Elizabeth and Mary exchanged frowns. It was clear their father favouredanyplan that reduced his effort or expense—as usual.
“But why?” Mrs Bennet whined plaintively, sounding entirely too much like Lydia.
Jane stood, placed her hands flat on the table, and leaned towards her mother menacingly.
“Do you truly want to know, Mother? Rest assured, you will not like it.”
“You will not talk to me that way!”
Jane sat and shrugged. “Very well, conversation over. Just do not mention that name again. Lizzy, might you pass the wine? I seem to have spilled mine.”
Elizabeth complied, but Mrs Bennet was not finished.
“You will tell me right now, Miss Jane Bennet. I did not raise you to talk to your mother that way.” she said indignantly.
“Actually, you did.”
Jane’s stare remained hard and unyielding. “Lydia talks that way every day of her life. Youhaveraised us to speak in such a manner. You are merely surprised because your elder daughters usually refrain, but we are quite capable. This subject will be closed forever before the hour. Do you want to know or not?”
“Very well, explain yourself,” Mrs Bennet snapped with ill humour.
“You have roused my curiosity,” Bennet added.
“Very well, though I doubt it will give you much satisfaction.”
Jane turned to a maid cowering in the corner. “Sally, pray fetch me pencil and paper, then retire to your own dinner. Ensure nobody returns until we ring.”
Sally hurried away.
While she was gone, Jane began. “I shall explain it using a method Uncle Gardiner taught me.”
She waited until everyone was paying attention.
“Let us start with the obvious. Mr Bingley paid particular attention to me for 6 weeks, left promising to return in a few days, and disappeared without a word. We can all agree that paints him in a terrible light, and if you wish to gossip about his lack of constancy, or even proper manners, you are welcome to do sooutside my hearing.While I am at it, let me extend the embargo to Lizzy and Mary, who also wish to be done with the Netherfield party.Agreed?”
The sharp edge on the last word, more command than suggestion, made everyone nod.
“Now that we agree his manners are very bad, and his constancy worse, let us move to the next topic.”
Sally arrived with pencil and paper, then scurried out.
“Let us turn to the question ofwhyhe left. Perhaps some of you have ideas, but I will give my opinion. He left because he is either aspineless wormor asensible man. We cannot reliably choose between them, but we have evidence enough to document those well.”
Mrs Bennet gasped at the language, mild as it was.
Lydia giggled. “Spineless worm—that is perfect. I vote for that one.”
“I favour it myself, as does Mr Occam,” Mary added.
“Indeed, that is a good explanation,” Elizabeth added, “but they are not mutually exclusive. He may have left and stayedaway because of practicality, but he did not take his leave properly or communicate his decision because he is a spineless worm, or something just short of that—perhaps a slug or snail.”
Everyone laughed, though somewhat nervously.
“Jane, show the evidence for him being sensible,” Mary said, “but before you do, allow me one question. Lizzy, purely on the topic of sensibleness, how would you rate Mr Darcy? You know him better than anyone else here.”
The question startled Elizabeth, but she gave it her full attention for a moment while everyone waited.
“I would rate him highly sensible. He is overly proud, punctilious, haughty, overbearing, rude, and awkward—but from what I have seen of his business dealings, his relations with his sister, and several discussions I had with him at Netherfield, I would say he is very level-headed. He may be the second most intelligent man I know.”
