Page 35

“William,”

said the Countess.

“would you prefer that I speak with Catherine first?”

“No, Aunt,”

replied.

“The matter is mine to address. I must see it done.”

“As you wish,”

she said with a slight incline of her head.

“But hear me well—I have no intention of urging you towards forgiveness. However, you would do well to consider what your dear mother might have done, had she known about Catherine’s duplicity.”

gave a solemn nod.

“I take your meaning, Aunt.”

With that, he lingered as the rest of the party made their slow progress towards the entrance. Once the last rustle of silk and muffled footfall had passed beyond earshot, he turned and made his way toward the advancing figures of his aunt and Mary. He bowed to Mary, who offered a polite curtsy and excused herself with admirable tact.

“Aunt,”

said he, once they were alone.

“I am not ignorant of what you attempted those many years ago.”

The words struck her like a sudden blow. Aunt Catherine paused mid-step, turned sharply, and fixed him with a look of astonishment. Her lips parted, her eyes widened, and a succession of emotions passed swiftly over her countenance: first indignation, then shame, and lastly, a weary sigh. She closed her eyes.

’s voice softened.

“I seek but one answer, Aunt: why did you never come to my mother and ask her pardon?”

Aunt Catherine lifted her chin and sustained his gaze, though her eyes were moist with feeling.

“I might offer the easy explanation—that your father forbade it. And indeed, he did. Yet that is not the whole truth.”

For a moment her imperious expression softened.

“The truth is, my dear nephew, that I was afraid—afraid to look upon your mother’s face and find there the quiet sting of disappointment. Not rage, nor cruelty, but that singular moment of hurt in her eyes. I knew it would last but an instant, for she possessed a heart vast enough to forgive almost anything. Yet that moment, , that single instant, would have undone me.”

She paused once more, her gaze falling to the gravel path beneath their feet.

“I regretted my actions the very moment they were done,”

she said quietly.

“But it was not until the following day that the full weight of them truly struck me. Your mother stood before me—tears upon her cheeks, her whole countenance shattered—and begged me to explain. Begged, William. She could not comprehend why I would accept a proposal from Sir Lewis, knowing it was a match devoid of affection. She asked whether she had failed me somehow, whether she might have prevented it had she done more, said more—been more.”

Aunt Catherine drew in a slow breath, her voice trembling with recollection.

“And there I stood—having, only the day before, endeavoured to win for myself the very gentleman she loved—and I was overcome. The shame of it was so great, I could not meet her eyes.”

At length, she looked up and met ’s gaze. Her usual hauteur had softened into something far more human.

“And now,”

she said.

“all I can do—all that remains to me—is to offer you my sincerest apology, and to hope that you, at least, might find it in your heart to forgive me.”

regarded his aunt with a curious mixture of familiarity and revelation. Always proud, always unyielding—yet now laid bare, exposed not by scandal but by sorrow. In that moment, he saw her clearly, perhaps for the first time: a woman who, like himself, had worn dignity as a shield, while sorrows of the heart lay concealed beneath.

“If forgiveness is to be given,”

said he at length.

“I cannot say it is mine to offer. And yet—I believe my mother, had she known all, would have forgiven you. Indeed, I am certain she would. Therefore, I choose to believe she did. And I think you ought to do the same.”

He held her gaze deliberately.

“Moreover—it is not my forgiveness that you are truly in need of.”

Her gaze sharpened. Slowly, watched the truth dawn behind her eyes—that his forgiveness was not hers to claim, unless first she humbled herself to Mary.

“Tell me, —what is going on here?”

she asked.

“I cannot but feel I have been made to play the fool in some private theatricals.”

drew a slow breath.

“There is much, Aunt, of which you remain unaware.”

With a calm air, he proceeded to recount the web of misunderstandings. Lady Catherine listened in a state of incredulous irritation that soon gave way to reluctant recognition.

“So,”

she declared, her voice carrying its usual operatic flair.

“Mr. Collins was taken in by your little performance and misled me entirely. Well—it serves me right for appointing him to the living at Hunsford. I might as well have ordained a cabbage.”

allowed himself a slight smile.

“He now devotes his attentions to Miss Lucas—a friend of Elizabeth’s. A sensible young woman, by all accounts. I believe she shall bring some measure of steadiness to his… eccentricities. Hunsford is likely to benefit. And so will he.”

“And so will I,”

said Lady Catherine with a surprising air of levity.

