Lost in Austen s01e02 Episode Script

Miss Bennet, you must be frozen.
Sorry.
Can you let me in? - Miss Price.
- Thank you.
I do not understand.
Miss Bennet came as you instructed.
You invited her, yes? She came.
Can you give me a hand? You must get this girl into bed.
Her fever does not abate.
It's paracetamoI.
They'll bring down her temperature.
Let's just You sit up.
Here you go.
Can you pass? Charles, I've taken the Iiberty of ordering the fayton - to take Miss Price back to Longbourn.
- what? No, no, no, no.
Miss Price must stay here.
She is the best possible nurse.
She has paracetomoles.
Then of course she must remain.
Miss Price, the night we spoke on the terrace, I must confess, l cannot stop thinking of your Iips, of God help me, Miss Price, your tongue Stay there.
Stay.
I never meant for that to happen.
I'd been drinking.
I was disorientated.
But I'm drawn to you.
I'm a man.
Well, I'm a woman and I'm drawn to other women.
You You mean, there really are Iadies who steer the punt from the Cambridge end? You bet.
The other night I got carried away and I'm sorry but nothing like it is ever going to happen again.
With me.
Ever.
It might, on the other hand, happen with her.
Can't you see? It's her you love, not me.
Open your eyes, Mr Bingley, and see.
Thank you.
Oh.
I'm not that big on seafood.
Miss Price does not care for oysters.
You may bring her the next course.
I have exchanged places, Mr Darcy, with my friend Elizabeth.
She is another sister of Miss Bennet.
I expect you've heard great reports of Elizabeth's sparkling wit.
About Miss Bennet, you lied.
Why? I know you're supposed to be abrupt but that's a bit stark.
I'm always stark with liars.
Elizabeth, what can I say? You're welcome to him, miserable sod.
Miss Price, you have an appetite to be proceeding so quickly to the larks, ahead of Mr Darcy.
Bring Miss Price another leash of birds.
She is manifestly famished.
Oh.
Now I shall not say another word.
Clearly I have interrupted a most fluid and informed conversation.
- How does Miss Bennet, Charles? - Better.
Miss Price is most adroit in her treatment of the sick.
Mr Bingley, have you considered giving a ball at Netherfield? Wouldn't it be a fun way to bring together people who need to be brought together? How I envy Miss Price, to be so inspirited by the mere thought of music that it quite sweeps away all anxiety for her friend.
After dinner you must play for us at the pianoforte.
No, no, no.
I insist.
I'm sorry I can't play.
At this.
The instrument is not to your satisfaction? Charles, you must send for another immediatley.
She mean, she cannot play the piano.
Any piano, is that the truth of it, Miss Price? How singular! But she can sing? Of course, she can sing.
All ladies can sing.
My sister shall accompany.
No! That won't be necessary.
I sing a song, my mother used to sing to me, when I was little.
What an instructive evening.
If all else falls, Miss Price, you shall not want for supper, for you can sing.
Good night, gentlemen.
Money, the fortune to which you aspire in the immediate instance, may pass you by, but I am certain you shall not starve.
No, I don't suppose I shall on 27,000 a year.
Brava, Miss Price.
And whenever life is gettin' me down, I shall be sure to go downtown.
- Eh, Darcy? - With alacrity.
Do you perform, Mr Darcy? Not in your league, Miss Price.
Whoa, smoulder alert! - I am for bed.
- Sleep well, madam.
Miss Price, I have found it difficult to accommodate the knowledge of your private disposition.
However, I have directed my eyes as you ordained, Miss Price.
Mm, I'm hungry.
Excellent.
Excellent.
I shall send at once for gammon and eggs.
A brace of partridge.
Nothing too substantial.
You've been ill.
It may have seemed that I was unaware of your nursing me.
I was not.
I thank you for your kindness.
Of course I am quite delirious with anxiety for Miss Bennet.
With her sister Elizabeth being away for so long, I am all behind, like a duck's taiI.
I understand your daughter is sufficiently recovered to receive Behold this tea! Does music give you pleasure, Mr Darcy? Good music played with esprit cannot fall to please.
My daughter Mary is prodigiously talented at music.
Mr Darcy thinks of Miss Price singing when he speaks of esprit.
The fact she has 27,000 a year does Iend sparkle to her dreariest utterance.
- what? who told you that? - She did.
Unbidden.
Gleefully.
Am I not ghoulishly indiscreet? - Hey.
- Oh, Jane.
My heart has not beaten right since I discovered you were gone.
Oh.
Oh! I would never have allowed you out in such a storm.
Mr Bingley, you are to be chided - for drawing her here.
- Quite so, Mrs Bennet.
From start to finish my brother's every action has been unpardonable.
Mr Bingley has been the quiddity of kindness.
With the permission of my hosts, l am quite ready to return home.
