Page 30 of The Shades of Pemberley
“Georgiana,” said Darcy when she fell silent.
“While I appreciate your thanks, I cannot say that I have done anything that any man of moral character would not have done in my stead. I did not offer to keep you here to make myself feel superior—I did it because I was concerned about you and wished to make your loss as easy to bear as I could.”
Darcy grinned, provoking her to respond. “As for my betrothed and her sister, I would point out that it is because you are such an excellent girl that they came to esteem you so quickly. That, my dear, is all your doing.”
A blush settled over her face, her responding nod shy. “Thank you for that. I hope you understand what you have taken on.”
“Oh?” asked Darcy, seeing a jest forthcoming. “And what is that?”
“Only that I mean to accept your offer so long as you can endure my presence. You shall never be rid of me unless I marry someday, for I mean to keep Kitty and Elizabeth’s, and all her sisters’ society forever.”
“They will welcome your society as much as you wish for theirs.”
Georgiana offered a pleased nod. “As for Mrs. Younge’s suggestion of the sea, I have no desire to go—as you are to become my guardian, I wish to inform you now. Perhaps, should the opportunity present itself, I should be pleased to go if you and Elizabeth are to go.”
“We shall discuss that when the time comes,” said Darcy. “As I intend to take Elizabeth on a wedding tour, we might use the house at Ramsgate. Perhaps this summer we could go to the lakes?”
“It is a lovely place,” agreed Georgiana. “You now own a lodge there—I should love to show it to you.”
“Then, should the occasion permit, we shall go.”
A bright smile lit up her face, and she excused herself, leaving Darcy to contemplate her after she was gone.
Knowing her situation in the world, though he did, Darcy had not considered the truth that she was now the only member of her family left.
Darcy did not think he had done anything so noble as he had informed her, but he could not but rejoice that his efforts to make things easier for the girl and repair her shattered life were not without success.
When they went to Hertfordshire and met the remaining Bennet sisters, Darcy knew they would complete Georgiana’s transformation into a laughing creature.
As she had said, she would always bear the scars of her lost family, but that was part of the experience of mortality.
New and lasting ties of blood, family, and friendship would take the place of those, and Georgiana would yet live a happy life.
“I WISH TO ANNOUNCE something of interest to us all, Mrs. Bennet,” said Mr. Bennet one day not long after Elizabeth and Kitty returned from the north.
The calendar had turned to March, and spring was approaching with warmer weather, hope, and new horizons in its wake, and Elizabeth’s wedding, for which Mrs. Bennet had entered a frenzy of planning.
This announcement of her father’s, therefore, was a surprise, for he had said nothing to any of them.
“What might that be, Mr. Bennet?” asked his wife. “I hope it is nothing that will tax my strength, for I must plan for Lizzy’s wedding!”
“It should not be beyond your capabilities, my dear,” said Mr. Bennet. “The timing is not the best, but I believe we have no choice.
“You see,” said he, holding up a letter sitting beside his plate, “I received a letter from my cousin, requesting leave to visit us and ‘heal the breach between our families’ as he terms it.”
“Mr. Collins? Your heir is to come to Longbourn?”
Elizabeth well remembered her mother’s nerves before William showed interest in her, for though she still displayed them, they were a pale shadow of what they had been before.
Had Mrs. Bennet still lived in fear for her future, Elizabeth could imagine how she would react to the news that the man who had the power to turn her out of her home was to visit.
As it was, Mrs. Bennet’s question was sensible and more than a little distracted, likely because she was still immersed in thoughts of what remained to be done to prepare for Elizabeth’s fete.
“He is,” confirmed her husband. “As I said, the timing is not the best, but I did not think it prudent to rebuff him. For good or ill, Mr. Collins will someday be the proprietor of this estate; it seems natural that he would wish to view it before he comes into his inheritance.”
Mrs. Bennet nodded, though she remained preoccupied.
