Page 49 of Resilience

“Now now, Lady Matlock might serve smuggled champagne, but she would never smuggle foie gras into the kingdom.” Laughter rumbled in Colonel Fitzwilliam’s chest and spread about the table.

“Lady Matlock would never need to serve smuggled champagne, your grandfather laid down enough to last twelve wars, and so did mine,” Darcy lifted his glass. “To forward thinkers. And to Mrs Denny’s tenant and her cook, who are indeed the suppliers from whom Lady Matlock and I procure our foie gras. I believe that it requires the skill of both the poulterer and a skilled cook to create.”

When the second course was served, Kitty spoke to Jane. “This lovely mushroom soup ought to be simple enough for you, Jane.”

“I must say, you set a remarkably rich table, Kitty. Quite unlike anything we ever had at Longbourn. Mama would scarcely believe it.” Jane eyed the dishes as if they were all snakes that might bite.

Elizabeth was ready to snap in frustration. Since sitting down, Jane had suggested that Kitty’s table was pretentious, implied that she was putting on airs, and now she had just diminished their upbringing as if they had never eaten well at home growing up.

“Perhaps we did not have foie gras at home, no great shock in the country and at wartime, and perhaps Mama did not serve many dishes with curry, but we hardly grew up on gruel, Jane. Longbourn’s cook is competent at her share of French dishes.” Elizabeth glared at her elder sister. “Kitty’s table is a credit to her cook, and even more so when you consider that nearly everything on the table came from the estate, and nothing was ordered from the butcher but tongue.”

“And that only to soothe my wife’s conscience, because if she was to entertain, she wished to give some trade to the village,” Denny added.

“It was intelligent of your wife to make a friend of your cook so quickly,” Darcy complimented. “For surely this meal is a credit to Mrs Denny’s warm welcome by her staff.”

“And it was intelligent of her to send the gamekeepers home with generous portions of their catch, she has made friends of them all. We shall eat well here at Hawthorne Vale.” Denny lifted his glass in Kitty’s direction. “To my wife.”

“To Mrs Denny,” everyone intoned, lifting their glasses to their hostess.

The mushroom soup was followed by a fat haunch of venison, with salt baked grayling, duck simmered in sweet wine and herbs, and foie gras. The table also groaned under platters and serving bowls of mashed potatoes with turnips, parsnips, baked apples, and a luxuriously layered trifle.

“This grayling is well prepared, Kitty, you must give my compliments to your cook,” Georgiana marveled.

“And the foie gras is simply excellent, Mrs Denny,” Priscilla praised. “One does not often encounter such a refined dish away from the most noble tables of London.”

Jane regarded the small serving of foie gras on her plate and everyone watched as she took the smallest of bites and chewed thoughtfully. Elizabeth wondered how she could taste such a small amount.

“I fear it is rather rich for me. I should hate to faint and cause a scene at Kitty’s table,” Jane worried.

“I detest being ill, it must be a trial for you to suffer so, Mrs Bingley,” said Major Gordenson.

Kitty flushed. “Perhaps we ought to have served something lighter.”

“Nonsense,” Elizabeth said firmly. “Jane, you are perfectly well.”

Mr Bingley looked down the table at his wife anxiously. “My darling, please, you must not over exert yourself for appearances. Would you like to return to the parsonage so that you might rest? Your sister will understand.”

“Certainly, Mrs Bingley must retire as soon as she pleases if she is unwell,” agreed Matthew. “We should hate to impose upon her in any way.”

“Do not be silly,” Jane put the matter to rest. “This is Kitty’s evening, I would never do anything to spoil it. Besides, she obviously put great effort into making her staff appear disciplined.”

Now it was Mary’s turn to be impatient. “Forgive me, but I believe that our sister manages a great deal better than only appearing disciplined. Kitty, I cannot recall when I attended a more graciously managed evening.”

“Nor I.” Darcy inclined his head.

“I am only newly out in the country, but I certainly pray that my first dinner as a proper hostess at Pemberley goes as well.” Miss Darcy looked anxiously at her friend.

Colonel Fitzwilliam chuckled. “Mrs Denny, if this is mismanagement, I should like to see your cook’s efforts at her most competent.”

A ripple of laughter swept the table, and Elizabeth was gratified to see Kitty’s eyes shine, not with tears or mortification, but with relief.

When the ladies rose to follow Kitty to the music room, Priscilla drew close to Elizabeth. “Your sister has remarkable social instincts. She knows precisely how to make a person’s merits seem malicious.”

“That she does,” Elizabeth acknowledged.

She wished that she understood Jane’s new desire to be the only Bennet daughter to be admired. The guests had been discomfited by her endless criticism of their hostess, but only a handful of the people in the room truly understood the evening for what it had been. An opportunity for Jane to see Kitty, a brand new, unprepared bride, mortify herself in an effort to please her eldest sister.

Elizabeth suspected that Jane’s games in Derbyshire had barely begun.