Jane looked up from buttering a slice of bread. "I do not think anybody notices gowns as much as we imagine. Your green gown looks very well to me, Kitty dearest."
Lydia laughed. "That is because you could wear a flour sack and still be admired."
Jane coloured immediately. "Lydia… please."
Mary, who had until this point had her nose buried in the volume beside her plate, closed it with deliberate care and cleared her throat noisily. "'The love of finery,'" she announced gravely, "'has led many women into sin.'"
Lydia rolled her eyes. "Who said that?"
"Doctor Fordyce."
"I cannot imagine he knew all that much about ladies' gowns."
"He understood human nature," said Mary. "That is more important than understanding gowns."
Mr Bennet lowered his newspaper by an inch. "Poor fellow," he said. "It must have been quite the burden to have carried the answer on every aspect of human behaviour."
Mary frowned. "He was concerned with moral improvement."
"I daresay he was, my dear, but I’m not sure we need to hear about it over breakfast."
"I was speaking of lace not morals," grumbled Lydia. "Mama, do you suppose Mrs Sheffield has enough left for my new bonnet?"
Mrs Bennet looked thoughtful. "We must go into Meryton before Mrs Long. If she sees that lace first, she will buy the entire piece out of pure spite. Her daughters have little of beauty and she thinks she can balance the scales with finery."
"I do not think Mrs Long truly has designs upon Lydia's lace, Mama," said Jane evenly.
"My dear Jane," replied Mrs Bennet, "I have known Mrs Long too many years to underestimate her."
The conversation wandered on and on. Mrs Phillips's latest supper party was dissected and Lydia announced several ambitious plans for the next assembly. Elizabeth listened with only half an ear. There was not another home in England she would rather have called her own than Longbourn, nor another family she could have loved more—flawed as they were. But as she looked around the breakfast table, she found herself with the curious feeling that she knew exactly what tomorrow's conversation would be, and the day's after that, and the one after that.
It was an absurd complaint. Many young women would have envied her life. Longbourn was a happy home, her sisters were affectionate, her father indulged her more often than not and even her mother's frequent anxieties rarely lasted longer than the next piece of neighbourhood gossip. Nothing at all was wrong.
Perhaps that was precisely it. She had lately begun to feel as though life had settled into a pattern that seemed never to change. The seasons continued in the same cycle, assemblies were held, dinners given and invitations accepted, yet each seemed only a variation of what had gone before.
She was not unhappy and would have been ashamed to call herself so. She wanted for nothing of consequence. Even so, there were mornings when she caught herself wondering what itmight be like to wake somewhere she had never been before or to spend an evening amongst people whose opinions she could not predict before they opened their mouths. She shook her head and smiled at her own foolishness. Her father would say she had read too many novels and longed for some dramatic gothic adventure. But even as she dismissed the thought she could not quite persuade herself that the world had already shown her everything it had to offer.
???
Elizabeth was still considering the matter when she wandered into her father's library later that morning. Shelves lined from floor to ceiling with books overflowed into untidy stacks upon every available surface. It smelt of paper and pipe tobacco—as it always had. Mr Bennet occupied his customary chair by the window, absorbed in a volume on Greek history.
Without looking up, he said, "If your mother has sent reinforcements in the matter of Kitty's new gown, you may tell her I remain unconvinced."
"I have come entirely on my own account, Papa."
"That does sound serious, my Lizzy."
Elizabeth smiled and wandered towards the shelves, trailing a finger along the spines as she passed. She had spent half herchildhood in this room, pulling down books at random and discovering worlds far removed from Hertfordshire. "I wished to ask you something."
Mr Bennet closed his book over one finger and regarded her with interest. "I shall endeavour to provide an answer if I can."
"I have been wondering..." She hesitated, uncertain whether the question would sound foolish once spoken aloud. "Did you ever feel that life ought to contain more. More than it presently does, I mean?"
He watched her for a moment without replying. "That is a curious question."
"I know," she said with a sigh.
"And what has prompted it?"
