You refuse to extend me hospitality; to a clergyman like myself. You also spurned my request for you to prefer me to the living in your gift even though it should be mine. Further, you tell me that I will never be allowed to marry any of your daughters!
Given your ungenerous words, the day you pass from this world can only be into the fires of hell. Your widow and unmarried daughters will be turned out of the house. For all I care they can starve in the hedgerows. In fact, so much the better.
Be on notice I will check and see that every stick of furniture, every piece of silver, plate, etc, etc. is where it should be according to the inventory. If one item is missing, I will have your widow and daughters arrested for theft.
Just because your eldest daughter used her arts and allurements to entrap a viscount, it does not follow any of your other daughters will be disposed of in marriage. The offer I was willing to make would have been the only offer any one of the rest of them would ever receive.
God will be good to me and see to it that a Collins assumes his rightful place as master of Longbourn sooner rather than later.
I take no leave of you, Mr. Bennet. I send no compliments to your wife or daughters. You deserve no such attention. I am most seriously displeased.
W C Collins, Curate
This letter decides it. I will pursue a simple recovery,” Bennet stated as he shook his head at William Collins’ childlike reaction to being denied what he had decided he deserved.
“You have no choice Thomas,” Fanny agreed. “No matter how many estates we own, we cannot allow such a man to be master over our dependants. He is a bully and I am positive he would destroy the estate inside of a year.”
“You will hear no disagreement from me, Fanny my dear. I will go see Philips in the morning on the morrow.”
Chapter 34
While Darcy supervised the harvests with his steward, his heart was more than a hundred miles to the south. Occasionally when he and his steward were speaking, Chalmers had to repeat something to gain his attention.
One evening he was seated in his study, a tray on his desk with a dinner plate thereon. He saw no point in using one of the dining parlours when he was alone at his estate. He looked at the calendar. It was but a few days to the one-month anniversary of Anne’s and Uncle Lewis’s passing.
In less than two weeks he would enter half mourning, but more importantly, Cousin Elizabeth’s mourning would be complete. By this time though, he thought of her as simplyElizabeth.
Darcy did not want to make assumptions, but in his opinion, she was not indifferent to him. She had taken as much pleasure from their walks in Kent as he had. Even though he had given her a choice each time, she had always chosen his company over a solitary ramble on her walks.
When he made his way south in about a sennight he would know more based on the way she would react to his return to her presence.
Not wanting Cook to scold him for not eating enough, Darcy turned to the delicious smelling meal on the tray in front of him. Once he began to eat, his body reminded him how hungry he was and soon he had cleaned his plates leaving Cook no cause to repine.
~~~~~~~/~~~~~~~
At the militia encampment just outside of Oxford, the officers were supervising their soldiers who were striking the camp.
Ordering soldiers around and not having to do anything himself suited Wickham just fine. He sauntered over to where Denny was imparting some instructions to a sergeant who was listening attentively. The sergeant gave a smart salute and made for a group of men to carry out the lieutenant’s orders.
“Tell me Denny, did you see pretty girls in the town where we are moving to?” Wickham enquired nonchalantly.
“Some, however we were told there is a group of sisters who are the jewels of the county, and are in mourning for someone in their family. Hence, we never met them,” Denny responded.
“Any one of the locals with a dowry of interest?” Wickham questioned.
“No, the estates in the area are not large, and from what I heard tell, the largest dowries are only one, mayhap two thousand pounds,” Denny related. “There is one larger and more prosperous estate in the neighbourhood, called Netherfield Park, but the owner lives at his primary estate and leases out the local one.”
‘Such a pity there is no one there with a decent dowry. If only my plan to acquire Georgiana Darcy’s had not gone awry. However, if thesejewelsare pretty enough I would not mind taking a tumble with some of them,’ Wickham thought.
“I will return to my men,” Wickham stated as he inclined his head. Denny had no useful information to impart so he had become bored talking to him.
“Do not forget we depart at first light on the morrow,” Denny reminded Wickham as the latter walked away.
Wickham nodded. He knew what time they were tobegin their move to Hertfordshire in the morning. The early mornings were one of the things he detested about the militia.
His illusion about strutting around in his uniform charming young ladies with his good looks, regardless of the angle of his nose, and doing nothing much else, had been shattered in Wickham’s first days of being an officer. Much to his chagrin he was expected to perform his duties, which included—some days—rising from his warm bed at the crack of dawn and others being up all night.
The first and only time he had missed relieving another officer from his overnight duties, a bucket of cold water had been emptied on him as he lay in his bed. If that were not bad enough, the Colonel had punished him by giving him a fortnight of consecutive night duty.
