Longbourn to London (22 page)

“Mama,” Elizabeth made one last attempt at flattery, “you have been generous to me in every respect. I am sure I do not deserve your forbearance in this, but Mr. Darcy would be so grateful for this gesture. He is sentimental, and longs to be reminded of the night he fell in love with me. Your condescension would be greatly appreciated.”

“My mind is quite made up, Lizzy. The lace bonnet will be good enough for you.” Mrs. Bennet and Mrs. Gardener slipped Jane’s petticoat over her head, laced and buttoned it, and followed it with the white gown. Mrs. Bennet made a great show of fastening the one string of family pearls around Jane’s neck.

Annie finished Elizabeth’s hair, which was at least styled as Mr. Darcy requested even if the pearls were not used. Elizabeth stepped away from the dressing table trying not to cry. Jane met her sister’s eyes and took her hand as she sat at Elizabeth’s place at the mirror.

Tears sprang to Jane’s eyes. “Mama, it pains me you would discomfort Lizzy and me on our wedding day.” It was as close to a serious complaint as Jane was ever to make to their mother and silenced the room for a moment.

“See what you have done, Lizzy? You have made your sister cry. Now her eyes will be all red when she faces Mr. Bingley,” Mrs. Bennet screeched, oblivious that the wedding was over an hour and a half away.

Elizabeth’s mouth assumed a flat line of dissatisfaction, her face a blank mask of disapprobation. In her hand was the pouch of pearl hairpins. She placed it in the fussy lace reticule that matched the ugly bonnet she would grudgingly wear. She walked to the door of the room. “Then I am ready. I shall go to our father as he requested.” Her feet, in their satin wedding slippers, were next heard stomping—as best they could wearing such light shoes—down the stairs.

“That girl and her big feet…” Mrs. Bennet muttered as she fussed with Jane’s veiling.

Elizabeth entered her father’s library, slammed the door and flung herself into a chair. “Your mother?” Mr. Bennet asked.

“Your
wife
,” Lizzy responded accusingly. She hopped back up, ashamed of herself for acting like she was fifteen again.

“Sit down, my love.”

Elizabeth was already pacing away her vexation.

“Or not. Suit yourself. Mr. Darcy knows he is getting a pacing wife, surely? I believe he is also given to forceful pacing when agitated. Indeed, I have seen him do it. You must take care you do not both start pacing in crossing directions unannounced. Lives could be lost!”

Elizabeth stopped and smiled. She turned and was welcomed into her father’s arms. “Oh, Papa…”

“Lizzy, the giving of such small but sage words of advice is not why I asked to speak to you. I have an important story to tell, and every word of it is true. I should have told you years ago. Pray, sit.”

At last she did; he took the chair next to her and held her hand. “When Jane was born, we were not at all concerned she was not a son. She was a first child, and there was no worry. But when your mother carried you, she was convinced you were a boy. I think I may safely say, of all my daughters,
you
are the one she has never forgiven for your sex, because she was found to be so loudly and completely mistaken. You did not have a name for two or three days, because you were not Edward Thomas Bennet. Your layette was even embroidered with the initials E. B. At the time, I was reading a history of King Henry VIII, and thoughts of the birth of good Queen Bess, his own second daughter, were much in my mind. He hoped for a boy but thought his second daughter quite a beautiful child, as she favoured him. She grew to be famously precocious. He saw she was intelligent and worthy of his attention. Of course, we know she lived to far outshine her siblings and was England’s greatest monarch.

“Thus I named you Elizabeth, and would brook no quarrel. And it has come to pass, Lizzy, that you are the only child who favours my side of the family, dark in your features and lively. You are the most intelligent, and today and hereafter, you will outshine all your sisters. When you stand up with Mr. Darcy, Jane will pale by comparison for everyone except Mr. Bingley, no matter how you wear your hair. Mr. Darcy will never notice your bonnet for the sparkle in your eyes and the wit in your smile.

“He loves you dearly, Lizzy, as he has never loved before, I would wager. I only ask that you be kind to him. Do not be impatient. He may be as clever as you, but perhaps not quite, so be brave and kind, and he will always remain devoted to you. But he is just a man, so do not expect too much.”

