CHAPTER 3
Elizabeth came at last to the entrance of Longbourn, upon whose grounds stood the modest house that had sheltered five generations of Bennets.
The line, unhappily, was to end with the present Mr. Bennet, for his eldest daughter could not inherit the estate; and so, in the manner of such families, it stood entailed away to the nearest male relation, one who bore the name of Bennet by no more than the accident of blood.
It was no small irony that the last of the Bennets to hold Longbourn should be, of all his line, the most liberal in his opinion of what a woman might accomplish, a conviction he was fond of illustrating by reference to his second daughter.
Elizabeth paused a moment beneath the modest, faux-Roman columns that framed the door, and considered her home with no small tenderness.
Its very aspect filled her with comfort and a sense of safety she could not have put easily into words.
For all her mother's nerves, her youngest sisters' high spirits, Mary's earnest solemnity, Jane's unfailing sweetness, and her father's habitual indolence, Elizabeth could not conceive of Longbourn without them, nor endure with any composure the thought of the day it must pass into the hands of a Mr. Collins; she could only hope her father's health would be spared them for many years yet.
Elizabeth opened the wide doors and drew a steadying breath, well aware of what awaited her the moment she set foot, dust and all, into the family's favourite parlour.
She had scarcely crossed the threshold before her mother's voice reached her.
"Why, Elizabeth! Is that you, come back from Meryton at last? Come here, child!" Mrs. Bennet came forward and seized her daughter's hand. "What can have kept you so long? Whom did you see? Did you go to Mrs. Smith's? What have you brought back?"
"Good afternoon, Mama. Yes, we did call at Mrs. Smith's.
I have several things to show you presently.
Charlotte and I went first to Mr. Miles's, where she purchased a book for John, and from there to Mrs. Smith's.
But on our way we met my aunt Phillips, who tells us that a regiment of militia is to be stationed just outside Meryton this summer. "
"The militia! Good heavens! This very summer?"
Elizabeth inclined her head, suppressing with some effort the frown that threatened to overtake her countenance. "Yes, Mama. They are already beginning to arrive, and are to be stationed just outside the town."
"Oh, Lizzy! I can scarcely credit it! Arriving already, and no word of warning!
What a very fine thing indeed! Our own Meryton, with a militia!
Girls, girls! Do you hear? We are to have a militia!
" Mrs. Bennet's delight was not to be contained, her mind leaping at once to the pleasing prospect of so many unattached young men descending upon the neighbourhood, and, if fortune favoured her, a colonel among them, which would be a very fine thing indeed.
Being mother to five unmarried daughters, and their father's estate entailed away from them all, Mrs. Bennet had long occupied herself with little else than securing her girls' futures by the only means available to her, a good marriage.
She had herself been raised outside the gentry, the daughter of a country attorney, and had recommended herself to a young Mr. Bennet chiefly by a pretty face, so that he had proposed within three days of their acquaintance and married her within the fortnight.
He had discovered soon enough, and to his lasting resignation, that his young wife's understanding was as slight as her person was pleasing, and that her nerves were to become the frequent and familiar companions of his domestic hours.
Having delivered her news, Mrs. Bennet turned at once to the surest audience for it, her youngest daughters.
Kitty and Lydia received the intelligence with transports of joy in which their mother was not slow to join.
Mary, absorbed in a chapter of Fordyce's Sermons to Young Women, appeared not to hear it, or else declined to be diverted from her reading.
Jane alone turned her sweet countenance toward Elizabeth, and Elizabeth answered with the lift of a single eyebrow, a look that passed between the two sisters more eloquently than any words, for none knew Elizabeth's mind so well as Jane, who returned her look with a small, knowing shake of the head, well aware that her sister took no pleasure in their mother's raptures.
***
Grateful for once for her mother's distraction, Elizabeth slipped quietly from the parlour and made her way down the oak-panelled hall, hung with the portraits of Bennets long since gone, the carpet beneath her feet worn thin by generations of use the family's means had never quite permitted them to renew.
At its end she came to a heavy, finely carved door, upon which she knocked, and was bid to enter.
Within, the room held its familiar scent of worn pages and pipe-smoke, the candles burning low against the gathering dusk.
Her father sat near a low fire in his great worn chair, his hair touched with grey, his side-whiskers thick, a book open in his hand and his spectacles perched upon his nose.
Elizabeth had always privately called it his scholarly figure, neither stout nor spare, and she smiled to find him so.
"Well, Lizzy, how does Meryton go on?"
"Meryton does very well, Papa, save for one unlooked-for addition."
Mr. Bennet lifted his eyes from his book, and Elizabeth knew she had secured his attention., "How very mysterious."
