have ever attended outside of London.”
“Ladies still have dowries,” Elizabeth assured him, “but the bride’s family is also paid the bride price, in exchange for the honor of her hand.”
“And what is the usual price of a bride in Meryton?” he teased.
“Well, everything depends on the perceived value of the bride to her beloved,” Jane replied, smiling winsomely at her husband.
“Is this only the gentry or do the common man do so as well?”
“All ladies hope to be of worth to their husbands. Even the tenants exchange a chicken or two for their wives. A tradesman, a pair of pigs or goats. For the landed gentleman, a more expensive animal is expected.”
“And yet they are all called cattle?”
“Yes, though I do not believe that anyone remembers why,” Darcy grumbled. “This is a common practice in Derbyshire as well. Perhaps it does come from the northern tribes of old. My mother, Lady Anne, was a six-cow wife as well. An unheard-of number in the area at the time.”
“My mother was a two-cow wife,” Elizabeth explained, humming with pleasure as she ate her trifle.
“Though Grandfather Gardiner gave the animals back to my Grandfather Bennet as he had no use for cattle as an attorney in Meryton; Grandpapa Bennet provided them with all the milk, butter, and cheese they wished for in recompense.”
“I am a three cow wife myself,” a lady interrupted from further down the table.
“My husband paid four cows for me,” another replied from across the table.
“Chickens,” Elizabeth whispered to them. “Sir William was a shopkeeper before he was knighted, and Sarah Winn, as was, was the daughter of the butcher.”
Linley snorted. “So truly it is the amount and not the value that matters? Surely that seems counterintuitive. Darcy might have bought 700 chickens instead of the sheep and saved himself a great deal of funds.”
“Oh no, the value matters, it is only that Lady Lucas is very sensitive about it all and the ladies of the district let her keep this polite fiction out of affection for her,” Jane explained softly, giving her sister a fondly reproachful look.
“Or because she bludgeoned them with it until they gave in,” Elizabeth grinned irrepressibly.
“So, Elizabeth’s six cows are the highest for the area?” Linley grinned at his friend. “Showing off a bit, old man?”
“Not at all,” Darcy demurred. “I would have paid much more to be able to marry my Elizabeth. Mr. Bennet did not haggle at all.”
“Haggle? You must haggle over your wife’s value as well?” He could not help the bark of laughter that burst forth.
“Oh, yes,” Bingley nearly exploded, over-excited as usual.
“I nearly lost my purse completely as I was so determined to prove Jane’s worth.
She told me to offer a single cow or two, and Bennet declared that as his most beautiful daughter, she was worth at least a dozen, and I did not know what to say, as I agreed with him.
He let me sweat for at least a quarter of an hour as I offered up to fifteen before he took pity on me and explained that I was supposed to negotiate down, not up. ”
“Oh dear,” Jane blushed at her father’s humor.
“It did not help that I had to speak to him before the entire town.” Bingley groaned and shuddered at the memory. “The teasing and taunting were unnerving.”
Jane comforted him with a soft hand and an even softer smile. “I thank you for your perseverance, dearest.”
“Mary-Hannah!” Mrs. Bennet screeched from outside the room. “Where is that girl? She is as foolish as she is plain! Mary!”
Elizabeth and Jane shared a look before their father’s sardonic voice attempted to make light of it all by raising his voice and saying, “Mrs. Bennet has certainly locked the instrument, or she would be there, most likely. Though to our detriment or our joy, I would not venture to guess.”
The neighbors laughed like it was a very good joke, but only Lingley noticed the flash of brown muslin which whisked out of the room from the direction of the window enclosure where Mary had apparently been hiding with the book she carried in her hands.
He frowned at the hurt he could see before she hid her face from their notice.
It was obvious that even the more acceptable members of the family discounted her worth, and against his will, his protective instincts were aroused.
“Mary-Hannah, this is your younger sister, Mrs. Darcy?” he asked, wondering what she would say.
“Yes, she is the middle Bennet girl. She is very intelligent and well-read and, as Papa mentioned, enjoys the piano-forte.” She winced as she spoke, making him wonder if she was prevaricating or merely embarrassed by her parents.
“She is often declared to be the most accomplished young lady in the district,” Jane added. “She, er, speaks, well, she knows several languages.”
“Mary? Mary-Hannah?” a woman who had obviously had too much to drink hee-hawed a laugh. “You mean that little shadow that comes into Meryton once in a while for a spool of thread? Always in the drabbest of colors?”
The ladies tittered, and another called out, “She has a face like a stone, never a smile that one!”
“And she looks as if she has missed too many meals!”
“She is merely slight,” Jane insisted softly. “My Grandmama Bennet was the same.”
He immediately regretted asking at all. If the poor girl was nearby, she could not help but be hurt by the words of her neighbors.
Even her elder sisters’ defense was lukewarm at best. Were they all blind?
Was beauty only to be found in the blond and statuesque, like her eldest sister?
He wondered if Elizabeth too was thought plain for her darker looks.
No, he decided. No one could have such confidence as she had if she was told all her life that she was ugly. Only look at Miss Mary!
“I would bet my allowance that she never marries,” the Colonel declared, eyeing the Bennet matron who had come to search the room for her wayward daughter.
Fed up, Lingley snapped, “I would take that bet!”
“Ha!” he barked, “Shall we say ￡1000? Easiest money I never earned!”
“Fitz!” Darcy muttered. “I did not think your pockets were so deep as to allow that!”
“It is a sure win, Darce!” he crowed. “I could have bet ￡10,000 and been safe.”
“Gentlemen,” Jane frowned, recalling them to their surroundings.
“I do apologize, Mrs. Bingley,” Lingley winced. “This was not the time nor place for such talk. We will save it for the club.”
∞∞∞
Mary stood in the hall enclosure and stifled her sobs.
She did not know why their words pierced her heart so deeply.
Her mother had been calling her plain and unmarriageable for years, and it had never hurt as this had, hearing the handsome gentleman place a wager on her lack of prospects.
She knew that some gentlemen would bet on anything.
There was a story from town that two Lords at White’s had been wagering huge sums on which drop of rain on the window would reach the bottom first, this was little different and much more certain, as Colonel Fitzwilliam had declared.
She supposed she had expected better of him, though Lord knew why.
Of course, he would see her as an object of pity and ridicule, everyone did in her experience.
She allowed herself five minutes of self-pity and then dried her eyes and slipped, silent as a shadow, down to the kitchens to fetch the tea tray, certain that was what her mother had wanted her for in the first place.