Page 36 of Some Natural Importance (Pride, Prejudice and Romance #3)

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

Elizabeth’s eyes swept the lengthy express she had just received from Gracechurch Street in response to her own frantic missive, it being of much greater interest than Mr Collins’s incessant sermonising.

My Dear Niece,

I have just received your express, and shall devote this whole evening to answering it, as I foresee that a little writing will not comprise what I have to tell you.

Enquiries to my friends still in Lambton—made as soon as I learnt of Mr Darcy as being a party necessarily concerned in your future—can at least answer some of your concerns.

Pemberley is in every way as prosperous as it ever has been—more so, even.

Of Wickham, the news is not kind. By every account, he is thought wild and ungentlemanly, and a poor reflection upon the late Mr Darcy who brought him up at his own expense.

Will you be very angry with me, my dear Lizzy, if I take this opportunity of saying (what I was never bold enough to say before) how much I like your Mr Darcy. His behaviour to us has been, in every respect, pleasing and gracious .

“...And I must say, Mrs Bennet, that the bleakness in your heart and that of your daughters can only be elevated by the word of God.” Mr Collins’s pointed throat-clearing in Elizabeth’s direction interrupted her musings.

“I have prepared readings, psalms and prayers in which to bring you peace with your loss, and to better comprehend that Mr Bennet feels no such sadness at his departure, for he is now in the arms of our Lord. All that was is no longer, and we all must look ahead to the present, nay future, course of our lives.”

Mr Collins paused to sip his tea. The biscuit he popped in his mouth only gave his audience of six a slight respite from his soliloquy of sympathy.

Elizabeth was proud of Kitty and Lydia, who managed to bite their tongues and refrain from giggles and snorts; their cousin had, after all, given them all reason for some laughter, but it was a horrified, distressed form of agitation.

Mary, being Mary, seemed to approve of every word spoken by Mr Collins, while Jane maintained her placid demeanour and played mother to ensure no one’s cup went empty.

Mrs Bennet stared vacantly ahead, as though envisioning a future as mother-in-law to such a man.

Elizabeth tucked her letter into her sleeve and watched her cousin bite into another piece of shortbread. “I prefer to remember the past only as it gives me pleasure, and think not at all of the present.”

As she had hoped, with his mouth full, the parson could only nod in response.

“I wish to think on my future with a handsome husband who keeps me happy with ballgowns and jewels,” Lydia said in her mother’s direction, as if to cheer her.

“And a big house in town,” Kitty added quietly.

“Cousins, you think far above yourselves! Piety!” He spat crumbs with his outburst.

The door to the drawing room opened.

Mr Hill entered and announced, “Mr Darcy. ”

Elizabeth startled, but her reaction was nothing to the shock displayed by Mr Collins.

The vicar’s eyes widened and his face paled as he cried, “Mr Darcy!”

Their visitor strolled in and greeted each of the Bennet ladies before turning calmly to the parson and saying his name in a cool voice. “Mr Collins.”

Elizabeth watched her cousin’s expression transform from shock to obsequiousness. He stood up, a bit unsteadily. Tall as he was, Mr Darcy was still taller, and with a far finer figure.

“Sir, I did not expect you!”

“Expect me to what?”

“To call on me here, sir! I-you understand, these are my cousins, and I have come here to help with their most grievous loss. Such kindness speaks well of your character, not that it was in any way lacking, of course, for you as the master of Rosings must?— ”

“Ah, you believe I have followed you here, Mr Collins?”

Elizabeth nearly guffawed at the way Mr Darcy feigned great insult to his character.

“No, I…uh…here you are. Rather, I did not know of your acquaintance with the Bennets.”

“The late Mr Bennet was one of Hertfordshire’s most esteemed landowners,” said Mr Darcy, his voice inflected with every element of hauteur. “I would be remiss to visit in the county without being acquainted with him and mourning his death.”

“Yes, of course, a great loss indeed,” the vicar cried. “As you see, I have come to condole with my dear cousins.”

At this, Elizabeth could no longer hold in her revulsion; in the hours since his arrival, her cousin’s ill manners and presumption had made her angry and not a little desperate.

Her note to Mr Darcy had not been a plea for help, but she was not so vain as to deny his immediate arrival had not given her relief .

The manner in which Mr Darcy strode into Longbourn, comfortable and familiar in its rooms, would have irritated her a day ago.

Now, however, it gave her more than ease, it made her glad.

