Page 31 of Till Death Us Do Part
Mr Bennet cleared his throat and looked threateningly at his second daughter, but she ignored him. His recent bout of familial authority aside, she thought she could hold her own.
“Are you aware that nobody in Meryton is surprised thataBennet damaged the family reputation—they were only surprised bywhichBennet was thrown to the wolves. Most assumed it would be you… or maybe Kitty.”
Lydia started standing up abruptly, but Elizabeth just said, “Pray, sit and listen, Lydia. In less than a fortnight, I will not be here to advise you, so just listen. Your behaviour could very well put you in the same position I am in, and I can assure you of one thing:You do not want that!I beg you to find a way to enjoy yourself without putting yourself and your family at risk. You do not have to become Mary, but somewhere between the two of you would be to everyone’s benefit, most especially your own.”
Then she turned back to her plate and sat her fork down gently. May I be excused?”
Mr Bennet grunted assent, and Elizabeth fled the table.
That evening, Elizabeth spent half the night trying to work out a way out of the debacle. She was locked in at night and watched like a hawk during the day. She had no money at all and was forced to endure the humiliation of having her father search her belongings and her room to ensure she had none hidden away.
Mr Bennet knew Elizabeth was a climber, so when he noticed a tree outside the window, he had it nailed shut.
Lastly, but most humiliatingly, he openly gloated that she need not go hunting for an extra key, nor waste her time picking the lock, because he tied the doorknob closed with rope when he went to bed.
For two days, Elizabeth endured this humiliation, spending nearly all her time in the guest room lately occupied by Mr Collins. She walked in the gardens, but her father went with her, or sent his valet, Nathaniel. Neither were exactly spring chickens, so Elizabeth did not bother with any sort of real ramble. It all seemed so pointless.
In the middle of her third night locked in the guest chamber, in what she estimated to be only a few days before her letter to Mr Bennet arrived, she had an epiphany.
When she worked it all the way back to basic principles, she reckoned that it was all a matter of reputation—Mr Darcy’s and hers. She suspected Mr Darcy was working under the assumption thatshe was desirous of marriage, and she would put up a fuss if one did not occur. Perhaps, if she could convince him otherwise, or better yet—
In the end, Elizabeth thought it funny that the entire enterprise would turn on a file. That had been the only bit ofsteel she could get that was sufficient for the job at hand. She noticed an old one laying around the garden from a workman’s forgotten project a few months earlier, so she contrived to have a boot crisis right over the top of it lasting long enough to fool old Nathaniel. She was prepared with several alternate strategies including indigestion from dinner, injured ankle, or if she got desperate, vague female problems. The latter was sufficiently terrifying to send any man running or at least blushing and looking away.
Her epiphany occurred the night previously, when her father came by to wish hergood night, with a nasty smirk she hated.
“Good night, Miss Bennet. Remember, just in case you get any ideas about the lock, it will be tied from the outside. If you wish to beat your head against the wall with a clever escape plan, feel free.”
The smirking, condescending way he said it made her blood boil for a while, until she worked out that anger was doing nobody any good, least of all her. She needed tothink.
In the end, the answer was obvious. He could rope the door from the outside because the door swung inward. That meant the hinges were inside, which meant she had a chance. Perhaps it was not agoodchance, but it was a chance. If she became desperate, she was fully prepared to simply throw a chair through the window and take her chances with a fast flight down the tree, but a bit more time would not be amiss.
The file seemed like a noisy contraption, even if she could get a hammer, so Elizabeth politely requested the loan of one of her father’s favourite books. It was of good hefty size, not too big and not too small. Elizabeth thought it was a particularly vile piece of literature, and even though it was a good fifty years old, she had not the slightest guilt about using it to beat on the file to drive the pins out of the hinges. She seriously considered throwing itin the fire when she finished but eventually decided that would be a step too far into vindictiveness (half a step, at least).
Much to her relief, the pins came out easily. Mrs Bennet’s nerves were driven to distraction by any unwanted squeals or squeaks, so the servants kept all the hinges in the house well lubricated. She had been afraid the hinge pins might be sealed, but she had seen a different door taken off for repair earlier and saw no reason this one should not work the same.
Trying her best to be quiet, she started in the dead of the night, around one o’clock. It took all of twenty minutes to remove the pins, and then the door came off its hinges with a small thunk, so she could just slide it open. She saw the rope tied around the handle and briefly considered using the leverage of the door to break the handle just to be vindictive but abandoned the idea. She just as quickly abandoned the idea of tying her father into his room in revenge, and instead just went about her business.
This time she did not take a valise, as this operation would succeed or fail in a matter of days, and more clothing would be no benefit, since she had no money for lodging either.
In her stockinged feet, carrying her best outdoor boots, she crept down the stairs, to the ground floor, then down into the kitchen, and continued all the way to the storeroom, listening intently and moving carefully every step of the way.
The pickings were slim. None of the meat was cooked, and Mrs Hill kept sausages and the like in a locked cupboard, ever since a groom was caught pilfering it a few years earlier.
Elizabeth got a bag with a dozen apples, a few onions, a bit of bread and sausage, and a water bladder. With that secured, she took her father’s biggest and best winter coat and left through the servant’s entrance.
Four days later, Elizabeth was tired and dirty, but not as bad as she expected. Nobody she had ever heard of would even conceive of doing what she had done. She had been told by a reasonable authority that it was nearly impossible to get into London by coach or horseback without being seen, but Mr Baker never mentionedwalking.
She knew the journey to Cheapside was twenty-four miles. At three miles per hour, simple arithmetic said it would be eight hours if she took the same route as the coach, did not stop or pause, and could maintain a reasonable pace.
Nobody in their right mind would walk that far, so she did not expect anybody to be specifically looking for her. Nevertheless, it seemed sensible to walk slowly and carefully, only in the dead of night, and hide herself away during the day.
She took a stout walking stick which, by a great coincidence, could easily pass as an exact replica of her father’s, just in case she met any dogs like the first trip. She also assumed it might be handy if she met any inebriated men, but fortunately, neither theory was put to the test.
She slept for a few hours during the day, sometimes in sight of the carriageway, but mostly in barns. Having grown up on a farm, she knew they all had a few hidden places. As long as they did not have noisy dogs, it was easy enough to find them. She saw what looked like they might be men searching for her once or twice, but no more.
She arrived in London in plenty of time, then worked her way to her target. She would only get one chance to make her approach, and since her food was down to just the onions, she was not set to make a good first impression, but she had to try.
At last, three hours after she entered her blind, she saw her quarry leaving his house and rose to intercept him. She had been reflecting that her entire life might hinge on the next quarterhour. If she could make her case adequately, she might have some options, and if not—
