Page 7

L ongbourn’scarriage enteredNetherfield'sDrive at around teno’clockin the morning. The family, including Mr. Darcy, were at breakfast when Miss Jane Bennetwas announcedinto the room. Mr. Bingley immediately sprung out of his seat, his face red and eyes wide as the beautiful blonde lady, dressed impeccably in a pressed lilac morning dress and a flaxen strawbonnetstood before them,

“Miss Bennet! What a wonderful surprise!”

Judging by the expressions on the faces of Miss Bingley and her elder sister, the surprise was anything butwonderful.

Miss Bennet smiled shyly, removing her bonnet from her head to show off the pattern of intricate braids that made up her elegant updo,

“Ihave come to inquire after my cousin.”She said softly, her gaze unmoving from Mr.Bingley’shandsome visage. Darcy raised a derisive brow at thelady’santics but was too much of a gentleman to say anything. Mr. Hurst, however, did not hold himself to the same restraints, and let out a snort.

His wife glared at him, but neither Mr. Bingley nor Miss Bennet noticed. It was Miss Bingley, in the end, who ended their stare-off,

“Miss Eliza must indeed be absolutely indispensable to the Bennetsconsideringthat not only did you come here yourself to check on her health, but so did a maid from your household.”She scoffed,“How many attendants can a sick person need, I wonder.”

Jane blinked, “A maid?” She asked, confused.

“Yes. An Indian girl, the housekeeper informed me.”Miss Bingley said, shrugging a delicate shoulder.

“Oh.”Jane blushed. How disorganised their household must seem!“That would be Hala, I think. She isLizzy’sabigail, and under hergrandfather’semployee.” That she did not see it fit to inform the Bennets of her whereabouts wentunsaid,but not unheard.

Mrs. Hurst looked surprised,“I had supposed your grandfather had passed, seeing as Mr. Bennet has inherited. Do all you girls have your ownlady’smaids?”If they did, the Bennets werecertainlymuchricherthan the Bingley sisters had previously considered. Even she and Caroline had had to share a maid between them both until she married.

Jane blushed further,“Not at all. The four of us share one amongst ourselves. When I say grandfather, I refer toLizzy’smother’sfather. Elizabeth lives with her maternal side of the family for most of the yearandshe is an only child. And so, it is only natural that she must have a maid of her own.”

“Of course.”Louisa smiled condescendingly, losing interest.For a long moment, nobody spoke and just stared ateveryone’sfaces.Jane squirmed. She had not anticipated for the meeting to go as uncomfortably as it was going,

“Um…” She started, “Lizzy’s room-”

“But of course!”Bingley started abruptly, walking around the dining table to offer Miss Bennet his arm,“I shall take you to her directly.Youmustnot worryforyour cousinovermuch.From what Mrs. Norris tells us, MissBraxton’slady’smaid has been nursing her since dawn, and the lady herself is as well as canbe expected.”

Rather than the news consoling her, it only made Jane slump further. After all, if Hala really was taking such prodigious care of Lizzy, what excuse would she have to stay at Netherfield?

Hala was wringing a cold cloth in the basin when she heard the door toNetherfield’sguest chamber open. She turned around only to see Mr. Bingley standing at the threshold, holding the door open for Miss Jane Bennet to walk into the room,

“Miss Bennet.”Hala greeted, curtsying,

“Hala,”Jane answered,“We none of us at Longbourn were aware you had come to Netherfield.”

“Iwas worried for my Miss Lizzy, madam.”

“Even so.”Jane peeked behind her, only to see Mr. Bingley still standing in the doorway, smiling widely. She smiled back at him, completely lovestruck, then faced Hala again with the sternest face she could muster,“You ought to have informed Mama before leaving.”

“Beg pardon, ma’am.”

Hala did not look very contrite, but Jane was not in the habit of discipliningservants,and so could not think of anything else to say. She nodded, then came over to where Lizzy was lying in bed, her skinpale,and a tight, pained look on her face as she slept. Jane sobered at thesight,and caressed the youngergirl’scheekonlyto find her face hot and damp,

“How is she?”

“Mistress is very unwell. Her fever seems to be getting worse, and whenever she wakes, she complains of pains in her chest.”Hala replied, then in a lowered voice, whispered only to Jane,“Could I beg you, miss, to ask Mr. Bingley to have the apothecary called?”

Jane assented, thenturningto Mr. Bingley, conveyed the request. Mr. Bingley startled as if coming out of a stupor, then grinned,

“Oh, certainly! Certainly!Mr. Jones had been called yesterdayalso, of course, and he had promisedhe wouldvisit again today.I have no doubt he will be here as soon ashe can.I shall write him a note in any case, urging him to hurry along. Perhaps we also ought to call for a London physician for Miss Braxton.”

“Oh, Mr. Bingley!”Jane started at the generous offer,“You are ever so kind, but a physician is unnecessary. Our Mr. Jones is a very capable apothecary. He has been taking care of the residents of Meryton for a good twenty or so years now.”

