His eyes landed on her with a sudden, sharp intensity. "You are very wise, Miss Bennet. My sister always said youwere... well never mind, she was wrong. You are the only person who has explained to me exactly what the situation is."
"I have a talent for the uncomfortable truth," Mary shrugged. "It is why I am rarely invited to the better dinner parties."
"I want to fix it." He stepped closer. The scent of pomade was stronger now. "Not just the town. Me. I want to be a gentleman who is more than just a name. Will you help me? Not as a Bennet, or a sister of Keathley and Darcy. But as a scholar?"
Mary felt a strange tremor in her chest at the proximity. It was a sensation she usually associated with a difficult passage of Handel, or a sudden drop in a carriage. It was most inconvenient.
"You wish for a tutor in the art of being a person?" she asked, her voice remaining steady by sheer force of will.
"I wish for a friend who does not think I am an empty, fashionable shell," he admitted.
Mary looked at him, then at the skeletal Mrs Chester, and finally at the gloomy Kitty.
"I cannot promise you will not feel like a shell on occasion, Mr Bingley," she said. "But I suppose I can help you find the books you need."
The selection of a book for Charles Bingley was a task that required the talent of a master watchmaker and the patience of a saint. Mary moved through the shelves with a sense of purpose that left Mr Bingley scurrying in her wake, his hands twitching as if he were afraid to touch the spines without permission.
"Too dense." Mary rejected a volume of political philosophy as if it were a diseased vegetable. "You will fall asleep by page four, and the village will find you the next morning with your face imprinted with the history of the Whig party. It is not the sight of a leader."
"I see your point," Mr Bingley murmured, gazing longingly at a small, brightly coloured book about birds that Miss Bennet had already passed twice.
"Too light," she muttered, intercepting his gaze. "That is for children and simpletons. If you carry that, Mrs Chester will report you to the vicar for intellectual vacancy."
She finally settled on a thick, handsomely bound volume of travel journals from the Levant. It was physically imposing enough to satisfy his desire for "heavy," but the content was structured in manageable vignettes, written with a clarity that would not tax a mind more accustomed to the nuances of a hunting schedule.
"This," Mary declared, pressing the book into his hands. "It provides the illusion of worldly curiosity without the requirement of being a Doctor of Divinity. It is the literary equivalent of a very sturdy pair of boots—reliable, dignified, and difficult to trip over."
Mr Bingley took the book as if it were a holy relic. "Thank you. It feels quite right. It has a very convincing weight."
"Now, the matter of the villagers," Mary continued, her voice dropping to a conspiratorial whisper. "Selecting a book is only the first step in your reconstruction. You cannot simply read your way back into their affections. You require a campaign. A strategy of visible, undeniable utility."
Mr Bingley leaned in, his eyes wide. "Utility? Should I fix a bridge? I have a bridge at Netherfield that is quite unstable."
"The bridge at Netherfield is for your own benefit," Mary countered. "The village requires acts that serve them. Small acts, genuine. You must be seen not as the master of the big house, but as a neighbour with a conscience. You must fix the fence of the widow and provide the extra grain for the charity of the curate. And you must do it without a valet in sight."
"No Tepper?" Mr Bingley asked, slightly panicked.
"No Tepper. Here, a valet is a sign of a man who cannot wear his own breeches. If you wish to be respected, Mr Bingley, you must work for them."
He nodded, determination crossing his features. It was a new expression for him—it sat on his face like a borrowed coat, slightly too large but worn with a certain pride.
"I will do it," he declared. "I will fix the widow's fence. I will be the most useful man in Hertfordshire. But I shall need guidance. I do not know which widow has the worst fence."
"Fortunately for you, I have spent years documenting the structural failings of every fence in the parish. I shall provide you with a list. But this endeavour requires planning. We cannot be seen conspiring in the library—my mother's nerves are already a fragile collective, and your presence in her parlour would likely result in a permanent state of hysteria."
"Where, then?" he asked, his voice eager.
"Oakham Mount. Monday at noon. It is isolated enough for a consultation but public enough to be respectable, provided we bring a chaperone."
She glanced at Kitty, who was currently staring at a dust mote with an expression of existential dread.
"Kitty shall accompany me. She is currently so lost in the pursuit of gravity that she will likely notice nothing less than a direct lightning strike."
"Excellent!" Mr Bingley's smile returned with a brilliance that made Mary squint. "Noon at Oakham Mount. I shall bring my new book. And I shall leave Tepper at home."
"A wise decision," Mary replied. "For both the book and the valet."
The shadows in the library had lengthened by the afternoon sun. The bell chime above the door signalled the departure of a pair of elderly ladies, leaving the establishment in a silence so heavy it felt as if the books themselves were holding their breath.
