Page 29

During the four days between Friday and the Netherfield ball, there was such a succession of rain as to prevent the Longbourn ladies from walking to Meryton once.

Fortunately for said ladies, any Derbyshire coachman worth his salt considered the Hertfordshire rain as unworthy of his concern (barely sprinkling), and the difference between the Darcy coach and the Bennet coach was as a mouse to an elephant.

Granted, none of the Bennet ladies had seen an elephant, but all doubted it could be any more impressive than the Darcy coach.

Friday morning found Darcy and Georgiana venturing to Longbourn to return the Bennet ladies to Netherfield for luncheon.

Naturally, since a Derbyshire gentleman was not as hardy as a Derbyshire coachman, they chose to dine with only the three eldest. Since Netherfield only had one officer and he was away for the day; the two youngest Bennet sisters vastly preferred to spend the time with their Aunt Philips, where many officers were bound to show up eventually.

Darcy dropped them in Meryton, and the rest returned to Netherfield.

Bingley was busy with Mrs Ashford on ball preparations until luncheon, so the three elder Bennet sisters spent the next hour or two conversing quietly with the Darcy siblings.

Having survived an afternoon with Lydia and Kitty, Georgiana was gradually losing her shyness and found she quite liked all the Bennet sisters (though some in moderation).

Mr Bingley dropped by occasionally for a few minutes at a time, but there was still much to do.

He was gradually discovering that Caroline, while annoying in the extreme, was at least competent.

She had only been organizing for a couple of days before returning to London (preceded by days of trying to talk her brother out of it), but most of the bigger tasks were complete.

Mrs Ashford would act as hostess as a favour. While she was happy to do it, she did not want to work herself to death, nor deprive her nephew of a good opportunity to improve his character. She believed most men needed to improve their characters, so such a chance was not to be wasted.

Lunch was an interesting affair. It was not as boisterous as the Bennet table, but still livelier than one would expect with the Darcy siblings present.

Elizabeth was starting to feel comfortable with both, which she still found slightly unnerving.

A week had yet to pass since Darcy’s apology, yet she could barely remember the time before.

She was still full of misgivings and nervousness, but found comfort in the fact that her beau seemed inclined to give her all the time she needed.

Miss Darcy turned out to have a subtle sense of humour that meshed very well with Mary’s. Elizabeth was thrilled with the relationship, not least because she suspected that Mary would end up in Derbyshire with her if she accepted Mr Darcy.

Jane was another matter entirely. The informal seating allowed both gentlemen to sit next to their objects of affection, but Elizabeth was far less anxious than her sister. Jane had given the man a chance, but Elizabeth thought it might take some time to regain their ease.

She was slightly puzzled by the whole affair.

The fact of the matter was that Mr Bingley had not actually committed any grave offence against Jane, apart from conversational neglect.

He did not correct his sister, but Elizabeth had not tried to correct her mother when she set about disparaging Mr Darcy often enough.

She had mostly given up on her younger sisters, and they said far worse things than the Bingley sisters ever did on a regular basis.

To be honest, Elizabeth also had to admit that any conversation involved two people, both capable of speaking; so, if Mr Bingley knew nothing about Jane, it was not necessarily his fault.

Even constrained by propriety, Jane could have given him something. It was all most perplexing.

Elizabeth wondered if Jane was nervous about making herself vulnerable to a weak man, whether she was giving him enough rope to hang himself, or she was simply not over her anger.

A stray thought occurred to her, followed by the shocking realization that the first thing she wanted to do was discuss it with Darcy.

Unlike using his given name for the first time, which was a deliberate ploy to make herself easier with it; the desire to discuss her private thoughts was unexpected.

