Page 9 of The Countess and Her Sister

The next morning, Elizabeth was told that Jane had gone to visit their aunt; something was clearly amiss.

Elizabeth had thought it best to allow Jane the solitude she seemed to desire the day before, but now she began to worry for her.

And, inevitably fearing that she had done something to upset Jane, Elizabeth could wait no longer to discover what troubled her sister.

Upon hearing that Jane had departed for Gracechurch Street above an hour earlier, Elizabeth made her way there at once.

The concern that carried her to the Gardiner home gave way to momentary chagrin when Elizabeth was shown into her aunt’s parlor. Jane wiped tears from her face and looked at Elizabeth in alarm. “Oh!” Elizabeth took a step backward, wanting to turn and flee. “I apologize for the intrusion.”

“Not at all,” Lady Gardiner said, smoothing her skirts before she stood. “I meant to look in on the children. Come and sit, Lizzy. Are you hungry? I will ask Sarah to bring you some tea and cake. Jane, I know you must wish to confide in your sister.”

Lady Gardiner embraced her niece, and then fairly shoved Elizabeth toward the sofa where Jane sat, fidgeting with her hands in her lap.

Elizabeth sat beside her sister, her own mortification burning her face.

“Jane? What is the matter? Have I done something to upset you? I hoped my fears on that score were wrong, but… Oh, I am sorry to push in like this.”

“No, I am glad that you came. Aunt Madeline is right, I ought to speak to you.” Jane took in a slow, deep breath, and then let out a brisk sigh before looking up and meeting Elizabeth’s eyes at last. “You were very patient in allowing me my privacy yesterday, but I know I owe you some explanation for my behavior after meeting with Mr. Darcy.”

“You owe me nothing – I only want your happiness. If you should prefer to keep your own counsel….”

“No, not at all. I only sought our aunt’s advice first for fear of offending you – I did not wish to speak before my feelings were more settled.

I was so terribly overpowered by everything.

I wanted to be sure of my impressions and wishes before taking any action that would affect the whole family. ”

A surge of pity swelled through Elizabeth as she considered her sister’s plight, and she reached for Jane’s hand.

“Oh, dearest, I am so sorry. I did not realize this would be so difficult for you, but I ought to have. Surely Mamma will not pressure you about Mr. Darcy, if that is what distresses you.”

Jane’s lips twitched to one side and then the other, her eyes seeming to search for the right answer. “It is more than that. Meeting him was overwhelming in every possible way.”

“I hope I have not compounded your dilemma,” Elizabeth said with a heavy sigh. “I must have soured your meeting with Mr. Darcy, angry as I was at his insult.”

“I am not cross with you,” Jane said, her eyes wide with dismay.

“You have been my devoted friend through all I have endured, Lizzy – I could never begrudge you a moment of high emotion. I cannot deny that my first impression of Mr. Darcy was affected – but it is natural that it would have been so, one way or another….”

“You mean to say that were I not involved at all, your first meeting with him would have happened differently.”

“Yes,” Jane said. “I suppose it is a fine thing that I saw the side of him capable of righting a wrong, and yet because of what happened at the ball, I believe he has made more of an effort to be pleasing to you . I am not angry with you for that, but merely disappointed in myself.”

Elizabeth’s shoulders slumped. It was just as she feared; she had spoiled something that had held such promise for her sister.

“Disappointed in yourself – no, Jane, that is ever so much worse! It is all my own fault, in allowing my grievance against him to detract from what ought to have become of your meeting Mr. Darcy.”

Jane smiled sadly. “I had not realized how much I wanted him to like me until yesterday. Robert certainly did not have Mr. Darcy’s good opinion – he never deserved it – but I wished for Mr. Darcy to think of me on my own merit, to deem me better than my former circumstances.

And I am not without superficial vanity.

I know I have not the same bloom of youthful beauty as I once possessed, but I wanted him to think well of me in that respect.

I wanted to exceed his expectations. You did, Lizzy, from the very moment he arrived.

You were charming and lively, and I could see the surprise and pleasure in his eyes when he spoke to you. I did not inspire the same sentiments.”

