Somebody finally says the quiet part about Mr. Wickham. This episode is the complete audiobook of Chapter 26 of Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice, in which Elizabeth receives the most sensible advice in the novel, a wedding goes forward without joy, and London teaches Jane the truth about her friends.

Mrs. Gardiner takes the first private moment to warn her niece: Wickham is agreeable and penniless, Elizabeth has no fortune either, and an attachment so imprudent would grieve her father. Elizabeth promises to do her best, which she notes is a new sort of promise for her. Meanwhile Thursday comes, and Charlotte Lucas becomes Charlotte Collins at the church door.

• Elizabeth’s answer to her aunt is honest above all: she cannot promise not to love Wickham, but she can promise not to hurry into anything, and she will try to do what is wisest.
• Charlotte’s parting request is a visit to Hunsford in March, and Elizabeth, who cannot refuse, expects little pleasure from keeping the promise.
• From London, Jane reports the visit Caroline finally repaid: a quarter of an hour of cold formality that ends the friendship and, at last, even Jane’s good opinion of it.
• Wickham’s attentions to Elizabeth quietly end in favour of a Miss King who has just inherited ten thousand pounds; Elizabeth decides her heart was only slightly touched, and writes to her aunt that she cannot even find it in herself to hate him.