Page 4 of Mrs Darcy’s Dilemma

Elizabeth wrote and enclosed some money, and Lydia answered, as promptly as may be imagined; and in not more than a fortnight from her conversation with her husband, Mrs. Darcy received a note informing her that her nieces would take passage in the railroad from their home in Newcastle to Manchester and that they would travel from thence to Pemberley in the coach that Mr. Darcy would send to meet them.

The railroad line had only been open a twelvemonth, and Mrs. Darcy feared this method of travel for her nieces; but the Miss Wickhams were wild to go, and their indulgent mother had nothing to say against it.

She considered that the railway fare was cheaper than that of the coach and therefore less of an expense on Mr. Darcy’s purse; an argument that would not have had much weight with his wife but that Mr. Darcy himself had taken one of the first journeys to London by the new line and was quite struck at travelling in six hours what used to take thirty.

There could be no questioning it. He assured Mrs. Darcy that her nieces would be quite safe; and as for their travelling without chaperonage, these were quite modern times, and they had one another.

But almost before anyone had time to feel much trepidation over the prospect of such an adventure, the young ladies had made the journey safely and so much more expeditiously than could have been otherwise accomplished, that at four o’clock in the afternoon of the very day they had set out, the two Misses Wickham were arrived at Pemberley.

The gentlemen were not at home, but Mrs. Darcy and her daughter welcomed the young ladies and showed them to a pretty bed chamber, new-furnished and filled with comforts, even to a handsome pair of modern glass astral solar lamps upon the well-supplied dressing table.

The trunk was soon brought upstairs, its contents, which were meager enough, bestowed in a handsome Japan-lacquer cabinet; and it was not long before the girls were dressed for tea.

There was then a little time to look about them, and the sisters’ reaction to their new quarters was characteristic enough.

Miss Wickham was tall and well-formed, a bold, handsome young woman who did not know what it was to feel at a loss for words; she surveyed the room and its furnishings at once and quickly gave her opinion.

“My uncle’s house is as fine a one as there is in the kingdom, I collect,” she said composedly, standing at the large window overlooking the lawns.

“I daresay Chatsworth is nothing to it; but fancy our being put into this poky small room. Quite on the wrong side of the house: the view should be of the sweep, not of the back gardens. And the two of us crammed in here together! Faugh! When they have an hundred rooms at the very least.” She fetched breath.

“I do call that mean. I see how it is to be. We will be the poor relations, Cloe, mark my words,” and she nodded emphatically.

Her younger sister had grown up with as many disadvantages as Miss Wickham and, perhaps from not being the flattered darling of their mother, had nothing like her elder sister’s assurance.

Smaller, and less striking in appearance, though altogether a very nice looking girl, with light hair and eyes and a sweet expression, Cloe never attracted the attention that Bettina commanded wherever she went; and being of a thoughtful disposition, with natural good sense, she had, despite her youth, already quietly drawn the conclusion that the manners of her mother and her sister were not the safest models to follow.

Indeed, she was often distressed by Miss Wickham’s opinions and strove to soften them.

“Oh, but my aunt seems kindness itself, Sister,” she protested. “Did not you hear her say, we are housed in this wing only because it is near our cousin Jane? And I am sure we are together because she thought we would like it and be more comfortable.”

“Very well, Cloe. But you will see what I mean about poor relations.”

“Well, and so we are, poor relations.”

“That is all the more reason we should not be treated as such. Well, then, are we ready to go downstairs? My India muslin is really shockingly shabby. I don’t know why my mother would not have afforded us new dresses out of what Mr. Darcy sent, so we could make better figures here.

I wish I had a Paisley shawl and one of those nice, new-fangled, coal-scuttle, poke bonnets.

Oh! I vow I shall make Mr. Darcy buy us some finery.

I was quite ashamed of my mantle, on the train. ”

“The train! Oh, Betty, I could not think of our dresses then. I was not afraid; but I did think, every moment, that it would fall over and we would be crushed, the noise and shaking were so great.”

“You goose, you,” returned Miss Wickham amiably. “How is my hair? Gone flat, I see. Oh, Lord, we must tease Aunt Darcy to give us a new curling-iron, so we may have curls like my cousin. Did you see her hair? She must have two French maids working on her, day and night, and you see we have no one.”

