What Jane Austen Didn't Tell Us!. Austen Alliance
in her household to one of her own relations. Without the support of the Twills, Anne’s only hope was to seek a husband.
On hearing the news, Mrs. Bennet merely shook her head. “With only £50 a year to call her own, that girl will have a hard time finding a suitable mate.”
Perturbed about her own daughters’ futures, Mrs. Bennet wrote to the Gardiners, begging them to make the most of the girls’ London visit.
At the long-awaited concert, Aunt Gardiner was pleased to notice a friend sitting nearby, a Mrs. Wellfleet, attended by her son Edward. Young Ned was down from his medical studies at the University of Edinburgh, following in his father’s footsteps. Not only did the senior Wellfleet have a fashionable practice, he had compounded a popular medicine.
The two parties exchanged introductions and chatted pleasantly. Elizabeth was delighted by Ned’s enjoyment of music. Mrs. Wellfleet promised to call on them at Gracechurch Street the very next day.
Ned Wellfleet accompanied his mother to the Gardiners’ with evident pleasure. As he sat in a corner with Elizabeth, she found his concentration on her every word gratifying. But he disturbed her usual composure, and she was annoyed to find herself blushing.
The next evening the Gardiners invited her to a small private ball, where Ned asked her for the Allemande. Elizabeth happily agreed. How sure his steps! How naturally he responds to the music! She was elated and began to feel the power of being thought desirable by a very attractive man. So this is what it is like for Jane.
Unfortunately, her joy was interrupted by her duty to dance with others. Ned remained with Mr. Gardiner, saying, “I cannot imagine a young woman of greater outer or inner beauty than Miss Elizabeth.”
The older man smiled. Mrs. Gardiner will be most interested in this conversation!
The night before the girls’ visit was to end, the Wellfleets hosted a dinner for the Gardiners and their nieces. Ned’s father welcomed his guests warmly, but Elizabeth, meeting Dr. Wellfleet for the first time, sensed that she was being scrutinized.
Dr. Wellfleet paid particular attention to the two girls after dinner. Mary, at her age flattered by the invitation and eager to please their host, was expansive in her description of the Bennet family and Longbourn. Raising his eyebrows, the doctor inquired, “Miss Elizabeth, am I to understand that you have four unmarried sisters but no brother to inherit your father’s property?”
Mr. Gardiner looked up from the post he had taken by the window. “The sky has grown quite dark.” A rumble of thunder underscored her uncle’s words. “I must get the ladies home before the storm begins. Thank you for a most pleasant evening, sir!”
Elizabeth was crushed. She was to leave London tomorrow but took comfort in the warmth of Ned’s farewell.
She could not expect to hear from Ned—only engaged couples might properly correspond. But she was confident that her Aunt Gardiner would furnish tidings of Ned and his family. When no letter came from Gracechurch Street in answer to several of her own, Elizabeth made excuses: Aunt must be much occupied with her children now that Mary and Elizabeth were not there to join in the nursery games.
Finally a letter arrived from Mr. Gardiner for Mr. Bennet. He read excerpts at breakfast: Mrs. Gardiner had been busier than usual with the children, who had the croup. Dr. Wellfleet had called to physic the sick children and had asked after the Longbourn nieces.
The good doctor had explained that Ned had undertaken an extended trip, investigating possibilities for selling the Wellfleet Elixir beyond England. Royal Patents for such things were more generally issued to gentlemen with medical degrees from Scotland—and Ned had trained in Edinburgh.
Folding the letter quickly, Mr. Bennet went back to his newspaper. Elizabeth stared at him, burning to ask what else Uncle Gardiner had written. But Mr. Bennet rose abruptly, leaving the room without so much as a glance at her.
She followed her father out of the room to his library, where he extracted some papers from the vast number of letters and pamphlets accumulated on his desk. “Not now, Lizzy,” he said. “I have business with the steward.”
He escorted her from his domain, but she stood irresolute in the hall. Had her father shared the whole of Uncle Gardiner’s letter? Was there something he was hiding from her? Some trifling Wellfleet reference to herself perhaps?
She heard the sounds of her mother and sisters’ noisy departure for the nearby town of Meryton. The house was empty, and the servants knew better than to disturb the tranquility of her father’s library.
Elizabeth formed a desperate plan that was against her normal good sense. She was being pulled by feelings that came from deep within her heart, that she could no longer resist.
Opening the library door, she approached the desk and examined the papers lying there to identify the letter in her uncle’s hand.
Spying her own name on the page, she read:
It was to be expected, I suppose. Old Wellfleet noted his son’s preference for Elizabeth and made it his business to learn the details of the Longbourn entail. A bride with four sisters who would too likely become dependent on the Wellfleet fortune? Alas. My dear wife fears a deep disappointment for Lizzy and urges us to continued silence. To speak of it now can do my sister no good, and my wife prays Lizzy’s heart may as yet be untouched.
We both know that young women are not “rational creatures,” and all that Wollstonecraft woman’s ravings about how women are treated will never change this. Should Lizzy approach you, I beg you to give her what comfort you can.
Mr. Bennet found his daughter at his desk when he returned some hours later, the letter still in her hands. “What are you doing here?” he asked sternly.
In a trembling voice she pleaded, “My uncle’s rationale for Dr. Wellfleet’s behavior cannot be correct. Can it, Papa?”
He softened his voice. “Tut, tut, child. Matters of entail and provisions of income are most unfit for the feminine mind. Come away,” he urged.
As he gently escorted her from his study, Elizabeth realized her father had not contradicted Mr. Gardiner’s assumptions.
Her next days were painful. She felt abandoned and at a loss for what to do.
Then she remembered Uncle Gardiner’s reference to Wollstonecraft. Perhaps, if she knew what that touched on, she could calm herself.
Feeling ashamed for again invading her father’s privacy, for several days she ransacked the library’s reading tables and shelves. At last she found a tract written by a Mary Wollstonecraft, Thoughts on the Education of Our Daughters.
In the next weeks, Elizabeth devoured the book and sought out other writings by the author. She was fascinated by the radical thoughts she encountered: “If women be educated for dependence; that is, to act according to the will of another fallible being, and submit, right or wrong, to power, where are we to stop?”
Jane and Charlotte were uncertain about these ideas. But Elizabeth was sure Anne would find them fascinating. She wrote to her friend frequently about this strange author and her revolutionary philosophy.
Some time later Elizabeth was invited to make an extended visit to Gracechurch Street, prompted in part by a need for help after the arrival of the Gardiners’ latest child.
Elizabeth eagerly agreed, remembering the whirl of concerts, theaters, and salons. She might even encounter Ned Wellfleet! But once in London, most of her time was spent in the nursery. Boredom crept into the intervals between her few social engagements, sometimes even during them.
Correspondence with Anne Twill provided Elizabeth’s greatest consolation, especially with Anne’s announcement that she was engaged to be married! Her fiancé was a longtime friend of her Uncle Twill. Mr. Walter Fortune’s recent appointment as chaplain to the bishop of Peterborough had provided him the means to set up his own household at last.
Anne was excited about their upcoming visit to London. Mr. Fortune