It took two days to get to the Bingleys’ house and retrieve the children and another two to reach London. During these long hours, Mary thought of little else but Mr Hayward. She missed him more than she could say – and could not quite believe the situation in which she found herself. Time and time again she rehearsed the circumstances which had divided them, trying to find an explanation for what had happened; but nothing satisfied her. To have returned home – for thus she now considered her uncle and aunt’s house – with matters so dreadfully unresolved was agony. She did not think she could bear the pain of unknowing; but what was she to do? She was powerless; even if she wished to, she could not act. It was impossible for her to call upon him; he was not in London, but even if he had been in town, it would have been unthinkable. Respectable young women did not visit the houses of single young men uninvited. Nor could she write. She supposed she might ask Mrs Gardiner for his family’s address in Hampshire; but knew her aunt would, in all probability, refuse to give it to her. She could not begin a correspondence with him – every rule of custom and delicacy forbade it. There was nothing to be done but wait to see what he would do – the world offered her no other choice.
Once back at Gracechurch Street, she tried to make the long days bearable. She took out her books and tried to study; but concentration eluded her, and she put them away. She read stories with the little Gardiners, and heard the lessons of the older children. She sat patiently next to the piano as the girls practised their scales and arpeggios, encouraging them gently as they stumbled through a few simple airs. She did not play herself; she had not the spirit for it.
She attempted to help Mrs Gardiner in her household tasks, volunteering to inspect the linen cupboards; but in her distraction, she confused the good sheets with those needing repair and the whole business of sorting and assessing had to be done again. She volunteered to wash the best china, the cups and saucers too fine to be entrusted to servants; but a wet plate slid out of her inattentive hands and broke into pieces on the floor. She looked so distraught that her aunt did not have the heart to scold her; but Mrs Gardiner did not think her household valuables would survive much more of her niece’s assistance and urged her to put on her coat and go out for a walk.
Obediently, Mary did so; but the lively City streets no longer excited her as they once had. The shop windows that had once entranced her seemed familiar, even tawdry. The roads were dirty, the pavement crowded. Everyone was in a hurry; she was jostled and pushed. The one sight she longed to see was that of Mr Hayward, in the long brown coat he had worn on the fells, on his way to call at Gracechurch Street – but no matter how fervently she hoped for it, there was no sign of him.
Mary had been back in London over a week when she returned back home one afternoon, dusty and discouraged from yet another dutiful expedition. As she walked into the hall, she saw one of the servants disappearing towards the cloakroom with a gentleman’s coat draped over his arm. She did not stop to ask who the visitor was, but raced up the stairs to the drawing room. Her heart was in her mouth as she reached the door, but when she opened it, it was not Mr Hayward who rose, delighted, eager to greet her. It was his friend Mr Ryder.
‘My dear Miss Bennet! How very pleased I am to see you! I have come to pay my respects. I would have come sooner, but I have been down in Kent. Yet more family business to attend to – although I hope all that is finished now.’
‘Mr Ryder! I thought – I imagined – I’m sorry, I was not expecting you.’
‘I hope I have not come upon you at an inconvenient time, as so often seems to be my fate?’
Mary recovered her composure enough to invite him to sit down. She called for tea; and by the time it arrived, she felt tolerably in command of herself.
‘I hope your time in Kent went off well, sir. I have never been there. Is it a beautiful place?’
‘It is pleasant enough. Fields and orchards and sheep. You know the sort of thing. Not to be compared to the beauty of the Lakes, of course.’
He began to talk fondly of the great grey mountains and bright blue skies they had so recently enjoyed, and she slowly felt herself more at ease. He did not seem to require much in reply except an occasional smile of reminiscence or assent. The conversation went on well enough with only the occasional question from her, which she found suited her mood admirably.
‘Should you like to return there?’ she ventured politely. ‘To a different part of the Lakes, perhaps?’
‘To tell the truth, Miss Bennet, the next time I travel, I am resolved to go abroad – to Italy, if I can. If the Westmoreland fells had such an effect upon us, imagine the impact of the Alps!’
‘I am not sure I have much appetite for mountains any more. Our walk down Scafell in the storm seems to have cured me of any desire to climb another.’
Mr Ryder laughed politely. It was plain he did not consider their saturated, struggling descent worthy of further remark.
‘And what of you, Miss Bennet? How have you been occupying yourself since our return? What are you reading at present?’
‘I am ashamed to say I have nothing particular about me at the moment. I seem to have lost the application a serious book requires.’
‘That sounds most unlike you. But I have the perfect solution. What you require is a review – they are the very thing for a distracted mind. You can read what you like and ignore the rest, picking through its articles as if you’re looking for the ripest pear in the bowl. Let me bring you one. Which do you prefer, the Edinburgh or the Quarterly?’
