Lydia Read online

  The officer is coming to Aunt Philips’s card party tomorrow evening. I don’t know how I shall survive until then. I think I may die in my sleep – if I sleep at all, which is unlikely. It is past midnight and my eyes are no heavier than when I first saw him this afternoon. They are still too full of him. My pen is flying across the page.

  His name is Lieutenant George Wickham.

  Wednesday, 20th November

  Father gave us the carriage, and we arrived early at Aunt Philips’s. The officers were still dining with my uncle, while we ladies and Mr. Collins waited in the drawing room. Interminable wait! Mr. Collins talked incessantly, though I haven’t a notion what about. Lizzy and Jane and my aunt murmured appropriate responses, while Mary read a book, Kitty played at solitaire and I sat in unaccustomed silence upon the sofa, wondering that my heart did not leap out of my mouth at the slightest sound from beyond the doors. There were other ladies present, but I hardly know who – some of the officers’ wives, I think. I wore my lightest spotted muslin (the very pale green with the pink trim), my arms and chest were bare, and yet still the room felt so hot I could not breathe.

  He entered. His beauty in scarlet regimentals was overwhelming. The world went black and I thought perhaps I had died, but then Kitty nudged me and I realised that I was alive, but had merely closed my eyes. Still, I kept them closed a few seconds longer, the better to savour the anticipation of seeing him again. I thought, surely he must be feeling it, too? For all the time my eyes remained shut, there was no one in that room but he and I. He approached the sofa. He seized my hand. I shuddered with delight as he confessed his most ardent and violent devotion.

  “Lydia!” Kitty nudged me again, harder this time. I opened my eyes.

  Wickham was talking to Lizzy.

  Every woman in the room was watching him, but he had eyes only for my sister. Every ear strained to hear what compliments he paid her. Lizzy blushed – Lizzy, who never blushes! Everybody sighed – had he already professed his love? So soon? If he had, it was too vastly romantic! The air positively crackled with curiosity and excitement as the room held its breath to hear her adoring response.

  “Indeed.” Lizzy’s voice rang out, clear and strong and not in the least bit amorous. “Sometimes when it rains the lanes become quite impassable for mud.”

  “Mud?” Kitty was outraged. Even Jane looked disappointed.

  My aunt and uncle, Colonel Forster and Mr. Collins sat down to whist. Two other officers and their wives formed another four. The rest of us crowded around the larger table for a game of lottery tickets.

  Wickham and Lizzy sat together. I dashed to his other side. “I’ll shuffle!” I squeaked, and seized the deck of cards.

  “It is a silly game,” Lizzy murmured to Wickham. “All chance and no skill, but the younger ones like it.”

  “You’ve never objected before,” I muttered.

  Lizzy’s black eyes glinted. It was terrifying. I fumbled and dropped the deck. And then . . . “Allow me.”

  A scarlet-clad arm descended between us. A strong hand reached for the cards. Lizzy and I sat back like chastened children as well-shaped, nimble fingers gathered them up.

  The cards danced as Wickham shuffled. He cut the deck and held it high in one hand, pouring them like a waterfall into the other. He fanned them out before him, swirled them over the baize, gathered them in equal piles, and flipped them expertly together before tapping them smartly on the table and handing them to me with a bow.

  I sighed.

  “A tip from a seasoned player, Miss Lydia,” Wickham murmured in my ear. “There is nothing wrong with chance. The trick is knowing how to use it.”

  I stole a glance at Lizzy. Her eyes flickered from me to Wickham. For the first time in my life, I saw her look uncertain, and felt a surge of triumph. Wickham dealt, as elegantly as he had shuffled. I seized my cards and gasped.

  “Is there a problem, Miss Lydia?” he asked.

  “None whatsoever,” I said. “I just appear to have rather a good hand.”

  Could he have . . . no, it was not possible . . . I looked at him suspiciously. He was calm itself. Could he have dealt me such a hand on purpose? He caught me watching, and winked. I could not stop myself – I winked back.

