In the immediate aftermath of Mr. Collins' ultimatum, the Bennet-Gardner family found themselves with only a few articles of clothing, and childhood mementos tucked away between layers of muslin and ribbon, on their Aunt and Uncle Phillips doorstep. Mrs. Bennet was still weeping, although she had managed to quiet herself a considerable amount, when she had been informed that she was to stay with her brother at his home, instead of living at Longbourn, with her second eldest married to its heir.
"London!" she sighed between sobs. Elizabeth, despite the circumstances and the tension she felt, could not help but laugh. It seemed that nothing would ever keep her mama's spirits low.
Her uncle rapped on the door of his sister's home, and waited. A few moments later, the woman, arrayed in black with accented grey took one look at the assembled party, and ushered them in quickly.
"I am indeed not surprised that you have come to us, brother. I do not give one fig what the neighbors should say, that Mr. Collins is an odiously hateful man, and any woman who shall be bound in matrimony to such a man, shall be very vexed indeed." Throughout her speech, she brought them all to the morning room where she received callers. Gesturing for them to be seated, she rang a bell, and a servant arrived a few moments later.
"Lucy, go and fetch Stevenson, and tell him to gather our guests bags, and situate them in the guest rooms. Then inform the cook that we shall need tea and biscuits." Here she turned to her nieces and sister. "Brother, you and my sister shall share a room of course, Mary and my poor sister shall share, Lyddie and Kitty will have a room to themselves, and Jane and Miss Elizabeth shall have the last. There, shall that do?" she asked, obviously wanting their satisfaction.
"I am afraid that we do not have much room, I am forever asking of Mr. Phillips to expand upon our home, but as you know he does not see the need, being that we have no children." Mrs. Phillips continued to get them situated, still prattling on-a trait she shared with Mrs. Bennet-" Mr. Phillips is at his practice, I shall send a servant to send word to him that you are staying with us for the time being."
Mrs. Phillips, who truly was a mirror image of her only sister, Mrs. Bennet, excepting the fact that she had no children, let alone daughters to marry off, smiled in satisfaction as she had her family all along side her.
Elizabeth was shocked at the reception she and her sisters had received from her mother's family, but her aunt's next words calmed some of her shock, as her aunt revealed that Mr. Collins had paid her a call after the infamous card party visit.
"The nerve of that man!" she exclaimed. "He and his odious father kept my nieces and dear sister away for the majority of a year, and the first time they have any amusements at all, in an especially proper environment-their aunt's home, no less-he comes here, calling my home a den of iniquity, and questioning whether or not my niece spoke to another gentleman-no an officer!"
Mrs. Phillips shuddered delicately, offering a handkerchief to her sister, who had begun a fresh round of tears at her sister's words. She patted Elizabeth's hand consolingly.
"I should have refused such a man, as well Miss Lizzie! Chin up! Besides, you shall be going to London, and I am sure there are quite a few gentlemen with three or four thousand a year that shall be swanning around you and your sisters as soon as your mourning period is over!"
Elizabeth smiled at her aunt's words, but it was a false smile. Her aunt knew as well as she did, that the only one of them who should make an advantageous match would be Jane, and that was simply not possible anymore.
A few days later….
They were to only stay a week, to catch their breath, before traveling by carriage to their aunt and uncle's home in Gracechurch street. Mrs. Bennet, although initially inconsolable, had stopped her wailing, and was now counting her blessings, that she should be able to live in London! She had wanted to do so all her life, for although she was shrewd enough to land an estate owner, when she herself was the daughter of a humble solicitor, she had never been able to convince him to spend any more than a few weeks, once or twice a year at most, in London-to see her brother and his family, and to take advantage of the shops.
Elizabeth could not help that they were making a mistake of a colossal size. She had always thought, that when faced with the choice-of marrying someone she did not love or respect, and saving her family, that her pride, her convictions should save her from making such a misstep, of repeating her mother and father's mistakes in terms of their marriage together. Yet she found that she did not think she could do it, now that her choice was looming before her face.
At best, she should always have to shuttle between her Aunt and Uncle Gardner, to her Aunt and Uncle Phillips. She did not know if she should be able to watch Mr. Collins and some other, nameless, faceless woman inhabit her dearly beloved home, Longbourn, and why should her uncle bear the majority of her and her siblings expenses when they brought in so little?
Elizabeth and Jane lay in their borrowed bed, wrapped in each other's arms in a way that they had not been able to for many months.
"Lizzie?"
Elizabeth closed her eyes, and deepened her breathing, hoping that she could fool Jane into believing that she had fallen asleep. A few more moments passed and Jane repeated her name, this time a bit louder. Again, Elizabeth ignored her sister, and resolutely snuggled deeper into her pillow.
