A Dishonorable Offer
Page 3
He would see Jane, be charmed, and in a few months’ time there would be a happy wedding.
That fancy might actually occur.
Elizabeth smiled through the window at a pretty couple with a child running in front of them who walked along the street. After Jane was happy, Elizabeth would find someone for herself. Elizabeth decided she would be quite old, at least four and twenty, and resigned to being an old maid. Since today was a day for reasonable fancies, instead of tall and bold, he would be…short and… Elizabeth wrinkled her nose, but today’s imaginary suitor would be bald. Short and bald.
But he would have a delightful smile, and laugh when she teased him, and not care at all that she paid attention to nothing but her novel when deep in a book. She would be ridiculously fond of him even though he wasn’t handsome at all.
A few minutes before the first guests were expected to arrive the evening post came. It contained a thick letter from Mrs. Bennet. Upon opening it was discovered that the envelope had a page addressed to each of them describing the awful news.
Lydia was with child.
She had seemed so girlish and young last Christmas. Lydia had only turned fifteen months ago. The father was a blacksmith in the village next to Netherfield.
A blacksmith!
He was willing to marry Lydia, and, after lengthy consideration, Mr. Phillips and Mrs. Bennet decided the scandal of Lydia having a blacksmith’s child while unmarried would be even worse than Lydia marrying the blacksmith. Besides, Mr. Phillips refused to allow her to remain in his house.
To Mrs. Bennet’s great disgust, there was real affection between the couple, and both parties were eager to marry.
A blacksmith.
Their father had been one of the richest gentlemen in the neighborhood. This was falling very low indeed.
Mr. Gardiner stomped around and rubbed at his slowly growing bald spot. “Horrible — this is horrible. How could Fanny show so little care?”
Mrs. Gardiner said, “She will no longer have any pretensions to being a gentlewoman. We must cut all connections with her. But, everyone will still know.”
“Yes.” Mr. Gardiner looked at Jane and Elizabeth. “Neither of you had any notion? Lydia did not suggest something of this sort in a letter to one of you?”
Elizabeth raised her eyebrows. “Lydia — write a letter?”
“Yes, of course.”
Mr. Gardiner paced again, waving the paper in front of him and muttering under his breath.
The door rang, and the Gardiners’ maid brought Mr. Thomas to the aghast gathering in the drawing room.
He had taken care to dress well today. The neat cut of his coat and the fine silk of his cravat did not disguise the way the man’s large stomach hung out, or his double chin, or the way he’d lost all of his hair except a fringe of grey.
Elizabeth had not disliked Mr. Thomas before his wife died. He had been taken by Jane’s beauty, but most men were. He had struck her as bland and slow of wit in everything that didn’t relate to acquiring money. But otherwise a decent sort. Given how much he cared about capital and ensuring his sons were well-established, it surprised Elizabeth that when he entered half mourning he began to present himself as a suitor for Jane.
Jane would smile at him and talk freely to the older man, but she never showed any real enthusiasm. For several months Mr. Thomas had seemed unsure, but in the past two weeks his attentions had sharpened.
When he entered the room he walked to Jane and kissed her hand.
Greetings were made all around, but he caught the stressed mood and looked at Mr. Gardiner in curiosity. With a grimace Mr. Gardiner said, “Thomas, we must talk in my office.”
The three ladies sat. Mrs. Gardiner wondered aloud whether Lydia’s behavior would make Mr. Thomas run away or not, Jane looked relieved as her aunt thought most likely he would withdraw. Of course Jane did not wish to refuse a man.
What was happening? The curiosity drove out all thought about Lydia. Elizabeth stood and said, “I shall wear my lavender shawl instead."
Instead of going to her room Elizabeth went into the hallway and winked at the maid who was passing through. Elizabeth did not demand much ceremony, and Ruth was a friend of hers. While the servant watched with a smirk, Elizabeth pressed her ear softly against the varnished door to Mr. Gardiner’s study.
"No. It is too much. Too much." Mr. Thomas’s voice rang out with disgust. “A blacksmith!”
