This Disconcerting Happiness: A Pride and Prejudice Variation

by Christina Morland

  “But I am in the middle of one of Mrs. Radcliffe’s novels, Mama!”

  “Novels are very immoral,” Mary said.

  “That is just the reason to read them!” Lydia exclaimed. “When I think of that scene in The Monk—”

  “Radcliffe did not write The Monk!” Kitty said.

  “Yes, she did!”

  “No, she did not!”

  “She did!”

  “Did not!”

  “Whomever the author, the book should be banned.”

  “Oh, Mary, what do you know about it?”

  “Yes, Mary, perhaps you should have gone to Kent with Mr. Collins so that you could write sermons together!”

  “Kitty! Help me to my room!”

  “Mama!”

  “Kitty!”

  “Obedience to one’s parents—”

  “ENOUGH!”

  Elizabeth found everyone in the family staring at her as if she were mad. She supposed that they might have some cause for thinking it, for not only had she screamed at them, but she had, without realizing it, tossed her shawl, which would have been of no consequence if it had not gotten caught on a small plaster bust of Socrates and sent it tumbling to the stone floor of the hall.

  There was a moment of silence—the bust had been Mr. Bennet’s one contribution to the decoration of the entrance hall, and its rather violent departure seemed to even the most oblivious of them a dreadful omen—before the room erupted into a cacophony of voices.

  “My dear Bennet’s bust!”

  “Well, well, Lizzy!”

  “I cannot wait to tell Aunt Philips about this!”

  “It is just like that scene in The Mysteries of Udolpho…”

  “‘He that is slow to wrath is of great understanding: but he that is hasty of spirit exalteth folly.’”

  “Perhaps I should leave.”

  Hearing Mr. Bingley’s aside to Jane, Elizabeth regained her senses. She had only to see how red Jane’s face had become to realize that she was behaving more like her mother and younger sisters than she would have cared to admit.

  “Please, do not leave on my account,” Elizabeth said. “I cannot apologize enough for my behavior.”

  Bingley shook his head. “There is no need, Miss Elizabeth! It is a trying time, I know.”

  “Well,” Jane said quietly, disengaging her arm from Mr. Bingley’s, “I suppose I should help Mama.”

  “Mary,” Elizabeth said, interrupting her younger sister’s recitation of yet another Bible verse. “I believe Mr. Bingley mentioned that he and Jane would enjoy hearing you play Bach.”

  “He did?”

  “Why…yes, I did!” Bingley said, taking Jane’s arm before she could protest. “Lead the way to the parlor, Miss Mary!”

  “Kitty, help Mama upstairs,” Elizabeth said. “You may read Mrs. Radcliffe to her; perhaps it will soothe her nerves.”

  “What will soothe my nerves is to have my dear Bennet’s favorite bust in one piece! What shall I have to remember him by when—”

  “Lydia, you and I will take Papa upstairs. Mrs. Hill, I am sorry about the mess,” Elizabeth added to the housekeeper, who had already found a broom.

  “You should be apologizing to me!” Mrs. Bennet said as Kitty pushed her toward the stairs.

  “And I should thank you,” Mr. Bennet said, as they ascended the stairs behind Mrs. Bennet and Kitty. “I hated that bust, which is why I moved it from my study to the entrance hall. Socrates had the most terrible scowl on his face, and I am the last person to advocate his brand of stoicism.”

  “I do not think you would have been so forgiving,” Lydia said, having taken her father’s other arm, “if I had broken something!”

  “If it had been that bust, I would have,” he replied. “Well, Lizzy, you have quite the temper this morning.”

  Lydia made a sound. “She has become so cross since she met that Mr. Darcy.”

  As they led their father down the corridor to his quarters, Elizabeth said, “It is not Mr. Darcy’s fault, but I have been cross. I am sorry for it.”

  “Then I hope you will apologize to Wickham, as well. Even Denny was shocked by your rudeness yesterday, though Lord knows Mr. Denny is shocked by almost everything!” she added with a giggle. “Why, once when Wickham and I—”

  “Lydia…”

  “What is this about Wickham?” their father asked as they helped him settle into his favorite chair by the fireplace. “Lydia, bring me another quilt, the one on the bed there.”

