“The same as the rest of us.” Miss Catherine laughed. “Mama and Papa once had such an argument about it. Though I suppose it was not so bad. Papa just glared at Mama quite angrily. Mama likes that Lizzy is here, it gives her someone to order about who is not a servant, but she would still happily send her away if she could.”
“Do you like Miss Elizabeth?”
Miss Kitty giggled a little. “Oh, well enough. But she isn’t one of us, Mama always makes sure that we know that . Not our equal. Mary only forgets that, because she is so plain, and thus isn’t my equal either.”
This sentiment did nothing to improve Mr. Darcy’s opinion of Miss Catherine Bennet, even though she said nothing that was not true. Darcy had an uncomfortable sensation because he too never forgot the inferiority of Elizabeth’s situation. Miss Catherine’s statement was like an echo of how Elizabeth said that of course Darcy saw himself as being above everyone in this neighborhood because of his wealth.
His application to Miss Lydia to possess her hand for half of an hour was met with a shocked look, a giggle, a straight statement of, “You cannot possibly wish to dance with me!”
As Fitzwilliam Darcy did not in fact wish to dance with Lydia Bennet, he could not argue with that. He stiffly looked at her and repeated the offer.
“Did Lizzy put you up to this? Oh, beyond a doubt! That can be the only reason you danced with Mary and Kitty. Such a joke! Do you mean to make her your mistress? I warn you, she might laugh in your face if you ask. She is too like Papa, queer.”
Darcy felt cold, angry, and hot.
He pulled his shoulders back. He glared at the woman. “I hardly believe that you would suggest—in a public place where there might be persons who can hear you, that a woman who is under the protection of your father, who has grown up with you in nearly the role of sister, who has—”
“La! You are quite as bad as Mrs. Gardiner for lectures. I’ll not be scared of you, not even though you are so tall. Not after Mr. Wickham told me about all you’ve done.”
Mr. Darcy bowed coldly to her. “You have said quite enough, madam. I perfectly comprehend your feelings. Forgive me for having taken up so much of your time.”
“Wait,” Lydia cried as he walked off. “But I beg you, do not tell my mother anything of this! She would be fierce, even with me, if she knew I’d refused a dance.”
“I assure you, madam, that I am most unlikely to do so.”
Darcy wondered if this reception from Lydia was sufficient to release him from the unwanted obligation to ask Miss Bennet to dance.
Due to her beauty, Miss Bennet was the only one of the group who anyone could imagine having a right to a gentleman of his consequence. That made Darcy particularly dislike offering to dance with her.
However, he was not dancing with the Bennet sisters for his own sake, nor for theirs. Elizabeth had asked him to dance with them all, and he would .
Darcy came up to where Miss Bennet stood next to Mr. Bingley, and he asked in a tight voice if he might have the honor of dancing with her for the next dance during which she was unengaged.
“Certainly, but the next is the supper dance, and I am engaged for it with Mr. Bingley. Will you happily dance the one following?”
“That is acceptable.”
It was clear that Mr. Bingley was quite surprised by Darcy making the offer, and he smiled at him. “I am deuced glad to see you making more of an effort to be kind to the Bennet family. I saw you dancing with Miss Kitty. All of them are monstrous nice girls, are they not. Though Miss Bennet is the prettiest, without doubt.”
Miss Bennet blushed to be praised so directly, but she kept a clear smile which showed that she was not so greatly affected by the praise as he might have expected from the girl that Bingley had flirted with for a whole month.
The seating at the supper proved to be a mix of the fortunate and unfortunate. He sat close enough that he could easily see Elizabeth but not speak to her. And further, Mrs. Bennet and Lady Lucas were the parties between Darcy and Elizabeth.
