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“Nearly two months,” Mrs Jenkinson supplied in an undertone, carefully avoiding Lady Catherine’s gaze. She immediately regretted speaking as Lady Catherine’s eyes fixed on her with displeasure.

“Two months!” Lady Catherine’s voice rose slightly.

“This will not do at all. Darcy knows his duty to his family. After that unseemly business in Hertfordshire, I would have thought he’d pay more attention to his proper sphere.

I shall write to him directly about this negligence - he must remember his position, his duty. To you, Anne.”

Miss de Bourgh’s fingers tightened around her teacup again, but she remained silent. Mrs Jenkinson watched helplessly as her charge seemed to shrink further into herself with each of her mother’s pronouncements about her cousin’s duty.

Having delivered her judgment on Darcy’s failings, Lady Catherine turned her attention to her breakfast, though her displeasure still hung heavy in the air.

The room fell into its usual morning pattern - the clink of silver against china punctuated by her ladyship’s pronouncements on the state of the county’s roads and the vicar’s latest sermon, none of which required response from her silent companions.

“It’s more than time the two of you were married,” Lady Catherine declared after a long sip of tea, as if the brief silence had only given her time to build up fresh steam.

“I don’t understand why he delays so. Your engagement has been understood since your infancy.

I have half a mind to put the announcement in the papers myself and begin the wedding preparations. That might stir him to action.”

Miss de Bourgh’s face had gone even paler at this fresh assault, but she was saved from responding by James’s entrance with the post on a silver salver.

Mrs Jenkinson’s heart lifted at the sight of her sister’s familiar hand among the letters - a welcome distraction from Lady Catherine’s matrimonial schemes.

Several letters were directed to her ladyship, enough, Mrs Jenkinson hoped, to occupy her attention and grant her daughter a moment’s peace.

She had just begun reading about a dinner party at her sister’s neighbour’s house when Lady Catherine’s screech shattered the morning calm.

The sound made Mrs Jenkinson’s blood freeze - in twelve years, she had never heard Lady Catherine make such a noise.

Before she could look up from her letter, there was a crash as her ladyship’s chair hit the floor.

Lady Catherine had leaped to her feet, her face purple with rage, one trembling hand clutching a letter while the other gripped the edge of the table.

The violent movement startled Miss de Bourgh into dropping her teacup, the delicate china shattering on her plate as she stared at her mother with the wide-eyed terror of a trapped animal, her already pale face turning ghostly white.

“This is not to be borne!” Lady Catherine’s voice rang through the breakfast room, the words echoing off the walls.

She whirled toward the fireplace, her skirts snapping with the force of her movement, but before she could reach the bell pull, Patterson burst through the door.

Two footmen followed at his heels, their faces showing both concern and the practised blank expression of well-trained servants.

The crash of her ladyship’s chair had brought the entire household running, each ready to respond to whatever crisis had provoked such an unprecedented display.

As Mrs Jenkinson dabbed at the spilled tea with her napkin, she watched Lady Catherine’s letter-bearing hand with keen interest. Lady Catherine could never keep distressing news to herself for long, and Mrs Jenkinson had caught enough glimpses of the familiar handwriting to recognise Mr Collins’ precise script.

Whatever news he had sent from Longbourn, it had clearly upset her ladyship’s carefully ordered world.

Lady Catherine rounded on her waiting servants, brandishing the letter like a weapon. “Patterson! The travelling carriage - at once. Have Brown and Davies begin packing.” Her voice brooked no argument as she added, “Miss de Bourgh and I leave for Hertfordshire immediately.”

The household erupted into carefully controlled chaos.

Mrs Jenkinson tucked her sister’s letter away - that would have to wait - and hurried Miss de Bourgh upstairs before Lady Catherine could notice her daughter’s distress.

In the sanctuary of Miss de Bourgh’s chambers, her charges trembling became more pronounced.