"Lizzie," Jane's hand reached to smooth Elizabeth's hair from her face, and returned back around her waist. "I know why you refused Mr. Collins, Lizzie. The real reason. Lydia told me." At that, Elizabeth stiffened minutely, and Jane's hand returned to her hair, gently stroking, petting. "I understand. Mama and uncle-everyone understands Lizzie."
"That does not discard the facts, Jane." Elizabeth finally rolled over to face her sister.
"Do you think our Uncle Gardner and Uncle Phillips have not considered the facts?" was Jane's rebuttal.
"Of course they have Jane, but I do not think that I could forgive myself if I-." Elizabeth paused, carefully considering her next words. "I had always considered myself a strong, disciplined woman, Jane, but it appears I am not."
Jane weighed her sister's words, comprehending the intent behind them.
"Lizzie, whatever you decide, I shall always be with you. Even if I have to stay with Aunt and Uncle Phillips."
Elizabeth grasped her sister's hand tenderly, before brushing a kiss to her forehead.
"I know, Jane."
After that, it seemed that Jane was finally content to sleep, having communicated her apprehension and loyalty to Elizabeth. Elizabeth lay awake for many hours afterwards, unable to fully fall into a sleep, and so, when the sun had began its peak, she deftly slipped out of bed, and had quickly dressed. Grabbing a thin shawl that belonged to her sister Lydia, she informed a passing maid that she was leaving the house for a walk, along the tract to Sir William's home, and that she should inform her family that she should be back before their morning meal.
Elizabeth flitted down the countryside, taking in the crisp, cool, clean morning air. despite the immense pressure she was still under, she had never been more, nor felt more free. Mrs. Bennet had often complained of her stubborn, independent nature, citing her daily walks along the countryside as visible, visceral proof that her only ambition in life was to flout the rules of society. Mr. Bennet, of course had taken her side, as she had been his favorite, and he enjoyed the fact, Elizabeth thought, that she was so entirely different from her mother. That while Jane was the image of everything she had desired of a daughter, so Elizabeth was his. She was better than a boy, he had always declared, something that had always made her laugh.
Elizabeth had come down the winding road that led to her dearest friend, Charlotte's home. Elizabeth grimaced as she thought of the previous visit that Charlotte had paid shortly after the Bennets and Gardners had vacated Longbourn. Charlotte was indeed surprised that Mr. Collins had thrown them out so quickly after the funeral, and had informed her that the entire town was speaking of it. She had laughed when Elizabeth archly informed her that people did little else, and that she was used to strangers sticking their noses into her family's affairs.
"I am not surprised you refused Mr. Collins, Lizzie. Something within you altered, with his presence. However, I caution you to be fully aware of what you are yielding."
Elizabeth exhaled deeply. Charlotte was too resolute, despite her double handed advice.
Elizabeth, not wishing to end her walk so soon, had elected to carry on, realizing that she was now quite close to Longbourn. Only a mile or so, an easy distance. She faltered, and could take no more steps forward, nor bring herself to turn around and return to her Aunt Phillips. She was at a standstill, and she cursed her weakness in being unable to break it.
Some long minutes passed, and Elizabeth noted a figure on a white horse approaching.
"Mr. Darcy!" Elizabeth called out, immediately embarrassed that she had shouted his name as though she had stumbled upon him committing some wrong doing.
For his part, he seemed surprised to see her, and Elizabeth was reminded that had her family's circumstances been different, he and she may have run into each other several times before, in the time he had spent in Netherfield. Perhaps they may have become better acquainted, and even become friends. Perhaps they should have loathed each other.
"Mr. Darcy, I do apologize," she expressed, still disconcerted, "I was surprised to see you here."
Mr. Darcy was on his horse, and he during her speech, he slipped off, and walked towards her, leading the horse by the bridle.
"Miss Elizabeth," he greeted her solemnly, sweeping his tall, black hat off of his head, transitioning into a smooth bow. She curtseyed, not for the first time feeling as though they were key players in a dance that did not seem to end.
After a few moments of awkward silence, Mr. Darcy cleared his throat, and asserted, "I have heard here in Meryton that you and your family are to live with your uncle in London."
Elizabeth swallowed a grimace, as she noticed that he was, rather politely, avoiding the fact that she had refused an offer from her cousin, the new master of Longbourn.
"Yes, we shall be leaving at the end of the week to travel to my aunt and uncle's. They are very eager to return home to their children."
"Indeed."
A lengthy silence reigned, and Elizabeth was about to bid Mr. Darcy good day and return back to her aunt's, when she heard her name.
"Miss Elizabeth?"
