Netherfield Park Revisited

by Rebecca Ann Collins

  For Jonathan, this was a novel experience. His courtship of Amelia-Jane had been so short and intense, his decision to propose marriage to her so precipitate as to surprise even himself. It had caused his usually calm, even-tempered mother some degree of consternation and provoked her to question his judgment in a most unusual way.

  He recalled her anxious questions about Amelia-Jane’s tender age and her ability to be certain of her feelings, “She is not yet sixteen, Jonathan, how can you be so sure she knows her own mind?” she had asked. Even his father had abandoned his generally disinterested approach to the matrimonial plans of his children to counsel caution.

  “It would be wise, since you intend to stand for Parliament, to be quite certain you are marrying a lady who understands the responsibilities of the position,” he had said.

  Yet Jonathan recalled also how, captivated by the beauty and exhilarating energy of young Miss Collins, he had felt no qualms. He had believed that her unquestioned good character was insurance enough; her mind would improve with association and maturity.

  Of his own affection for her, he had had no doubt at all.

  The feelings he had begun to recognise stirring within his heart for Miss Faulkner seemed to have developed over the many months of their recent acquaintance, each occasion providing scope for their enhancement. It was a sensation completely different to the rather desperate ardour of his earlier wooing of Amelia-Jane.

  The Armandes had noted their increasing intimacy with much pleasure, for they had a deep affection for both of them. To their partial eyes it seemed the pair were ideally suited, and they would dearly love to see them engaged.

  Each evening, it appeared to them that Anna, having taken tea, left more reluctantly than before in the carriage that took her home to Haye Park. While every morning, after breakfast, Jonathan seemed restless and impatient until he heard the curricle from Haye Park come up the drive.

  While in all their dealings, there was perfect decorum and propriety, they could not conceal their genuine enjoyment of each other’s company. To be with them was to share that pleasure.

  When most of the work was done, Jonathan, prior to leaving for London with the Armandes, who were soon to return to Europe, wrote to his mother and daughters at Ashford Park.

  A letter he had received earlier that week had said the girls longed to see their father again and hoped they would be together at Christmas.

  His mother urged him to let the children know when he would come for them.

  “While it would be no trouble at all to have them stay over Christmas, I know they long to be with you,” Jane wrote.

  Replying, Jonathan promised he would soon be there to collect them and bring them home to Netherfield.

  Dearest Mama, please assure Cathy and Tess that I share their longing for us to be together again. Indeed, it is to this end that we have all worked so hard these last few weeks, getting the house and especially their rooms ready for them.

  Netherfield, thanks to the wonderful work of many people, including Monsieur and Madame Armande, Miss Faulkner, and a whole team of tradesmen and staff who have worked tirelessly to finish the job, has been transformed from a rather dull though solid Georgian manor house into an elegant and comfortable home for us all.

  I look forward to having all three of my dear daughters home at Christmas and I know they will want me to thank everyone on their behalf.

  Indeed, Mama, I can hardly wait until Spring, when you and Papa, Aunt Lizzie and Mr Darcy, Emma and James are all to join us at Easter.

  It will be a pleasure we shall look forward to all Winter long.

  He concluded with an assurance that, having collected Anne-Marie from Harwood House, he would soon be travelling to Ashford Park.

  After despatching the letter to the post, he said his farewells and drove with the Armandes to Haye Park.

  Expecting to be away for a fortnight at least, returning only a few days before Christmas, Jonathan had hoped for a private word with Anna to thank her for her help and perhaps obtain from her a promise to visit Netherfield when he returned with his daughters.

  But, there was never an opportunity. Whether by accident or design, there was always someone around to engage them in conversation whenever he tried to see her alone.

  Only at the end, as they waited for his carriage to be brought round to the front door, was he able to say a few words. They mainly reiterated his appreciation and added the hope that they would meet again soon.

  It was she who reminded him of her promise to teach Teresa to draw and he eagerly took the chance to invite her to dine with them on their return.

  “I know the girls will be looking forward, very much, to seeing you again, Anna, and so will I,” he declared, with as much feeling as he could express, as the carriage rolled up to the door.

  It had been said so quickly and with so little warning, she had no time to take in the significance of the words, much less to respond to them. The others were waiting and before she could say more than a brief “thank you,” he had kissed her hand and was gone.

  On reaching London, the Armandes prepared to leave almost immediately for Europe, but Monsieur was as good as his word and ensured that Jonathan was able to make his choice of paintings for Netherfield and another very special item, which he selected and had carefully packed and stored at Grosvenor Street. The Armandes, loathe to part from their new friend, urged him to visit them. Jonathan, though he had no immediate plans to visit Europe, assured them that he had hopes of seeing them again, soon.

  Anne-Marie was seeing her father for the first time since the two weeks they had spent, following her mother’s death, undertaking together a series of melancholy tasks. It had not been a pleasant time. Going through her mother’s things and writing to all the friends and relations who had to be thanked and, even worse, finding the right words to apologise for the delay in settling the many bills she had accumulated over two or three months, had been difficult.

