Chapter 21
“He loves me,” Elizabeth murmured into her aunt’s ear before the Sunday dinner, at which she sometimes joined them—the only time she ever left the Academy to see her family.
Mrs Gardiner looked at her in astonishment. “Of course he loves you; he told you so—”
“Oh,” sighed Elizabeth, pressing her hand to her breast as if to still the furious beating of her heart, which pained her. “Then why is he engaged?”
“An angry man does nothing but foolish things.”
Both knew, in truth, that the real question was another: why had she not understood, then, in Kent, that she loved him? How had she not hesitated, even for a moment, to refuse him?
“I did not feel, in his presence, the sentiment I expected. Perhaps I began to love him only when I lost him.”
“Enough!” Mrs Gardiner spoke somewhat firmly. Elizabeth required no further words; she understood their meaning. Jane, suffering for Mr Bingley, was heard by all, for in her case there was hope—small, fragile, yet existent—and thatvery hope which had brought her to London had, indeed, proved their salvation. But in Elizabeth’s case, the road was closed for ever. To speak of it was nothing more than a useless exercise, stirring an open wound, prolonging pain…to no purpose.
“It is not possible to forget him by any effort of will…that is folly, my dear,” her aunt continued. “Yet it is no folly to believe that time heals all things. Popular wisdom is oft the soundest guide—each day that passes will carry you further from your sorrow, and there will come a day when you shall feel only the scar; it will trouble you, but it will not pain you.”
“I wish to believe so,” Elizabeth murmured, and her aunt affectionately pressed her hand.
“You shall see,” Mrs Gardiner replied with gentleness.
Yet that same wisdom must surely have neglected to say when forgetfulness might truly begin—or how long it would take her to forget him, through days and nights beyond number—when at last the moment would come in which she would have nothing more to do with him. For now, between Miss Darcy and the approaching marriage of her sister Jane to his friend Mr Bingley, forgetfulness was impossible, and Time, in her case, was powerless.
The mere sight of his sister’s sweet smile was enough to plunge Elizabeth violently back into her most profound regret and pain. The resemblance between them was peculiar and moving. Had Miss Darcy been proud and haughty like her brother, all would have been easier to endure. Still, she was gentle, kind, and amiable. By a strange and painful process of imagination, Elizabeth, whenever she closed her eyes, could see him as she saw his sister—smiling, warm, and tender, as he might have become had she said yes. She had glimpsed that side of him once or twice, as a brief illumination—especially when he spoke of Miss Darcy, of his mother, or of Pemberley.
She could not forget him; she thought that perhaps she might succeed only in the autumn, after his sister’s departure and Jane’s marriage, when she would see him no more. Mary, who suspected nothing, contributed in her turn to keeping the pain alive, for she sometimes spoke to her of Miss Darcy. After a day’s work, she would throw herself beside Elizabeth upon the bed—exactly as Jane had done at Longbourn—and tell her all the little tales of the girls; for it was interesting to know them in that way, and, to Elizabeth’s surprise, Mary seemed to communicate with them easily.
“Imagine—Mr Darcy once told Miss Darcy of a lady named Elizabeth, a woman he admired. What a coincidence that you share the same name! The rascal was fortunate—”
“He is no rascal,” Elizabeth interposed, for she did not like even her own family to speak ill of him.
“He is not exactly a rascal,” Mary allowed, “but his arrogance may be taken for a kind of villainy.” Mary had never liked him, nor did she try to hide it, for there appeared no reason to alter her opinion. Her sister had, with good reason, refused him, and he had since become merely a subject for her idle afternoon gossip.
“He told Miss Darcy about me?” Elizabeth could not refrain from asking.
“Yes, indeed. Before Kent, and though he said no more, she guessed it must be of his future wife, for it was the first time her brother had ever spoken of a lady. And now she believes it to be Lady Elizabeth! How convenient.”
“Yes, it is simpler for him,” Elizabeth admitted; yet when Mary was gone, she remained desolate. Fitzwilliam had loved her for so long—he had spoken her name to his sister—proving that the struggle within him, of which he had so openly spoken, had not been as fierce as he had claimed; for he had named her aloud, thus betraying his affection long before Kent. Even a girlof sixteen had understood as much. And he would never have done so, had her image not already possessed his heart and his decision to marry her already been formed.
These incidents did her no good; just as Mrs Gardiner had said, they disturbed her needlessly and delayed that healing which time, she had hoped, would accomplish.
Yet, to her comfort, when she was exceedingly busy, he faded from her mind; and the Academy, in those days, afforded her no moment of repose.
∞∞∞
In the last fortnight of the school term, the whole Academy departed for Hampstead. Once again, Elizabeth realised how fortunate she was to be entrusted with such a mission.
The house was not as large as that in London, yet it possessed a peculiar charm that captivated her from the first moment. Situated within a park much smaller than that of Rosings, it nevertheless united the elegance and warmth of a garden overflowing with flowers. She soon discovered, behind the house, a narrow path leading to a marvellous pond, encircled by willows—wild, yet possessing that peculiar magnificence which only nature can bestow when it has not been too much tamed by man. In a short time, that spot became her favourite retreat, where each day she withdrew to listen to the water and the murmuring of the trees.
Her apartment was far more graceful than that in London—if such a thing were possible. Mr Clinton smiled when she made this confession. “This was Margaret’s favourite house, and the apartment she arranged herself; I have left it unchanged.”
The cheerfulness that pervaded the house soon caught her also. The young ladies, freed from studies, came there at the end of the year for open-air pursuits, games, and lessons on nature, which were taught outdoors. For at least one hour each day, the young ladies painted the lovely landscapes around them. Then everything culminated in a grand ball, to which their relatives were invited.
“The more, the merrier,” Mr Clinton would say—words which Mrs Clinton repeated every year.
It was a splendid ball, with an orchestra and a magnificent buffet such as Elizabeth had never seen before. She was fortunate in Mrs Robertson, who knew every detail of each event.
She knew that Mr Darcy could not possibly be absent, and tried hard to consider in what manner she might avoid him without allowing anyone to perceive her intention. Then, on the evening of the ball, as she stood before the great mirror in the hall, she heard Mary behind her exclaim, “This evening, I assure you, you are so beautiful that you might tempt a prince himself.”