“Yes, you are correct to be certain. Welcoming Mr. Collins is no trouble, but I hope you do not mean for us to entertain him at all hours of the day. There is yet much to be done to plan Lizzy’s ball, and I would not endure a fortnight’s delay—if he intrudes upon our planning, I have no notion of how I will complete it all. ”
“I dare say all will be well, Mrs. Bennet. So long as we ensure my cousin is aware of the situation when he comes, he should not intrude much. In responding to his letter, I have made this same point to him; he does not seem to see it as a concern.”
“Very well, Mr. Bennet. When is Mr. Collins to come?”
“March the sixteenth. According to his suggestion, he means to stay until Saturday week.
“What I did not tell your mother, Lizzy,” said Mr. Bennet to Elizabeth later in his study, “is that my cousin does not appear to be a sensible sort of man. Here, read his letter, if you can endure his flowery prose, for I suspect you will think no more of his capabilities when you read it than I do.”
As her father suggested, Mr. Collins’s comments were nothing short of ridiculous, from homage to his patroness to his assertions of his eagerness to admire Mr. Bennet’s daughters. In saying so, Elizabeth thought she caught a whiff of the man’s true reason for approaching them.
“An oddity, indeed. I suppose you did not miss his reference to your daughters.”
“Not at all, Lizzy,” replied her father, the light of anticipation shining in his eyes. “What do you think? Shall you throw Darcy over in favor of my silly cousin?”
“I believe, Papa,” said Elizabeth, “that I have no notion of throwing William over for anyone . Given what I suspect of him, I must thank the heavens above that I am not a consideration for Mr. Collins’s matrimonial ambitions.”
“Jane, too, will not be a consideration,” observed Mr. Bennet, “not with that Bingley fellow showing such a promising inclination toward her. That leaves Mary, Kitty, and Lydia, of course, though Lydia and Kitty will not be a consideration, given their still tender years.”
“I cannot suppose Mary will be interested. Though Mary would do well as a parson’s wife and is a little puritanical in her beliefs, she would not tolerate a dullard any more than the rest of us.”
“Yes, I suppose you are correct,” mused Mr. Bennet. “It is a shame, but I suspect Mr. Collins will leave Longbourn disappointed. Do you suppose he will take a liking to any other lady of the neighborhood?”
“I cannot think of one who would endure him.”
Mr. Bennet shrugged. “Then he must find a wife elsewhere.” Turning serious, Mr. Bennet said: “As I cannot suspect my cousin of much discernment, he may not understand your sisters’ disinclination for him.
If any of them have any concerns or if he becomes too ardent, you may tell them to inform me, and I shall deal with him. ”
“UGH, WHO WANTS TO MARRY a parson?” demanded Lydia when Elizabeth communicated her father’s instructions to her sisters.
Mary, Elizabeth noted, did not agree with Lydia’s assessment, but she avoided provoking an argument—wise, in Elizabeth’s opinion.
“That is not the point, Lydia,” said Jane. “As Papa has stated, you and Kitty are still too young and cannot be targets for Mr. Collins. Papa’s advice is more directed toward Mary and me.”
“Papa does not suppose he is sensible?” asked Mary.
“If you read his letter,” replied Elizabeth, “you would understand. There was not a sensible word on the page.”
With a nod, Mary said: “Then I will have no more interest in him than Jane. I have more modest wishes in a husband, but I will not tolerate a fool.”
A fool was an apt description of Mr. Collins, and this Elizabeth noted within moments of making his acquaintance.
While appearance was not everything, he was about the furthest from appealing that Elizabeth had ever seen in a man, from his mop of oily black hair to his distinct paunch to his pudgy, ruddy cheeks.
The moment he alighted from the hired gig, Mr. Collins proved their opinion of him, for his greetings consumed five minutes, and no one else could insert a word edgewise.
“Welcome, Cousin,” said Mr. Bennet, remaining diplomatic in the face of such an unimpressive specimen as William Collins. “Please allow me to introduce my family to your acquaintance.”
Why Elizabeth could not say, but she felt a distinct shiver run down her spine when her father pronounced her name, and Mr. Collins’s piggy gaze rested on her longer than all her sisters.
The man did not speak to her, but he bowed low to them and inundated them with further exclamations of his pleasure.
