Chapter 12 #2
Before she could speak, they were interrupted by a servant knocking at the door.
“Mrs Gardiner, you are needed downstairs,” Mrs Hill said when she was admitted.
“Very well,” that lady said, then turned towards her niece one final time before leaving the room.
“Come join us downstairs, Jane, if you wish—but only if you can improve your attitude and behaviour towards your sister. If not, remain here, and consider which lady—Miss Bingley or your sister—has less reason to mislead you, and which has always acted as your friend.”
After her aunt left, Jane sank back onto the vanity stool as she had been when Mrs Gardiner first entered the room.
She remained there for several long minutes, considering her aunt’s words, before at last rising to open the locked drawer of her dresser.
It did not take long before the tears began again in earnest—sharp and angry as they slipped down her cheeks.
Before long, she rose and made her way to the bed, no longer able to hold herself upright. Nearly throwing herself across it in frustration, she allowed herself to sob out all that she had been holding back. At last, exhausted by her tears, she fell asleep.
The room was dimmer when she woke. For a time, she lay still, disoriented, before her thoughts returned. A part of her wondered why no one—particularly not Elizabeth—had come to seek her out.
In her hand, she still held the letter she had drawn from her drawer. Once again, she opened it carefully and read the next-to-last paragraph.
I cannot but feel for you, my dear Miss Bennet, in reflecting upon the closeness that we each once might have hoped for.
It had been my sincere wish that a closer connexion between our families might have taken place; yet in light of recent events, I fear such expectations must now be entirely relinquished.
It would grieve me exceedingly were you to depend upon prospects which circumstances have rendered so uncertain.
It had been strange to receive such a letter so unexpectedly.
The letter had arrived only a short time after her father had returned with Lydia, when the house had been in a state of great distress.
Jane had expected, at the very least, to hear from Elizabeth before then, yet she had received no reply to either of the letters she had sent to Derbyshire.
When the letter from Caroline Bingley arrived, Jane had seized upon it as the truth. It offered an explanation for Lizzy’s absence—something to account for what had otherwise made no sense—one that, however painful, at least explained what she had not understood before.
She recalled how Lizzy had told her of Mr Darcy’s proposal at Hunsford and thought that surely he would not willingly propose again after being so harshly rebuffed the first time.
After seeing Pemberley, perhaps Lizzy had begun to regret her refusal and had somehow persuaded Mr Darcy to offer again.
Miss Bingley had provided no details, only vague allusions to wrongdoing; yet surely that explained both Lizzy’s silence and the delay in their return after the receipt of her first letter.
The following day, letters from Lizzy and her uncle Gardiner had arrived; yet even after reading them, Jane could not reconcile what Caroline Bingley had said with what Lizzy had not said.
It did not make sense—no matter how she tried to reason it through—and so, when they arrived with not only Mr Darcy but Miss Darcy as well, Jane had not known what to think or how to act.
Regardless of how it had come about, Mr Darcy was here and appeared to be in earnest about marrying her.
Jane murmured the thought to herself, dimly aware of how it contradicted what she had said to her aunt earlier.
Despite her earlier words, it had been evident from what she had observed downstairs that he meant to marry her sister.
She had been foolish to have lent so much credit to the letter, particularly when she considered that it had been months since she had last heard from its writer.
After that late, ill-fated call at the Gardiners’ home, she had known that Caroline Bingley wished to have little to do with her, and was plainly directing her brother otherwise.
For her now to claim that she had ever desired a match between Jane and Mr Bingley was preposterous.
Yet she had been jealous—she could admit that much to herself—if only a little, at seeing how tenderly Mr Darcy behaved towards Elizabeth.
Even in the few minutes they had been together, their connexion had been apparent, and Jane knew her sister too well to truly believe she might have compromised any man.
Still, the shock of seeing the Darcys in her home had seemed to knock all sense from her, and she had allowed her hurt, her bitterness, and—although she scarcely wished to name it—her jealousy to take hold.
In that state, she had clung all the more tightly to Caroline Bingley’s letter, as though it might offer some explanation for what she could not otherwise reconcile.
Elizabeth’s engagement to Mr Darcy was astonishing; yet even more so when she considered that her sister had refused his proposal only months before, and had, before that, received an offer from Mr Collins—the heir of Longbourn—while Jane herself had never been the object of such an address.
All this had occurred while Jane herself had not been able to inspire even a single offer of courtship.
Mr Bingley had seemed so promising last autumn, yet in the end he had proved no different from those who had come before him.
He had left her without so much as a farewell; had allowed his sister to put an end to their connexion without protest, and without any attempt to renew it—leaving her to wonder whether he had ever truly intended to choose her at all.
Mr Bingley was not the first man to show her some interest, only to withdraw from it in the end.
She could not always blame her family, either.
Granted, she had not been in the best of dispositions in London this year, but on several occasions a man had paid her some attention only to drift off before long, leaving her alone.
At the time it had not troubled her, for she had not wanted to draw the attention of any gentleman, but the more she considered the matter, she realised that this spring was not the first time that had happened to her.
By contrast, Lizzy rarely had difficulty making friends at any event they attended, whether at home in Meryton or at the gatherings they attended with their aunt and uncle in London.
Even her cousins, who adored her at nearly all times, would readily leave Jane behind to join Lizzy in whatever activity she chose to engage them.
Others also seemed to enjoy her company.
When Jane had gone to London in January, it had still been Lizzy whom the former Charlotte Lucas had invited to Kent.
Jane was nearer to Charlotte’s own age, yet Charlotte had always preferred Lizzy’s company.
There were others who felt the same—or so Jane supposed—given how people seemed to gravitate towards her, both in the neighbourhood of Longbourn and in Meryton—while Jane herself was so easily overlooked.
Until now, Jane had never realised she felt as she did. She had been content to be admired, never questioning why she was not chosen. Still, she had struggled with some measure of uncertainty, and had not recognised until now that she… resented Lizzy for the attention she so naturally garnered.
The thought unsettled her, yet it brought with it a clarity she could not entirely ignore. She rose slowly and went to the vanity to wash away the traces of her tears; then, smoothing her gown with unsteady hands, she made her way towards the door after only a brief hesitation.
It did neither her nor her sister any favour for her to remain cloistered in her room. There was much she needed to sort through in her own mind, but for now she must put on her usual composure and show herself pleased for her sister.
With that resolve, she left her room and went downstairs, quieter than before, though no longer quite so sharp.