"Mr. Darcy, are you ever planning to tell the rest of us what you are really doing in Hertfordshire?"
"What do you mean, Miss Mary?"
Darcy had been caught off guard by the question, mainly because he was deep in thought. The spring day was warm and pleasant, so Mrs. Bennet had sent the entire lot off to walk to Oakham Mount. She had not entirely given up on the idea of Jane being paired with Mr. Darcy, or with the gentleman bringing Mr. Bingley back somehow. Thus determined, she made sure Darcy was escorting her eldest and most eligible daughter, and then shooed them out the door so she could have some peace and quiet.
Naturally, that arrangement only lasted until they were out of sight of the house. At that point, Anne commandeered Jane and set out slightly ahead of everyone because they were in each other's confidence and had secret affairs to discuss. Kitty and Lydia continued their usual pairing, excluding everyone and everything.
That left Mary to walk beside Darcy, which he did not mind in the least. He offered her his arm, and she looked at it in some confusion, as if no gentleman had ever done such a thing before. She took a moment to finally put her hand into the crook of his elbow. He gave her a small smile, which seemed to half‑frighten her, so he decided to just let them walk a spell to allow her to get accustomed to the idea. He was certainly the last man in the world who should comment on someone feeling or acting socially awkward.
Darcy had spent some time thinking about the middle Bennet daughter, and his thought always went towards both understanding Elizabeth through her sisters, as well as entertaining ideas about how he could help them. He thought it was a bit pointless for a man to be rich and powerful if he could not help his friends. The Bennets were, he hoped, to be at least friends and preferably much more than that, so a little forethought would not be amiss. As usual though, once he started thinking about that, he became unsure of himself.
Fortunately, in this particular case, he did not need to conjure up a long‑dead father or mother. His conversation with Anne the previous evening had been sufficient. He had mentioned his thoughts, and he wondered if Anne thought he was being overly presumptuous thinking about how to help the other Bennets, as if they were already sisters.
Anne's reply had been quick.
≈ It is a bit late to worry about officious interference now, Fitzwilliam. Before the Bingley debacle would have been a good time to start, but since we are on the subject, let me be clear. If you treat them as sisters, then you are being presumptions, and frankly ridiculous. If you treat them as friends who have shared their home with you for a fortnight, then you are not wrong, so long as your interference amounts to nothing more than introductions, suggestions, help when requested or things you would do for any friend. ≈
The distraction lasted only a moment, while Miss Mary was deciding if she wanted to ask the question again.
"Well, Mr. Darcy… you have been here a fortnight, ostensibly 'protecting' your cousin. Forgive my skepticism, but I doubt Anne requires any protection from you or anyone else. You might, but she does not. You have another purpose, and I wonder if you are planning to share it, or if I will just need to guess."
Darcy looked at her carefully, and said, "Those are good observations, Miss Mary. I presume if I share something in confidence, it will remain as such?"
Mary just snickered, and said, "Of course, it will", and then she looked a bit crestfallen, and added, "it is not as if anyone wants my secrets anyway."
Darcy felt quite small, but said, "Would you prefer I just tell you, or would you like to guess? I have some things I would ask as well, if you are of a mind to oblige me."
Mary looked at him and saw a level of sincerity in his face that she liked, so she accepted the challenge.
"I suppose the real purpose is fairly obvious – or it is to me at any rate. You are waiting for Lizzy to return. Either you want to court her, or you have already made a complete hash out of it and are here to try to repair the damage."
Darcy laughed with ill humor, and said, "That is very astute, Miss Mary. It is the latter and describing it as 'a real hash' understates the magnitude of the disaster by half. Can you tell me how you guessed?"
"Well, Sir, it is simple, really. You got off on the wrong foot with Lizzy right from the beginning by slighting her at the assembly. May I presume Jane or Anne have already taken you to task over that?"
"Yes, in fact they have, though I have relieved them of the burden by feeling inordinately ashamed and guilty on my own."
"Wasted emotions, Mr. Darcy. The purpose of those is to encourage you to better yourself or make amends. If you have done so, then it is time to let them go, although you still have to apologize to Lizzy for it, IF she will listen to you."
