章節 4: 4. In which Lady Catherine holds forth
To Elizabeth’s surprise, Lady Catherine greeted the news of their engagement with relief, before deciding that she, of course, had been the one to find a solution to her nephew’s socially awkward dilemma.
“I do not know Fitzwilliam,” said she, as Elizabeth and Colonel Fitzwilliam sat patiently before her, “why for so many years you were so very worried about your soulmark. I well remember when it appeared! You yourself were ashen-faced, your brother quite lost his infamous composure, Matlock locked all the children out of the breakfast parlor, my sister Anne fainted, old Mr. Darcy spat out his coffee, dear Sir Lewis turned quite red, and your dear mother, God rest her soul, went into hysterics. ‘Christabel,’ I told her, ‘you are in hysterics over a problem that will resolve itself in due course. Did you not consider,’ said I, ‘that it might be a last name and not a first? My own sister, Lady Anne, had the name ‘Darcy’ upon her wrist, and she died a Mrs. Darcy. If she were not in a swoon she would tell you so herself.’ Your mother did not listen to me at the time, but I am sure that if she were alive now, she would very much regret that she did not accept my assurances when you were sixteen, and save herself... it must be... fourteen years of anxiety?”
“As my mother died four years ago, I think it more likely ten,” said Colonel Fitzwilliam, with remarkable equanimity.
“Indeed yes,” said Lady Catherine. “Yes, I had something like this in mind ever since I heard that my parson would inherit an estate from the Bennets of Longbourne. ‘Mr. Collins,’ I told him, ‘you must have some of your fair cousins to visit.’ Never saying of course, why he must. I pride myself on my discernment. But ‘Mr. Collins,’ said I, ‘you have five female cousins, by the name of Bennet, you must bring at least one of them here.’ And as soon as you arrived, Miss Elizabeth Bennet, I began to suspect you were a good match for dear Fitzwilliam. You will not, I think, object to the life of a soldier’s wife.”
To be the wife of a colonel seemed to Elizabeth a very different thing than being the wife of a common soldier, but before she could phrase this in a way amusing enough to be spoken aloud, Lady Catherine continued on, “Yes, you are a very lively girl, Miss Bennet, of a very similar humor to dear Fitzwilliam. I knew as soon as you played for us, with Fitzwilliam to turn the pages, that I had managed to correctly pair together two souls. I observed you both most carefully; indeed, it had been my wish for you to play together to see how you would work together at any shared task.”
“Colonel Fitzwilliam turned pages with such elan I was quite overcome,” said Elizabeth, solemnly.
“An arduous task,” agreed Colonel Fitzwilliam. “It is the modern day equivalent of dragon-slaying. I am glad to hear I acquitted myself well.”
“Your page turning was something out of an Arthurian legend.”
“I am unmanned by such praise.”
Lady Catherine could tell that they were joking, but, as it was inconceivable they could at all be making fun of her, she chose to think they were merely just giddy from their engagement. “Yes, it is touching indeed to see such a thing— but Fitzwilliam, have you at all written to Miss Bennet’s father? I think you must not have done, for you have never met him.”
Colonel Fitzwilliam nudged Elizabeth slightly; she smiled and, recalling the hasty battle plan he had sketched out for her in the dirt of the lane, said, “I must beg your advice on that head, Lady Catherine. I have written to my father, and mentioned the existence of Colonel Fitzwilliam. From that I am sure he has drawn his own conclusions, but he could hardly give his permission to a man he had never before met.”
“A very reasonable objection,” said Lady Catherine. “I think your father a very sensible man. Of course he must meet Fitzwilliam himself, and then there can be no objections to the match. You will of course invite him— perhaps not here—” her relief in the match did not, as Elizabeth expected, extend so far as to welcome a mere Mr. Bennet to stay at Rosings “—but to London? You have family, there, I think.” She did not wait for Elizabeth’s response before continuing on, “Yes, you will ask him to meet you there. Dawson has very disobligingly broken his leg, but has promised me his son will be well able to drive the barouche-box, should I require it— I wonder, Fitzwilliam, have you told Darcy of your engagement?”
“I thought it right to tell you first, ma’am.”
Lady Catherine was excessively pleased by this and not only said as much, but repeated it many times before she returned to her original subject. “I cannot think Darcy will be very pleased. He is not, like myself, quite... privy to the facts of the case that make this match more unexceptional than it would appear to strangers. It is best we do not rely upon his carriage. Yes, I think I ought to inform your the rest of the family myself as to the happy arrangement I have made for you; I shall take you both myself. And Anne of course. Mrs. Jenkins is too large to make a comfortable fifth, so she must stay behind. But in that, I think, I may be doing a favor to Mrs. Collins’s sister, for I am robbing her of her traveling companion. I did not like the idea of two young ladies traveling alone; one young lady on her own fills me with alarm. Dawkins will, I think, be better then and will drive Miss Lucas and Mrs. Jenkins to London, when Miss Lucas is ready to depart.”
As Colonel Fitzwilliam had no carriage, this was exactly what he had hoped— especially given how uncomfortable it would be to ride to London with Darcy. He accepted with all fitting expressions of gratitude, and listened to Lady Catherine’s guesses at their courtship with an amusement that could be easily mistaken as good humor. Elizabeth was happy enough that her left hand was cradled in the crook of Colonel Fitzwilliam’s arm.
