Chapter Two — Silvermere Receives Its Guests #2
She was not tall, but she possessed the effect of height by the stillness with which she held herself.
Her age was perhaps nearer sixty than fifty, though she had the kind of looks upon which time had worked not ruin but refinement.
Her hair, dark once and now threaded with silver, was arranged beneath a lace cap of exquisite simplicity.
Her gown was black silk, softened at the throat and wrists by white, and relieved by pearls that did not glitter so much as remember light.
Her face was handsome, composed and intelligent, marked by grief long mastered rather than grief forgotten.
There was nothing in her expression that invited pity.
If sorrow had lived with her, she had taught it manners.
Mrs Gardiner descended first and was greeted with a warmth proportioned exactly to acquaintance. Jane followed, and Lady Ashbourne’s manner softened by a degree—not sentimentally, but with unmistakable attention.
“Miss Bennet,” she said, taking Jane’s hand for a moment. “I am very happy to welcome you to Silvermere. Your aunt has done me a kindness in permitting the visit.”
Jane curtseyed with her usual grace. “You are very good, ma’am. We are honoured by the invitation.”
“The honour, I trust, will prove mutual.”
The sentence might have been mere civility. Elizabeth did not think it was. Lady Ashbourne turned next to her.
“Miss Elizabeth Bennet.”
Elizabeth curtseyed, conscious at once of being not looked at, but measured.
Lady Ashbourne’s eyes were calm, dark and exact.
They moved over Elizabeth’s face with no impertinence whatever, and yet Elizabeth had the sensation of standing before a person accustomed to receiving more information than was offered.
“Lady Ashbourne.”
“I have heard of you,” said her ladyship.
Elizabeth smiled. “Then I must hope your sources were either very charitable or very inaccurate.”
A faint amusement touched Lady Ashbourne’s mouth. “I seldom trust sources that are wholly either. Accuracy is generally found in the uncomfortable middle.”
Elizabeth’s smile became more genuine. “Then I shall endeavour not to contradict your expectations too soon.”
“I should be disappointed if you contradicted none of them.”
It was a delicate exchange, brief and courteous, yet Elizabeth understood by the end of it that Lady Ashbourne had not invited her merely because she was Jane’s sister, nor because she supplied liveliness to a party.
She had been summoned, if so strong a word might be allowed beneath so much politeness, as a mind of a particular kind.
Whether Lady Ashbourne desired that mind as ornament, assistance or experiment remained to be seen.
They were conducted into a cool, high hall paved in stone and softened by carpets laid with mathematical discretion.
Portraits looked down from the walls, none large enough to overawe, all old enough to instruct.
A vase of white flowers stood upon a central table beneath a lamp not yet lit.
Their scent was faint, almost severe. Elizabeth looked about and thought again that the house was beautifully kept and insufficiently alive.
It did not breathe around its guests. It received them.
Rooms were offered, servants directed, shawls removed, trunks dispatched.
Lady Ashbourne performed hospitality with such smooth authority that no one seemed to act under command, yet nothing occurred outside her expectation.
Mrs Gardiner was given a chamber overlooking the west garden; Jane and Elizabeth were placed in adjoining rooms with a shared view across the lake.
This, Elizabeth thought, could not be accidental.
The view was one of Silvermere’s chief accomplishments.
Any guest waking to it would begin the day with beauty and perhaps with gratitude.
When she entered her room, Elizabeth went first to the window.
The lake lay below, still holding the house in its pale surface.
From this height the reflection appeared less exact, troubled now by the faint movement of air, and she was glad of it.
Perfect images were oppressive. A little distortion permitted one to breathe.
Jane came in through the connecting door a few minutes later, having removed her bonnet. She stood beside Elizabeth and looked out without speaking.
“It is very beautiful,” she said at last.
“It is.”
“You sound almost regretful.”
“I am considering whether beauty makes me unjust.”
Jane smiled. “Does it?”
“Sometimes. I am inclined to suspect it when perhaps it asks only to be admired.”
“Then admire it first and suspect it afterwards.”
“That is a generous arrangement.”
“I find it often saves time.”
Elizabeth laughed and turned toward her. “You are quiet.”
Jane did not pretend to misunderstand. “I know.”
“Not unhappy?”
