The Forgotten Sister: Mary Bennet's Pride and Prejudice

by Jennifer Paynter

  Because I fancied she was a little flustered by what had occurred, I described my visit to Peter’s mother and the sketch of the Jolly Poacher. Cassandra laughed at this and soon afterwards repeated her praise of Peter: “I must say I liked him from the first—ever since I heard how he stood up to your father at the Netherfield ball.”

  She then went on in rather too casual a manner: “By the bye, have you heard that the tenant of Netherfield may be returning soon?”

  “Mr. Bingley is coming back?”

  “For the shooting. Aunt heard it from the butcher-boy this morning—the housekeeper Mrs. Nicholls had placed a great order for meat. But I daresay it is all a hum.”

  It was not a hum, however, and within a week of the Wickhams’ departure the servants brought my mother intelligence of Mr. Bingley’s arrival. She was of course beside herself, and at the same time furious with my father for refusing to call. But my father was adamant. “No, no. You forced me into visiting him last year, and promised if I went to see him, he should marry one of my daughters. But it all ended in nothing, and I will not be sent on a fool’s errand again.”

  When Mr. Bingley called at Longbourn a couple of days after his arrival, I was not at home—I was at the Longs—but Kitty later interrupted my music practice to tell me about it.

  “You will never guess who came with him.”

  I knew I must observe the childish ritual. “Very well. I will never guess.”

  “That tall, proud man who never talks—Mr. Darcy.”

  “But did he not talk to Elizabeth?”

  Kitty shook her head, giggling. “He just sat there and looked at his boots—beautiful black ones they were, exactly like the ones Wickham had made for himself in London. But Mr. Bingley had on the same blue coat he was used to wear before—the one with the gilt buttons. Mama has invited them both to dinner on Tuesday.”

  “Has she indeed?”

  “Yes, and she means to ask Mrs. Long and her nieces too—and Mr. and Mrs. Goulding. And Jane is to have a new gown made up specially.”

  16.

  Fourteen of us sat down for dinner on Tuesday—George having been invited by my mother after he had called at Longbourn the previous morning. I half expected Helen to keep away on that account (she had of course refused all my mother’s invitations while Wickham was with us) but both she and Cassandra came with Mrs. Long, arriving a little after Mr. Bingley and Mr. Darcy.

  George was the last of the guests to arrive, and I saw him eagerly looking around for Helen even as he was being introduced to Mr. Darcy. But I had forgotten that George had never before met Mr. Darcy, and on being presented, he was unable to repress a start, exclaiming: “Good God! For a moment I mistook you for someone else, sir.” He then asked if Mr. Darcy was acquainted with a family by the name of Coates.

  “Coates?” Darcy smiled, on his best behavior, perhaps believing Elizabeth to be within earshot. “I have heard of Romeo Coates the actor, certainly. I saw him play Lothario at the Haymarket—”

  “No, no.” George with his usual impatience cut him off. “I was alluding to a Mr. Jasper Coates. You are not by any chance related to anyone of that family?”

  Darcy was no longer smiling. “No sir, I am not.”

  George said hastily: “I beg pardon—it was an impertinent question—but the resemblance is so very marked.”

  Darcy merely acknowledged this with a bow before moving off, and poor George then turned to me. “He must have thought I was questioning the legitimacy of his connections.”

  Helen came up then. “What did you say to him, for heaven’s sake? It must have been something quite shocking.”

  George grinned and took her hand, and this seemed to me such a promising beginning that I at once moved away. But just as we were about to go into the dining room, I heard them arguing. George had written a new song that he wanted Helen to sing before the company and Helen was now refusing to oblige him.

  “I’ve not sung for months,” said she in what I now thought of as her “hard” voice. “I’ve been far too busy. You had better ask Elizabeth or Mary.”

  “Too busy to sing! Just what have you been doing, may I ask?”

  “Oh, Cass and I have been out raking every night—haven’t we, Cass?”

  So saying, she moved off to join the others around the table, taking her place on one side of my father. George was then summoned by my mother to sit next to me.