She was too emotionally exhausted for much else. Realizing one’s hitherto prized and unclouded judgement was actually blinded by pride and prejudice would have been exhausting enough for one day; having to swing from that emotional low point to what she had always been taught was the apex of human joy, definitely finding one’s soulmate, was more than she could bear with equanimity. Tears felt too perilously close to the surface, and she had already spent most of the morning crying on Colonel Fitzwilliam out of vexation (and joy, after she had nearly tackled him in the lane when accepting his proposal).
Lady Catherine neatly disposed of Colonel Fitzwilliam’s emotional trajectory and said, “Miss Bennet, your part in this is still something of a mystery. I am sure I mentioned my own brother and his family many times before dear Fitzwilliam came on his yearly visit, and yet you evinced no real excitement at the prospect of his arrival.”
“Your Ladyship referred to your brother as the Earl of Matlock and his children,” said Elizabeth. She could not keep herself from adding, “As is only fitting with your ladyship’s great sense of propriety.”
“Indeed. I wonder....”
For a moment Elizabeth thought Lady Catherine would demand to see her soulmark— Lady Catherine had a manner even equal to that rudeness— but instead she contented herself with, “I suppose, Miss Bennet, that you likewise have a last name upon your wrist?”
“Indeed I do, madam.”
“Fitzwilliam’s?”
“It could hardly be otherwise, if she has agreed to marry me,” said Colonel Fitzwilliam, with enough good humor to take the sting out of the rebuke. “I assure you Aunt Catherine, we are matched in every particular.” When she did not quite grasp what he meant by that, Colonel Fitzwilliam sighed and said, “We have each others’ last names, Aunt Catherine. Like Aunt Anne and Uncle Darcy.”
“Yes, I was on the point of making such a comparison. I feel that I did so when your mark first appeared, but as Anne was so incautious as to faint—”
Not very eager to get into the story once again, Colonel Fitzwilliam said, “Do you think to stay with my father, Aunt Catherine?”
“Of course not, Fitzwilliam. My own town house is a great deal more comfortable. Lady Stornoway keeps making improvements to your father’s that I cannot think are at all improvements .”
“Perhaps you had better write to the servants, so that all is prepared,” said Colonel Fitzwilliam. “I ought to walk Miss Bennet back to the Parsonage, so that she may write to her father and ask him to come to London; and, after that, I ought to write to my father as well.”
“A very good course of action,” was Lady Catherine’s magnanimous response, and they were free to go.
Elizabeth risked propriety by leaning her head on Colonel Fitzwilliam’s shoulder, when they were out of view of Rosings.
“Poor Miss Bennet,” said he, smiling down at her. “My family seems determined to put you through your paces; for that I am sorry.”
“Oh no,” said she, tiling her head back to smile up at him, “it reassures me that my relations are not the only ones that shall try our tempers. I was only tired! It is not everyday that one must confront one’s flaws in the presence of the person with whom one hopes to marry.”
“You do not think it a necessary part of falling in love?”
“I have never fallen in love before, so that I cannot tell you.”
His smile softened. “My dear Miss Bennet. I hope you will not vex yourself unduly. You know my flaws, do you not?”
“The few that exist, yes. They hardly amount to anything before my misjudgments.”
“But you are still glad we are engaged?”
“Oh, immensely so!”
“Then believe that I feel the same— that is, that the flaws you revealed to me seem small, in comparison with my own.”
Elizabeth blushed and hid beneath the brim of her bonnet.
After a moment, Colonel Fitzwilliam said, “I am sorry to press upon this point but there is one flaw in my character that I cannot believe you accept, particularly after Lady Catherine was so kind as to remind me how I caused perhaps one of the worst family scandals of my generation.”
“Poor Fitzwilliam,” said Elizabeth, looking up at him. “Was it as bad as Lady Catherine made it out to be?”
“More-or-less. Before I changed everything, there was the most absurd rigmarole about soulmarks appearing. The whole family— my younger siblings and cousins excepted— were gathered around the breakfast table on my birthday. I pulled back my sleeve, sure this would be a repetition of my brother’s birthday from four years before, and felt the blood quite drain from my face. I knew it was bad, but had no real idea how it would distress everyone. My father had sponsored bills in the Lords, to make civil partnerships easier to obtain; my mother was loudly supportive of Signoria Di Rossi and had her sing in her salon when the Royal Opera refused to let her onstage.”
Elizabeth found this something of a non sequitur and said so.
“It got out, about a year or two before my sixteenth birthday, that Signori Di Rossi soulmate was comedienne known for her breeches roles. It am glad to hear it was successfully hushed up, but I recall it being a very great scandal when I was in London on the long vac from school.” He looked worried; there were lines about his mouth and eyes Elizabeth had previously attributed to smiles, rather than any sort of anxiety. “It is one thing to support people you do not know, who but briefly touch upon your life and are gone again; it is quite another to accept so grievous a fault in your own relation. Everyone reacted as Lady Catherine so... exactly detailed, though far from assuring my mother all would be well, she began detailing all the Harley Street doctors that could fix the imbalance of humors that lead to only a partial mark appearing. I do not know what woman’s name begins with ‘Bennet,’ but my father took some comfort in the notion. I am grateful that the final doctor suggested I only wanted toughening up and ought to go into the army instead of going to university. It did not change my soul mark, but it provided me with purpose and a sense that I was not alone. Many men join the services in the hopes of traveling to the countries where their soulmates may be, and a great deal of men in my... particular circumstances end up in the army or the navy. There is greater licence there than at home.
