The rest of the day passed in agreeable distraction; Mary found she quite liked Lucy Radcliff, her keen eye and her efficient manner, and that it was not insignificantly preferable to the Miss Lucases' natural mirth, which was, if not particularly irksome, at least wholly foreign to Mary's own disposition.
Miss Radcliff bid them all farewell late that afternoon, and they saw her off on the evening coach. The rest of the visit might well have passed relatively unremarkably, in fact, if only the group had not determined to explore some more of the town that next morning, as precursor to the day's seafront excursion; if it were so, they very well might have never passed the particular back thoroughfare of rather unkempt houses, from one of which exited a young lady in rather shabby dress, and ineptly mended gloves, but a disproportionately haughty expression on her pretty face notwithstanding; and who halted with a great exclamation of surprise upon seeing the group.
"Mary, good heavens!" Lydia cried, in a tone of sheer amazement, which at the same time did not suggest an immediate delight at the prospect of such an unplanned sisterly reunion. For an unguarded moment, there was displayed before Mary quite a different Lydia than the one she remembered – a thinner face, wearing an expression much warier than her years merited; a general furtiveness in her posture, which had surely never been present before, in even the faintest shadow, in their young, reckless Lydia; but then another moment passed, and her sister seemed to gather herself, and recover somewhat her composure; and then all at once a far more familiar air was assumed, and it was as if the first one had never existed at all.
"Mary, my dear!" she resumed in her usual affected tone, with a charming and indulgent smile, and came to embrace her sister as affectionately as if they had always been the dearest and closest of friends. "You have given me the most delightful surprise! To think of running into you here – in Southend, indeed - of all places! My dear Wickham shall never believe it, when I recount it to him tonight! No, he shall teaze me, and say I have made it all up - he shall not believe it in the slightest! Of all the people I might have run into – Kitty, perhaps, I might have expected – any of our other sisters - indeed, how wholly improbable that it is you, particularly!"
Mary was certainly not any less surprised – last she had heard from letters to Longbourn, Lydia and Wickham were settled comfortably somewhere in Gateshead, and with an intention of remaining there some time, Wickham's prospects at his current station, as Lydia wrote, being quite good, and the situation comfortable – it was the faint feeling of stupor one was afflicted with when one, being certain they were headed away from some landmark, suddenly emerged upon it instead – to see Lydia here, in residence at some house, which did not in and of itself seem particularly agreeable – but there was nought for Mary to do, upon her wits being somewhat recovered, but to introduce Lydia to the rest of her party, and once all appropriate exchanges of greetings were completed, to extend an invitation to join them.
Lydia, who seemed impressed, out of the company, only by Mr. Radcliff's presence, and took especial pains to smile at him quite charmingly, while quite ignoring the Miss Lucases, seemed to consider Mary's proposition quite seriously; but, after a moment's hesitation, could not allow the idea. Several errands must be run today; there was simply no circumventing their necessity.
"But indeed," said Mr. Radcliff jovially, "such a serendipitous reunion cannot be rendered so brief! Perhaps, upon completing your errands, you shall join your sister for a cold luncheon at our inn?"
The direct appeal from Mr. Radcliff seemed to tip the scales in favor of acquiescence – but what a wonderful idea! Of course, a cold luncheon should be just the thing, once her morning schedule was completed. They parted ways with the inn's address and firm promises to one another that they should meet at one o' clock, or thereabouts – certainly not more than half past one, Lydia added, as her final farewell, and Mary left her with a growing assurance that this brief exchange might well have been the last she saw of Lydia in Southend –
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Pomp and Circumstance: A Pride and Prejudice Continuation
Fanfiction"In the character of Mary Bennet there existed a profound irony which was as follows: the only quality that saved her from being wholly ordinary was the extraordinary degree of ordinariness which she possessed." A Mary Bennet romance and Pride and P...
