Page 47 of Miss Bennet's Dragon
I took Jane’s hands last. If Papa looked tired, Jane was a wraith. Heavy shadows clung below her eyes.
“Promise me you will go out,” I said. “And please take a trip of your own.”
I had suggested that Jane visit our aunt and uncle in London. Papa wouldnot object while the “Monster of Meryton” lurked, and that would put Jane close enough to call on Miss Bingley. But Jane had refused, saying if Miss Bingley had not answered two letters, calling in person would be improper. Even desperate.
Privately, I was becoming desperate on Jane’s behalf. But I had not convinced her.
I hugged everyone and waved to our firedrake, mostly for humor although I would miss him. However, I would not miss his profound inattention while I stood on my new wooden platform in the freezing dawn.
The driver whistled, and the coach set out with groaning traces and rattling bolts. A four-horse team was harnessed to haul all that metal, and we would change teams twice.
I was on my way to visit Charlotte, observe Mr. Collins in his natural setting—which I expected to be amusing—and, perhaps, meet the formidable Lady Catherine de Bourgh, the only widowed wyfe to hold a wyvern.
19
ROSINGS PARK
The sun was low when,after swinging east to skirt the traffic of London, we clattered and clanked into Kent and crossed a stone bridge into Rosings Park, the estate of Lady Catherine.
The trees lining the road became uniformly spaced and trimmed. From Charlotte’s letters, I imagined her ladyship lectured every crooked branch into submission.
The parsonage came into view—bits of it, at least. I had to bounce on my seat to catch glimpses through the narrow window. There was a garden, a small home of fieldstone, laurel hedges, and a pretty white gate.
Our horses stopped, blowing with relief. Charlotte and Mr. Collins emerged. I fumbled the locks open, and Charlotte and I hugged. The awkwardness that had struck with her engagement fell away, defeated by absence, or distance, or our mutual trials.
Mr. Collins, however, was profoundly unchanged. After minutes of roadside platitudes, I was grinding my toe in the gravel. Finally, he invited me to tread the stone path to their house.
We passed an uncovered rectangle of bare earth. Their empty draca house had been removed.
Mr. Collins demonstrated the door. The entryway was meticulously noted. Then we almost collided in the parlor due to another spate of bows.
“Would you like tea?” Charlotte asked, dodging with evident practice.
“Indeed, cousin,” chimed Mr. Collins, “after such extensive travel, passing near the noise and parching smoke of London, refreshment is most recommended. May we offer…” He stopped, flummoxed by the need for a concrete thought.
“Tea?” suggested Charlotte again.
“Tea would be nice,” I said.
Tea grew into a light supper. I learned such humble offerings could not properly be called supper in the shadow of the sumptuous feasts of Rosings.
My face was becoming sore from suppressing raised eyebrows and eye rolls.
Charlotte peered out the window. “How the shadows are lengthening.”
“Oh! My lettuce!” Mr. Collins excused himself, for he had a row of lettuce sprouts to weed, and, if that row was not weeded today, the task would cascade into tomorrow’s weeding, and thus onward until catastrophe.
After he vanished backward through the parlor doorway, Charlotte suggested a stroll.
I was determined to show no hint of amusement or disapproval, so we started stiffly, but in fifty yards we were chattering like any of our walks back home.
But not all the news was happy. Charlotte asked about the attack at the meadow. I had not written that I was present, so when I told her that—nothing more—we were silent for a time.
I decided to put the difficult topics behind us. “Charlotte, I am very sorry you did not bind.”
“I am honestly relieved. I am uncomfortable with draca. Everyone has been most considerate. Mr. Collins as well, after a few days of disappointment.”
Other than my sisters, there was no one else I would dare ask my next question. But Charlotte was my most intimate friend, and I was curious. “Had you no marriage gold?”
