His Best Hope

by Charlotte Patterson

  “I shall only say a few words, then you must leave Darcy House. There is no scandal as Lydia Bennet and Mr. Wickham married in Scotland as soon as they arrived. Also, he has a commission in the regulars and is no longer in the militia. As for my marrying my cousin, neither Anne nor I want that. She does not wish to marry and her health would fail her if she were to try and have a child. But that is not the important point. We do not love each other.”

  “You are stubborn man, nephew, but you will not marry a woman such as Miss Elizabeth. If she were not so foolish, she would have accepted Mr. Collins when he offered her. I suppose she felt she could entrap you, instead? Cannot you see that she is not from our sphere. She has relatives in trade. And her sister has married your friend who is in trade, but he at least has money.”

  “I chose my friends without regard for their wealth and title and I shall do the same when I marry. You can see my best friends are presently at this table and you need to apologize and then leave.”

  “No, I want a few minutes alone with Miss Bennet, and then I shall leave.”

  “No, this is my home and...”

  “Mr. Darcy, let your aunt and I go into your study and we can talk without disturbing you.”

  Darcy was at a lost as the woman tapped her cane and motioned for Elizabeth to accompany her into the study. Her carriage remained at the door, and Darcy next saw that her waiting-woman was inside.

  Lady Catherine and Elizabeth thus proceeded in silence toward the study. Elizabeth was determined to make no effort for conversation with a woman who was now more than usually insolent and disagreeable.

  “How could I ever think her like her nephew?” she thought, as she looked in the face of Darcy’s aunt.

  As soon as they entered the study the older woman locked the door and moved away from it to speak with some privacy. “Miss Bennet, you can be at no loss to understand the reason of my journey hither. Your own heart, your own conscience, must tell you why I come.”

  Elizabeth looked on with unaffected astonishment.

  “Indeed, you are mistaken, Madam. I have not been at all able to account for the honour of seeing you here.”

  “Miss Bennet,” replied her ladyship, in an angry tone, “you ought to know, that I am not to be trifled with. But however insincere you may choose to be, you shall not find me so. My character has ever been celebrated for its sincerity and frankness, and in a cause of such moment as this, I shall certainly not depart from it. A report of a most alarming nature reached me two days ago. I was told that not only was your eldest sister most advantageously married, but that you, Miss Elizabeth Bennet, would, in all likelihood, be soon afterwards united to my nephew, Mr. Darcy. Though I know it must be a scandalous falsehood, and I did not believe the truth of it possible, I instantly resolved on setting off for this place, that I might make my sentiments known to you.”

  “If you believed it impossible to be true,” said Elizabeth, coloring with astonishment and disdain, “I wonder why you took the trouble of coming so far. What could your ladyship propose by it?”

  “At once to insist upon having such a report universally contradicted.”

  “Your coming here in front of my sister and her husband and my friends,” said Elizabeth coolly, will be rather a confirmation of it; if, indeed, such a report is in existence.”

  “If! Do you then pretend to be ignorant of it? Has it not been industriously circulated by yourselves? Do you not know that such a report is spread abroad?''

  “I never heard that it was.”

  “And can you likewise declare, that there is no foundation for it?”

  “I do not pretend to possess equal frankness with your ladyship. You may ask questions which I shall not choose to answer.”

  “This is not to be borne. Miss Bennet, I insist on being satisfied. Has he, has my nephew, made you an offer of marriage?”

  “Your ladyship has declared it to be impossible.”

  “It ought to be so; it must be so, while he retains the use of his reason. But your arts and allurements may, in a moment of infatuation, have made him forget what he owes to himself and to all his family. You may have drawn him in.”

  “If I have, I shall be the last person to confess it.”

  “Miss Bennet, do you know who I am? I have not been accustomed to such language as this. I am almost the nearest relation he has in the world, and am entitled to know all his dearest concerns.”

  “But you are not entitled to know mine; nor will such behavior as this, ever induce me to be explicit.”

  “Let me be rightly understood. This match, to which you have the presumption to aspire, can never take place. No, never. Mr. Darcy is engaged to my daughter. Now what have you to say?”

  “Only this; that if he is so, you can have no reason to suppose he will make an offer to me.”

  Lady Catherine hesitated for a moment, and then replied. “The engagement between them is of a peculiar kind. From their infancy, they have been intended for each other. It was the favourite wish of his mother, as well as of her’s. While in their cradles, we planned the union. Now, at the moment when the wishes of both sisters would be accomplished in their marriage, to be prevented by a young woman of inferior birth, of no importance in the world, and wholly unallied to the family! Do you pay no regard to the wishes of his friends? To his tacit engagement with Miss De Bourgh? Are you lost to every feeling of propriety and delicacy? Have you not heard me say that from his earliest hours he was destined for his cousin?”

