Mr. Collins in Matrimony
If Lydia thought Mr. Collins had a hidden propensity for worldly pleasures she was proved wrong the first night of matrimony.
He did insist on reading sermons before their conjugation and sometimes after if he did not immediately fall asleep, and their joining was quick and unromantic as handing cook a list for the grocer's. Lydia thought it an uncomfortable, dispassionate business, but there was not much for it, as it was her wifely duty to succumb to him whenever he turned to her in the night.
It might have been tolerable, had her husband not the ghastly misfortune of snoring. All else might have been endured if she could but sleep through the nasal projections. She was not tired enough to sleep and she would not be tired enough if Mr. Collins was the only active participant during intercourse—and he barely active at that.
However, she was not discouraged, as she was confident he required only a push here and there to awaken his sleeping desires.
For the time being, however, the most passion he showed was over his flower garden or beef steak.
They were a most congenial couple at breakfast.
"Collie," she would say, as he chewed a mouthful. "I am going to buy new gloves today."
And as he could do nothing but nod and smile, she would have her way in anything she asked for; so long as it was discussed before he'd finished swallowing.
"Collie!" she would call to him as she feigned a great interest in trimming the rosebush, "My hair is caught in a thorn!"
And unaware of the trap he was falling into, Mr. Collins would come to his wife's aid, ready to lecture on the folly of loose curls, even one or two around the face bearing a clear mark of vanity, and instead be struck speechless by the unavoidable view of Lydia's fine breasts, exhibited by her stooping posture.
"Now, do not be cross," she pouted. "They are such beautiful roses, so round and pink, and I could not resist getting a closer look. Are they as soft as they appear?"
Mr. Collins was overcome by an extreme case of dry throat, and coughed most alarmingly until the vivacious Mrs. Collins sat him inside and brought him water. It was a difficult task when her shoulders shook from laughter.
It was not too long before Lizzy made her visit to the new mistress of Hunsford. Jane would have come, but for Mrs. Bennet's absolute refusal. Mr. Bingley paid her a great deal of attention which could not be mistaken—at least in Mrs. Bennet's eyes—as intentions towards marriage. Even to Elizabeth, it seemed a budding mutual preference was fast becoming a courtship, and therefore Jane could not be spared.
Kitty was in London, taking advantage of her Aunt and Uncle Gardiners' wish for a young travelling companion. Elizabeth was therefore set to make the journey alone, but for the accompaniment of a servant.
It was a relief to her to see how happy Lydia was. Elizabeth had feared her flighty sister might be pining away in boredom, or plaguing her husband's heart out with twice the fervour that her mother showed. It was a pleasant shock to witness the mirthful way the new Mrs. Collins teased her husband—perhaps a little wickedly, but to no one's great harm—and he accepted it with a sort of perplexity that left little time for his pretty compliments that were the product of previous study. Lydia did not seem to miss them. In fact, she seemed so distracted by her making a project of her husband that finding areas of complaint were quite forgotten.
It was a fine day, and Mr. Collins was tending to his little plot when Elizabeth and Lydia were first able to speak freely to one another.
Married life had not improved Lydia's posture, and she made quite a show of falling into her chair with a sigh. "Oh, look at my husband, Lizzy. Isn't he quaint? I think him quite ridiculous, but there is something to be said for a man that makes me laugh so. I remember a day when I fancied a man in uniform. But I am an old married woman, now and hardly recall the pursuits of my youth. Who was that young man we used to talk about?"
Elizabeth smiled into her teacup. "He was not so very young, Lydia. You know very well George Wickham is older than you by a number of years."
"Ah, yes! Wickham! Can you believe he's run off with Mary King? It is not surprising due to his history," she mused distractedly.
Elizabeth had heard of his recent elopement, and thought it made his dark tale of Mr. Darcy all the more curious.
"What history? Whatever do you mean, Lydia?"
"Well, one of Collie's parishioners, Mrs. Greetling, she's very old you know, said that Wickham was quite the scoundrel. He incurred debts, and was always running off at university instead of attending to his studies. He refused to take the parish the elder Mr. Darcy set out for him, and gambled away his prospects. There was even some strange incident that made the younger Mr. Darcy break all contact with him. Might have had to do with the sister, Georgiana. Darcy's, not Wickham's." She twirled her fingers through the curtain as she nattered on, "The Darcy family was always close with Wickham, you know. But the Darcys are so private. Any scandal would have been hushed up, of course. And now Wickham's run off with that freckled nit, Mary King! What a lucky escape you've had! For I know you fancied him, Lizzy," she ended with a giggle.
"Perhaps I did," Lizzy mused. "Perhaps it was a very lucky escape."
The moment Elizabeth could be alone with her thoughts, she wrote a letter to Jane, relating to her what a foolish creature she was to so easily be deceived by George Wickham, and recounting the entirety of what she now knew of the matter.
She sealed the letter and put her pen away, determined to think a little better on a certain gentleman with ten thousand a year.
Just then, a knock on the door preceded the maid, and Mr. Darcy was announced.
Author's Notations:
Lydia is a naughty. But am I the only one who thinks this could actually sort of work? It seemed an absurd notion at the time of writing the first part of this-back when it was still a one-shot-but the more I think about it, the more I'm convinced that Lydia's marriage to Mr. Collins could solve virtually all the problems of every Pride and Prejudice character. I know, I know. That reduces the conflict, the tension isn't dramatic enough... but for ways of simplifying your own life and getting to a faster happy end, marry off your Lydias to respectable clergymen!
That's wisdom from an old maid right there.
Ah. And do tell me if I need to rank this under M. I'm wavering, because it's not dreadfully obscene, but then there is a flash of womanly endowments, so what do you think? Might some T readers be offended that this is not the story they expected?