Page 5 of Mistress of Pemberley
He hesitated for several more days to have the conversation with his daughters. But the matter could no longer be delayed. Elizabeth would be visiting her friend Charlotte in the coming weeks, now married to Mr Collins, while Lydia and Kitty spent much of their time in the somewhat perilous company of the militia officers stationed nearby.
Eager to speak to them without interruption or opposition from his wife, he summoned his daughters to him one morning when Mrs Bennet had planned a journey to St Albans with her sister.
He regarded each of them in turn as they sat around him in the library. Elizabeth was curious, as she always was during their conversations. Lydia and Kitty looked faintly apprehensive, though also visibly irritated at being detained from their usual diversions. Mary, meanwhile, had already retreated to a quiet corner, a book taken from his desk firmly in hand.
“I wish to discuss what has happened to Jane,” he began with resolve, and at once, their expressions changed to interest. This was not like the lessons they used to receive in their childhood, and the novelty of the subject caught their attention.
“Jane fell in love,” Lydia declared, her tone disdainful.
“You speak as though you do not believe in love yourself,” Elizabeth retorted sharply. Mr Bennet, observing the lively discourse, refrained from interjecting. He thought this was the perfect opening to a serious discussion in which they might all engage.
“I do believe in love,” Lydia replied. However, her tone remained indifferent, and her countenance lacked the spark one might expect in a young girl discussing the subject. “But not like Jane.”
“Do you think Jane was in the wrong?” Mr Bennet asked slyly, guiding the conversation in the direction he intended.
“No!” Elizabeth exclaimed. “How can we speak so of her and her feelings, so pure and beautiful? Her love was no mistake.”
“But it ended in separation and sorrow,” Mr Bennet continued.
“That is exactly my point,” Lydia interjected, with Kitty nodding in dutiful agreement as she always did with her younger sister. “Luckily, she has gone to London and will forget him there.”
“You may be mistaken about the depth of Jane’s feelings,” Elizabeth remarked. “Jane did not journey to London to forget Mr Bingley. Quite the opposite—she nurtured great hopes of meeting him there. At this very moment, she is likely penning a message to Miss Bingley, announcing her safe arrival in town. And I am certain her message will centre upon one question: When do you think we might meet?”
“But if she does not see him, she will forget him in no time,” Lydia said with conviction.
“We must be patient, Lydia dear,” her father replied with a faint smile, recognising both her confidence and her na?vety.
“Patient? Mr Bingley left the country at the end of November. Nearly six weeks have passed, and Jane’s grief remains unabated. In your estimation, how long does it take to recover from such an attachment?” Lydia asked.
“There is no set duration,” Mr Bennet responded. “It is not influenza, and even in the case of such an ailment, it is difficult to know the precise period it takes to recover. Nevertheless, I hope that nothing untoward happens in London and that she will return to better spirits. We may witness a joyful Jane when the spring finally arrives.”
“Spring?” Elizabeth asked, genuinely surprised. “You agree, after all, that Jane’s sentiments are not a mere passing fancy?”
“All I agree on is that Jane had higher expectations than reality could offer, and it is your mother’s fault for encouraging her to entertain hopes beyond what the gentleman had expressed. When combined with her eagerness to experience love and her somewhat innocent nature, it led to the grief we all observed. But, as I told your aunt, young ladies should experience affection at least once before finding a husband. It is a valuable experience when one reaches the point of choosing a spouse.”
“Must I remind you, dear Papa, that we young ladies do not choose our husbands?” Lydia said defensively. “It is the gentlemen who make their selections while we simply wait. It is akin to what occurs when you journey to St Albans to negotiate a horse sale!”
“Lydia! How can you utter such offensive words about ladies?” her father exclaimed, feigning indignation yet secretly admiring his youngest daughter’s grip on reality.
“You do not have to pretend you are shocked by Lydia’s words,” Elizabeth intervened, for once agreeing with her youngest sister’s point of view. “Rather than indignation, I perceive admiration in your eyes for Lydia’s courage in confronting reality.”
They watched as her father burst into laughter—a rare occurrence since he generally responded to their jests with merely a smile. But this time, Mr Bennet appeared in high spirits, thanks partly to their conversation.
“If memory serves me correctly, young ladies, when Mr Collins came here, two Bennet ladies rejected his proposal to ‘purchase’ them.”