For the whole dinner Mrs. Bennet loudly exclaimed to Lady Lucas about how delighted she was to have two daughters on the verge of marriage. “Mary is nice enough—though she is so plain. So very plain. Even with what she has done to improve, I do not trust Mr. Collins to come up to scratch—he ought to! He owes us some great favor, since he will receive Longbourn on the basis of an entail. I would be terribly ashamed to receive an estate which was merely entailed on me . But her hopes are nothing to Jane’s .”
Mrs. Bennet engaged in a lengthy discourse upon the virtues of such a match, the excellence of Mr. Bingley, the excellence of his purse, the excellence of the chances that this would give her to throw her other daughters into the paths of many rich men, the closeness of Netherfield, and how fond Miss Bingley and Mrs. Hurst were of Jane.
Until now Mr. Darcy had not thought Bingley to have any serious intentions towards Miss Bingley. He had known her to be an object of interest to him, but not one whom he was prepared to marry.
Yet it seemed that the gossip of the town had now united them in matrimony, with only the date of the happy event still to be determined.
Darcy must speak to Mr. Bingley, to warn him that he must act to disentangle himself immediately if he did not mean to marry the girl.
But further, when Darcy looked at the couple and studied them, he found reason to worry that Bingley did in fact mean to marry the girl. Bingley’s conversation was enthused, was eager, and he looked at Miss Bennet in such a way as to suggest that he knew what it was to love. Miss Bennet received these attentions with politeness, with sweet smiles, with acceptance of Bingley’s attentions.
But Darcy perceived no sign in her of particular attachment.
“The best of it,” Mrs. Bennet loudly said for the third time, “is that she shall throw the other girls into the paths of very rich men!”
Elizabeth had a harassed look.
Darcy met her eyes, and he made a slight smile. She smiled back and shrugged. Her mood clearly improved after this.
That Mrs. Bennet was vulgar and determined to speak loudly of hopes that ought to be kept private threw no shade upon Elizabeth.
The nature of that family was well enough known to Darcy that he could understand the situation. For Miss Bennet to refuse the attentions of a very eligible gentleman would be impossible. Perhaps Miss Bennet did not wish to. Perhaps she was as mercenary as her mother.
Darcy determined that he needed to follow Bingley immediately to London and make every effort that he could to dissuade him both from the match, and from returning to Hertfordshire.
This made him feel sad, as he did not wish his acquaintance with Elizabeth to end so suddenly. Yet, it was a matter of a duty to a friend to do the best that he might to protect him from a serious error of judgement. If Bingley married a woman who was indifferent to him, the consequences of that decision would haunt him for the whole course of his life. Even if this made Elizabeth’s life worse, he had a duty to his friend, and he had a duty to be honest and say what he had truly observed.
That Darcy thought ill of the whole family due to their treatment of Elizabeth tended to convince him that anyone marrying one of the Bennet girls would be making a mistake.
When the servants removed the plates, and the announcement that the dancing would resume in the other room was made, Darcy immediately approached Miss Bennet, and with a bow claimed her for the next set.
Bingley grinned widely. “You shall soon be best of friends with Miss Bennet—note that I did not forget myself this time.”
Miss Bennet smiled at Bingley good naturedly. “I have observed your success.”
“But off,” Bingley added. “Though I am not at all confident that I shall live through your absence for two sets.”
“I fear,” Miss Bennet replied smiling, “that it will be four sets, for Mr. Gould has my hand for the set after Mr. Darcy.”
But though it looked as though the two might very happily continue to speak, Miss Bennet went with Darcy to the dance floor, while Mr. Bingley danced with one of the nieces of Mrs. Long.
Darcy felt a little anger towards this imperturbable woman. Something about Bingley’s manner now made him sure that his friend’s heart had been deeply touched.
He thus found it difficult to speak with Jane.
After a few minutes Miss Bennet said, “The first of us who you danced was with Miss Elizabeth. I have noticed that you give her a great deal of consideration.”
“ You consider Miss Elizabeth to be ‘one of you’.”
