“For now, until they find another estate to buy. Poor Jane. Mama has not yet turned her sights on the remote management of her daughter’s home, but she will just as soon as the wedding breakfast has been cleared away.”
“But you will be at Pemberley, and Mama will not have the means to set your cook’s menus.”
“I shall be forced to muddle along, I suppose.”
“Are you not worried?”
“Worried? About what, dearest?”
“About…about Mr. Darcy.”
“Mr. Darcy? Do you think he will beat me?” Lizzy laughed.
“No, no. Only, well—”
“Only, well what?”
“When you are alone. At night.”
“That is a curious question,” Elizabeth said in a low, reluctant voice.
“I did not know anything about husbands, and, well…you know. And Carver and Dotty and everybody, really, felt honor bound to rectify my ignorance since I had eloped like an ignoramus, not knowing what Wickham wanted of me. And to be honest, Lizzy, I was pretty put off by the whole notion!”
Elizabeth was certainly reluctant, but she was not a lady to run away from such a conversation like a prude. They were in complete privacy, after all, on their hill deep in the Hertford countryside. “I do not know what to expect, Lydia, and I do not know what you were told. I have heard such differing accounts of the business from Mama and Aunt Gardiner and, I shudder to say, even our aunt Philips. Charlotte hinted to me that it was something to begotten through, and yet when I am with Mr. Darcy, I cannot believe it will be at all unpleasant. So, to be honest, Lydia, perhaps you should withhold judgment until you fall in love in earnest with a man who kisses you, an experience the very opposite of unpleasant.”
“Well,” Lydia said, putting her chin on her knees, “I doubt very much I shall ever marry, but if I do, I shall not agree to any proposals without first having kissed the man. Wickham kissed me, and I did not find it anything but an irritant.”
“That is a dilemma, I am afraid. You can hardly go around kissing various men to see whether you will let one of them court you. But if it helps, Iwillsay that, for some time, I have secretly wished Mr. Darcy would kiss me, and when he did, I was quite swept away. Really, Lydia, you are just fifteen years old. Perhaps you should wait until you are one and twenty before you think of marrying anyone.”
This was a comfortable thought. But there was a catch. “Mama will push me at every man in breeches,” she said disconsolately.
After a brief silence her sister chuckled and said, “And when in your life, Lydia Bennet, have you bent to anyone’s will, save your own? You have slept in a potato cart, emptied the slops for a dozen women, and run through a barley field to escape a pair of ruffians—not because you were made to but because you have a will to prevail! Can you picture Kitty doing half of anything you have done? I cannot imagine you shallnowbe meek and say, ‘Yes, Mama,’ to everything she demands of you.”
“I had been thinking how horridly willful and selfish I am, but you have made me sound pretty stouthearted just now.”
“Because all your childish fits were setting you up to learn to be stouthearted! You can still be willful, you know, but you can decide to serve something better than your vanity and a craving for beaus. When you are very old, you will be a veritable dragon, and no one will dare to cross you. And if you put your mind to it now, you can begin to use your headstrong nature to do some good in the world and thereby earn your future reputation as a formidable lady.”
“And I shall have had an adventure, Lizzy.”
“Yes! You have had a marvelous adventure, and what a lioness you have proven yourself to be.” She stood and helped Lydia to her feet. While they brushed the dirt from their skirts, she asked, “So, what would you like to do with your time between now and the day some poor man falls hopelessly in love with you?”
“You will laugh at me.”
“I doubt it. What would you like to do?”
“I would like an education, Lizzy.”
“Would you? How marvelous! I imagine Mr. Darcy would be delighted to provide such a thing for you. But I sense that is not all you want, is it?”
“I would like to do something for Mr. Parch.”
“Certainly. But you see, you are not the only one to wish to do something for him. Papa and Uncle Gardiner have sent him a little something.”
“A purse of money?” Lydia exclaimed with a laugh.
“I would imagine so, dearest.”
They walked down the hill in silence, and Elizabeth suspected the list of Lydia’s wishes was not yet fully disclosed. “You may as well tell me what it is you truly want,” she said gently, “for I shall have it out of you sooner than later.”
