An Unexpected Ally

Part 26

Peace reigned over the Longbourn parlour until the clattering of two pairs of feet thundered along the corridor and Lydia and Kitty burst together through the door, shrieking over one another in the excitement to share their news.

"We have just come from Meryton!" Kitty yelped. "We ran home because - because -" She hiccupped, trying to catch her breath and Lydia seized the opportunity to be the one to deliver their announcement.

"Mr Bingley has returned to Netherfield!"

Their words were so unexpected, and their arrival so chaotic, that it took a full minute before anybody could respond. Eventually, it was Mary who spoke, suspicion lacing her voice.

"Where did you hear this? Are you sure it's true?"

"Of course it is true!" Lydia retorted, with a toss of her head.

"Why should we invent such a thing?" Kitty was hurt. "Maria Lucas told us, and she heard it from her father. We thought Jane would want to know."

Jane bit down hard on her lip. She had managed, somehow, to hear this news without displaying any kind of reaction, but now that every eye turned towards her she felt the strain of remaining impassive.

"Why should Jane care so much to know it?" Elizabeth asked, desperately. She glanced with concern at her sister and then threw herself into the breach, taking at least some of their family's curiosity onto herself. "If it is true then it is of interest to all of us. Was not Mr Bingley a friend to our whole family?"

Lydia smirked.

"I merely thought the one member of this family who anticipated marrying him -"

"Oh, do be quiet, Lydia!"

This censure was so sharp and sudden and from the unlikely lips of Mrs Bennet, that Lydia recoiled as if she had been struck, bursting into noisy tears and fleeing from the room as hurriedly as she had entered it. When nobody immediately followed her, eager to pet and comfort, a wail reached the room demanding her sister.

"I must go," Kitty said, evidently unwilling to leave the room for fear she might miss some delicious gossip, but also knowing that to avoid Lydia in her moment of need would be to store up trouble for herself later. With a reluctant sigh, she shuffled after her sister.

"Jane?" Mrs Bennet, who was sitting next to Jane, clenched her hand tightly. "Jane, dear. You need not bear this shock alone. We are all here for you."

"Thank you, Mama," Jane said, stiffly. She tried to extricate her hand from her mother's crushing grip and smiled when she finally succeeded. "But truly you need not fret. I am - I am glad Mr Bingley is here. How pleasant it will be for Mr Darcy to have company again. I am sure..." She paused, taking a breath and praying her voice sounded more natural to her sisters' ears than it did to her own. "I am sure Charles hardly thinks of me at all." She did not say and even if he did, it would not matter, for I am engaged to another man. She was not even sure she could think those words truthfully in the quiet confines of her mind. Oh, why did Charles have to return at all! And why do so now?

"Did he say as much to you about his plans, Mary? When you met them in London?" Elizabeth asked, turning desperately to her sister. Jane could sense her concern and wished to reassure her that it was unnecessary but she knew, of everyone, that it was Lizzy who she would struggle most to persuade that she remained quite well and undisturbed by Charles Bingley's reappearance.

"Why should he have confided anything at all to Mary?" Mrs Bennet queried, dismissively. Her eyes brightened and she leaned forward, her eagerness to comfort her eldest daughter not quite outweighing her interest in potential gossip. She was not unlike her younger daughters in her thirst for drama.

"What will you say to him, if he calls here, Jane?" She frowned. "I suppose we might refuse to see him, although -"

"Mama, no!" Jane was more shocked by this than by the fact of Charles's return. Fact, for she knew that however vindictive her youngest sisters could be to others, even they would not go as far as to construct this story. Charles was back at Netherfield, no doubt with his sister in tow. If they were to remain then she must grow used to seeing him again. At least until Colonel Fitzwilliam and I are married.

She had not thought very much about the future after the wedding but now she could not help but consider it. Where would they live? Who would their friends be? Marriage to Charles Bingley, which she had dreamt of so fervently, had afforded her the hope of staying near home. She could be mistress of Netherfield Park, and the same friends and neighbours she had known all her life would be her friends, still. Her family would always be close. As wife to Colonel Richard Fitzwilliam...who knew?

It is not an accurate comparison, she reminded herself. Charles never did care for me. I must stop deceiving myself into thinking he did. His return is a coincidence, only.

At least, with Kitty and Lydia's eagerness to share gossip, she was afforded a little warning before he came to call. He would, she felt sure of it, and she must be mistress of her emotions before he did. She stood, so suddenly that every eye again fixed on her.

"Excuse me. I think I will go upstairs."

By some miracle, she managed to cross the short distance from her chair to the doorway without faltering, but she leaned heavily on the bannister as she climbed the stairs to her bedroom and when she closed the door firmly behind her, she leaned against it, hot tears welling in her eyes.

Why could Charles Bingley not have come home sooner? If she'd known he would come back she might have waited, mightn't she? Or had she made the decision she always would have made? Colonel Fitzwilliam was the same good man he had been when she consented to marry him. He loved her just as much now as he had then, and she cared equally for him. The presence of Charles Bingley at Netherfield Park changed absolutely nothing. Did it?