Despite the cheery season, there was a morose aspect to the atmosphere in Longbourn on the day a week before Christmas when Mr. Gardiner and his family arrived at Longbourn to celebrate the holidays.
Only Kitty and Lydia fully escaped the depressed general mood. Their minds were easily filled by light flirtations with heavy officers, and heavy flirtations with light officers. The presence of the regiment was an unalloyed joy to them which must be sucked dry, like youth or a cup of chocolate, lest it end too quick — and end it would before the steaming heat of summer came.
For her part, Elizabeth found the presence of the regiment and its provision of ample partners at balls greatly preferable to its absence, the ability to truthfully tell a man asking for her hand at dance that her card was already full was a paltry recompense for the heartbreak she felt and tried to hide.
Elizabeth had only spoken to Jane about Mr. Darcy's offer of his hand.
And even from her sister she endeavored to conceal her continuing feelings for the man, and her desperate wish that she had been able to say yes… She wished that he had remained and showed a persistence in seeking her hand that proved that his suit was driven by more than a passing passion.
She loved Mr. Darcy.
She had refused the offer of his hand.
These facts were both true, though the combination was ludicrous.
To the public eye, Elizabeth was not one of the two members of the Bennet family who had been deeply hurt and disappointed by the events of early December. Jane had been tragically jilted, when Mr. Bingley and his family left suddenly, and Mrs. Bennet had suffered a yet worse blow to her nerves when her most ungrateful and undutiful daughter refused Mr. Collins. A situation made wholly unrecoverable by Mr. Bennet's unwavering support of his daughter, and the clergyman's spiteful choice to engage himself to Miss Charlotte Lucas the following day.
Over the course of a few days, Fortuna had hurled Mrs. Bennet down from a pinnacle of delight at the enviable prospect of two daughters well married, and thrown into an overflowing cesspit of despair by the wholly unenviable prospect of five daughters all unmarried. One of whom would die of a broken heart, and another who was determined to die a spinster simply to spite her mother.
A stronger woman than her might have borne these weights in dignified silence. Mrs. Bennet did not even try.
Jane's manner after Bingley left was filled with a quiet, wistful sadness. She never complained, and she made every effort to not speak of her unhappiness. That sadness still colored her behavior in a manner that Elizabeth found both touching, and a touch frustrating.
Elizabeth was unhappy that her passing infatuation with Darcy had not led to any durable connection, but she refused to mope.
Perhaps her emotions were not so deeply rooted as Jane's. Or maybe it simply showed how greatly different their characters were. Perhaps it was simply that the way Mr. Darcy had so strongly preferred Elizabeth to her sister gave Elizabeth ability for the first time in her life to admire herself more than her prettier, kinder, and more generally perfect sister.
It was deeply unsettling to permit herself to think that Jane's approach to anything was greatly inferior to her own.
The eagerly awaited arrival of the carriage came on a windy and drizzly day. As soon as the carriage stopped the Gardiners' older three children hurled themselves out of their conveyance and immediately ran around in wide circles.
Beth, the oldest girl who had selected Elizabeth as her favorite aunt, hurled herself into Elizabeth's arms, "Aunt Lizzy! Aunt Lizzy! Can you still pick me up?!"
Elizabeth laughed and pulled the girl into the air, grunting with effort. "You are getting much too big for this."
"I know!" She laughed as she was set down, and then ran around Elizabeth three times, while her parents sedately exited the carriage, with Mr. Gardiner holding their fussing toddler in his arms. Mrs. Gardiner let down a white poodle who was still almost a puppy. The dog also barked twice to see so many strangers, ran up to lick Beth's face, and then peed against a tree.
Beth looked decidedly like a tiny Jane, with the same blond hair and angelic looks — but when she smiled there was a sort of clever mischievousness that Jane never showed. With her own grunt Beth picked up the dog who looked rather unsure if he liked being in the air, and she exclaimed, "He's Hector! I named him that because he'll be a great warrior, even though he's a poodle!"
The presence of children and her favorite aunt and uncle made it impossible for Elizabeth's melancholy mood to remain, and even Jane lit up with smiles as she was surrounded by the children and immediately involved in games of ribbons and marbles.
Mr. Bennet cheerfully greeted his brother-in-law, who had always been a favorite of his, though Mr. Gardiner was ten years younger than Mr. Bennet. "Well, good day! Good day! How is your London business?"
