Charlotte was happy to agree to this plan; she knew Lizzy was a diligent correspondent, who wrote to her sister Jane nearly every other day, and to the party at Longbourn almost as often. To add to this regular programme, she was also writing frequently to her husband. Moreover, Charlotte had letters of her own to reply to. That very morning, along with a rambling communiqué from her husband – much concerned with the early fruiting of their cherries and the slower progress of the Rosings orchard – she had received a letter from Anne de Bourgh.

Now, as Lizzy seated herself at one of the grander desks in the saloon, and while Herr Rosenstein leafed through the pieces of music with which he had been presented, testing out a few bars or melodic lines here and there, Charlotte reread the heiress’s letter.

Dear Mrs Collins,

I wonder how you and Mrs Darcy are going on at Pemberley. Mr Darcy passed through Kent very briefly on his way to business dealings in London, and he said you had all settled well, including the girls, although I doubt he had much to do with their arrangements.

Here time goes by as always: my mother pronounces, at length, on how the world should wag, Mrs Jenkinson clicks her tongue or her knitting needles, and I read or retreat into the spaces of my own mind. Fortunately, nobody expects me to pay them much attention, so I can muse freely.

I do wish my father’s library was rather less fusty; I would be grateful if you would see what modern productions are in the Pemberley library, and we shall make plans to procure some new books. My cousin’s expensive education surely prompts him to select the best and, if not the best, the most fashionable publications. Nailed as I am here at home, I am particularly interested in writings by travellers, such as those by the Frenchman François Levaillant, their accounts of mountain ranges, deserts, lakes and shores, flora and fauna new to me, exotic peoples and interesting hardships; from the furthest poles of the earth to the next county, I do not mind, as long as the particulars are intelligently and fluently expressed. I found Lady Mary Wortley Montagu’s published letters from her time in Turkey engaging, and could wish for more.

What shape does your day take now that you are enjoying what must be a sort of holiday from your usual responsibilities? I fear I must press for a reply to this letter as a small measure against the tedium of life here: I miss your contribution to conversations at Rosings.