“Oh, certainly, she has grown up as our sister, since I was seven, I think. When she came to us Papa took me aside, and he made me solemnly swear to look after her as best I could.”
There was a sort of serenity to Miss Bennet’s countenance that suggested she had consciousness neither of the wrongness with which Darcy believed Elizabeth to be treated, nor that she had said anything extraordinary.
Darcy realized that he had never seen Miss Bennet treat Elizabeth with any sort of unkindness, though it was clear that she was not so friendly with her as Miss Mary.
“It was in fact Miss Elizabeth’s request that I dance with each of you—she seemed to have a great anxiety upon this point, I gathered it had something to do with your mother. I believe Miss Elizabeth thought that she should never receive more attention from an eligible gentleman that Mrs. Bennet’s own daughters. I hope I do not say anything shocking when it is clear to me that Mrs. Bennet does not consider Miss Elizabeth to be ‘one of you’.”
Miss Bennet smiled and said, “Mama is always nervous. So very nervous. She is such a nervous person.”
“And you? Are you also nervous?”
“Mr. Darcy,” she replied with a smile. “I see that you mean to discover some particular point, but I am not so clever as Lizzy. I cannot guess at what your questions aim.”
“I hardly understand what you think about anything,” Darcy replied. “You always look at everyone and answer every question with that same smile.”
“I thank you for that compliment. Is that not what a lady is meant to be like in such a company as this?”
Darcy found himself unable to reply to that. He found himself suddenly much less certain in all his assessments of Miss Bennet and her feelings and thoughts.
They were quiet as they stepped through several revolutions of the line. The two of them passed Mr. Bingley and his partner for the dance, Bingley grinned and cheerily said to Miss Bennet, “I told you Mr. Darcy can be remarkably agreeable when he wishes to be.”
“Yes,” replied the beautiful young woman, with a constant smile that Darcy now knew to be a matter of policy, “I do think he feels deeply.”
They continued in silence.
Darcy wondered for the first time what growing up in such a household had been like for the Miss Bennets—the nerves of their mother. The way that Elizabeth was introduced by one parent as a sister and by the other as an unwanted creature whose inferiority must never be forgotten.
Perhaps Miss Bennet’s always fixed smile and calmness was her way of navigating such a situation, much like the way that Elizabeth’s manners and way of holding herself changed when Mrs. Bennet was present.
“What was it like when you were children? When did Miss Elizabeth come to live with you.”
For once Miss Bennet ceased to smile. “I shall never forget it. She was terrified—a person had beaten her terribly within the week. There were black and blue bruises all over. And she had seen her mother die before her eyes. She clung to Papa like a raft upon a stormy sea—but these are hardly memories that one ought to recall in a ballroom.”
“I have a very low opinion,” Darcy said, “of these restrictions that ladies seem to put upon what may or may not be discussed in a ballroom. For my part I have heard nothing so interesting tonight—she had been beaten? But do you know by whom?”
Miss Bennet managed to shrug gracefully in the midst of a turn of the set. “I wonder...I do not think it was her mother for she always spoke of her memory with sadness, and Papa refused to let anyone question Elizabeth about it, or about anything else—I have such a clear memory of how she looked then. I still think of it from time to time. I try to never think ill of anyone, and when I am given cause to dislike a person, I always remind myself that they have surely never beaten a child in such a way. Papa never lifts a hand to us, not even when he perhaps ought to have—there was a time when Lydia was seven, and she—but you cannot be interested in such a tale.”
“I assure you, I am. Is it a proper sort of tale to be mentioned to a person not part of the family?”
Now Miss Bennet’s smile returned. “This is known by all and sundry, for Lydia threw her fit in the churchyard on a pleasant morning as everyone came in. The whole neighborhood observed her behavior. Papa did once look as though he wished to give her a spanking, I know that any other father in the neighborhood, Sir William certainly, would have done so. I think many persons judged him for not doing so. But he would not. He barely even reduced her pocket money and liberties in punishment afterwards. I think that Papa took Lizzy’s treatment very much to heart—he had once or twice given us some spanking before she came, but never afterwards.”