“But that is not to say that there were no consolations. Outside of my immediate family, and my aunts and uncles, no one knew— why Darcy himself did not know until last fall. And my sister Honoria was not treated quite as badly two years later, when she awoke with what was unquestionably a woman’s name on her wrist. My mother only sighed and asked the room at large why God saw fit to punish two of her children this way, my father hid behind his newspaper, and no one fainted at all. I grant you, Lady Anne was dead then, so she could not faint, and she only fainted when I was sixteen because she was consumptive and was more often in a swoon than fully awake.”
This was worse than she thought; Elizabeth felt tears start to her eyes.
“A fine fiancé I am,” said Colonel Fitzwilliam. “I keep making you cry.”
“I am merely distressed at how your family treated you. I was given to think London was more accepting than that.”
“All of my sisters are, as is my sister-in-law. Her brother Lawrence is in much the same situation as myself. But as Honoria has said many times, there is such a small segment of the population that find soulmates among their own sex, it is easier to ignore them than make any effort at integration. When one is forced to face the reality of it, one digs in one’s heels and insists upon normality. I imagine it is worse in the country.”
“I cannot claim Hertfordshire as a utopia, but we are not as backwards in our attitudes as you seem to fear. In Meryton, the principal milliner has a male soulmate. When he first came back from London with his soulmate, the neighborhood was in more of an uproar than it had been over the death of Louis XVI. The parson told anyone who would listen he would not conduct a service of... what is the euphemism again?”
“Civil partnership.”
“Yes, that, for the two men in question. But oh, the endless repetitions of shock when it was discovered Mr. Brown and Mr. Goring had taken precautions before braving the wilds of Hertfordshire, and gotten their civil partnership in the naval dockyards! There was some talk of a boycott. My father, as you shall soon see yourself, likes to amuse himself at the expense of his neighbors, and decreed that unless we bought our bonnets and shoe roses from Mr. Brown, we should have none. My mother’s understanding is... scanty, and she was easily persuaded to view Mr. Brown as tragic a figure as Romeo. I admit I was my father’s principal accomplice in this; we had then started in on the Iliad and I was very invested in how Achilles avenged his soulmate Patroclus. Poor Mr. Brown was no Achilles, but he was very kind to an overeducated thirteen-year-old girl who came into his shop every day for a month, making a point to buy something with ready money, even if it was merely a haypenny's worth of ribbon. The neighborhood was eventually brought to accept them, for the other milliner had not the same quality of goods on sale, and now we even have a pair of female soulmates as the town’s chief mantua-makers, and another pair of male soulmates as the chief chandlers.”
Colonel Fitzwilliam looked more relaxed but there were still faint lines of tension about his mouth. “I am glad to hear of that, but have you met anyone like myself?”
“Only in the classics,” said Elizabeth, “and in accounts of Lord Byron— but really, I do not see how your very reasonable attempts to find your soulmate should offend. As long as you are not wishing I were a man—”
“I would not change you in any possible way,” said he, so fervently Elizabeth was moved to stop walking and put her hand to his cheek. He leaned into it as he haltingly explained, “I find little sympathy from either half of society; each faction tends to think I am lying about one half of my nature, when they are feeling kindly disposed, and think me as a deviant the likes of Lord Byron, when they are not. In reality, I am sadly conventional. I want only to be left alone to have a family and an occupation.”
Elizabeth slid her hand to the back of his neck, so she could pull him down for a chaste kiss. It was very short, no longer than the forfeits Elizabeth had paid during winter parlor games, and yet he looked at her with such startled wonder it could have been the sort of kiss that broke curses in fairy tales.
“Fitzwilliam,” said Elizabeth, with mock solemnity, “I am not society. I think you my soulmate. That is it and that is all.”
“I should very much like to kiss you for that, Miss Bennet.”
“Then do.”
And thus Mr. Darcy found them kissing in the middle of the lane.
They sprang apart guiltily.
“Um,” said Elizabeth.
“Darcy,” said Colonel Fitzwilliam, recovering more quickly. “I had wanted a word with you— but I think I should first tell you that this morning I asked Miss Bennet to marry me and she was so good as to accept.”
Mr. Darcy stared at them both as if they had announced their plan to assassinate the Prince Regent with a banana.
“I should like to apologize,” Elizabeth forced herself to say. “Colonel Fitzwilliam explained certain circumstances to me that I had not known— I was wrong, extremely wrong, to have believed Mr. Wickham, and to have based my understanding of your character on his lies. I can only credit my own vanity for such a misperception, and I must heartily beg your pardon.”
Mr. Darcy looked at her without seeming to hear her, while methodically folding a sealed letter into eighths.
