Swipe Left on Mr. Darcy — Mutual Friends, Page 8
By Suha · Published
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Transcript
Two stacked panels in a cool, opulent interior of steel-blue and emerald. Top panel: Ms. de Bourgh — 62, silver-grey hair in a tight chignon, pale steel-blue cold eyes, a severe deep-emerald skirt-suit with a large emerald brooch — sits straight-backed in a large throne-like armchair, one hand on the arm, appraising coldly. Ms. de Bourgh: 'So. You're the friend.' Bottom panel: Lizzie Bennet stands under the cold once-over, chin up and unbothered, while Mr. Collins gives a low, fawning half-bow beside her. No dialogue.
Image description
Ms. de Bourgh sits regally in a throne-like chair in a cool opulent room, appraising coldly; below, Lizzie stands unbothered as Collins bows fawningly.
About this chapter
With Jane finally at peace and her own verdict on Darcy set in stone, Lizzie takes a weekend train out to visit Charlotte — now married to Mr. Collins and installed in a tidy cottage on the grounds of his employer's grand estate. Lizzie arrives braced to pity her best friend, certain she'll find her diminished and trapped. Instead she finds Charlotte quietly, unromantically content: she has carved out a livable arrangement, her own mornings and her own space, while Collins fusses over curtains and name-drops his imperious patron, Ms. de Bourgh. When the household is summoned to dinner at the big house, Lizzie meets Ms. de Bourgh herself — a cold, appraising matriarch who interrogates Lizzie's family and prospects and expects total agreement. Lizzie, politely, refuses to give it, and earns a startled, narrow-eyed once-over. By the end of the evening Lizzie has made her peace: Charlotte's chosen life is survivable, even good, and the visit is going to be fine. Then the estate's front door opens and the patron's newly arrived nephew steps into the hall — Fitzwilliam Darcy. The one certainty Lizzie came here to keep, that she was finally, permanently done with him, collapses on the spot. The mutual friend was him all along.