‘Mr Hayward used to give me the Edinburgh sometimes. But he said its judgements were not entirely to be trusted.’
‘That’s because its reviewers have not always been kind to his adored Wordsworth. You know how loyal he is, once he has found something to love.’
Mary looked away, putting the lid back on the sugar bowl.
‘Have you seen him since we returned to London?’
‘I have not,’ he replied. ‘I imagine he is still with his family. It will come as no surprise to you to hear that he is a very dutiful son.’
Mr Ryder had nothing more to say about his friend’s whereabouts, nor could he be prevailed upon to suggest when he might be seen amongst them again; and, perhaps feeling this subject had been thoroughly exhausted, announced shortly afterwards that he was obliged to take his leave.
‘I have an appointment with my bankers. It is nothing but business and more business for me lately, which has made even this short interlude feel like a snatched pleasure – as though I’ve been let off my lessons, as it were.’
He downed the last of his tea and stood up, entirely at his ease in Mrs Gardiner’s drawing room.
‘I shall bring you copies of both the Edinburgh and Quarterly reviews – you can decide for yourself which you like best. It will be an excellent excuse for me to call again.’
A few days later, he returned, bearing the promised copies of the magazines. Of course, it was necessary to offer him tea, during which he declared his intention of returning again to hear what Mary made of them. Soon he was almost as regular a presence in the Gracechurch Street drawing room as his friend had once been.
‘You must have a great deal of time to call your own,’ observed Mrs Gardiner one afternoon a week later, when Mr Ryder was once more to be found in her drawing room, drinking her tea and eating her cakes. ‘Of course we are always glad to see you – what should we do with our currant tarts otherwise? – but you seem somewhat solitary at present. What of Miss Bingley? I have not seen her for a while.’
‘She is visiting her brother, but returns shortly, I think.’
‘And is there any news of Mr Hayward? We’ve heard nothing from him since we left the Lakes.’
Mr Ryder flicked a few crumbs from his waistcoat.
‘No, not a line. But I expect we will hear from him soon. It isn’t like Tom to stay silent for long.’
Mary placed her hands in her lap, hoping to convey the impression of a serenity she did not feel. Mr Ryder’s company had only made her miss his friend more. His visits sharpened her loss, magnifying her sense of abandonment. The better she came to know Mr Ryder, the more she longed for Mr Hayward.
It was not that Mr Ryder’s company was distasteful. She was used to him now. She knew how to appreciate his better qualities; and his less admirable traits no longer disturbed her as they had once done.
Even his self-absorption no longer bothered her; after a while, there was something restful in it. His reluctance to make moral judgements came to seem equally soothing. It gave him an easy tolerance of the shortcomings of others – and also of himself. He preferred things to be agreeable rather than not, but, Mary suspected, did not in truth feel anything particularly strongly. He craved sensation, but she doubted he was a man subject to profound and lasting passions. Those would involve rather too much trouble. His feelings were like jam spread thinly on bread and butter – sweet, all-encompassing and readily available, but not penetrating very deeply.
The contrast with Mr Hayward could not have been more stark. His affection, she supposed, would be like a long-simmered beef stock – a great while in the making, but strong and rich and unmistakeably flavoured. It amused her when she thought how ridiculous a simile this was. Yet even as she smiled inwardly to herself, she felt a sharp pang of regret. She missed his passionate enthusiasms which sat so unexpectedly with his otherwise steady temper. She missed his sharp mind and ready wit. She missed the warmth of his smile, the look of amusement in his glance as he caught her eye across the dinner table. She had hoped that as the days passed into weeks, she would have begun to miss him less, but this had not been so. If anything, the opposite was true.
‘Have you written to Mr Hayward, sir? Perhaps he needs a little encouragement to begin upon a correspondence?’
‘I am not a greater writer of letters, I’m afraid. No, in Tom’s case, there’s nothing to be done but wait. He is determined to try our patience, but we are equal to it. He will write when he is ready to do so, and not a minute before.’
Mary nodded at Mr Ryder’s words with every appearance of taking them to heart; but each day she looked for a letter from Mr Hayward; and each day she was disappointed. When the post arrived, she sorted through it with as much appearance of unconcern as she could muster; and when she found nothing there for her, put it back on the tray with an equally unconvincing display of indifference. She did this for nearly three weeks; yet every morning, she hoped against hope that today would be the day his letter finally appeared.
So one morning, when her aunt approached her as she sat at the piano with her niece, ready to begin their practice, the first thing Mary noticed was the envelope she held in her hand.
‘I have some most unexpected news,’ announced Mrs Gardiner. ‘We are to have a visitor, it seems. Your mother is coming, Mary. She expects to arrive next week.’