“Darcy, are you well?” Colonel Fitzwilliam asked, in mingled exasperation and kindness. “I know this must bring back memories of last summer, and I appreciate your concern, but there is no doubt in this case. You saw yourself that I bear Miss Bennet’s last name and—” he looked to Elizabeth for permission, before adding “— and I think you saw that she bears mine. And though I know all you said to Miss Bennet yesterday because of the ah, events of last summer, I must tell you that you went about it in the worst possible way. That was not the behavior of a gentleman. Are you so convinced that only you know the truth of things? Even if you doubt Miss Bennet, I have two years on you; I think I know what I am about.”
“I am sorry,” said Darcy, mechanically, putting the letter- now folded neatly into thirty-seconds- into the pocket of his coat. “My interference was kindly meant and I have felt nothing but regret since that interview.”
The awkwardness was a little too much for Elizabeth’s fragile equanimity. In some real fear of becoming like her mother and begging everyone to have some compassion on her poor nerves, she said, “Thank you, Mr. Darcy, you are more generous to me than I deserve.” Colonel Fitzwilliam looked inclined to dispute this, so she hastily added, “I shall leave you both; I must to the Parsonage, before Charlotte thinks I have been murdered by highwaymen or the like.”
Colonel Fitzwilliam pointedly said he would call on her tomorrow before walking on with Darcy and remonstrating with him quite heatedly.
Elizabeth was grateful to have some time to compose herself before seeing Charlotte and Maria, but it was insufficient; upon Maria’s innocent, “You look monstrous unwell, Lizzy!” she found she had no social resources left and decided to sleep until it was nearly time to dress for dinner. She awoke groggy, but with renewed reserves of mental fortitude, and could answer Charlotte’s polite knock on the door with, “Oh do come in Charlotte, I have a great deal to tell you!”
Charlotte was a most appreciative audience, for she really felt she had made the match herself, and she had never been inclined to think well of Mr. Wickham. Elizabeth left out the details of Colonel Fitzwilliam’s early difficulties with his soul mark and Georgiana Darcy’s misfortunes in the retelling, but it sufficed for Charlotte that a soul mark reading ‘Bennet’ was exceedingly awkward for a man to bear, and that Mr. Wickham was a fortune hunter who had taken three thousand pounds instead of a living, and insisted upon the living anyways.
“I told you not to let your partiality for Wickham blind you,” said Charlotte, perched primly on the edge of the bed.
Elizabeth, leaning against the headboard, with her legs drawn up to her chest, nodded tiredly. “I know, I ought to have listened to you. Instead, I let vanity rather than reason hold the reigns, and I begin my engagement by quarreling with my fiance’s favorite relation. It shall be vastly uncomfortable.”
“Especially since it was Mr. Darcy,” said Charlotte, dryly. “I cannot imagine how awkward he will now become.”
“It is beyond imagining.”
***
Elizabeth spent the rest of the evening writing letters, while being gently interrogated by Maria, whenever Charlotte was out of the room, checking on a jam that would not set.
“Did you know immediately?” asked Maria, as Elizabeth hesitated after her ‘ Dear Papa .’
“Know what, Maria?”
“That Colonel Fitzwilliam was the one ?”
“No, I did not. The possibility did not escape me, but I was not certain, no. It is difficult to be, in general.”
This letter would not come as easily as the one to Jane, which had flowed from her pen with the rapidity of her thought, and to her aunt and uncle Gardiner, which, being a more detailed account of Colonel Fitzwilliam’s courtship, had cheered her enormously to write. She set it aside and wondered if she should write to her mother and younger sisters. Elizabeth was still mortified that their behavior had ruined Jane’s prospects, and did not entirely trust them to keep silent on news that would send them into paroxysms of silliness—
“When did you know?” interrupted Maria.
“Know what Maria?”
“That he was the one ?”
“To tell you the truth, I did not really love him until I was angry, and he said it was justified.” This seemed ridiculous, but Elizabeth had no better answer. But it would not fill Maria’s empty but receptive mind. Maria wanted only someone to reassure her of the world, and that she was taking her place well in it. If someone spoke with enough authority, Maria would believe it and set herself to act on such advice at once.
Elizabeth turned from her letters to smile at Maria. “Laugh at me, do, but I meant it. There are moments that reveal a man’s character, and in that one, I think I realized that he would always respect me— and my feelings, which men generally cite as the reason not to respect their wives.”
Maria was wide-eyed at this revelation.
“Where respect is united with commonality of feeling, taste, and thought,” said Elizabeth, remembering an earlier conversation with the colonel, “I do not think there is much risk of guessing wrongly.”
Charlotte had been listening in the hall at that and came in, saying, “And even if you do guess wrongly, you are at least married to a friend who will respect and support you. That must substantially add to the comfort of one’s own establishment, and guaranteed future.”
Elizabeth felt vaguely guilty at this, but Charlotte smiled at her and said, “Do not misunderstand me, Lizzy. When it comes down to it, a soulmark is nothing more than a mark on one’s arm. You must decide what it means. You must choose how to act on it.”
“But what if you do guess wrongly?” asked Maria, anxiously.
“It depends, once again, on your choices,” said Charlotte. “Do you react with bitterness or do you make the best of the situation?”
