Chapter 66
Mary was silent the next morning at breakfast, and her aunt prudently did not press her to account for her distracted state.
Her experience with both Jane and Elizabeth had taught her that the best action to take with unhappy young women was often to do nothing at all.
So she contented herself with passing coffee in Mary’s direction, making no comment when it was politely refused; and when Mary declined to accompany her and the children on an excursion to the Park, she acquiesced graciously without fuss.
Chased from the breakfast table by servants impatient to clear it, Mary wandered into the drawing room, where she picked up her book and tried to read; but she could not settle.
Her mind returned again and again to the events of the previous night.
Why had she not spoken to Mr. Hayward when she had the chance?
A few well-chosen words might have made it clear she had not meant to suggest that Mr. Ryder’s company was essential to her.
If she could have got them out before Mr. Hurst’s unfortunate remarks, so much the better.
Afterwards, she had been too unhappy to speak.
Mr. Hayward had helped her into the Gardiners’ carriage in silence, his expression unreadable.
Again, she had said nothing. She would not make that mistake again.
When next he called, she must make sure she was alone with him for long enough to explain what had happened.
But then she recalled his warning that the press of business was likely to prevent his visiting for a while—what if he did not come for weeks?
She was considering the full horror of such a possibility when the doorbell rang downstairs.
She started up with surprise, her open book falling to the floor.
It was far too early for Mrs. Gardiner to have returned—was there any chance it might be Mr. Hayward?
She knew this was most unlikely, that he was certain at this hour to be at his office; but her hopes sprang up regardless.
Why should it not be him, he might be passing, perhaps some errand had brought him into Cheapside?
None of these were likely occurences, but when it was not Tom Hayward but Mr. Ryder who was announced, Mary’s spirits nevertheless fell like a stone.
“Mr. Ryder! We did not expect you so early. I’m afraid Mrs. Gardiner is out.”
Mary did her best not to reveal the disappointment that so unreasonably welled up within her, and it appeared she had succeeded, for Mr. Ryder seemed quite unaware of the degree to which his not being someone else had distressed her.
“I’m sorry to hear that. I had hoped this was the perfect moment for coffee.”
He gazed at her expectantly, but Mary was not sure she was equal to making polite conversation this morning—and especially not with Mr. Ryder.
“I’m afraid the servants are still clearing the breakfast things.”
“Then surely there must be a pot of coffee quite close to hand?”
He spoke with his usual good nature, but was plainly determined not to be refused.
“It need only be a very small cup, you know. And I am quite happy to drink it lukewarm.”
Mary wavered. She could not send him away, not after such a plea.
It would be easier to entertain him than to eject him, and it need only be for a very short while.
She called for coffee, and soon Mr. Ryder was exactly where he had wanted to be, confidently established on Mrs. Gardiner’s best sofa with the Chinese yellow chintz.
“I have come to see how you enjoyed the dinner last night, Miss Bennet.”
“Very much, sir. It was a most interesting evening, in every way.”
“I think you would have liked it more at our end of the table—we were very lively there.”
“Yes,” replied Mary. “It did seem as though your conversations required rather less effort than my own.”
“I wondered why you expressed so strong a desire to sit alongside Mr. Hurst. I should not have imagined you shared many interests.”
“I am not sure I did express it; but I must say that as a result, I know a great deal more about horse racing than I did last week, both the jumps and the flat.”
“Now that I recollect,” declared Mr. Ryder, “it was Miss Bingley who insisted you would be happier seated next to him. I imagined she was acting upon your wishes.”
“I’m sure she was doing what she thought best.” Mary had no desire for the breach between herself and Miss Bingley to become more widely known. “I expect she thought it a kindness, to one of us at least.”
Mr. Ryder put down his coffee cup and shot Mary a conspiratorial, confiding smile.
“I have not observed that little acts of kindness are much in Miss Bingley’s line.”
Before she could help herself, Mary laughed—then immediately regretted it, and sought to compose her features into a suitably contrite and neutral expression.
“It is very wrong of you to make such an ungenerous remark.”
