Author's Note: Wow! People really don't like this version of Mr Bennet. For the record, Jane Austen's Mr Bennet is one of my favourite characters in P&P. I know I have strayed far from canon in this portrayal, but that is the enjoyable thing about fan fiction - it is a realm in which we can experiment with all those what-ifs, and in this case, what if Mr Bennet was supremely selfish, as well as indolent? So here we go! Elizabeth finally gets to talk to her father.
Chapter 13
After what felt like an age of social niceties, when all she wanted to do was to talk to her father and find out what the problem was, Elizabeth was out of patience. She did not wait for her father to speak. She did not take a seat. She stood before her uncle's desk with her hands on her hips and demanded, "Papa, why have you not given Mr Darcy an answer?"
Although provoked by his daughter's obvious ire, Mr Bennet replied with every appearance of calm, "Because I did not wish to refuse him without hearing you first, my dear."
That was enough to take the wind out of Elizabeth's sails. She sank into the waiting chair, eyes fixed on her father's face. "Refuse him? Why ever would you refuse him?"
"Because we all know him to be a proud, unpleasant sort of man. He claims that you have consented to a courtship, Lizzy, but I know it must be a falsehood. I could not have pitched on any man within the circle of our acquaintance whose name would have given the lie more effectively to such a proposition! Mr Darcy, who never looks at any woman but to see a blemish, and who probably never looked at you in his life, until he was forced into a carriage with you for days on end, I suppose! Have you so quickly forgotten his opinion of your appearance at the assembly? He finds you barely tolerable, which just goes to show what a fool he is. And I well know your pointed dislike of the man: how you have sharpened your wit at his expense! And he told me how vehemently you rejected him at first. Of all people to come seeking my consent for a courtship, Mr Darcy! I am sure he has requested it for some mischievous purpose of his own, but he will not find me easily gulled. The whole thing is wonderfully absurd. But Lizzy, you look as if you do not enjoy the joke. You are not going to be missish, I hope, and pretend to be affronted by such a comedy? For what do we live, but to make sport for our neighbours, and to laugh at them in turn?"
"Papa, this is not a fit matter for sport. I have long repented my early dislike of Mr Darcy. I am surprised he told you of his earlier proposal, and while I rejected him at the time, I now deeply regret my harsh words, for he had not merited my disdain. I have since come to know him better, and find him to be an excellent gentleman. Indeed, I admire him greatly. I did consent to a courtship, Papa, and the request was made before any thought of us returning to London together. It certainly does not proceed from us travelling south together. I like him very much indeed. I welcome his suit, and beg you to grant your consent." Elizabeth looked most earnestly at the father she had loved and admired her whole life, and was dismayed to see a grimace of distaste cross his face before he resumed his more usual visage - that of the genial country squire.
Mr Bennet was disappointed at the turn the conversation had taken. He had hoped Elizabeth would be ready to join in his joking dismissal of Darcy's proposal. Instead, it seemed his daughter's sentiments were firmly engaged, but he was far from dissuaded from his path. He knew his Elizabeth better than any person on Earth, and was confident he could bring her to his way of thinking. The child was smart enough to understand the disadvantages of being tied to Darcy for the rest of her life!
"Let me advise you to think better of it." He spoke gently, bringing to bear all his powers of persuasion. "I know your disposition, Lizzy. I know that you could be neither happy nor respectable, unless you truly esteemed your husband; unless you looked up to him as a superior. Your lively talents would place you in the greatest danger in an unequal marriage. You could scarcely escape discredit and misery. My child," and this was said with a most affectionate look, "let me not have the grief of seeing you unable to respect your partner in life. You know not what you are about."
Elizabeth could not help but be affected by her father's words. She had lived her entire childhood and youth with the ever-present lesson of her parents' marriage. She knew her mother to be a silly, flighty sort of woman, with more ambition than sense, and had often been embarrassed by her in public. The lack of affection between Mrs Bennet and her husband was an open secret. All their children had watched their father regularly make fun of their mother, and not only in the privacy of their own home. Elizabeth knew very well the sort of marriage she did not want.
But the Bennet household was not her only example of marriage: she had been in and out of Lucas Lodge since she was old enough to visit, and knew that one did not need to be witty or wise to be genuinely affectionate. Sir William and Lady Lucas were kind to each other and were often found remarking with fondness on something the other had done or said. And then there was the example of Mr and Mrs Gardiner, who clearly loved and respected each other in a manner Elizabeth would be proud to emulate. She understood her father's regrets (although, he would be disappointed to know, she did not hold him to be the only injured party), but she saw no parallel between his circumstance and her own. Fitzwilliam Darcy was a man she could both love and respect, and she was confident that he both loved and respected her in turn. Marriage to Mr Darcy promised a level of felicity she knew her father could only imagine.
Earnestly and solemnly, she explained at length the gradual change which her estimation of Mr Darcy had undergone, relating her absolute certainty that his affection was not the work of a day, but had stood the test of many months' suspense, and enumerating with energy all his good qualities. He really was, she explained, the object of her rational, considered choice. She methodically refuted her father's arguments: that Darcy was a domineering man who would want to control every aspect of her life; that on entering the first circles, she would no longer have the freedom she currently enjoyed to ramble through the countryside or to speak impertinently; that Darcy was humourless and dry, and would suck the cheer out of her life; even that Derbyshire was too far from Longbourn and she would be estranged from her family and friends. "Oh, Papa," she laughed, attempting to lighten the mood, "what is fifty miles of good road where there is sufficient fortune to make the expenses of travelling unimportant?"
