Mrs. Bennet Has Her Say (4 page)

I have taken steps to save my sanity. “I am going to London,” I announced on a day when Elizabeth was particularly noisy. “I will no longer tolerate the tyranny of an infant who by rights should be spanked and put to bed in a room whose walls are thick enough to shut up the racket within.”

“Mr. Bennet,” answered Mrs. Bennet from her bed, “Elizabeth is but ten days old. It makes no sense to apply punishment suitable for a child much older, if then. You will simply have to put up with Elizabeth's temper until she can accommodate herself to our world. Sooner or later she will have to take nourishment from me and not from the bottle administered by Mrs. Rummidge. Sooner or later she will find comfort next to me and her sister, Jane, instead of the bony arms of Mrs. Rummidge, who I am beginning to suspect of being a fraud and a liar and no fit company for our children. Are you listening, Mr. Bennet?” There are times when deafness seems preferable to hearing such remonstrance, especially on those rare occasions when Mrs. Bennet approaches common sense. I remained silent. I planned my escape.

And now, dear reader, at the risk of seeming to complain in a most unmanly way, I must declare to this journal—and to myself—that the life of quiet contemplation, the life I had planned, has never come to fruition.
Bear with me. My aim, as I write, is to draw you to a closer understanding of this man whose world—through no fault of his own—is at present intolerable and shows
no sign of easing
. (Note the underscore.) With the achieving of my majority came the undeniable truth that my home and my garden and my woods and streams and the animals I imagined frolicking within were not mine. They would never be mine, not until the property is legally settled upon my son. Entailment is a curse, especially so with the heir apparent, my cousin, the insipid Collins, and his sycophantic ways. To think that this idiot might one day take his place at Longbourn kept me awake many a night, and so, early on, I took steps to lift that curse. The first was marriage.

Winnowing Mrs. Bennet out from all the girls keen to become my wife had not been an easy task, but at least until recently the result of my efforts, that being marriage, had not been particularly painful or inconvenient. Indeed, asserting my conjugal rights in the bedroom had proved not only convenient but pleasurable, reducing the necessity for trips into the village or to London to quiet the storms within me. Mrs. Bennet was comely; she was young and strong and not averse to my bedding of her. After the birth of Jane, she seemed agreeable to a certain amount of activity, even took occasional but undeniable enjoyment from my frequent forays into her bed. I quite enjoyed the flush in her cheek, her perfect little bosom, and the way her nipples retracted whenever I came near, though now as I
think on it and on my somewhat limited experience, those nipples ought to have puckered out, not in. No matter. She could no more hide the pleasing curve of her waist than she could the suppleness of her limbs. Granted, she seemed to go to some trouble to cover herself; I had never seen so many bedclothes on one bed. But she could not help the dark curls that sprang from beneath her cap nor the shine in her dark blue eyes, sometimes tears, yes, but sometimes a ready spirit.

No matter, all that is behind me; for this wife of mine and her baby Elizabeth have ruined not only my present but my future. Such perfidy is beyond forgiveness. I will journey to London and pick up a book or two, and who knows what further adventures may come my way. After all, it is not my fault that things have not come out right. Besides, while London may be noisy it can offer nothing as unnerving as the eternal bawling and wailing from the bedroom above. In fact, I may find once more the man I was before this monumental betrayal. My sensibilities, many of them I recall as quite exquisite, may be restored.

As if to remind me of what I was fleeing, Mrs. Rummidge stood at the head of the stairs and screeched, “Shame on you running off to the city of sin and corruption whilst your dear ones struggle to survive! I swear on my virginity the sainted Jesus will come looking for you!” “Shhh,” I heard another voice, unmistakably my wife's,
say. “Let him go. You cannot miss what you did not want in the first place.”

I slammed the door on my way out. “I have married a shrew,” I muttered, “and she just seventeen.”

On my way down the walk I began to whistle, a tune recalled from my youth, “Constant Billy.”

