PRIDE AND PREJUDICE AND ZOMBIES Page 9

  “Indeed, Mr. Collins, all praise of me will be unnecessary. You must give me leave to judge for myself, and pay me the compliment of believing what I say. I wish you very happy and very rich, and by refusing your hand, do all in my power to prevent your being otherwise.” And rising as she thus spoke, she would have quitted the room, had Mr. Collins not thus addressed her:

  “When I do myself the honour of speaking to you next on the subject, I shall hope to receive a more favourable answer than you have now given me. I know it to be the established custom of your sex to reject a man on the first application.”

  “Really, Mr. Collins,” cried Elizabeth, “you puzzle me exceedingly. If what I have hitherto said can appear to you in the form of encouragement, I know not how to express my refusal in such a way as to convince you of its being one.”

  “You must give me leave to flatter myself, my dear cousin, that your refusal of my addresses is merely words of course.”

  To such perseverance in wilful self-deception Elizabeth would make no reply, and immediately and in silence withdrew; determined, if he persisted in considering her repeated refusals as flattering encouragement, to apply to her father, whose negative might be uttered in such a manner as to be decisive, and whose behavior at least could not be mistaken for the affectation and coquetry of an elegant female.

  CHAPTER 20

  MR. COLLINS WAS NOT left long to the silent contemplation of his successful love; for Mrs. Bennet, having dawdled about in the vestibule to watch for the end of the conference, no sooner saw Elizabeth open the door and with quick step pass her towards the staircase, than she entered the breakfast-room, and congratulated both him and herself in warm terms on the happy prospect of their nearer connection. Mr. Collins received and returned these felicitations with equal pleasure, and then proceeded to relate the particulars of their interview.

  This information startled Mrs. Bennet; she would have been glad to be equally satisfied that her daughter had meant to encourage him by protesting against his proposals, but she dared not believe it, and could not help saying so.

  “But, depend upon it, Mr. Collins,” she added, “that Lizzy shall be brought to reason. I will speak to her about it directly. She is a very headstrong, foolish girl, and does not know her own interest-but I will make her know it.”

  Hurrying instantly to her husband, she called out as she entered the library, “Oh! Mr. Bennet, you are wanted immediately; we are all in an uproar. You must come and make Lizzy marry Mr. Collins, for she vows she will not have him.”

  Mr. Bennet raised his eyes from his book as she entered, and fixed them on her face with a calm unconcern.

  “I have not the pleasure of understanding you,” said he, when she had finished her speech. “Of what are you talking?”

  “Of Mr. Collins and Lizzy. Lizzy declares she will not have Mr. Collins, and Mr. Collins begins to say that he will not have Lizzy.”

  “And what am I to do on the occasion? It seems a hopeless business.”

  “Speak to Lizzy about it yourself. Tell her that you insist upon her marrying him.”

  “Let her be called down. She shall hear my opinion.”

  Mrs. Bennet rang the bell, and Miss Elizabeth was summoned to the library.

  “Come here, child,” cried her father as she appeared. “I have sent for you on an affair of importance. I understand that Mr. Collins has made you an offer of marriage. Is it true?” Elizabeth replied that it was.

  “Very well-and this offer of marriage you have refused?”

  “I have, sir.”

  “Very well. We now come to the point. Your mother insists upon your accepting it. Is it not so, Mrs. Bennet?”

  “Yes, or I will never see her again.”

  “An unhappy alternative is before you, Elizabeth. From this day you must be a stranger to one of your parents. Your mother will never see you again if you do not marry Mr. Collins, and I will never see you again if you do; for I shall not have my best warrior resigned to the service of a man who is fatter than Buddha and duller than the edge of a learning sword.”

  Elizabeth could not but smile at such a conclusion of such a beginning, but Mrs. Bennet, who had persuaded herself that her husband regarded the affair as she wished, was excessively disappointed.

  “What do you mean, Mr. Bennet, in talking this way?”

