I knew she meant her suitors.
“Maybe the next few days will give you more insight,” I said kindly. “What are you doing now? Can I help you get ready for dinner?”
“I’m just about to take my health cordial,” she said with a sigh. “I hate it so, but grandmother insists on it.”
“What is in it?” I asked curiously, looking at the little vial, because the contents smelled atrocious.
“I don’t know,” Anne replied, wrinkling up her nose. “I just know Grandmama says it will improve my looks.”
I don’t know to this day if it was because I was irritated at Lady Catherine’s calm assumption that I should spend the day at the pigsties, but I said, “That doesn’t smell all that healthy, Miss Anne. Sometimes these modern beauty treatments aren’t very healthy. Why don’t you try going without for a few days and see how you feel?”
I held out my hand for the tonic. She hesitated for a moment. But I held my hand out firmly, and her weaker will bent under my stronger one. She handed me the vial.
“Well, let’s go out to dinner,” I said. “Your dress is very fine tonight.”
She smiled at me. “You look very well, too, Mrs. Collins. Green suits you.”
I sniffed and said nothing. Compliments passed right over my head, because I didn’t believe any of them. I looked neat and suitable, and that was all.
*
I happened to be behind Anne as she walked in the room for dinner, and I observed three men’s faces as they saw her. They all said what was right and proper, but I only saw one face light up quickly with a warm look, and that was Mr. Crawford thesolicitor. I heard Anne smooth a strand of her already-neat hair as she met his eyes, and suddenly I knew.
Anne didn’t want either Mr. Radcliffe or Sir Francis. She was in love with Mr. Crawford the solicitor.
And Lady Catherine would never countenance this match! I recalled how angry she had been when her nephew Mr. Darcy had married Elizabeth Bennet, and there was a much greater distance between her daughter and Mr. Crawford.
I tried to stifle a sigh as I felt Anne glowing beside me. Love was a very inconvenient thing, causing all sorts of problems. I was glad Mr. Collins and I were not afflicted with the malady.
I wondered if it was as obvious to anyone else as it was to me that Anne preferred Mr. Crawford to her other suitors.
I had been placed by Mr. Crawford at dinner, and accordingly I engaged him in conversation.
I could hear my husband’s loud, booming voice, so admirable for preaching to a large number of people on Sundays, but now quite loud at the table as he and Lady Catherine discussed her invitation. “Your affability and condescension are beyond all bounds,” he said, the glasses rattling slightly at his voice. They moved onto discussing the quality of the silverware and I asked Mr. Crawford about his practice. He spoke quietly and kindly to me, and I was impressed by him.
“Your husband has quite a powerful voice,” he said, smiling at me.
“Yes, he does,” I replied, because I was quite used to visitors having difficulty adjusting to Mr. Collins.
“I like it,” Mr. Crawford went on. “My clergyman has such a sleepy, lugubrious voice that I often feel a wicked urge to nap in church. I bet this is not a problem in Mr. Collins’ parish.”
I felt a pleased flush come into my cheeks, and I dropped my eyes to my plate. The warm feeling inside me was because I was proud, I suddenly realized. Proud of the compliment Williamhad been given. I looked up under my short lashes at Mr. Collins on the other end of the table. In a voice so loud it seemed to shake the rafters, he was commending the fine leg of lamb.
Well, itwasa very fine leg of lamb. We always had very handsome dinners at Rosings.
I was impressed with Mr. Crawford. He asked me questions and listened to the answers.
He would make an admirable husband for Anne, I realized. That was exactly the kind of man she needed! Someone quiet and reserved, but who listened attentively. Someone like that would help her come out of her shell and blossom after living her whole life under Lady Catherine’s thumb.
I sent a fervent prayer up that Mr. Crawford was not either the acrostic thief or a madman who went about letting pigs out of their warm, safe homes.
In due course, Mr. Crawford turned to speak to Anne’s former governess, Mrs. Jenkins, who sat on his other side.
I was less impressed with Mr. Radcliffe, sitting onmyother side, who barely afforded me a glance, tucking deeply into his dinner as if it was the last one he would ever have. Perhaps he or his family wasn’t as wealthy as he pretended they were? I would have to see if Mr. Darcy or Mr. Bingley knew anything more about him when they came to visit.
I could hear Sir Francis rambling on with a long and tedious anecdote of a leg of lamb he had once had at his aunt’s house that ended up being stolen off the table by a dog who had been accidentally let into the dining room.
The anecdote took a long time to tell, and was accompanied by many of Sir Francis’ own nervous giggles, and Lady Catherine was not encouraging, only saying, “very droll” when he finished, in a disapproving manner.