Elizabeth shook her head. “I set the standard very low for myself in my thinly veiled fury the first time he called – he must have been relieved I was not strangling him. But I am sorry for taking the lead in conversation. I felt myself in the wrong for it even then, but knew not how to stop. I did try to turn the conversation back to you….”

Jane held up a hand. “Please, Lizzy, just listen. I speak not to hear you refute my qualms; I only wish to make myself understood.”

Elizabeth nodded, fighting the urge to give Jane reassurance that was apparently unwanted.

“I did hope to please Mamma, in earning Mr. Darcy’s good opinion, but for myself I also wished to earn the regard of a worthy man; such was not my experience with Robert. I thought I might make something right that has long felt shameful and wrong, in being a woman worthy of Mr. Darcy’s esteem.”

“Did he make you feel unworthy? Was his civility wanting in some way that I failed to comprehend?”

“ He liked you better ,” Jane said, half groaning as she spat the words out.

“Yet I cannot even say that I wish I had met him without you, for I am sure that if I had been left alone with him, we would have had little to say to one another. You drove the conversation the entire time, and he addressed himself chiefly to you. I do not blame you for it – what else could you have done whilst I was so dull? It is my own fault for making such a lackluster effort.”

Tears of shame and guilt pricked Elizabeth’s eyes. “I am sorry to have played a part in what caused you pain; you must believe me when I tell you it was unconsciously done. I meant only to facilitate your becoming acquainted with him.”

“Do not trouble yourself, Lizzy. I fear I did not much like him, either, so I cannot envy you his good opinion.”

“But Jane, you like everybody!” Elizabeth gaped at her sister, astonishment mingling with her self-reproach.

“I do not dislike him, but he is not the sort of suitor I had hoped he might be. I forgave him for insulting you after his pretty apology; what truly bothers me is that he allowed that circumstance to overshadow the true purpose of his visit, which was to meet me and discover if we might suit. He allowed making your acquaintance properly to take precedence over wooing me. He simply… liked you better.”

Elizabeth let out a helpless cry and shook her head, then pressed her lips together to suppress her protestations.

Jane wished to be heard and not placated, and Elizabeth was determined to oblige her.

She owed her sister that much, after spoiling her meeting with Mr. Darcy.

It was a rare thing for Jane to speak so candidly, to express any unfavorable sentiment, and Elizabeth wished to hear all that Jane would say.

“I know you did your best to further the conversation between us, but it seemed that at every turn, your mode of encouraging him to speak only caused him to reveal such information as gave me apprehension.”

“Oh, Jane, I was wretchedly aware of it! I could sense that I often said the wrong thing, or evoked some response in him which would furrow your pretty brow, but I was so perplexed that I could not find my way back to what would please you.”

“Perhaps that is for the best. If there are things about Mr. Darcy that make me wary, I should rather know directly.”

Though Elizabeth had sensed her sister’s discomfort, she could not at all account for it. If she could forgive the man who had insulted her, why could Jane, who never thought ill of anybody, not like Mr. Darcy?

Jane produced a small notebook, which had been tucked under a cushion at her side.

“I penned all my observations into my diary when we returned home. I spent the whole evening ruminating, before I resolved to seek our aunt’s assistance in making sense of my impressions.

Would you like to hear what I have written? ”

“Of course, Jane! If you have sketched his character with greater clarity than I managed, I should like to be enlightened at once.”

Jane glanced down at the pages filled with her own elegant script. “The first thing that gave me pause was what he said when you asked why we had not seen him after Robert’s death.”

“You urged him to speak candidly.”

“Yes, I did, but only after he seemed to think that you could handle hearing his true opinion, but he worried that I was too delicate to be told the truth. I did not like that he thought me so fragile.”

“He hesitated out of respect, surely.”

“He might respect me by believing me capable of hearing unpleasant truths,” Jane replied with a clench of her jaw. “He was assured of your courage and fortitude.”

“I am not a widow with a child!”

“Is it not a mark of strength to be a widow with a child?” Jane shook her head and gave a dismissive shrug, before glancing back down at her diary.

“And then he said something else – that he had hoped to reconcile with Robert someday – something about the cooling of their respective tempers. Not Robert’s temper, but their tempers.

If he has the same wrathful temper as my late husband, we are not as fine a match as Mamma may suppose. ”