Anne looks forward complacently to what she hopes will be a springtime wedding with Mr. Darcy…
March 1, 1812
Lady Catherine prided herself on her deportment, which consisted in a magnificently upright carriage, and a way of moving that might be called an arrogant glide. To display a need for haste, would be deserving of contempt; a lady did not hurry-skurry like a schoolgirl. Yet on this morning, Lady Catherine did enter the small summer breakfast-parlor at Rosings with such unwonted rapidity that Miss de Bourgh and Mrs. Jenkinson looked up startled from their work.
It was only March, yet the ladies liked to sit in this room of a morning because it had good light for stitching, and was in its way more comfortable than many of the grander rooms. Anne, who hated to walk before noon, liked to sit and sew, and look out of the window. She was engaged in making yet another garment for her trousseau, which had been her self-assigned daily task for many years. Almost since she was a little girl sewing her sampler, had she worked on the embroidered linens and night-dresses for her marriage to Mr. Darcy. She seldom accomplished more than one or perhaps two stitches a minute, but fortunately Mrs. Jenkinson had worked more steadily and great piles of fine Irish cloth and delicate laced muslins were put up in lavender in the massive cedar-lined chests, waiting in the great store-rooms of Rosings for the happy day.
“My dear!” trumpeted Lady Catherine. “Here is news, tremendous news.”
“Oh!” Mrs. Jenkinson exclaimed, “Is it something that must be broke to her in stages, Lady Catherine? Anne is delicate. You know we are always saying that she is not at all strong. Shall I fetch some water?”
“No, no,” impatiently returned Lady Catherine, “it is good news—the very best.”
Anne’s eyes grew wide and a pink color mounted in her sallow face as she sat forward in her seat. In no other way did she betray her expectations, but they were no less than that the letter her mother so excitedly flapped, should contain a proposal from Mr. Darcy.
“Only think!” Lady Catherine cried. “Darcy is coming! He will soon be here!”
Anne made an impatient gesture with her needle and a satin flounce. “Why, yes, Mama. We know that. He always said he would come in the spring—perhaps with Fitzwilliam, to make their yearly tour of inspection. But is that all the news?”
“No, it is not all. Stay and you shall hear. Darcy will be here as early as next week. Yes! He will be at Rosings for Easter. And you know what that means, Anne!”
Anne rose to her feet, her face scarlet. “Has it come? So soon!”
“Soon, you call it!” Lady Catherine made a “tsk” noise of impatience. “My dear girl, you are eight and twenty years old. Darcy has not been at all forward in settling your marriage. Indeed I have at times been almost cross with him for being so—not reluctant precisely, but… Naturally I could never be truly cross with dear Darcy, but you will allow that he has not been expeditious.”
“Oh, but Lady Catherine,” protested Mrs. Jenkinson. “So much as Mr. Darcy has to do! With running the Pemberley estate, and the house in Town, and overseeing Miss Georgiana’s education—he never meant to marry until his sister was a young lady in society herself, I am sure. Now she is out, and will be a perfect companion for Miss Anne, when Mr. Darcy brings her home to Pemberley.”
“Does he—does he say anything about that, Mama?” Anne ventured.
“Well, no, not directly. He would hardly do so in a letter. Darcy was always the very soul of delicacy and discretion. But, depend upon it, he will make his declaration in form when he is here. A springtime engagement! Only think! That is what he has been waiting for, I know.”
“So romantic!” simpered Mrs. Jenkinson. “All the little sheep and lambs, and the primroses too.”
“But we are hardly prepared,” Lady Catherine bethought herself, drawing her heavy eyebrows together.
Mrs. Jenkinson lifted her hands with a wordless sigh. “Oh, Lady Catherine! Not prepared! Why, we have been sewing Miss Anne’s trousseau for these twenty years at least! The bed-sheets alone—the Mechlin lace—oh! She will be the envy of many a Duchess.”
“That is not what I mean,” said Lady Catherine, frowning. “I am talking of Anne’s own person, her own tout ensemble.”
“Why, she has as many pretty gowns as any young lady in the kingdom, surely, Madam. Anyone would be sufficient to invite the proposal.”
“Her clothes are well enough,” returned Lady Catherine shortly.
“Mama, you don’t mean—do you not think Mr. Darcy will be pleased with me? Will he not think me handsome enough? Perhaps there are other young women of his acquaintance who are—showier.”
