[Pride and Prejudice] Mary's Pride and Prejudice

"Colonel Edwards, please tell me, how long have you been doing this? What is your purpose? Where have you taken her? Did anyone else see and see through her disguise? Or was she killed when you returned?" People saw it? Tell me everything now!"

Mary's questions like a cannonball almost wiped out Colonel Edwards, a war-torn soldier, but his powerful combat experience finally played its role. He stood straight in front of Mary and answered her solemnly: "I I went out like this with Miss Lydia a few times, no more than ten times in total. I don't have any bad intentions, Miss Mary, I just want Miss Lydia to have more happy times, instead of being locked in a high tower Like the princess in the movie, when others can happily socialize and dance, they can only hide in the room alone and cry alone."

Mary laughed angrily: "So I'm the vicious witch who locked up the princess? And you are the knight who saved the princess! Lydia is the poor princess?"

"Knight and princess?" Lydia was still adding to the confusion: "I like this metaphor!"

Elizabeth was also angered by Lydia: "Lydia, don't talk! This is my advice to you. I think you'd better obey it. Of course you don't have to listen. I think you have the courage!"

Lydia hesitated for a while and finally listened. Elizabeth said: "This is very good. I think we'd better leave. The princess only needs to be responsible for being rescued by the knights. You don't need to intervene in other things."

As she spoke, she pulled Lydia out of the room and went downstairs. Mrs. Bennet was standing at the bottom of the stairs looking around. When she saw the two of them coming down, she immediately went up to her: "Mr. Alfred is back again, He also brought Colonel Edwards, he said that he had something important to tell Mary, is he going to propose to Mary?"

Elizabeth said helplessly, "No, Mom, they have other things to do."

Lydia chuckled. "It's even more fun than that, Mom."

"Lydia?" Mrs. Bennet seemed to have just seen her little daughter: "Are you back? When did you come back? Oh, no, no, I was asking when you left? Oh, no, it doesn't matter How can you sneak out? Do you know how dangerous it is to sneak out alone? There are a hundred times more thieves and robbers in London than in Meryton!"

"No, Mom, London is [-] times more exciting than Meriton. I love it to death. I have always wanted to come back to Meriton since I came back to London. I never want to go back to Meriton again. "

Elizabeth sighed, and she felt that she had sighed more recently than in a year: "Lydia, I have been looking for a chance to talk to you, although now is not a good time for me, but I don't think we can continue Wait any longer, can you come with me to the lounge?"

Lydia hesitated and went. Although she felt that she didn't have to be afraid of these sisters, especially the tyrant Mary, it wouldn't hurt to listen to what Elizabeth and Jane had to say once in a while. They had educated her before. Mary's tit-for-tat, her relationship with the two elder sisters is still very good.

Upstairs in her room, the tyrant Mary was bombarding her knights.

Mary asked Colonel Edwards with a serious face: "When I was sitting here just now, I made a lot of guesses about who Lydia's accomplices were. I thought of you, Mr. Colonel, although your reputation is not like yours. Your appearance is as glamorous as yours, but I am still willing to believe that you are a gentleman, and you will never lure an ignorant girl to do things that damage her reputation! However, I am very sorry that you let me down."

"I'm sorry too, Miss Mary, but I don't think my intention was to induce an ignorant girl to do anything that would damage her reputation. I just wanted to give Miss Lydia some joy."

"Doesn't that sound familiar to you, Colonel? The theater on Triroux Street plays such a plot anytime and anywhere, accompanied by such lines. Those are the standard lines of those dandies when they do evil. I see you You have lived on Lilu Street for too long, so you have turned a blind eye to this, or you have already regarded this as your greatest advantage, so you have never been ashamed of it, because you knew early on that you were a playboy, specializing in seducing innocent girls! "

"Miss Mary!" Colonel Edwards interrupted her angrily: "Please forgive me, I don't agree with your statement, and I don't accept your offense to me either!"

"Offensive?" Mary sneered: "Isn't your behavior an offense to the Bennet family, Mr. Colonel? Don't you think you are insulting us by using this disgraceful and disreputable way to associate with our youngest daughter?" No, you just think that her relatives and friends don't know anything about it, and she will keep it secret, and you see that she doesn't have a brother to fight you for her, so you play her tricks thought……"

"please forgive--"

"please forgive--"

Mr. Alfred and Colonel Edwards said in unison.

Alfred looked at his brother's blushing face, and he said to Mary: "Mary, I don't think Andrew meant to play with Miss Lydia, he just doesn't know how to think comprehensively, and he is impulsive. , likes to do things according to his personal preferences, but I guarantee that he will never have any thoughts of hurting Miss Lydia!"