Once those thoughts occurred to her, she could hardly be bothered to make decent conversation. Fortunately, it all happened during dessert, so after taking some time to refresh themselves, they were off to the drawing room for the afternoon.

~~~~~

Mary and Georgiana abandoned their elders in favour of the pianoforte, and ten minutes later there was a surprising amount of giggling, fine music, and god-awful noise, much to the approval of their elders.

Jane went to aid Mrs Ashford and Bingley for some ball-related tasks that Elizabeth did not even want to know about, so she was left with her beau.

Elizabeth smiled. “William, something surprising happened during luncheon. Are you curious?”

“Dying to know,” he said, and gave her his full attention (which naturally required him to slide half a hand closer).

“It is about Jane. She has given Mr Bingley another chance, but she does not seem comfortable with him.”

Darcy thought a moment. “I wonder if his doing his other tasks is to his favour or detriment. On the one hand, as I understand it, she wants things to be slower than last time, and she probably wants him to show some industriousness—but perhaps she feels neglected?”

“No, I think not… at least not overtly.”

“What then?”

She thought a bit more, and finally said, “Before we speak of Jane, allow me to digress. I had a disquieting thought about Jane and very much to my surprise, I discovered the first thing I wanted to do was share it with you.”

Darcy gave her a smile that would challenge Jane’s in its radiance. “That makes me happy.”

Elizabeth thought about it a moment, and finally whispered, “Me as well.”

They sat in thought for some time, and he finally said, “Perhaps we should discuss it.”

“Of course.” She laughed. “Here is my odd little thought: All Jane’s life, she has been denied the luxury of anger, let alone rage.

She was always Jane the beautiful, Jane the steady, Jane the smiler, Jane the peacemaker.

I used to try to shake her out of her shell of complaisance, but her habits are as steady as the tides. ”

“I suppose that makes sense. It reminds me of the ride back from that blasted assembly…” then he caught himself and looked to Elizabeth apologetically.

“You will have to curse worse than that to bother me. You should hear my uncle Philips,” she said with a laugh.

He nodded and smiled. “Bingley was carrying on at great length about what an angel your sister was, and I said she smiled too much.”

Elizabeth chuckled. “Well, about that—the incident in this very room may have given her a justification for true anger that nobody could deny. For good or ill, I quite readily absolved the gentleman of offenses against myself, just so he could get on with making a proper apology to Jane—which he did, according to her.”

“He told me as much, but also that she wished things to proceed much more slowly and subtly this time.”

“Here is my thought: Maybe Jane is enjoying her anger too much to let it go easily. ”

Darcy thought about it for quite some time. “Did he shoot himself in the foot by returning to London?”

“I think not. I am not certain I approve of how he is handling his sisters, nor have Jane and I canvassed the subject. In fact, she is tight-lipped about the man at present.”

“That is not necessarily bad.”

“It is not, but to answer your question, I suppose Jane is trying to work out what kind of man he is, and more importantly, what kind he will be.”

“Yes… Bingley told her we had opposite problems. He needs to grow up and I need to reclaim my childhood.”

Elizabeth laughed. “Yes, Jane said you were very much like a middle-aged man before your twentieth birthday.”

“That sounds like something Bingley would say.”

“If this be your second childhood…” she glanced at the oblivious sisters at the pianoforte before giving his hand a squeeze, “…do not be in too much of a hurry to grow up.”

He laughed, and tried to answer, but her hand on his made him mostly incapable of speech, so he simply returned her squeeze and smiled.

Bingley and Jane interrupted them in time to avoid awkwardness, saying the rain was increasing so they should return to Longbourn.

In short order, they reversed the morning’s journey.

Elizabeth noticed the officers leaving her aunt’s house, so presumed her sisters must have been well entertained.

She shuddered to think what they got up to without any of their elders, but she could not spend all her time doing her parents’ job.

She noticed Carter, Chamberlayne, and Wickham ducking around the corner and making a break for the barracks at a run, then never gave them another thought.

~~~~~

Saturday played out much like Friday, with the three elder Bennet sisters visiting Netherfield.

The colonel made an appearance, and Darcy asked Elizabeth to get to know him, as he was his closest confidant and Georgiana’s other guardian.

He now seated himself by her, and talked so agreeably of Hertfordshire and Derbyshire, of travelling and staying at home, of new books and music, that Elizabeth had never been half so well entertained in that room before.