Mr. Gardiner replied in a quiet soothing tone, but Elizabeth could not catch his words.
“Your niece is too proud of her looks. She does not even like me."
“You would appear a hero if you offered now.”
“A village blacksmith! You are such an excellent man that I assumed your nieces must share those virtues. I was clearly wrong. A blacksmith! What if Miss Bennet has such a faulty character too? I cannot marry her. It would explain why she showed no interest in my attentions. I am a respectable man whose income is far above what she could expect. Miss Bennet wants some worthless, pretty dandy. Well, she can have him. Mark my words — nobody of any substance will marry any of those girls. Nobody.”
Thinking the conference was over, Elizabeth rushed away from the door and went upstairs to grab her shawl.
Was Mr. Thomas right?
Elizabeth felt a chill for her own future as her feet pounded up the hollow wooden stair-steps. Her hopes focused on Jane, but she wished to fall in love and marry as well. It was so shocking. A blacksmith.
Mr. Thomas couldn’t be right. At least Jane would find someone.
Chapter 4
Mr. Phillips paced in his tidily furnished drawing room. He studied Elizabeth and Jane. Elizabeth kept a calm smile pasted on her face, and resisted the urge to brush at her hair or shout at him.
“Why both of you?” He at last whined, “When I sent Kitty off to get her away from that woman I knew I’d need to take one girl to relieve Gardiner, but why both? Do you really not prefer London? Don’t you have any consideration for me?”
Elizabeth shrugged and smiled. “I am delighted I shall see all my friends again — and I have missed the ability to walk in the country.”
“Jane, couldn’t you have stayed in London? Not even out of affection for me? You do not even know how to walk — though it may be healthy for you — you’ve become plump. You’ll lose your figure, and then what vanishing hope I have of getting rid of you will go.”
Elizabeth looked away from her uncle and rolled her eyes as Jane replied with her pretty voice, “You know Mama wished me here.”
In a brief burst of optimism, Mrs. Bennet had Jane come back when she heard a wealthy gentleman had taken Netherfield Park. Elizabeth would follow Jane wherever she went. However, by the time Mama met them at the post stop midway, she was completely convinced none of her daughters would ever marry. Lydia, after all, was no longer a daughter.
“I won’t spoil you two like I’m sure Gardiner did.” Mr. Phillips stamped his foot. “You hear me! I’m sure you are both immoral like Lydia, and useless like your mother. I want my spare room back, so you both will bed down in the attic. I won’t provide new dresses, pocket money — nothing. I’m done spoiling wanton girls. I gave Lydia more than she deserved, and look what happened. A blacksmith. That trollop. That bitch. She stared at that man’s muscles when he came to my office. Not again.”
Jane blushed at Mr. Phillips’s crudity. But she replied, “Oh — we do not mind at all. It is quite natural, and you must want to save everything for your own children. We will be perfectly content in the attic.”
Elizabeth found it quite hard to not roll her eyes at Jane being Jane.
Mr. Phillips stared at Elizabeth, and with less grace than Jane, she said, “Yes, Uncle. Can you at least pay the fee for the circulating library—"
Mr. Phillips stomped his foot angrily. “No. A hundred times no. I do not want either of you, but I married that damn woman so I must provide shelter and food for her slatternly sisters and nieces. But nothin
g more. Nothing more.”
"It is not much money, and" — Elizabeth could not resist smiling impishly, though she knew as she spoke it was a mistake — “reading novels will keep me out of trouble. I really think that if Lydia had read more—”
“No trouble! You will not seek trouble! If you do anything, I’ll throw you out in the cold and make Gardiner take you all. If you need to read to stay out of trouble, there is the Bible, and I can loan you a legal reference.”
There was enough space in the attic to allow a bed for both Jane and Elizabeth to be set up, and there was a small wardrobe for them to share. The room used to house an extra maid, but as Mr. Phillips decided Elizabeth and Jane could help with some housework, he was letting one of his servants go.