"Mysterious indeed, Papa. I saw a number of redcoats on my walk into town with Charlotte, and my aunt Phillips tells me a militia is to be stationed just outside Meryton this summer."
"A militia, at Meryton? That is strange," said Mr. Bennet, raising a brow at his daughter before his gaze wandered, inevitably, back to his page.
"So I thought as well. What can have brought them here, do you suppose, Papa?"
"I could not say, my dear, but I daresay they have their reasons." And with that, his head bent once more to his reading.
"Charlotte and I thought much the same," Elizabeth said, wandering a few steps about the room, lost in thought.
"Hm," was all the reply she received, her father once more entirely absorbed in his book.
After a length of companionable silence, she withdrew, and rather than return to the parlour, went up to her own room to arrange her purchases and change out of her walking dress.
A knock came at her door. "Come in," she called, and Jane entered, closing the door softly behind her before settling upon the edge of the bed, watching her sister sort through her parcels at the writing desk.
"It is a curious thing, is it not, Lizzy, that the militia should come to Meryton? The wars with Bonaparte are over, and I have heard nothing of any trouble worsening in the East."
"No more have I, Jane. I confess I find it altogether singular that we should have a militia stationed so near us."
"You are uneasy about it; I can see as much. What is it that troubles you?" Janes asked, with a look of concern upon her brow.
Elizabeth set down the length of ribbon she had been winding and looked up. Jane, as ever, read her better than she could have explained herself. "I hardly know how to name it. Relief, I think, in part, and yet some disquiet besides."
"But why disquiet, Lizzy? What is there in a regiment's arrival to trouble you so?"
"It is not the officers I fear will misbehave, though I do not doubt some among them will fail of perfect gentility.
It is rather the men who have already seen battle that weigh on my mind.
I have read of soldiers returning from the Continent much altered, not in body only, but in spirit; wounds that leave no mark to be seen, and yet do not heal so readily as we might wish.
I cannot like the thought of sending such men to fight again, nor of training new recruits to follow after them. "
"Surely it cannot be so very bad,” Jane reasoned. “War, I imagine, is a dreadful thing, but it has been some years now since the fighting ended. Surely those who suffered by it are recovered."
"You are all goodness, Jane, and it is much to your credit that you have never troubled yourself with Papa's volumes on the subject.
I have been rather too curious for my own peace of mind, and have read whatever I could find concerning the war and its aftermath.
If these men are indeed being prepared to sail for battles in the East, I confess it troubles me, both for the new recruits, and for any battle-worn soldier who might come to make his home among us. "
"Have you spoken to Papa of it?" Jane asked.
Elizabeth shook her head, "I have, but he does not appear troubled."
"Then perhaps it is not so very much to fear. If Papa does not consider it a danger to Meryton, surely we need not either." Jane said thoughtfully.
Although, Elizabeth still felt an uneasiness about it, unconsciously biting her bottom lip in thought, "I do not know, Jane."
Jane pushed her sister further, "What can you have read, to leave you with such an impression?"
Elizabeth looked to Jane with a frank expression, "Things I would rather not repeat, for I should not wish to distress you. I will only say that I believe even the best of men may be grievously wounded by war, and that men who have been hurt do not always leave others unhurt in turn."
"Can it truly be so very bad?" Jane asked softly.
"It may be. I cannot say for certain. If Papa is not troubled, then perhaps I ought not to be either, and yet I cannot entirely help it."
"But if, as you say, they are training men for battles so far away, then surely those recruits must be new to soldiering altogether. Those who already fought Bonaparte would have no need of further training."
Elizabeth knew her eldest sister was attempting to bring her solace, and she appreciated the effort, but was not entirely convinced at Jane’s reasoning, "Perhaps. I cannot be certain."
"I think we ought not to distress ourselves overmuch, Lizzy. We know that any man is capable of good or ill, and I am persuaded the regiment coming to Meryton will be composed chiefly of good men, under a colonel mindful of his duty toward them. I am sure all will be well."
"Jane, you are goodness itself." Elizabeth rose and crossed the room to embrace her sister, who laughed and returned the embrace warmly.
"Now you must not make yourself uneasy," Jane said, smiling, before turning the subject with her usual gentleness. "What did you find at Mrs. Smith's? Did you happen to see the blue thread I have been wanting?"
"I found a few new colours, and a pattern I mean to try, since Lydia has contrived to misplace my last one." Elizabeth's eyes lifted briefly at this, and Jane's answering look told her the sentiment was well understood between them. "But I am afraid I did not see your blue."
"No matter, thank you for looking all the same.
" Jane rose, crossed to her sister, and kissed her cheek.
Elizabeth smiled, and, rising in turn, followed Jane out into the passage, where the two made their way down to join the rest of the family, that Elizabeth might display her purchases from Mrs. Smith's for her mother and sisters to admire.