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Bingley held up his cup, which he had been obliged to retain throughout the discussion. "Jane, when we are married, might we keep one table for breakfast?"

"Yes. One cupboard for my papers, if you will allow it. You may close the door."

Elizabeth — Longbourn

Elizabeth was trying to stop Lydia from going to Brighton.

It wasn't going well.

Darcy's invitation had arrived that morning inside Mr. Bingley's note, unsealed. He offered three afternoons and left her at liberty to reject them all. She intended to accept one as soon as she had dealt with Lydia, who was making three afternoons seem a rash estimate.

"But I must go!" Lydia wailed. "All the officers! The parties! The fun!"

"Lydia, it's a terrible idea⁠—"

"You're just jealous because you're old and boring!"

Elizabeth held the bonnet Lydia meant to pack. Her sister was still young enough to believe a crowded ballroom must contain somebody who would be kind to her.

But her mouth wouldn't say the words.

She tried again with her father. The warning stuck exactly where his had. He had asked about Lydia's chaperone and been told everything that was proper, and his demand for weekly letters had been granted so cheerfully that he distrusted it.

She tried talking to Jane. The words came out as "I'm probably just being overcautious."

Unable to tell Lydia what she feared, Elizabeth wrote to Charlotte about the frustration instead. That much the page permitted. She sent the letter by the ordinary post and received an answer three days later, blotched where rain had found the fold.

Try every ordinary precaution first, Charlotte wrote. Your father need not know the future to insist upon a responsible chaperone. If the warning fails, prepare to help. We know what the old story required; we do not know what this one will permit. I will not call your sister safe merely because a novelist once married her off.

Elizabeth read that sentence twice. Charlotte had every reason to distinguish a wedding from a happy resolution.

A second letter arrived with the same post, on Lady Catherine's imposing paper. It ordered Elizabeth to return to Hunsford for dinner at Rosings, where her influence upon Darcy was to be examined in person. The earlier ban, it explained, did not apply when her ladyship required an explanation.

Elizabeth took the invitation to her father.

"An arrest warrant with a menu," he observed.

"I should like to go. With Jane."

He considered the journey and gave his permission, providing the carriage and groom. Jane accepted for them both. Darcy, independently summoned from Netherfield, sent word that he would attend. Four forecast chapters of separation had been defeated by Lady Catherine's desire to interrogate people in her own drawing room, and by Elizabeth choosing to accept.

She wrote to Darcy before they set out: The Pemberley prediction is wrong. We are going to Kent instead. Please cross it out in ink.

For once, the ink formed exactly the words she wanted. She kept a copy. On a disagreeable day, she might enjoy reading it again.

CHAPTER 19

The Bennet carriage had brought Jane and Elizabeth back to Hunsford after two days on the road. Charlotte welcomed them with a hot meal; Lady Catherine welcomed Elizabeth by informing her that the temporary lifting of her ban should not encourage presumption. Darcy arrived from Netherfield that afternoon. His first act, unseen by his aunt, was to show Elizabeth the thick line through the Pemberley forecast.

After dinner, in the drawing room, Lady Catherine raised one hand toward the curtains, stopped, and looked at the hand as though it had interrupted her.

Then she said:

"This is absurd."

Everyone froze.

"I beg your pardon, Aunt?" Darcy said carefully.