Chapter 1 - Longbourn in Hertfordshire

Two weeks after her youngest sister eloped to marry an officer, or, as Elizabeth suspected based on a better knowledge of the true character of the man involved than the rest of her family could claim, allowed herself to be seduced and abducted by a scoundrel, their father returned from London admitting defeat in his efforts to locate the couple. It was, by now, quite evident that no marriage had taken place and the remaining Bennet sisters had no option but to partake in the ruin visited upon the family by the youngest's folly.

Their mother, never a woman of sense or discretion, was not quiet in bemoaning their fate. "Who will marry my beautiful girls, now?" she cried. "We shall be shunned by the whole village!"

Mrs Bennet's complaints were soon redirected from the errant but absent Lydia to a target more satisfyingly present: she reasoned that if Elizabeth had not refused to marry Mr Collins when he offered for her last winter, Lydia would have been at home enjoying the wedding preparations and not off in Brighton where she was lost. Mrs Bennet was not a vicious woman, but in her anxiety for her favourite, darling Lydia, she could barely think straight, and her character demanded someone to blame other than the actual culprit. While Lydia's fate was unknown, her doting mother could not countenance blaming her for much of anything. Far easier to vent her anxiety on a daughter who was safe and sound in front of her.

Elizabeth could not escape the constant rebukes, and soon came to feel that she might indeed have prevented Lydia's ruin, and by extension that of all her sisters, had she sacrificed herself on that particular altar. Mr Collins was in all ways objectionable as a potential husband, but had she set aside her own wishes and accepted his offer, would it not be as her mother said? Could her own selfishness be the true cause of the current disaster?

And, she reminded herself, if her mother knew of the other proposal Elizabeth had rejected, how much worse would her reproaches be? For, only that April, Elizabeth had roundly refused the hand of Mr Darcy of Pemberley in Derbyshire - a man worth ten thousand pounds a year - for no better reason than that she could not like him and had believed him to be of bad character.

If she was to now regret refusing a proposal from an eligible gentleman, it was Mr Darcy and not Mr Collins she should truly regret. After her refusal, he had provided her with a letter responding to some of the allegations she had thrown at him. The letter had shown her the extent of her own prejudice in accepting the word of others against his credit. Indeed, she had given weight to the word of the very man who had now stolen her sister from Brighton! And then, during her recent holiday in the north, she had encountered Mr Darcy again, learning more of his good character and improved manners. She now knew Mr Darcy to be a much better sort of man than she had at first thought him, and even if she was not certain she loved him, she could no longer hate him as she did. And he certainly was a cut above Mr Collins, both in person and in mind.

Luckily, her mother was in complete ignorance of this second proposal, and Elizabeth was determined to keep it that way. It was bad enough to be berated for refusing the offer she could not regret. How much worse to be blamed for refusing the offer she found on reflection that she did regret: she might really have saved her family from ignominy if she were Mrs Darcy and not plain Lizzy Bennet.

But she also knew a profound relief that she had refused the man. Given what she knew of his history with Mr Wickham, how could she have dragged his family into this current mess? How could she have reconciled herself with forcing that good man and his innocent sister into a connection with the very wastrel who had done them so much hurt in the past? It was not to be thought of.

These swirling thoughts kept her from sleep and tormented her even on her long walks through the countryside. She alternated between guilt and relief at her own choices, between anger at Lydia and fear for her safety, between flashes of hope that it might yet turn out well and profound grief at all they had lost.

Elizabeth was pleased to receive her father's summons to his book room, where he had sequestered himself since his return from town late that morning. She had missed his calm, wry humour and his ability to see to the heart of things despite his wife's histrionics. A conversation with Mr Bennet was just the tonic she needed to distract her from her mother's chastisements and her own guilt.

"Well, Lizzy, I see that things at home are much as I expected," began Mr Bennet once she had taken a seat next to him before the fireplace in his study. Although he held a glass of amber liquid, he did not invite her to join him in imbibing. She was twenty years, and a woman grown, but to Mr Bennet she was still his little Lizzy, a girl too young to touch spirits.

"Things have been difficult, Papa," she answered honestly, "but nothing to what you must have borne in London. Was there truly no sign of them to be found?"

"It is a very large city, my dear, with many places to hide should you wish to avoid detection. Your uncle and I visited every reputable hotel and boarding house we could find, and some not so reputable, but if they are using a false name, we might even have been at their very doorstep and not known it. It is in every way hopeless so long as they do not want to be found."

Elizabeth had known this, of course, but to hear it stated so baldly drained her of her last dregs of optimism. Somehow, she had hoped against hope that her sensible father and her smart, well-connected uncle would be able to find Lydia and rescue the family. Now she had to abandon that dream along with all her others.

"I should have married him when I had the chance," she muttered.

"What? No!" her father cried, believing she spoke of Mr Collins, for he had never heard of the other proposal she had refused, "It is bad enough to lose one daughter to a scoundrel. I could not have borne to lose you to a blithering idiot. Let me not have the sorrow of seeing you unhappy in your marriage, Lizzy. And you forget that even had you consented, I would have refused him your hand." Overcoming his initial shock at the idea, Mr Bennet observed his daughter more closely, noting her defeated air. "Never, never, never think that this is your fault, Lizzy. Lydia's choices were her own, and the decision to send her so far from my supervision was mine alone. You warned me against allowing her to go to Brighton. Would that I had listened to you. But it is all too late now, and there is no purpose served in might-have-beens. I do not wish to hear another word about you and Mr Collins, do you hear me?"

In teary gratitude for his vehemence, Elizabeth nodded, and turned the conversation to their family in London: Mrs Bennet's brother, Mr Gardiner, his wife and children. Mr Bennet was able to provide a positive report as to their health, though his reason for staying with them had not left either him or his brother-in-law with much time for socialising. "In fact, Lizzy," he added, "Mrs Gardiner thinks she may be with child again - she is not certain yet, you understand, and does not want it bandied about, but is feeling more tired than usual. She asked if I might send you to London to help her for a month or two. I would be loath to lose you for so long, but the Gardiners have been so kind to us that I cannot in good conscience refuse them. Would you like to go, my dear?"

"Oh, yes! I should like that above all things. Do you think Jane might come, too?"

Pleased to see his usually lively daughter regain some of her animation, Mr Bennet laughed gently - the first time he had found amusement in anything since the news of his youngest child's disappearance some weeks before - but had to disappoint her in this. "No, I am afraid not. I could not part with you both or there would not be a single word of sense uttered in my presence for the whole duration. I will rely on Jane to help ease your mother's nerves and to play the occasional game of chess with me of an evening. Otherwise, I am convinced we should all run mad before too long."

"Poor Jane," was her sister's pensive reply. Yet, much as she cared for her eldest sister, Elizabeth was not one to look a gift horse in the mouth, and before she left her father's study on his first evening home, it was settled that she would set off for London the next afternoon. This news met little opposition from the matriarch of the house, who was glad to have her most vexing daughter - the one who had inexplicably refused a perfectly good proposal - gone from her sight.

© 2019 elag