Chapter 1
Chapter One
Thursday arrived with the particular quality of a day that has been expected too long.
Elizabeth had been awake since six. This was not, she told herself, significant.
She was often awake at six. The frost on the window was the particular hard frost of late November, which made the light come in pale and definite, and there was nothing unusual about lying in bed listening to it — listening to the house before it began, to Hill somewhere below, to the small sounds that meant Longbourn was still itself and not yet the version of itself it would be today.
He was coming on purpose. She had known this when he said it; she had known it more precisely at every subsequent hour.
Every previous meeting had involved some cover — rain, a borrowed horse, Bingley's frank sociability, the useful shelter of books lent and returned.
Cowper had been a genuine excuse, and also, she now understood, a way of making the question about literary conversation until they had both decided it was about something else.
Thursday had none of that. Thursday was a named day, a named call, and a question he had said he would bring, and all of it was as deliberate as a pencil mark placed exactly where he meant to put it.
She came down to find Jane already at the breakfast table and the house already in a state of oblique preparedness — the parlour cushions had been turned, the best china was arranged on the sideboard in its waiting formation, and Hill had produced a quantity of seedcake that had not been requested by anyone and would be offered to everyone regardless. Longbourn, in short, knew.
"He is only bringing a question about Cowper," said Elizabeth, sitting down.
"Yes," said Jane.
"It is a literary call."
"Of course," said Jane.
"You are not saying anything."
"I am agreeing with everything you say." Jane poured the tea with the serenity of a woman who has decided not to start an argument she would win too quickly. "There. You see? I am perfectly agreeable this morning."
Elizabeth looked at the seedcake.
Her mother appeared from the direction of the kitchen, already in conversation with herself.
"Hill, the good tablecloth — not the one with the — yes, that one, the one we had at the Lucases'— and the silver, which Kitty polished last Tuesday, or was it the Tuesday before, I cannot — Lizzy, sit up straight, for heaven's sake, you have excellent posture when you try—" She swept through without stopping and was gone toward the stairs.
"She will have it straight-backed by noon," said Elizabeth.
"She means well."
"She has also," Elizabeth observed, picking up her cup, "told three people in Meryton, or I am very much mistaken."
Jane considered this with characteristic fairness. "Two," she said. "Mrs. Long and possibly Lady Lucas. But Lady Lucas will have told Sir William, who?—"
"Who will have told the regiment, who will have told the whole county." Elizabeth set down her cup. "So Darcy will be arriving to a call that is already, functionally, an announcement, without either of us having said anything."
"Lizzy." Jane looked at her with a gentle directness she reserved for the moments that mattered. "He is coming on purpose. That is new. You know it is new."
Elizabeth did know it. That was the difficulty.
Every previous meeting had sheltered behind something — rain, a borrowed horse, Bingley's easy sociability, the excuse of books and return visits.
Thursday had no shelter. Thursday was a question he had told her he would bring, on a day he had named, to a house where her mother would be waiting with the good china.
"He may regret it," she said, "when he sees the seedcake."
"He will survive the seedcake," said Jane, and smiled.
From upstairs there was a crash, followed by Lydia's voice explaining that it was Kitty's fault, followed by Kitty's voice explaining that it was not.
Mr. Bennet appeared in the doorway in his dressing-gown, took in the tablecloth, the silver, and the seedcake, and looked at Elizabeth with the expression of a man reading a situation he could have predicted a week ago.
"Thursday," he said.
"Thursday," said Elizabeth.
He nodded, thoughtfully, and went back toward the library. At the door he turned. "Tell Hill not to put out the Wedgwood. It is too much. It will make him think we are impressed by him."
"Are we not?"
"We are," said Mr. Bennet, "but there is no reason to show it."
He disappeared. The library door closed with its particular click.
Elizabeth sat for a moment with her cup. From upstairs came the continued negotiation between Lydia and Kitty, which showed no signs of resolution. Jane was looking at the tablecloth with the composed expression she wore when she was not going to say anything unless asked.
"I know what you are thinking," said Elizabeth.
"I am thinking nothing in particular."
"You are thinking that it is very sweet, and you are very nearly right, and you are refraining from saying so out of extraordinary tact."
"I am thinking," said Jane carefully, "that you have been happier this month than I have seen you in some time. And that it suits you." She looked up. "And that if you tell me this is only Cowper, I shall believe you, and I shall also not believe you, and we shall both know which of those is true."
Elizabeth looked at the seedcake. She thought about a garden walk in October, and a pencil mark in a margin, and a note sent on plain wax before Jane had reached the landing, and a question brought deliberately on a deliberate day to a house full of seedcake and expectation.
"He knew what Longbourn would be this morning," she said. "He has been here enough times now. He knew about the good china, and Mama, and Lydia, and quite possibly the seedcake." She set down her cup. "He came anyway."
"Yes," said Jane. "He did."