“Do you think,” Darcy asked, “that this is why Miss Lydia is poorly governed?”
Darcy realized at once that he ought to not have said that, and certainly not to the sister of the woman in question. Perhaps he could have asked Elizabeth.
Miss Bennet smiled at his sudden confusion in a warm way that made Darcy think that she was quite amused. “This is like that tale Lydia told all of us, about how she had been not quite handsome enough to tempt you to dance. You say what you think easily, even when many would hide their feelings. I admire that.”
“Do you hide your feelings?” Darcy asked in reply.
“I try to always feel what I ought, so there will be no cause for that.”
The sweetness with which she said this left Darcy confused. “Did your mother ever discipline you in such a way?”
“No, Papa never allowed that . We were quite wild. It is a wonder that any of us turned out well. I recall that she once slapped Lizzy. I think Lizzy had asked about the meaning of an improper word. When Papa heard of it, he and Mama did not say a civil word to each other for two weeks. But she certainly never did anything of the sort again.”
Miss Bennet’s smile then returned.
Their dance soon finished, but as they walked to the side of the room, Miss Bennet paused them to say, “My mother lives and loves as best she can. She loves as she best can.”
The tale of Elizabeth coming to them with her body beaten black and blue made him sick.
He immediately looked around to find her. She stood next to Mr. Bennet near a balcony door, and both of them had a slump from fatigue. On the opposite side of the room, Mrs. Bennet was cheerful, erect, and she looked as though a ball at two in the morning was her favorite time to be alive.
Elizabeth was well, she was healthy, and she was full grown.
But he wondered now if the deferential treatment with which she always treated Mrs. Bennet may have come from that mostly forgotten childhood. Everything he heard or saw said that Mr. Bennet would protect Elizabeth in any matter of importance where she asked and where she was in the right.
Why then did she so elaborately fear making Mrs. Bennet angry?
But he still did not understand fully. It was not his mystery to solve, and he would soon need to leave, and that made him sad. He would miss his conversations with Elizabeth. He would miss regularly seeing her.
Darcy strode over to where she conversed with Mr. Bennet.
Mr. Bennet ironically asked, “Are you not to dance with Lydia as well?”
“I do apologize,” Elizabeth said, “for putting such a task on you. But I thank you very much. Mr. Bennet has insisted to me that it was not necessary. But let us all go to the library to sit a little. You do not like to be amongst crowds and noise for so long.”
“Neither do I,” Mr. Bennet said, “and I fear that Mrs. Bennet shall not let us call the carriage until it would be quite awkward for us to remain.”
“You, sir, give your wife the choice of when to leave such gatherings?” Mr. Darcy asked Mr. Bennet.
That gentleman said, “Do I detect judgement? Lizzy, lead on to the library. Through this door if I recall?—Are not balls principally meant for the young and the female? I usually do not attend so my preference on the matter has little meaning. But if I am brought to attend, it would be hardly kind to curtail the pleasures of others.”
Elizabeth opened the library door, and Mr. Bennet settled onto a plump sofa with a yawn. He put his foot up on the ottoman. Though the candles were all lit, there were no other guests.
“I see,” Mr. Bennet said to Elizabeth, “that your tale of denuded shelves was true. It makes me think better of Sir Alfred to know that he carted the whole collection with him to that small place he took in Bath—It was a fine collection, not quite so good as mine, but by no means to be despised. On occasion we lent books to each other.”
Elizabeth sat down next to Mr. Bennet, and Darcy settled gratefully into a winged chair looking at them.
The banked embers had left the room a little chill, but after the overheated ballroom that was a pleasant change. The quiet was preferable. Darcy felt as though together they created the sort of small domestic circle that he liked best.
