The Collins problem seems to be solving itself, which should have been the warning. This episode is the complete audiobook of Chapter 21 of Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice, in which a rejected suitor finds a much more patient listener and a letter from Netherfield knocks the wind out of Jane.

Mr. Collins spends the day in stiff silence toward Elizabeth and transfers his attentions to Charlotte Lucas, whose kindness in listening to him comes, Elizabeth thinks, at a real cost to her friend. In Meryton, Wickham reappears and walks the girls home, all easy explanation about why the ball had to go on without him. Then the post brings Caroline Bingley’s farewell.

• Wickham admits he chose to avoid Mr. Darcy at Netherfield: scenes might have arisen, he says, unpleasant to more than himself.
• Caroline’s letter announces the whole party gone to London with no intention of returning that winter, and dwells lovingly on Georgiana Darcy, whom her brother admires and the family hopes to call a sister.
• Jane reads the letter as friendship and fact; Elizabeth reads it as the work of sisters who see their brother in love with the wrong family.
• Elizabeth’s counter-theory is firm: Bingley loves Jane, London cannot hold him, and no one is so needful of the neighborhood’s comfort as her sister is that night.