Some Natural Importance: A Pride & Prejudice Variation by Ashton Jan

Author:Ashton, Jan
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Quills & Quartos Publishing
Published: 2021-05-09T16:00:00+00:00

There was no escape for Elizabeth. Her mother questioned her closely on what Mr Darcy had collected from the book room, her younger sisters begged to hear any stories from town that Mr Darcy might have imparted, and Jane plainly thought there was more than a search for a borrowed book going on behind that door.

Mr Darcy’s shocking words, and her uncle’s reference to a plan and a letter tucked into one of Swift’s books drew her back into the book room. It still smelled of her father’s pipe, his books, his leather chair. She walked to the window and closed it, desperate for the room to retain its familiar scent as long as possible. Then it was to the shelves, which while never orderly to the unfamiliar eye of her uncle or sisters, had a pattern well-established to her. The books on the shelves were not of current reading for Mr Bennet; he kept those stacked beside the window seat or on the desk or on the table by his chair. As her uncle had, Elizabeth found Gulliver’s Travels on the shelf, and Drapier’s Letters on a stack beside the sofa. But neither were notable for anything but the occasional bookmark.

Jane sought out her company and smiled wanly in the doorway. Elizabeth knew her sister’s heartache over their father was compounded by her worries over Mr Collins and Mr Bingley. Miss Bingley’s perfunctory note of sympathy acknowledging Mr Bennet’s death had done little to assuage Jane’s tender heart or their mother’s fretting over the kind, handsome, rich, and inconveniently missing Mr Bingley.

Despite her own burdens, Jane tucked away her curiosity and waited until evening to curl up beside Elizabeth, brush out her hair, and make her enquiries.

“It was kind of Mr Darcy to come to Longbourn. Mama was quite pleased he called here before ending his journey at Netherfield.”

“Mr Darcy is all goodness,” Elizabeth replied. “As Mama said so at least six times after he left.”

“Lizzy! It speaks well to his character that he respected Papa so much.”

“Yes, Jane.” After a week of feeling bereft and worried, the emotions that Mr Darcy bestirred were almost welcome. Shock, anger, and curiosity warred within her.

Why would he come here and say these things? My father, promise me in marriage? And to a man he knew I disliked? Who scarcely found me tolerable?

“What news did Mr Darcy bring to upset you?”

Jane’s voice was soft but her question was pointed. Elizabeth wondered how to even begin telling her sister what had occurred in the book room earlier today, or what had allegedly been discussed and plotted in there weeks ago. She could scarce believe a word said by Mr Darcy as its particulars were so foreign to her conception of her father and the very idea of an arranged marriage so at odds with the life she had imagined for herself. A secret betrothal, linked to a secret estate, planned by two men with an acquaintance younger than her aunt’s new-born son? How

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