It was Elizabeth’s turn to laugh. “It was a rare instance where the horse dug in his heels, refusing to follow a new master. But what can I say? I am grateful you did not force us to marry that man. Such leniency is seldom encountered, even in our time. Consider Charlotte, who had no alternative but to accept Mr Collins.”
“Are you sure that Charlotte did not accept him of her own will?” Mr Bennet asked.
“What do you mean? Did not Sir William intervene in her decision?” Mary spoke for the first time, and they all looked at her as she rarely expressed her inner thoughts or dilemmas in a family conversation.
“Indeed! I am suggesting that he did not need to exert the power he possesses within his family.”
“Are you saying that Charlotte accepted Mr Collins’s proposal because she genuinely wanted to?” Elizabeth continued, pondering a possibility that had not even crossed her mind. “From first hearing of their betrothment, I assumed Sir William forced her to marry Mr Collins. However, if you are right, how did Charlotte reconcile her aspirations for a marriage of love with her acceptance of someone like our cousin?” Elizabeth wanted to know, while Mary nodded, placing the book back on her father’s desk, suddenly interested in the conversation.
“Did Charlotte hold a genuine desire to find love, or was it more a reflection of what she heard in our household?” Mr Bennet asked.
“Is it not every woman’s aspiration?” Elizabeth asked her father, puzzled.
To her surprise, Lydia shook her head. “Love may be a wish but not an aspiration.” Her somewhat cynical words made Mr Bennet nod, while Elizabeth looked from one to the other in pure astonishment.
“Listen to your sister, my dear,” Mr Bennet said, emphasising his unexpected support for Lydia’s position.
“So you agree with her?” cried Elizabeth, her face covered with a delicate redness that showed her distress.
“I partially do,” came his answer. “Such aspirations are reserved for young ladies like you or Jane or Mary who read tales of love and adventures, and who dream, at liberty to voice their sentiments. However, I assure you that most women simply wish to marry, and they ultimately do so if the gentleman in question meets certain conditions, irrespective of their affection for him.”
“Conditions? Such as?” Elizabeth continued to ask, still not believing that her father was inclined to accept that perspective on marriage when she remembered him talking about the importance of love.
“Social standing, wealth, family background, occupation… Or if the lady has reached a certain age, any suitor will do!”
“Oh, how unkind of you to say such a thing,” Elizabeth murmured. However, she reluctantly admitted that Charlotte might indeed fall into that last category. “It implies never experiencing that feeling called love,” she mused.
“You can experience love, yet taking into account all that Papa said,” Lydia spoke again, “I want to love a man, but the feeling alone is not enough.”
“What more can there be?” Elizabeth asked, and she saw Lydia blush. At the same time, their father tried to avoid looking at her, as he had also understood Lydia’s meaning, which certainly could not be discussed in that library.
Fortunately, Mary did not observe the awkward moment and asked in all na?vety, “Jane has fallen in love. The love Lizzy was talking about. Do you believe she is any happier for it, Papa?”
“Obviously not now,” Mr Bennet answered.
“You sound rather sarcastic, Papa,” Elizabeth answered with reproach as she still considered Jane’s story a tragedy and her tragic love something ideally beautiful.
“Let us say that circumstances have prompted such a response from me. As I said before, I find it sensible that each young lady should encounter love at some point. It is an experience that contributes to the wisdom a lady requires—understanding the nature of love and contemplating whether love should be the sole basis for marriage, particularly when it leads to disappointment and sorrow.”
“No!” Elizabeth exclaimed, disappointed.
“Yes, my daughter!” Mr Bennet smiled.
“So you are not discouraging us from searching for love?” Lydia suddenly asked, causing Elizabeth to regard her with deep suspicion. They were beginning to understand that their father did not view Jane’s situation to be as dire as the rest of the family did.
“You cannot bear to be outdone by Jane for long. Now it is your turn,” he said, looking at each of them. Suddenly, they all smiled, amused, incapable of seeing the advice as a serious proposition coming from their father but merely as a way of making them reflect more on that subject called love.
“Thank you, I shall forgo that honour,” Elizabeth uttered, finally at ease.
“It is your decision,” Mr Bennet conceded, still smiling, “but it is a consolation to think that whatever may befall you in that regard, you have an affectionate mother, who will make the most of it if you decide to fall in love.”
“Poor Mama. The most tragic aspect of this affair is that she fails to recognise her significant role in intimidating Mr Bingley and his family,” Elizabeth said.
