Page 4

While Elizabeth contemplated more recent events, Mr. Bennet’s thoughts drifted further into the past. He roused himself and began to speak.

“As you may know, I started at university when I was sixteen. As you can probably imagine, I was determined to focus my studies on the classical philosophers, particularly the Greeks. That is where I met your Uncle Gardiner and, as he will attest, I did little else but immerse myself in my studies, though I did emerge occasionally for debates.” He quirked an eyebrow. “And the chess club, I will admit.”

Elizabeth smiled, easily picturing her father in such behavior.

“At the time, I wished never to leave. I took my degree in three years but convinced my father to allow me to stay on as a fellow and continue my studies. At times I let myself dream that Papa would live forever, leaving me to pursue an academic career. You never knew him but he was not terribly concerned with intellectual pursuits. He had some interest in politics but no desire to participate in them. Really, the only time I remember him leaving the boundaries of Longbourn was for the hunting parties.”

Mr. Bennet sighed and focused his memories. “In short, I had very little in common with him and no great friends among the neighbors. With my mother long dead and my sister married and living in London, I could see little attraction in returning to Hertfordshire.

“At Oxford, one of the professors took me under his wing, Dr. Burbidge. I met him in my first term and he became a mentor… even a father figure, if you will, for I certainly felt more comfortable talking to him than I ever had with my own. He and his wife invited me to visit quite often for dinner and such. ”

Mr. Bennet removed his spectacles and rubbed his eyes before absent-mindedly cleaning the lenses with a handkerchief.

“The Burbidges had a daughter, Olympia. She was away at school for several years, but returned when she was seventeen and I was twenty. She was very pretty and, because of her father I suppose, very comfortable with scholarly gentlemen carrying on the sort of academic discussions I found fascinating. In short, I became infatuated without taking the time to actually get to know the girl. Sound familiar?” He smiled crookedly.

Elizabeth returned his smile but found that she could not laugh at him.

“One Saturday afternoon, we all went for a picnic along the river. It was a lovely day and Olympia agreed to go out in a punt with me. Somewhere in the course of our conversation, I suggested that if we were to marry, we could repeat such idyllic days for the rest of our lives.”

Thomas Bennet sighed. He might be nearing fifty, but he could still feel the mortification he had experienced as a young man.

“She laughed—it didn’t even occur to her that I might be serious.

She explained that she had no intention of wasting her life away in a dull university town.

She had returned to Oxford only because it provided her with the perfect opportunity to meet some rich, well-connected gentleman, preferably titled, who would sweep her away into the glitter of London society. ”

“Oh Papa, I’m so sorry.”

“Don’t be. I was young and self-centered; It never occurred to me that she would not leap at an opportunity to join my life…

never occurred to me that she might have hopes and dreams of her own.

I observed her but never bothered to get to know her.

” He shrugged. “Some months later she got herself engaged to a wealthy baronet’s heir and was, by all reports, deliriously happy. ”

Not certain how she should respond to such a disclosure, Elizabeth remained silent.

Remembering the point of his confession, Mr. Bennet turned to her.

“For me, the hurt did not last very long. I was enamored with the dream of escaping my responsibilities and imitating my mentor’s life, not with the lady herself.

It would never have occurred to me to write a letter such as your young man has done. ”

He paused before continuing. "To be honest, I have no idea what happened to Olympia, or Lady Cobb, as I suppose she is now. She departed (for London, I assume) and a year or so later, your grandfather passed on and all my energies became consumed by Longbourn.”

Father and daughter sat quietly for some time, each lost in their thoughts as a lark filled the air with his songs. Eventually, Elizabeth stirred herself and asked a question that she had long wondered about but never dared to raise.

“Papa? How did you and my mother come to marry? ”

Thomas sighed. It was a question that he had hoped never to receive from his children, but he supposed he shouldn’t be surprised that his disclosures this day had prompted it.

He stood, leaving his hat and walking stick on the ground.

