This flattering request from the proud, exclusive, great man of the neighbourhood, who is naturally still more exclusive for his young sister than for himself, is delicate homage indeed, such as Elizabeth is well qualified to appreciate. Any desire Miss Darcy has to know her must be the work of her brother, and, without looking further, it is very gratifying to have this strong testimony that his resentment has not made him think really ill of her.
Elizabeth hardly knows how she accedes to the petition, only it cannot have been very ungraciously. He wishes her to walk into the house, but she excuses herself, saying she is not tired, and the two stand together on the lawn talking indefatigably of Matlock and Dovedale, to avoid an awkward silence, till the Gardiners came up, when, after a renewed and pressing invitation to enter the house and take some refreshment, Mr. Darcy hands the ladies into the carriage.
Elizabeth has to listen to her uncle and aunt’s remarks on the Squire of Pemberley, who, in spite of his formidable reputation for hauteur and reserve, has shown himself “perfectly well-behaved, polite, and unassuming.” “I can now say with the housekeeper,” ends Mrs. Gardiner, with a great deal more point than she is aware of, “that though some people may call him proud, I have seen nothing of it.”
The probability of such a reformation of manners on Darcy’s part remains an open question. Perhaps the sudden change in him is one of the most unlikely occurrences which happen in Jane Austen’s life-like novels. But her readers must remember that Darcy was only eight-and-twenty years of age. He was a young man of high character and many fine qualities, though these had been warped by the false self-importance which was the result of the over-indulged, isolated, really narrow experience of the only son and heir of a great family, confined largely to the circle of his own friends—at the utmost his dependents. And the influence brought to bear on Darcy, with such telling effect, was his strong attachment to the bright, true-hearted girl who told him his faults so plainly, yet who could not alienate him, partly because of the single-heartedness of her nature, partly because of the elements of nobility in his. Love and his mistress, acting together on good principles which had been suffered to lie dormant, were Darcy’s teachers, and at twenty-eight such teachers are still powerful.
The gradual change of Elizabeth’s feelings towards Darcy is wrought out with great skill.
Darcy is so eager to fulfil his intention with regard to Elizabeth Bennet and his sister, that on the very afternoon of Georgiana’s arrival at home he drives her over to the inn in Lambton, where the Gardiners are staying.
Elizabeth has not been able to tell her uncle and aunt the compliment which she is to receive, and her confusion when the Pemberley livery is seen in the streets, together with the effort to be calm, impresses them with a new idea. There is no way to account for so marked attentions from such a quarter, unless by supposing a partiality for their niece—a supposition highly acceptable to the worthy uncle and aunt.
Elizabeth finds Miss Darcy, who is a ladylike girl, though not pretty, no alarming critic. She is shy instead of proud, but her shyness does not prevent her from being eager to like the friend her brother has presented to her.
A few minutes afterwards Bingley also “waits upon” Elizabeth, and is as friendly as of old. Her anger against him has vanished long ago. She is glad to see him again. She is pleased to fancy that he looks at her once or twice as if he were seeking to trace a resemblance between her and Jane. He is clearly on terms of simple friendship with Georgiana Darcy, for whom his sister, in complacently contemplating the possibility of a double family match, has designed him. And Elizabeth believes she detects a regretful remembrance in the tone in which he refers to its having been a long time since he has seen her. She approves of the promptness and exactness of the mental calculation which follows: “It is above eight months; we have not met since the 20th of November, when we were all dancing together at Netherfield.”
An invitation to dine at Pemberley follows. It is accepted with pleasure by the Gardiners, under the agreeable persuasion that Mr. Darcy is much better acquainted with Elizabeth than her friends had any idea of; in fact, that he is very much in love with her. Of the gentleman’s feelings there can be no doubt; with regard to the sentiments of the lady—whom her relatives do not choose to embarrass by pressing for her confidence on the great conquest of which she has been far from boasting—there is still an interesting uncertainty.