  “My dear,” replied her husband, “I have two small favours to request. First, that you will spare me the expense of having your lips sewn shut; and secondly, that you will allow me the free use of my room. I shall be glad to have the library to myself as soon as may be.”

  Not yet, however, did Mrs. Bennet give up the point. She talked to Elizabeth again and again; coaxed and threatened her by turns. She endeavoured to secure Jane in her interest; but Jane, with all possible mildness, declined interfering; and Elizabeth, sometimes with real earnestness, and sometimes with playful gaiety, replied to her attacks. Though her manner varied, however, her determination never did.

  While the family were in this confusion, Charlotte Lucas came to spend the day with them. She was met in the vestibule by Lydia, who cried in a half whisper, “I am glad you are come, for there is such fun here! What do you think has happened this morning? Mr. Collins has made an offer to Lizzy, and she will not have him.”

  Lydia noticed that Charlotte was flush with the warmth of exercise and had a rather disconcerted look on her face. “Charlotte? Are you ill?”

  Charlotte hardly had time to answer, before they were joined by Kitty, who came to tell the same news; and no sooner had they entered the breakfast-room, where Mrs. Bennet was alone, than she likewise began on the subject, calling on Miss Lucas for her compassion, and entreating her to persuade her friend Lizzy to comply with the wishes of all her family. “Pray do, my dear Miss Lucas,” she added in a melancholy tone, “for nobody is on my side, nobody takes part with me. I am cruelly used, nobody feels for my poor nerves.”

  Charlotte’s reply was spared by the entrance of Jane and Elizabeth.

  “Aye, there she comes,” continued Mrs. Bennet, “looking as unconcerned as may be, and caring no more for us than if we were the very unmentionables she takes such pleasure in occupying her time with. But I tell you, Miss Lizzy-if you take it into your head to go on refusing every offer of marriage in this way, you will never get a husband at all-and I am sure I do not know who is to maintain you when your father is dead.”

  CHAPTER 21

  THE DISCUSSION OF MR. COLLINS’S offer was now nearly at an end. The gentleman himself scarcely spoke to her, and his assiduous attentions were transferred for the rest of the day to Miss Lucas, whose civility in listening to him was a seasonable relief to them all, and especially to her friend. Indeed, Charlotte seemed to flatter Mr. Collins with an almost unnatural attentiveness.

  The morrow produced no abatement of Mrs. Bennet’s ill-humour or ill health. Mr. Collins was also in the same state of angry pride. Elizabeth had hoped that his resentment might shorten his visit, but his plan did not appear in the least affected by it. He was always to have gone on Saturday, and to Saturday he meant to stay.

  After breakfast, the girls retired to the dojo and attended to their mid-week musket disassembly and cleaning. With those very weapons on their person, they next set out for to Meryton to inquire if Mr. Wickham were returned, and to lament over his absence from the Netherfield ball.

  They were less than a mile from Longbourn when Kitty, who had elected to take point, abruptly stopped, and signaled for the others to do so as well. She raised her musket, but at what, Elizabeth and the other girls knew not, for the road seemed free of trouble. After standing thus for a moment, a single chipmunk scurried out of the woods on their right. It darted across their path with considerable rapidity, before disappearing into the woods on the left. Lydia could not help but laugh at the sight. “My dear Kitty, how shall we ever thank you for sparing our toes a most unfortunate tickling!”

  But Kitty kept her musket at the ready, and, after a mom
ent, a second chipmunk scurried across the road with equal alacrity. It was followed in short order by a pair of weasels, then a skunk, then a fox and her pups. More creatures followed, and in ever-increasing numbers; as if Noah himself beckoned, offering refuge from some unseen flood. By the time deer began to leap across their path, the other girls had their muskets trained on the tree line, ready for the herd of zombies they suspected would appear at any moment.

