“I could have relieved you of your worries years ago, but I was enjoying being amused instead. The behaviour of both of us, if examined, is not above reproach. As my mother used to say: learn from the past, but then only remember it as that remembrance gives you pleasure. It is advice we both need to follow.” Bennet paused for a moment to cogitate. “Fanny, will you join me when I address our girls?”
“Yes, Thomas, I most certainly will,” Fanny insisted.
~~~~~~~/~~~~~~~
“No! I will not take lessons with a governess; Mamma told me all I need is to be…” Lydia stared at her mother with wide eyes after the latter had slapped her cheek.
“Unless you want to be locked in the nursery until the new governess is chosen and employed, you, Lydia Hattie Bennet, will not speak to your father or me in that fashion. Do you understand me?” Fanny demanded. “I blame myself for indulging you in ways I never should have, but that stops right now.”
Her mother had not slapped her hard, but the shock that she had slapped her was far more powerful than the strength of the blow. Lydia could not fathom how it was that the mother who would never deny her anything she wanted, even if said thing belonged to one of her sisters, was telling her she would have to take lessons from some stuffy old governess. All Lydia could hope was that Mamma would come to her senses soon, and things would go back to normal. “I understand,” Lydia hissed.
The three eldest Bennet sisters looked on in wonder. They thought they must be dreaming to see the day when Mamma was willing to discipline Lydia. They had long hoped for this day but had never felt they could articulate that to either parent.
For her part, the second youngest Bennet did not know what to think. If Mamma no longer liked the way Lyddie behaved, did that mean she did not have to follow her youngest sister to gain Mamma’s approbation? Perhaps it was time to look to her three older sisters as examples.
“Come, Kitty, let us go play,” Lydia insisted as she stood.
“No, Lydia, I will remain here until I hear everything Mamma and Papa have to say,” Catherine responded.
Lydia was about to come pull Kitty up when her father’s words froze her.
“Firstly, I have not given you leave to depart this room, so sit down, Lydia!” Bennet commanded. “Also, forthwith your next older sister is to be called Catherine, as she was named. No more Kitty. Before you claim it is what your mother calls her, you may ask her, but she agrees with me on this.”
After sitting, Lydia looked at her mother and saw the truth of her father’s words in Mamma’s challenging look. She crossed her arms over her chest and pouted.
By the time her parents released her and her sisters, Lydia began to worry that this change would not be transitory.
~~~~~~~/~~~~~~~
A sennight later a list of names and their characters for possible ladies to fill the posts the Bennets were looking for was received from the Gardiners.
Two names were recommended above all others. Maddie wrote that Lady Elaine Fitzwilliam, the Countess of Matlock, could not speak well enough about the two, who happened to be sisters.
The older of the two, Mrs Alicia Annesley, had been married to a minor gentleman with an exceedingly small, unentailed estate. He had lost it all, including her dowry, before being shot for cheating at the tables, thus leaving his young widow to fend for herself.
She and her younger sister were very well educated. The younger sister had been living with Alicia on her husband’s estate since their parents had died, because that estate had devolved to some male cousin thanks to an entail to heirs male after their father’s death. The sister’s name was Miss Jemima Firth. Mrs Annesley was in her mid-thirties and her sister was soon to be thirty. Their situation dictated the need to go into service as governesses, so they did.
The sisters had always tried to find a situation where they could be together, or at the very least close to one another. It was why the possibility of both of them being employed at Longbourn was so attractive to the Firth sisters. They were both highly educated, and the older sister knew what was needed to be an effective mistress of an estate.
At Bennet’s request, Maddie and Gardiner escorted the sisters to Longbourn. It was not a long interview for both Fanny and Bennet to agree they wanted both ladies to work with their daughters.
The offers were made, and the sisters accepted with alacrity.
Chapter 13
In the early days of Mrs Annesley’s and Miss Firth’s tenure at Longbourn, the four eldest Bennet sisters soaked up anything they were willing to teach. Even the mistress of the estate spent time—in private—with the older sister so she could learn both the duties of an estate’s mistress and how to behave in a way which befit her position in society.
The one exception was the youngest Bennet, who tried to resist every attempt to educate her and moderate her behaviour. With the support of both the master and mistress, Miss Firth consigned Miss Lydia to be locked in the nursery anytime she misbehaved.
It took some weeks before Lydia accepted that her mother would not revert back to who she had been and support her like she used to. In fact, rather than condemn the nasty Miss Firth for punishing her, Mamma praised the governess. Not only that but her mother, who had encouraged Lydia’s liveliness, kept on insisting on proper behaviour. In the face of such consistent resistance, Lydia finally began to be open to the lessons.
As soon as she started to cooperate and moderate her behaviour, Lydia discovered that learning was not boring. It did not hurt that, like her older sisters, Lydia was not unintelligent; she had simply hidden that part of herself. An added advantage was becoming closer to all of her sisters.
Mary and Catherine loved their lessons. The former enjoyed the broadening of subjects beyond those Papa had taught them. As soon as the latter had broken her dependence on Lydia, Catherine had discovered that she was included in the bonds of sisterhood she had witnessed between her three older sisters. She also realised that it was not her sisters whohad excluded her, but she who had not accepted the hand of friendship when it had been offered in the past, all because Lydia had decided it should be that way.
Jane and Elizabeth did not have structured lessons in the way their three younger sisters did, but Mrs Annesley had begun to teach them what they would need to know if they ever entered London society. Part of this was so they would be ready when they would be presented to the Queen one day.
When Mrs Annesley could not spend time with Fanny during the times she was busy with her daughters, she met with both Mrs Hursts either at Longbourn or Netherfield Park.