“Yes, and that demonstrates that we should not anticipate any change in her behaviour in the future. But, after all, such is my life with five daughters to marry off. I cannot deny that I encouraged you to seek love, yet I never mentioned coupling love with marriage.”
“Papa!” Elizabeth and Mary exclaimed vehemently at the same time.
“So, the liberty you and Mama granted us to find love came from your conviction that love would ultimately disappoint us, leading us to seek a husband based on those other ‘conditions’ you enumerated,” Mary said.
“No, my dear! You must not suspect me of such deceit. I merely wish for you to endure the least amount of heartache and find a husband better suited to your character than to your heart.”
“And what, pray, might that mean?” Elizabeth asked.
“It means that it is all well and good to reject a proposal from Mr Collins or any man of his ilk, but it also means that you should not fall in love but search for a man . There is a vast distinction between the two endeavours.”
“I am not entirely clear on the distinction,” Mary responded, although they grasped their father’s words.
“I shall not bother explaining something you already comprehend, my dear.”
“No, please explain,” Kitty said unexpectedly. They all looked at her as if they were seeing her for the first time.
“It is simple, Kitty dear. You are talking and talking about love, and I have this feeling that at one moment or another, you forget that love does not exist on its own, but you need a man to experience the feeling. I am telling you to look for the man who will make you happy instead of dreaming about love as an achievement on its own.”
“Oh!” Kitty exclaimed. “You are right… Find a man instead of chasing love.”
“Yet what you have said today might contradict the freedom you and Mama gave us to follow our hearts,” Elizabeth insisted.
“My dear, perhaps your mother uses the term ‘love’ occasionally, but you are all too aware that her primary concern lies in seeing you ‘well married’ rather than in love with your future spouse.”
“I had hoped, at the very least, that you championed the cause of love,” Elizabeth murmured.
“I would prefer to see you content with your choice. Not in the first weeks of matrimony, perhaps, but after ten or twenty years, as it has been in my experience.”
“Are you content?” Mary asked with courage, which she had never had in her father’s presence.
Mr Bennet looked at her with profound tenderness and answered with much honesty as he considered his daughters to be of an age to have serious discussions about life. “I am a man —I possess other concerns beyond the pursuit of contentment springing from love, a notion seldom used in my time. Yet, speaking earnestly, I appreciate that Lizzy and Jane did not consider Mr Collins as a husband. I hope you will regard the officers you meet in Meryton with suspicion, and I am genuinely pleased that Jane fell in love with a sincere gentleman like Mr Bingley—”
“Papa, how can you say that he is sincere?” Mary asked, her face illuminated by an expression that made her look remarkably similar to Elizabeth, something Mr Bennet observed with much joy as it meant Mary could change and be more like her sister in every aspect of her being.
“Because, my dears, Mr Bingley is honest, and his departure without a word may be attributed to a minor oversight or his inability to confront Jane due to his genuine feelings for her.”
“Then why did he leave?”
“Because he is gentle and kind and puts his family’s wishes or whims above all else. It is no secret that his family did not hold ours in high regard, and your mother’s behaviour did not help in improving our image. In this particular instance, I believe they were two hearts entwined by love yet surrounded by gossip and adversity.”
“So Jane must fight for him!” cried Lydia.
“Perhaps, but Jane is not well-versed in the art of fighting, unlike you or Lizzy. I am convinced that if such a situation arose, you would fight for the man you wished to marry, while Kitty or Mary may take Jane’s hesitant road. But…”
They glanced at their father, who rarely hesitated to express his thoughts.
“Yes, Papa,” Mary said, suddenly the one most interested in a subject she had never shown any inclination for before.
“I am asking all of you to reflect on what I am telling you. Do not allow your heart to be the master of your life and it alone to plan and build your future. The heart is not always a reliable source of advice. Please, do not fall in love but rather search for a man you might be able to love.”
“Oh!” exclaimed Mary as if she had experienced an epiphany.
“Yes, dear!” Her father said, looking at her face, where understanding seemed to finally prevail. “The word ‘fall’ implies that one might tumble and suffer an injury. Falling is a singular action, whereas searching signifies a journey towards understanding and appreciating a human being.”
“Well, I do not intend to search for anyone or anything for a while!” Elizabeth jested, and Mary approved with a nod. At the same time, Lydia said nothing but obviously had an opinion. Finally, even Kitty seemed to have understood what their father wanted to tell them.