  “Oh! It smells terrible!” she cried, dropping it almost as soon as she had picked it up. Then, she turned and left the room.

  “Well, so much for that.” Bennet tried to laugh but instead began to cough.

  Rubbing his back until the fit subsided, Elizabeth glared at the door.

  “Now,” her father said, taking shallow breaths, “tell me about the infamous Mr. Wickham.”

  Elizabeth grabbed the coverlet (which did in fact smell terrible) and tucked it around his legs. “Do not concern yourself with that.”

  “Lizzy.”

  She matched her father’s stern gaze. “Papa.”

  “Well? Do you think because I am dying that I have become stupid? I have not met this fellow, but Darcy mentioned him. I can only conclude that Wickham is a cad.”

  Elizabeth looked at her father in surprise. “You trust Darcy that much then?”

  “No, Elizabeth, but I do trust you.”

  She smiled.

  “Of course, Mr. Wickham does himself no favors when his strongest supporters are Lydia and your mother.”

  “What are you saying about Wickham?” Lydia stood in the doorway, carrying a large quilt in her arms. “Oh! I told you, Lizzy, that Papa’s quilt smells terrible!” She went to her father, pulled off the offending blanket, and wrapped her quilt around him. “There! Just because you have the cancer does not mean that you should also have an unpleasant odor about you.”

  Mr. Bennet smiled up at his youngest daughter. “Thank you, Lydia. You can be charming—when you want to be.”

  Lydia beamed down at him.

  “And it is for that very reason that you will never have my permission—even from my grave—to flirt with, court, or marry Mr. Wickham.”

  “What?”

  “From what I have heard,” Mr. Bennet said, patting Lydia’s hand, “he is not to be trusted. For all your silliness, my girl, you deserve better.”

  For perhaps the first time in her life, Lydia was speechless. Then, suddenly, she began to laugh and cry simultaneously. “You believe everything Lizzy tells you! Well, believe this: she is the silly one!”

  With that, she stormed from the room.

  “Thank you for the blanket,” her father called after her. “The lilac scent is quite delightful! Well,” he said, turning to Elizabeth, “that went well. Now, wake me for dinner. I will not want to eat, but I am looking forward to seeing Lydia sulk.”

  *

  “I do not want to go to the library,” Georgiana said as they made their way through Matlock House. Taking Darcy’s hand, she led him to a little nook off the breakfast parlor where a window seat looked out over the street. “Let us sit here, instead. It is my favorite place in the house.”

  “You prefer this to the library?” he asked with some surprise. The library offered solitude—not to mention books. While the window seat was cozy and the view mildly interesting (for a city view), anyone could come upon her here.

  “You are the one who likes to hide away in libraries.”

  Had Elizabeth spoken those words, there would have been a teasing lilt to them; her brow would have been arched, her smile crooked, and her eyes bright with laughter.

  But there was no amusement in Georgiana’s countenance as she spoke; indeed, with her bottom lip poked out and her eyes narrowed, she appeared quite put out, and Darcy (who had never seen his sister sulk, not even after Ramsgate) was so taken aback that he dropped her hand.

  Her face softened then, and she sat down
in the window seat, smoothing out her skirts. “I sometimes come here to read and, when that becomes tiresome, watch the unsuspecting people below.”

  Darcy sat almost gingerly beside her, as if she were a cat that might flee if he made too sudden a movement. He let the silence stretch long before saying, finally, “Georgiana, do you think you can ever forgive me?”

  Her eyes—so much like their mother’s—grew large and tearful. “Oh, Fitzwilliam, I do not know how to ask for your forgiveness! I am the one who—”

  “No,” he cut in, wiping one of her tears away with his thumb.

  She jerked her head back, and he again found himself dropping his hand in surprise. Still, he managed a steady tone as she said, “You need not cry. You did nothing wrong. I, on the other hand, should never have let our uncle take you from me. I was weak—worse than weak. I was a coward.”