  After that – of course – he talked with Lizzy all evening, all about Derbyshire where he grew up with Mr. Darcy, of all people. Even though, as we know, Mr. Darcy is monstrous wealthy, he has done Wickham a great wrong depriving him of some inheritance. It is vastly tragic for Wickham, but I don’t see why Lizzy must monopolise him. I could be just as sympathetic if they would only let me. As it was, I had to make a great show of being interested only in the game, the fish I had won and the fish I had lost.

  Thanks to Wickham, I won much more than I lost. “If we were playing for money instead of fish,” I said, “I would be disgustingly rich.”

  Lizzy went pink and said not to be so vulgar, but Wickham roared with laughter, and it made me feel funny inside.

  It is some consolation, I suppose, that I can make him laugh, though I wish he would take me seriously.

  Monday, 25th November

  It has rained continuously since my aunt Philips’s card party, and the lanes, as Lizzy would say, are quite impassable for mud. The garden is become a swamp and may yet turn into a lake. Ducks have taken up residence on the lawn and yesterday Hill found a frog in the scullery. The trees have lost the last of their leaves, and the views from the windows are all grey skies and brown mud. It is the most dismal thing you ever saw, and yet here at Longbourn we are not at all despondent – far from it. We are tremendously cheerful.

  A few days ago, Mr. Bingley and the Conceited Caroline braved the weather and the treacherous lanes to invite us all in person to the ball at Netherfield, but it was plain to anyone with half a brain he couldn’t care a fig if none of us went except Jane. He gazed at her with big calf eyes for the entire visit, and she gazed back all pink and moony. They are perfectly adorable, their children will be perfectly adorable, their whole life together will be one happy bundle of perfect adorableness. I keep hugging her, and she keeps telling me not to be silly, but I can’t help it. Love has made her more beautiful than ever – as if she has swallowed the sun. She is netting a new overskirt for the ball, but I don’t suppose it will ever be ready, because every time she picks it up she puts it down again, sighs, and stares out of the window with a dreamy adorable smile.

  That is the first reason we are so cheerful, and it is marvellous. The second is that Mr. Collins – Mr. Collins! – is pursuing Lizzy. Mamma is delighted. She says it is his way of making up for inheriting Longbourn, and it is the funniest thing in the world to watch them. He is all compliments and pleasantries. She cuts him whenever she can, and hides whenever she sees him coming. Yesterday afternoon, she braved the pouring rain and ran all the way to the farm to escape him, but even then there was no respite. “She is probably in the dairy,” I told Mr. Collins when he enquired, and I nearly died as we watched him wade through mud and streaming manure to join her. She hid behind a bale of hay, and he got filthy dirty for nothing. He bored us to death all evening trying to save face by telling us how fascinated he is by cows, and Lizzy is still not speaking to me, but it was worth it.

  I know exactly what I will be wearing to the ball. It is an old gown of Jane’s, let down at the hem and out at the bust, but the prettiest white spotted muslin, with an embroidered bodice and sleeves like little puffed clouds. I shall wear white silk flowers in my hair, my jade earrings, and new dancing slippers after the last pair got ruined at the assembly ball. I shan’t be as smart as Bingley’s sisters or their friends, but I am sure I am an absolute decade younger than most of them. And anyway, I don’t care about them. I don’t even care about the officers – except for one . . . Maria Lucas has learned all the new dances from her London cousin, and is teaching them to us. Kitty and I practise all the time. I already have blisters on my feet, but I don’t care. Mr. Collins has engaged Lizzy for the fir
st two dances (she couldn’t say no, after the cowshed) and has warned that he plans to monopolise her for the entire ball.

  I am quite glad for once that I am the youngest and Mamma does not want me to marry Mr. Collins. It is so very difficult to resist Mamma when her mind is made up (like poor Jane riding to Netherfield in the rain), and marrying Mr. Collins must be one of the most disgusting things anyone could do. Poor Lizzy! I do feel sorry for her, but . . . and I know this isn’t sisterly or kind or good . . . but with Mr. Collins pursuing her, Wickham will be mine all evening.

  Wednesday, 27th November

  It is four o’clock in the morning. Kitty is snoring away beside me but I can’t sleep. The ball – oh, the ball!