Her eyes met Mr. Darcy's.
"Yes, sir?" she asked, wincing minutely, as even the title reminded her of Mr. Collins, and of the decision she did not wish to determine, and yet she had no other choice, if she wished for her family to be comfortable after the trials they had endured on her behalf. While her family, especially her aunts and uncles were understanding, only she, Mrs. Bennet, Lydia, Kitty, Mary, and Jane knew the truth. And while they may not resent her now for making the choice her uncle had wished of her, they would, in the future. Of that, Elizabeth was sure.
Mr. Darcy clasped the brim of his hat in his hand, twisting it cruelly. He spoke softly, but full of authority, that Elizabeth hardly reconciled what he was expressing.
"Miss Elizabeth, I understand that you and your family have gone through a tremendous loss recently, and if there were any other option, I should have taken it, but the present circumstances are what they are, and there is no changing them. It will not do. I must confess to you how ardently and violently, I admire and love you."
At that last confession, one that he nearly whispered, Mr. Darcy's hat fell uselessly from his hands, and onto the ground. He did not notice it lying upon the ground, and Elizabeth was far too shocked to mention it. Immediately, her mind returned to Charlotte's previous teasings, and then to the current predicament she found herself in.
Could Mr. Darcy be the answer to her prayers? She had not time to contemplate that notion for Mr. Darcy had said-
"I have fought against my family's expectation and reputation, the inferiority of your rank and circumstance, and I am of the utmost willing to put your circumstances aside and ask for you to end my agony. Please do me the honor of accepting my hand in marriage, Miss Elizabeth."
Elizabeth rapidly flitted from astonishment to acrimony to astonishment again. Mr. Darcy had actually proposed to her, albeit in the most insensitive, arrogant method. She was reminded of Charlotte, who had said shortly after their first meeting with Mr. Darcy, that a man so illustriously wealthy in connections and money, had a right to be proud, as though there were no other way.
Mr. Darcy was now staring at her, intent on upon her answer, and Elizabeth rushed to say something, anything that did not make her sound like a fool, let alone an outright refusal. The barest trickling of an idea crept into her mind, and she contended that it was not the worst idea, and certainly not a trial.
"I-I appreciate your sentiments sir, and I am very sorry to have caused you any unjust pain. It was unconsciously done."
Mr. Darcy scowled at her answer.
"Is this your final reply, Miss Elizabeth?"
"No, sir."
He seemed surprised at her response.
"Then please, Miss Elizabeth, I should like to know the intent behind your reply, if you are not refusing me. Is this a convoluted attempt at determining the depths of my affection for you?" Mr. Darcy spat out the word affection, as though it were an infection that he was determined to be rid of as quickly as possible.
"No, sir. I am simply trying to sketch out your character before I agree to marry you. I hear such different accounts of you that puzzles me exceedingly. Your insult of my family circumstance seems to confirm at least one account."
Mr. Darcy seemed dumbfounded for a moment, before he remembered himself.
"Forgive me, Miss Elizabeth. I-I meant no offense."
Elizabeth had meant for it to come as a gentle admonition, something that could be construed as teasing, for no matter what she had said to Mr. Darcy about sketching his character, she had its essentials firmly in mind, and in that he was her choice. However, her response came more bitterly than she had anticipated.
"I do find it odd, Mr. Darcy, that you should insult me in one breath, and insult me in the next. Although I should be used to such a thing, for you behaved in the same manner at the very first assembly in which we met."
Mr. Darcy frowned.
"To what do you refer?"
"I refer to the remark that you made to Mr. Bingley after you had both been introduced to my family-to my sister, Jane." Elizabeth could not even shame him further, by spitting out the remark afterwards, for it pained her every time she thought of the incident.
Mr. Darcy's face colored a deep red, and his stared at the road.
"I apologize, Miss Elizabeth. There is no excuse for what I said, and I should have apologized sooner had I know that I had been overheard. I shall apologize to Miss Jane, posthaste, no matter what your answer may be."
Elizabeth nodded in satisfaction, glad that she should invoke such an action from Mr. Darcy. It would not take away the pain, nor the feelings Jane held for Mr. Bingley. But it would satisfy. For now.
"What else is it that you wished to know, Miss Elizabeth?" Mr. Darcy finally ventured after a few moments silence.
"Mr. Wickham." There was no triumph in her voice, though the gentleman in question was her trump card. His name had provoked such a strong reaction from not only Mr. Darcy, but Mr. Bingley, in barring him from the Netherfield ball, and Miss Bingley, in her impassioned defense of Mr. Darcy's non-existent faults.