"Tolerable! Better than tolerable. We've got a contract to sell out for the excise men the cache of a smuggler by the name of Younge that was recently found — some excellent pieces in there. Mostly real French wines that haven't been easy to find since the war, I brought a case as a gift."
"Oh, very good." Papa turned to Mrs. Gardiner, and cheerfully complimented her upon her appearance before promising everyone that the parlor was warm and drinks were already prepared.
The children were not particularly interested in sitting after the four-hour trip from London that had been taken slow due to the potential ice after the showers and frosts of the past week. They ran circles around the wilderness and little shrubberies that surrounded Longbourn.
Because the space around Longbourn was huge compared to the cramped inner courtyard garden of the Gardiners' house, or the nearby church gardens that they would get opportunity to play in, the two boys always ran wild when they visited the house.
Here in the country, there was a full supply of trees, bushes, dirt, sticks to play at swordsmen with, an ample supply of lizards and bugs, the occasional snake, and a creek (that unfortunately barely dribbled in the winter).
What were the joys of warmth and clean clothes compared to that!
Elizabeth rather shared their enthusiasm for Longbourn's rural yard — not large enough to properly be denominated a park but by no means insignificant — she could not imagine spending more than a few months at a time in London without coming to hate the pavement beneath her feet, the smell of sewage, and the endless rows of buildings shading her instead of leafy greens.
Elizabeth stayed out minding the children for a while, mostly being happily pestered by Beth Gardiner for an account of everything. Her niece also demanded praise to be heaped upon her ribbons, clothes, and doll. Then the discussion of her letters, figures and sums, and how Mama wanted her to either be sent off to a school for young girls, or to have a governess during the next year, as she was now almost eight.
"Mama says the governess would not be so expensive, as she could help to look after the younger children, and perhaps Molly would not need to be replaced — she is to be married you know this spring, she gave notice last month."
"You will love to learn, I hope. And be nice to your poor governess or school mistress?"
"Oh yes!" Beth grinned toothily, but with a mischievous expression that would not have been fully reassuring to Elizabeth had she been the future governess or school mistress who would have management of the sweetling.
Elizabeth laughed, and soon the children, having burned off their first excess of spiritedness, were herded into the house to wash their hands and be stuffed with cookies and tea — preparation for future excesses of activity.
The way that Darcy had judged her father, and her, for a lack of discipline in their education still stung.
She had loved her childhood, but likely her uncle's effort to have his daughter be raised in a more systematic way was superior. A governess to guide them.
When Elizabeth found herself back in the drawing room, Mrs. Bennet had fully settled into her favorite subject of conversation for the past three weeks: The recent disappointments she had suffered under.
"I do not blame Jane, for Jane would have got Mr. Bingley if she could. But, Lizzy! Oh, sister! It is very hard to think that she might have been Mr. Collins's wife by this time, had not it been for her own perverseness. He made her an offer in this very room, and she refused him. It makes me very nervous and poorly, to be thwarted so in my own family. However, your coming just at this time is the greatest of comforts, and I am very glad to hear what you tell us of long sleeves."
Noting that her nieces had reentered the room, Mrs. Gardiner diverted the conversation to the ever-fascinating subject of what sort of sleeves were most popular in town at present.
At dinner Mrs. Bennet returned to her complaints about how Jane was likely to die a heartbroken old maid, and that Elizabeth would die a spiteful spinster.
"Mama, I do not even know how to spin, and given the progress of our industrial arts in Britain," Elizabeth replied sharply annoyed after her mother applied that monicker to her a third time in the course of one course, "it seems unlikely to be a profitable occupation to take up."
"Lord! Lizzy, so sharp and impertinent still! You have disappointed me forever. And now you seek to vex me with your pointed jabs? Like your father! The precise same as your father. And he will not allow us to replace Johnson, who is leaving at the start of the year, and we'll only have one footman, and what will become of our consequence? — this is all Lizzy's fault, she put into his head this notion of 'economizing'."
"Quite right," Mr. Bennet said cheerfully. "I've set aside fifty pounds simply from that expedient and by ending my subscription to a few journals that I scarcely ever make the time to read — we have no need for so many manservants. Two is more than enough for a fine establishment."
"You see, Edward, you see what I suffer?"
"Yes, very awful, Fanny," Mr. Gardiner said in a comforting tone. "But one must bear up under life's little vexations."
"And Mr. Bennet will die, and Mr. Collins and that scheming Charlotte Lucas will inherit — I imagine they speak of nothing else at Lucas Lodge — and we will be forced to depend upon you and your kindness for everything. Lord, Lizzy, this is what you have done to us!"
