Elizabeth couldn’t help but imagine how awkward such a visit would be. After all, Mr. Collins had proposed to her a mere three days before proposing to, and being accepted by, her friend. Could there be a more awkward situation? She thought not. However, Charlotte was her very dear friend and had been for many years now and she didn’t feel quite right saying no just because she didn’t like her friend’s husband—or her motives for marrying him.

So Elizabeth said she would ask her father and promised to write.

~

By early February, Mr. Bennet had secured a house on the seaside for the summer. It was in a quiet section of Margate, a seaside town in Kent not too popular with tourists. He agreed that Elizabeth could go visit her friend Charlotte at Easter, largely to keep peace with Mr. Collins They would collect her on their way to the seaside.

Jane had been invited to London after Christmas to stay with the Gardiners with the hope that she would see Mr. Bingley, the young man who’d stolen her heart and callously left the area last November. In the end, Mr. Bennet said no to the journey.

He didn’t know how much longer he had left with his family, and he did not want to send off one of his favorite daughters when he knew his days were numbered and thought it was unlikely she would even see Mr. Bingley, making the entire journey an exercise in heartache. She was doing well at home, making progress in drawing and French especially, and her singing was improving. No, he would not send his sweet, beautiful daughter off to the wolves of London to have her heart broken. It would be much more prudent for her to continue her studies and find someone at the seaside. Perhaps he would send her to London for part of the season in the spring. For now, she would stay safe with him, where she belonged.

As the winter passed on, the girls at Longbourn continued their lessons and had two very proud parents to show for it. Having finally gotten tired of eating porridge, though it took over three weeks, Lydia agreed to participate and put forth effort in her lessons, which earned her regular meals that included meat and vegetables and the accompanying silver with which to eat them, but she still ate above stairs and was not permitted to sit with the family unless it was a holiday or she had been particularly well behaved. When they had guests, which wasn’t terribly often but happened once or twice a fortnight, Kitty would eat upstairs with her and they would giggle and laugh like old times. When the family went out to neighborhood parties, the two youngest stayed home and read books or worked on their needlepoint.