“I am afraid,” Darcy said to Elizabeth, “that something made me recollect business that I will need to handle immediately in London. I mean to follow Bingley there on his business, and I do not think I shall return before I go up to Pemberley for Christmas.”
“Oh.” Elizabeth’s voice caught. “This shall be goodbye? But you have already prepared me for the blow, and I shall not be unhappy again to see you go. But I promise you, I shall miss your presence in the neighborhood.”
Mr. Bennet watched their interaction with interest, though the principal object of his study was Elizabeth, not himself. Mr. Bennet then stood and offered his hand for Mr. Darcy to shake. “I hardly have had chance to fully understand your character, but I have found nothing that I do not like, at least a little, in what I have seen.”
“Miss Elizabeth has told me that you mostly study characters to amuse yourself,” Darcy replied dryly, “so I do not know if I ought to feel that as a compliment.”
Mr. Bennet laughed in reply, and Elizabeth grinned, and looked at him again with those sparkling dark eyes.
It was a terrible pity, Darcy thought, perhaps for the first time, that she had not been born a daughter of an earl or some other great gentleman. Despite the modesty of her upbringing, she would shine and sparkle amongst society if allowed.
“But shall we not see you in Bingley’s company some time or another?” Elizabeth asked. Then she sighed a little dolefully. “I suppose you are not likely to visit him at Netherfield for another long stay in the next few years.”
The whole left Darcy with an uncomfortable sensation.
He still meant to advise Bingley to not marry Miss Bennet. Except…after his conversation with her he no longer had the same conviction that Jane herself deserved censure, and her always fixed smile might simply reflect her unwillingness to show her feelings to the general public—a delicacy he could not despise—rather than an indifference to Bingley.
Or maybe it hid indifference.
Darcy could not know without a much closer acquaintance with her.
The three of them talked on other matters, but Mr. Bennet was awake rather past his bedtime. After a few minutes he mostly ceased to interject himself in the conversation and he laid his head against the winged side of the sofa, and after five minutes he closed his eyes and began to softly snore.
Elizabeth looked at Mr. Bennet with a smile and a great deal of affection.
The two of them became a little quiet for a few minutes, but Darcy thought it was more out of comfort in each other’s presence than a lack of things that might be said.
The candles were low and made Elizabeth’s skin glow warmly. He would miss her very much. More than anything else in Hertfordshire, including Bingley. If only… But Darcy did not know what that “if only” pointed towards. He only knew that he liked Elizabeth’s conversation very much, that he would worry for her when they were absent, and he wished that they would not be apart.
She looked at him with what he suspected were similar thoughts.
“Can you read Miss Bennet’s feelings?” Darcy asked of a sudden.
Elizabeth laughed at the question. “The cypher of the eternal smile?—but to what does the question turn.”
Darcy frowned in thought. He did not know that it would be proper to explain that he had been seeking to perceive if she liked Mr. Bingley.
“She is hard to understand,” Elizabeth said. “Even those who know her best find it difficult. She has always been guarded—I think it is because she can recognize wrongness in how loud Mrs. Bennet always is. No one ever wonders what she thinks.”
With a smile Darcy repeated his question, “And you? Can you read her feelings.”
“Often. There are subtle hints. And she is less guarded at home. But anyone who has not spent weeks in close conversation with her would be unlikely to understand much of what she thinks—must you go so soon? But you must. You have your duties. I’ll say it again: I shall miss you greatly.”
“And I you.”
They smiled at each other. They spent the next hours just enjoying each other’s presence.
They had an inexhaustible store of things to say to each other. He felt as though he might talk to Elizabeth forever without any chance of boredom.
Eventually Mr. Bennet awoke with a start, and he laughingly asked how long he had been asleep, pulled his watch from his waistcoat and looked at the time, and then with a smile at them both said, “Much as Mrs. Bennet might protest, this is late enough that we cannot be accused of leaving unfashionably early if I have the carriage called around.”