A/N: snippet below.

Novel has been published on Amazon, B&N, and Kobo as of October 22, 2019.

It is a truth, universally acknowledged, that a family member near death's door cannot but have an effect on and change the members of that family.

Mr. and Mrs. Bennet were sitting together one evening and, for once, were by themselves and not surrounded by their children.

"Mr. Bennet, have you heard the news?" said his lady to him.

"No, my dear, what news do you have to report?" He looked up from his book.

"Netherfield Hall has been let! I believe it indicates that there is an end to the troublesome times that the neighborhood has faced." Her face glowed with excitement; her cheeks displayed a rosiness that contrasted with the starkness of her dress. The glow took off a few years from her face and, for a moment, the former beauty of Meryton could be seen in her features.

"Too true, my dear. Though it cannot truly brighten our family troubles." Mr. Bennet's face looked grave as he looked down at his lap. No bloom graced his cheeks, and his dark eyes held a world of worries and sorrow.

"Well, my dear, it has been let by a young man from the North. Mrs. Long reports that he is young and single. Perhaps he may consider one of the girls!" she remarked, attempting to cheer him before returning to her stitching.

"And I suppose you wish for me to visit him? Does it not seem too soon after losing our Mary to be thinking of marriageable young men for our remaining daughters?" He did not look up again from his pages.

"Mr. Bennet, the death knells rang over a year ago. I think it is time we consider that we need to move on." Mrs. Bennet's eyes sought his in a plea that said far more than her words.

"I, for one, cannot forget the day that Mary was lost to us, my dear." Her husband returned her gaze and tried to say things with his eyes that he could not say with his voice.

"Nor I, Mr. Bennet, nor I. I have loved all of my children, but we have four daughters to consider. And Lizzy has just come back to us after being gone for most of that year—we need to consider them," she maintained pursuing her lips while she pursued her line of thinking.

"Perhaps you are right, my dear," he muttered, though he did not sound convinced.

"Consider…" she began, but Mr. Bennet interrupted.

"That seems to be your favorite word," he commented.

"Yes, Mr. Bennet, consider that Jane is now almost two years past twenty, and no matter how beautiful she may be, beauty does not last forever. And Lizzy…"

"Yes, my poor Lizzy." His shoulders sagged, and he looked down at his book, though not because it held his interest.

"Poor Lizzy has recovered, but her hair will take a long time to grow back. And her injury—I fear no man will take her now." Mrs. Bennet shook her head sadly and bent over her embroidery again, pulling tightly at a stitch.

"I doubt that; it may make marriage more manageable if she cannot hear what her husband has to say. Besides, Lizzy says she has some hearing in one ear and seems to be slowly recovering more and more." Mr. Bennet's voice brightened for the first time, and some semblance of his old humor snuck back in. "And our Katherine, well, Kitty appears to have settled down and is considerably less ridiculous than she once was," he added. "I never thought I would think to see her less foolish, but there it is."

"Our Lydia is still a sweet, joyous girl," proclaimed his wife. "This period of mourning has been such a strain on her. It is too bad that her formative years had to be marked by losing a sister," remarked Mrs. Bennet of her youngest and still favorite child.

"That is one of the lessons of life." Mr. Bennet's face showed that he did not subscribe to his wife's views about their youngest with his firmly-set lips. "So you wish me to visit this new tenant of Netherfield Hall?" He brought his wife back to their original point.

"We have had no balls or assemblies in the neighborhood for over a year. Families have barely been visiting with the fever passing through. It will be pleasant to have things return to normal." She put on her most alluring smile as she winked at him.

"Nothing will be normal with so many in the neighborhood having been affected." Mr. Bennet looked at her sternly. "But I will visit this new neighbor."

There was a fuss at the breakfast table the next morning.

Jane noticed that her mother was wearing a lavender dress.

"Why, Mamma! You have decided to stop wearing mourning! Has it truly been a year?" She asked when her mother walked into the room. Lydia and Katherine glanced up from their conversation in astonishment.

These three Bennet sisters had their mother's blue eyes. Jane and Lydia were graced with blond locks, while Katherine had dark ones. Jane was the beauty of the three; her intelligent yet sweet disposition added to her attraction. Lydia's joie de vivre was part of her appeal. She was on that borderline between child and adult, but there was still something of a child about her.