“Or how you define a soulmate,” said Elizabeth, trying to recall all her philosophy readings. “We choose to call it romantic in our society, but Voltaire thought it referred to a person who would change your life, somehow, an idea that has gained remarkable traction in France. I think they consider it rather freeing that they need not marry their soulmate. And the ancient Greeks thought a soulmark signified the truest and greatest friend a person could possess— though I should clarify that as ‘the Greeks after Plato.’ Alcibiades certainly considered the soulmark to be a physical bond. Plato-through-Socrates thought one’s mark ought to be the only physical manifestation of a spiritual bond. I recall reading that the Iroquois consider a soulmark the name of some guardian spirit that acts as a guide through life and especially through dreams, and the Inca, who believe that people have two souls, think the mark nothing more than the name of your second soul, the one that remains within the body after death.”
“In short,” said Charlotte, smiling, “it means whatever you decide it means. For my part, I think it....” She paused, considered it a moment, and then said, “I think society makes too much of it. I think it is yet another involuntary, external marker that one cannot change, and, because one cannot change it, we think it must mean something, and must define us somehow.”
Elizabeth was fascinated to hear this and begged for Charlotte to continue, “for I think you have thought more on this subject than most.”
“Indeed I have, for I am satisfied by none of the traditional explanations. I think a soulmark is merely a signpost— a warning of something significant. You must choose how and why.”
Maria considered this with great solemnity, flattered to have been allowed part in a grown-up discussion.
Elizabeth whispered to Charlotte, “But in your case—”
“I choose,” said Charlotte, after a moment, “to think God, or the universe, or whomever has let me know that I may safely trust in my own judgment and premonitions. I need no warning; I am prepared for whatever will happen.”
“You are,” said Elizabeth, pressing her hand. “I have never known anyone so pragmatic. Charlotte, I daresay you could survive an apocalypse.”
“I rather think I would,” said Charlotte, smiling, “as long as we are not relying on my jams to suppliment the blighted harvest after the sun has been extinguished. Really, it refuses to be anything but watery juice.”
Rather cheered by this, Elizabeth could at last manage the letter her father required:
Dear Papa,
I am sure you drew your own inferences from my last, where I stumbled upon the existence of one Colonel Richard Fitzwilliam. I like him a great deal. He is a most gentleman-like man, who reacts to my anger with assurances that it is justified; to my impertinence with laughter; to my jokes with jests; and to my opinions with respect. I do not know if the English, the French, or the Greek school is correct in what a soulmate is, or should be, or what precisely it means that our wrists match, but it has made me exceedingly happy on a day that would otherwise have been given over to bitter self-recriminations and deep gloom.
I must beg you to come to London at the end of the week and gave me your opinion on the subject. I have reached a conclusion, as has Colonel Fitzwilliam, but it needs your expert opinion before it can be acted upon.
I do beg, however, that you do not tell Mama. I fear she would end the debate before it had begun, and send the poor colonel back to Portugal several months early.
Yr loving daughter,
E. Bennet
***
By the end of the week, Elizabeth had received a note from her father reading:
My Lizzy,
Very well my dear, you know I cannot leave you to struggle alone with a question of philosophy. Your aunt and uncle Gardiner always tell me that I must stay with them any time I was in London, and though I hate to oblige them, I shall.
Your mother thinks I am merely spending a week or two in London with you and Jane, as I have installed a new shelf in my bookroom, and must purchase enough to fill it. You may rest easy on that score— though this Colonel Fitzwilliam of yours had better give me at least a good discussion of the Edinburgh Review, after the days of illogical insistence from your mother that I have no understanding what being a fortnight from her does to her nerves— this when she has told me many times before that I had trampled on her last one. I wonder if she will ever run out.
Yrs etc
Elizabeth could not deny the uneasiness she felt at her father’s attitude towards her mother, at how, in his disappointment, he saw his wife as merely a source of amusement, rather than love, comfort, or companionship. She had to spend a long walk with Colonel Fitzwilliam discussing their opinions on everything from Shakespeare to slavery to reassure herself that this could not be her lot. When they did not agree, Colonel Fitzwilliam listened to her with every evidence of interest, and could be, with a little work, persuaded to her side, unless he had experienced something abroad that had fixed his opinion more decidedly. But even then Colonel Fitzwilliam did not call her naive or silly, he merely explained, straightforwardly, and with examples, why he thought as he did, and listened carefully when she replied in kind. She was at first afraid that this was merely gratitude for her acceptance of something his own family did not much tolerate (she was more inclined to think her easy acceptance merely an effect of her father’s eccentricity and teachings, coupled with her own relief that she would not die an old maid); but she was reassured of his very real interest when Colonel Fitzwilliam brought up some point she had made about Plato’s Republic and Sir Thomas More’s Utopia by saying, “I have been thinking more about what you said— it was so interesting to me, I was willing to brave even Lady Catherine’s curiosity in order to get down both volumes. I shall spare you her opinions on Sir Thomas More, as they will only exasperate you, but I have been rather impatient to know what you think.”
There was only one subject on which they did not speak; Elizabeth did not ask about Mr. Darcy, and Colonel Fitzwilliam only looked angry when alluding to him. This perfectly suited Elizabeth’s feelings. She could not think about Mr. Darcy without such a sweep of shame and mortification that she grew mute.
The one evening the members of the Parsonage were invited to play cards at Rosings Mr. Darcy was found to have returned early to London. The real trial that evening was Mr. Collins, who was vexed he had not arranged the match himself, until he realized it had all been the work of Lady Catherine. This settled his sense of self-importance, as he was able then to boast that he had played a vital part in her scheme, and, as it suited Lady Catherine for her scheme to involve as many people acting upon her advice as possible, they ended the evening greater pleased with each other than before.