Bingley flushed,“Of course. I meant no offence.”

“Nonewas taken, sir, I assure you.”

Moony-eyed and oblivious to the malaise in the room, Bingley and Jane stared at each other. Hala looked between them alternatively, then rolled her eyes. Miss Elizabeth would no doubt find their interactions amusing, but Hala was in no humour tobe entertained. She could only send the heedless lovebirds a reproachfullook,and continue with caring for her lady.

It started, as these sorts of things are usually wont to do, through the ingenuous andratherharmless musings of an unsuspecting servant.

Nigella was a housemaid at Netherfield. Only fifteen years old, she was a relatively recent hire and had been coming out of themaster’sstudy after having lit the fire in the hearth when she had heard the front doors burst open. Intrigued by the noise in a manor that she often found much too quiet and sombre, she had walked out to the foyer as quickly and as quietly as possible just in time to see hermaster’shandsome friend, Mr. Darcy, marching into the house, his person soaking wet, and carrying an equally wet young lady in his arms.

Nigella gasped, but remained hidden on the underside of the grand staircase for the most part. Mr. Darcy, his jaw set and stare cold, seemed incapable of noticing anything or anyone that was not the lady in his armsand,without breaking his stride for even a moment, he headed for the nearest parlour with Mrs. Norris, the housekeeper, fretting at his heels. The footmen they left behind in the entry hall exchanged looks but were much too well-behaved to gossip while they were still on duty. Nigella was new at herjob,and not nearly as attached to either Netherfield as an estate or to the Bingleys as a family as the rest of the servants seemed to be. She wasalso,perhaps, a little too curious for her owngood,andthereforefelt no scruples as she stealthily made her way to the parlour the gentleman had entered andunassumingly, began tending to the fire burning in its hearth even as she listened in on the conversation that was taking place between the rest of theroom’soccupants.

The unconscious and bedraggled woman lying on the divan was a Miss Braxton, a visiting cousin of the Bennets, whose estate was situated some three miles from Netherfield. Miss Braxton had fallen into a nearby lake, and Mr. Darcy, who had seen it happen, had dived in after her like a knight in shining armour and had pulled the maiden out before she drowned. Rather than escorting her to Longbourn, which was significantly further away, he felt it prudent to bring Miss Braxton to Netherfieldconsideringnot only the terrifying scare she must havehad,but also her flagginghealth,and the rain that was imminent if the angry grey clouds in the sky were anything to go by.

To Nigella, who was a perpetual starry-eyed romantic, Mr.Darcy’sbrave actions made him no less charming than a prince. She felt him rise in her esteem, and if she weretruly honest, she envisioned him, with the uncommon swiftness of a young girl’s imagination, falling in love, marrying and living happily ever after with theprettyfair maiden he had so valiantly rescued from an unspeakably horrifying fate.

All this she thought, and all this she related to her closest friend and bed-mate, Millie Thomas, another housemaid who had, at the time these events took place,been too occupiedclearing Mrs.Hurst’sbathwater in the upstairs rooms to witness any of them. Where Nigella was a dreamer, Millie was more of a sceptic, and whatNigella had considered a fortunate and rather providential coincidence, Millie thought much more likely to be a planned assignation gone awry. With a smile as sly as acat’s, she repeated her own, more cynical version of events to the cookwhowas also heraunt’shusband’ssecond cousin. The cook, as entertained by the scandalous tale as any woman her age and with her propensity to gossip might be, then forwarded it to the milkmaid, who spoke of it to her husband, who repeated it to his brotherwhowas also the town innkeeper, and then all of a sudden, every other person in Meryton was gossiping about the infamous rendezvous turned romantic rescue that took place between two of thevillage’svisitors.

Miss Braxton was considered by all she met to be a clever, good-humoured and handsome young lady, second only in beauty to her cousinJane;and while Mr. Darcy was not as universally liked, having offended the neighbourhood with his stoic silences and arrogant tendencies, the more perceptive members of the society had noticed that if there was one person whose company the wealthy and aristocratic gentleman did attempt to seek outside of his own party, it was MissBraxton’s. In light of all these observations, no one in Meryton thought it too great of a leap to consider that the couple might have, in the course of their acquaintance, developed a tendre for each other.

To all this chatter, the people of Longbourn and Netherfield werecompletelyoblivious. Mrs. Bennetwas much too investedin spreading the impending news of her owndaughter’smatch to the amiable Mr. Bingley to care for any other information circulating amongst her society, and theBingley sisters considered themselves much too superior to deign to converse, for any length of time, with the people of the village.

The rumours thus spread unheeded.In amarket town assmall andasremoteasMeryton, the people had learned to take entertainment whereitcouldbe found.In Mr. Darcy and MissBraxton’ssupposed courtship, the residents found there was much to gasp at, much to romanticise, and much to censure. It satisfied everyperson’spreference fordiversion,and was, therefore, a topic not easily set aside.