"Does this mean there will be balls again, Mamma?" asked Lydia. "Will I finally be able to go?" Her delight at the prospect of being out in society was evident.

"Mamma! You did not let me come out until I was sixteen!" pouted Katherine, looking from her younger sister to her mother.

"We will have to see what the autumn season will be like with so many of our local families affected; there may not be many social events, I fear," sighed Mrs. Bennet. "We need to set an example for the neighborhood and begin to start Meryton society on a track back to what it once was."

"What is this discussion of 'conventional' events?" beamed a beautiful woman who walked in arm-in-arm with another. Both were around the same height, with balanced figures, though they sported short-cropped hair that was laced through with a ribbon in an attempt to make their appearance more feminine. The questioner, Catherine Parks, had a classically beautiful face, blond hair, and dark eyes. The last Bennet daughter, Elizabeth, was also handsome—though not in direct comparison to her friend—with dark hair but entrancing dark eyes. Like her sister, Jane, her intelligence was readily apparent in her expression.

Elizabeth looked toward the group and then back to her friend as if she had missed something; her lower lip pouted. Jane looked from her sister to her mother and raised her voice. "We were talking about the prospect of the harvest season," she announced to both women, "and life returning to normal."

"I do not see how things will ever be normal again with both Mary and Charlotte gone." Elizabeth declared and sat down suddenly at the table without going to the sideboard to select her breakfast. Miss Parks was left standing when her friend disengaged her arm, and the smile faded from Catherine's lips. Jane knew the reason for the distress that clouded Miss Parks' face. To her surprise, Katherine Bennet stood up and took Catherine Park's arm and led her to a seat.

"I have to help my fellow Catherine!" Kitty declared as she directed a look at Elizabeth while she helped Miss Parks. Kitty went to the sideboard and prepared two plates of food and brought them back. Miss Parks expressed her thanks, but Lizzy was silent and stared at her plate.

"My sweet Katherine! What a big help you are!" gushed Mrs. Bennet. "Helping poor Miss Parks because she is too blind to see; you are a dear, sweet child!" Most of the occupants at the table winced at her words, but no one said anything to censure her speech. "We are so fortunate that Elizabeth found such a good friend in Miss Parks when she was sent away to that sanitarium. They make such an interesting pair: one blind, the other deaf. Almost as if between the two of them, they make one whole woman!" There were more grimaces at the table.

"Though I'm sure what a man wants is a woman who is mute," declared Mr. Bennet as he walked in with a book under his arm. Elizabeth smiled at him, their dark eyes meeting in amusement. He had learned to project his voice so that she could always hear him.

"Good morning, Papa," Lizzy said, and finally began to nibble at her breakfast. He smiled at her and then seated himself with his book by his plate.

"Oh, my dear Mr. Bennet! You are such an excellent father!" declared his wife. Her daughters and Miss Parks looked at her expectantly, noting the tone of excitement. "He is to visit the new neighbor you know, the one Mrs. Long told us about!" Mrs. Bennet waved her hands in the air excitedly. "He agreed, last night."

"Oh Papa! Do you think he is handsome?" asked Lydia who clasped the side of the table as if to steady herself. "I could only marry a handsome man!"

"Oh hush, Lydia," Jane scolded. "You are too young to know what you want."

"I am not!" Lydia countered, "Mamma was only seventeen when she met Papa."

"Yes, but you are only fifteen," pointed out Katherine, who was two years older than Lydia. Before the loss of Mary, she would have argued for Lydia's emergence into society and taken her side in an argument. But the loss of her sister Mary had affected her more than anyone could have anticipated given that Mary and Kitty were never close.

"Yes, but I will be sixteen in the spring," began Lydia.

"We will talk about it later. I want to eat my breakfast in peace. After all, I have a social call to make," declared their father; his statement was enough to make the room quiet down.

Mr. Bennet paid his visit. Despite all the questions put to him by his family, he did not volunteer any information about the new neighbor. The Bennet girls knew, from a visit to their Aunt Philips, that his name was Mr. Charles Bingley. He was reasoned handsome, rode an exquisite black horse, and was to have a sister live with him. He was purported to be from the North, had been living in London for some time—had inherited a fortune made in trade just a generation ago—but intended to live like a gentleman. Mr. Bingley had several sisters, and they all made an appearance at Netherfield during the coming weeks. But only two would remain: an unmarried one who was to keep his house and a married sister with her husband. The discussion of Mr. Bingley's family situation was a sufficient topic to keep Meryton in raptures for over a fortnight.

