Posted on 2013-03-28

One morning, about a week after Elizabeth's engagement with Darcy had been formed, as three females of the Bennet family were sitting together in the dining-room, their attention was suddenly drawn to the window by the sound of a carriage; and they perceived a chaise-and-four driving up the lawn. It was too early in the morning for visitors, and besides, the equipage did not answer to that of any of their neighbours. The horses were post; however, the carriage and the livery of the servant who preceded it were all too familiar to them from a former visit.

"Oh! No! Not again!"

"Lady Catherine has come to offer you her congratulations, Lizzy! Kitty, ring for tea, coffee, chocolate, lemonade, raspberry cordial, meringues, white soup, syllabub, and pork rinds!"

"That footman is exceedingly handsome!"

The ladies' overlapping comments were interrupted when the door was thrown open, and their visitor entered. They were of course not intending to be surprised; so their astonishment was beyond their expectation, and on the part of Mrs. Bennet and Kitty, though she was perfectly unknown to them, even inferior to what Elizabeth felt when she recognized Mrs. Jenkinson bearing a bundle of woolen, silk, flannel, and cashmere shawls.

She entered the room, made no other reply to Elizabeth's salutation, than a slight inclination of the head, and, in a flurry of fringe, tassels, and one or two sodden handkerchiefs, unfurled her burden, setting it upright upon the floor.

"Miss de Bourgh!" Elizabeth exclaimed. Recalling her manners, she curtsied and said, "Welcome to Longbourn. May I say you are looking fetchingly pale, cross, and sickly today."

Elizabeth now expected that she would produce a poison dart for her from Lady Catherine, as it seemed the only probable motive for her calling. But no weapon appeared, and she was completely puzzled.

After a particularly ripe cough that sent Kitty into paroxysms of envy, Miss de Bourgh wheezed to Elizabeth --

"Miss Bennet, I have been told of the prettyish kind of a little wilderness on one side of your lawn. I should be glad to take a turn in it, if you will favour me with your company."

Elizabeth agreed, and, running into her own room for her parasol and antibacterial sanitizer, returned just as Mrs. Jenkinson kicked a damp handkerchief to the corner and picked up her well-swaddled charge. As they passed through the hall, Mrs. Jenkinson opened the doors into several rooms and, when held up to the doorways, Miss de Bourgh pronounced them, after a short survey, to be made of walls, windows, and populated with furniture.

They proceeded in silence along the gravel walk that led to the copse; Elizabeth was determined to make no effort for conversation with a woman who was now more than usually infectious and contagious.

As soon as they entered the copse, Mrs. Jenkinson reattached Anne's mustard plaster, stood her up on the flagstones, pinned the shawls in place, and Miss de Bourgh began in the following manner: --

"You can be at no loss, Miss Bennet, to understand the reason of my journey hither. Your own heart, your own conscience, must tell you why I come."

Elizabeth looked with unaffected astonishment.

"Indeed, you are mistaken, madam. Once I detected you brought no poison dart, I have not been at all able to account for the honour of seeing you here."

"Miss Bennet," replied Miss de Bourgh, in an angry tone, "my character has ever been celebrated for its crossness, and in a cause of such moment as this I shall certainly not depart from it. A report of a most alarming nature reached me two days ago. I was told that you, that Miss Elizabeth Bennet, were betrothed to my cousin -- my own intended mate -- Mr. Darcy. Though I know it must be a scandalous falsehood, I instantly resolved on setting off for this place, that I might rip you a new one."

Elizabeth, colouring with astonishment and disdain, said coolly, "If you believed it impossible to be true, I wonder you took the trouble of coming so far."

"This is not to be borne! Miss Bennet. Your arts and allurements may, in a moment of infatuation, have made him forget what he owes to himself and to all his family. You may have drawn him in."

"Oh! Did he tell you about that? Believe me, Miss de Bourgh, it was only after we were engaged, and ... really ... well ... not so very improper ... and we were promised to each other by then ... and ... "

"Let me be rightly understood. This match, to which you have the presumption to aspire, can never take place. No, never. Mr. Darcy is engaged to ME. Now, what have you to say?"

"Only this: that if he is so, you must think him very careless when it slipped his mind and he proposed to me."

Miss de Bourgh hesitated for a moment, and then replied --

"The engagement between us is of a peculiar kind. While in my cradle, I planned the union: and I slept in a cradle until the age of nineteen! Do you pay no regard to the wishes of his friends -- to his tacit engagement with me - to those vivid fantasies I indulged in while lying in my cradle? Have you not heard it said, that from his earliest hours he was destined for me?"

"What is that to me? Mr. Darcy breaks out in hives at the thought of marrying you, so why is not he to make another choice?"

Elizabeth by this time was musing that the deep purple hue Miss de Bourgh's face had assumed was more flattering than its customary pale, but Anne was determined to continue her rant.

"Because honour, decorum, pru-- Ah-aaah-CHOO!"

Elizabeth was a girl not only quick of mind but quick of parasol, as she proved in raising that accoutrement to deflect the effect of Miss de Bourgh's explosive sternutation back onto its originator.

Mrs. Jenkinson, reaching into the capacious leather bag slung over her shoulder, retrieved toweling and an atomizer of water and within minutes had sprayed Anne down and cleaned her face.

Thus refreshed, she continued. "Unfeeling, selfish girl! Do you not consider that a connexion with you, must disgrace him in the eyes of everybody?"

"Miss de Bourgh, I have nothing farther to say. You know my sentiments."

"You are then resolved to have him?"

"You betcha."

While Mrs. Jenkinson bathed in lavender water the veins popping out from Miss de Bourgh's forehead, Anne seemed to lose momentum. She jumped into her faithful companion's arms, sniffled into her shoulder, and asked to return to the carriage.

In this manner they went on till they were at the door of the carriage, when, turning hastily round, Miss de Bourgh added one last sally--

"I take no leave of you, Miss Bennet. I send no compliments to your mother. You deserve no such attention. I am most seriously pissed off."

Elizabeth made no answer, walked quietly into the house, and tossed her damp stained parasol into the fire. She heard the carriage drive away while her mother impatiently asked, "Is Miss de Bourgh not coming in for pork rinds?"

"She did not chuse it," said her daughter; "she would go."