Chapter 17
My dear Lizzy, where can you have been walking
to?” was a question which Elizabeth received from Jane as soon as
she entered the room, and from all the others when they sat down to
table. She had only to say in reply, that they had wandered about
till she was beyond her own knowledge. She coloured as she spoke;
but neither that, nor any thing else, awakened a suspicion of the
truth.
The evening passed quietly, unmarked by any thing
extraordinary. The acknowledged lovers talked and laughed; the
unacknowledged were silent. Darcy was not of a disposition in which
happiness overflows in mirth; and Elizabeth, agitated and confused,
rather knew that she was happy than felt herself to
be so; for, besides the immediate embarrassment, there were other
evils before her. She anticipated what would be felt in the family
when her situation became known: she was aware that no one liked
him but Jane; and even feared that with the others it was a
dislike which not all his fortune and consequence might do
away.
At night she opened her heart to Jane. Though
suspicion was very far from Miss Bennet’s general habits, she was
absolutely incredulous here.
“You are joking, Lizzy. This cannot be! Engaged to
Mr. Darcy! No, no, you shall not deceive me: I know it to be
impossible.”
“This is a wretched beginning, indeed! My sole
dependence was on you; and I am sure nobody else will believe me,
if you do not. Yet, indeed, I am in earnest. I speak nothing but
the truth. He still loves me, and we are engaged.”
Jane looked at her doubtingly. “Oh, Lizzy, it
cannot be. I know how much you dislike him.”
“You know nothing of the matter. That is all
to be forgot. Perhaps I did not always love him so well as I do
now; but in such cases as these, a good memory is unpardonable.
This is the last time I shall ever remember it myself.”
Miss Bennet still looked all amazement. Elizabeth
again, and more seriously, assured her of its truth.
“Good heaven! can it be really so? Yet now I must
believe you,” cried Jane. “My dear, dear Lizzy, I would, I do
congratulate you; but are you certain? Forgive the question—are you
quite certain that you can be happy with him?”
“There can be no doubt of that. It is settled
between us already that we are to be the happiest couple in the
world. But are you pleased, Jane? Shall you like to have such a
brother?”
“Very, very much. Nothing could give either Bingley
or myself more delight. But we considered it, we talked of it as
impossible. And do you really love him quite well enough? Oh,
Lizzy, do any thing rather than marry without affection. Are you
quite sure that you feel what you ought to do?”
“Oh yes! You will only think I feel more
than I ought to do when I tell you all.”
“What do you mean?”
“Why, I must confess that I love him better than I
do Bingley. I am afraid you will be angry.”
“My dearest sister, now be serious. I want to talk
very seriously. Let me know every thing that I am to know without
delay. Will you tell me how long you have loved him?”
“It has been coming on so gradually, that I hardly
know when it began; but I believe I must date it from my first
seeing his beautiful grounds at Pemberley.”
Another entreaty that she would be serious,
however, produced the desired effect; and she soon satisfied Jane
by her solemn assurances of attachment. When convinced on that
article, Miss Bennet had nothing further to wish.
“Now I am quite happy,” said she, “for you will be
as happy as myself. I always had a value for him. Were it for
nothing but his love of you, I must always have esteemed him; but
now, as Bingley’s friend and your husband, there can be only
Bingley and yourself more dear to me. But, Lizzy, you have been
very sly, very reserved with me. How little did you tell me of what
passed at Pemberley and Lambton! I owe all that I know of it to
another, not to you.”
Elizabeth told her the motives of her secrecy. She
had been unwilling to mention Bingley; and the unsettled state of
her own feelings had made her equally avoid the name of his friend:
but now she would no longer conceal from her his share in Lydia’s
marriage. All was acknowledged, and half the night spent in
conversation.
“Good gracious!” cried Mrs. Bennet, as she stood
at a window the next morning, “if that disagreeable Mr. Darcy is
not coming here again with our dear Bingley! What can he mean by
being so tiresome as to be always coming here? I had no notion but
he would go a shooting, or something or other, and not disturb us
with his company. What shall we do with him? Lizzy, you must walk
out with him again, that he may not be in Bingley’s way.”