At this moment there was a knock upon the door, and Cloe opened it to admit a smart young person who said she was Miss Darcy’s maid, sent to see if she could help the young ladies to dress.

The girls thanked her, accepted her services for the finishing touches to their toilettes, and soon were ready to join the other ladies.

“This house is as large as a village,” commented Cloe. “Now, which way do we go? Past the picture gallery, surely. I wonder if we may see all these pictures some time.”

“I don’t know,” said Miss Wickham indifferently. “Oh! That silver-and-crystal chandelier, I declare I never saw such a one in my life; it must be worth five hundred pounds.”

Miss Darcy advanced to meet her cousins and drew them into the grand sitting-room, where Mrs. Darcy and one of her sisters were working.

Mrs. Clarke, the girls’ Aunt Kitty, was married to the rector of the parish church, but she contrived to spend much of her time at Pemberley House.

This suited her husband very well, for he was a mild and retiring man, whose reigning interest in life, beside the few needs of his prosperous parish, was his garden, and if such a gentle person could be thought to have any strong dislike, it was for his wife.

Mrs. Clarke’s fretful disposition as a girl had brightened nearly to cheerfulness in her young womanhood, during which period she attracted and married her young clergyman; in middle life, however, she lapsed into a solid sourness, and it may be guessed that her husband was thankful that she chose to haunt Pemberley, rather than to disturb his own communion with his flowers.

Mrs. Clarke had no children living, and she doted on her sister’s.

Her curiosity to see Lydia’s daughters was great, for she was very sure they would be wanting in comparison to Jane, and in her partizanship she disliked them, even before their arrival.

Their mother had been her companion-sister in girlhood, but now she disesteemed her as a lost being and loved her not.

Mrs. Clarke had a weak understanding that her disappointments in life, fancied and otherwise, had not improved.

She considered that her husband had spirit for nothing but to attend to his herbaceous borders; and she resented that her income, though adequate to her needs, was contemptible in comparison with that of her sister Darcy.

Mrs. Clarke had always been used to feel inferior to her sisters, Jane and Elizabeth; and seeing them happily settled in prosperous marriages, with rich and loving husbands, and healthy families of children raised no very charitable feelings in her.

Jealousy and ill-temper were the beginning and the end of Mrs. Clarke, but her pinched features were spread with a smile as she stood to greet the visitors.

“So! This is Betty, and this is Cloe. Let me guess which is which. You are the tallest, my dear—I suppose you are the youngest?”

“Quite wrong, my dear aunt; I am Bettina,” said Miss Wickham, curtseying slightly and turning her back on her Aunt Kitty to gaze upon Mrs. Darcy, who regarded her with a quizzical expression.

“Your Aunt Kitty only says that, my dear, because in our family the youngest was the tallest—your mother, that was. And how is sister Lydia?”

“Oh! Very poorly, but that’s always the way with Mama. She complains from morning until night about her nerves, but we swear that nothing ails her, really.”

“How like my own poor mother that sounds,” said Mrs. Darcy thoughtfully. “You do not remember your Grandmother Bennet, do you, my dears?”

“No; Grandpapa Bennet never invited us to Longbourn, you know,” said Miss Wickham candidly.

The other ladies were reduced to an awkward silence, but Miss Wickham continued, “But ’tis no matter.

Mama always says he is a bitter old man, and I dare say he is, a widower living in that great house.

La! I should think he would like to see his grandchildren round him, to give him some comfort, but that’s the way it always is with such old gentlemen. ”

“My father always liked a retired life,” said Mrs. Darcy reprovingly.

“He has a great interest in books. And he is grown too old to travel, which is to be regretted, for otherwise we would surely see him and my sister Mary at Christmas. Perhaps she may be induced to leave him and come here for a rest, later on.”

“Oh, does she visit?” asked Miss Wickham. “I thought that her late husband was a clerk.”

Mrs. Darcy was surprised. “My sister Mary did marry an attorney’s clerk, a family connection. He was a most respectable man, who died quite young; and since then she has kept house for my father.”

“Oh, then you don’t consider her as too low on the scale to be admitted into the best circles? That is very good of you,” said Miss Wickham with a disagreeable little laugh.

“My sister is a very learned lady,” said Mrs. Darcy, coldly, “very fond of study.”