Pride and Prejudice; Sense and Sensibility

Chapter 58 Bingley Returns to Netherfield
Mr. Wickham was so thoroughly satisfied with the conversation, that he did not mention it any more, lest he trouble himself, or annoy Elizabeth, who was glad to see him silenced.

In a blink of an eye, it was time for him and Lydia to leave.Mrs. Bennet had to be separated from them, and for at least a year, because Mr. Bennet strongly disapproved of her plans for the whole family to move to Newcastle.

She cried: "Oh, my dear Lydia, when shall we meet again?"

"My God! I don't know either. Maybe I won't see each other for two or three years."

"Write to me often, my dear boy."

"I must write a lot. But you know, married women don't have much time for letters. Sisters can write me a lot, because they have nothing to do anyway."

Mr. Wickham's good-byes were much kinder than his wife's.He was full of smiles, well-mannered, and said a lot of nice things.

As soon as they walked out, Mr. Bennett said, "He's the coolest guy I've ever seen in my life. He can smirk, giggle, and make fun of everybody. I'm so proud of him." Proud. Not even Sir Lucas, I daresay, could have produced a more distinguished son-in-law."

After her daughter left, Mrs. Bennet was depressed for many days.

She said: "I often think that it is really hard to part with my relatives; when they are gone, I seem to have lost my home."

Elizabeth said: "Mom, you have to understand that this is the fate of marrying a daughter. Fortunately, no one wants your other four daughters. It will definitely make you feel better."

"That's not the case at all. It's not that Lydia is leaving me because she's married, but because her husband's troops happen to be so far away. If it were nearer, she wouldn't have to go so fast."

Although Mrs. Bennet was depressed because of this incident, it didn't take long for her to recover.At this time, a piece of news was circulating in the outside world, which cheered her up again.It was rumored that the master of Netherfield was going back to the country in a day or two to hunt for a few weeks, and his housekeeper was being ordered to put everything in order.

Mrs. Bennet was quite disturbed by the news.She looked at Jane for a while, smiled again for a while, and shook her head for a while.

"Very well, Mr. Bingley is coming, sister." (For it was Mrs. Philips who first told her the news.) "Very well, very well. But I don't care We don't think much of him, you know, and I really don't want to see him again. But since he's willing to come back to Netherfield, we welcome him anyway. Who knows what will happen? It's none of our business anyway. You know, sister, we've agreed to never talk about it again. Will he really come?"

Her sister said: "Don't worry, Mrs. Nichols was in Meryton last night. I saw her go, and I ran out to ask her if it was true, and she told me, It was true. He would be here by Thursday at the latest, probably Wednesday. She added that she was going to the butcher's to order some meat for Wednesday's cooking, and she had six ducks ready to be slaughtered. eat."

Miss Bennet's countenance changed when she heard he was coming.She had not mentioned his name to Elizabeth for several months.But this time when only the two sisters were together, she said: "Lizzy, when my aunt told me the news today, I saw you were looking at me, and I knew I looked ugly at that time. But You don't think it's because of something stupid like that, but I was a bit upset at the time because everyone was staring at me. To tell you the truth, the news didn't make me happy or Painful. There is only one thing that pleases me—he came alone this time, so we will have fewer chances to see him. I don’t have any scruples per se, but I’m afraid of gossip.”

Elizabeth did not know what to think of the matter.If she hadn't seen him last time in Derbyshire, she might have thought he had no ulterior motives in his visit.But she still thinks that he has not forgotten his love for Jane.Did he get his friend's permission to come this time, or did he come here on his own?It's really hard to tell.

Sometimes she couldn't help thinking: "This poor man, coming back to the house I rented, caused such speculation from others. It's really uncomfortable to think about it. I don't care about him either."

Regardless of what her sister said, what she thought, whether she expected him to come or not, Elizabeth could easily see that her sister was affected mentally, and was more restless and restless than ever.

About a year ago, the parents had vehemently argued about this issue, and now it's time to bring it up again.

Mrs. Bennet said to her husband again: "My dear Mr. Bingley—you must call on him."

"No, no, last year you forced me to go to see him, saying that as long as I went to see him, he would choose one of our daughters to be his wife, but the result was nothing, and I will never do it again It's such a fool."

His wife added that when the nobleman returned to Netherfield, the neighbors were obliged to visit him.

He said: "I hate this kind of etiquette. If he wants to come and go with us, let him come to the door himself. It's not like he doesn't know our address. Every time the neighbors come and go, they have to go to the door. If you want me to come and see you off, I don't have the time."