Elizabeth could hardly help laughing at so
convenient a proposal; yet was really vexed that her mother should
be always giving him such an epithet.
As soon as they entered, Bingley looked at her so
expressively, and shook hands with such warmth, as left no doubt of
his good information; and he soon afterwards said aloud, “Mrs.
Bennet, have you no more lanes hereabouts in which Lizzy may lose
her way again to-day?”
“I advise Mr. Darcy, and Lizzy, and Kitty,” said
Mrs. Bennet, “to walk to Oakham Mount this morning. It is a nice
long walk, and Mr. Darcy has never seen the view.”
“It may do very well for the others,” replied Mr.
Bingley; “but I am sure it will be too much for Kitty. Won’t it,
Kitty?”
Kitty owned that she had rather stay at home. Darcy
professed a great curiosity to see the view from the Mount, and
Elizabeth silently consented. As she went up stairs to get ready,
Mrs. Bennet followed her, saying,—
“I am quite sorry, Lizzy, that you should be forced
to have that disagreeable man all to yourself; but I hope you will
not mind it. It is all for Jane’s sake, you know; and there is no
occasion for talking to him except just now and then, so do not put
yourself to inconvenience.”
During their walk, it was resolved that Mr.
Bennet’s consent should be asked in the course of the evening:
Elizabeth reserved to herself the application for her mother’s. She
could not determine how her mother would take it; sometimes
doubting whether all his wealth and grandeur would be enough to
overcome her abhorrence of the man: but whether she were violently
set against the match, or violently delighted with it, it was
certain that her manner would be equally ill adapted to do credit
to her sense; and she could no more bear that Mr. Darcy should hear
the first raptures of her joy, than the first vehemence of her
disapprobation.
In the evening, soon after Mr. Bennet withdrew to
the library, she saw Mr. Darcy rise also and follow him, and her
agitation on seeing it was extreme. She did not fear her father’s
opposition, but he was going to be made unhappy, and that it should
be through her means; that she, his favourite child, should
be distressing him by her choice, should be filling him with fears
and regrets in disposing of her, was a wretched reflection, and she
sat in misery till Mr. Darcy appeared again, when, looking at him,
she was a little relieved by his smile. In a few minutes he
approached the table where she was sitting with Kitty; and, while
pretending to admire her work, said in a whisper, “Go to your
father; he wants you in the library.” She was gone directly.
Her father was walking about the room, looking
grave and anxious. “Lizzy,” said he, “what are you doing? Are you
out of your senses to be accepting this man? Have not you always
hated him?”
How earnestly did she then wish that her former
opinions had been more reasonable, her expressions more moderate!
It would have spared her from explanations and professions which it
was exceedingly awkward to give; but they were now necessary, and
she assured him, with some confusion, of her attachment to Mr.
Darcy.
“Or, in other words, you are determined to have
him. He is rich, to be sure, and you may have more fine clothes and
fine carriages than Jane. But will they make you happy?”
“Have you any other objection,” said Elizabeth,
“than your belief of my indifference?”
“None at all. We all know him to be a proud,
unpleasant sort of man; but this would be nothing if you really
liked him.”
“I do, I do like him,” she replied, with tears in
her eyes; “I love him. Indeed he has no improper pride. He is
perfectly amiable. You do not know what he really is; then pray do
not pain me by speaking of him in such terms.”
“Lizzy,” said her father, “I have given him my
consent. He is the kind of man, indeed, to whom I should never dare
refuse any thing, which he condescended to ask. I now give it to
you, if you are resolved on having him. But let me advise
you to think better of it. I know your disposition, Lizzy. I know
that you could be neither happy nor respectable, unless you truly
esteemed your husband; unless you looked up to him as a superior.
Your lively talents would place you in the greatest danger in an
unequal marriage. You could scarcely escape discredit and misery.
My child, let me not have the grief of seeing you unable to
respect your partner in life. You know not what you are
about.”
