Page 12 of Such Persuasions as These (Pride and Prejudice Variation)
CHAPTER ELEVEN
C aroline Bingley wished she had never sent that invitation.
The week before, she had sent a missive to Longbourn at the request of her brother, inviting Jane Bennet for lunch at Netherfield.
She knew Charles to be besotted with this quiet, fair-haired maiden, but as Miss Bennet had never shown any particular regard for him, she had not fretted about furthering her own acquaintance with her, especially if she could do so in such a way that her brother and Mr Darcy—and indeed Miss Bennet’s upstart sister—happened to be absent.
However, in the week since the invitation, this very same Jane Bennet had begun nigh on flirting with Charles.
Such pretensions!
Half the time, she was the first to greet him when he walked into a gathering.
Then they would walk hand-on-arm through the crowd until he seated her comfortably and set himself beside her.
And when they were separated, she had developed the habit of brazenly smiling at him from across the room.
More than once had she tapped him on the arm as she laughed at one of his ‘clever’ quips.
It was enough to make Caroline sick.
“Mr Darcy, what shall we do?” she hissed to him the morning Miss Bennet was expected.
“We? Do about what?” he asked in his usual high-born apathy.
“Charles and that Bennet girl.”
“What should we have to do with that? Bingley is his own man.”
“A man who believes himself in love. We are to be saddled with that woman and her family for the rest of our lives if we do not do something.” She did not quite realise she had vocalised her fantasy of joining her own life with his until after the words had left her mouth.
Ah well, perhaps he will take the hint and act on it at last.
“This situation does not affect us equally, Miss Bingley, but I see why you might be concerned,” he answered pointedly.
“On one hand, Bingley might marry a woman who brings you no connexions and adds neither to your brother’s fortune nor his place in society.
On the other hand, you would gain as a sister a fine gentlewoman from a respectable family, who, while she may not add to your brother’s consequence, could add very much to his happiness. ”
Caroline growled her frustrations aloud, unable to believe what she was hearing from the usually sensibly-proud gentleman. If anyone saw the necessity of preserving rank and standing in the eyes of society, it was Mr Darcy. Why would he answer in such a way?
“She has relations in trade,” she cried .
“That is a common malady, Miss Bingley,” Darcy answered drily, never looking up from his newspaper.
His refusal to satisfy her rankled.
And why does it feel as if he is implying something?
Surely her relations in trade were so far in the background they would not put a dent in her own social standing.
Would they? They could not affect her chances of marrying well, she was sure.
Her father had made his fortune before she was born, and had not his death severed that connexion?
She herself had been raised from the cradle to be genteel and accomplished.
Her Italian was flawless and her proficiency on the pianoforte was as fine as any young lady in England.
Why, she had been finished in Switzerland!
He could not possibly be lumping her in with these Bennets, could he?
Rather than setting her down, the notion only raised her ire to the point that, when Miss Bennet appeared on her doorstep not a little damp from the downpour that had overtaken her on her journey, Caroline could hardly countenance the woman.
Of course, she and Louisa put on the airs necessary to play the gracious hostesses.
They asked all the correct questions, shared all the correct stories, offered all the correct victuals, and very correctly called for the apothecary when their guest swooned at table.
While a little shocked at the event, she could not say she was sorry. Caroline did not want to give this self-seeking chit any more encouragement than she had already received from her gormless brother.
She was sorry, however, when Mr Jones came and made it clear the young lady should not be removed from Netherfield.
And she was positively vexed when Miss Bennet’s sister, the very sister who had been the grit in Caroline’s eye since the moment they had set foot in Meryton, showed up the next day with her hair tousled and her hem six inches deep in mud.
In truth, it was not the muss or the mud on Miss Elizabeth’s person that particularly irked her. It was the smile on Darcy’s face as he openly admired the muss and the mud.