  I now observed that the course of true love was not running smooth for Elizabeth and Mr. Darcy either. They were seated at opposite ends of the table and Elizabeth seemed particularly ill at ease. Darcy’s feelings were harder to determine. It may have been that the earlier exchange with George had put him out of humor; he certainly looked not to be enjoying himself—but that may have been because he was seated on one side of my mother.

  Of all the lovers or would-be lovers, only Jane and Bingley appeared to be happy. They were sitting next to each other (my mother’s contrivance matching Bingley’s inclination) and amazingly Bingley seemed not to mind my mother’s obtrusive attentions: “Pray take a little more of the venison, Mr. Bingley, and there is frumenty too—our cook makes an excellent frumenty.” And a little later: “Can I not tempt you to another piece of pie, Mr. Bingley? Or what say you to a ratafia cake? Or some trifle now?”

  In contrast, her exchanges with Darcy were cold and formal, and I realize now that it must have given Elizabeth considerable pain, for nobody except herself and the Gardiners then knew of Mr. Darcy’s part in bringing about Lydia’s marriage.

  After dinner, while we were waiting in the drawing room for the gentlemen to join us, both Helen and Elizabeth seemed especially out of humor. When Mrs. Long tried to persuade Helen to sing, saying that it would make Mr. Rovere very happy, Helen retorted: “I have no wish to make Mr. Rovere very happy.” Likewise Elizabeth, happening to spill a drop of coffee on Kitty’s gown, was impatient with the latter’s lamentations: “What a piece of work over nothing, my dear Kitty—’tis barely visible.”

  And when the gentlemen at last walked into the room, and George and Mr. Darcy approached the table where Jane was making tea and Elizabeth pouring coffee, Helen immediately moved close to Elizabeth, whispering: “The men shan’t come and part us, I am determined. We want none of them, do we?”

  I thought though that Elizabeth wanted very much to talk to Mr. Darcy, and upon his walking away holding his coffee cup, she looked after him with such longing that I felt for her most sincerely. And when soon afterwards George also walked away—to sit at the pianoforte—Helen seemed equally unhappy at the success of her maneuver.

  My mother had earlier given orders for the whist tables to be set up, but George was permitted to remain at the pianoforte, and Kitty having retired earlier with her coffee-stained gown, the twelve of us remaining took our places at the three card-tables.

  Beyond ensuring that Bingley and Jane played together and that she secured Mrs. Long for a partner, my mother cared not how we disposed ourselves, and when Mrs. Goulding claimed my father for herself and Mr. Darcy for her husband, Elizabeth was obliged to partner Helen. Cassandra and I then sat down opposite Mr. Goulding and Mr. Darcy.

  Ours was the dullest of tables. Mr. Darcy and Mr. Goulding had by far the best cards and as Cassandra soon stopped concentrating on anything other than Mr. Bingley—whose table was next to ours—I began to amuse myself by studying Mr. Darcy.

  There was something about him that bothered me. I knew him to be a man of integrity but watching him—his haughty face, his immaculate linen, and white, well-tended hands—I felt a stirring of distaste. The man had been so pampered—had enjoyed so much more than his fair share of the world’s blessings. I thought of Peter’s frayed shirt cuff. I thought of Peter’s hands—working hands with the fingers of his left hand calloused from stopping fiddle strings and the back of his right hand scarred from a long-ago accident when the powder horn of his gun had caught fire—hands I would infinitely prefer to touch, and be touched by.

>   “’Tis your turn to play, Miss Mary.” Mr. Goulding sounded impatient.

  Mr. Darcy smiled at me. “Miss Mary was woolgathering, I think.”

  I felt myself blushing; I had forgotten to count trumps. I now led out a low card that Mr. Goulding topped with an emphatic grunt.

  “You were miles away, my dear,” said he to me afterwards, totting up the score.

  “Aye,” murmured Cassandra. “In Yorkshire.”

  Mr. Goulding heard this. “In Yorkshire, was she? What was she doing up there, I wonder?” (sorting his cards with a satisfied smile) “Fine county, Yorkshire. My friend Stoke is up there now for the grouse-shooting—you remember Stoke, Mr. Darcy? Sir John Stoke?”

