In the gloom of the following morning, at an hour which seemed
exceptionally cheerless by reason of the mist and fine rain which
prevailed, Mr. Bingley's chaise drove round to the front entrance of
Pemberley. Kitty, who, after a night of weeping and wretchedness, had
fallen into a doze, was aroused by the sound of movements and voices,
but when she peeped through her curtains, she was too late for anything
but a heartrending glimpse of the skirts of William Price's great-coat,
as he stepped into the carriage. The door was shut, Darcy and
Fitzwilliam waved their farewells, and the horses moved off at a brisk
trot. Kitty watched and listened to them as long as she could, and then
flung herself on her bed in a paroxysm of grief. Though William's
avoidance of her during the latter part of the previous evening, his
strange altered looks, and his embarrassed way of saying good-night, had
undermined her hopes to such an extent that she had been all night
facing the terrible desolation caused by the thought, "If he does not
care for me after all," yet she had not actually given all up in
despair until the moment of hearing him leave the house. Some note, some
message, might have arrived--might still arrive; but since parting from
him, Kitty had not been able to quell the horrible fear that all was
over. The indications, which had been so favourable, had completely
changed since Mrs. Jennings had uttered her foolish remark; in vain had
she tried to reinstate her old relations with William Price. What could
it all mean? Each time she put this question to herself she gave way
afresh to unrestrained tears, and, weakened by fatigue and emotion, was
totally incapable of following out any train of thought or conjecture.
She had longed to hasten to Georgiana the night before, to pour out her
heart in an appeal for the support which Georgiana had never failed to
give; but Elizabeth had checked her in this intention; and, poor Kitty,
unable to bear pain alone with any degree of courage, had worked herself
into a deplorable condition by the time her sister arrived at her door
in the morning.
Elizabeth and Jane had naturally both surmised something of the state of
things as regarded Kitty. It was not difficult for anyone acquainted
with the previous development of the affair, to perceive that William
Price had not fulfilled the expectations which had been formed of him,
and Elizabeth accounted for Georgiana's evident unhappiness by
concluding that she had become aware that this would be the case.
William Price had looked much as usual, up to the last, but Elizabeth
suspected that there had been some elucidation either between him and
Georgiana, or through Mrs. Jennings, and she hardly knew how much to
blame him. There was no time to talk matters over with Jane, for she
felt, as soon as she was up, that her immediate visit must be to the
chief sufferer, to comfort and sustain her and, if possible, to shield
her from the consequences of her own error.
Kitty would not admit her at first, and when at length Elizabeth
persuaded her to do so, she was distressed to see what ravages the shock
of disappointment and the hours of weeping had wrought. Kitty's tears
broke out anew, but the sense of Elizabeth's affection and companionship
somewhat soothed her, and when she could speak more coherently, she
begged to see Georgiana, who could perhaps tell her things--who would be
able to explain. This Elizabeth could not permit, for she saw that Kitty
was in no fit state to talk over her troubles, but she promised her an
early opportunity of doing so, and having induced her to swallow some
food and a cordial, she soon had the satisfaction of seeing her fall
asleep. These precautionary measures were fully justified in the course
of the next forty-eight hours, during which time Kitty remained really
ill, attacks of strong hysteria alternating with weakness of extreme
exhaustion. Every care was lavished on her by her two sisters, by
Georgiana, and by Elizabeth's maid; but naturally anything like rational
discussion of the cause of her illness was out of the question, and,
indeed, Kitty herself, after once asking if Mr. Price had left any
message for her, or spoken of returning at some future time, and
receiving a negative answer, seemed, after giving way to a torrent of
tears, unable or unwilling to puzzle matters out any further.
Georgiana did not escape the inquiries and speculations of Elizabeth and
Jane. When she descended from her room the morning after the ball, at an
hour little later than her usual one, to take her place in the family
circle, she had regained complete control of herself, and declared
herself entirely refreshed, and beyond a little heaviness of the eyes
and paleness of cheeks, naturally attributable to the fatigues of the
last two days, there was nothing in her aspect to cause remark. No one
guessed at the sense of guilt which filled her heart when she saw what
grief and disappointment had done for Kitty, or at the deep compunction
and almost unendurable self-reproach which assailed her when the others
discussed his strange defection, and professed themselves unable to
account for the curious change in his attitude towards Kitty--a change
which several people had noticed the last hour of the ball. Elizabeth
and Jane asked her if she was at all prepared for it, whether anything
had occurred to make her suspect that Mr. Price would not propose
marriage to Kitty after all. These questions were a hard trial to
Georgiana, for she could not bear to be other than straightforward, and
for a multitude of reasons she could not divulge the true explanation;
she could only say in a low, troubled voice, and with as few words as
possible, that she had learnt, in the course of the evening, that their
expectations were mistaken ones, and that she feared Kitty would take it
very much to heart.
