“Then I suspect it was Anne de Bourgh. If you recall, Mr. Collins referred to her several times when he stayed with us in November.”
Eyes wide, proving Kitty remembered, she nodded without saying a word.
“If Mr. Wickham came to Meryton with a woman of Anne de Bourgh’s position in society, it can presage nothing good,” continued Mary. “Now, what happened after?”
It was more of their inability to behave themselves, for it was Mary’s firm opinion they should have rebuffed Mr. Wickham’s request. When Kitty recited Lydia’s insistence on telling Mr. Wickham what they had seen of Elizabeth and Anne, she turned a scowl on her youngest sister, which the girl returned in equal measure. The final bit of crowning glory of Lydia’s foolishness was her wish to accompany Mr. Wickham in his carriage to Longbourn.
“You did well to refuse to even entertain such a notion as traveling in Mr. Wickham’s carriage,” said Mary, smiling at her younger sister. “It was, as you noted, improper in the extreme to even consider going with him.”
“We would have been each other’s chaperone!” exclaimed Lydia, throwing her hands up and stalking about in a temper. “Why can you not see that?”
“Yet it is still improper,” maintained Mary. “I would not have thought you so blind, Lydia.”
“Do not lecture me, Mary. I know how to behave.”
“And yet you rarely betray this knowledge to anyone else.”
Lydia glared, but she did not respond, curious as the girl rarely allowed anyone else to have the last word in an argument. Mary ignored her in favor of Kitty.
“Where is Mr. Wickham now?”
Kitty frowned and looked down the street. “His carriage was there,” said she, pointing at a position perhaps halfway between the southern and northern edges of town. “He must have departed while Lydia and I argued.”
There was little enough they could do. Mr. Wickham would go to Longbourn and if he did not reach Lizzy and her guest before they reached the safety of the estate, Mary could not imagine her father handing the woman over to his care. Though indolent, her father was no fool. What might happen should he come across them before they reached Longbourn Mary did not wish to consider, for she could not imagine it would go at all well for them. Or at least for this Miss de Bourgh—Mary did not suppose Mr. Wickham had any interest in Elizabeth, not if he meant to make his escape with Miss de Bourgh.
Then again, thought Mary with a grimace, she also could not imagine Elizabeth allowing the man to leave with Miss de Bourgh without a fight. Mary had the firmest reliance on Elizabeth’s determination when she thought she was in the right, and there was no question Elizabeth would believe herself correct in such a situation.
“How long before Mr. Wickham departed did you see Elizabeth and Jane escorting Miss de Bourgh toward Longbourn?”
Kitty turned to Lydia who only scowled.
“Perhaps ten minutes?”
Mary quickly calculated the distance and relative speeds of the carriage against the walkers. “Then I suspect they will reach Longbourn before Mr. Wickham can arrive. That is for the best.”
“What do you mean?” asked Lydia with a frown.
“For heaven’s sake, Lydia!” exclaimed Mary. “Use your head for something other than a place to carry your bonnet! Mr. Wickham has brought Miss de Bourgh here for some purpose of his own, but his overall objective must be marriage to control her dowry. If Elizabeth somehow convinced her it was not wise and hurried her to Longbourn, do you suppose Mr. Wickham will be content to allow her to escape his clutches?”
“I never thought Mr. Wickham so bad as this,” said Lydia, every other feeling giving way to shock.
“As I know little of the man,” retorted Mary, a little more sharply than she intended, “I cannot say. What you told me suggests he is not a man to be trusted, regardless of the front he presented to the community when he was here.”
“Then what should we do?” asked Kitty.
“We should make for home at once,” replied Mary. “Though I have little notion that we may assist, it would be best if we put ourselves behind Longbourn’s walls as soon as may be.”
Mary began to walk, hearing her sisters’ footsteps hurriedly approaching a moment later.
“Do you suppose he might turn to one of us?” asked Kitty, a little of her fretful nature coming to the fore.
“We have not much fortune to give,” said Lydia. “Not next to the wealth Miss de Bourgh must surely possess.”
Mary, however, was considering other stratagems, ploys that a libertine might employ to advance his designs. Would Mr. Bennet, for example, continue to protect Miss de Bourgh if Mr. Wickham had one of his daughters in his clutches? Mary could not say Mr. Wickham was so morally bankrupt as all this, but she was not about to test the theory either. Thus, Mary hurried her sisters along.
Chapter XI
Longbourn’s sitting-room had always been a cozy, welcoming sort of place in Elizabeth’s opinion. The room exuded warmth and family, the décor consisting of light patterned wallpaper, the furniture well-fashioned, made of fine designs in keeping with the rest of the room. It perhaps did not match the opulence of the great room at Rosings Park, but then again, Longbourn could not compare with the venerable estate in Kent.