  But Darcy was not listening; he was looking at Elizabeth, and before Mr. Goulding could repeat his question, Mr. Bingley turned in his chair and said: “Sir John is in Yorkshire, is he? I wonder he is not here for the start of the partridge season.” Bingley then disclosed that his sisters were presently in Yorkshire: “They have been in Scarborough these past three weeks.”

  A short dialogue between Bingley and Cassandra on the beauties of Scarborough followed, and I now noticed that Mr. Darcy had turned his attention to Jane. She for her part was listening to Bingley with such unaffected pleasure as to make her face for once very easy to read. And I felt sure that Darcy had indeed read it, and read it correctly, for he was regarding her not in the way a man generally appraises a beautiful woman (although Jane was looking lovelier than she had looked for a long while) but more thoughtfully, even with a touch of disquiet.

  “I believe it is your lead, Mr. Darcy.” Mr. Goulding was impatient for play to resume and now reminded me, with a condescending smile, that spades were trumps.

  And so we played on, accompanied as before by George’s music—an eccentric medley of his own compositions, culminating in such a deafening rendition of the last movement of his sonata that my mother begged him to play more quietly.

  The party broke up soon afterwards. Contrary to my expectations, George did not offer to take the Long ladies home—they went instead with the Gouldings. And just how Mr. Darcy parted from Elizabeth I did not see, although Elizabeth afterwards seemed as dissatisfied as before. Bingley, alone of the young men, seemed to have thoroughly enjoyed himself, prolonging his farewell to us all in the vestibule and then glancing back for a last look at Jane.

  As soon as we were by ourselves and my father had escaped to his library, my mother began to congratulate herself on the success of the dinner: “And, my dear Jane, I never saw you look in greater beauty. Mrs. Long said so too, for I asked her whether you did not. And what do you think she said besides? ‘Ah! Mrs. Bennet, we shall have her at Netherfield at last.’ She did indeed. I do think Mrs. Long is as good a creature as ever lived—and her nieces are very pretty behaved girls, and not at all handsome: I like them prodigiously.”

  17.

  Despite several clumsy attempts on my mother’s part to force Bingley’s hand, Jane’s happiness was secured within a few days of the Longbourn dinner. Elizabeth’s took a little longer, however, and about a week after Jane and Bingley’s engagement, there was a most curious visit from Lady Catherine de Bourgh.

  I heard about it from Kitty in the usual fashion: “You will never guess who called this morning.”

  She was too excited to wait for a response. “Lady Catherine de Bourgh! Are you not astonished? She called to see Lizzy and the two of them walked together in the wilderness.”

  I was indeed astonished. “Lady Catherine called here!”

  “She came in a chaise and four and she wore the most amazing hat with six black feathers in it.”

  “Did she give a reason for her visit?”

  Kitty shook her head. “Lizzy told Mama later that she had nothing particular to say. Mama thinks she must have been on her road somewhere and—passing through Meryton, you know—decided to call.”

  Neither Cassandra nor Helen seemed especially interested when I told them of Lady Catherine’s visit. Cassandra said: “The lady that Mr. Collins was forever talking about? The one with the eight-hundred-pound chimney-piece? Goodness.”

  Soon afterwards she left to go up to her painting-room and I was about to follow, when Helen said: “Oh, let her be, Mary, for God’s sake.”

  We were in the kitchen and Helen as usual was sitting on the old settle with her feet cocked up. After a moment she said: “Mr. Bingley called here yesterday. He wants Cass to paint a whole-length portrait of your sister and himself to mark their betrothal. It’s not that Cass isn’t happy for your sister, you understand. It’s just that—well, you know how it is.”

  After a pause I said: “Perhaps it would be better in the circumstances if she refused the commission.”

  Helen answered me in her “hard” voice: “We need the money, Mary. It seems we will always need the money—unless I decide to marry George.”

  She looked at me then and laughed. “All very well for you to sit in judgment, chérie, but some of us cannot afford principles. I shall make George a proper wife, never fear. I have sown my wild oats after all.”