After making a brief circuit around the peak, he returned to look his daughter straight in the eye.

“I will answer, but this is in the strictest of confidence, Lizzy. You will not even speak of it to Jane, you understand?” At her earnest nod, he attempted to lighten the mood.

“Although I suppose you may share it with Mr. Darcy if you find yourself scrounging for family secrets with which to repay him.”

When she rolled her eyes, Thomas smiled. Fanny Gardiner might not have been the ideal he once dreamed of marrying, but she had gifted him five beautiful daughters whom he prized above all the jewels in the Kingdom.

“After the debacle with Olympia, I plunged myself into my studies. Really, what were girls to Plato and Aristotle? My only social outings, if they might be termed such, were to the chess club. I had met your Uncle Gardiner over a chessboard and we became friends, which is odd, I suppose, given the disparity of our academic interests. His studies might have appeared haphazard but he was always very focused— every lecture or laboratory he attended had a reason, educating him to take on a larger role in his father’s business.

He studied modern languages so that he wouldn’t have to rely on translators.

He was interested in politics and economics so that he might better predict the markets.

I remember once he even attended some geology lectures so that he might better understand why certain gems and ores were found where they were.

“We were an odd pair, I suppose. I, heir of a modest country estate and trying to forget the responsibilities that would someday drag me from my beloved books. He was the only son of a gentleman’s younger son with a good head for business and a disdain for frittering away his time in society’s useless nothings.

Old Emmet Gardiner had taken a small inheritance and bought a share in a brig headed for the Orient.

That was the start of his import business and he grew an excellent income from it.

Edward planned to continue with his father and had no qualms with making his living through honest work, even if the ton spurned him as a tradesman.

“Anyway, our rooms were on the same staircase for a time and we kept in touch when he left to join his father’s business.

It was a friendship that meant a great deal to me particularly when, not long after, I received word that my own father was deathly ill.

I returned to Hertfordshire and rapidly discovered that all my Greek and Latin were of no help at all in managing an estate. ”

After a lengthy pause, Elizabeth’s father finally continued; “I muddled along for some months until Papa finally passed away. Then I used the funeral as an excuse to beg Gardiner to come up and apply his keen business sense to Longbourn’s ledgers. And he came, bless his heart.”

Thomas sighed. “He also brought his younger sister with him. Their own father had died the previous year and Edward became Fanny’s guardian; he did not like to leave her in London without his supervision.”

“She was barely seventeen, as beautiful as Jane is now, but lively… effervescent. I don’t know how else to describe it. She said nothing particularly witty or intelligent but a room was warmer with her in it, somehow.”

Lizzy nodded, beginning to see her mother in a new light.

Mr. Bennet continued, “Gardiner and I spent most of our time buried in the study— my father had not been a particularly attentive record keeper and I’ve never been any sort of correspondent.

My elder sister Jane (your sister’s namesake) came to help me with the house and funeral.

Unfortunately, she was attended by her husband. ”

Elizabeth’s eyes widened at the venom in her father’s voice.

“Wilberforce Collins was not a moral man and I rue the day my sister met him, let alone married him. I realize that I should have some affection for young William Collins as my sister’s only child and I do have sympathy that he grew up in the house of such a domineering, unprincipled miscreant…

but the son looks so much like his father that I find it hard to forget. ”

Mr. Bennet shook himself. The man had died, quite miserably, of consumption if Gardiner’s information was correct.

There was no need to hold on to such anger.

“In short, Collins enticed Fanny into a compromising position. Although Gardiner and I interrupted them before anything… err… serious had occurred, they had been observed and Fanny recognized.”

He sighed, feeling very, very old. “Fortunately, Collins was not. Your mother was in need of a respectable husband and I was in need of a wife and helpmate. So I proposed, and once our engagement was announced everyone assumed that it was I whom she had been seen embracing.”

Thomas could see in his daughter’s eyes that she was listening intently. “She was not a brilliant wit but she was pretty and affectionate and knew how to run a household.”