“I should not mind the company of a woman capable of carrying a conversation without reciting a sermon or a menu. Now, —”

she paused, her tone lowering to something rather nearer humility.

“—now that I have been suitably chastened, I wish to do what is right. Return to the parlour and ask Miss Mary to join me.”

She drew in a breath, then added, almost to herself.

“I have not yet offered her my apology. And I, of all people, ought not to speak of plainness in others. It was unkind. And it was untrue.”

regarded her for a moment, softened by the rare candour in her manner. “Aunt,”

he said gently.

“One thing I have learned of late is that beauty often lies in the eyes of the one who sees it.”

Lady Catherine gave a dry little laugh, tinged with ruefulness.

“That sounds remarkably like something I said to Miss Mary earlier. Go on, . Do what I asked. And ask her—politely—if she might grant a few minutes’ conversation to a contrite old lady.”

gave a respectful bow and made his way back to the parlour, his heart lighter than it had been for many days. Upon entering, he approached Mary, who, on hearing Lady Catherine’s request, rose at once and left without hesitation.

then crossed to where Elizabeth sat.

“Well?”

she asked.

He seated himself beside her, leaning in as he briefly recounted his exchange with Aunt Catherine.

Elizabeth listened attentively.

“Is it time, Fitzwilliam?”

she asked, glancing meaningfully toward her mother.

“I daresay if we delay much longer, Mamma may begin announcing it herself out of sheer impatience.”

Indeed, Mrs Bennet was perched at the very edge of her chair, her whole frame trembling with unshed exclamations. Though she had, miraculously, kept silent thus far—likely due to the presence of the Earl—her hands were in constant motion: folding and refolding her handkerchief, patting her hair, smoothing her gown with the urgency of a woman expecting the Prince Regent at any moment.

’s eyes swept the room. Mr and Mrs Phillips had arrived, no doubt summoned by Mrs Bennet in anticipation of this very moment. With the Gardiners also present, all of Elizabeth’s relations were assembled in the parlour, which was bustling and rather crowded.

Among his own kin, all were present save for Viscount Henry and his family, and Anne. Uncle Matlock sat with a certain stately boredom, yet not without interest, while the Countess conversed with Jane, evidently delighted.

“A moment more, Elizabeth,”

returned.

“We have waited this long—let us wait a little longer. I would have Mary and aunt Catherine returned, that we might make our announcement before the whole family.”

Elizabeth’s eyes softened.

“As you wish, Fitzwilliam. But if my mother bursts before they return, you shall be obliged to handle the consequences.”

smiled, faint but warm.

“I shall bear them bravely.”

And so they waited.

Epilogue

Saturday, January 18, 1812

Meryton Church

Happy indeed—for all her maternal feelings—was the day on which Mrs. Bennet found herself finally rid of her three most deserving daughters. Though the formal announcement had been made a month prior—in the presence of an Earl and Countess, no less—she still occasionally lost track of which gentleman was engaged to which young lady. For the couples, in their affectionate exuberance, were so indiscriminately cheerful in one another’s company that it became rather a trial to distinguish who belonged to whom.

Fortunately, on this momentous morning, they stood in proper order—each daughter placed beside her intended—and thus Mrs. Bennet could regard them with unclouded satisfaction, untroubled by confusion and fully persuaded of the superiority of her arrangements. There was, she believed, no cause to repine, and every reason for pride.

To observe the expression upon Lady Lucas’s face—whose daughter Charlotte was to marry Mr. Collins, the heir of Longbourn and a man whose conversation might fatigue stone—was, in Mrs. Bennet’s estimation, the crowning joy of the occasion. It was, as she later confided to several intimate acquaintances—the very sugar atop an already most superior confection.

The journey to this day had not been without difficulty. She had fought, more or less single-handedly, to delay the weddings for an entire month—a month!—against the unified impatience of all three couples, who had seemed most inconveniently eager to be married by the Tuesday following the announcement. But she had prevailed. There had been wedding breakfasts to arrange, dresses to be fitted, invitations to be managed, and—most importantly—every detail made suitably grand for the closest relations of an Earl and Countess. Such an event could not be rushed.

And now, as she stood amid the floral garlands and the congratulatory murmurs of assembled friends and relations, her heart full and her eyes moist with the sweet excess of triumph, Mrs. Bennet felt confident in her conviction: this triple wedding would be the talk of Meryton for years—decades—to come.

Lady Catherine’s Town House, London