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Prologue

Collins’ estate near Faversham, Kent

Clem and Ophelia Collins, the master and mistress of the medium-to-large-sized estate of Collins Hollow, were as happy as any married couple could be. Collins Hollow was situated some six miles north of the market town of Faversham in Kent.

The Collinses had been blessed with two sons, Clem Bennet, who had been born in October 1779, and William Bennet, who had joined the family in May 1784. The reason that both sons, like the elder Clem himself, had the second name of Bennet was to honour his great-grandfather, the first Collins in their line. William Clem Collins had been a Bennet before marrying a woman with the family name of Collins. She had been the only child of the then master of Collins Hollow and was the heir to the unentailed estate. However, her father had demanded that William Clem Bennet take the Collins name so that the name would not cease being tied to the estate. To that end, Johnathan Collins had an entail written that would be valid for four generations, stating that the master had to have his blood and his family name had to be Collins.

As he was a third son of Clem Collins’s great-great-grandfather, Henry Bennet, had much preferred to manage an estate than seek a profession, William Bennet had changed his name to Collins on marrying Lettie Collins in 1683. As Clem the younger was the fifth generation, once he reached his majority still bearing the Collins name, he would be able to reclaim the Bennet name if he so chose.

The Bennet patriarch, who was the master of Longbourn in Hertfordshire at the time, had not been sanguine with his son giving up the Bennet name. To display his displeasure, with his eldest son’s agreement, he ended the current entail to heirs male on Longbourn. In its place, a new one was written. True to the prevailing attitudes that only a man was able to manage an estate, the new document entailed the estate on heirs male as the previous one had, except there were additional clauses added to state that only one of Bennet blood could ever own Longbourn, among some other clauses, none of it could be mortgaged, it forbade selling all or part of the estate, and lastly and most importantly to Henry Bennet, the master at that time, an heir presumptive who did not take the Bennet name before becoming the master was disqualified from inheriting the estate. In the then master’s thinking, if one of his third son’s line was eligible to become the master, the injustice of William abandoning the Bennet name would be reversed. The new entail to heirs male was to be valid for seven generations after Henry Bennet. The rest of the clauses would be enforced for twenty generations.

Due to his pride, Henry Bennet rejected any overtures of reconciliation made by his third son, the great-grandfather of the current master of Collins Hollow. This had led to a breach in the family, which persisted to this day.

None of the Collins men were indolent or inactive. From a young age, the Collins sons each joined their father around the estate, and they were not afraid of getting their hands dirty. As such, all three Collins men were rather fit. The sons took after their father in their looks and height; however, both sons had their mother’s dark blond hair and light bluish-grey eye colour. Like his father had taught him when he was the age of six, Clem Collins made sure that both of his sons were able to ride first ponies and then, before they turned ten, horses. More than that, the master of the estate taught the boys how to care for their mounts themselves and not to always leave said care to the grooms.

Even though Clem Collins’s father had not seen any value in his son gaining a gentleman’s education, the current master of Collins Hollow believed that his sons needed to be educated at university. Hence, first, Clem the younger, and then William, began at Harrow when they were twelve, and upon graduating from Harrow, both sons were to be sent to Oxford. The older brother began his studies at Oxford at the start of the 1796-1797 academic year, while William would begin at university in October 1801.

Over the years, the senior Clem Collins, like his father and grandfather before him, attempted to re-establish contact with his Bennet cousins at Longbourn, but he never received a reply to any of the letters he sent. It was known, thanks to various contacts in Meryton—the market town one mile west of Longbourn in Hertfordshire—that the current master of Longbourn, Thomas Bennet, and his wife had been blessed with five daughters and no sons. The first one was born in January 1788, a little more than a year after Thomas Bennet married the then Frances—called Fanny—Gardiner. Word had reached Collins that after the fifth daughter was born in April 1796, that due to the size of the babe and some damage done during the birthing process, Fanny Bennet would not be able to carry another child.

Seeing that it was all but certain that Longbourn would become his if he outlived his cousin, Clem Collins knew he needed to make some plans. Thanks to the entail on his estate created by his great-grandfather’s father-in-law, he could not take the Bennet name as the entail on Longbourn demanded, and neither could his older son before he inherited. Clem the younger was the fifth generation and had to keep the Collins name until after he reached his majority. Hence, because his eldest son would have an estate, Collins decided to designate William as the heir presumptive of Longbourn.

To that end, in October 1800, days after the older Collins son reached his majority, he accompanied his father into Faversham to see Mr Huntington, the local solicitor used to transact all Collins Hollow legal business.

Per his client’s instructions, Mr Huntington’s clerk had prepared a document which declared that both Clem Collinses, the older and younger, renounced any claim to Longbourn in Hertfordshire in favour of William Bennet Collins. If one of them were to be the heir presumptive of the Longbourn estate if Mr Thomas James Bennet was called home to God with no male issue, it would be the youngest Collins. The Collins patriarch had his solicitor post a copy of the document to the master of Longbourn.

