Posted on Friday, 1 September 2006

I sit, Dear Sir, writing this letter to you, as you are engrossed in conversation with my father. I believe that I owe you a debt, Fitzwilliam, of exactly one letter.

I know you would prefer that other letter forgotten – banished from my memory. But as I have explained to you before, I am grateful to that letter for removing the scales from my eyes. It freed you to say things you could not speak, and allowed me to see you as I would not before. However, as I shall very soon promise to obey you, I suppose I should do as you ask and forget that letter. As soon as I dispatch this to you and erase my debt, I promise it shall be so, if you truly desire it should be so.

It pleases me so much, my love, to see you with my father. To see the two men whom I regard most in this world come to understand, respect, and even enjoy each others’ company is more than I could have hoped. Papa is very dear to me, and for the first time in my life, I believe we all at Longbourn are very glad that I am not his precious son.

It has always been a joke of sorts here – I am so much like my father in so many ways. Certainly, I vex Mama almost as much as he does. In a way, I believe my stubborn adherence to the female form in the face of my very Bennet-like personality and appearance is, perhaps, the most frustrating part of my mother’s much-crossed existence.

I believe, however, that you might have been disappointed had I been a boy. Truly, I believe you are the first person I have met for whom I can say that is so! In fact, I think I can state quite emphatically that you are glad I am a female. Perhaps that is why I like you so much?

You have joined me just now, at a pause in your conversation with Papa. I can tell that my answers as to with whom I correspond have not satisfied you. And yet, sir, I must state that I, too, am disappointed. Not once have you asked to repair my pen or admired my rate of writing or firmness of hand. For shame! Have you learned nothing of the arts of flattery?!

Will you be surprised, my darling, to know that you are the most special friend to whom I am writing? Indeed, you should not be. Over these last few weeks, what was profound regard and respect has grown somehow into more: conviviality heretofore unsuspected. I could never have fathomed how much you have grown to mean to me as not only a future husband, but as a friend. I cherish our walks and our conversations, and each one of those treasured memories will be called to fore to sustain me whilst you, dear Sir, are far away from me.

As you are leaving me with the rising of the sun tomorrow, I will give this letter to you to take with you and read as you will. I hope that it carries just a small piece of my intense regard for you within it, to keep you warm in the vast chill of Derbyshire.

I know we have spoken of my tour of Derbyshire before, but I do not know that I have told you exactly how it came about. You know that I was to have toured the Lakes district with Aunt and Uncle Gardiner earlier this year? I am all astonishment that I could ever have been disappointed at the change of plans! But you must understand my feelings at the time. I knew, then, that you were a good man. And I knew I had not only misjudged you, but that I had treated you harshly and unfairly.

When the letter came with the “disappointing” change of itinerary, I felt a moment of dread and embarrassment. I remember Jane’s eyes on me – poor Jane who knows me better than anyone, save you – regarding me quizzically. I believe I stated something to the effect that Derbyshire was a large area, and that surely I might tour it with impunity.

But in my heart, it was your Derbyshire that I was to enter. Though I viewed the trip with some trepidation, I was, at the same time, excited with curiosity to see the country that had made you and shaped you. When my aunt suggested visiting Pemberley, I knew that I ought not to do so. And yet, when they assured us you would not be home, I had an insatiable desire to see this place that was… you. If I could do nothing else, I could make an effort to know you by trying to see and understand your home.

(As a side note, do you think that article will feel more diminutive once it loses its appendage? I quite optimistically believe that, instead, it will feel quite lightened of its burdensome load of the extra “y”. Your. Our. Yes, I believe the latter is much preferable. But I digress.)

Seeing your home (soon to be our home!) was truly extraordinary. To know that such vast responsibility was placed on your shoulders – so many tenants, so many staff – and they all thought so highly of you! Not a cross word spoken of Mr. Darcy in Lambton. Mrs. Reynolds gave you such a flaming character reference that I thought perhaps she knew our sordid tale and was trying to punish me for being such a blind, prejudiced thing. But it was not so – she was merely telling the truth of the man, landlord, brother, master.

As you are soon to add to the roster the title of husband, I am glad to state with certainty that you will excel in that role even more than the any of the ones you have held previously. Perhaps it is my prejudice at work again. In this case, however, I shall adamantly stand by my bias.

How I long to call you husband! Truly, in my heart I already do. (And someday, God willing, there will be at least one more role to fill…)

You are leaving me tomorrow, for at least a week’s journey north. I know it is quite non-sensible of me, but although I already miss you, the idea does not disturb me as much as I believed it would. Oh, I shall miss you dreadfully. I know that. In fact, it seems as though every time you take one of these trips away from me (and I understand their necessity – the more business you finish now, the more time you will have for me later!), on every consecutive trip you take a larger piece of me with you, leaving me feeling somehow less Elizabeth every time! I sometimes wonder how I stay anchored with such a large part of what is me missing. (The result of this is that Papa has started to question if I am, indeed, his rational Lizzy after all – these feelings are, in fact, quite nonsensical, are they not?) Yet this time, there is something else – an anticipation that I am quite hesitant to give voice to. Will you think it too forward, too bold of me to state this? Yet, my courage rises again at this attempt to intimidate me. No, I am not as distressed at your absence as I should be, because I have a certain knowledge. It is the last time you will leave Elizabeth Bennet. For when you come back, we shall be very soon married, and from then we shall be one. Even if some circumstance arises that takes you away from me, it will be Elizabeth Darcy who anxiously awaits your return.

So, hurry back to me, my love. But come back whole and hearty and hale. Take no unnecessary risk in shortening your trip. I can, in this once instance in my life, be patient for your return. For the reward of our upcoming union is something worth waiting for.

Always and forever yours,
Elizabeth

The End