  Wickham was not there. I have to write that straightaway. I looked everywhere for him the moment I arrived. Every scarlet coat made my heart skip a beat, but then I saw Denny and he said Wickham had been called away on business. Naturally, I was devastated, because the entire purpose of my evening was to dance with Wickham, and yet if I am honest I was also a little relieved, because Lizzy looked really beautiful last night – far, far nicer than I. I don’t know how she does it – her dress was simpler than mine, and she had no flowers in her hair, and yet the way she carried herself, she looked like a queen, and made me feel like a common country girl. Even Mr. Darcy, who was so superior about her at the assembly ball, asked her to dance. It is much, much better that Wickham didn’t see her like that. It can’t be long now before Mr. Collins proposes. Mamma is quite convinced he will ask before he leaves, and Kitty says Lizzy cannot refuse, for if she accepts Mr. Collins and Jane marries Bingley, we shall all be doubly saved when Father dies. And once she is engaged, Wickham will immediately like me instead.

  Every ball in the world should be like Netherfield. After last night, I don’t think I can set foot in the Meryton assembly rooms again. The Meryton rooms are always so crowded, the floorboards so dark, the ceilings so low, there is never enough air. By the end of an evening we are all sweat and red faces and everybody is panting like thirsty dogs. It was all very well before last night when I didn’t know any better. But now the very idea of those evenings is intolerable, because Netherfield – ah, Netherfield is all sparkling chandeliers and mirrors and light! The ballroom floor is the colour of honey, and even after hours of dancing the air was still sweet with the scent of lilies and roses. And the dresses! Such headdresses, such brightly coloured silks, such gauzy muslins and delicate lace and expensive jewels! At first, I did feel ashamed of my poor old gown. But then the dancing began, and I forgot all about it, for I knew more people than anyone, and even though none of the officers is half as handsome as Wickham, I danced with every one of them, even Colonel Forster. So what that my dress once belonged to Jane, and that my hair was not pinned in the latest fashion like Caroline Bingley’s, or my throat did not sparkle with fat diamonds like Mrs. Hurst’s! I was infinitely more popular than they. And the supper! The pastries and jellies and creams, the ices and sweetmeats, the pies and fowls and meat cakes and wines and ales! The London ladies picked and pecked and watched appalled as I ate everything.

  “I never saw a girl stuff herself so,” gasped Hateful Hurst. “Why, she will never dance again!”

  “They will have to roll her out of here,” Conceited Caroline tittered.

  But then the orchestra started up another jig, and the players were from London, so infinitely better than our local musicians, and off I went until the final dance.

  How tired I am, suddenly! Perhaps I will sleep after all. Sleep, and dream of ball after glittering ball.

  Later . . .

  Mr. Collins has proposed to Lizzy! Kitty was in the breakfast room with them when Mamma made her leave, and she ran to fetch me to tell me it was starting. We tried to listen at the door, but Mamma shooed us away. Kitty, Mary and I sat waiting on the stairs while Mamma paced the vestibule, and it was a bit like last summer, when the roan mare was having her foal, and everyone waited outside the stable to be the first to see it, except this time we weren’t waiting to see an adorable baby animal, but for the promise of a roof over our heads.

  The breakfast-room door opened. Lizzy came out first. Mamma rushed forward to embrace her, but Lizzy pushed past without a word and rushed upstairs. I don’t think she even noticed us all still sitting on the stairs. Mamma stepped into the breakfast room, already calling out congratulations to Mr. Collins, then hurried out again moments later and ran into Father’s library. The bell rang. Hill was sent to fetch Lizzy, who walked past us and into the library with her jaw set and her eyes positively blazing.

  We waited.

  The library door flew open. Lizzy came out, smiling even though Mamma was scolding her. Mr. Collins stepped forward. Mamma tried to grab him with one hand while tugging with the other at Lizzy, who shrugged her off and swept back up the stairs to where Jane stood waiting on the landing.

  “She has rejected him,” Mary whispered in awe.

  Mr. Collins went out for a walk. Kitty began to cry.

  Mamma complained bitterly all morning. To Father when he ventured out of the library, to Jane and Kitty and Mary and me, to Hill, to Charlotte Lucas when she arrived to spend the day with us. Mamma alternately pleads with Lizzy and threatens her, painting a picture of what life will be like for us if Mr. Collins gets away.

