A small canker of resentment niggled, too. She, Charlotte, might be accused of disinterested calculation, but while she did not begrudge her friend her moral scruples, surely Lizzy could understand that her insistence on romance was a luxury available only to the young and the lovely?

For now, though, seeing the dismay and shock that marked Elizabeth’s features, Charlotte’s heart ached. Their friendship was a bright band that stretched back across otherwise unremarkable years, and she feared she had struck it a mortal blow. She reached out a hand as hoofbeats could be heard advancing up the driveway: ‘That is my father. I asked him to visit your family to convey the news, but I wanted to speak to you first. I beseech you, Eliza, do not judge me too harshly. Try to understand why I have acted as I have. I believe I have been guided by prudence, not avarice, and shall do my best to make a good wife. Once I am married, I shall regret the loss of your companionship more than anything else.’

Her friend’s eyes mirrored the tears in her own, and the young women exchanged an awkward embrace before Charlotte set off home, wishing to escape before Sir William could make any formal announcement.

Her father joined her back at Lucas Lodge a little later, mopping his brow. He had endured harsh treatment at the hands of Mrs Bennet, who insisted that he was mistaken in his announcement of his daughter’s engagement, while Lydia had freely exclaimed, ‘Good Lord! Sir William, how can you tell such a story? Do you not know Mr Collins made an offer to Lizzy?’

Charlotte had to smile at the thought of her father sitting through such abuse with his usual complaisance, and took comfort from the fact that Lizzy had corroborated his news, which she had been swift to follow with earnest compliments and congratulations. Jane, after a minute’s surprise, had followed Lizzy in uttering good wishes, congratulating the proud father not only on the happiness that would surely follow, and the excellence of Mr Collins’s character, but the convenient distance of Hunsford from London. This account of the generosity of the elder Bennet sisters cost Charlotte more pain than the frank disbelief and scorn of the mother and younger girls, and the rest of the morning passed in more tears than might be expected on the part of a woman newly affianced.

CHAPTER XVI