At the mere mention of the man's name, Mr. Darcy had tensed visibly and Elizabeth noted that his fists had clenched within his hands. When he noticed her looking, he tucked his hands behind his back.
"What has he told you, Miss Elizabeth?" Mr. Darcy asked, his tone soothing and encouraging.
"I do not appreciate being spoken to like a child, Mr. Darcy, as I told you at the Netherfield ball." Elizabeth stated coolly, her anger roused at his patronizing tone. "Mr. Wickham informed me at my Aunt Phillip's card party that he was your father's godson, and that you had been jealous of his relationship with his father, to the point to where you had not allowed him to see your father on his deathbed, and had cheated him out of his inheritance-a position in the Church."
Elizabeth continued on, before Mr. Darcy could speak, glad that she, for once, had the upper hand. "I did not trust Mr. Wickham. I did not trust that he should tell me such things, personal, intimate details of another's family upon our first meeting. I told my sisters to stay away from him, whether or not his story was true." she said, lifting her chin to face Mr. Darcy square on.
Silence reigned, as Mr. Darcy, Elizabeth supposed, was struggling to keep his agitation under wraps. Finally, he said,
"That was indeed very wise of you, Miss Elizabeth. If you would permit me, I should like to tell you the true story of our estrangement."
When Elizabeth nodded her assent, Mr. Darcy rushed to explain, unable to bear the agony her her opinion of him being tainted by Wickham's falsehoods.
"Mr. Wickham and I were indeed close, boyhood friends, and my father was his godfather. My father loved him, sent him off to university with me. It was there that our paths began to diverge. Wickham began to spend more time with immodest women, indolent heirs to fortunes, and the gaming tables. He lost and borrowed quite a bit of money. Always, my father paid his debts. Less than two years into university, Wickham left, and I heard nothing from him until years later when my father was nearing death."
It was here, Elizabeth noted that his breath had turned ragged. Even speaking of his father's death still wounded him to this day.
"My father wished to see Wickham before he died. I had spent a large amount of money trying to locate him, and when I did, Wickham refused to see to my father. My father died without ever seeing him, and it was weeks afterwards that Wickham came, asking about my father's will. He declined the living, and wanted the value of it-some three thousand pounds-and which he was given. He disappeared again, and I had hoped to never see him again."
Elizabeth had listened to his story in rapt attention, and so when silence lapsed around them again, she somehow had a feeling that the story did not pick up to the period where they had met here in Meryton. Mr. Darcy swallowed roughly, looking anywhere but at her.
"It was a year ago, when I came across him again. I have a younger sister, Georgiana, who is your sister Kitty's age. After our father's death," here he stopped, and then contradicted himself, "no, Miss Elizabeth, if I should be completely honest, it was after the death of our mother that Georgiana's woes began."
He gave her an apologetic look.
"My father loved my mother, and fell into a deep depression after my sister's birth coincided with her death. He was an excellent father, to me, but not to Georgiana. She has very few memories of his full attention. When I returned home from university to take my place as the master of Pemberley, I found a timid, mouse of a girl, instead of my inquisitive little sister. As a remedy, I had slowly exposed her to more society, and in part of that was sending for a holiday in Ramsgate, with a companion."
His visage darkened, and Elizabeth nearly withdrew. She understood the pain that Mr. Darcy's sister felt, how she had transformed. It only took one person to make the transition, and belatedly, Elizabeth realized, Mr. Darcy was hers.
"It was there that I had discovered, but for the fact that I had decided to arrive a few days early, that her companion was in league with Wickham and had conspired to elope with my sister. She is to inherit thirty thousand pounds. Once I informed him that he should never receive a penny of her inheritance, he left immediately. My sister was thrown into a deep depression, one from which she suffers to this day."
His gaze met hers, his eyes somber and heavy. Elizabeth's heart ached for Miss Darcy, for she understood the shame and worry she felt. It was a heavy burden, to have come so close to disappointing, and shaming your family in the pursuit of happiness.
"Do you understand now, Miss Elizabeth?"
"I-yes, Mr. Darcy. I understand."
"And if your inquiries are thus satisfied, shall I have your final reply as to my original question?"
"I should like for my sisters to be able to stay with us, Mr. Darcy." she finally said. "Not all the time, but I want-."
Elizabeth felt breathless and though she were about to faint. Mr. Darcy walked towards her, offering her the crook of his arm, as he led his horse alongside.
"We shall be able to discuss such things later, Miss Elizabeth. Allow me to escort you to your aunt's. I should like to speak to your uncle straight away, before your party leaves."
Elizabeth and Darcy walked, arm in arm, and once they had reached her Aunt Phillip's house, she was swept inside, and the last she saw of Mr. Darcy, was requesting an audience with both of her uncles.
