Page 47 of The Vanished Bennet Sister

"He has other purposes than the usual ones. He is very useful to me in a variety of ways."

"What purposes?"

Elena smiled, but it did not quite reach her eyes in the way Mary had come to expect it to. "You will understand with time."

Mary set down her teacup.

She had been aware, at the edge of her attention and for the past minute or two, of an atmosphere of wrongness that had not yet crystallised into a nuanced observation. It was the way one was aware of cold before one had identified the source of the draught. She had spent the past hour adapting, learning to reconcile Elena’s face with the words she had read across four months of letters. It was a composed and handsome face, dark-eyed, framed by dark hair that had gone considerably grey. It was not an unkind face, but it was, she realised, one she could not read as clearly as she had thought.

"I ought to go," she said. "My family will be worried. I did not tell anyone where I was going, and it is getting late."

Elena set down her own cup with unhurried care. "In a moment. First I would like to tell you something."

Mary waited.

"There was a young woman," Elena began in a tone that sounded rehearsed, "who was incredibly frightened. She had made a mistake, the sort young women from good families are warned against. She’d fallen in love with a young man, you see, who in turn abandoned her at her most vulnerable. And she was alone with that for a long time. She was frightened and she did what any young person in such a state would do: she accepted the help that was offered to her, even when the terms of that help were not what she had believed them to be."

Mary listened, her heart thumping rapidly in her chest. Why was Elena telling her this? The question lingered on her lips but it was difficult to summon the urge to push it out.

"She gave her child," Elena continued, "to a woman she trusted. She intended it to be temporary. A matter of months, no more, while she arranged her circumstances. But the months transformed into years. When she attempted to return, it became clear that the child had been stolen away from her."

Mary's hands were folded in her lap. She was aware of the texture of her skin, and of the slight drizzle against the window, and of Elena's voice, which had not altered its register.

"She spent years trying to find a way to connect with her child. When she finally had a method she used it. You see, she discovered her child had a keen interest in theological things, music … So, she wrote to a parish. She asked for a correspondent with serious interests in music and devotion. And she found the person she was looking for."

The fire shifted in the grate. A cold sensation began to descend upon Mary despite the warmth. She was aware that this had gone beyond a visit to a friend. It included a new element on the verge of revelation and Mary sat stiffly, helplessly, as the narrative unspooled.

"The woman could see," Elena said, "even through the letters, that her daughter had become a remarkable young woman. Serious. More capable than the family she had been placed with had ever fully recognised. And now, at last, they are under the same roof."

There was a long silence. Mary's mind moved through the implication in stages, gradually arriving at a conclusion.

"You have your mother's colouring," Elena said. "You are rather prettier than she was at your age, though she was always told that she was beautiful."

Her eyes held a seriousness within them that was nothing like Mrs Bennet's chatty temperament or Jane's fairness. It was nothing like Elizabeth's intelligence. What it brought to mind startled Mary. She was reminded of the reflection she had seen in her mirror above a writing desk a while ago.

“You are my mother?”

“I am,” she said and placed a hand on Mary’s who immediately yanked it away.

"You deceived me," she murmured. H

"I was being cautious. I was not certain how you would handle the truth. I needed to know you first. I needed you to trust me."

"You faked the trust. Every letter. The theological questions and devotional interests. The questions about my family. You were not seeking a friend. You were searching for me specifically."

"Yes."

"Everyone has lied to me. I’m sure you must have all had your reasons, none in consideration of me."

"I had reasons. I hope, eventually, to explain them."

"Not yet. I should like to be alone. To think."

"Of course." She rose from her chair. "Call me Alice. That is my name."

"So I have come to know," Mary said bitterly. "Thank you for making it clear."

Alice ignored the sarcasm and left the room. Once the door closed, Mary leaned forward and dropped her head in her hands.