  The first was a young, freshly dead female in a white lace wedding gown, which, like her skin, was surprisingly white-almost shockingly so, save for the bright red rubies that dripped from her mouth and onto the lace covering her bosom. Kitty put the creature down with a shot to the face, upon which Lydia placed her barrel against its head and promptly dispatched it to Hell. So close was this shot, that the bride’s hair was set alight by the powder flash. “Seems a shame,” said Lydia, as acrid smoke began to rise. “Wasting perfectly good wedding clothes like tha… “

  The wail of another zombie interrupted her; his flowing white beard and half-eaten face attached to a stout body, which was clad in a blood-crusted blacksmith’s apron. Elizabeth and Jane aimed and discharged their muskets; Jane’s ball finding one of the creature’s eyes, and Elizabeth’s striking its neck-cutting through the brittle flesh and separating head from body.

  These zombies were followed by several more-each vanquished as quickly as the last, until the cracking of powder at last fell silent. Sensing the danger passed, the sisters lowered their barrels, and spoke of setting off again for Meryton. But these plans were belated by a most unusual noise from beyond the tree line. It was a shrill shrieking, neither human nor animal, and yet unlike any zombie wail the sisters had ever heard. It grew closer, and once again, all muskets were trained and readied. But when the source of this strange noise revealed itself, their barrels were lowered.

  “Oh! No…” said Jane. “Oh! It simply cannot be!”

  A long-dead female zombie stumbled out of the woods, her modest clothing slightly tattered; her brittle hair pulled back so tightly that it had begun to tear the skin of her forehead. In her arms, she held something exceedingly rare; something none of the sisters had ever seen, or ever wished to see-an unmentionable infant. It clawed at the female’s flesh, emitting a most unpleasant series of shrieks. Elizabeth raised her musket, but Jane was quick to grab the barrel.

  “You mustn’t!”

  “Have you forgotten your oath?”

  “It’s an infant, Lizzy!”

  “A zombie infant-no more alive than the musket I mean to silence it with.”

  Elizabeth again raised her weapon and aimed. The female dreadful was now more than halfway across the road. She trained her sights on the elder’s head; her finger caressing the trigger. She would put it down, reload, and dispense of them both. All she had to do was squeeze. And yet… she did not. There was a strange force at work, a feeling she faintly recalled from her earliest days, before she had first traveled to Shaolin. It was a curious feeling; something akin to shame, but without the dishonor of defeat-a shame that demanded no vengeance. “Could there be honor in mercy?” she wondered. It contradicted everything she had been taught, every warrior instinct she possessed. Why then could she not fire? Hopelessly bemused, Elizabeth lowered her musket, and the zombies continued into the woods until they were seen no more.

  It was agreed that none of them would ever speak of it.

  Wickham joined the sisters on their entering the town, and attended them to their aunt’s, where his regret and vexation, and concern upon hearing of the regrettable fate of Mr. Bingley’s household staff was well talked over. To Elizabeth, however, he voluntarily acknowledged that the necessity of his absence had been self-imposed.

  “I found,” said he, “as the time drew near that I had better not meet Mr. Darcy; that to be in the same room, with the very man who crippled me for a twelvemonth, might be more than I could bear, and that scenes might arise unpleasant to more than myself.”

  Elizabeth highly approved his forbearance, which was greater than her own, for she confessed that a duel would have almost certainly ensued, had she been in his place. Wickham and another officer walked back with them to Longbourn, and during the walk he particularly attended to her. His accompanying them was a triple advantage: the compliment of his attention, an occasion of introducing him to her father and mother, and the presence of an extra warrior, should they encounter trouble on the road.

  Soon after their return, a letter was delivered to Miss Bennet; it came from Netherfield. The envelope contained a sheet of elegant, little, hot-pressed paper, well covered with a lady’s fair, flowing hand; and Elizabeth saw her sister’s countenance change as she read it, and saw her dwelling intently on some particular passages. “This is from Caroline Bingley; what it contains has surprised me a good deal. The whole party have left Netherfield by this time, and are on their way to town-and without any intention of coming back again. You shall hear what she says.”