There was no heating in the room, and it would get cold during the winter. And, being the highest room the house, it would be stuffy in the summer. Not important, Elizabeth decided, they would spend little time during the day in the small room anyways.
Elizabeth grinned and suppressed the urge to hop up and down to hear what sound the floors would make. She was so happy to be back in Meryton.
The walls were thin white plaster, and there was a window that faced on to the main street through Meryton. Except when she had climbed the church steeple, Elizabeth had never looked down at the familiar street from so high up. The people looked small. The roof sloped down, and their bed was nestled against where its angle intersected the hardwood floor.
“Jane, you shall sleep closer to the wall, so that you are the one to bang your head every morning.”
“I would have to in any case,” Jane said as she folded her undergarments and placed them into a drawer. “You often stay awake quite past a proper hour reading.”
“And I shall continue to do so.”
Elizabeth pulled out the small coin purse from her reticule. She weighed it in her hand, and tossed it up to hear the clinking. She had nearly a pound saved. It was enough for several months of library fees and tallow candles, if her uncle insisted on making her pay for any candles she used. Which he would.
Elizabeth wrinkled her nose, she hated how the cheap candles guttered and smelled. Well, nothing to do about it.
More cheerfully Elizabeth decided that she could convince the Gardiners or Charlotte to give her a little more pocket money for Christmas. At least she would always have new books to read.
Elizabeth grinned. “Mr. Phillips is awful — he is, Jane, do not deny it — but I am so delighted to be back. Country walks once again! Trees and soft dirt beneath my boots, instead of great paving stones, no more endless lanes of houses. We’ll be able to see Charlotte and Mary regular once again, and all our other friends. And the smell — I only realize now that it is gone, but it is gone. It of course is terrible for Lydia — but I am glad.”
Jane smiled at Elizabeth. But something in the way she looked over at the cramped room with its bare walls and angled roof said that she was not satisfied.
It worried Elizabeth. Jane would not have married Mr. Thomas, not in the end. But Jane had become desperate enough to think of it. Mama had endlessly accused Jane of being an awful daughter because she hadn’t found someone with a little money to marry before Lydia wrecked all hopes.
Of course then Mama accused Elizabeth of sabotaging her sister. If Mama knew how Elizabeth had begged Jane to not marry Mr. Thomas, she would have been truly incensed. Mama had always been suspicious of Elizabeth since Charlotte married Mr. Collins instead of Jane.
Elizabeth went back to the window and saw a hill in the distance. She hadn’t walked to that summit in two years. Tomorrow she would!
Jane would soon perk up. They were back in Meryton and surrounded by the friends they had barely seen for the two years since Mama went bankrupt. People here were more relaxed than in London, and Jane would become happier now that she was part of the neighborhood again.
*****
Jane did not let her kind smile waver.
She would not let herself feel bitter.
Miss Gould spoke hurriedly. “I am glad you’re back — I am. But… I have so many…acquaintances. There is no time to call. In fact, I must hurry off now. You do understand?”
“We have been excessively engaged ourselves. I beg you think no more on the matter.”
Both lies. Polite lies. No one was so busy in Meryton that they could not afford time to call on a person who had once been a dear friend.
Miss Gould said, “I must run, but — Miss Bennet, you must know I do wish you very well.”
Miss Bennet. They had once been Harriet and Jane. Before. Harriet had been her closest friend except Lizzy.
Screaming would do no good. Miss Gould was only worried for her own reputation and family. She had herself to think about. No good Christian could think ill of Miss Gould for not associating with the sister of a blacksmith.
Jane would shock Elizabeth if she was unkind to Miss Gould.
She searched for the warmth with which to reply as she ought, and Miss Gould’s face became worried. Jane wanted to scream: Don’t treat me this way. I’ve done nothing wrong.
Instinctively Jane said, “I know you wish me well and are truly my friend. Do not feel you must run about and call attendance on me like we used to.”
“I’m glad.”
The two girls smiled falsely at each other, but Miss Gould looked up at the sound of a horse cantering down the cobblestone street, and she ran away from Jane and Elizabeth with barely a curtsy.