What no one in the neighborhood could reason was why he had chosen to let Netherfield Hall when the community had been plagued with scarlet fever a year ago; they reasoned that any stranger would want to keep his distance. But Mr. Bingley was precisely the sort of focus the area needed to help it heal from their collective gloom.

A year earlier, a tenant family on the Goulding's estate had taken ill. No one had thought much about it as people often became sick. But then families on estates and families in the village began to be feverish as well. The poor apothecary found himself summoned day and night, and the surgeon from the next town over was called in to help.

The local parson, Reverend Vickers, found his hands full with charitable work as many of the women in the parish refused to visit the sick out of fear for their safety. A few, like Elizabeth Bennet, Charlotte Lucas, and Amy Goulding, carried on. Elizabeth entreated her sisters to help her carry parcels of food to those tenant families on the Longbourn estate who were suffering. On the day Elizabeth came down with scarlet fever, she had pleaded with Jane to come but had been refused. Jane claimed she was busy helping their mother but had been fearful of contracting the dreaded disease. So Elizabeth cajoled her next younger sister, Mary, into trudging the estate to deliver soup, bread, and a kind word.

By the day's end, Elizabeth's throat was fiercely sore, by the second day, her body was bright red with a rash, and her head burned. Mary was tucked into bed next to her with the same symptoms. The family feared that their second and third daughters would share the same fate as those of the Stone children—all six—who had been laid to rest in the Meryton graveyard within a week of Elizabeth and Mary's charitable visit.

Jane, Katherine, and Lydia were sent to stay with their Aunt Philips while Mrs. Bennet proved she loved all of her children equally as she nursed her two stricken ones. Mr. Bennet, usually not one for the sick room, found that he could visit and read to them.

Mary, however, did not recover. On a bright, warm day in September, Reverend Vickers said a beautiful service for her, and the bells in the Meryton church were rung to note her passing. Two days later, he performed the same service for their friend, Charlotte Lucas.

Charlotte had been a particular friend of the Bennet family, though she was a few years older than Elizabeth. Mr. and Mrs. Bennet could not bear to tell Lizzy about her friend's passing while she was so stricken. Many months went by before she would know of Charlotte's fate.

Amy Goulding, a neighbor, was the same age as Elizabeth but took ill after Elizabeth and Mary. Amy's father had family In London who knew of a new type of health facility called a sanitarium. It had an on-staff physician and was reckoned the very best option for Amy's recovery. Mr. Goulding prepared to send his daughter there, but being a good neighbor, he also called on the Bennets to describe the merits of the facility.

Within a day, the two young women were carefully packed into the Bennet carriage, accompanied by Mr. Bennet and the Goulding housekeeper as no younger female servant was willing to be near the sick women out of fear of catching the fever. They were carefully taken to Kent with their parents' apprehensive wishes for their lives, no matter the expense.

The Priestwood Green Sanitarium was located in a building of new construction along the London road in a town called Addington. It had been founded by a gentleman, Mr. Benedict Markham, who had studied with the Royal College of Physicians. Eschewing the gentlemanly life of leisure and its injunction to never work with one's hands, he founded the sanitarium in the hopes of bringing relief to those who suffer. Dr. Markham employed a staff of surgeons and apothecaries who performed most of the care-taking work, but Dr. Markham still consulted with his patients and administered 'physics' or medicines in the hopes of curing them or at least relieving their symptoms.

Amy and Lizzy were brought to the Sanitarium and placed under Dr. Markham's care, and they recovered. Amy Goulding recovered fully, without any ill-effects of having suffered from scarlet fever. By Christmastime, she was able to return to her family and the approbation of the neighborhood (which needed a bright spot of news). While the fever seemed to have run its course, people's memories run long, and it was hard not to fear that at any moment, it might return and wipe them all out. To see Miss Goulding in good health with plump cheeks and bright eyes did the entire town good.

