Chapter 24
Twenty-Four
As the Darcy carriage quitted Longbourn, its occupants intent upon enjoying the first hours of a union founded upon mutual affection, another was being loaded at Rosings, some fifty miles to the south.
Lady Catherine had been in a state of high indignation since the moment her rector laid the intelligence before her.
That he had not conveyed it sooner was, in her estimation, a failure bordering upon negligence, and she had not scrupled to tell him so—at considerable length—despite his repeated assurances that he had only that morning received the information himself.
Such excuses, she declared, might satisfy others; they did not satisfy her.
“You should have known that your cousin was capable of drawing him in, and warned both him and myself against her designs,” she informed him at last. “Pray do not attempt to excuse yourself by pleading ignorance. You saw her with him in Hertfordshire, and again here in April—you ought to have understood what was passing under your own roof.”
Having at last concluded her reprimand of the rector, Lady Catherine turned her attention to making her plans.
At first she resolved to proceed directly into Hertfordshire and put an end to the business without delay.
Orders were issued with such imperious force as to admit of no pause; yet her frequent reversals rendered them nearly useless, and the servants, in their efforts to obey, came near to undoing one another entirely.
Anne de Bourgh, who had never wished to marry her cousin—or indeed anyone—at last asserted herself in a manner wholly unexpected. Declaring the entire scheme a fool’s errand, she refused to accompany her mother.
“I would rather remain precisely as I am than be carried about the country to secure a husband I do not want—nor one who does not want me in return,” she said, with a calm that admitted no contradiction.
“We have both told you we will not marry; to attempt to compel him into obedience is, I think, a fruitless pursuit—and one in which I shall have no part.”
She then retired to her room and locked the door.
There she occupied herself in writing letters, which she intended to dispatch the moment Lady Catherine was safely upon the road; and, for once, her delicate spirits seemed perfectly equal to her purpose.
The quiet instructions she gave for her phaeton to be readied were executed with far greater efficiency than the many contradictory commands issuing from below.
Within doors and without, servants hurried to pack and prepare; but it was long past noon before the carriage was at last brought round, and Lady Catherine, still in full possession of her displeasure, was assisted inside.
Yet as she travelled upon the London road and drew near to Bromley, her thoughts—far from cooling—settled into a new and, to her mind, more judicious design.
It would not do to act without first consulting her brother.
As the head of the Fitzwilliam family, his authority must prevail; and he could not fail to see the advantage of uniting Pemberley and Rosings.
Indeed, if her nephew were in town, as she now strongly suspected, she would not have him imagine he might dispose of himself without her knowledge.
“We shall go to London first,” she declared suddenly, tapping the side of the carriage with her cane. “There has been quite enough done without proper guidance. My brother will assist me in making my nephew see reason.”
At Bromley, where the horses were changed, she confirmed the alteration with decisive brevity: they would remain the night in town and call the next day at both Matlock House and Darcy House.
That it was the height of summer, and that such houses were very likely empty, did not trouble her in the least.
Accordingly, when she arrived at Matlock House and found the knocker removed from the door, she did not permit so trifling an obstacle to deter her.
Commanding her footman to knock regardless, she stood close behind him, and when his efforts proved insufficient to her expectations, employed her cane upon the panel herself.
“Knock again,” she said sharply. “You cannot suppose my brother has abandoned his house entirely.”
After several minutes—during which her displeasure increased in exact proportion to the delay—the door was at last opened just far enough to admit a narrow view of the butler.
“Why has the door not been answered in a more expeditious manner?” Lady Catherine demanded at once.
“I have been standing here an unconscionable length of time—at my father’s house, no less.
Now stand aside. I wish to see my brother, and you will send for refreshments.
I have matters of the first consequence to lay before him. ”
“Lord Matlock is not in London,” the butler intoned, not moving from where he stood. “My orders are that no one is to be admitted at present.”
