Chapter 24 #2
He regarded Mr Collins speculatively, and Darcy presumed that what he was about to relate would not be pleasing to the man.
“Lady Catherine chose the day after Darcy’s mother was buried to insist upon the matter once more.
My uncle Darcy cut all contact with her from that day, and I never heard of her mentioning the notion of this betrothal again until after he died. Make of that what you will.”
Mr Collins did not seem to wish to make anything of that, for he swiftly replied, “But surely Lady Catherine knew best. Her wisdom, her surpassing knowledge, must certainly have led her to understand the most advantageous course for all involved. To marry the flower of Rosings would be an honour of which most men cannot dream! There could be no greater ornament to your own great estate, sir, and you would acquire Rosings, to become the moon to Pemberley’s sun. ”
“Balderdash,” pronounced Darcy, to Mr Collins’s great consternation.
“Rosings is entailed upon descendants of my cousin’s great-grandfather.
If we married, it would not become mine, but be held in trust for a child of hers.
Surely you, who so admire my cousin, have noted that her health is very poor?
Would you have her life cut short in an attempt to provide Pemberley and Rosings with an heir?
For I truly do not think she could accomplish it.
It is a dangerous business even for a lady in the most robust of health.
Better that Sir Lewis’s cousin or that gentleman’s son inherits the place after my cousin has lived out her life in peace. ”
It was clear that this assertion troubled Mr Collins deeply. “It is true that her health is delicate,” he muttered distractedly. “I cannot deny it. But I must think that a mother is the best judge of her daughter’s capabilities.”
“It may be, my dear,” Miss Mary said softly, laying a hand upon his arm, “that Lady Catherine has been a little misled by her natural partiality for her daughter into believing her more robust than she is. A tender mother’s heart cannot bear to view her own child as incapable of anything so desirable as continuing the family line, I should imagine.
Of course, if such is the case, your duty of care to poor Miss de Bourgh must take precedence over her mother’s natural but sadly impossible wishes. ”
“You have seen the matter more clearly than I, my dearest Mary. What a treasure you are! Tell me, do you think it would be best to attempt to lead Lady Catherine to a more clear-sighted view of her daughter’s prospects, or to allow events to unfold as they will and condole with her when the union she longs for does not come to pass? ”
The readiness with which Mr Collins seized upon that line of thought was a startling indication of a real affection for his betrothed.
Darcy had, until that moment, assumed Miss Mary to be little more to the man than a means of obeying Lady Catherine’s dictates.
It also suggested that the young lady was a great deal more capable of managing his devotion to his patroness than Darcy would have expected.
With a few years in her near-constant company, Mr Collins might even become something less than ridiculous.
The couple bent their heads together and began to devise a strategy for mollifying his patroness.
“Rosings Park is entailed, but not to the male line?” Mrs Bennet asked with unusual timidity.
“No, madam,” Darcy answered, comprehending her interest in the matter, and finding himself struck with sympathy for the silly woman.
An entail such as Longbourn’s would weigh heavily on the minds of ladies much cleverer and more resourceful than she.
“Though I believe there is a clause stating that when a woman inherits, if she has a son, he must take the de Bourgh name to claim Rosings in his turn.”
“Well,” the lady said, “I must say that seems a very sensible way of doing things. Is it the same with your estate, sir?”
“Pemberley has no entailment whatsoever,” he replied.
“I may dispose of it as I wish. Presently my sister is my heir, as my excellent father would have expected, but if she were, for example, to marry someone of whom I did not approve, it would be within my power to protect Pemberley from coming into his hands even if I were not so fortunate as to have children of my own.” He gave his cousin a wide smile.
“It would likely fall to this ramshackle fellow in such a case.”
“I hope, Mr Bingley,” Mrs Bennet announced, “that when you have an estate of your own, you will take Rosings Park and Pemberley as your examples when you consider what will become of it after your own time. It is a hard thing for a wife or a daughter to know that her home cannot be her own forever.”
“That is an advantage to purchasing an estate rather than inheriting one,” Bingley agreed. “I mean to do everything in my power to ensure that all of my descendants will be provided for, I assure you, madam.”
“We have been very fortunate that my husband’s heir is a kind man, and even more so that he likes our Mary,” she said with a fond look at the clergyman, who was still engaged in an intense whispered conversation with his future bride.
“Had he taken us in dislike, or married a woman who did not wish for him to support his relations, our future might have been bleak indeed.”
“It is to be hoped, Mrs Bennet,” said the colonel with a smile, “that you will have several sons-in-law when that unhappy day arrives.”
“May it be just as you say!” the lady exclaimed.