***
On Lady Catherine’s stately progress to London, Elizabeth and Colonel Fitzwilliam sat backwards, which they did not much mind, since it meant they could sit beside each other. Lady Catherine and Miss DeBourgh faced them, as Miss DeBourgh’s health apparently required it.
Lady Catherine spent the first of many tedious hours detailing every Earl of Matlock and his family since Charles II had created the title. Elizabeth tried to look interested, but as Lady Catherine thought it right to save all the living relations for another time, it was hard going.
Colonel Fitzwilliam never liked to be idle in the face of her distress— even so mild a case as boredom— and edged his hand closer to hers. Elizabeth shifted, so that the folds of her traveling coat masked the space between them from view. He gently maneuvered his hand over hers. Elizabeth smiled to herself and turned her palm upwards, so they lightly grasped each others’ hands. For a time the colonel was content with this, but then he gently tugged on her glove.
“It buttons,” she muttered, when Lady Catherine was distracted by Miss DeBourgh sneezing.
Though he did not shift his gaze from where Lady Catherine had last directed it, Colonel Fitzwilliam could not quite hide his smile. He managed to undo the buttons one-handed, and then rested his fingertips on the ‘Fitzwilliam’ on her wrist and the thundering pulse beneath it. Elizabeth flushed slightly in pleasure at this, and then again slightly later, when he traced the letters of her soulmark.
Elizabeth, wishing in some measure to repay the comfort and pleasure he had given her, slid her hand back to they were palm to palm (as holy palmer’s kiss, she thought irreverently), and then back again. So her fingertips rested on the underside of his palm. She traced ‘amo’ there.
It took Colonel Fitzwilliam a moment to understand what she was about but then he smiled brilliantly and wrote ‘amas.’
‘Amat,’ she replied.
‘Amamus,’ wrote he. Then, unfairly taking another turn, wrote out a careful, ‘I love you,’ with his fingertip.
Elizabeth blushed.
Colonel Fitzwilliam took advantage of a bumpy stretch of road (and Lady Catherine's subsequent ire and shouts at the driver) to lean over and whisper, “Has my Latin much improved Miss Bennet?”
“You took some liberties with your translation, sir. Only a subject is implied.”
“Do you dislike it then, when I take liberties?”
The thought was not in the least unpleasant; still pink, she replied, “About as much as you dislike making me blush.”
To this he gave no answer but a stifled laugh and a flourishing ‘te amo’ on her palm.
“What is so amusing, Fitzwilliam?” Lady Catherine demanded.
“Latin conjugations,” said he.
Lady Catherine looked suspiciously at him. “Indeed, the second Earl was known for his malapropisms in Latin. But I wish you would treat it more seriously, it kept him from public life. Anne takes it seriously.”
Miss DeBourgh endeavored to look noble.
Colonel Fitzwilliam squeezed Elizabeth's hand instead of laughing, and looked out the carriage window. The four hours to London passed much more pleasantly with this sub rosa commentary, though Elizabeth could not be really truly happy until Lady Catherine deposited her at her uncle Gardiner’s.
Jane had been keeping an eager look out and though she was too sedate and graceful a creature to rush down the steps of the Gardiner townhouse, Elizabeth was touched and pleased by Jane’s rapidity, and the enthusiasm of her embrace. “Oh Lizzy!” she whispered. “I am so very happy for you, and so very happy to see you! I cannot tell you how much I have longed to speak with you!”
Elizabeth embraced her in kind and said, “Oh Jane, how I have wanted you! But come, I must make one very pleasant introduction, and two unpleasant. The sweet first— Colonel Fitzwilliam?”
He turned from where he was attempting to mediate between Lady Catherine and her new coachman with some relief, and came up to them.
“May I present to you my eldest sister Jane?”
“A very great honor,” said he, bowing.
Jane always looked to like, and was prepared to like the Colonel from the outset; the little conversation they had, while Lady Catherine was too busy arguing about directions with her coachman to be introduced, cemented him in her good opinion. The fact that the colonel excused himself to keep Lady Catherine from firing the coachman on the spot only increased her regard.
By then Mr. and Mrs. Gardiner had come out, composed but curious, and said all was proper while Elizabeth made introductions.
“Your father is not yet arrived,” said Mrs. Gardiner, to Elizabeth, as Mr. Gardiner listened to Lady Catherine lecture him about the size of his street, a problem about which he could do precisely nothing, “but he shall be here this evening— I doubt very much that Lady Catherine will like to come, but should we invite her to dinner?”
“Perhaps we ought. Lady Catherine will see it as our duty to provide her with an invitation to decline.”
The invitation was made, accepted by Colonel Fitzwilliam, and very regally declined by Lady Catherine, who gave the excuse of her daughter’s health, and her own obligation to call on her brother the Earl of Matlock. She did not scruple to invite the Bennet sisters, the Gardiners, and the absent Mr. Bennet to dine at her brother’s not tomorrow (for that was Sunday), but the day after.
Colonel Fitzwilliam’s gentle protests that perhaps his father would like to issue his own invitations was met with a haughty, “Nonsense Fitzwilliam! He is far too busy to concern himself with such details. I shall organize the party for him. I am sure you wish to make Miss Bennet and her relations known to your own?”