  “The inheritance!” she cries. “Longbourn! The workhouse, the streets, guaranteed poverty the moment your father dies!”

  “I am not planning on dying yet,” Father says, but Mamma ignores him.

  “What will become of us, with such ungrateful daughters!”

  Lizzy’s hands shake as she busies herself with her stitching, and her neck is red, as always when her temper is up, but once when she thought no one was watching I saw her mouth curl into a smile.

  It is evening now. Charlotte has gone home, and we are all gathered quietly in the drawing room. I am writing. Mamma, Jane, Lizzy and Kitty are sewing, Father is reading the newspaper, and Mr. Collins sits before the fire pretending to look at a book, radiating gloom and offended pride. No one dares say a word. Every so often, Mamma heaves a reproachful sigh in Lizzy’s direction and tries to look like someone starving to death in the gutter (a considerable challenge as she is almost as plump as Aunt Philips). Lizzy ignores her.

  Mary just came in, looking even paler than usual, with her hair pulled back and wearing her best spectacles. She sat beside Mr. Collins and asked him what he was reading. He muttered that it was Saint Augustine, and Mary asked, would he not read out loud to us?

  We were all astonished, but Mr. Collins drew himself up like a drooping plant that has suddenly had a drink of water, and grasped his book more firmly.

  “The world is a book,” he announced. “And those who do not travel read only one page.”

  On and on he goes. I cannot believe Mary is subjecting us to this. What point can there possibly be? I am glad Lizzy isn’t marrying him, even if it means she wins Wickham. Lizzy and Mr. Collins! He is not just mean and ugly, he is so, so dull. How could I ever have wished it for her? But then . . . what if no one else wants to marry us? Jane will soon be twenty-three. Before long it will be too late for her, and we are none of us as beautiful or amiable as her. Where will we live, when Father dies and Mr. Collins turns us out? Is it better to be poor than stuck for ever with Mr. Collins? I don’t want to live on the charity of others, and never have nice things or go anywhere and live always with my sisters . . .

  No – one way or another, I will have the life I want. And in the meantime, I am not going to think about it.

  Thursday, 28th November

  Mr. Collins disappeared straight after breakfast on another long walk. The rest of us went into Meryton, where we found Wickham already returned from London, talking to Denny outside Savill’s. He smiled gloriously at each of us as we approached, but then, after offering to walk us home, he spoke only with Lizzy. They walked together ahead of us, and I followed straight behind, glowering. Lizzy was wearing her new
noisette pelisse, with rose-pink gloves and bonnet. I wish I had asked for a pelisse, too, instead of my new red cloak. A close-fitting pelisse is so much more willowy and elegant. As we walked, I tried to carry myself as she does – very straight, with long, even steps and this way she has with her arms, neither swinging them nor keeping them still. It is not as easy as it seems, and though I think I succeeded tolerably well, Wickham did not look at me once.

  Maybe, if he had paid more attention to me and I hadn’t been so irritated about Lizzy, I wouldn’t have been so impatient with Mr. Collins when he returned for luncheon. I might even have felt sorry for him. As it is, I sat down in a foul temper, and all through the meal, as he droned endlessly on, all I could think was that it was his fault, because if he had not been so dreadful Lizzy might have accepted him, and then Wickham would be all mine.

  When he is not boring us with the lives of saints, Mr. Collins continues to advise us on all matters farming, from Better Cow Husbandry to The Auspicious Sowing of Oats. Today’s chosen topic was Hens and How to Improve Their Laying. Did we know how vastly improved the flavour of eggs was by feeding chickens exclusively on a diet of corn? There was nothing like corn to ensure a good yellow yolk! Did we grow corn, ourselves? Lady Catherine’s hens indeed had no other diet. But then Lady Catherine’s hens were an altogether superior breed of bird – why, their very coop is built of the finest ash by a French carpenter who used to be a duke before the Revolution forced him to flee Paris.

  I shouldn’t wonder if Lady Catherine’s hens slept on silk cushions and produced solid gold droppings.

  Lord, it was unbearable! I wanted to pull the cloth off the table, just to make him stop. I don’t know how the others managed to stay so calm. They just sat there munching away as he wittered on, with only Mary showing the slightest bit of interest.