  She surprised him by laughing. “Oh, how strange we all are!”

  “Strange?”

  “Yes,” she said, continuing to laugh, “very strange! You remember those events so differently than I do. My recollection is of you raging at Uncle Charles. Poor Norris came to the door of the drawing room, you know, frightened out of his wits because of your shouting! You did not see him; your back was to him. But I saw the old man’s face. He did not think you weak; I did not think you weak.”

  “Bluster is not strength, Georgiana.”

  “Perhaps not.” She sighed. “But I agreed to go with him. In fact, I wanted to go. I felt I deserved it. I could not stand to see the family tear itself apart, not over my stupid, selfish actions!”

  It was Darcy’s turn to laugh. “I move to ban the word ‘selfish’ from the English language.”

  She frowned up at him, and he again found himself confronted with this sullen young woman he did not know.

  “I am not laughing at you, Georgiana,” he explained. Yet he could not explain further, not without introducing Elizabeth into the conversation, and he suddenly doubted, for the first time, that his sister might meet the news of his engagement with anything but happiness.

  She tilted her head and studied him. “I am glad to see you, Fitzwilliam. But I hope…” She looked away.

  “What is it?” he asked, attempting to meet her eye. It struck him then how this show of shyness, which had once been such common behavior for her, now seemed unnatural. “You have changed.”

  “Have I?” She offered him her first true smile. “I should hope that I have changed. I was selfish, Fitzwilliam. Not only when I nearly eloped with…with Wickham, but also when I wrote you those letters from Rosings.”

  “You should never hesitate to tell me of your unhappiness. Perhaps if I had been a less negligent brother…”

  “No, you cannot blame yourself for my choices. I was such a fool, Fitzwilliam.”

  “You were young. You still are young. It is my duty to protect you.”

  Her frown reappeared, but this time, it had the effect of making her appear sad, rather than sullen. “That is what I fear, that you have come here to protect me. I know what you wrote in your letter, but tell me—assure me that you have not come to marry Anne, Fitzwilliam. When Aunt Catherine told me that you were coming to London, she sounded so gleeful, so confident…”

  “When does she not sound confident?” Darcy asked, attempting a smile of his own.

  Georgiana’s face crumpled. “You are going to marry her!”

  Darcy closed his eyes. It should have been a relief to him, his sister’s fervent hope that he would not marry Anne. Still, the guilt he felt on making such a choice weighed on him—for though he loved Elizabeth, he loved his sister, as well. “No, Georgiana, I am not going to marry Anne.”

  “Truly? Oh, Fitzwilliam, I am so glad! Though, I do feel terrible for writing such unflattering remarks about her in my letter. She would never do as your wife, but with each passing day, I find something more to like about her.”

  Darcy raised an eyebrow.

  “Really, I do! When she is not near her mother, she can be quite amusing! But she would not suit you, and I should never forgive myself if you were shackled to her for the rest of your life because I was so silly.”

  He looked away.

  “If you are not to marry Anne, then tell me, why do you appear so glum?”

  “Tell me how you are,” he said. “Tell me how they are treating you.”

  “Fitzwilliam, what is the matter?”

  “I want to know how you are.”

  “Very well, then. I am content. Lady Catherine can be domineering, but I have discovered that she is very much like a horse.”

  He laughed. “A horse?”

  “Exactly like a horse. Old Frank once told me, when I first started riding, that a horse senses your fear and will throw you first chance he gets. So, you must pretend to be stronger than you feel.”

  “I will have to remember that.”

  “And I have already told you that I like Anne. Oh, she complains far too often for any one person, but when I ignore her complaints, she eventually gives up and becomes a pleasant companion. As for my uncle’s family, they are amusing. Uncle Charles can be as overbearing as Aunt Catherine, but he is not unkind. Indeed, he sometimes tells me stories of our mother, and when he does, his entire face changes. And he is enamored with Grantley’s boy, whom we all call Master Charlie. My aunt and Sophia have so many interesting views, particularly on fashion. There is something to learn from everyone. That is my new philosophy.”

