CHAPTER NINETEEN
That night, I savoured every word written of Longbourn by Mr Bennet’s daughters. All three ladies had written a page. Jane Bennet’s hand was as serenely elegant as her person. She wrote of the weather, which was mild, of the neighbours, who sent well wishes to her father, and of the complacency and happiness with which they anticipated Christmas.
Mary Bennet wrote more charmingly than she spoke, using large, rounded strokes. She gave her father an artless summary of her reading, liberally sprinkled every sentence with her deep sense of morality, and expressed a kind of existential hope for the unending improvement of mankind. It was precisely the sentiment that every coming new year inspires in the hearts of idealists the world over, and I hoped her father would reply rather more gently than he might wish.
With my heart in my throat, I turned to the page I had purposely set aside for last. Like the veritable mooncalf, I ran my finger over the script, slanted, sharp, and gorgeous to behold.
Papa,
I do not call you dearest because you have caused Jane to worry. You know we have been on pins and needles to hear of your safe arrival, and you should be ashamed to have waited so long to write. And now I must tell you what my sisters will not.
Half the tenants are sick with a cough, the rector has visited us twice over twice in the mistaken belief we need his lugubrious consolation at his time of year, and Sir William and Lady Lucas have continued to be curious about your stay in Derbyshire. Aunt Philips, too, has been relentless in her questions, and if you do not send me a diagram of the number of rooms, fireplaces, and windows, you must at least speculate on the amount of silver and plate to be found at Pemberley. I know you shall do so because only you would find her vulgar curiosity amusing.
It has been well over a year since I have taken you to task for anything. You have been too mild and, dare I point out, pitiful, to chastise. I can do so safely now, having seen with my own eyes your horribleletter. Jane is knitting you a scarf, thinking you are indeed cold all day and fretting you might come down with a fever. I hope you are at least a little sorry, though I admit that the resumption of your pranks is a cause for reluctant joy. But you must promise to spare Miss Darcy, at least, and Mrs Annesley, too, for they are far too well bred to be played with.
And now I must close with the assurance that I did just as you privately asked me to do on the day you asked me to do it. Mama’s gravestone is cleared of slush and covered with holly branches, juniper, and ribbons fashioned into a sort of pretty, festive hatchment. It was the best I could do without hot house flowers which would have wilted in an hour. And when Jane slipped out to visit Mama later that day, she said she wept to see such a tribute, and wondered aloud who might have done such a thing for our mother. We then all of us went to the churchyard to ritualise and to satisfy our grief by looking upon her headstone so sweetly adorned. I know you did not want me to do so, but I hinted that you might have had a hand in it, and this caused everyone to weep again.
She closed with a brief, fierce declaration offilial love which must have caused the old gentleman to resort to his handkerchief, for I nearly had to myself. I read her letter once again, and again in the morning before I slipped it to Mr Bennet at the breakfast table. He ignored me as he pocketed his letter and I pretended not to notice.
“How long is Mr Bennet staying with you?” Richard asked with artful disinterest on the following day.
We had taken our horses out for a spanking ride on the muddy path from the stable to the eastern pasture, since it would not do to let them fret from inactivity in the confines of their stable boxes. I had taken my sister out earlier and was exercising yet another of my horses on this second run.
“As long as he wishes.”
“Will you return with him to Hertfordshire?”
“Why do you ask? Would you care to do the honours?”
“Do not be testy, Cousin.”
“I shall cease being testy when you cease being curious about affairs that do not concern you.”
“Affairs, is it?”
I smiled enigmatically at my interrogator. “I have many affairs of which you know nothing.”
“Apparently. I have arrived at Pemberley and seen for myself you are on intimate terms with a gentleman with whom you have nothing in common.”
“I trained his unruly dog.”
“Did you? I would be more inclined to believe thatyouare the unruly dog in need of training.”
“When does your leave expire?”
“Three Kings Day.”
“Should you not visit your mother?”
“I should, but I would much rather linger here and bother you with questions about youraffairs.”
“By all means, stay. Georgiana, at least, enjoys having you here.”
This was how we expressed our affection for one another. He knew I was up to my neck in something deadly serious, and I refused to enlighten him. It was precisely how he dealt with me whenever I pressed him about the gravity of his postings on the Continent. I knew Richard was in harm’s way simply by the nonchalance with which he claimed to be sitting idle well behind the forward push, or when he sometimes hinted that Wellesley did not even know of his existence. More than once, I suspected my cousin was one of the notoriously foolhardy tools the allied generals used to advantage like pegs on a board. I shuddered, not just from the cold, and kicked into a gallop that ended in a race the likes of which had enraged my mother in bygone days.
We celebrated the new year,and I watched Mr Bennet grow sprightlier with every passing day. To my great surprise, he was a cherished favourite with the ladies. My sister doted on him, and like a tame wolf, he accepted her care with the fond toleration he showed his eldest daughter. In other words, he kept his fangs hidden. To Mrs Annesley, he devoted himself with a great deal more respect, though sometimes he indulged in a brief show of wicked sarcasm in an attempt to make her laugh. That lady, however, had a way of simply looking at him with eyes of gentle reproof and an expression of sad disappointment, not in her pupil, but in her own inability to influence him. This look, common to the best governesses, could throw a protégé into instant docility and even horrible remorse, with nary a word spoken. Mr Bennet thrived under her watchfulness, and he was also careful with Richard, perhaps because a colonel still fresh from a war does not give off the scent of fair game.
To me, however, the old gentleman became a highlight in an otherwise uneventful season of quiet. He observed me with the amused irony of someone who knew my deepest secret, and I acknowledged that he likely did. He seemed to be content to outwait me, and was perhaps guilty of taunting me a little.