November at Longbourn

Dear Sister,

He has departed the scene, though not, alas, forever. He has gone to London, he says to purchase a book, though I know better. I did not come to this marriage completely ignorant of the ways of men. Do you recall Mindy Sharpton, she being left an orphan at an early age and forced to find her own way in the village? Did we not feel sorry for her even after we discovered her and the tailor's boy, Billy Cummings, locked in a tussle in the alley behind the shop? We hastened on but no detail had escaped us, not the frayed hem of her petticoat, not the mud on the soles of her boots, nor Billy's trousers around his ankles, nor the sickening sight of his mouth stretched into a rictus the likes of
which we hoped never to see again. (Little did I know that I would too soon see just such a sight, and in my marriage bed at that!) Poor Mindy Sharpton with only one path left to her, and that trodden by men of the village whose respectability was unquestioned. I remember asking dear Mother why a man, Mr. Broadley the leather merchant, a husband and father, would seek out the company of a girl like Mindy Sharpton. Mother stiffened. “Now, young lady,” she said, “leave well enough alone. It is the way of all men and has ever been such.” We knew better than to persist with our questions and so, with a shrug, we grew further and faster into the womanhood that was our fate.

Am I not a Mindy Sharpton? Am I not a foolish girl who cast propriety to the winds and fell head over heels into the arms of a stranger? You might well ask, dear sister. You never ever called my behaviour into question; you never ever scolded me. You simply put your arms around me there in the little bedchamber in the house of our childhood and held me safe. “Hush, dear Marianne,” you said over and over and smoothed my hair. What else you could have said I cannot imagine. Surely you were as ignorant as I of a future with a child and without a husband. Surely you were almost as frightened as I. The two of us—you and I—shared a desperation unknown to respectable young ladies, ladies like those Mother predicted her daughters would become. I betrayed her as only a daughter can betray a mother. Had she lived she would have known the shame of my indecency. She would have
seen me as less than Mindy Sharpton, for after all, I did not have poverty to excuse my behaviour; I did not need to exchange my skirts for coin; I did not need to become a whore; and yet in her eyes I did. Illness is never a blessing, but in this instance it carried her off and saved her. But nothing saved me.

There are times when shame for the deceit with which I entered this marriage threatens to overwhelm me. But then, I look to my little Jane and wish with all my heart that Mother could be here to love her. All would be made right again . . . and . . . So Mr. Bennet travels to London to embellish his library? Of course he does. If indeed he does purchase a book I know what its subject will be, for I have seen what rests on his library shelves, hidden behind the volumes of birds and beasts he boasts of. “Ah, my dear,” he has exclaimed more than once, “how much we have to learn from the world about us! The birds, do they not make you wonder how such flight is possible?” I am to look at him in admiration, impressed by his wisdom and intelligence. I am to be grateful for his attention. I am to look on him as my superior. “I urge you, my dear wife, to prepare yourself for the motherhood that awaits. Pray, leave off your contrariness and heed my counsel. It is certain that your mood would improve, as would the well-being of our children, especially that of my sons. We must look to the future.” Tra-la, I want to say, I prefer the past.

And then came Elizabeth and with her the blame that fell upon me. He thought to comfort me: “I am not blaming
you,” he said, and added, “but it is your fault.” Elizabeth and I are the reason Mr. Bennet is making his way to London. If he thinks to punish me by his absence I am content to have him think so inasmuch as his departure recalls a bit of the freedom I felt as a girl, before Mr. Bennet showed himself on my horizon, and returns to me some of the joy I felt in the company of my dear colonel. Such happiness must have showed itself at once because Mr. Bennet was no more out of the door than Mrs. Rummidge said, “O ma'am, your cheeks are rosy! I have not seen their colour since little Elizabeth came to us.” Mrs. Rummidge at this moment held the baby in her arms as she does during most of her waking hours, quieting Elizabeth by way of some mystical spell I know not of. I am grateful to the woman, no matter that my daughter may be becoming bewitched; she is at least quiet. My strength is returning, as is the colour in my cheeks, as is my desire to see what lies beyond the upstairs chamber of my lying-in. Little Jane, sweet and compliant in her crib, babbles a bit and waves her little fingers in my direction; she takes my milk hungrily and often; she grows plump and rosy, just like her mother, and soon she will walk on her own. She is nothing like her little sister, although, given the difference in fathers, one ought not be surprised.