“No. Only…” She paused, searching for the exact word, as Jane always did when feeling mattered. “Collected, perhaps.”
“Collected against Lady Ashbourne?”
“No. Against being kindly observed.”
Elizabeth’s teasing impulse vanished at once. “My dear Jane.”
Jane looked back toward the lake. “It is strange. I am not ashamed of being happy. I should be very ungrateful if I were. And yet when happiness is expected of one, watched for, almost prepared by others before it has taken its own proper form, it becomes difficult to know how to hold it.”
Elizabeth took her hand. “You must hold it as you please, and let others drop their expectations where they may.”
Jane smiled faintly. “That sounds very simple when you say it.”
“Most things do, until one attempts them.”
“I am glad Mr Bingley is to come.”
“I should have been astonished if you were not.”
Jane blushed, but did not retreat. “I am glad. But I hope—” She stopped.
“That he will not be hurried?”
Jane nodded. “Or made to feel he ought to hurry. I think he wishes to speak, Lizzy.”
“I think he does too.”
“And I think I wish him to. But not because every room we enter seems to leave a space for the question.”
Elizabeth glanced toward the shining lake. “Then we shall step around all such spaces until he finds one of his own.”
Jane’s smile trembled into gratitude. “Thank you.”
Elizabeth squeezed her hand, then released it as a maid came to assist with their things. The moment passed, but not its tenderness.
By the time they descended to the drawing room, more guests had arrived, and Silvermere had begun to display not merely its rooms but its composition.
The drawing room faced the lake and was arranged in pale colours touched with blue and silver, a scheme Elizabeth suspected had been chosen by someone who found symbolism useful when kept within taste.
Long windows opened toward the terrace. The furniture was elegant, older in form than fashion, and grouped to permit conversation without intimacy.
A harp stood near one wall. A writing table, delicate and inlaid, occupied a place where light fell handsomely upon it.
Beyond, through open doors, a gallery could be seen running toward the music room.
Lady Ashbourne stood near the hearth, receiving each new arrival with unfailing grace. Beside her, slightly behind and yet always usefully near, was Mr Felix Vale.
He was handsome in the way Bingley had promised, though Elizabeth found the handsomeness less interesting than its management.
He was perhaps a little above thirty, fair-haired, well made, with a smile that appeared before it was needed and withdrew before it became excessive.
His dress was exact without vanity; his manner easy without carelessness.
He possessed the valuable social talent of seeming attentive to the present person while remaining aware of the entire room.
If Lady Ashbourne’s authority was stillness, Mr Vale’s was movement.
He crossed spaces to prevent them becoming awkward, supplied names before anyone had forgotten them, placed an elderly lady in the best chair without appearing to guide her, and laughed just enough to relieve a pause without making the pause visible.
Elizabeth distrusted him almost immediately, and was amused by herself for doing so.
“There is Mr Vale,” Mrs Gardiner said quietly beside her.
“So I had supposed.”
“He seems very agreeable.”
“Yes. That is what concerns me.”
“Lizzy.”
“I know. It is a prejudice. I shall give him at least half an hour to justify it.”
Before Mrs Gardiner could reply, Felix approached them with a bow of graceful warmth.
“Mrs Gardiner, Miss Bennet, Miss Elizabeth Bennet. My aunt has spoken of your arrival with so much pleasure that I begin already to feel acquainted with you.”
Elizabeth curtseyed. “Then we must try not to disappoint an acquaintance begun at such an advantage.”
“That would be impossible, I am sure.”
“Impossible is a large word for so early in the day, Mr Vale.”
He smiled, not at all discomposed. “Then I shall amend it. It would be highly unlikely.”
“That is safer, though less gallant.”
“I shall endeavour to be accurate first and gallant after dinner.”
“You arrange your virtues by the clock?”
“Where a house party is concerned, Miss Elizabeth, one must arrange everything.”
It was lightly said, but Elizabeth’s attention sharpened.
Felix’s smile remained pleasant. He turned to Jane with particular courtesy, expressing Lady Ashbourne’s hope that she would find the music room agreeable, since the pianoforte had lately been tuned and the house sadly lacked accomplished performers.
Jane answered with modest grace. Elizabeth saw at once how neatly the compliment had been made useful: Jane was welcomed, praised and assigned a role in a single sentence. Not unkindly. Not improperly. Yet arranged.