“Certainly not, Anne,” snapped Lady Catherine, in a manner that betrayed it was exactly what she meant. “You are handsomer than the very handsomest girls, because you have so decidedly the aristocrat in your lineage. No, no, the lines of your nose, the bearing of your head…”
Anne felt comfortable again. “That is true,” she said complacently, “I don’t suppose Darcy can have been associating with any girls of such antecedents as mine. Our own family is the noblest of all, even more than those of higher rank. And what sort of people can he have met in traveling lately, in Hertfordshire, with his friend Bingley?”
“Yes, very common people there,” Lady Catherine sniffed agreement. “Assembly balls and things of that sort, where you might meet anyone. And Darcy has not lost his sense of what he owes the family. He has the proper Darcy pride, and would never forget himself.”
“Oh, Lady Catherine!” sighed Mrs. Jenkinson. “I am sure he would be the very last young man to do that.”
“Very true. Still, he has been seeing a great deal of the world, and so I think it expedient—that is, it cannot do any harm, for Anne to look her very best for the meeting.”
“Why, what more can I do?” asked Anne perplexed. “I did think I would wear my green sarsanet—it is my best gown this season, and cost seventeen pounds, you know. And Helene is well schooled in all the best Parisian ways of curling my hair. Ringlets are the very latest style, and you seehow well they become me.” She shook her curls so they bounced, like a dozen brown mice.
“Green!” Lady Catherine fell back in her chair, momentarily lost for words. “My child, no woman ever received a proposal in that unfortunate color. And your figure—” She looked her daughter up and down, and her expression grew grave.
Anne regarded her parent with astonishment. “Why, mother, you have always said my figure was the perfect size for true elegance! It is not fleshy, but rather more aerial.”
“The truth is, I am afraid you may be too thin,” muttered Lady Catherine. “What if Darcy’s taste is for a fleshpot, a tall, full-figured woman.”
“Not in a wife, surely!” ejaculated Mrs. Jenkinson with horror.
Anne had regained her poise. “Really, Mama, where did you get such an extraordinary notion? Mr. Darcy could not wish his wife to look like a milkmaid. He will want her to be a person of refinement, and ton, and of course, related to him in an advantageous way.”
“And the promise was made when the children were still in their cradles, do not forget that,” reminded Mrs. Jenkinson.
“Yes. Why, you have always promised me that I would marry Mr. Darcy. Mama, how can you forget?”
“It ought to be so,” said Lady Catherine, troubled.
“And I will take your advice in one thing, and wear my pink India muslin. That will give my complexion a rosy hue.”
“You will look like an angel on a cloud,” enthused Mrs. Jenkinson breathlessly, “a pink cloud.”
“Perhaps you are right,” said Lady Catherine, still with some air of doubt.
“Of course I am right, Mama. Never fear.” Anne got up and went to the beveled mirror above the sideboard, and regarded herself with her head on one side, again shaking her new-fangled ringlets, a style which in truth did little for her mouse-colored hair and pallid skin. “I think I am most uncommon looking, with all the tints of real refinement.”
“She is like a painting, an oil painting,” nodded Mrs. Jenkinson in ecstasy. “I have always said so. Or perhaps a really elegant watercolor.”
“And Mr. Darcy will assuredly honor his obligations in the course of this visit. He has the reputation of being the very pattern of honor. And it is high time! He must know that I do not want to be a bride at thirty.”
“I only hope he has not been forming any new attachments, that is all,” said Lady Catherine thoughtfully. “It would explain his dilatoriness. But no, no, I know that to be impossible. Darcy is far too proud to lower himself to such nonsense.”
“Proud! Of course he is. And I have a very good pride of my own,” cried Anne. “We are so alike, it is quite ridiculous. I laugh about it to myself all the time.”
“And,” Mrs. Jenkinson reminded them, turning back to her stitchery, “remember, no matter how many girls he has known, he has remained single-minded, and pure. He has been saving his heart for no one but Anne.”
“So sweet a notion,” Anne sighed. “But you will say, Mama, that we are being too romantic. Even in a prudential sense, then, remember all that Darcy gains in marrying me.”
“True,” Lady Catherine nodded, reassured. “Not many girls have such a fortune.” Then she remembered something. “Girls—yes. I had forgot that the Collinses are here almost every night. We must put a stop to that.”
“Why ever bother?” asked Anne. “Darcy surely will not pay any attentions to Mr. and Mrs. Collins, so common and dull as they are. He will converse with us, and on the first night I will say—” She swirled the satin material about her and did a little dance in her thin slippers. “Shall we not take a turn, I will ask him?”
Lady Catherine and Mrs. Jenkinson’s eyes met and there was apprehension in each. They were both thinking about the contrast the pretty Miss Bennet might make with Anne, and they acknowledged their mutual thought, without any words.
