I tried to take comfort in the fact I still had the ribbons. Nothing gave them away as Kitty’s. The only thing suspicious about them was how hidden away they were. I knew they would be safer left in plain sight, so I relocated them alongside my own hair ribbons in the drawer of my dressing table. It felt like madness to store them so openly and irreverently, but it was for the best.
When everything was done, I slumped onto the end of the bed, feeling more alone than ever. I missed Elizabeth and Darcy. I missed Kitty. The only ally I had near Rosings was Charlotte, and I didn’t think it likely I would be granted leave to visit her anytime soon. Especially not after my most recent outburst.
I sat there, waiting for the repercussions of my actions to find their way to me. The knock that sounded at the door almost a full hour after I burned the first letter still managed to make me jump. I considered climbing to my feet and standing demurely to show my regret, but I wasn’t feeling particularly regretful. More than anything, I just felt even more lonely than before. I wished I could have read Kitty’s words and, even if I had been the one to destroy them, it was my aunt who had left me with no other choice. I would not stand piously in deference.
Regardless of my lack of greeting, the door to my bedroom was pushed open anyway. I looked up to find Anne standing in the doorway. She seemed more tentative than vengeful, but I didn’t doubt she was paying me a visit only at Lady Catherine’s request. She was no one I could tell anything remotely approaching the truth to.
“Is everything all right?” Anne asked, taking a seat next to me on the bed. “My mother is worried about you.”
I laughed bitterly, unconvinced. “She is angry.”
Anne could have denied it, but after a moment she corrected herself.
“I am worried about you,” she said quietly. “You are not…”
I was not refined. I was not well-behaved. I was not polite. I was not following a single rule of etiquette despite a rigorous upbringing that rivalled Anne’s. Any ending would have been accurate, but she was kinder than my imagination seemed willing to give her credit for.
“You are not happy here,” she eventually finished. “Is there anything I can do?”
“I do not want to be here,” I admitted.
Anne nodded slowly. My confession was obvious, but I wasn’t willing to say anything more. I would not gamble with Kitty’s safety, and I was afraid if I started talking, I would say too much. Rather than asking why, Anne sat with me in a silence that began awkward but slowly turned comforting. It was broken only after several minutes.
“I can get a letter to someone, if you need to send one,” Anne offered. “She does not check my post.”
If I wasn’t so afraid of Lady Catherine suspecting something and reading Anne’s letters, too, or of Anne herself learning too much, I would have jumped at the chance to communicate with Kitty, but I still could not bear the risk. I thanked Anne all the same and forced a smile I hoped did not seem as weak as it felt. She rose from the bed and squeezed my shoulder.
“I will tell her you are feeling unwell,” she promised. “That ought to give you some peace for a little while, and she may be a little more understanding of your outburst if you blame it on a fever. I would certainly advise you to keep your distance until her mood has had time to recover. Perhaps I will see you for breakfast tomorrow?”
“Thank you,” I said, genuinely appreciative of her attempts to help. I did not doubt she was risking her mother’s wrath if she was found to be comforting me.
After Anne took her leave, I followed her advice and confined myself to my room. She had seemingly made good on her promise to convey my state of ill health as food was brought to me and I was offered hot soup and tea. All I wanted to do was read Kitty’s original letter, but when I raked through the ash in the fireplace, not a single scrap of her writing remained. It was better this way, but it still tore my heart apart.
Without a chessboard or piano or library to pass the time, I found myself reading throughThe Disposition of an English Lady. Every page talked of a woman’s duty to her husband, how she ought to conduct herself to please and complement him.
It was not news to me that there was no mention of a woman taking a wife, for I knew the idea was practically unthinkable to almost everyone, but even living alone seemed out of reach of the author’s conceptualisations. To be married and unhappy was a greater fate than to be happily a spinster, it seemed, and to happily spend one’s life with another woman was beyond even imagination.
I thought of Charlotte’s words. She had been forced to make a choice, but if it was a choice, then she could picture another option, a version that wouldn’t have ended with her married to William Collins in a parsonage in Hunsford. A version that sounded like it might not have featured a man at all. If she could imagine that, I wanted her to teach me. Icouldn’t see a way to being able to be with Kitty, but if there was one, then I had to know. I just needed to get back to Charlotte, and for that I had to appease my aunt.
I descended to breakfast the following morning expecting fire and brimstone. A restless night had left me tired enough that Anne’s story of me having a fever could easily have been true. Regardless, I had dressed impeccably, ensuring not a single hair on my head was out of place and no wrinkle dared crease my skirts. There was already enough about me for Lady Catherine to criticise without providing her with further stones to throw.
Rather than exploding at me, my aunt sat silently through breakfast. It was worse this way. An icy surface that hid turbulent waters was more dangerous than the waters alone, lulling you into a false sense of safety. I refused to be deceived, staying on guard for what I knew for sure would be coming. When she finally spoke, I did not even flinch.
“I have been considering an apt punishment for your actions yesterday,” she said calmly as she set her teacup down on the table with a delicate clink of china. “It occurred to me that perhaps you are not deserving of my tuition, but after much thought and no small degree of graciousness on my behalf, I believe I owe it to your mother to do my best to turn you from any erroneous path you have begun down. There’s still good blood in you. It would be remiss of me to already consider you a lost cause.”
“I don’t understand,” I said, barely louder than a whisper.
“My nephew clearly allowed your education to continue improperly after it was left to him, but there’s no reason some further lessons won’t be able to undo the damage and shape you into a becoming young woman, ready to make this advantageous match to Lord Salter and be worthy of your lineage.”
She made it sound like we were descendants of royalty. The best thing about my brother had never been the surname on his calling cards or the money in his accounts but the loyalty and patience he showed the people he cared for. I hoped no one truly believed that the best thing about me was my parentage. Kitty’s delight at the languages I spoke, the chess games I could always best her at, and the music I played made me feel like a person worth valuing, but not because of my name.
It seemed clear Lady Catherine would not be giving up. Part of me had hoped that perhaps she would decide me not worth the trouble and refuse to allow me to remain at Rosings, but instead I was to remain even more firmly under her thumb. I expressed gratitude I did not feel in an attempt not to make things worse. I needed her to trust me again.
Once breakfast was cleared away, I took my place in the drawing room and picked up the embroidery I’d abandoned at the first sight of Kitty’s letter the day before. I kept my head down, stabbing the needle through the fabric with more force than was strictly necessary. It made my stitches even more uneven and poorly tensioned, but it was an effective channel for my anger.
Chapter Twenty
I did everything as Lady Catherine dictated. She told me daily how much more work was needed on my deportment, mannerisms, and general countenance before Lord Salter would consider me a suitable wife, but the month’s deadline he had set was fast wearing out. I did not have long to find a chance to return to the parsonage and speak to Charlotte again.