  She then read the first sentence aloud, which comprised the information of their having just resolved to follow their brother to town directly, and of their meaning to dine in Grosvenor Street, where Mr. Hurst had a house. The next was in these words: “I do not pretend to regret anything I shall leave in the perilous, zombie-covered country, except your society, my dearest friend; but we will hope, at some future period, to enjoy many returns of that delightful intercourse we have known, and in the meanwhile may lessen the pain of separation by a very frequent and most unreserved correspondence. I depend on you for that.” To these highflown expressions Elizabeth listened with all the insensibility of distrust; and though the suddenness of their removal surprised her, she saw nothing to lament.

  “It is unlucky,” said she, “that you should not be able to see your friends before they leave the country. But may we not hope that the period of future happiness to which Miss Bingley looks forward may arrive earlier than she is aware, and that the delightful intercourse you have known as friends will be renewed with yet greater satisfaction as sisters? Mr. Bingley will not be detained in London by them.”

  “Caroline decidedly says that none of the party will return into Hertfordshire this winter. I will read it to you: ‘When my brother left us yesterday, he imagined that the business which took him to London might be concluded in three or four days; but we are certain it cannot be so. Many of my acquaintances are already there for the winter; I wish that I could hear that you, my dearest friend, had any intention of making one of the crowd-but of that I despair. I sincerely hope your Christmas in Hertfordshire may abound in the gaieties which that season generally brings, and be not the least bit similar to the Christmas of two years past, which resulted in so many unpleasantries.’ It is evident by this,” added Jane, “that he comes back no more this winter.”

  “It is only evident that Miss Bingley does not mean that he should,” said Elizabeth.

  “Mr. Bingley is his own master. Perhaps the sight of his bloodied staff was too much for his delicate character. But you do not know all. I will read you the passage which particularly hurts me: ‘Mr. Darcy is impatient to see his sister and we are scarcely less eager to meet her again. I really do not think Georgiana Darcy has her equal for beauty, elegance, and skill in the deadly arts; and the affection she inspires in Louisa and myself is heightened from the hope we dare entertain of her being hereafter our sister. My brother admires her greatly already; he will have frequent opportunity now of seeing her on the most intimate footing. With all these circumstances to favour an attachment, and nothing to prevent it, am I wrong, my dearest Jane, in indulging the hope of an event which will secure the happiness of so many?’”

  “What do you think of this sentence, my dear Lizzy?” said Jane as she finished it. “Is it not clear enough? Does it not expressly declare that Caroline neither expects nor wishes me to be her sister; that she is perfectly convinced of her brother’s indifference; and that if she suspects the nature of my feelings for him, she means (most kindly!) to pu
t me on my guard? Can there be any other opinion on the subject?”

  “Yes, there can; for mine is totally different. Will you hear it?”

  “Most willingly.”

  “You shall have it in a few words. Miss Bingley sees that her brother is in love with you, and wants him to marry Miss Darcy. I dare say she means to keep you from his attentions. Your honour demands she be slain.”

  Jane shook her head. “You forget yourself, Lizzy.”

  “Jane, no one who has ever seen you together can doubt his affection. Miss Bingley, I am sure, cannot. She may not be a warrior, but she has cunning enough. Dearest sister, I implore you-this unhappiness is best remedied by the hasty application of a cutlass to her throat.”

  “If we thought alike,” replied Jane, “my honour would be restored at the expense of losing Mr. Bingley’s affections forever. And what, pray, would be the purpose? Caroline is incapable of willfully deceiving anyone; and all that I can hope in this case is that she is deceiving herself.”

  “Is it she who is deceived, or you? You forget yourself, Jane-you have allowed your feelings for Mr. Bingley to soften the instincts bestowed by our Oriental masters.”

  Though they could not agree on a course of action, Jane and Elizabeth agreed that Mrs. Bennet should only hear of the departure of the family, but even this partial communication gave her a great deal of concern, and she bewailed it as exceedingly unlucky that the ladies should happen to go away just as they were all getting so intimate together. After lamenting it, however, at some length, she had the consolation that Mr. Bingley would be soon down again and soon dining at Longbourn, and the conclusion of all was the comfortable declaration, that though he had been invited only to a family dinner, she would take care to have two full courses.