Colleen McCullough - The Independence of Miss Mary Bennet

Bingley Hall lay in five thousand acres outside the village of Wildboarclough, well south of Macclesfield. It had been a happy purchase for one seeking to advance his social station from plutocrat to aristocrat, and had fallen to Charles for a good price thanks to Fitzwilliam Darcy, who stood as guarantor not for his wealth (that was proven) but for his respectability, his propriety. Charles Bingley would not use the wrong fork or put the port decanter on the table! The land was well tenanted and Charles an excellent landlord, but the chief glory of the estate was its mansion, a large white building of central pile and two wings. Its beautiful and imposing Palladian faзade dated it to the seventeenth century.

The boys were off somewhere-the youngest was now eight-which meant they knew their mother needed peace and quiet. The only girl, Priscilla, had come after William, Percival, Robert, James and Marcus, so there was no hope that Prissy, as she was universally called, would turn out in a feminine mould. Since Hugh and Arthur were her juniors, she had two brothers to dominate and bully, and hared about with quite as much vigor as her brothers, leaving havoc in her wake and a mountain of darning in the housekeeper’s mending basket.

“She’s always more difficult when Charles is away. He knows exactly how to deal with her,” said Jane, having gone through the Bingley litany for her sister’s delectation as soon as she arrived. Which she did in time for breakfast, served at ten o’clock, and dreading how to broach the subject of Mary.

William walked in, not to dine, but to pay his respects, for he viewed his favourite aunt with great affection; Aunt Elizabeth was uniformly loved, Aunt Louisa was tolerated, and Aunt Caroline feared. A year older than Charlie, he was a handsome young man who resembled his father and seemed likely to follow him into the labyrinthine corridors of plutocracy. Since he had elected Cambridge, he and his cousin never saw each other apart from Christmas, for which Elizabeth was glad. They would never have got on together. Charlie was brilliant, William a plodder. Charlie’s looks were spectacular, William’s orthodox. Charlie didn’t notice girls-or boys, curse Caroline’s slanders!-whereas William liked to break hearts and keep tally of his conquests.

However, he did not stay long, and none of the others appeared in his place, even Prissy.

“You’re not eating, Lizzie,” said Jane with disapproval. “I swear that you are as slender today as you were when you married, so you have no excuse. Have some bread-and-butter.”

“Just coffee, thank you. I ate at Pemberley.”

“That was hours ago. What is this I hear about Lydia?” Jane asked, pouring coffee.

“Lydia ?” For a moment Elizabeth stared blankly-oh, too much had happened in the past few days! How could she possibly have forgotten Lydia? So she ploughed through that story first, while Jane listened in horror.

“Oh, it is too bad! Can’t you tell me the exact words she used to Fitz?”

“Believe me, I can’t. The foulest-mouthed soldier doesn’t say That Word-he would be flogged within an inch of his life. Truly, Jane, she used the worst words in the English language! And she was so drunk! Coaxing her with a bottle was the only way we could elicit coцperation from her.”

“Then she must be shut away,” said Jane with a sigh.

“So Fitz has decided, and what he decides is the law. Still, much and all as I condemn his highhandedness, I must confess I too can see no alternative other than to shut her up as Mama was. Her new address is Hemmings, ten miles the other side of Leek. Perhaps sixteen or seventeen miles from Bingley Hall. As soon as I can, I’ll visit her.”

“Let us go together. What is today, Wednesday? Shall we plan for this Friday?” asked Jane.

“We cannot,” said Elizabeth miserably. “Lydia isn’t the sum of my news. In fact, I’ve come for quite a different reason.”

“Tell me, please!”

“Mary has disappeared, we fear abducted.”

As Jane was still sadly pulled down after miscarrying, she fainted. Brought around by the hartshorn and vinaigrette, she began to weep, and half an hour passed before Elizabeth could calm her enough to give her the details.

“I came because I didn’t want you seeing it in a journal,” she concluded. “Fitz even had the notion of including a sketch of me because I look like Mary. There is a reward of one hundred pounds, large enough to stimulate a good search.”

“Lizzie, this is dreadful! Oh, poor Mary! All those years of looking after Mama, and now this. What was she about, to travel on the common stage?”

“We don’t know, even Angus Sinclair. Were it not for him and a disjointed letter she wrote to Charlie last year, we would be even more ignorant. They seem to think that she embarked upon some kind of investigation of the poor, with the intention of writing a book. Perhaps the stage-coach journeys were a part of it.”

“That would fit,” said Jane, nodding. “Mary never had a particle of sense, for all her goodness and piety. I thought her much improved when I saw her at Mama’s funeral, but perhaps the improvement was only skin deep-the festering spots gone, I mean. For surely her lack of good sense won’t have improved. She was a sad case.”

“No, I believe the improvement went all the way to her core. Certainly Ned Skinner admired her spirit, and he isn’t a susceptible man. She fought back when she was set upon, and she managed to find her way out of a dense forest. The real abduction took place on a bridle-path, not a road, and far from any big town. So Fitz has ruled out footpads or another highwayman. Whereas I begin to think of a madman, Jane.”

“A Bedlamite, you mean? But the nearest Bedlam is surely the one in Manchester.”

“Yes. Fitz is making enquiries to see if any inmate has escaped recently. From the Birmingham Bedlam too.”

They discussed the matter until every possibility had been exhausted, by which time Jane looked exhausted too.

“I confess that I’m glad Charles will be away for another year. You need time to recuperate,” said Elizabeth.

“He has a mistress in Jamaica,” said Jane, sounding quite her usual self. “Children by her as well.”

“Jane! No!”

“Yes.”

“Who told you that?”

“Caroline. She was very angry-the girl is a mulatto, which offends Caroline’s sense of fitness. It means the children are also tainted, poor little things.”

“Oh, I knew I was right to put my foot down about that bitch of a woman!” cried Elizabeth. “Jane, Jane, I beg of you, don’t grieve! Charles loves you, I would stake my life on it!”

The beautiful honey-coloured face broke into a smile that put dimples in its cheeks. “Yes, Lizzie, I know Charles loves me. I never doubt it for a single moment. Gentlemen are-well, strange in some ways, is all. Charles’s business interests in the West Indies require his presence there every eight or nine years, and he’s always away for months, sometimes a year or more. I would far rather that he had a decent woman as his mistress than flitted from woman to woman. I don’t want to accompany him on these trips, so how can I repine? I simply hope that he provides properly for this woman and their children. When he comes home this time, I’ll talk to him.”

Elizabeth was staring, amazed. “Jane, you are a saint. Even a mistress doesn’t have the power to shake you or your marriage. What did you say to Caroline when she told you?”

“Much what I’ve just said to you. You’re too hard on poor Caroline, Lizzie. Some people are so stuffed with malice that it bursts from them like a jet of water from a fountain. Caroline is such a one. I used to think that her poison was reserved for you and me, but it isn’t. It’s for anybody who offends her. Like Charles’s mulatto mistress, like Charlie, Prissy, and quite a few ladies in London.”