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Charlotte sat, staring at the grass in front of her. She felt Jane’s hand grasp hers and looked up.

“I have never confessed this but I too have had moments when I wondered whether I could have done what Lizzie has done. I comfort myself knowing that Mama would never have let me take over Uncle Gardiner’s house the way Lizzie did. But rather than wish that we could have swapped, I instead have spent more time wondering if I could have done as much, and done it so well, as Lizzie.”

It was not the same as Charlotte’s confession but she squeezed Jane’s hand in thanks.

“Thank you. It rather nicely brings me to the point that I have been trying, unsuccessfully, to make.”

Charlotte sighed.

“Please believe me when I say I do not want this to come across as hard as it will sound. I think that Eliza has become somewhat bitter at the world and has lost any sense of romance.”

Rather than have to defend herself Charlotte was shocked by Jane’s response.

“I agree completely. It took me a moment or two to understand what you were meaning but you are correct.”

“Oh.”

It was not the most cogent of retorts but Jane’s immediate agreement had caught Charlotte unawares.

“Lizzie has talked about this with both Mary when she visited her and with myself the two times I visited her.”

“She never mentioned anything in her letters. We must have written tens of letters over the years.”

Charlotte tried to hide the hurt in her tone but was not completely successful.

“She never writes about it in her letters, it was the same with Mary and me. And it would take several hours of conversation with her before she shared much even with her two sisters. Elizabeth says that she has managed to trap herself.”

“Trap herself? How do you mean? What does she mean?”

“Calm yourself Charlotte, I will explain. First of all I am going to use the word wife despite the fact that Elizabeth is still a maiden. All of the things, the positions, I am going to list partially apply but very few of them tell the whole story. Lizzie has taken over the role of Uncle Gardiner’s wife, within the context of running his house and entertaining. She is more than just his hostess, as she has helped raise the three youngest children and is the mother figure to all three of them, especially Michael who has almost no memories of his mother. She interviewed all the governess candidates and it was the person that she recommended that Uncle Gardiner hired. She even deals with the nurse that cares for him. But what is different is that she assists Uncle Gardiner in running his business. And it is that aspect that has hardened Lizzie.”

Charlotte had used the word bitter but as she thought about it she realised hardened was an even better way to describe Elizabeth.

“Two things contributed to this. The first is the way gentlemen deal with tradesmen. She mostly refuses to share examples with me. She has confided in Mary once or twice, but that is more a matter of timing. Mary had arrived at Gracechurch Street and Lizzie needed to vent. That trait has not changed.”

They lightly chuckled, Elizabeth had often vented to both of them, mainly about her mother, when she was younger.

“From what Mary has shared, occasionally a gentleman would make a comment about the ‘stench of trade’ when attending the Uncle Gardiner’s offices. I never knew any of our grandparents. You have told us more stories of them from your childhood memories than either of our parents. They were all dead before I was three years old. It has never been a secret that Mama’s father was a country solicitor. Or that one daughter married the man who took over the practice while the son went to London and started a business. Papa’s family has owned Longbourn since the time of Edward VI, so more than 250 years. We are the daughters of landed gentry, minor to be sure but gentle-born nonetheless.

“Elizabeth has been exposed to the scathing snobbery of society in London. Her descriptions of life in the ‘Ton’ seem to be so shallow and so petty. Everyone appears to think the worst of everyone else, and they all wait for an individual or a family to make some kind of mistake so that they can pounce. And as the example Mary shared shows, they would also make pre-emptive comments.”

Charlotte thought about this last point and held up her hand.

“Is it any different to how my mother or your mother act within the small society of Meryton and its surrounding area? Remember how gleeful they were when they heard the story of one of the Purvis’ nieces had suddenly gone to Scotland for a year?”

Jane stopped and pondered this point.

“So it is nothing more than the scale, I can see that. London is multiples bigger than Hertfordshire so there is more scandal to report and talk about.”

“I interrupted. You were talking about tradesmen.”

“Lizzie has been the eyes and ears of our uncle ever since the accident. He laughingly calls her his legs, she can get places that he is no longer able.”

Charlotte gasped at this black humour.

“I know, that was my reaction as well when he first said it to me. What Lizzie has been exposed to is the snobbery of Uncle Gardiner’s customers. Well some of them. The polite version that is commonly spoken of is ‘the taint of trade’. You cannot be a gentleman if you have any taint of trade. The less polite version is ‘the stench of trade’ that I just mentioned. It is Lizzie’s contention that although it is not repeated out loud very often, it is the way that most of the London gentry think. It is something that I find very difficult to challenge. She is the person that deals with that attitude, or at least hears it, or of it. To be honest, when Mary first told me I thought that it was Lizzie over-exaggerating things but according to Mary she has been consistent about it for years and the few times that she has mentioned it in front of Uncle Gardiner he has not refuted what she is saying.”

“The stench of trade? Really?”