His expression softened as he turned to Elizabeth. “I cannot deny that at all.”
Lady Catherine was by now tired of the lack of dignity that came from standing on a street in Cheapside, and, as all Elizabeth’s trunks had been taken away by footmen, declared that she must away, and left Elizabeth to the comfort of her family. Elizabeth distributed sweets purchased in Kent to her young cousins, eagerly quizzed her aunt and uncle on what impressions they could have of Colonel Fitzwilliam after five minutes’ acquaintance while Lady Catherine was holding forth, and then begged to be let upstairs to wash off her dust. Jane accompanied her to the room they always shared when staying in London.
“Lizzy, you must tell me everything!” Jane exclaimed, helping Elizabeth out of her traveling clothes. “How did you come to meet, how did he propose?”
This Elizabeth was glad to do but hesitated a little when she came to Mr. Darcy’s part in it. She did not yet know what, if anything she ought to relay. Some change must come from the strictures that had so wounded her, and therefore some acknowledgement of what caused her to change her behavior, but what could she say that would not hurt Jane?
She was saved from this by the shrieks of her young cousins informing them of Mr. Bennet’s arrival. Elizabeth kissed Jane and said, “I have more to tell but I must content myself with a word about Mr. Wickham: he is not at all what he seems. He treated more than one relation of the colonel’s very shamefully. For my part I am sorry I did not listen to you—and Charlotte and really everyone else. But come, Papa awaits, and perhaps I shall actually get to the proposal before we must dress for dinner!”
***
She did not. Seeing how eager his second daughter was to talk about Colonel Fitzwilliam, Mr. Bennet decided to instead have an extended conversation about a new translation of Sun Tzu’s The Art of War instead.
As soon he turned to Elizabeth with an arch air and asked, “And how has General Wellington applied this in Portugal? Has your new admirer anything to say on the subject?” Mrs. Gardiner looked at the clock and said, “You must ask Colonel Fitzwilliam yourself. He will be here soon. Lizzy, would you like me to send Kearney to you? I asked her to press the gowns you commissioned when you were in London last month; I think the red muslin turned out much better than we expected.”
Elizabeth expressed her thanks, struggling not to let her exasperation show. Her father laughed and kissed her forehead as he rose to dress.
“Come Lizzy,” said he, “don't be missish. After dinner I promise I will give you my opinion on Colonel Fitzwilliam, but I can hardly base my opinion on letters from you and Mr. Collins.”
Elizabeth was left with no very charitable feelings. She was, however, restored to equanimity upon the return of Colonel Fitzwilliam. He appeared more at ease than Elizabeth would be in a parallel situation. His manners were engaging, his conversation lively, his interest in ever member of the party sincere. Mr. Bennet was perhaps the least disposed of the party to immediately like him, but he soon found that the colonel was not a new object of ridicule, but a new accomplice in his quest to laugh at all the world. The two men were, for some time, so witty on Lord Castlereagh no one else could follow them. Elizabeth was surprised at how quickly the evening passed; they had left the men to cigars and brandy before she realized she hadn't said half of what she wished to Colonel Fitzwilliam herself.
But she turned eagerly to Jane and Mrs. Gardiner when they were alone. “And do you like him?”
“Yes, and very much for you,” said Mrs. Gardiner, “A well-informed mind that indulges in lively conversation instead of lectures is a rare thing; and for you, my dear, a necessity.”
“He is very gentleman-like,” said Jane, “and I like his manners. He and father get along very well.”
“Also a necessity,” agreed Mrs. Gardiner. Their approbation of the colonel’s manner and conversation was all Elizabeth could wish, and she had the joy of actually talking to him after dinner, and of having him turn pages for her as she played.
“I like your father extremely,” said Colonel Fitzwilliam, as she mangled her way through a Mozart sonata. “I should dearly like to sit through a play with him— the worse the melodrama the better. If there is always something to excite his ridicule I dare say we shall not fall silent all evening.”
“No indeed! I am glad you like him; I had hoped you would.” She paused and said, “And Jane. Do you like Jane? I must insist you do.”
“I doubt anyone could dislike her.” He smiled at her. “Your aunt and uncle Gardiner I like also, and I am sure the children peering at me from over the bannister I shall also like—”
Elizabeth laughed but said, “I suppose you think me over anxious about my family.”
“After the lecture Darcy gave you? No. I know why you are anxious on that head, but today you endured a four hour monologue from my aunt, whereas I had a very good dinner and an even better conversation from your very elegant aunt, your very eloquent uncle, your extremely clever father, and your very sweet-natured sister. So far it has been only my relations who deserve censure. And...” he hesitated and added, “I hope you will allow me to make my brother and sister-in-law known to you tomorrow after church, and my father as well? I should not like you to feel entirely ill at ease at dinner Monday.”
“I should like that above all things.” They were a little while at settling the details between them, then Colonel Fitzwilliam made himself agreeable to the rest of the party. It was very late when he left; Jane yawningly and quite convincingly said she was tired and ceded the room ot the others. Mr. and Mrs. Gardiner lingered a little, to give their approbation of Colonel Fitzwilliam and to agree with Elizabeth’s scheme of walking in St. James’s Park after church, if the weather proved fine, but soon abandoned the sitting room entirely to Mr. Bennet and Elizabeth.