Whether from the shock of her mother’s outburst or anxiety about the impending journey, Mrs Jenkinson couldn’t tell, but the young woman’s racing pulse and the telltale tightening around her eyes warned of an approaching headache.

The corridors hummed with purposeful activity as the household mobilised.

Whispered exchanges between servants carried news of the unprecedented journey - not since Miss de Bourgh’s last trip to London had such hasty preparations been required.

The younger maids scurried about with wide-eyed confusion, while the more experienced servants moved with deliberate efficiency, their meaningful glances coordinating a silent campaign to protect their young mistress from her mother’s impetuous demands.

Below stairs, Mrs Louis orchestrated the kitchen’s response, preparing simple foods that wouldn’t upset Miss de Bourgh’s delicate digestion during the journey.

Meanwhile, Brown and Davies, Lady Catherine’s personal maid and Miss de Bourgh’s maid respectively, worked with practised efficiency.

While Brown made a show of rushing to fulfil her ladyship’s increasingly urgent demands, Davies quietly assembled everything Miss de Bourgh would need - her medicine box, several soft cushions, and the special shawl that helped ward off drafts.

These essentials made their way into the carriage through a carefully coordinated series of servants’ movements, each timed to avoid Lady Catherine’s notice.

Despite Lady Catherine’s demands for immediate departure, it took nearly two hours to ready everything for the journey.

Her ladyship spent the time pacing the entrance hall like a caged lioness, clutching Mr Collins’ letter and issuing an increasingly strident stream of orders.

Each time she passed the great clock, her demands grew more urgent, her voice more shrill.

Mrs Jenkinson used this delay to her advantage, ensuring Miss de Bourgh not only took her morning powders but also rested quietly away from her mother’s agitation.

Still, she couldn’t help but worry as she watched her pale face grow more drawn - Miss de Bourgh’s health was precarious enough without such dramatic upheavals, and the March winds would only add to the journey’s strain.

Finally, they were settled in Lady Catherine’s well-appointed travelling coach - its elegant blue-black lacquer gleaming even in the misty morning light, though even the best springs money could buy couldn’t entirely smooth the road.

Miss de Bourgh huddled in her special shawl and propped against the cushions Davies had smuggled in, while Lady Catherine sat rigidly upright opposite her, still clutching Mr Collins’ letter as if it might try to escape.

Mrs Jenkinson took her place beside Miss de Bourgh, perfectly positioned to steady her charge against the jolts of the journey.The contrast between mother and daughter could not have been more stark: one drawn in on herself like a wounded bird, the other bristling with barely contained fury.

As they rolled down the drive, Mrs Jenkinson watched Rosings disappear into the morning mist, wondering what they would find when they returned.

The silence stretched, broken only by the crunch of wheels on gravel and Miss de Bourgh’s shallow breathing.

Each jolt of the carriage seemed to make her charges breath catch, but Lady Catherine appeared not to notice, her attention fixed on some distant point beyond the gates, her fingers tightening on the letter with every turn of the wheels.

They had barely passed through those gates when her ladyship drew herself up even straighter - if such a thing were possible - and broke her ominous silence.

“Never,” Lady Catherine declared, brandishing the crumpled letter, “in all my years, have I encountered such a scandal!” Her voice trembled with suppressed fury. “Such a connection cannot be allowed to continue.”

Miss de Bourgh shrank into her corner of the carriage, her fingers twisting nervously in her lap.

Mrs Jenkinson noticed with concern how the morning’s excitement had already brought a flush of fever to her cheeks.

Whatever news Mr Collins had sent must be extraordinary indeed to provoke such a reaction from her ladyship - in all their years at Rosings, she had never known Lady Catherine to risk her daughter’s health with such a hasty journey .

“Mr Collins writes,” Lady Catherine’s voice rose with each word as she shook the offending letter, “that the youngest Miss Bennet has eloped!” Her face, which had begun to return to its normal colour during their preparations, flushed purple once more.

“The connection must be severed at once!” The carriage windows rattled with the force of her declaration.