  But much worse was the task of explaining, haltingly, to her younger sisters what had taken place, without destroying their image of their mother. Teresa, being rather slight and fragile since her premature birth, had spent most of her childhood with her grandmother Jane Bingley. She was less likely to miss Amelia-Jane than Cathy, who was a sturdy, cheerful girl, who had lived most of her life in Kent. She had been closer to her mother than any of the other children. Her little world had changed utterly overnight, and while Anne-Marie had done her best, there were questions she could not possibly answer.

  To some, she did not know the answers herself, while others were best left unanswered, seeing that most of the participants were dead. No one could explain to Cathy why her mother had decided to leave for Bath in Mr Alexander’s light carriage, which she had criticised only the previous week as being unsafe for the girls to ride in.

  Cathy had recalled and retold the incident when Mrs Watkins and Mr Alexander had been visiting and Mr Alexander had offered to take the two girls for a drive around the park. Cathy had been willing, but Teresa, cautious as always, had wanted her mother’s approval, which had not been forthcoming. Indeed, she had been quite cross with Mr Alexander for even suggesting it and had ordered Cathy to get out of the carriage and go upstairs at once.

  “She was very cross,” Cathy had said, and Teresa had claimed she would never forget the sharpness of her mother’s voice as she rebuked first her daughters and then Mr Alexander for what she had called a “stupid idea.”

  “Clearly she did not approve of him driving the girls around the park, and yet, she was willing to make the much longer, more hazardous journey to Bath with him and Arabella Watkins in the same vehicle, careless of her own reputation and safety,” Anne-Marie had said to Eliza Harwood, who had agreed there appeared to be no logical reason for her behaviour.

  It was something that had concerned Anne-Marie, but she had never been able to talk
to her father about it, feeling he had borne enough pain and needed no more.

  When they set out on their journey north, having stopped off in London to purchase Christmas presents for the family, Anne-Marie seemed cheerful enough. But as they journeyed on, her father became aware that she was unusually restless and yet remained silent for most of the time.

  At first, he put it down to tiredness and hoped she would recover her spirits after they had broken journey for the night at Cambridge.

  But the following morning, at breakfast, she was still very quiet and appeared out of sorts. Determined that she should not travel all the way to Ashford Park in such a state, Jonathan decided to bring the matter out into the open by asking her directly, “I can see you are not happy, Anne-Marie, and it grieves me. Will you not tell me what is the matter? Is there not something I can do or say to help?”

  She was startled by his question and appeared, at first, unwilling to let him see what it was that troubled her.

  But when he persisted, she turned to him with tears in her eyes and told him of the letter she had received from her mother, just two days before her imprudent journey to Bath. It started slowly, but as she talked, it all poured out, the grief and strain of keeping it all to herself for so many months exacerbating her distress.

  Jonathan was shocked and remorseful about her solitary suffering.

  “Why did you not tell me, my dear?” he asked. “Why did you choose to keep it to yourself, all these months? It cannot have been easy. You have suffered unnecessarily and for too long.”

  Taking the letter out of her pocketbook, where it had lain hidden, she gave it to him and watched, tearfully, as he read it through.

  His face drained of colour, Jonathan looked devastated.

  Gradually, painfully, she explained.

  “What good would it have done to expose it, to give you even more pain? Why would I wish to add to your suffering, Papa?”

  He held her hands in his, trying to comfort her, but realised that it was not the kind of emotion that could be easily explained away.

  For himself, Jonathan had never fully understood the extent to which his wife had blamed him for the failure of their marriage. Always a loving father and husband, he had not regarded his absence from home in pursuit of his Parliamentary career a matter for disapproval. This was especially so since Amelia-Jane had admired and encouraged his dedication to his constituency when they were engaged.

  After they were married, she had enjoyed the early excitement of being the wife of a promising and popular Member of Parliament. That it had caused so much aggravation between them later had surprised and disappointed him; he had always hoped that she would in time come to understand the value of his work for the community.

  He had the examples of women like his sister Emma Wilson and his cousin Caroline Fitzwilliam—both married to dedicated Parliamentarians, both Reformists with a strong commitment to improving the lot of the working people and extending the franchise to all.

  He tried to explain to Anne-Marie. “It is not as if I was indulging myself, as David Wilson did for many years, keeping poor Emma in ignorance, while he enjoyed the high life in London. I was just a hard-working MP, pressing for reform, trying to help the people who elected me to Parliament,” he said.

  It had been increasingly difficult for him to comprehend his wife’s antagonism to his work.

  “I could not imagine why your mama thought it was such a waste of time; I thought I was doing well,” he said sadly, and Anne-Marie was sympathetic.

  “Of course you were, Papa. I knew that and so did many other people. But poor Mama—after she tired of the London scene, she lost all interest in the work of Parliament. She was not like Aunt Emma or Cousin Caroline, she felt no personal loyalty to the Party as they did, nor did she understand very much about the reforms you were struggling to introduce. She was bored and annoyed that you were always away doing things in which she had no part and no real interest.”