"Easier said than done, Miss Mary."
"Everything worthwhile is, Mr. Darcy, but Oakham Mount is only two miles so we should advance our discussion I think."
"Agreed."
"Well, Lizzy likes to think she is very clever, and I admit she is. She is quite the cleverest of all of us, but that gives her one big disadvantage. She does not fail often enough to take the possibility of failure of her intellect seriously enough. Those of us that make a muddle of it most of the time need to learn some humility. She likes her first impression, and since you hit her on a particularly sensitive subject, her course was set."
"I see. Why particularly sensitive?"
"Mr. Darcy, if you had my mother, and Jane for a sister you would understand."
Darcy looked at the ground, and said, "Perhaps I understand better than you might think, Miss Mary. I grew up with two other boys, Robert Breton and Mr. Wickham. My father was a very good man, and very astute in every area of his life except Mr. Wickham. He never 'favored' Wickham per-se, but he did make it clear on any number of occasions that I should be more like him socially. He was a lively man and found me to be too sober and taciturn for his taste, so he spent quite a bit of time with Wickham. I am certain it is not as bad as what you suffer, but at least enough to give me the vague concept."
"Fair enough, Mr. Darcy. No imagine a life where your father told you explicitly, nearly every day, that you were not as good as him. Not as clever, not as handsome, whatever adjective you would find most troublesome. Then, imagine Lizzy as a peer, and the very first thing she did is slight exactly the same attribute your father slighted, and you will be getting close."
Darcy's face turned red, and he looked at the ground, before saying, "I understand much better, Miss Mary."
"Put the pieces together, and then throw a snake into the garden at the worst moment, and you will see the obstacle you were facing. You are aware I am certain, that wherever Lizzy is, Mr. Wickham's poisonous words have not been refuted, since you missed your chance to do that in the fall. She probably still believes him, unless she has managed to work it out for herself."
"Yes, I am aware of that, among my many failings. But may I ask a question? You worked out that I would like to court her. How?"
Mary just laughed, and said, "Lizzy is very clever… cleverer than I am by far, but she does have her blind spots. She frequently wondered why you stared at her and advanced the theory that you stared 'to find fault'."
"And"
Mary took a deep breath, and said, "As a woman with plenty of faults to find, Mr. Darcy, I can tell you that it takes a man very little time to identify them. No staring is required."
Darcy gasped in surprise and stopped walking, which caused Mary to stop as well, though she was staring down in so much embarrassment that she might have tripped over the next pebble in the path anyway.
Darcy said very gently, "Miss Mary, I have shared your home and your table for a fortnight and have had ample time to study you at my leisure. It has not been sufficient to find any fault. Perhaps, you underestimate yourself, or perhaps your mother's poison has caused you to underestimate my sex in general."
Mary looked at him, and said, "Mr. Darcy, you say that now, and you do it with the voice of sincerity, although a practiced deceiver would do that while spouting empty flattery. I will give you the benefit of the doubt and believe you are sincere, but may I ask, what did your evil twin that was here last Autumn think?"
Darcy looked at his boots, blushing in shame, and said, "Anyone who listened to that idiot should have their head examined."
"But what did he think?"
Darcy blushed, and said, "He thought you beneath him, and not worth getting to know. Beyond that, he did not think about you at all. Much to his discredit, he dismissed you and all your sisters save one with a glance. That one he dismissed with a great deal of effort… or tried to anyway."
Mary smiled, not accustomed to such brutal honesty, but thinking she could well get used to it. It would make life so much easier and less confusing.
"Thank you for your honesty, Mr. Darcy. Your earlier doppelganger has more adherents to his way of thinking than you do."
Feeling quite out of his depth, Darcy said, "Perhaps, Miss Mary, but may I ask you this? How many husbands to you actually desire? Is it zero or one?"
"One of course. I may not be the most beautiful or accomplished or lively Bennet daughter, but I still want to live, just like any other woman."
"So, in the entire cohort of men, does it matter what percentage of them are worthy of your attention and which are not."
"Mr. Darcy, even Jane is unwed after seven years. I have no dowry, no connections, little in the way of accomplishments, and beauty that is marginal at best. Do you truly think I stand any chance at all?"