Elizabeth’s quiet tears spilled down her cheeks, and he gave her his handkerchief.

“You will always be my confident Lizzy, my fearless and inquisitive girl. Mr. Darcy loves you for the same reasons I do. There may have been some reluctance on my part when the two of you came to me, but over the course of your engagement, it must be admitted, Lizzy, I now think that, had I the choice from a menu of attributes from which to select and construct you a husband, I could not have created better.”

Elizabeth sniffed into the handkerchief. “I am keeping this.”

“Yes, I thought you might. Your Aunt Gardiner had it made for me. See? It is the colour of your dress—candlelight. I have learnt something of lace after nearly twenty-four years with your mother. My last demand as your father is that you not tell her.”

There was a tap at the door and Jane spoke from without. “It is I.”

Elizabeth rose to leave but stopped at the door. “Thank you, Father. How could two such men love me so?” She turned to him briefly for a kiss on her cheek and then she was gone.

Jane looked at her quizzically in the hall. “What an adorable person our father is,” was all Elizabeth could say, and Jane slipped into the library. Elizabeth was alone in the hall with her mother, who observed as Elizabeth dabbed her eyes in front of the mirror.

With a sigh, Elizabeth picked up her gloves and the dreaded white lace bonnet from the entry table.

“Oh, Mr. Bennet,” Mrs. Bennet muttered under her breath. “Making your daughters cry on their wedding day… Hill! I have left my gloves upstairs! Hill!”

Elizabeth stepped outside onto the front porch to await her father and sister, and donned her gloves. The late autumn sun brightened the frosty ground with a glaring brilliancy. She did not trust herself to be alone with her mother for even one more moment, and perhaps she would not need to be so again for a very long time. Jane and Elizabeth would ride with their father in the Bingley coach. The rest of the Bennets would ride in their own carriage with the Gardiners.

Mrs. Gardiner joined her. “Lizzy, let me help you with the bonnet.” They eased it into place and Elizabeth felt it crushing the loose curls on the back of her head.

Something in the construction of the bonnet poked her in several places, and she tore it off again. “This is a veritable crown of thorns, Aunt!” Elizabeth looked inside to see several joints in the construction were not properly finished with padding. “No wonder Jane rejected it.”

“Oh, Lizzy,” consoled her aunt, putting an arm around her shoulder. “It is cold. You should put it on.”

“I shall not wear it one moment before I must.”

The Bingley carriage could be heard on the drive. Mr. Bennet and a laughing Jane joined Elizabeth and their aunt. Immediately pulling up behind it was the Gardiner carriage. Elizabeth looked at her aunt in surprise.

“Like you, Lizzy, I am sure I do not want to spend any more time with
her
than is absolutely necessary. This bonnet dispute has disturbed me, and Edward suggested we leave for London immediately after the wedding breakfast instead of staying another night.” She squeezed Elizabeth’s hand. “Just because she can wail louder than everyone else does not make her right.”

Elizabeth smiled. Her father handed Jane and her into the carriage, and they set off for the church with the Gardiner coach just behind them. They were ahead of schedule.

Chapter 15

The Wedding Breakfast

“We will have rings and things and fine array.”
William Shakespeare
The Taming of the Shrew

The newly married Fitzwilliam Darcy stood just outside the formal dining parlour at Netherfield Park, waiting for Elizabeth to emerge from a small sitting room set aside for the use of the brides. The guests would arrive shortly and enter the dining room by a door near the main hall after greeting their official hostesses, a surprisingly composed—one might almost say catatonic— Caroline Bingley and an ebullient Mrs. Louisa Hurst. The door of the sitting room opened and Jane emerged first.

“Mrs. Bingley!” Darcy bowed. “Your husband awaits you inside.”

“Thank you, Brother.” She smiled and curtsied. Darcy was the first to call her by her new name and she coloured prettily. “Mrs. Darcy will join you directly. She is adjusting her hair.” In an unprecedented action, Jane winked at him, and entered the dining room through the door Darcy had opened for her.