She at once pulled an ottoman before her father’s easy chair, and asked, “Well?”
“Well, well, well,” said Mr. Bennet, flicking his gaze from his newspaper to her. “A red coat! Lydia and Kitty will be jealous. And the second son of an Earl! Your mother shall faint.”
“I do not care for their opinions,” said Elizabeth, impatiently shoving her evening bracelet up her arm. “I care for yours , and Jane’s, but I think Jane would love anyone named ‘Fitzwilliam,’ for my sake.”
Mr. Bennet folded up his paper and tossed it aside. Elizabeth had loosely folded her hands into her lap; he looked absently at the ‘Fitzwilliam’ on her wrist and said, “The more I think on it, the more I begin to believe that Voltaire was right. I always knew it was the application of education and reason that separated us from beasts, but my own experience seems to bear out his ideas on soul marks. It may well be just a person who is in some way significant to one’s life. I never told you this Lizzy, but my old wet nurse died two years ago. I would have died in my cradle if she had not come early to the room, and got me breathing again. I found out recently that she had the same name as your mother. Perhaps that is the Jane meant by this—” waving his wrist, so that his mark could be seen “— or perhaps it was your sister. Miss Jane Bennet was perhaps one of the most significant changes in my life, and, once she was old enough to take the housekeeping from your mother, she changed all for the better. Perhaps she may keep me from eating spoiled meat someday, or she will be the one to comfort me in my old age. It is impossible to know.”
“You do not like him,” said Elizabeth, shocked.
“No, no, I like him more than I had anticipated— more indeed than I thought I would like any man who proposed to take you from Longbourn. But Lizzy, I must beg you not to think you must marry a man because his name happens to be on your wrist.”
“Even if my name is on his? Papa—”
“Society is frequently wrong,” said Mr. Bennet. “Do not feel obligated to obey it in this case. I did, and I regret it daily.”
“I do fear society’s censure, but that is a different point—”
“Lizzy,” said her father seriously, “if you have any doubts at all, my girl, do not marry him . Your lively talents give you greater odds of being trapped in an unequal marriage, and I could not bear it if you were to make the same mistake I have.”
“And if I like him— indeed, if I think I might love him?” Elizabeth demanded, feeling unequal to her father’s caprice. “Father, do not think I would marry a man just because his name is ‘Fitzwilliam.’ If I did, I would marry Mr. Darcy.”
“ He was christened Fitzwilliam? The mind rebels. Mr. Darcy, your soulmate! He never looked at you but to criticize.”
“Oh he has done considerably worse— and I shall tell you of it once we have settled this point.” She shewed her father her bared wrist. “You see my mark; Colonel Fitzwilliam’s reads ‘Bennet.’ But I do not propose to marry him based on that alone. I think you yourself saw how much we agree on, and how our preferences and thoughts align. He is most truly the gentleman; I enjoy his company exceedingly; I— I do not know what proofs you require, father, to know that I am most sincerely attached to Colonel Fitzwilliam. I look upon this—” shaking her wrist “—merely as a bridge over the insurmountable obstacles that would have separated us otherwise. I think he would have liked me, but would not have seriously considered me if this was not treated as so heavy an argument in favor of matrimony all fiscal and social difficulties fade— well, not fade , never fade, merely pale in significance.”
Mr. Bennet looked at her with a sort of sad amusement. “A cynic ever, is my Lizzy. Would you have been affected by him, without the mark?”
“Indeed I should, but I would have been too conscious of the difference of our stations to allow any strong affection to take root.”
“You, Lizzy?”
“Yes, I.” She sighed. “I suppose I cannot keep off the other point I am most desirous to make. The day before Colonel Fitzwilliam proposed, Mr. Darcy paid me a private visit.” This was quickly gone over; Mr. Bennet chuckled at it, and Elizabeth felt, for perhaps the first time, a sense of shame at her father’s tendency to laugh at censure than learn from it.
“His criticisms were true,” protested Elizabeth. “I cannot think the inferiority of my connections is so horrible an obstacle to overcome, but the great impropriety of the imprudent and unguarded manner that Mama possesses and has passed onto Mary, Kitty, and Lydia in varying degrees— that is much harder got over. Colonel Fitzwilliam has never met them, so he makes light of such a difficulty, but I cannot help but think Mr. Darcy is right! The Earl of Matlock is active in the House of Lords, and his heir, Lord Stornoway scarcely less so; Lady Stornoway, his daughter-in-law, is a very respectable political hostess. Their disapprobation—”
“— would be enough for Colonel Fitzwilliam to change his mind? I doubt that, Lizzy. I doubt that exceedingly. Given his aunt is Lady Catherine, he does not strike me as a man to be put off by connection to absurdity and, unless I very much mistake matters, he is too much in love with you to let anything but a decisive break with his family keep you from him.”
Elizabeth blushed. “If you think that, then why do you talk as if I should be making a terrible mistake in marrying him?”
“You may not,” said Mr. Bennet. “I myself cannot tell his character from one meeting where he was exerting himself to be agreeable. I only urge caution. I could not bear to see you miserable, Lizzy, when a little effort on my part could prevent it.”
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