“This was my father’s house,” she insisted, her voice rising and drawing attention from those around her, even if she did not observe it. “You cannot refuse me entry.”
Lady Catherine fixed the butler with the sort of look that had sent servants at Rosings scurrying for years, but this was not Rosings, and he did not so much as lower his eyes.
For several long moments, she glared at him in offended silence.
Then her mouth compressed, her chin lifted, and her fingers tightened about the head of her cane.
“Very well, then,” Lady Catherine said, her words clipped and cold. “I shall know how to act.”
That said, she took her seat in the carriage and bade her coachman drive on to Darcy House, situated but a short distance away on Park Lane.
There, the scene was repeated: the knocker was down, the servants were slow to answer her imperious summons, and, despite all her bluster, she was once again denied admittance.
Resigned—though more incensed than before—she repaired to the Clarendon, where she secured a room for the night, much to her displeasure, and resolved to set out for Hertfordshire the following morning.
Shortly after her departure from each house, letters were dispatched to their respective masters to inform them of what had passed at their doors.
Though many of the neighbouring houses stood closed, there were still servants about, and a few others besides who bore witness to the scene.
Few recognised Lady Catherine—she had not appeared in society for more than two decades—but the tale was repeated with great relish among the servants and, in more than one instance, carried to the ladies of those houses, and even to a gentleman or two.
Thus the story of Lady Catherine, her imperious demands—and her ignominious failure to gain admittance to her brother’s and nephew’s homes—soon made its rounds, growing in relish with every retelling, with no small degree of satisfaction among those who heard it.
Thursday, 13 August 1812
The following morning, Lady Catherine rose at the unusually early hour—for her—of half-past eight, rather than her customary ten o’clock.
Nothing in her preparations proceeded with the promptness she required; the maid sent from the inn to assist her was reproved twice for her slowness in attending to her dressing.
Even the proprietor himself was summoned to answer for a delay of several minutes in bringing the carriage to the door. “Do you imagine, sir, that I am to be kept waiting whilst every other guest is attended before me?” Lady Catherine demanded.
She had been obliged—most improperly to her mind—to wait whilst other carriages were boarded before her own was brought round, as though her convenience were to be placed on equal footing with that of any other guest. She had given orders, shortly before descending, that her carriage be made ready with all possible expediency; yet even this simple command had not secured her the precedence to which she was so evidently entitled as the daughter of an earl.
Thus, after a morning of mounting impatience, she at last took her seat in the carriage, ready to depart for Hertfordshire.
Once within her carriage, she directed her coachman to proceed northward to the village of Meryton—a place she was quite certain must be of the smallest consequence, given those who resided there—determined to learn what she could of her nephew and of the young woman who had dared to engage herself to him.
From Mr Collins, she knew that Mr Darcy was likely to be at an estate called Netherfield, and that the Bennet family resided at Longbourn.
Lady Catherine resolved to call first upon Miss Elizabeth Bennet, confident that her arguments would prevail upon that obstinate young lady to relinquish her nephew from this so-called engagement.
In the spring, when the young lady had been at Rosings, Lady Catherine had nearly found her admirable—or, at the very least, so different from those who usually surrounded her as to seem almost refreshing.
It was most unusual for anyone to argue with her, yet Elizabeth Bennet had done so with a vigour Lady Catherine had not before encountered.
She would never have owned it aloud, yet she grudgingly respected her for it, even as she remained firmly resolved to put an end to what she considered a most improper marriage.
She carried in her reticule a bank draft for ten thousand pounds, and though it might not, in truth, be worth the paper upon which it was written, she was determined to have her way by whatever means were required.
If she could convince the young lady to take the draft, it would only prove her unworthiness to Darcy, and she had little doubt that she would be successful.
Once she had persuaded that chit to release him, she would discover where he was to be found and compel him to return with her to Rosings, there to fulfil his duty by marrying her daughter, Anne—after which she would install the young couple at Pemberley and leave Rosings to be managed as she saw fit.