Seeing her unhappiness on her friend's behalf, the two ladies forbore to
tease her with further inquiries, though Jane still felt that Georgiana
could have thrown more light on the mystery had she cared, and in her
hearing continually lamented the failure of everything for poor Kitty,
who had fallen, as it were, between two stools, the regrettable ending
to all this pleasant time, and the fickleness of young men, or, rather,
the unfortunate complications that arose through their not knowing their
own minds. Georgiana had to listen to this in silence, though conscious
that the last was not an accusation that could fairly be brought against
William Price, and Elizabeth's more rational way of accounting for
things was not much better, when she said that she did not think Mr.
Price guilty of more than thoughtlessness, but it was certainly a pity
that he had not been able to perceive earlier the extent of Kitty's
feeling for him, as no doubt, when he had at last become aware of it, he
realized what Elizabeth had already surmised to be in his mind, namely,
that his roving life did not warrant him in thinking about matrimony at
present. Georgiana thought she might venture to say here that William
Price had indeed expressed great sorrow to her on finding that he had
been the cause of disappointment to Kitty, and she even went so far into
the dangerous fields of explanation as to add that he had had no
suspicion of it until surprised by a chance word of raillery from Mrs.
Jennings. She was pleased to see that this news partly rehabilitated him
in the mind of Elizabeth, if not of Jane; and for fear of betraying more
than she ought, she went away, wondering why she should be glad for him
not to be misjudged, when she really ought to be only thinking of how
wrongly he had behaved.
The hour of enlightenment for Kitty could not be long postponed. By the
third day she was well enough to sit up in a large chair in her own
room, and on being visited by Georgiana, begged her to stay for a time,
and to fasten the door. When assured of their freedom from interruption,
she seized her friend's hand, made her sit close beside her, and
implored her to relate everything she could that would throw light on
Mr. Price's changed conduct and hasty departure. Georgiana nerved
herself to reply, but for the first few minutes, Kitty was talking and
crying incessantly, pouring out the pent-up grief of the last few days,
so that Georgiana had great difficulty in calming her, and dreaded the
effect of the revelation about to be made.
"Dear Kitty," remonstrated Georgiana, "you must not cry; you must be
more composed, or Elizabeth will not let me stay with you. Do try to be
brave; think whether it is right to give way so much; you will make
yourself ill again, you know."
"Anyone would be ill after what I have been through," lamented Kitty; "I
shall never be happy again. Why does he not care for me? Did he tell you
why not, Georgiana? What have I done, or what has Mrs. Jennings done?
Something must have happened to offend him, for he changed all in one
minute."
"I do not believe anything happened to offend him, Kitty," returned
Georgiana. "As he has gone away now and did not do what he all thought
he would do, is it not best to assume that he does not care in the way
we hoped for, and try to forget about it, and not mind too much? Dear
Kitty, I am deeply grieved for you: it has been my fault, more than
anyone's, and you are right to reproach me; I can never forgive myself
for having led you into the mistake."
"But you are not answering me, Georgiana," cried Kitty, with the
petulance of an invalid; "of course, I know he does not care, and has
gone away, but I want to know why he has gone. If it is not for anything
I have done, he might come back."
Georgiana was silent, and held her down; she shrank still from telling
Kitty that he would not come back. Kitty began again impatiently. "It is
foolish of you to talk about reproaching yourself. It is not more your
fault than anyone else's; not so much as Mrs. Jennings's, but if he
spoke to you about it at all, he must have said something, have given
some hint. Did he talk to you, Georgiana? You have not told me that
yet."
Georgiana gave up what hopes she had had of concealing from Kitty what
would make the disappointment far more thorough, and crushing, and as
gently as possible managed to convey the fact of William's confession of
attachment to herself. She was obliged to say it several times, and in
language of unmistakable clearness, before Kitty could grasp her
meaning; and even then, as she sat crouched on the ground, her face
averted and her cheeks burning with shame, Kitty, who had drawn her hand
away, gazed at her in mingled horror and incredulity. In the course of
these three days, the notion that Miss Kitty Bennet was _not_ the object
of William Price's preference had at length penetrated the mind of that
young lady, but that her friend should be the chosen one was a thing
altogether past comprehension, and the first idea that occurred to her
was that there must have been treachery to herself somewhere. Kitty's
changes of mood lately had been punctuated by bursts of tears, and this
was no exception to the rule, though they were now tears of
mortification. Her first angry impulse was to pour out words of blame,
accusing Georgiana of not being satisfied with the attentions of Mr.
Bertram, but requiring those of his cousin too. Georgiana disdained to
reply to such a taunt, but it needed all her patience, all her
tenderness, to persuade Kitty out of her bitter frame of mind, and to
endeavour to heal the wound to the poor girl's vanity, which had indeed
all through been more deeply involved than her affections, little though
she realized it. Combined with a love of importance, and the
encouragement given by her friends, it had carried her on a wave of
excitement through the past months, and had helped to fix her hopes more
firmly on William Price than any knowledge of his character, any real
congeniality in their natures could have done. But she could not be
aware of all this, and there was no immediate comprehension to make the
disappointment less acute.