Edwards straightened his face and said: "I definitely didn't mean to play with Lydia, she didn't want to be locked up, so I just wanted to take her out for a walk, I asked her to change into men's clothes, so no one would recognize her, Then we can go where we want to go. She likes this way of traveling," he said with a little embarrassment on his face. "Although this way of traveling is not decent, I think it is still feasible, at least she gets A lot of happiness, that's the most important thing. Miss Mary, I think it's a crime to oppress humanity, and we shouldn't be burdened by worldly red tape to give up looking for happiness, although in your eyes, Miss Lydia's words and deeds are not sincere, so It is necessary to be punished, but it seems to me that her unbridled naivety is her unsurpassed virtue. It would be a very cruel thing to force her to give up her nature by subjecting her to those ancient and inhuman rules. !"

He spoke very fast, like a torrential rain falling from the sky, crackling and hitting Mary's heart, making her furious heart become cold, but at the same time, her anger did not decrease at all.

"Mr. Colonel, you say that I give my sister all the old red tape, that she is oppressed and restrained, so I ask you, do you think it is good for her to let go of this oppression? She should break free from this oppression , live according to her nature?"

"Of course," Colonel Edwards nodded as a matter of course, "Miss Mary, everyone should live according to their own nature, otherwise they will never be truly happy."

"It's so funny, Mr. Colonel, you come from a wealthy family, but you admire the dissolute. Do you think that if Lydia really lived as reckless and willful as you said, would she be able to marry a good husband in the end? I'm afraid that any moral character A noble, kindly young gentleman will not let those elegant and good-looking ladies not come to propose to her instead!"

"I'm so surprised by your words, Miss Mary!" Colonel Edwards yelled, "Do you think the ultimate value of a woman is to be proposed?" He turned to his brother and asked, "You Do you really know your friend, Alf? I can't believe that you told me several times that you and Miss Mary are congenial!"

"Yes, Andrew, I still think that I know Miss Mary and have the same temperament as her." Alfred said to his brother with a frown.

"Mr. Colonel, please don't change the subject, please look me in the eyes and answer my question." Mary said loudly to the colonel, "I never thought that marriage was the ultimate value of a woman, but Lydia definitely thought so! So We need to think from her point of view! Obviously, you are not as understanding and considerate of your friend as your brother!"

Colonel Edwards corrected his color and said: "Then I will answer your question, Miss Mary, if you are referring to those hypocritical aristocratic youths in London's upper class, gentlemen, then there is no need to worry about Miss Lydia not getting married, she Even if she is ten times presumptuous, with her dowry, there will always be a lot of young people who will propose to her."

"Ha——" Mary opened her mouth and said with a sarcastic smile: "Is that how you evaluate your friend? She only deserves those who are not popular, with dirty hearts and dirty morals, and their moral qualities are not even as good as The rats in the stinky gutters, who only want to rely on their wives' dowry to eat and drink, are they dissolute young people? Those good young people with noble thoughts, noble morals, kindness and kindness will ask a man whose mind is full of nothing but a generous dowry. Only superficial women who eat, drink, and play propose?"

"I don't think Lydia would have said yes to such a man, and she wouldn't go with such a man, Miss Mary!"

"Colonel Edwards, Mr. Alfred has talked to me about you, I think you are a family man, please put yourself in Lydia's shoes, she will not help her to build a good future happy family."

Colonel Edwards was silent for a while, and said to Mary: "Miss Mary, I understand your painstaking efforts very well, and I am also very moved by your sisterly affection for your little sister, but I think you don't have to worry about her marriage at all. I, I would love to propose to Miss Lydia."

"Oh?" Mary twitched her mouth when she heard this, "Colonel Edwards, I don't think you have fallen in love with my sister. If that's the case, Mr. Alfred must have noticed it, and neither has my sister." Falling in love with you, if that's the case, there will be a lot of discussions in my family, so your marriage is purely imaginary, please don't make fun of this kind of thing."

"No, Miss Mary, I'm not joking. If it were me, I would definitely propose to Miss Lydia. I have seen her cuteness. Her value is not in her rich dowry or youthful beauty, but in her beauty." It was her vivacious taste and her innocence, which charmed her more than anything else."

"Is she attractive in your eyes?" Mary asked in amazement.

"Yes, isn't it obvious?" Colonel Edwards nodded as a matter of course.

"Then I ask, are there many people like you in London?"

Colonel Edwards was silent for a while, and after a while he answered with difficulty: "No."

"Can you make sure that people who think like you can fall in love with her? Can you make sure that she loves him too? Can you make sure that they can get married smoothly and live happily together?" Mary asked sharply.

"I can't guarantee anything, Miss Mary." Colonel Edwards said dejectedly.