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TIME SEEMED TO SPEED past, and two fortnights had gone in the blink of an eye. It had been a busy month with the contract negotiations and announcing the engagement, followed by the party planned for that evening. Lady de Bourgh had arrived the day before, and Lizzy was concerned by how frail she seemed. When she entered the sitting room and found Lady Catherine showing Lottie an intricate dance step from a dance no longer in fashion, she asked, “What are you doing, Lady Catherine? You should be resting.”
“I am not so old that I cannot manage a small dance step, particularly on the eve of the ball.” Lady Catherine sounded annoyed by her fussing, but Lizzy suspected she secretly liked it. She’d always liked someone to defer to her, though contrarily, it seemed that was the reason she liked Lizzy—her refusal to do so.
She didn’t want to treat her any differently than she had, but she was still concerned for her. “Have you seen the apothecary recently?”
Lady Catherine huffed at her as she sat down, accepting a cup of tea from Lottie, who was glowing with excitement. “Of course not. Only sick people see the apothecary. I am not sick, dear girl. I am merely getting old. It happens to everyone, if they are fortunate enough to live to a ripe age.” She frowned, seeming to be thinking of her daughter, and Lizzy patted her hand in a show of sympathy as she pretended it was just to offer her the bowl of sugar.
After Lady Catherine had added a couple of lumps, Lizzy said, “I do not mean to fuss. I worry about you.”
“I do appreciate it, dear girl, but it is unnecessary. I feel fine and in good health. I shall enjoy life until I am no longer able to do so. Tonight, we shall celebrate this engagement of my grandson to my goddaughter, and we shall all be quite jug-bitten fools by morning.”
Lizzy smiled, hardly able to imagine Catherine being intoxicated, though it was amusing.
Shortly thereafter, they all went separate ways to prepare for the ball, and Lizzy stopped at her mother’s room to check on Fanny, who was having what sounded like a nervous episode. She peeked in through the doorway, discovering Fanny was simply looking for her pearls and asking the maid where they might have gotten to as she bemoaned her nerves being overwrought with all the excitement.
Lizzy smiled, not interceding, as she made her way to her bedroom. Her maid was waiting, and she was dressed within a couple of hours. She couldn’t help feeling a faint stirring of excitement for the forthcoming ball at Netherfield. It had so many echoes of the past, though she hoped this evening ended differently for everyone than the last one had.