“I see my reports were not at all incorrect, for the beauty I see before me has me quite undone. Even were I not at a complete loss for words, I could not do justice to the reality that is your daughters, sir, for it is clear they are blessed with the best parts of splendor and majesty.”
“Is that so, Mr. Collins?” asked Mr. Bennet, declining the low-hanging fruit of so verbose a man as Mr. Collins proclaiming himself bereft of anything to say.
“I must own to one point of confusion, for I did not think you had any other connections in the neighborhood. From whence did you hear reports of my daughters?”
“Oh, reports of their beauty have spread far and wide,” said Mr. Collins.
Elizabeth was certain he was dissembling, but she could not imagine the reason for it.
Again, she felt his gaze upon her more than her sisters, and she had no choice but to conclude he had come here for reasons other than what he stated.
Elizabeth had no concern for herself, secure in her connection with William and their upcoming wedding, but her sisters would need to take care—she did not suppose that Mr. Collins would be easy to divert.
“That is curious, but no subject to discuss in the chill out of doors,” said Mr. Bennet. “If you will come into the house, I shall have the housekeeper show you to your room.”
Once Mr. Collins retired to his room, the family gathered to wait in the sitting-room. It was her mother who spoke up to state her opinion first.
“I offer my apologies if I offend, Mr. Bennet, but I cannot say that your cousin is at all an impressive man.”
“With that,” said Mr. Bennet, the edge of hilarity in his voice, “I cannot disagree. When the occasion presents itself, I shall recommend he hire a steward, for I cannot suppose he will prove any more adept at estate management than he is at portraying himself a rational man.”
The youngest girls giggled at their father’s witticism, but Mrs. Bennet only offered a regal nod. “I understand your reasons for inviting him, Husband, but he will be a most disagreeable guest, and at such a busy time, too.”
“I am certain we can divert his attention, Mrs. Bennet. If nothing else, I shall send him on a tour of the property—with any luck, that will consume his time until he must return to his parish.”
“Your welcome is most excellent, Cousin,” said Mr. Collins that night at the dinner table.
As the parson had bored them all to tears throughout the afternoon, no one in the family looked on the coming two weeks with anything other than dread.
It seemed he was intent upon rendering them all insensible before the soup course was complete, for his never-ending avalanche of words did not cease.
“It brings me to mind the condescension of my excellent patroness, who is a wondrous person, one I am fortunate to serve. Though her estate is a jewel of the country and Longbourn cannot compare, I find your arrangements to my taste and your welcome second only to her ladyship.”
“Then I must suppose she is a prominent woman?” asked Mrs. Bennet, perhaps in desperation to insert a word into the parson’s monologue.
“Of course, for she is the most preeminent lady in all the land,” agreed Mr. Collins.
“I received my ordination last Easter and thus have experienced a most marvelous year under her ladyship’s tutelage.
You will understand when I say that I lose no opportunity to praise her beneficence, for I could never imagine such affability as her ladyship bestows on me daily. ”
“Then I hope you do not miss her to excess, Cousin.”
Mr. Bennet’s dry comment, though Elizabeth suspected Mr. Collins could understand nothing of such humor, was intended to close the subject. In this, he perhaps underestimated Mr. Collins’s nose for the absurd.
“Not at all, Cousin. For you see, I have come here for a specific purpose, one, I cannot but imagine, you will all find agreeable. There is, at Longbourn, something I could not find in any other location, happiness I am eager to claim.”
“You refer to the estate?” asked Mr. Bennet. “It is, after all, your inheritance.”
“It is, but I refer to a more personal matter,” demurred the parson. “I shall speak of it anon.”
None of them missed the significant glance from Mr. Bennet, though the parson did not notice it. It appeared their apprehension about Mr. Collins’s reasons for coming to Hertfordshire was confirmed.
Yet Elizabeth could not help but feel that something was off about him, a vague sensation that extended beyond his being an oddity.
What it could be, she could not say, but something niggled at the back of her mind, whispering that he was not saying everything.
When Mr. Collins then turned to Elizabeth, the feeling grew.
“Tell me, Cousin, what do you think about bees? I have many in my gardens at Hunsford, you know, for my patroness advised me to procure them and directed their placement behind my excellent parsonage.”