William Collins was gratified when his sire and older brother told him what had been done, but he swore that he would not count his chickens before they hatched and would continue on his chosen path as if he would never inherit Longbourn. He wisely said that no one knew what God’s plan for any of us was. It was why he would keep to his plan of gaining a degree in theology, work the years needed to take his orders, and enter the church as a clergyman once he was ordained.

The younger Collins son had been fifteen when Mr Fergus Davidson was awarded the living at St Peter’s Church in Faversham. The new rector, a man of not yet thirty years, did not say one thing and do another, which impressed young William due to the fact that the man who Mr Davidson replaced was very much a ‘do as I say, not as I do’ clergyman.

Thanks to the positive impression Mr Davidson left on William, he had decided the church was the profession for him. In the summer of 1801, before he began his studies at Oxford, William Collins had sat with Mr Davidson and shared what path he wanted to follow and why. Davidson had been flattered that he had inspired the young man to enter the church and had volunteered himself as a mentor. The clergyman told William Collins he was welcome to call on him and his wife Sophia, anytime they were at home and William was on a term break.

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Thomas Bennet was doing what he did as much as he was able. He was seated in his study at Longbourn, reading a book and sipping a glass of port. He had always been an indolent man and, at best, an indifferent master of his estate. Before Lydia had been born more than four years past, he had not exerted himself because he told himself he was waiting for the birth of a son. However, Bennet had done what he needed to do and always addressed tenant concerns on time. That had all changed when the midwife and Mr Jones, the local doctor and apothecary in one person, told him that Fanny would never be able to carry another child.

That news, combined with his wife wailing and screeching about how, when he passed away, she would be thrown into the hedgerows before his body was cold in the ground, caused Bennet to do the bare minimum to keep his estate profitable. Thanks to the entail to heirs male, one of the Collins cousins would become the master of Longbourn when Bennet went to his final reward. What cared he that his wife and daughters would be left in genteel poverty? He would not be there to see it or hear the complaints about imaginary attacks of nerves.

He cared not that Longbourn was the largest estate in the area around Meryton, and if he took the trouble, his income could be above six thousand pounds per annum. As it was, it had slipped below three thousand pounds annually.

In his own way, Bennet loved his five daughters, but not enough to exert himself. Fanny’s older brother, Edward Gardiner, had pleaded with Bennet to invest Fanny’s dowry and any profits from the estate with him. Gardiner, his wife, Madeline, called Maddie by all, and their daughter of two lived at 23 Gracechurch Street in London, less than a mile from Gardiner’s warehouse in Cheapside. Gardiner was in the import-export business, but he also had a nose for good investments. Even though Gardiner could return ten percent per annum, and sometimes better, Bennet would not trouble himself and give Gardiner money to invest on his behalf. Besides, he wanted money available to purchase more books and port; and to keep his wife’s noise to a dull roar; he allowed her to spend freely. So, the truth was that at the end of the day, there was little or no profit left even if Bennet wanted to invest with Gardiner.

Bennet sat and thought about his family. By October of 1800, Jane was twelve years old and already always seeing the best in everyone, the serene peacemaker in the family. She was a very beautiful young girl who her mother thought was the epitome of beauty because Jane was blonde with blue eyes, just like Fanny. His favourite daughter, Lizzy—Elizabeth Rose named for his late mother—was nine. He favoured her because of her intelligence and quick wit. Bennet had to admit that Mary, who was eight, was also intelligent, but she was not as outgoing as Lizzy and preferred solitary pursuits. Catherine, called Kitty by all, would be six in November, and the youngest and most indulged by her mother, Lydia, was four. Even though it had been Lydia’s birth that had ended the dream of birthing a son, Fanny favoured her youngest, even above Jane. That was because Hattie Phillips—Fanny’s older sister and wife of Meryton’s solicitor, Frank—had told Fanny that Lydia looked exactly like Fanny had at the same age.

Hill, Longbourn’s butler, had just delivered the newly arrived post. Hill’s wife was Longbourn’s long-suffering housekeeper. It was surprising the Hills had not resigned long ago given Fanny Bennet’s mercurial moods and screaming for her salts at least once each day.

On seeing that the single epistle was from an address in Faversham, where that uneducated cousin of his, Clem Collins, lived, Bennet was about to toss it into the fire when he noted that the return address was of a Mr Huntington, a solicitor in the town. As much as he wanted to return to his tome and continue reading and sipping his port, Bennet knew that, given who it was from, he needed to read this missive to determine if it was something important. He hoped not, as the last thing Bennet wanted was to have to exert himself for any reason.

After he broke the plain wax seal, Bennet began to read.

13 October 1800

Law Offices of Guy Huntington, ESQ

15 Main Street

Faversham

Kent