“The remark was mine, it is true,” murmured Mr. Ryder. “But the laugh was all your own.”
“Yes,” replied Mary, “and now I’m rather ashamed of it.”
“Of course you are,” said Mr. Ryder, surveying her with an intensity she found disconcerting. “It does not come easily to you to be disobliging. You are not someone who takes pleasure in being unkind.”
Their conversation, which Mary had hoped would be light, bright, and emptily social, appeared to be taking a very different direction, one she was not certain she wished to encourage.
“Really, Mr. Ryder, you hardly know me at all. You cannot say what I might do or how I might behave.”
“I must contradict you, Miss Bennet. I believe I have a very good sense of who you are. And before you protest, I will tell you why I think so. First, I am influenced by the judgement of my friend. Tom has an excellent opinion of you—he always speaks of you in the highest possible terms—and there is no-one whose perceptions I trust more. Second, I listen to what my own feelings tell me. My heart assures me that you are exactly what you seem to be, and I am happy to believe it. There is no artifice about you, Miss Bennet. Your qualities shine out. They have not been obscured or corrupted by the false polish of the world. I do not need to know you better than I do already to know that this is true.”
Mary could not bear to sit any longer trapped in the uncomfortable directness of Mr. Ryder’s stare. She broke away by picking up her book from the floor on which it had fallen, and placed it carefully beside her on the sofa.
“These are observations of a very personal nature,” she said.
“I realise this is not the usual language of the drawing room,” he replied. “But you know I have no very high opinion of the petty rules to which we submit ourselves in the name of good manners or politeness.”
“Yes,” ventured Mary mildly. “I believe you have mentioned it.”
He stood up, warming to his theme, and began to stride about the room as he spoke.
“It is my conviction, Miss Bennet, that our inability to say what we mean, to tell the truth about what we think and feel, is one of the great curses of our age. We say we honour candour and honesty, but we do not practise them. Instead, we hide behind a thousand equivocations and disguises that we like to call politeness—and remain in wilful ignorance of the truth of our affections, when knowledge of them might have changed our lives forever, had we but been aware of their existence.”
He stopped by the sideboard and placed his arm lightly upon it, striking a very elegant pose.
“That, Miss Bennet, is what I believe. And I came here today to put that belief into practice and commit the great impropriety of telling you honestly what I think of you.”
“Is that really wise, Mr. Ryder? There may be occasions when, for all manner of reasons, some things are better left unsaid.”
“I cannot agree. I intend to live my life by bolder principles.” He stood silent for a moment, imagining perhaps the multitude of possibilities contained in that thought, before moving back to his place on the sofa opposite Mary.
“I gave some thought to how I might achieve this aim,” he explained in a more throughful tone, “and it seemed to me that poetry was the best way to capture what I wanted to say. I did try to scribble a few lines myself—but they did not turn out as I wished. Then I thought of some verses of Mr. Wordsworth’s—and when I looked them out, they summed you up so well—captured your spirit so perfectly—that I knew I need look no further. ”
He pulled a piece of paper from his pocket.
“May I be allowed to read them to you?”
Mary hesitated. Propriety of the kind Mr. Ryder so disdained urged her to refuse. But curiosity, and indeed a rising sense of excited anticipation, overcame her—which poem would he quote? What did he wish to say? She did not have the strength to deny him—so she nodded, and he began.
“She dwelt among the untrodden ways
Beside the springs of Dove,
A Maid whom there were none to praise
And very few to love:
A violet by a mossy stone
Half hidden from the eye!
Fair as a star, when only one
Is shining in the sky.”
He read surprisingly well, measured, sincere, and heartfelt. Mary had not expected that; and, as a result, was unprepared for the degree to which the poem moved her.
“It captures something true to you, I believe,” he said simply, folding up the paper.
“You see me as a lonely figure then?” asked Mary.
“Isolated, perhaps. ‘She dwelt among the untrodden ways…’”
Mary knew she must fight against surrendering to the emotions the poem had aroused in her. If she allowed herself to succumb, she might lose her self-possession in front of him—and that would never do.