Elizabeth bit back her bitter retort that she rather would have preferred it if her mother had kept to her resolution to never speak to her again.
"I read in the letters from you all," Mrs. Gardiner said, by way of introducing another topic, "that you had resident in the neighborhood for some time a prominent citizen of Derbyshire."
"Oh, Lord! Mr. Darcy, an odd quiet fellow—" Mrs. Bennet's tone of voice made it clear that she held this rather against him. Another great gentleman who'd shown no interest in her daughters. "Nothing like Mr. Bingley, his friend was wholly superior to him. And his sister had married a fortune hunter — I never liked him. But then Bingley in the end did not come up to snuff and disappointed us all."
Elizabeth stared into her soup. She stirred it three times clockwise, and once counterclockwise. The green peas swirled around while the reddish ham floated to the top.
"I recall seeing Mr. Darcy as a child," Mrs. Gardiner said, "when he rode a few times with his father through Lambton. The family was the most important in the area, and everyone spoke well of him, though his family did not frequent Lambton, as it was much further from Pemberley than the market town on the other side of the estate."
Elizabeth raised her head. "What did he look like then?"
"Oh, I can hardly recall, but he was a fine horseman. A handsome tall boy. I'd married Mr. Gardiner by the time his mother, Lady Anne, died."
"And what was his father like? — what did they say about him in Lambton?"
Mrs. Gardiner smiled at Elizabeth with a look that suggested that she perhaps read through her niece's questions, even if it was clear that Mrs. Bennet did not. "A fine master of an estate, generous, proud, he always kept a full establishment and maintained his consequence, but he never spent to excess, and he was not known to have any serious vices."
"And trivial vices?" Mr. Bennet said laughing. "I hardly can imagine what I'd think of a man who had no vices."
"I do not know. I merely speak to his reputation. He certainly did not gamble away the estate — he was a very handsome man, tall, striking, with glowering brows. But he had very stiff and icy manners. Always formally polite, but in a way that never allowed a person to forget his superior station. He dictated the education of his children very closely. Too closely for my taste — when I heard from my friends that the talk of everyone for ten miles about was that Miss Darcy had eloped with old Mr. Darcy's charming godson, I wondered if it might in part have been an escape from the strictures that she had always lived under. I do hope they are happy."
"I doubt they are," Elizabeth said quietly. "From what Mr. Darcy told me, I very much doubt it."
"Ah, that is a pity," Mrs. Gardiner replied, "But he hardly is a neutral judge in the matter, so one might still hope despite that information."
The following day, after a breakfast filled with the loud calls of children, a great many shouts, laughs, and some food tossed about by the youngest child, Mrs. Gardiner pointedly asked Elizabeth to join her for a ramble in the little wilderness outside of the house. This rather surprised Elizabeth, as Mrs. Gardiner did not include being a great walker amongst her many virtues.
When they set out Beth followed them into the cold, her yellow hair floating around her in ringlets, but her mother smilingly ordered her to go bother her brothers, since she wished to talk to Aunt Lizzy about full grown matters.
"But Mama, I'm nearly full grown. I'm almost eight."
Mrs. Gardiner laughed, mussed her daughter's hair, and repeated the instruction to go off.
Elizabeth added to this a suggestion to go to the barn and ask the groom to let her feed an apple to the horses. This was enough to send the girl off skipping merrily.
"Well, Lizzy, a great discussion has been made upon Jane's disappointments, and unhappiness, but nothing about you."
"What about me?" Elizabeth replied, unconsciously imitating Darcy's habit of pressing his hand against his mouth. "Jane is the one who was left without warning by a suitor. I have not suffered in that manner."
The thought again came to Elizabeth that perhaps her refusal of Mr. Darcy had perhaps brought about the defeat of Jane's hopes. But she refused to believe that Darcy would have sought to convince his friend to not marry her sister out of spite. If Bingley's inclination had been so slight that his friend's decision to leave Netherfield suddenly was enough to prompt him to abandon both Jane and the estate which he'd rented, then it would have come to nothing no matter what.
Elizabeth was willing to attribute to herself Darcy's choice to leave Netherfield following the night of the ball. Only someone with a perverse insistence in never holding a possibly egotistical belief would assume that there was no connection between a man's offer of being marriage refused and his decision to leave the neighborhood in short order.
Jane could have managed such a belief, not Elizabeth.
"Have you not? Yet you appear quite out of spirits. The whole night you were quiet, except—"
"As you likely perceived, Mama would prefer for me to speak less."