Wondering exactly what kind of hole he was digging, Darcy said, "Do you truly believe that the less‑evil version of myself will not help you?"
Mary stopped again and stared at him, as if the idea had never occurred to her.
Darcy pressed a bit, asking, "Put the matter help from me aside for the moment Miss Mary. Even before my return, Jane spent four months in London at your Uncle's house. According to her reports, she just wasted her time pining away for Bingley. If she had been in the right mood, is it possibly your Uncle and Aunt Gardiner would introduce her to eligible men in that amount of time?"
"Yes, they have always offered to, but Mama does not want us marrying tradesmen. She thinks them beneath us."
"I see. Do you believe this?"
"Of course not. My aunt and uncle are the finest people I know, but none of us have become desperate enough to fight with Mama yet. We will eventually, but not yet."
Darcy nodded, and said, "We all fight our chains, Miss Mary. You fight your mother's influence and your father's indolence. I fight the big target on my back and my own addlepated ideas about my position in society. Bingley fights his indolence, his indecision, his pernicious sisters and his overreliance on my advice, which is far from infallible. I guess the question for all of us is whether we let the chains define us, or whether we break free of them."
"Have you broken free, Mr. Darcy?"
"I believe I have broken some of them, but not all. I am a better man now than I was a few months ago. I would not have even had this conversation back then. I would have been afraid to even walk with you. More importantly, I will be a better man a few months hence. You see, Miss Mary, I fully expect your sister to reject my first proposal. Nobody with a scrap of sense or pride, could accept it. My hope is that she will allow me to court her properly, and humbly, and show her that I am not the evil twin. It will be a chance for me to grow, to improve my character, and by the time I eventually wear her down, I hope to be worthy."
"Well, I wish you success, Mr. Darcy."
"Now, let us discuss your chains, Miss Mary. I will be honest. I hope one day to be your brother, and your concerns would be my concerns, but I am not that yet, and may never be. I do however have an idea that you might like… friend to friend. I do hope I may call you that?"
Mary got quiet for several paces, rolling the idea around in her mind, and said, "Yes – friends, Mr. Darcy."
"Well then, Miss Mary. If you are not in a particular hurry to meet eligible men, what say you to meeting a friend who is a bit less… er… less… well, I will not say it. I guess my question is, would you like to meet my sister? I believe you could both teach each other some things."
"You would introduce me to your sister?"
"Yes, of course. As you know by now, I am the laziest man you know, with the possible exception of your father. My sister is timid, shy, and astonishingly short of female influence her own age. That is my fault, but now that I have identified it as a fault, I plan to fix it the easiest way possible. If I just have you in my house for some months, then all would be resolved without my lifting a finger. Yes, I cannot imagine why I did not think of this before."
Mary just stared at him in perplexity, and said, "Your sister?"
"Yes. She is but sixteen. She is very good at the pianoforte, and I have masters engaged that you could share. You have talent but need training. You have energy and application, but it needs direction. Socially, you and Georgiana are both a bit awkward, although far be it from me to criticize. Georgiana learned it from me, and you probably from your father. I would suggest you might form a tight bond something like your two elder sisters share if possible. Then after a few months, if you are not lively enough, I can just drop your other two sisters into the mix. Problem solved, and with so little trouble and expense. It is the perfect solution. Even better, Georgiana will come out in society next year. You will come out with her. Yes, it is all arranged. I shall write to my Aunt Matlock immediately to start the process moving."
"You are mad, Mr. Darcy!"
"In that, you are absolutely correct, Miss Mary. What say you? Will you come to Derbyshire for a few months?"
"Let us see if you are still mostly intact and willing to meet with anyone named 'Bennet' after you meet with Lizzy. Whether she objects to you or not, I will be happy to meet your sister. I am afraid you cannot command us to befriend each other. We will have to work that out ourselves, but I will try."
"That is all I ask, Miss Mary."
Mary nodded, and asked casually, "By the way, do you have any idea where Lizzy is?"
"'North' is all I have heard. For all I know, she could in the blue parlor at Pemberley, talking about me at this very moment."