Elizabeth, still more affected, was earnest and
solemn in her reply; and, at length, by repeated assurances that
Mr. Darcy was really the object of her choice, by explaining the
gradual change which her estimation of him had undergone, relating
her absolute certainty that his affection was not the work of a
day, but had stood the test of many months’ suspense, and
enumerating with energy all his good qualities, she did conquer her
father’s incredulity, and reconcile him to the match.
“Well, my dear,” said he, when she ceased speaking,
“I have no more to say. If this be the case, he deserves you. I
could not have parted with you, my Lizzy, to any one less
worthy.”
To complete the favourable impression, she then
told him what Mr. Darcy had voluntarily done for Lydia. He heard
her with astonishment.
“This is an evening of wonders, indeed! And so,
Darcy did every thing; made up the match, gave the money, paid the
fellow’s debts, and got him his commission! So much the better. It
will save me a world of trouble and economy. Had it been your
uncle’s doing, I must and would have paid him; but these
violent young lovers carry every thing their own way. I shall offer
to pay him to-morrow; he will rant and storm about his love for
you, and there will be an end of the matter.”
He then recollected her embarrassment a few days
before, on his reading Mr. Collins’s letter; and after laughing at
her some time, allowed her at last to go, saying, as she quitted
the room, “If any young men come for Mary or Kitty, send them in,
for I am quite at leisure.”
Elizabeth’s mind was now relieved from a very heavy
weight; and, after half an hour’s quiet reflection in her own room,
she was able to join the others with tolerable composure. Every
thing was too recent for gaiety, but the evening passed tranquilly
away; there was no longer any thing material to be dreaded, and the
comfort of ease and familiarity would come in time.
When her mother went up to her dressing-room at
night, she followed her, and made the important communication. Its
effect was most extraordinary; for, on first hearing it, Mrs.
Bennet sat quite still, and unable to utter a syllable. Nor was it
under many, many minutes, that she could comprehend what she heard,
though not in general backward to credit what was for the advantage
of her family, or that came in the shape of a lover to any of them.
She began at length to recover, to fidget about in her chair, get
up, sit down again, wonder, and bless herself.
“Good gracious! Lord bless me! only think! dear me!
Mr. Darcy! Who would have thought it? And is it really true? Oh, my
sweetest Lizzy! how rich and how great you will be! What
pin-money,bn what
jewels, what carriages you will have! Jane’s is nothing to
it—nothing at all. I am so pleased—so happy. Such a charming man!
so handsome! so tall! Oh, my dear Lizzy! pray apologise for my
having disliked him so much before.I hope he will overlook it.
Dear, dear Lizzy. A house in town! Every thing that is charming!
Three daughters married! Ten thousand a year! Oh, Lord! what will
become of me? I shall go distracted.”
This was enough to prove that her approbation need
not be doubted; and Elizabeth, rejoicing that such an effusion was
heard only by herself, soon went away. But before she had been
three minutes in her own room, her mother followed her.
“My dearest child,” she cried, “I can think of
nothing else! Ten thousand a year, and very likely more! ’T is as
good as a lord! And a special license15—you
must and shall be married by a special license. But, my dearest
love, tell me what dish Mr. Darcy is particularly fond of, that I
may have it tomorrow.”
This was a sad omen of what her mother’s behaviour
to the gentleman himself might be; and Elizabeth found, that,
though in the certain possession of his warmest affection, and
secure of her relations’ consent, there was still something to be
wished for. But the morrow passed off much better than she
expected; for Mrs. Bennet luckily stood in such awe of her intended
son-in-law, that she ventured not to speak to him, unless it was in
her power to offer him any attention, or mark her deference for his
opinion.
Elizabeth had the satisfaction of seeing her father
taking pains to get acquainted with him; and Mr. Bennet soon
assured her that he was rising every hour in his esteem.
“I admire all my three sons-in-law highly,” said
he. “Wickham, perhaps, is my favourite; but I think I shall like
your husband quite as well as Jane’s.”