"Oh, it would be very impolite of you not to call on him. However, I can invite him to dinner here, and I have decided to invite him. We should have invited Mrs. Long and the Godin family earlier. , including our own family members, there are thirteen people in total, so it is just right to reserve a seat for him."

She decided to do this, and she felt better in her heart, so her husband's unreasonableness made her feel better.In doing so, however, the neighbors would end up seeing Mr. Bingley before they did.

His coming is drawing near.

Jane said to her sister: "Now I think it's better for him not to come. In fact, it doesn't matter. I can pretend nothing happened when I see him. It's just that I can't bear to hear people always talk about it. Mother means well, but she doesn't know (no one knows) how much her words hurt me. I hope he doesn't stay at Netherfield any longer, and I'll be content!"

Elizabeth said: "I really want to say a few words to comfort you, but unfortunately I can't say a word. You must understand what I mean. I don't want to be like ordinary people. Always had great patience.”

Mr. Bingley came at last.Mrs. Bennet, by the assistance of her servants, was the first to receive the news, and therefore the longest to be vexed.Now that her plans for an early visit to him had fallen through, she was counting the days on her fingers to see how many more days it would be before the invitation was delivered.On the third day of his arrival in Hertfordshire, Mrs. Bennet saw him from the dressing-room window, riding into the paddock, towards her house.

She was overjoyed, and hastily called her daughters to share her joy.Jane resolutely sat at the table without moving.Elizabeth, to please her mother, went to the window, looked in, and seeing Mr. Darcy coming with him, went back and sat down by her sister.

Katie said, "Mother, there's another gentleman with him. Who's that?"

"I guess it must be his friend or something, honey, I really don't know."

"Look!" Katie went on, "like the guy he used to be with. Can't remember his name, but that tall, very haughty guy."

"Good heavens, it's Mr. Darcy! It must be. To tell the truth, Mr. Bingley's friends are always welcome here. Otherwise, I hate the man when I see him."

Jane looked at Elizabeth with great wonder and concern.She was quite ignorant of her sister's meeting with Darcy in Derbyshire, and felt that her sister must have been embarrassed to see him for the first time since his explanatory letter.The sisters were not very happy.They are considerate of each other and have their own secrets.

The mother was still going on, saying that she didn't like Mr. Darcy very much, and only received him with civility because he was, after all, a friend of Mr. Bingley's.Neither sister heard these words.There was indeed another reason for Elizabeth's uneasiness, which Jane did not know.Elizabeth never had the courage to show Jane Mrs. Gardiner's letter, nor to describe to Jane the change in her affection for him.Jane only knew that he proposed to her and was rejected by her. She still underestimated his strengths, but she didn't know that Elizabeth's secret was more than that. She thought he had great kindness to their family, so she treated him differently.Even if her affection for him is not as deep as Jane's for Bingley, at least it is as reasonable and appropriate as Jane's for Bingley.Darcy's return to Netherfield, and his offer to revisit her at Longburn, indeed surprised her almost as much as she had when she saw his change in Derbyshire.

It has been such a long time, but his affection and his wish remain unswerving.Thinking of this, her pale face regained its blood color, and it became more vivid. She couldn't help but smile with joy, and her eyes shone brightly.But she was still worried after all.

She thought, "Let me see how he behaves, and then I hope it's not too late."

She sat there absorbed in her needlework, trying to pretend to be calm, and did not even lift her eyes. When the servant approached the door, she became impatient. She looked up to see the face of her sister, and saw that Jane's face was slightly more than usual. She was a little paler, but she was dignified and steady, quite beyond Elizabeth's expectations.She blushed when the two distinguished guests arrived; but she received them with ease and grace, without showing the slightest trace of resentment, or being overly courteous.

Elizabeth made no conversation with either of them, but after a few perfunctory words, as usual, out of politeness, she sat down again to her sewing, and did so with great vigor.She only cast a bold glance at Darcy, who looked as grave as ever, not as he had been at Pemberley, but as he had been in Hertfordshire.This may be because he cannot be as informal in front of her mother as he is in front of her aunt and uncle.Although her speculation is painstaking, it is not necessarily unreasonable.

She also glanced at Bingley, and saw at once that he was mixed with pleasure and self-consciousness.Mrs. Bennet's politeness to him, and her perfunctory indifference to his friend, made both her daughters very sorry.

Her mother, in fact, treated these two distinguished guests quite out of favor, for one of her beloved daughters was saved from disgrace by Mr. Darcy's rescue, and Elizabeth's knowledge of the incident was extremely painful.