  “I hate to hear you talk that way.”

  The only answer I received was a shrug. I said: “Has George renewed his offer to you then?”

  “Not yet, no. But he will.”

  I took my leave, feeling more than a little vexed. And my mood was not helped by finding there was no letter for me at the post office. Peter had promised to write to me while he was away; I missed him terribly and I found I could not really care about the happiness of Cassandra and Helen, let alone Elizabeth, whilst ever my own seemed so uncertain.

  But Elizabeth’s happiness at least was soon assured. Two days later Mr. Darcy returned to Longbourn with Mr. Bingley. They called very early and as soon as I saw Mr. Darcy, I sensed he had come on purpose to propose. There was about him an unusual nervousness—a brightness of eye and flicker of cheek-muscle as he looked toward Elizabeth—and when Bingley suggested a walk, he could scarce conceal his impatience to be out of the house and away from my mother.

  I declined the invitation, saying that I could not spare the time, but Kitty elected to go with them, and again I saw a look of impatience cross Darcy’s face.

  The five of them then set off across the fields in the direction of the Lucases—I watched them from my bedroom window—and I soon saw Jane and Bingley fall behind. But of the three figures going on ahead, I saw only one of them turn into the lane which led to Lucas Lodge. It was Kitty of course—I recognized her pink pelisse—and Mr. Darcy and Elizabeth then walked on alone.

  18.

  My mother had wanted Jane and Elizabeth to be married in London by special license—a grand double wedding to puff the consequence of her two rich sons-in-law—but Bingley asked instead for the banns to be read at Longbourn village church. He wanted a quiet country wedding and for the ceremony to take place on the 26th of November, the anniversary of the Netherfield ball, and on this he was at last permitted to have his way since, as Elizabeth put it, he had been so abominably thwarted in the past.

  In my own case there was no such quick and simple resolution. Peter had returned from Yorkshire as determined to speak to my father as before, and indeed, I was at first optimistic that Papa would look kindly on his suit, for after giving his consent to Mr. Darcy and Elizabeth, I heard him call out from his library: “If any young men come for Mary or Kitty, send them in, for I am quite at leisure.”

  But of course he had not really meant it—or he may have thought that nobody would want Kitty or me—in any event, when Peter first applied to him, my father gave him a flat refusal. Peter told me about it afterwards—we walked together in the little copse while the others were all gone to Meryton—and amazingly he was not cast down by it: “I always knew I’d have a job convincing him. He kept telling me that a thousand pounds in the four per cents was all the money we could ever hope for. Then he changed tack—”

  Here Peter paused, drawing my arm through his. “I’ve
never told you this, love, but I once had occasion to speak pretty sharp to your father—it was at the ball at Netherfield when he—when you had been singing—”

  I saw he was looking embarrassed—I was myself embarrassed—and quickly I said: “I know to what you refer.”

  Peter pressed my arm before going on: “Any road—as they say up in Yorkshire—your father suddenly remembered what’d passed between us but he seemed not to hold it against me. That was when he asked me about m’prospects.”

  “And then?”

  “There was no ‘and then.’ Soon as I mentioned New South Wales, he wouldn’t listen. Said it was out of the question—oh, he tried to joke me about it—told me his youngest daughter had just moved to Newcastle and as far as his wife was concerned, Newcastle was the end of the earth. He said: ‘What would she say to a daughter’s going to New South Wales, I wonder.’ ”

  We walked on in silence then, but upon my remarking that it all seemed quite hopeless, he kissed me and said, “Not a bit of it. With your approval, I mean to ask Mr. Galbraith to give us his support. He’s been a good friend to me over the years and I know he’d speak up for us if I asked him.”

  To this I at once agreed, for my father had long been acquainted with Mr. Galbraith as the uncle of my tutor Mr. Knowles, and two days later Peter again came to Longbourn, this time with Mr. Galbraith. They came in the morning while my mother and sisters were at Netherfield, and my father received them in his library. I waited in the hall, alternately hoping and fearing to be sent for, and after about five minutes my father stepped out and called to me.