"And yet somehow for you to refuse less."
Both ladies laughed together at Mrs. Gardiner's witticism.
"It is not your mother's unhappiness which makes you unhappy. That is not the character of my Lizzy. No, the only time you were animated was when the discussion turned to a particular gentleman who also left suddenly."
Elizabeth flushed. "I perhaps have — oh, I do not want to hide anything from you. I do not. I did love him, I think I did, and — oh, but I cannot complain about anything."
"You certainly can." Mrs. Gardiner placed her arm around Elizabeth. "You do not need to maintain a mask of happiness. When you are sad, you have the right to be sad. You need not always hide."
"I'm not so — oh, I do hate this! I can't even tell Jane how I am unhappy, because she is miserable, and I am not. I do not wish to place a burden on her. You see how Jane is unhappy. She tries to hide it, but she cannot. I have mostly laughed myself out of any misery, and I refuse…" Elizabeth hiccupped, and suddenly she found tears filling up her eyes. "I refuse to…"
"There, there."
Mrs. Gardiner was a little taller than Elizabeth, and her arms enveloped her niece. "There, there. Heartbreak is no easy thing."
"I keep wondering. Keep wondering if I should have done differently," Elizabeth choked out. "And, oh, it is so stupid. And he had so many… harsh edges and sharp corners, but I can't stop — I can't stop it. I dream about him still. And I keep wishing that I could have…"
They sat on a green bench with water worn wood, which Mr. Bennet's father had put in many years ago when he first inherited the estate.
For the first time Elizabeth had been able to cry with someone else to comfort her. Jane knew that she'd refused him, and Papa had guessed that she loved him, but she hadn't been able to tell Papa about what happened, because he might make a joke of it, or worse become offended on her behalf again by her tale of Mr. Darcy's words, and that would expose how much she hurt.
After a while Mrs. Gardiner said, "It is an easy thing to fall in love with a great gentleman, and even though you know he is destined to marry someone of higher standing, to forget for a time that—"
"No, no, no. You misunderstand what happened." Elizabeth began crying again. "He made me an offer, but I had to refuse him."
"Mr. Darcy made you an offer!"
"Not so loud," Elizabeth hissed. "Can you imagine what my mother would say if she knew I'd refused two eligible gentlemen in the course of twelve hours, rather than just one?"
The two looked at each other again.
Mrs. Gardiner started laughing, and then Elizabeth began laughing through her tears, though she then cried again.
Afterwards the two of them stood up, and despite how well bundled they were, Elizabeth's hands felt rather numb from the cold that seeped through the wool of her coat. She was not used to sitting still outside in this sort of weather, and it appeared that Mrs. Gardiner likewise was cold.
After they'd strolled in a circle twice more, going around the whole of the little copse, Mrs. Gardiner said with another laugh, "So you refused him. That does put a far more serious tone to the matter."
Elizabeth giggled. "Two eligible gentlemen: One in the evening, and one the morning. But only one who I wish I could have accepted."
"Why couldn't you?"
"Oh! I wonder if it was a mistake to not accept his offer, but… you ought to have heard him — he spoke so passionately about how he disliked my connections, my lack of fortune, and how great a sacrifice it was for him to marry me. At that time, you see, he thought I would accept Mr. Collins. His… jealousy would not allow him to see me marry another man."
"It would have been a sacrifice for him."
"I know! I know! But he ought not have spoken so insultingly of us all."
"Is that the reason you refused him?"
"No, not precisely, but… you see I asked him. I asked him if he thought he would regret marrying me, if in the end he would regret it. He couldn't say anything in reply."
"I see." Mrs. Gardiner rubbed her chin thoughtfully. "I understand why you made the choice that you did—"
"You think I made a mistake, to refuse such a man."
"No. No. I do not know what I would recommend." She frowned, and they walked over the cold crunching ground. "You two ought to have spoken at greater length, and over a period of days, so that emotions would have had time to cool." Then Mrs. Gardiner shrugged. "It is unfortunate, but not surprising that events made such impossible."
"I'd hoped that he would realize. That…" Elizabeth pressed her hand against her mouth again. "That…That he wouldn't regret marrying me, not ever." The tears started coming again. "I'm not… I am not adequate. He does not care for me enough."
"Oh, my dear Lizzy. You know better than to take this to the heart."
"I do. I do." Elizabeth tearily nodded. "But I cannot prevent myself. No matter what speeches I make to myself. But do not worry. I will be well. I am well. Usually. And I do not think the wound is of a permanent nature."