In early December, before Miss Goulding came home, Mr. Bennet visited Elizabeth at the sanitarium; he was surprised at the thin and somber creature that sat wrapped in a shawl by a fire with some of the other residents—his daughter Elizabeth was barely recognizable. Amy Goulding was in the parlor as well and looked her usual, before-illness self. The difference in how much one had recovered, compared to how little the other had progressed, was sobering to him. Mr. Bennet decided he could not yet impart the news about Charlotte Lucas to Lizzy as he had planned—that news must wait for another day.

"And how are you getting on with the other residents?" he asked instead. It was such a general question as if she was a new acquaintance.

"They treat us very well, and Dr. Markham is quite the gentleman, you know. But I do wish there was more to read," replied his Elizabeth.

"I will pack up some books when I get home and send them to you," he smiled wanly. "Miss Goulding, I understand you are to go home soon?" Bennet turned to Amy, who was sipping tea.

"Yes, I am anxious to be home again with my family. My brothers will be finishing up their studies in their respective terms, and we shall have the merriest of Christmases!" She grinned, then perhaps she thought about the Bennet's first Christmas without Mary as she looked at Mr. Bennet's somber face, and her smile became a frown, and she said no more.

"Your hearing, my dear, does it get better or worse?" Mr. Bennet asked as Elizabeth sat silently. He was seated on her left-hand side so he could be sure to be understood by her. Her left ear was her better ear.

"It has at least stopped getting worse, Papa. That is something." A smile, similar to one that his old Lizzy used to project was displayed. "And I miss my hair." She ran a hand over the short length of hair on the top of her head. In three months, it was only about an inch and a half long. "I don't understand why the surgeon thought the need to cut it all off."

"I know!" laughed Miss Goulding as she tilted her blond head back and forth; it shone in the light from the fire. Her hair had also been shorn.

"So there is hope for me?" piped up a voice from the sofa.

"Papa, this is Miss Catherine Parks. She is a new resident here." Miss Park's head was newly shaved, yet she did not wear a lace cap to hide her baldness as most of the other residents did. Her beauty was overwhelming, even with her barren head. Mr. Bennet suddenly wished he was a younger man. They nodded their introductions.

"You are beautiful even without your locks," Bennet could not help himself saying.

"Curious," Miss Parks laughed, "that is what Dr. Markham says as well."

Mr. Bennet considered asking if Miss Parks had suffered from scarlet fever as well but then realized that was too inappropriate a question. He gazed at her beautiful face a moment longer and then turned back to his daughter. He and Elizabeth returned to their discussion of family and Meryton, and he was relieved to see her come out of her quiet shell. The longer they spoke, the more he saw vestiges of his beloved Lizzy.

Later, Mr. Bennet spoke privately with Dr. Markham.

The doctor

told him that he feared that Elizabeth's remorse about the death of Mary was hindering her recovery. While her body had completely recovered from the fever, her appetite had not returned, and she seemed little interested in her usual pursuits. The doctor discussed how, at first, he was not sure if her slow recovery had been because she had been ill longer or if it was something else. But as the weeks, and months passed, it became evident that Lizzy's spirit seemed to be fighting against her cure. While her body was rid of the fever (having damaged her ears), Dr. Markham feared that her improvement was being hampered by her desire not to improve.

Mr. Bennet remarked that he had found Elizabeth not in her usual spirits. Her nature and character weren't the same; his old Lizzy hadn't returned. The doctor feared that if she did not recover her usual perspective on life, she might not ever recover. He wasn't sure how to lift her spirits, but he felt that she should remain at Priestwood Green and not return home lest home bring on additional sorrows and an even more forlorn outlook. Mr. Bennet regretfully agreed.

For Elizabeth, once her head had been cleared of the fever, could only focus on her guilt at cajoling poor Mary to accompany her on that fateful trip to the Stone family farmhouse. Her sorrow at the loss of her sister was boundless. The death of any family member—having wheedled a reluctant sister to accompany her—was a great weight, and Elizabeth let it consume her. But added to it was the feeling that it was her fault that Mary was dead. This made her typically lively outlook turn into a austere one. She didn't want to recover from an illness that had taken a beloved sister. Her feelings were always intense, whether in joy, anger, outrage, or sorrow.

Mr. Bennet left his beloved child in Dr. Markham's hands and returned home with no idea of when she would be returned to them, in body and spirit.

The Bennet family, therefore, was still uneasy about Elizabeth in December, even while they rejoiced with the Goulding family as Amy came home for Christmas.