Mr. Collins bowed deeply across the table. “My dear Mary’s devotion to improvement is among her many distinguished qualities, and one of which my patron is bound to approve. I am most fortunate.”
Kitty attempted to suppress a giggle and failed. Lydia did not even make the attempt. “Well!” she cried. “Mary will have sermons at breakfast and sermons at supper! What a bore!”
“Lydia!” Mrs. Bennet snapped sharply, startling the entire table.
Elizabeth raised her brows. Mrs. Bennet, who seldom rebuked Lydia with any lasting effect, fixed her youngest daughter with a severity rarely employed. “Your sister’s engagement is a matter of great consequence. You will behave accordingly.”
Mary’s chin lifted another fraction.
Lydia subsided, though not without tossing her hair in exaggerated martyrdom. Kitty leaned close to whisper something that caused both of them to shake silently with laughter, though under Mrs. Bennet’s vigilant eye they did so with unusual restraint.
Mr. Bennet surveyed the scene with philosophical detachment.
“Well, Mary,” he said mildly, “I trust you will reform your husband as thoroughly as you intend to reform the rest of us.”
Mary received the remark without visible irony. “I shall endeavor to be a suitable help meet to my husband, Papa. As Proverbs says,The heart of her husband doth safely trust in her, so that he shall have no need of spoil. She will do him good and not evil all the days of her life.”
Mr. Collins nodded solemnly. “A virtuous woman is a crown to her husband.”
“Oh, Lord,” Lydia said with a sigh. “Now there are two of them in the family.”
Elizabeth, however, could not help but reflect that if Mr. Bingley’s courage had not set the example that morning, Mr. Collins might yet have remained hovering at her sister’s elbow for another fortnight. Encouragement, it seemed, was contagious.
And Longbourn had become most unexpectedly infectious.
This thought lingered with Elizabeth as she lay in bed later that night. The house had at last settled into uneasy quiet—Mrs. Bennet sighing in satisfied exhaustion, Lydia whispering animated speculations to Kitty across the darkened room, and Mary no doubt composing her future sermons in solemn triumph.
But Elizabeth could not sleep.
Mary engaged.
Jane being courted.
Is it possible I will be the next?
The thought sent a most inconvenient flutter through her chest.
It was odd—very odd—that Mary should be secured before Elizabeth. No one would have wagered upon such an outcome a month ago. Yet there it was. Mr. Collins had acted. Mary’s happiness was declared. The future, once distant and theoretical, now pressed forward with surprising haste.
Would Darcy act as well?
Did she wish him to?
A courtship was pleasant. It was lively. It allowed for conversation, for discovery, even for retreat if one discovered a misjudgment. An engagement, however, was no trifling matter. Engagements were seldom dissolved without scandal. They bore the weight of permanence.
She had always vowed—though only to herself—that she would marry for the deepest affection. Not for security. Not for convenience. Not for relief from her mother’s nerves.
For love.
She turned upon her pillow.
Do I love him?
The question ought to have been simple.
She knew that her pulse quickened at the sight of him. She knew that she sought him in every room, that her spirits rose when he entered and settled when he stood beside her. She knew that she valued his judgment and respected his steadiness, even when she wished to tease it.
She knew she missed him when he was absent.