"No." Mrs. Gardiner embraced her again. "My poor niece."
"They just left. Two days later we got the note from Miss Bingley, saying they had all left for London."
"I hesitate to suggest this, but do you think it is possible that Mr. Darcy discouraged his friend from your sister out of spite after you refused him?"
"I have considered the possibility, but—" Elizabeth shrugged and turned her palms upwards. "I cannot believe that of Mr. Darcy."
Several more circles of the yard, and Elizabeth began to feel her hands and feet warm up again. The afternoon was progressing and despite the season it was a sunny day. A tabby cat who had climbed up into a tree sat and stared at them as it preened itself.
"Nothing for it." Mrs. Gardiner smiled. "We planned to invite Jane to come to London with us, in hopes of allowing her to escape what must be a difficult situation due to your mother's constant references to her disappointment. I must extend the offer to you as well — six weeks, or perhaps two months. Your mother will have calmed somewhat by then."
Elizabeth laughed. "She has sworn eternal vengeance."
"You misjudge her, at least a little." Mrs. Gardiner laughed. "But that is easy at your age."
"Papa shall be unhappy if I stay in London, as I have promised Charlotte Lucas that I should visit her at Hunsford Parsonage around Easter once she has settled into her new situation."
"Your poor father." Mrs. Gardiner rolled her eyes. "He can spare you for four months out of twelve this year. He ought to console himself with the thought that he shall not be required to spare you permanently due to a marriage."
Elizabeth grinned, feeling more positive about her plans than she had for months.
"And Beth shall be delighted to have easy access to her favorite aunt — do not let her pester you more than you like."
"I like it when she pesters me," Elizabeth replied laughing.
They now walked back in, with Mrs. Gardiner chuckling as they went. "One in the evening; one the following morning. One in the evening and one in the morning."
Mr. Bennet did in fact complain to Elizabeth about the loss of all sense at the dinner table which would result from the absence of both Jane and Elizabeth at once. "You'll be missed. Very missed, Lizzy."
"I know." She smiled at him. "I will miss you."
"But it will do you good, you and Jane both, to be away for a while. Your mother can be tiresome — she associates my recent efforts to economize a little with your refusal of Mr. Collins, and that has kept the whole matter in mind longer than I expected — and you abandoning me."
Elizabeth raised her eyebrows and suppressed a grin.
"Usually when she is properly angry, by the point a month has passed she is well along the road to calmness — the loss of Johnson pricks her."
"But there is a connection."
Mr. Bennet laughed. "There is, but not in the way she thinks — it is annoying to manage cash matters. But oh well — oh well. One must occasionally act in a responsible manner, if merely for the novelty."
"Papa!" Elizabeth adopted an expression of faux judgement that made her father laugh.
"But I am glad for you. You have been rather low, compared to your usual. I think it was that other gentleman who left. Not Mr. Collins. The proud silent one. He obviously is not worthy of you, as proven by the case. But I rather think that whenever you do find a husband for yourself, no matter how worthy he is, I'll consider him unworthy of you."
"I'll depend on you to think my worth greater than it is." Elizabeth smiled, the words were a common place, but she was still pinked and touched by her father's approbation.
"Only true, only true. I see you the way you are, though I am biased. You are an extraordinary girl, and I never could have been more fortunate in a child. I love you all, but you have always been my favorite — there was a way about you as an infant which already reminded me of myself. It shall be good for you to be exposed to new people, London sights, sounds… smells."
"That is why we go in the depths of winter, to minimize the smells."
Mr. Bennet stood to shuffle Elizabeth out of the library. "I once spent three weeks in August in the capital on a matter of business. I bought a great many excellent books, but I have never been in so unpleasant an environment for so long —mainly the people. A new circle of society will be good for you."
"Surely you are not hoping that I'll find a husband."
"You might."
Elizabeth shook her head firmly. "It will be impossible for me to marry for some time."
"Ah." Papa pushed his spectacles up to his forehead and peered at her. "Ah." He gripped her elbow. "I see."
Elizabeth smiled and winsomely shrugged.
Papa studied her face, then he nodded. "Still in love with Mr. Collins, eh?"
Somehow that seemed to her like the funniest thing Elizabeth had heard for months, and she dissolved into laughter before she impulsively embraced her father tightly. "I always know that you love me and want me to be happy. Thank you, Papa, thank you."
Mr. Bennet flushed with embarrassment, sputtered a little, and then smiled at her.