It certainly was consoling to feel that everyone else must have been to
blame, that everybody had been equally deceived; that even Georgiana
herself had been taken by surprise, and was now heaping upon herself the
severest reproaches, while she implored Kitty's forgiveness--not, Kitty
discerned in a puzzled way, for having received Mr. Price's proposals,
but for having helped to foster the deception which had reacted so
cruelly upon her friend. Above all, it would have been a relief, having
discovered that Mr. Price must have acted atrociously, to say so, and
the more Kitty thought of it, the more she resented his conduct. But
Georgiana would not admit this; she would only allow that it was all
utterly inexplicable, but that they could not judge fairly of Mr. Price,
not being able to see his point of view, and that if that was clear to
them, she was sure that he would be found to have acted honestly all the
way through.
Kitty immediately suspected that Georgiana had been won round to the
said point of view, and began to question her closely as to what had
passed between them; but Georgiana indignantly repudiated the
suggestion, and assured Kitty, in a manner that forbade further
discussion, that she had decidedly refused Mr. Price, refused even to
listen to him, and had not the slightest expectation of ever seeing or
hearing from him again. She added, that she had refrained from telling
Elizabeth, or any of the others, about Mr. Price's offer, and thought it
would be best if Kitty decided to do the same, to which, as she had
expected, Kitty willingly agreed.
Nothing, in fact, could have suited Kitty better, in the circumstances,
than a compact of silence. At the end of their long conversation, when
Georgiana left her, by far the more exhausted in spirits of the two, she
had begun to have some of the sensations of an injured heroine, and it
was much more satisfactory to consider herself badly treated--to have
been jilted, to all intents and purposes, than if it came to be known
that she had been all the time in love with the wrong man, in which case
her position would be shorn of much of its dignity. Her sisters'
sympathy was very acceptable to her, and when Jane invited her to return
with her to Desborough for a time, she gladly promised to do so, knowing
that it would not at first be at all comfortable to remain with
Georgiana, the one person who knew the whole story. It was therefore
arranged that Jane and Miss Bingley should defer their journey for two
days more, when it was hoped she would be quite equal to travelling with
them.
The only drawback to the plan, as far as she was concerned, was Miss
Bingley's presence for another fortnight at Desborough. That lady had
not troubled herself to make any conjectures with regard to William
Price's departure, but frankly told Jane and Georgiana that it was
exactly what she had expected. She at least had never been misled; she
had never supposed Mr. Price to be in love with Miss Bennet or anyone
else. She could not imagine why they had all persuaded themselves of it.
Nothing was clearer than that he was a young man quite heart-whole. Jane
protested, but Georgiana made no comment, only begging her friend
privately not to refer to the subject in Kitty's hearing.
The day arrived, Mr. Bingley's carriage again drove to the door, and the
three ladies took their seats in it, Kitty's farewell glance being given
towards the spot where she had last seen William Price. With their
going, the whole episode seemed to be finally closed, and Georgiana
turned to re-enter the house, and to take up the duties of a life which,
in one short week, seemed to have been robbed of almost all its
brightness. She had been making an unsuccessful struggle against low
spirits, ever since the ill-omened day of the ball, and being unable to
dismiss, had tried hard to account for, the strange sense of depression,
of loneliness, and loss, which assailed her continually. It was not only
sorrow for Kitty's disappointment, or regret for her own share in it,
nor was it the estrangement that had arisen between them; no, it was not
a vision of Kitty that so constantly obtruded itself upon her thoughts,
but of a very different person, one whose ardent looks and words
insisted on being remembered, whose voice she seemed to hear again
pleading for what she dared not give. Every detail of their conversation
in the gallery crowded upon Georgiana's memory, once she had made her
confession to Kitty, and would admit these thoughts; they would not be
denied, as she had denied him a hearing, but came back to her with a
vivid clearness and an irresistible appeal.
She remembered how he had described the beginnings and the growth of his
attachment to her, and looking back over the course of their
acquaintance, countless incidents stood out, to verify all he had said.
When no longer viewed through Kitty's illusions, every one of their
meetings and conversations was seen in its true light, consolidating
their friendship, giving each an insight into the other's character. Why
was it such a joy, though an indescribably painful one, to recall these
things, to live again through the moments spent in the gallery?
Georgiana's heart answered her, and she felt that the answer must always
have been there, though she had only just awakened to it. It was a joy
because everything connected with William Price must be a joy to her,
himself, his nobleness, his true worth, and the knowledge that he cared
for her, but it was pain, because, sweet though it was to hear what he
had to tell her, it was a disloyalty to her friend to listen, the friend
whose life had perhaps been spoilt by their mistake. How could she ever
think of being happy as long as that friend suffered? For despite her
grief at the thought that she had lost him for ever, that she had
refused his love and he would never know now that she loved him in
return, yet Georgiana felt that she could not have acted differently.
Even had she known at the moment he spoke, what he was to her, she could
not have been so traitorous as to take what Kitty longed for, from under
her very eyes; and she was glad that Kitty did not guess at the extent
of the sacrifice.