Old friends and new fancies

by Sybil G. Brinton

Lady Catherine was silent for a moment with anger; then she broke out, as Elizabeth had expected: "There is no one I can get in her place. The impudent girl! She should be glad to come to a house like this. Probably she is intending to come all the time, if the truth were known; how can you tell she is not?"

"Only that when I last saw her she distinctly said that she and her sister had no reason to think themselves expected."

"No reason! when with my own mouth I said, 'I should like you to come and play at my house on the sixteenth.' Nothing could be clearer. As to her sister, if that is the very ordinary-looking person whom I believe you presented to me one morning, no, I do not recollect saying anything to her; but it is not she who plays the harp."

"She is a very agreeable and cultured woman, widow of a Canon of Westminster, and Miss Crawford goes nowhere without her."

"Well, it is all extremely annoying, and I do not know when I have been so upset. You should have told her, Elizabeth, told her plainly that she was to come. Really, the airs these people give themselves! Here is a card; I will write their names and send it round this afternoon, and I hope after that we shall have no more nonsense."

This by no means satisfied Elizabeth, and the next ten minutes were spent by her in using every means of persuasion she could think of to induce her aunt to repair all previous omissions by going to visit Mrs. Grant and conveying her invitation in person. Lady Catherine at first resisted the proposal indignantly, and would have continued to do so but for her knowledge that Miss Crawford's music was to have been an attractive part of the evening's entertainment, and an uncomfortable recollection of having told many of her friends that they would hear a person scarcely known, in whom she had discovered some remarkable talent.

This she did not betray to her niece, and when the latter left the house it was without having secured a definite promise, but Elizabeth felt she had said as much as she safely could, and she walked home, pondering on what had passed, and wondering uneasily whether what she had done had been a real kindness to Mary. This question was also raised by her husband, to whom she had related the affair on her return. He shook his head over it, and gave it as his opinion that as his aunt had been rude to Miss Crawford, and the latter was fully conscious of it, they would not meet in a spirit conducive to future good feeling.

"But it would have been worse," said Elizabeth, "if Aunt Catherine had counted on Miss Crawford's coming and she had not appeared. There would have been no healing the breach then."

"Would it have greatly signified if there had been a breach?" inquired Darcy. "But never mind, my dear, you have done your best, and it will be interesting to see the result of Aunt Catherine's efforts at conciliation—the first time she has ever appeared in such a role, I should think."

Strangely enough, Lady Catherine's efforts were successful enough, although no one ever knew precisely how she accomplished it. But it was partly accounted for by the fact that she saw Mrs. Grant alone, Miss Crawford being out. She had taken only her daughter with her, not choosing that Miss Steele should be a witness of an interview which was undoubtedly galling to her pride; and Mrs. Grant, realizing but a small part of the great lady's insolence towards her sister, and the nature of Mary's resentment of it, only perceived that Lady Catherine was anxious to have them at the party, and was willing to acknowledge any remissness in her manner of issuing the invitation. Lady Catherine was so relieved at not having to apologize directly to the object of her dislike, that she became, in the course of the interview, more and more condescendingly gracious to Mrs. Grant, whom she found, as she afterwards remarked to her daughter, an amiable, unpretentious person; and actually admitted that she ought to have called sooner, but the pressure of engagements in Bath at this period of the season was so great. The call was strictly limited to a quarter of an hour, and Mrs. Grant described it all to Mary when she came in with much spirit and humour.