F. Darcy
Elizabeth folded the letter slowly. The final sentence lingered with her and she smiled. Her answer was dispatched the next morning.
Mr Darcy,
I am sorry to hear that London continues to disappoint you. The city will be mortified by the discovery.
Your account of the dinner has interested me greatly. Not because of the company themselves, who sound perfectly ordinary, but because your reflections on the evening are not what I imagined.
There are disadvantages to becoming accustomed to another person's opinions. I have discovered the same difficulty at Longbourn, where I often happen upon things that I think you may like to discuss.
My father has recently taken to walking with my mother every evening. Meryton is so astonished by this development that I expect reports of a coming apocalypse before the month is out.
Mrs Long believes they have quarrelled. Sir William Lucas believes they have fallen in love. Lady Lucas is determined that my mother has some sort of wasting disease, and to walk with my father must be some sort of final wish. She is certainly lingering as they have been wandering the lanes every night for a week!
I have spent the last week wishing to tell somebody this story and am forced to conclude that you are the unfortunate recipient.
Yours in bafflement,
Elizabeth Bennet
The reply arrived more quickly than usual and Elizabeth carried it into the garden before opening it.
Miss Bennet,
I am not at all unfortunate. On the contrary, I consider myself unusually fortunate to have been entrusted with the story.
As for your parents, I confess myself inclined towards Sir William's explanation.
People speak often of first attachments and very little of last ones. There is something admirable in discovering, after many years, that one's happiness has been sitting across the room all along. Forgive the sentimentality. I fear Mrs Makepeace would accuse me of becoming a soppy fellow and the charge would be difficult to defend against.
I think of you often as I go about my day.
Yours always,
F. Darcy
Elizabeth read the letter once and then again in quick succession. The afternoon stretched quietly around her and a rook crossed the sky above the trees.
His words possessed a curious intimacy and she thought of the ease that had grown between them. Simply and steadily, until the habit of writing to him had become as natural as speaking to Jane.
The realisation ought perhaps to have alarmed her, but she found herself smiling. Then, because the smile refused to leave, she lowered her eyes to the letter and began reading it once more.
Chapter Twenty-Five
The weeks which followed passed with greater tranquillity than Elizabeth would once have believed possible.
Summer deepened gradually over Hertfordshire. The hedgerows grew dense and green, the days lengthened, and Longbourn resumed the familiar habits of ordinary life. Yet beneath that appearance of familiarity there existed a sense that something had altered, not only within the household but within the people who inhabited it.
Nowhere was this more evident than in her parents. The change was difficult to define precisely because it was Mrs Bennet who had altered most and yet altered least. She remained sociable and deeply interested in the lives of her daughters, but the restless agitation which had once accompanied every disappointment had deserted her. She no longer hurried from one excitement to another, nor did she dwell upon imagined disasters with quite the same enthusiasm. There was a contentment about her which Elizabeth could notremember seeing before; a quiet confidence that sat so naturally upon her that it seemed impossible to believe it had ever been absent.
The younger girls were considerably less comfortable with the transformation. Lydia appeared to regard it as a temporary illness and watched her mother with open suspicion whenever she failed to become alarmed by something. Kitty, finding herself deprived of the familiar storms around which she had long arranged her own feelings, seemed at first uncertain what to do with herself. Yet even they were not entirely untouched by the change. A calmer household had a curious effect upon its inhabitants, and though neither sister would have admitted it, both had become a little steadier in consequence.
Mr Bennet, for his part, appeared quietly delighted by the whole affair. Whether this was because he genuinely admired the alteration in his wife or because he enjoyed bewildering the neighbourhood, Elizabeth was never entirely certain. Most likely, she suspected, it was both.
There was something unexpectedly affecting in seeing two people, who had spent so many years misunderstanding one another, arrive at a place of greater kindness. No declarations had been exchanged. No revelations made. The transformation had occurred through a hundred small acts which would have appeared insignificant to anybody not paying attention.
Jane, meanwhile, continued to astonish her in an entirely different manner. Elizabeth had expected uncertainty and disappointment and all the other emotions which common sense suggested ought naturally to accompany a separation. Instead Jane appeared as cheerful and serene as ever.
