Page 13 of Ever After End

CHAPTER 12

M eryton - January 1812

“Do not lie, Jane. He has frustrated you greatly,” Elizabeth said to her sister, who had just left their father in his study. Emboldened by Elizabeth’s encouragement to take hold of the reins of her future, Jane had become more animated, and played a greater role in the running of Longbourn.

Jane still deferred to her mother in all matters of the household, as was proper, but now she went out and spoke to the tenants every week, accompanied by a footman hired by Elizabeth to accompany her and her two eldest sisters. Jane was learning about crops, drainage, and harvests, and finally convinced both her father and half of the tenants to agree to try a crop rotation method. Mr Bennet had wanted to try the method years ago, but when the tenants proved resistant, he gave up, as he did with everything else. Jane only convinced half of their tenants to try the method, the others were holding out to see what the braver families would make of it.

“It was not so very bad,” Jane lied .

“What did he make you barter to get your way?” demanded Elizabeth. Mr Bennet had recently turned childish and petulant, disliking his daughters’ and wife’s new habit of making demands of him and insisting that he should care more now about the estate, since it was going to Jane. In truth, Mr Bennet had cared about little but books and port for years, and a short period of having his spending curbed for the sake of his family had put him in a sour mood.

“If we make a larger profit, from the next harvest, he must get half for his books,” admitted Jane. “It is not unfair.”

“It is not unfair as long as you get the other half for yourself, considering that you are doing all the planning and management with the tenants. He hasn’t left his book room for weeks now,” said Elizabeth. “If you are the heir, and past your majority, doing all of this work so he might have a few more books, you ought to have the proper allowance for the heir to this estate.”

“I did tell him that,” Jane confessed, biting her lip. “I cannot believe I was so bold. I told him if I am to do all of this work, I would benefit from a proper riding mare, not his dreadful horse, which I fear I will fall off of, or Nellie, who seems as if she might fall down and die at any moment. And it was eventually agreed that the cost of educating my sisters must come off the top of the profit before we split what is left. He did not like that, but I am doing this for them, not for him.”

“I will help however I can with my sisters, as we planned before Mr Collins made his decision,” promised Elizabeth. “You will not have them all with you forever, except perhaps Mama. With not only an estate of your own, and my house in London from which to launch them all one at a time, and my six hundred a year, we will all be well looked after, and I am certain that all three of our sisters will find husbands one way or another.”

It had been assumed by Mrs Bennet once it was made known that Jane was to inherit Longbourn that she and the young ladies would stay there forever, a situation she preferred far better to depending on Elizabeth. It had not made it into the paper until nearly Michaelmas that the entail was dissolved on Longbourn of Hertfordshire, and Mrs Bennet had been in her element ever since. Sadly, relations with Lucas Lodge had been even more hostile ever since, nearly aggressive, even.

“I think that if I were a man, John Lucas would call me out,” Jane had said of the matter when Mr Lucas had been alarmingly rude to her one day in Meryton.

“If you were a man, you and Papa would have ended the entail between you already, and Mr Collins would have never entered the neighbourhood,” replied Elizabeth. “It is not our fault that Mr Collins decided he did not wish to run an estate. We could never even have predicted he might act in such a matter, but it is not as if Charlotte has any cause to repine. Our cousin’s living is generous. John’s sister will be fine, and the Lucases never had any right to Longbourn. They have all been difficult since I won the lottery. Charlotte changed right away, and you see how the rest of them turned against me when I refused John, and then Uncle would not give them any of my money to educate Henry.”

Lydia had suffered the most since all of the changes to the Bennets’ fortunes, and the new resolve of her parents. Her friendship with Maria Lucas was in tatters, she was no longer out, and she was lonely. She spent her time in the company of her mother, sisters, and their governess Miss Ellis, the thirty-year-old well educated daughter of a parson and scholar, who had left his daughter nothing but his intellect. The uncaring man had donated a fortune in books to a school owned by his friend, and his daughter had been left not even a farthing for her dowry.

Elizabeth, Jane, and Mrs Bennet had insisted that the younger girls compare this with the neglect of their father, and to always remember how selfish men could be. They all promised not to marry without their Uncle Gardiner’s or their Uncle Phillips’ approval, not that the girls had much worth marrying for. At least their uncles could ensure their best possible protection, and that of their children, whatever their situations would be in the end.

Miss Ellis was active, lively, and stern, ensuring that Lydia learned what was expected of her. She travelled to Ware with Mary each week, to visit a friend of Miss Ellis that had a harp-lute, and was willing to give some lessons. So far, Mary had shown great interest and enthusiasm, and Jane promised her that if she showed progress that they would ask their uncle to look for an instrument in town.

People in town were always selling items out of desperation, there were shops all over town filled with used jewellery, furniture, small instruments, even used clothing and hats could all be purchased in the city for bargain prices. Shopkeepers paid pennies to desperate sellers, and then sold the items for low prices to move them quickly. Mr Gardiner already had furnishings for a third of Lizzy’s new house waiting in his warehouses. The house had been taken by a woman whose estate was lost to debts upon the death of her husband, and whose two eldest sons must work in the city. The family had their own furniture that they brought with them, and they hoped to stay in Elizabeth’s house for some time.

Kitty also benefited from Miss Ellis’s company. Along with a master from St Albans, Miss Ellis began to train Lydia and Kitty both to show some small skills on the pianoforte, and Lydia was also learning to draw. All three of the youngest girls met separately with their father once a week in his study for lessons in their most difficult subjects.

In late January, excitement washed over the town when it was learned that a gentleman with an estate was coming to visit Netherfield Park. Mr Ferrars, an old friend of Mr Lockhart, was coming to visit for one month before travelling on to visit his sister. He was his mother’s heir to a comfortable fortune, though it was rumoured that he might take orders until he inherited.

The man was to arrive on the first of February, and Mrs Lockhart had promised the village a ball for St Valentine’s Day. By the time the gentleman arrived at Netherfield Park, every shoe rose, glove, and painted fan were cleaned out of the haberdasher, and most of the unmarried ladies in town had converged upon the dressmaker, though the Bennet ladies all agreed that the gowns Elizabeth had purchased for them when she won her prize were little enough used, and would suit perfectly for the evening.

Mr Ferrars was dubbed a fine figure of a man, and everything a gentleman ought to be when he appeared. He was invited everywhere with the Lockharts, who entertained each week that he was with them. Of course, the man gravitated immediately to Jane, as most bachelors did when entering the neighbourhood.

There were grumbles among the neighbouring families that the Bennets had enjoyed more than their share of good fortune recently, but Mrs Goulding, a long time friend of Mrs Bennet’s who had not liked the recent tone of relations in the village, pointed out to everyone that it was only to be expected that the man would first be interested in Jane Bennet, every man always was, even before she was an heiress. She was the most beautiful woman for three counties, she was kind, she was gentle, and she was to inherit property. Mrs Goulding pointed out that the sooner Miss Bennet was married, the sooner suitors could be turned towards the other young ladies of the neighbourhood.

As the days passed and Mr Ferrars paid more and more attention to Jane, it was soon clear from the man’s quiet, rather unassuming demeanour, that he was perfect for the eldest Miss Bennet, and was drawn to her not for her looks or her fortune, but because their temperaments were very much alike. Mrs Bennet was beside herself with excitement over Jane’s beau, and when the man was not calling upon her daughter, she was travelling about Meryton in her carriage, boasting to her friends about every single compliment and attention Mr Ferrars made to Jane.