She was pleased, if not a little surprised, by his quick appearance; she realised, when his eyes sought out hers immediately upon walking in the drawing room, that he had understood her meaning and her concerns over Mr Collins.

She counted it good fortune she did not blush.

“Indeed, you have come to Hertfordshire with alacrity,” Darcy said pointedly to Mr Collins. “Did you not receive my letter informing you that you would be needed at Hunsford and to await my visit?”

“I, well, yes, of course, Mr Darcy, sir,” Mr Collins stammered. “But you see, my cousin’s death...my presence was needed here, to provide solace?—”

“Did you write to me, or call on my steward or housekeeper, so that I would be made aware of your impending absence?”

Watching the pompous Mr Collins appear to fold in on himself, shrinking and perspiring under the onslaught of Mr Darcy’s enquiry was amusing, and Elizabeth could not be ashamed of herself for enjoying Mr Darcy’s relentless questions.

“I apologise, sir. I put my duty to my family above that to?—”

“To me and to your parishioners?”

“No, no! They are in secure hands with the vicar from Ashford. I have promised to return within a fortnight to prepare my congregation for my leaving, and to be of service to you by providing counsel on the needs of my flock as you seek my replacement there.”

“Leaving?” Mr Darcy was coldly incredulous. “You plan to leave Hunsford?”

Mr Collins swelled a bit. “This is my family, sir, and my estate?—”

“Ah, the entail. It shall be yours when the Bennets conclude their mourning. The grieving widow will be in mourning a full year. How heartless it would be to assert the entail when the grave itself is so newly dug.”

“But—”

“You were given the living at Hunsford by my aunt and former mother-in-law.” Mr Darcy glanced at Elizabeth as he said this. “Those under your care require your presence. It is your duty to them to remain until I can do my duty and assign the living to another vicar.”

“Ah yes, I see. Of course, sir.”

“Good man, Mr Collins.” Mr Darcy clapped the man on his shoulder in what Elizabeth thought a diverting example of male domination.

“However,” he went on, “I wonder, have you thought whether the life of a squire is the one for you? You are greatly valued at your parsonage.”

“Oh, such gracious words, sir!” Mr Collins beamed a smile at his patron before sharing it with all the ladies present.

“I thank you. It has been my life’s work to enrich the spiritual lives of those I look down upon from my pulpit.

Conveying the word of God is not a task but a joy that fills my soul.

“And yet, I believe in familial duty as you do. You honoured your aunt and mother by marrying Miss de Bourgh. I must honour my father and Lady Catherine by doing as each wished for me: I must wed one of the Miss Bennets and be the olive branch between our families.”

Mrs Bennet, who had been watching the exchange between the two men as though seated at a lawn tennis match, cried out and promptly fainted.

Whether her exclamation was of relief or joy, it was difficult to say; the reactions of five other ladies in the room were as one, and consisted of alarm and dismay.

After Mrs Bennet had been put to bed, attended by Jane, and after Mary, Kitty, and Lydia had found occupations elsewhere in the house, a note was sent to the Philipses, asking them to host Mr Collins for his short visit to Meryton.

His resistance to leaving the home he had inherited was overcome when his patron made clear that no man of the cloth, let alone a future gentleman, would lay abed in a house of six unmarried ladies.

“You must leave Longbourn with all due haste, and pay calls here only in the company of a married gentleman, lady, or relation. Or myself.” Mr Darcy cast a severe look at Mr Collins.

Within the hour, as a cold, steady rain settled in, calm had descended within Longbourn’s walls. Elizabeth, unable—and unwilling, at least until they spoke—to send Mr Darcy off in such disagreeable weather, asked whether he would care for some of her father’s brandy.

He nodded gratefully and followed her to Mr Bennet’s book room. “It would be a tonic after achieving victory over such unpleasantness, and before heading out into the rain. Will you join me? It is your victory as well.”

“So long as it is not a hollow one,” she replied. “You have my thanks, my family’s thanks, for sending Mr Collins to my aunt’s home, but barring him from sleeping at Longbourn does not negate his rights here as the new master. He will return.”

“So he shall.” Mr Darcy examined the carafes and bottles on the cabinet. “I will occupy him as best I can in Kent to delay his move here, and do what I may to curtail his claims on your sisters.”

“He is persistent.”

He turned to gaze at her. “So am I.”

The intensity of Mr Darcy’s assertion was beyond anything Elizabeth anticipated. His eyes darkened and seemed to pierce her.

“Yes,” she managed to say at last. “I will join you.”

Yes, I will join you.