“I was brought up in Hertfordshire, sir,” she said, brightly. “The road to London was barely five miles away.”
“It is possible, I have heard, to feel oneself alone, even in such close proximity to town.”
“In my village,” she continued, “it was quite untrue to say that ‘there were none to praise, and very few to love.’ There were scores of people only too eager to praise my sisters. And they had no difficulty in finding people to love, as they are all married now.”
Mr. Ryder considered for a moment.
“Then I direct you to the later lines. Perhaps the attractions of your sisters kept you ‘half hidden from the eye.’ Now they are claimed, you can be seen as you deserve at last, ‘fair as a star, when only one is shining in the sky.’”
Mary caught her breath. His words reminded her powerfully of what Mrs. Hill had once said to comfort her, back in the days when she had felt so alone and unhappy that she had not known what to do with herself.
Mr. Ryder had surprised her; she had not imagined that he possessed such insight into the hopes and fears of others.
Perhaps there was more to him than she had thought?
From under lowered eyes, she looked up at him, tall, well made, his fair hair catching the morning sun, a striking figure in his dark coat.
“You are very direct, Mr. Ryder. You do not hold back.”
“As I said before, we owe to ourselves to speak the truth as our heart feels it, Miss Bennet. I think you are about to come out from underneath your own mossy stone and become visible for the first time. I should very much like to be there when you emerge, blinking a little, into the light.”
It seemed to please him that he had ruffled her composure.
“I feel I’ve said enough for one morning. Please keep the poem. I hope it will help you to think kindly of me. Good morning to you.”
He bowed and left the room. As he went downstairs, Mary heard Mrs. Gardiner and the children return, Mr. Ryder exchanging a few pleasantries with them as he went away.
She stuffed the piece of paper quickly into her pocket and did all she could to appear as self-possessed as possible as her aunt hurried into the room.
“What on earth can Mr. Ryder be thinking, calling so early? That is a young man who follows his own inclinations far too readily for my taste.”
“I think he was merely in search of coffee and some company. He did not stay long.”
She looked out of the window, watching Mr. Ryder as he strode confidently down the busy street.
She did not know what to think as he disappeared from view.
There could be no doubt now he had some regard for her.
She could not say what form it took, or how deep it ran, but his liking could not be denied.
Nor could she pretend that the encounter had not been exciting.
And yet, at the same time as she gave herself up to the unfamiliar pleasure of knowing herself the subject of a man’s admiration, she could not help asking what that admiration was worth.
Was his manner perhaps rather too easy and untroubled to suggest true emotion?
Could truly deep sentiments be quite so readily expressed?
She did not think that he was insincere.
But it occurred to her that he had rather enjoyed playing the role of the man of feeling, that part of him had been observing himself as he did so, and that he had gone off convinced he had acquitted himself pretty well.
It was just as well, she thought, that she did not harbour strong affection for him.
It was impossible not to feel some warmth towards a man who was so open in his professions.
But in her heart, she knew that it was not from him that she longed to hear them.
She wished more than anything she had had the courage to ask him what Mr. Hayward had said about her.
It thrilled her to know that he had spoken well of her to his friend—but who knew what he might think now?
“Mary,” said Mrs. Gardiner. “Mary, are you listening to me at all?”
Mary looked up to find herself the object of Mrs. Gardiner’s enquiring glance, and realised she had been so lost in her own thoughts that she had heard nothing of what her aunt said.
“I was asking what Mr. Ryder had to say about his dinner last night. Did he think it had gone well?”
“Yes,” Mary replied, “he seemed pleased enough.”
Mrs. Gardiner threw herself onto the sofa, exhaled with relief at sitting down at last, and put her feet on a little padded stool. She looked as if she was about to speak again; but Mary knew she could not bear it if she asked her anything else about Mr. Ryder.
“If you’ll excuse me, aunt, there’s something I must fetch—I’m sorry, I will be back directly.”
As Mary rushed away, up to her room, Mrs. Gardiner sighed as she watched her go. It did not seem as though Mary’s state of mind had improved at all since she took the children for their airing. If anything, she seemed even more distracted now than she had been at breakfast.