Miss Bingley’s second letter arrives, and it ends the question. This episode is the complete audiobook of Chapter 24 of Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice, in which the Netherfield party settles in London for the winter and the two eldest Bennet sisters take the blow in two very different ways.

Caroline writes with warm insincerity: her brother is fixed in town, and the family grows fonder of Georgiana Darcy by the day. Jane resolves to think of Bingley only as the most amiable man of her acquaintance and to get over it quietly, without complaint. Elizabeth burns on her behalf, and her opinion of the world’s constancy drops several degrees in a single week.

• Jane’s heartbreak is conducted with such composure that only Elizabeth can see it at all; her sister sees, and rages inwardly at brothers persuaded and sisters scheming.
• Elizabeth ranks the winter’s lessons bitterly: the more she sees of the world, the more she is dissatisfied with it, between Charlotte’s bargain and Bingley’s vanishing.
• Mr. Bennet offers his own consolation: next to being married, a girl likes to be crossed a little in love now and then, and he congratulates Jane on her distinction.
• Wickham’s story, no longer a secret, spreads through the neighborhood, and everybody enjoys condemning Mr. Darcy as the worst of men before Christmas.