  He gazed at his sister, wondering why he had not seen her strength before now. In the fortnight after Ramsgate, she had retreated, becoming shyer than ever. When she had left with their uncle, she had seemed such a small, frail thing. Though he could not but continue to regret their separation, even he had to admit that Georgiana had grown from the experience of it.

  “And you know,” she continued, “that I love Richard…like a brother,” she added, blushing.

  “Not as a favorite brother, I hope?”

  Her blush deepened. “No, of course not. I do miss you, and I miss Pemberley, but I feel that this pain is natural and just. I have been reading Sir Isaac Newton, you see.”

  Darcy raised his eyebrows.

  “Uncle Charles has some of Newton’s writings in the library, and he said that I would not want to read them, so of course I asked Richard to obtain the volumes. We have been reading them together. I do not understand most of it, but one idea—it is one of Newton’s axioms on motion—struck me most particularly: that to every action, there is always an opposite and equal reaction. He is referring to mechanics, not human emotion, but as a foolish, narrow-minded miss, I can only apply the lesson to my own experience. I suppose this is just an awkward way for me to admit that I did not truly understand the consequences of my choices until it after I had already made them.”

  “Georgiana.”

  “No, please, let me finish,” she said, her mouth forming a firm line. “I must explain myself to you.”

  “Very well.”

  She took a deep breath. “When Wickham came to Ramsgate and turned his attentions to me, I was flattered. I was more than flattered. I felt as if his admiration was proof that I was no longer the child you believed me to be.”

  He opened his mouth to speak, but at her frown, he nodded and sighed.

  “I was restless upon my return from school; I wanted to be out in society.”

  He gaped at her. “But you have always been so shy! You despise society as much as I do.”

  “I am shy, but I felt this was a deficiency to overcome. I had learned so much at school, and I began to realize how much there was to know, to see, to experience! I wanted to meet more people, to see more of the world than I had at Pemberley and at school. But you hated London and detested society. I feared broaching the subject with you.”

  “Well, I wish you had, Georgiana.”

  She flushed. “Would you have listened?”

  Darcy turned and looked out the window; the rain had become steadier. “I hope
so.”

  “You would have listened to my words, but you would not have heard what I meant. You were always telling me what was best for me, always advising me on how to live my life. You were not afraid to point out my deficiencies. I did not want to hear such things.”

  “If I allowed you to think that I was not proud of you, that I did not consider you the very best of sisters…”

  “No, you have never wavered in your love or support of me. I was only too foolish to understand the difference between true encouragement and empty praise. He was very good at that, you know, giving empty praise.”

  Darcy pressed his fist against the glass.

  “Of course, I see now how wrong I was, how you were the one who loved me. I think I first realized this the day before you arrived at Ramsgate. I was playing a sonata for him, and I was so distracted, thinking of the elopement, that I gave a terrible performance. When I had finished, I looked up, expecting him to comment on the mistakes. Instead, he said with that same smile he always gave me, ‘Charming.’ I knew then that he could not possibly have been listening, that he was in fact lying to me. Still, I allowed myself to believe…”

  “Yet you told me the truth, Georgiana. That is what is important! You trusted me, and ultimately, you trusted yourself.”

  “That is just it!” she said, bringing her hands to her face. “I did not trust myself, not until it was almost too late! I was blind and selfish. I wanted only to be flattered. Oh, I did not compromise my virtue, but I compromised my own mind! What is even worse is that I did not learn my lesson. For those first few months I was at Rosings, I thought of nothing but myself. Those letters that I sent to you, so full of complaints! No wonder you did not respond.”

  “No, you must not take the blame for that, too. If anyone has been selfish, it has been I. When I did not write you, it was not because I was angry; I did not know how to tell you what I felt.”

  “I wish I had never put you in such a position, Fitzwilliam. I think my actions have changed both of us. That is what I meant by Newton’s law. My action has caused a reaction—and though I do not know if it is equal or opposite or what will come of it, I do know that life cannot return to what it was before. It is why I am determined to accept my fate here cheerfully. My only regret is that our separation has caused you to suffer.”