Double wedding or double disaster?
November 18th, 1812
“How thrilling!” a woman in the pew behind said in hushed excitement. “A double wedding!”
Caroline Bingley rolled her eyes heavenward and leant closer to her sister. “Double disaster, more like,” she whispered. Although she had no choice but to attend this farce, she did not have to make believe she liked it.
Her brother’s choice of bride was truly a disaster. He might have married a girl from one of the best families, someone who would have enhanced the prestige of the Bingley name… and perhaps added to the family’s fortune as well. What had they all been working for, after all, if not to raise themselves to where nobody would ever remember their humble origins again? Louisa had done her part, at great person sacrifice. But Charles! He was this minute throwing his one chance away on a nobody, and there was nothing she could do about it.
Caroline could not bear to watch her brother disgracing himself, but she did hazard a glance in Mr. Darcy’s direction… and a sigh. Were there any justice in the world, she would have been the one standing up beside him now, the one he was regarding so tenderly, the one to whom he plighted his highly covetable troth. It was unaccountable – and patently unfair – that after all her efforts, all her attentiveness, he should also prefer a Miss Bennet! It was not to be borne!
Had Darcy determined to marry Miss de Bourgh over herself, she might have understood, for then she would have been beaten by the undeniable claims of a noble bloodline and a superior fortune. But what did Miss Eliza Bennet have to boast of… except for those notorious “fine eyes”?
It was indeed a harsh blow, and one that was not to be recovered from anytime soon.
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Is there ever a universe where Caroline Bingley grows some self-awareness? She’s really going to be a fly in the ointment on that wedding day at the rate she’s going.
Author
Anything is possible, and I’m sure somebody has written a self-aware Caroline! Haha!
I think she is smart enough, though, to keep her cool through the wedding and beyond, at least in public. She doesn’t want to humiliate herself or lose visiting privileges at Pemberley!
I too am amazed! How on earth could Darcy prefer a beautiful, intelligent, kind hearted gentlewoman (with fine eyes) over a selfish, self centred, haughty, shrewish tradesman’s daughter? It’s totally baffling! 😱😉😂🤣
Author
Haha! There’s no accounting for taste, I suppose.
I agree with Glynis, Jealousy though name is Caroline Bingley!!!
Author
Yes! But I think she’s more sorry to lose the position (as Mrs. Darcy and mistress of Pemberley) than the man himself. Just my opinion. 🙂
I’ve always wondered if Miss Bingley ever found a husband to suit her ambitions, had to marry a younger son or stay single. I don’t know how old she was when the Bennet sisters’ married but I think she’d been out a few years. She’s too confident to be in her first season. I imagine her after more seasons chasing men like Darcy having, at 27, to settle for a man like Mr Hurst “of more fashion than fortune.” As Jane’s a landed gentleman’s daughter, her sister is Mrs Darcy, and her cousin Collins married a knight’s daughter she isn’t a nobody. The Bingleys don’t have any in-laws with such great status as Mr Darcy and Bingley had no estate on his wedding day. I expect Mr Gardiner will buy an estate in time. I think Miss Bingley might as she ages be caught by a fortune hunter pretending to be well connected and have great estates in a remote place like Scotland or Ireland where she’d no friends to check up on his lies.