"In other words, you are determined to have him. He is rich, to be sure, and you may have more fine clothes and fine carriages than your sisters, but will they make you happy? You may have felt inclined to accept his hand after seeing his fine house and all the liveried servants who no doubt people his properties, but l know you, Lizzy. A few luxuries will not be enough to ease the pain of being tied to such a man. He will think to own you: you will be just another bauble he has purchased for his own convenience, and when the first flush of infatuation is past, he will set you aside and look for something - or someone - else to amuse himself with. What comfort will your pin money be then?"
Despite his insulting her honour, suggesting she was swayed by Mr Darcy's wealth, Elizabeth gave her father's concerns due consideration. "You know I care nothing for wealth and station, Papa. Let him only be rich enough to provide me with a comfortable situation and I ask for nothing more. It is not for his money or his fine carriages that I admire Mr Darcy. It is for the man himself, who I know to be too honourable a gentleman to behave in the way you have described. But he is not rushing into anything on the basis of infatuation: he has admired me for many months, in the face of long separations and my own intemperate rejection of his first proposal. If he were going to tire of me, he might well have done so already, but he has not. Nor is he seeking a hurried engagement, though he has waited so long. He has respected my suggestion that a courtship would be preferable, to provide us both with an opportunity to know each other better. But I can tell you now, Papa, that if he were to press his suit immediately, I am more than ready to accept him."
Mr Bennet grew increasingly more sullen as he saw his persuasion was not going to work. The child was both too clever and too stupid: too clever to be easily defeated by debating points, and too stupid to see past her own infatuation! Well, there was no point in discussing the matter further tonight. "Enough, Lizzy. You are too young and inexperienced to know what is best. It is my place as your father to look out for your interests, and in time you will see that I am right. Mr Darcy is not for you. You would do better to die an old maid than to tie yourself to such a man."
Elizabeth looked at her father in shock. For all his shortcomings as a husband and father, she had believed him to respect her intelligence and understanding. After all, had he not said she had something more of quickness than her sisters? Had he not distinguished her from his general disdain for the silliness of his wife and daughters? Yet now he was dismissing her reasoning as though she was a foolish child asking for a treat that would only serve to make her ill. Why would he not credit that she knew Mr Darcy better than he did, and that her opinions of the gentleman were founded in a dispassionate estimation of this worth? She loved Darcy, it was true. But she was not so foolish as to be swept up in her emotions without consideration of the practicalities of marriage. With her parents' example daily before her, how could she do otherwise than to think the matter through most carefully? She had taken all her father's arguments into consideration, but it seemed he was not willing to return the favour.
"Would you really rather have me die an old maid, Papa?" she asked, a touch of wonderment in her voice. She had often joked about the matter herself - had assured Jane that she would happily live as the maiden aunt who spoiled Jane's children - but in truth it was not a future she relished, and not one she was happy to hear her father propose.
Mr Bennet wisely chose not to answer directly. He did not think this a propitious moment to explain his own hopes for Elizabeth's future. Instead, he settled on prevarication: "Come, come, my dear. Mr Darcy is hardly the only young man you are likely to meet. There are plenty more fish in the sea. You need not rush into matrimony for fear of being left on the shelf. Besides, a girl likes to be crossed in love now and again."
Elizabeth rolled her eyes. It was not her ambition to marry simply for the sake of being married. She had always hoped to marry for love, to a man she esteemed and respected, even though she was aware the chances of such a match were small. Against all expectations, that opportunity was now before her, and yet her father treated it as nothing. "I do not want another fish, Papa," she replied. "I prefer the one I have already caught. In any case, I hardly think I am ever likely to receive a better offer! You should be happy to have one of your daughters so well settled, and at so little inconvenience to yourself."
"Little inconvenience, do you call it?" her father cried, incredulously, his careful strategy forgotten in his outrage. "Do you not see how inconvenient it would be for you to leave while I am left behind in a house full of silly women? Who is to keep me company, if you go off with Mr Darcy? Who will there be to discuss books with, or to play chess, or share a joke with? Who will help me with the accounts and the tenants? Who will be my helpmeet then?"
Elizabeth drew a deep breath in dismay. Did all her father's professed affection, all his arguments about her future happiness, all his concern about her respecting her partner in life, come down to this, then? Was he so selfish that he would sacrifice the happiness of his favourite child in order to secure his own comfort and enable him to continue in his indolent ways? Her heart cracked at the thought. Her beloved father had always been her ally in the family. But not, it seemed, for her own sake. The thought of spending the rest of her life sharing his study, growing - like him - ever more misanthropic, catering to her father's whims while her friends and sisters all married and moved out into the world, chilled her to the bone.
Without answering her father's outburst, Elizabeth simply stood and left the room. Mt Bennet watched her go with a sense of satisfaction: clearly, he thought, she saw the sense of his position and accepted his decision.
But as soon as the door was closed between Elizabeth and her father, she leaned back against it and said, "Well, then, I shall know how to act." She went in search of her one sure ally in this household.
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