Jane winking! I wonder what causes such a singular action. This has been a day of surprises already— brides arriving early, Elizabeth in tears as she came with her father to stand beside me, now Jane winking at me…

Mr. Bennet had taken Darcy aside in the church before the wedding. “There has been a set-to about Elizabeth’s hair, and I am afraid her mother carried the day. Your bride means your gift no disrespect, but I cannot say the same for Mrs. Bennet.” Darcy rolled his eyes but made no other response. He had been warned that every wedding produced a silly story or two, and he had, at that moment, much more important matters to consider than the folly of Mrs. Bennet. His adored Elizabeth was about to become his wife.

And yet, when the processional finally began, there stood his magnificent bride, his woman and chosen partner, elegant in her charming gown with his pearls in her hair. Mr. Bennet brought Elizabeth alone up the aisle and met no one’s eye except that of his wife. His stern and steely gaze effectively silenced Mrs. Bennet from pitching a fit and falling in it. The proud father deposited his dearest daughter next to her betrothed before turning to nod at the organist. Mr. Bennet then strode briskly back up the aisle and, within a moment’s time, conveyed his eldest daughter to Bingley. It was a conspiracy planned from the start by Mr. Bennet and the Longbourn church musicians, as he was determined each daughter should have her moment to shine.

Even immediately after the fact, Darcy’s memory of his wedding was a hazy muddle. The magnitude of the event seemed to inhibit all real experience of it. The only detail remaining with him was the phrase “happiness in marriage requires diligent practice to become truly proficient,” offered by the vicar during his homily. It was all Darcy could do to suppress his laughter, and he dared not look at Elizabeth. She told him during their brief carriage ride to Netherfield that she felt exactly the same, and was afraid the congregation could see her shoulders shaking with stifled hilarity. Elizabeth rather hoped they thought she was crying.

She also explained why, despite the brides arriving early, the wedding started a few minutes late. Once all the guests had been seated, Elizabeth stood before a mirror in the vestibule and donned the dreaded white-veiled bonnet. She turned to her father with her chin up for courage, but Mr. Bennet could see her expression was fragile.

“Great God, child!” Mr. Bennet was appalled at the hat on Elizabeth’s head. “What a dreadful spectacle. It does not match your gown. Jane, come. Are Mr. Darcy’s pearls here? We cannot have Lizzy enter the church resembling a frigate setting sail at Plymouth.”

And so, as quickly as Mr. Bennet and Jane could manage it, the bonnet was superseded by pearls. Elizabeth’s relief and joy brought forth her tears. Darcy had yet to decide whether he was vexed to have been kept in ignorance of the contest with her mother or he was truly better off having not known.

***

The hall door opened and Elizabeth stood in the doorway looking for him. She was just as lovely as at the church, wreathed in bridal radiance, her hair shining and dotted with pearls. They smiled as their eyes met, and she held out her hand as she approached him. He intended to kiss her rather more thoroughly than he had in the open barouche that carried them from the church to Netherfield, but Mrs. Bennet burst into the hall.

“Mr. Darcy! Oh, Lizzy! Your hair, child!” She drew breath to launch into a proper tirade. Mrs. Bennet was waving the unworn white bonnet through the air.

Darcy would not hear it. “Madam… Mrs. Bennet!” His strong deep voice stopped her mid-inhale. “Mrs. Darcy has dressed her hair exactly as Mr. Darcy wishes. We, none of us, shall hear any more from you on the subject.” He held out his arm, Elizabeth laid her hand upon it, and they entered the dining room affecting a regal hauteur, trying not to laugh. They were by no means successful.

Mr. Bennet smiled from behind his thwarted wife.
At last, Lizzy has a champion better than I.

An hour later, Darcy stood by the far window of the dining room. He had taken coffee and noticed Elizabeth still carried a cup of wine punch, but neither had done more than push their food around on their plates during the meal. He watched steadily as Elizabeth circled the room, stopping to visit with friends and neighbours, and graciously accepting the many compliments on how well she looked, what a handsome couple she and her husband made, and how lovely the flowers were that arrived from the glasshouses at Pemberley.
She is my enchanting bride.