  “Yes, and I had heard it before. But what is that to me? If there is no other objection to my marrying your nephew, I shall certainly not be kept from it by knowing that his mother and aunt wished him to marry Miss De Bourgh. You both did as much as you could in planning the marriage. Its completion depended on others. If Mr. Darcy is neither by honour nor inclination confined to his cousin, why is not he to make another choice? And if I am that choice, why may not I accept him?”

  “Because honour, decorum, prudence, nay, interest, forbid it. Yes, Miss Bennet, interest; for do not expect to be noticed by his family or friends, if you willfully act against the inclinations of all. You will be censured, slighted, and despised, by every one connected with him. Your alliance will be a disgrace; your name will never even be mentioned by any of us.”

  “These are heavy misfortunes,” replied Elizabeth. “But the wife of Mr. Darcy must have such extraordinary sources of happiness necessarily attached to her situation, that she could, upon the whole, have no cause to repine.”

  “Obstinate, headstrong girl! I am ashamed of you! Is this your gratitude for my attentions to you last spring? Is nothing due to me on that score? Let us sit down. You are to understand, Miss Bennet, that I came here with the determined resolution of carrying my purpose; nor will I be dissuaded from it. I have not been used to submit to any person’s whims. I have not been in the habit of brooking disappointment.”

  “This will make your ladyship’s situation at present more pitiable; but it will have no effect on me.”

  “I will not be interrupted. Hear me in silence. My daughter and my nephew are formed for each other. They are descended, on the maternal side, from the same noble line; and, on the father’s, from respectable, honourable, and ancient -- though untitled -- families. Their fortune on both sides is splendid. They are destined for each other by the voice of every member of their respective houses; and what is to divide them? The upstart pretensions of a young woman without family, connections, or fortune. Is this to be endured! But it must not, shall not be. If you were sensible of your own good, you would not wish to quit the sphere in which you have been brought up.”

  “In marrying your nephew, I should not consider myself as quitting that sphere. He is a gentleman; I am a gentleman’s daughter; so far we are equal.”

  “True. You are a gentleman’s daughter. But who was your mother? Who are your uncles and aunts? Do not imagine me ignorant of their condition.”

  “Whatever my connections may
be,” said Elizabeth, “if your nephew does not object to them, they can be nothing to you.”

  “Tell me once for all, are you engaged to him?”

  Though Elizabeth would not, for the mere purpose of obliging Lady Catherine, have answered this question, she could not but say, after a moment’s deliberation, “I am not.”

  Lady Catherine seemed pleased. “And will you promise me, never to enter into such an engagement?”

  “I will make no promise of the kind.”

  “Miss Bennet, I am shocked and astonished. I expected to find a more reasonable young woman. But do not deceive yourself into a belief that I will ever recede. I shall not go away till you have given me the assurance I require.”

  “And I certainly never shall give it. I am not to be intimidated into anything so wholly unreasonable. Your ladyship wants Mr. Darcy to marry your daughter; but would my giving you the wished-for promise make their marriage at all more probable? Supposing him to be attached to me, would my refusing to accept his hand make him wish to bestow it on his cousin? Allow me to say, Lady Catherine, that the arguments with which you have supported this extraordinary application have been as frivolous as the application was ill-judged. You have widely mistaken my character, if you think I can be worked on by such persuasions as these. How far your nephew might approve of your interference in his affairs, I cannot tell; but you have certainly no right to concern yourself in mine. I must beg, therefore, to be importuned no farther on the subject.”

  “Not so hasty, if you please. I am by no means done. To all the objections I have already urged, I have still another to add. I am no stranger to the particulars of your youngest sister's infamous elopement. I know it all; that the young man’s marrying her was a patched-up business, at the expense of your father and uncles. And is such a girl to be my nephew’s sister? Is her husband, is the son of his late father’s steward, to be his brother? Heaven and earth! -- of what are you thinking? Are the shades of Pemberley to be thus polluted?”

  “You can now have nothing farther to say,” she resentfully answered. “You have insulted me in every possible method. I must beg to return to my friends.”

  And she rose as she spoke. Lady Catherine rose also, and they turned back. Her ladyship was highly incensed.

  “You have no regard, then, for the honour and credit of my nephew! Unfeeling, selfish girl! Do you not consider that a connection with you must disgrace him in the eyes of everybody?”

  “Lady Catherine, I have nothing farther to say. You know my sentiments.”

  “You are then resolved to have him?”

  “I have said no such thing. I am only resolved to act in that manner, which will, in my own opinion, constitute my happiness, without reference to you, or to any person so wholly unconnected with me.”

  “It is well. You refuse, then, to oblige me. You refuse to obey the claims of duty, honour, and gratitude. You are determined to ruin him in the opinion of all his friends, and make him the contempt of the world.”

