Page 26 of Such Persuasions as These (Pride and Prejudice Variation)

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

U pon arriving home that afternoon, Jane and Elizabeth were introduced to their cousin, William Collins, who had been recently ordained and was serving a parish in Kent.

This was the dreaded heir, the one to whom Longbourn would pass upon their father’s demise.

He had always been ‘that odious man’ when mentioned; Elizabeth could not imagine what circumstance could have made him welcome in their home.

She was soon enlightened.

For many minutes, he beamed at Jane with admiring eyes, as had any number of men before him.

But, after a short conference with Mrs Bennet, those same admirations began to be directed towards that woman’s next eldest daughter.

Elizabeth had noted this shift with acute horror; she was in too much tumult of emotions to deal graciously with the attentions of the obsequious man intent on stalking about after her.

She soon claimed a sick headache and, begging Mary to entertain their guest in her stead, fled to the solitary comfort of her chambers.

With the doors closed behind her, she continued to contemplate the implications of what had occurred that morning.

Freddie is engaged.

She no longer had to fear him asking for her hand and the pain she might have had to inflict by refusing him. How that weight had been pressing upon her hour after hour since his arrival, and now it was lifted.

But another weight, the weight of Mr Darcy’s disapprobation—no, more than that, his feeling of betrayal—began to oppress her.

She would never forget his expression when Frederick made his announcement; he was shocked, then confused, then tragically not confused at all.

It was as if he were the last one to understand the joke, and he felt it was on him.

Her duplicity had been exposed, and it had hurt him.

Bricks were being laid between them, a wall going up that would prove too high to surmount.

The hurt on his countenance, though fleeting, had wrenched Elizabeth’s heart.

The true pain, however, came when that affliction was replaced with the stony, practised indifference he wore for those about whom he cared nothing.

She could not trust his words of the morning.

“Nothing you could say could make me despise you,”he had sworn.

He had called her his truest friend, and now she would be considered his falsest. Their entire relationship, their place of trust, was founded upon a lie, a deception that sketched her as scheming and mercenary.

And there was nothing she could do to make it better.

Promises made in absolutes are rarely kept.

Elizabeth remembered almost sayingto Miss Bingley at Netherfield that the surest way to rankle Mr Darcy would be to tease him, to laugh at him.

But even voicing that, recognising aloud this chink in his armour, this fault of his pride, felt too much like a jest at his expense, and she could not mortify him so.

How hearing Frederick laugh about their ‘engagement’ this morning must have struck him thus!

If he did not dismiss her as mercenary, he would surely brand her a heartless harlequin intent on making a mockery out of him.

After turning the situation over in her mind for far too long, Elizabeth’s head truly did begin to ache.

She had not slept the night before, and her early rising and the subsequent events had taken their toll.

Soon, she was deep in slumber, a black, dreamless place where neither concerned voices, nor fireplaces, nor striped cats, nor dark eyes invaded her peace.

Elizabeth was just opening her swollen eyes when she heard the snick of her chamber door closing.

Jane had entered, her face showing genuine worry, and informed her that Frederick was asking for her.

Elizabeth looked at the clock, disoriented and confused; she could not have slept through to supper.

No, it was only half past three. What could he need?

Entering the drawing room, it was obvious from his dishevelled appearance that he was in some great distress.

“Freddie, what can be the matter?” Elizabeth ran to him and grasped his hands, searching his red-rimmed eyes.

“She has thrown me off. My Anne. Broken our engagement because I do not live up to her pompous father’s standards.

” He reached into his coat and withdrew a letter, which seemed to have been crumpled and abused before being finally folded and placed there.

Handing it to Elizabeth, he said, “Here, see for yourself.”

Elizabeth opened the letter and read while Frederick looked on.

She saw an elegant hand and evidence of tears blotching the ink before it was dry— her tears.

The woman, Anne Elliot, wrote of her undying affection and respect for him, then explained that after having endured the censure of her family and trusted friends, she did not feel that it would be prudent to follow through with their engagement.

Her father had made it clear that he would do nothing for his daughter and had been treating her icily since their announcement.

Her friend Lady Russell, it seemed, had begged her to look at things from a standpoint of reason, and Anne could not but agree that becoming attached to a man, however brilliant and deserving, who had only himself to recommend him, who had not an income to support a wife, nor yet a place to keep her, could not be capable of success.

Elizabeth’s anger at Miss Elliot’s lack of resolve softened a little as she read the last paragraph, wherein she explained that she could not be persuaded to relinquish him were she not convinced that it was in his best interest, that he would ultimately be happier because of her decision.

Bidding him every wish of success and assuring him of her lasting affection, Anne Elliot closed the missive with a signature hardly legible for the tears it had sustained.

No longer capable of meditating on her own affliction, Elizabeth threw herself into the comfort of her friend.

She ordered them tea, then sat near him on the sofa while he told her about his Anne: how they had met, what had attracted him to her, how he had courted her and convinced her of the certainty of success they would have together, how she would help him on to greatness, and he would care for her with every breath.

Listening to Frederick—once all knees and elbows, now a well-formed Captain Wentworth of the Royal Navy—as he spoke in his deep voice things so tender and hopeful, Elizabeth could not help but feel what a distinction it would be to be pursued thus by a man of such worth.

How could Miss Elliot break his heart so? Elizabeth was determined not simply to share his pain but to ease it.Thus, she sat with him and commiserated with him and cried for him until it was time to dress for supper.

In his chambers at Netherfield, Darcy was again attempting to finish some correspondence, and again, his tasks were interrupted by thoughts of Miss Elizabeth Bennet and what a fool she had made of him.

Was she even now teasing him, laughing at him with her sister?

How much of the supposedly sanguine Miss Jane Bennet’s serenity was put on?

Was she, too, a cunning mercenary, triumphing in her victory over his friend’s heart?

Well, Miss Elizabeth would not crow over him .

Her designs had been found out, and he had escaped her wiles.

He wondered how she had planned to extricate herself from her supposed ‘engagement’ if the man had not conveniently shown up.

Would she have pretended to receive a letter from this Wentworth, calling it all off?

Would she have claimed that the captain had been lost at sea and looked to Darcy for comfort in her grief?

There was no telling to what depths such a practised beguiler would stoop in the effort to gain her objective.

No doubt his poor sister had felt the same connexion to George Wickham. Georgiana had been fully convinced of his sincerity and his heart’s affection. His friendship, like Elizabeth’s, had been a worthless counterfeit, a paste diamond, pernicious and deceptive and brilliant.

Some part of Darcy pleaded with him to be more generous.

Had he and Elizabeth not spent many hours conversing, sharing stories of their upbringings, laughing over anecdotes of silly sisters and meddling mothers, relating on a level of intellect and insight that could not be feigned?

Could he really have been just an object to her, something to be gained no matter the cost?

A life of luxury and ease—silk gowns, pin money, carriages, and the consequence of his exalted name?

That generous part also pleaded: whatever she may have been at the start, what if she had developed true feelings for him?

She certainly seemed to be genuinely overcome as she tried to tell him whatever it was she had struggled to say.

She could have been attempting to tell him how young she and Wentworth had been when their sham of an engagement had come about, that she had lied to him and now felt regret.

Even then, if she were attempting to confess her dastardly designs and profess a change of heart, could that wash away the avarice that had given rise to their relationship?

No. This was his own fault. He had fallen for the schemes of a fortune hunter. Or worse, a bored maiden interested only in making him a laughingstock. Perhaps she had had a change of heart when she had thought she might actually win him, but the facts remained.

She was false, and he was a fool.