Mrs Makepeace looked unimpressed. "That many?"
Bingley laughed.
"It requires some courage."
"Young people in love always imagine letters require eloquence. What they generally require is posting."
Darcy coloured, but found himself unable to disagree.
"I begin to suspect," he said, "that letters are a very poor substitute for conversation."
Mrs Makepeace handed him a cup. "They are."
Nevertheless, the dissatisfaction remained. The distance between Lyme and Hertfordshire seemed greater now than it had whilst the Bennets were actually travelling it.
Bingley, who had been unusually thoughtful throughout much of the afternoon, set down his cup and leaned back in his chair. "I have been considering something."
Mrs Makepeace sighed. "Whenever a young man begins a sentence in that manner, it is wise to sit down."
"We are already sitting down."
"Then we are admirably prepared."
Bingley ignored her. "It occurs to me that I ought eventually to settle somewhere."
Darcy raised an eyebrow.
This was not a new idea. Bingley had spoken often of taking an estate and fulfilling his family’s greatest wish of joining the landed gentry after the family fortune had been made in trade a generation before.
Bingley coughed self-consciously. "And I wonder if Hertfordshire might be just the thing. It is an easy distance from London, and I am sure the neighbours would be quite to my liking." He beamed and rubbed his hands together, very satisfied with this plan.
Georgiana laughed. "Mr Bingley, that is quite the best news I have heard in days!"
Chapter Twenty-Four
The letters began four days after the Bennets' return to Longbourn. The family were sat down to breakfast, with Kitty and Lydia arguing noisily over the last muffin, when Mr Bennet placed a letter carefully next to Elizabeth’s plate.
"There you are, my Lizzy."
Elizabeth looked down at the unfamiliar hand and knew exactly who her correspondent was.
"I believe," continued her father, buttering a piece of toast, "that this falls under the category of approved communications."
"Thank you, Papa."
"You are very welcome. I feel I have behaved with uncommon integrity. I have not read a solitary word."
Mrs Bennet laughed. "Mr Bennet, leave Lizzy be. Go on and read your letter, my girl."
Elizabeth suspected that if she remained in the room another minute, her father would begin describing the heroic nature ofhis self-restraint. She was relieved that the rest of the family were too distracted to watch her slip away, although Jane eyed her thoughtfully.
Once upstairs, she broke the seal.
Miss Bennet,
Having devoted an unreasonable amount of thought to the opening of this letter, I have reluctantly concluded that no opening composed with excessive care is likely to improve upon one written immediately.
Mrs Makepeace informs me that hesitation in letter writing is a grave sin and that old Mr Makepeace would have had no truck with my hesitancy.