  “Neither duty, nor honour, nor gratitude,” replied Elizabeth, “have any possible claim on me, in the present instance. No principle of either would be violated by my marriage to Mr. Darcy. And with regard to the resentment of his family, or the indignation of the world, if the former were excited by his marrying me, it would not give me one moment’s concern -- and the world in general would have too much sense to join in the scorn.”

  “And this is your real opinion! This is your final resolve! Very well. I shall now know how to act. Do not imagine, Miss Bennet, that your ambition will ever be gratified. I came to try you. I hoped to find you reasonable; but, depend upon it, I will carry my point.”

  In this manner Lady Catherine talked on, till they were at the door of the carriage, when, turning hastily round, she added, I take no leave of you, Miss Bennet. They both looked on in surprise as now Darcy was at the carriage and was attending to Anne, who had become sick and was very ill. One of his aunt’s footman had alerted those inside that the young woman had taken sick and had messed the grand coach. Darcy had immediately left his guests and gone to his cousin and had asked a servant to summon Miss Bennet to return to the coach right away. He was embarrassed by his aunt’s actions and he privately grieved that Elizabeth would have to stand up against the woman. All he could tell was that his aunt had not won the day for she was even angrier than before and Elizabeth seemed more calm.

  “Miss Bennet, please come to help me with my cousin. She is very ill.”

  Elizabeth soon was at Anne’s side. “Mr. Darcy, she must be brought inside. I believe she has what Jane and Charles had.”

  “No, nephew, she will not stay here. We can ride through the night to Rosings.”

  “Mr. Darcy, she must stay here and be treated. I shall help her. Please bring her inside. Lady Catherine, if she does not receive some treatment soon she will die before you get to Rosings.”

  “And that would please both of you?” said the aunt.

  “You are mistaken Aunt Catherine, Elizabeth just recently nursed her sister and Mr. Bingley who had the influenza. This looks the same and you too might also be affected.”

  “But she is not a doctor.”

  “No, but my doctor is away and Miss Bennet has much experience as she often helped her doctor in cases of influenza.”

  When Lady Catherine saw the mess inside the coach she gagged and nearly fell as she turned away from the coach.

  Before the Bingleys left Darcy House, Jane wrote a missive to the Gardiners telling that Mr. Darcy’s cousin was sick and that Elizabeth would stay with her at Darcy House. Colonel Fitzwilliam and Georgiana were advised to stay clear of Anne to avoid coming down sick but Darcy’s cousin next assisted a footman to carry Anne to a bedroom, and there Elizabeth told the housekeeper what she needed in the way of help to attend to the sick young woman.

  Whether it was the same influenza that Jane and Mr. Bingley had earlier, Lady Catherine soon became sick and collapsed at the door of Darcy House and was taken to the room next to Anne. Elizabeth and Georgiana directed her footman and in her room at Darcy House. another servant to also bring her into the house and they put her in a room near her daughter.

  “Mr. Darcy, this is very bad. I suspect this is the same influenza but we must all be careful. I should like to repeat for your staff and others what I said at Mr. Bingley’s house.”

  “Yes, Miss Bennet, but are you unwell? Lady Catherine looked angrier than ever when she left the study.”

  “That is a talk for some other time, but for now, let us get them both well.”

  “But she insulted you and your family, did she not.”

  Elizabeth looked up with an arched eye. “Sir, I have heard insults before but do not hate those who have said those things. There was much emotion in all your aunt said. I recall we, both you and I, were emotional that night at the parsonage near Hunsford. I was particularly emotional and said terrible things about you that I have regretted every day since I received your letter.”

  “But I brought those words on. You are not an unkind person, but I have been the fool. Miss Bennet, can you ever forgive me?”

  “Sir, I read your letter often and I cannot describe in words how hopeful I was when I saw you again during my visit at Pemberley. And then came the news of Lydia and Mr. Wickham. Mr. Darcy, I have long ago forgiven you because I never gave us a chance. I was foolish to think I was proficient at sketching a person’s character after only a few meetings and I certainly know that my vanity was hurt at the dance, but I wanted to dance with you and could not. It was later that I knew the reason for your cold mood that evening, and that was something you could not get over, the attempted elopement of your own sister and Mr. Wickham.”

  Darcy noticed tears welling up in Elizabeth’s eyes and she saw the same in his.

  “Shall we get your relatives well, Mr. Darcy?”

  After that the housekeeper and others listened as Elizabeth told of the safeguards and other precautions that were necessary t
o keep the influenza from spreading. But the first thing to be done that evening was to wash the two women and stop the nausea. Both women could not hold down any food and this was a problem for two days. Elizabeth had the medicines she needed to treat the patients but both Anne and her mother were far sicker than Jane and Mr. Bingley had been.

  The next day Darcy’s uncle stopped by to check on his sister and his niece.

  “Darcy, Richard told me of the spectacle last evening. Has your aunt apologized yet?”

  “No, but she is very sick and Miss Bennet is treating them both.”