And so I am left to amuse myself and, dear sister, I am doing so though not as my husband would wish. In his absence I can return to
Pamela
. Alas, her misfortunes multiply with each page, caused by her Master, who pursues
her unceasingly. Do you wonder at my affinity for this poor child? I will say, however, that her Master, unlike mine, brings her beautiful clothes: a silk nightgown, silken petticoats, laced shoes, Holland linen, and fine stockings, even a swan-skin undercoat. Good girl that she is, she refuses them and sews for herself flannel undercoats and rough shifts. Now, were Mr. B. to offer me fine silken garments, I would never for a moment refuse them, though of course, unlike Pamela, I am a married woman whose virtue belongs to the past. I shall add one additional difference between Pamela's Master and mine: Pamela's is handsome though nonetheless loathsome in his pursuit of this virginal girl. Oh, what luxury it is for me to while away the hours when I am detached from my babes amidst the pages of Mr. Richardson's novel.

But it is not just Pamela who provides my amusement. A unique sort of amusement comes from the slim volumes hidden on Mr. B.'s library shelves whose pages, as thin as the skin of onions, detail females like Mindy Sharpton in congress with men who resemble, dare I say, Mr. Bennet. So many and such varying ways of securing male pleasure I find astounding. I pray you will not think me too immodest, dear Jane, but I have no one else, certainly not Mrs. Rummidge, with whom to share my discoveries. I pray that you do not scold me for what I write: The drawings show figures whose outlines are smudged by fingers certainly not mine; they are upside and down, the male one way, the female the other, the female atop the male, sitting,
lying, and she even standing with the male behind. Now, how is such discomfort supposed to pleasure him? Well, I will have ample time, with Mr. Bennet away, to reach an understanding of such positions. He thinks me lacking in curiosity? If only he knew how well versed I am in the world about him.

The rector and I will christen Elizabeth without her father's help, then. I will not expect either you or your fine husband, Mr. Phillips, to be on hand this time. It was so good of you both to make the arduous journey to Longbourn for little Jane's christening during that storm-tossed season. The snow seemed deeper than at any winter within memory, even Mr. Bennet said so, and the winds chilled us to the bone. The memory of Mr. Phillips's cough remains with me to this day. Your calm presence proved a balm to everyone, even to Mr. Bennet, whose disappointment over little Jane's sex he could not hide. I must say that had you been able to be present at Elizabeth's birth your calm demeanour might have prevented such violent outbursts as we were subjected to, not to mention his stomping from the house, shouting that he would make his way to London. Then again, I will confess to a certain relief brought about by his absence. Dear sister, I shall seek forgiveness in the next world; in this one I will seize what happiness I can. Allow me, while memory sharpens experience, to share with you what I call the Coming of Elizabeth:

A little less than one year had passed since Jane, and again the winds were fierce, a fitting storm for the birth of
one who for nine months had been obstinate in my womb. Even Mrs. Rummidge, who insisted on boiling water well in advance of my delivery, agreed that this little one was no Jane and that indeed we had best begin the choosing of names for him.

Anticipating a son and despite my protestations, Mr. Bennet insisted on the presence of a doctor. A midwife and Mrs. Rummidge's hot water had done very well during my first labour with Jane, but Mr. Bennet would have none of it this time. He went so far as to import a Dr. Smellie from London to watch over me the moment my water broke. I must tell you, even in my pain, a more formidable figure I never saw and hope never to see again. Like a thundercloud, the doctor banged into my chamber, cape flying, hat clamped atop his head, clutching a leather satchel, which I took to hold his habiliments but which instead held the tools of his trade, among them that new invention, the forceps. I gasped at the sight—like tongs Cook uses to turn the sausages, only larger—and wondered aloud how it might be used. “The infant is occasionally reluctant to join us,” he answered. “This will clasp his head and help him into his new life. Normally only a slight tug is necessary.” His smile revealed a monstrous number of yellow teeth. Silently I prayed that my baby would come willingly. So, too, did the midwife who stood nearby and Mrs. Rummidge, who prayed, too, loudly, spilling hot water as she did.