The rider was a finely dressed gentleman on a sleekly muscled stallion. As Jane stared at him, all of her anger at Miss Gould was completely forgotten. He wore a vibrant blue riding coat and tan breaches that fit tightly around his legs. He kept a perfect seat and had curly brown hair. There was a relaxed smile on his face.
When the gentleman stopped his horse for a moment and looked around, his eyes met Jane’s, and he smiled at her. Their gazes gripped each other.
Jane’s stomach flip-flopped. The jolt she felt at the interested look in his brown eyes was far stronger than anything another gentleman had ever made her feel.
Then he shook himself, touched his hat and grinned at her. He rode off with a jaunty seat.
Jane’s heart was beating fast and her hands trembled.
Elizabeth exclaimed, “That must be Mr. Bingley! Why he looked right at you. He liked you exceedingly well — does my Jane like him?”
Jane blushed at the question. The shape of his nose was very fine. He had a nice jaw. And the lean figure of an enthusiastic sportsman. And his smile was so…warm.
His horse had by now passed out of sight along the road towards London.
“Aha! My Jane does like him.”
“He is most likely not Mr. Bingley. He did not stop in town but is headed for London.” Despite herself Jane’s last words came out in a depressed murmur. “We shall never see him again.”
“Ah, you are wrong. I encountered Netherfield’s housekeeper on my walk this morning, and came back into town with her. The new master was to travel to London today to retrieve his sisters and a very wealthy friend who will stay with him for a month or two. I asked her most particularly about Mr. Bingley’s appearance — curly brown hair, a fine blue coat, and an excellent seat on his horse — there could be no two gentlemen heading through Meryton to London this morning who matched the description.”
Jane’s heart skipped a beat at the thought she would see him again. Even just looking would make her happy.
Sir William rode down the road in the opposite direction from that the gentleman had traveled. Elizabeth rushed over to him when he dismounted and tied his horse up in front of the haberdasher. “Sir William — did you see the gentleman passing the other way, the handsome, finely dressed one? Was that Mr. Bingley?”
“It was. He stopped and asked me about an angelic girl he had seen with flaxen hair and the bluest eyes. There are so many pretty girls here that I could not say for certain who he had seen — but it must’ve been you, Jane.”
“Of course, of course. Mr. Bingley made me promise to do so himself, if we should discover the identity of the girl.”
It seemed too romantic…impossible. Mr. Bingley would hear of her connections and refuse the acquaintance. But — the way their eyes had met. He must have felt something. Mr. Bingley would be her knight who would care nothing for social opinion or money. He would fall desperately in love with her and carry her away from her poverty and disgrace.
Then they would all stop looking at her as though she was worthless.
Nonsense.
Jane would be pragmatic. She would not open her heart to being broken. It was Elizabeth who enjoyed such fancies. Mr. Bingley would ignore her as soon as he knew.
They finished the conversation with Sir William and curtsied while he inclined his head and walked into the shop. Unlike much of the community, Sir William had shown nothing but his usual amiability and good nature towards the Bennets. Jane knew she should not feel anger towards those who avoided her and Elizabeth, but she could happily think very well of Sir William and Charlotte. They were as much friends as they ever had been.
Elizabeth grabbed Jane’s hand and pulled her along the road out of town. “Come, come. We must visit Charlotte.”
“What? Why?”
“The assembly. We only have a few days to prepare you.”
“But what has Charlotte to do with that?”
“You saw how Mr. Bingley looked at you.” Elizabeth spoke with an exasperated huff, as though the matter was obvious. “We must make you as beautiful as possible. Charlotte will happily loan you a dress and a necklace so that you can look your finest when you are introduced to him.”
“I could not possibly ask Charlotte to—”
“Of course you couldn’t. Don’t be absurd. That is why I shall — if I had piles of money, and a dear friend needed to borrow a dress for a matter as important as looking her best for a handsome gentleman, I would be very, very happy if asked to help. The golden rule, do unto others as you would wish to be done unto you.”