Darcy asked Elizabeth about the Gardners, and Elizabeth was a little flustered when she answered, and Darcy didn't say anything after that.He was reticent, perhaps because he was not sitting with her, but he had not been in Derbyshire last time.I remembered that last time he talked to her aunt and aunt whenever it was inconvenient for her to talk to herself; but this time, he couldn't hear him for several minutes.

She could no longer restrain her curiosity, and looked up into his face, only to see that he looked at her and Jane from time to time, and most of the time he was always staring at the ground in a daze.It can be seen that this time his mind is much heavier than when the two of them met last time, but he is not as eager to win others' favor as last time.She was disappointed and at the same time blamed herself for being disappointed.

She thought: "How did you expect him to be like this? Then why did he come?"

She was in no mood to talk to anyone but him, and yet she didn't have the courage to speak to him.

She asked him about his sister, but after asking, she had nothing to say.

I only heard Mrs. Bennet say: "Mr. Bingley, you have been away for a long time."

Mr. Bingley hastened to say that it had been a long time indeed.

"I was worried at first that you wouldn't come back. People say you're going to quit the house as soon as Michaelmas, and I hope you don't. A lot has happened around here since you left. Miss Lucas is married and settled, and one of my own daughters is married. I suppose you've heard about it, and you must have seen it in the papers. I know that The Times and It's all in the Express, but in a bad way. It just says: 'Mr. George Wickham is to marry Miss Bennet in the near future.' About her father, where she lives, and so on. It's not mentioned at all. It was drafted by my brother Gardner, and I don't see how he could do it so badly. Did you see it?"

Bingley said he saw it, and congratulated her again.Elizabeth dared not even raise her eyes, so that she could not know what Mr. Darcy's expression was at the moment.

Mrs. Bennet went on: "It is a joy, indeed, to have a daughter successfully married. But, Mr. Bingley, I am sorry to have her away from me. They have gone to Newcastle, and are very soon." Far north, they don't know how long it will be before they come back. His unit is there, he has left the militia and joined the regular army, you probably know it. Thank God! He has some friends at last, but he still It would be nice to have a few more.”

Elizabeth knew that she meant this to Mr. Darcy, and was so terribly embarrassed that she could scarcely sit still.But these words were more effective than anything else, allowing her to chat with the guests reluctantly.She began to ask Bingley if he intended to spend a little time in the country.

He said it would take a few weeks.

Her mother said: "Mr. Bingley, when you have finished shooting the birds on your own estate, please come to Mr. Bennet's and shoot as many as you like. I am sure he will be more than happy to let You come, and the best partridges will be left to you."

Elizabeth was all the more sick at hearing her mother talk so much nonsense, so flattering.Thinking of a year ago, they were full of hope and complacent. Now, although they can see that good things are coming, but in a blink of an eye, they will all come to nothing, which only adds to the sadness.She felt that whether it was Jane or herself, even if she could be happy for a lifetime in the future, she could not make up for the pain and embarrassment of these few minutes.

She thought to herself, "I just hope that I will never see them again. Although they are pleasant to be friends with, they can't make up for this embarrassing situation. I hope I will never see them again!"

However, although a lifetime of happiness could not compensate for the present pain, it was much less painful when, in a few minutes, the sight of her sister's beauty touched the heart of her former lover again.

Bingley hardly spoke to Jane when he first came in, but he soon became more and more attentive.He found that Jane was still as beautiful as last year, with a docile personality and a natural attitude, but she was not as talkative as last year.Jane could only hope that no one would see that she was any different from what she had been, and she fancied she was still as talkative as ever.In fact, she was too preoccupied, so sometimes she fell silent, even she didn't realize it.

Mrs. Bennet had long intended to make some courtesies to her distinguished guests, and remembering this when they were taking their leave, she immediately invited them to dine at Longbourn in a few days.

"You owe me a return call, Mr. Bingley," she said, "when you went to town last winter, you promised to come and dine with us as soon as you got back. I've always taken that to heart, you know." I'm really disappointed that you haven't come to the appointment all this time."

Bingley couldn't help being dazed for a long time at the mention of this matter, and then said that he was sorry for the delay.Then the two took their leave.

Mrs. Bennet had originally planned to invite them to dinner that day, but she also thought that although the usual meals at home were very good, but he was a person of status, with an annual income of as much as ten thousand pounds. With such a deep hope, how can you be ashamed not to add two main dishes?

(End of this chapter)