But my baby did not come willingly. It seemed as if she
would not come at all. It seemed that she preferred to kick and stir and turn about within me, causing me endless pain. She did not wish to come out, nor did it seem that she wished to stay in. She was furious with her dilemma and I the object of her anger. At one minute I thought that my back would break in two and at another that my lower parts would give way altogether. Such pain, like bolts of lightning, came, then went, always to return with greater and greater violence and with greater frequency. The struggling of the child to be born seemed never to end and I cried out for my mother often. Even the midwife, who was surely accustomed to such goings-on, looked stricken. As for Mrs. Rummidge, her bucket was almost empty.

“Put that water down, old woman,” Dr. Smellie ordered. “This is not the middle ages. You there,” he said to the midwife, “pay attention; you are about to witness the most advanced methods of birthing. But first”—and his yellow teeth loomed large—“we must get you quiet.” With that Dr. Smellie produced from his satchel some vials. Soaking a cloth with a tincture of something smelling so sweet as to sicken me, he showed his yellow teeth at me and said, “Place this cloth over your nose and mouth. Breathe deeply and your pain will be as nothing.” I did as he asked and indeed, the pain receded. But so then did my baby and for a time it lay still. I drifted off and woke to see that everyone was a-slumber. The midwife lay curled at the foot of my bed, Dr. Smellie on the couch nearby, Mrs.
Rummidge on the bedclothes, which my exertions had pushed to the floor.

Mr. Bennet, you can assume, was nowhere to be found, though in my hazy half-consciousness I imagined I heard the clump of his boots as he paced back and forth along the hallway. Time lost its meaning. Awake, I was wracked with pain; surely something in me would burst from the kicking. I breathed from Dr. Smellie's cloth and once more fell asleep. This went on, said the midwife, who bless her heart refused to leave me, for a day and a night. “And that Dr. Smellie,” she told me after, “made as if to depart, so impatient was he with you. And then you cried out, ‘O Doctor, help my baby to be born!' To that he thundered, ‘Push it out, woman, so that my forceps can grasp the head.'” I felt the forceps close to my nether region, which felt to me now quite distended. “Oh, please, sir,” said the midwife, “might it not be possible for that instrument to harm the child? Might it not misshape the head, that so delicate part of a newborn?” “Quiet, woman,” said Dr. Smellie, and I felt the cold metal upon me. Quickly, the midwife moved beneath his arm, came close to me, and whispered, “I believe you are quite wide enough for the baby to come through. One more push, dear child.” I did as I was told and, suddenly, there she was, a caul hiding the red fuzz we would see anon. And there stood Dr. Smellie, forceps dangling uselessly from his hand. His grimace became a scowl as Mrs. Rummidge jumped up and down and
sang merrily and of course loudly, “A caul! She is born with a caul! Good luck will follow her all of her life.”

It was at this moment that Mr. Bennet chose to enter my bedchamber. “A what?” he demanded. “A caul? My son with a scummy cap on his head?!” And he ran out and down the stairs no doubt to his library to find what information he could about cauls. But not even halfway down the stairs he stopped and roared up, “She?! It's a she?!”

I have not seen him since. Nor have I seen Dr. Smellie, although the midwife told me not long ago that the good doctor was being investigated for possible burking, that being the murder of patients for purposes of obtaining corpses for medical research. Goodness gracious, who would think that so horrible a crime could happen in this day and age. Thank goodness. I suspect that Elizabeth, in all her infancy, chose to brave the elements of her new world on her own terms; thus was the forceps saved for another day. I shudder to think of it. I know only that it will not see my bedchamber again.