“Oh, no,” said Lady Catherine decidedly, “we won’t want them here.”
“Certainly not. Do you wish me to write a note, Lady Catherine?”
“That won’t be necessary. The invitations shall simply cease, until, of course, everything is settled—or not.”
“It will be settled,” Anne assured her complacently, fluffing up her ringlets. “Don’t worry, Mama. Have not you always said that Darcy and I are the perfect match?”
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Definitely my idea of Anne de Bourgh, the epitome of complacency and privileged. Not worth troubling herself with thinking too much or too hard, maybe she might have gotten a pug and lounged around all day had she married Darcy except she would not have had the innate slight good nature of a lady Bertram. Although canon speaks about them both being in their cradles, I would rather put that down to lady Catherine’s enthusiasm than “fact” and might put Darcy a toddler ahead of Anne being a newborn. So I personally think of him as being three or four years older than Anne. But that’s neither here nor there. We will never know how explicit Darcy was in repudiating his cousin as a wife but perhaps he felt like Sir Thomas, that cousins in love was generally bad business or perhaps, like how he had Bingley at the back of his mind as a husband for Georgiana, he had Anne as a wife in reserve. I hope not. Anyway, a good take. Thanks.
Glad you liked the idea of this Anne – and I think you are quite right about the cradles, more a figure of speech than literally babies of exactly the same age! I think cousin marriage was more approved then than it later became, and people were more interested in having financially equal alliances. Anne would have qualified in that respect, but I don’t see a scrap of evidence that Darcy ever thought about his cousin as a potential wife, whatever Lady Catherine wished.
Oh dear! Like mother like daughter! Talk about over confident. It seems as if Lady Catherine isn’t quite as sure of Anne’s appeal as she is? 😉 she obviously realises that Elizabeth has way more appeal 🥰. Now if only Elizabeth was aware of that. 🤔😳
Well, I suppose Elizabeth rationally knew herself to be more attractive than thin, sour-looking Anne, but she also probably never thought the proud Darcy would give a thought to marrying a girl of lower estate, whom he had initially not considered pretty enough to dance with!
So delusional…all three.
Yep!
Oh dear, poor Anne. Fed all this rubbish about herself from childhood how would she not perceive her future as assured?
Beautifully written. Well done.
Thanks! Yes, Anne was brought up to expect the future her mother wanted, and lacked judgment to see how things might not necessarily work that way!
I have read a few versions of Anne DeBourgh and since she is described as ‘insipid’, this works. She seems ‘entitled’ and seems to have been brainwashed by her mother…however it is interesting to see the Lady Catherine is a bit worried LOL! I can’t wait here what Anne thinks after Darcy refuses to marry her and marries Elizabeth instead. Loved this. Thanks Diana
Thanks, Char! Jane Austen probably didn’t need to describe poor Anne’s disappointment because her mother’s incandescent fury spoke for itself!
Oh, My Goodness! All three ladies are delusional. Poor Anne. She sees herself in a mirror darkly. She doesn’t have a true picture of herself. Her companion and her mother have enabled her all her life. I wonder if they were putting initials on any of those linens? Perhaps an AD on her handkerchiefs? Now that would be sick. Bless her heart. I want to feel sorry for her. She has been brainwashed into thinking as Lady Catherine wanted. She has been coddled and cossited to the point of still being childlike. She was confined or sequestered at Rosings [like in a nunnery] and not allowed to grow emotionally, spiritually, educationally, or even to become a free-thinking individual. Wow. You have painted a pretty pathetic picture of Anne de Bourgh. I have the same thoughts as the other comments. Lady C and Mrs. J think Miss Elizabeth should not be near when Darcy arrives. Anne will not stand by comparison.
Oh, dear, J.W. Garrett, I am in stitches about the initials on the linens! Poor Anne probably has a fabulously delusional Regency wedding hope chest…
Diana
Goodness, I almost feel sorry for Anne, given that she’s spent her entire life focused on this goal! And Lady Catherine — to realize, by Elizabeth’s arrival, that perhaps her own daughter is not quite Darcy may want in a wife! Oh yes, I pity you both, proud ladies. I’m sure you would not like my pity, but there you are: by your own willful blindness, you have made me pity you! Thanks for this great P&P Untold Story, Diana!
Probably Elizabeth would say to both Lady C and Anne, “Don’t count your chickens before they are hatched. ” That would be very much in the mode where she says “I thought at least the pigs had
got into the garden and here it is only Lady Catherine and her daughter. ” Right?! Glad you liked the story, Christina!
Diana