  Then, seeing the stricken look upon his face, she took his hand. “Poor Papa, you did not know and no one told you, but, after our two little brothers died, she even lost interest in the rest of us. She had very little time for Teresa and me, and even Cathy spent a lot of her time with Aunt Harrison. I think Mama was lonely and sad, but whenever she tried to speak of Thomas or Francis, someone would try to cheer her up, tell her to dry her tears, and I think that made things much worse. She thought that you and the rest of us did not feel their loss as deeply as she did.”

  Jonathan shook his head in bewilderment.

  “What did you think?” he asked, wondering how his wife could have been so mistaken, and astonished also at Anne-Marie’s understanding of her mother’s sad and confused state of mind.

  She held fast to his hand as she spoke.

  “It matters little what I thought. For the most part, I agreed with Mama that you worked too hard, but I do not censure you, for I know what dedication means. In my own work, I have learnt the value of single-minded commitment to a cause, and I know the satisfaction it can bring.”

  “You do not blame me then, as your brother does?” he asked, anxious to discover her opinion.

  “Not at all, except that I would have wished you were home for us more often; we missed you, Charles and I. We had no real grown-ups to talk to. But I cannot blame you for your desire to work hard at your chosen profession, nor can I agree with Mama’s demand that you give it all away and stay home, like the landed gentry do.”

  Jonathan had to smile as she continued.

  “As for Miss Caroline Bingley, nothing will make me forgive her for introducing Mama to Mrs Watkins and Mr Alexander. The two of them filled her head with such foolish ideas, ideas that bore no relation to reality and led ultimately to her death. My only consolation is that justice was served when they died with her in the accident.”

  Jonathan was surprised by the harshness of her judgment, yet he understood how, having borne the frustration and sorrow, she was not ready to forgive and forget. She held those who had misled and deluded her mother into a calamitous course of action duly culpable.

  Presently, they approached the village of Ashfordby, a few miles before the turn-off to the Bingleys’ estate.

  She spoke more gently, urging him to remember that Cathy and Tess would be waiting, seeing him after a long separation. They would notice his mood if he was upset, she warned.

  “We must try to be a little more cheerful, Papa, for their sakes; they are too young to understand our continuing sorrow, and we have no right to add to theirs.”

  Jonathan was proud of her selflessness and maturity. Clearly, she had acquired, at an early age, the qualities her poor confused mother had never learned. He suffered again those feelings of remorse that had assailed him directly after his wife’s death, when he assumed that he might have been able to prevent it in some way.

  They were approaching Ashford Park and the journey would soon be over. He turned to her and asked anxiously, “Anne-Marie, tell me truthfully and do not try to spare my feelings, do you not believe that I, had I been more vigilant, paid greater attention to the character of her friends and perhaps exposed their true nature, that I might have averted this disaster?”

  She was absolute in her denial.

  “No, Papa, I do not accept that for one moment. While I was sympathetic to Mama’s complaints that you were frequently from home and she was often lonely, I do not believe that anything you could have said or done would have separated her from her new-found friends,” she declared.

  “They set out to ingratiate themselves with her in every possible way. Had you tried to warn her against them, she would have concluded immediately that you were trying to detach her from them for some sinister, selfish reason. It is likely to have made matters worse rather than better.”

  Seeing his troubled expression, she added, “I tried too, Papa, I did everythin
g I could think of and so did Aunt Emma and Aunt Catherine, and every one of us who tried must have suffered as you did, feeling we had failed or could have done more to prevent Mama acting as she did, so do not judge yourself too harshly. You must not take on all the blame.”

  The gratitude he felt was too deep to be expressed in a few words, and, in any event, the carriage had already turned into the park. As they drove up to the house, their eagerness to see the children and the Bingleys again lifted their spirits.

  Despite the cold November day, everyone came out to welcome them as they drove to the door, and Jonathan was left in no doubt of their feelings as his mother and two daughters greeted him warmly, with smiles and tears combining as he enfolded them in his arms.

  Standing to one side, it was a while before Anne-Marie was similarly received, first by her grandparents, and then by the two young sisters who owed much to her courage and compassion.

  For Jonathan Bingley and his daughters, happiness came not only from being together again at last, but from the warmth and comfort of what was, in the words of his eldest daughter, “without any doubt, the happiest home in all England.”

  The Bingleys—Jane and Charles—enjoyed a degree of conjugal felicity that was the envy of many others and, while they had not been spared the sorrow of life’s vicissitudes, they seemed better able than most to rise above them.

  They were both blessed with an evenness of temper and a capacity for compassion that enabled them to cope with their own afflictions while understanding the concerns of others. Jane’s affectionate heart and her husband’s amiable nature endeared them to many, and where it was needed, they gave of their time and shared their good fortune gladly.

  The year just past had brought them more than a fair share of tribulation, as they had watched Jonathan’s family disintegrate and then endured the disastrous consequences of Amelia-Jane’s needless death. With courage and generosity they had taken on the task of comforting the two youngest children. Uncomprehending and desolate as the two girls had been at the time, it had not been easy. But they had persevered, and here they were, welcoming their father and elder sister and planning a happy reunion.