Page 6 of Mr Collins in Love
It would soon be all over the parish that Mr Collins had given charity to a ragged fellow he had known as a boy from miles and miles away, on the south coast.All the details of the encounter would be laid out and pored over, and if I talked to Jem in my study, and people did not consider that right, they would never forget it.
Some men would have known which location was the most suitable.Trafford would have known.He would not have had to think about it.He would have met Jem in just the right place and it would all have been easy and natural.
I went to my study.The air was hot and stale and as I opened the casement, I found I still carried my stick.I returned to the front door and deposited it on the hall table.
Now, Jem would be drinking his beer.Mrs Fowke might be giving him a piece of the apple pie I sometimes ate myself after dinner.It was good pie, flavoured with nutmeg, but not too much.She served it with cream.I hoped he enjoyed it.
I went back to my study and sat at my desk.The latest issue of theFarmer’s Magazinelay upon it.I had recently started taking it so that I might apprise myself of developments in the agricultural world and thus become a more adept conversationalist for my new neighbours.I opened the magazine and leafed through a few pages.Then I closed it and arose.If Jem was brought in, he would have to stand and I did not want that expanse of desk between us.
I seated myself in the easy chair by the grate, but it was not the same without a fire, and of course it was too warm to want one.It was a shame Jem could not have arrived in April when I should have had a fire in here, and then it would have seemed most natural and fitting to talk before the fire.
I stood up.
I should stifle in the study.Fitting or not, I must have air.
I went into the garden to look at the beans.
CHAPTER 3
Once in the garden, though, I realised that since I usually spent Sunday evenings in my study, that was where Mrs Fowke or Milly would look for me.What if they did not think to find me in the garden?What if they let Jem go without his seeing me again?But I had said ‘let’s talk when you have eaten’, which made it plain I expected to speak with Jem again.I was suddenly not sorry for having said it.
I looked the beans without seeing them.
Perhaps, under the circumstances, it would not be wrong for me to stop by the kitchen door?I could say ‘Come, Jem, let us talk now, then I must get to my study’.Or I could invent a need for tea, or bread and butter, or some other excuse that would give me a reason to stop by the kitchen.
Then I hit upon it.The gate.
There were two front gates to the property: the main—or garden—gate and the stable gate, but both gave directly onto the lane.Jem must pass through one or the other to leave.It was more likely he would leave by the stable gate, because that would be more fitting for a man of his station, and because it lay closer to Hunsford which was likely the direction he would go when he departed.In the other direction lay only Rosings Park and some of Mr Butler’s fields, and it was unlikely Jem could have any reason to go to either of those places.
I went around to the front of the house, passed alongside it and thence into the stable yard, which was some thirty yards from the house.I rested my hand upon the stable gate and at once felt easier.
Jem did not come and I began to walk to and fro.I could hear faint voices, occasionally, from around the back of the house.Mrs Fowke’s, mainly, and occasionally Milly’s.I could not hear Jem, but then he always spoke soft.The voices of the others seemed quite loud.They must have the kitchen door open to let in the cooler air.Or perhaps Mrs Fowke had asked him to stand outside so as to keep the kitchen clean.
Pilot stuck his head out of his box and nickered, his brown coat lit to a lovely coppery-red by the late sun.I scratched the place beneath his forelock, as he liked, and he mouthed my ear with velvet lips.
“Jem has come,” I whispered to him, for the pleasure of saying it aloud.“My friend, Jem.”
My eyes filled with tears as I spoke, and I wiped them away, unsure what sentiment had caused them, whether joy or relief or fear of something I could not name.Pilot rubbed his nose against my hair.How much better are beasts than humanity?Pilot listened and seemed to understand but did not remark nor try to make me explain myself.I scratched beneath his forelock again.
The house and stable faced south and the sun, though it was now low in the sky, still held a great deal of warmth.There was a bench by the stable, and I sat upon it, but the sun dazzled me and sweat pricked out under my arms and down my back.I pulled out my handkerchief and mopped my brow.Pilot blew a sweet-smelling gust through his nose and turned back to his hay net.I could get inside his stall and be out of the sun, but then I might miss Jem.
I stood up and spied a long strip of shadow under the hedgerow on the other side of the lane.It would be cooler there.I opened the gate, crossed the lane, and edged into the shade.
The hedgerow was not quite high enough and my head and shoulders were still full in the sun.I could not sit in the dust of the road, but I stepped across the ditch and up onto the verge, which rose a little above the level of the lane at that point.I turned and stood in the long grass.Now I was in the shade of the hedge and, moreover, from my vantage point had an excellent view of the house and both gates.There was even a breeze coming through the hedgerow, pleasantly cool upon my back.
Now I could not miss him.
I had asked him why he had come and had not heard his answer.I should have begged his pardon and asked him to repeat himself, but in my excitement to show him all the points of interest I had quite failed to do so.
It seemed odd that he should come all this way to see me just because I had enquired after him at his sister’s.I always enquired after him when I was in Marshing visiting my great aunt, and he had never come before.Of course, he had been at sea.
I had wondered about it earlier, but it struck me suddenly as tremendously odd that he had been dressed in rags.He must have left his ship, but why would he exchange his sailor’s rig for something worse?Perhaps he had fallen on hard times, in which case he had come a long way for a few words and a bite of mutton.I was pleased, of course, but why should he?—
Oh.
Money.
He must want some.