Come on, Bingers.
Oh.
Right you are.
Um I'll bid you good day, madam.
That was pathetic.
Do you have brothers, Miss Price? - One brother, Kevin.
- Oh.
How lovely.
Does Kevin share your commodious residence? Oh, I wouldn't share a bag of chips with Kev if it could be avoided.
He's pretty feral.
He's 15.
Why doesn't he take a horse? He cannot ride.
Why doesn't one of you take one? They're not saddled.
To ride without a saddle would be monstrously indelicate.
On the subject of indelicacy, might I presume to advise you as you have advised me? Look to Mr Darcy.
He is an insufferable, proud man but he has qualities, he must have, that are not immediately apparent.
He is, after all, the bosom friend of Mr Bingley.
The formidable size of Mr Darcy's income makes us silly in his eyes, I know.
But you Your own wealth renders his fortune dwarfish.
Such a woman he could respect.
Jane, Darcy is not for me.
Darcy is for Elizabeth.
It is her destiny to be with him and it's yours to be with Bingley.
- I'm not fitted for Bingley.
- Mama! See, we are rescued! Oh, thank the Lord! Ladies.
I rather form the impression you are satisfied to meet his Majesty's mllitia.
Gentlemen, acquaint yourself with the roof.
We have acquired a most precious cargo that must be stowed within.
To whom do we owe the pleasure of this most felicitous offer? Captain Wickham, madam.
All felicity is entirely mine.
You are too kind, Mr Wickham.
Can I press you to take a dish of tea? Alas, madam, we are indefatigable in the defence of the realm, but I shall, if I may, call some other day to pay my respects.
Back off, Wickham, I know you.
But I have not had the pleasure.
Get used to that.
The first duty of an officer is, after all, gaiety.
- Mr Bennet - My dear Mrs Bennet.
How timely you are, at last.
Allow me to introduce my cousin, Mr Collins.
Ah.
I am honoured, sir.
I saw the carriage outside - but I did not - Oh, no, naturally.
The fayton is one of a fleet of 1 5 Belonging to my patroness, Lady Catherine de Bourgh.
She Ient it me specifically for the purpose.
For the purpose, Mr Collins? Of visiting you, Mrs Bennet.
And making the acquaintance of your famously radiant daughters.
- Is it they I see peeking, I wonder? - It is indeed.
Lydia Stand correctly.
This is Lydia.
And Come girls.
Come, come.
This is Kitty.
And Mary.
She is prodigiously talented at music.
Oh.
And Jane, my eldest daughter, who has not been well and is not Iooking her best.
Oh.
Dearest cousins, alI.
Mr Bennet, you must exult like a sultan when you gaze upon your adorable Iadies.
And this, therefore, is Miss Elizabeth.
Elizabeth is presently in town.
At this time of year? Well, we shall not tell Lady Catherine.
Her Ladyship is very firm about the season.
Er, we have in her place Miss Amanda Price.
You stay to dinner, Mr Collins? Mr Collins stay the fortnight.
- Is that not the plan? - Oh, two whole weeks.
We are so fortunate, Mr Bennet.
- Indeed, the Lord has smlled upon us.
- Oh.
Girls.
Mary, your spectacles are fllthy.
Lydia, do you have St Vitus Dance? I never beheld such a fidget.
Kitty, the drawing-up of phlegm through the nose is not the action of a Iady.
Jane, you Ient Miss Price your sllken scarf.
Get it back.
For what is now afoot in this household is neither for her benefit nor her entertainment.
I cannot impress upon you all that sufficient sufficiency Mr Collins must be given cause to bind himself to us, to love us, to to love one of us in particular.
Lord, let it be Kitty.
Lydia.
Mama, he is not comely.
Do you think I jest? I do not jest.
The woman Mr Collins marries be mistress of this house when your father is dead.
Now think on that and go about your business.
Collins, on the page, OK, he's pretty bad.
In the flesh he's all-time king of the mingers.
He squeezes himself through his trouser pocket.
You know the thing men do when they think you can't see? And then he sniffs his fingers! Elizabeth, Iisten.
Collins is supposed to marry Charlotte Lucas, OK? But your mother is just taking your sisters and just throwing them under him.
And Jane Jane's got to marry Bingley and she thinks he doesn't give a damn.
And frankly, he's not acting like he does.
He does but he's so bloody repressed, he can't express it.
I cannot do this without your help.
Big surprise, I have to.
Lizzie has told you, then, of our wretched condition pertaining to our present guest.
Mrs Bennet prescribes plenty of advantageous marriage.
It is a very sensible remedy and it makes me feel like a whoremonger.
It's not whoremongering to bring together people who are in love.
To marry for money is merely despicable.
To marry for beauty, that is a great foolishness.
But my wife was a great beauty.
Let your daughters marry for love and everything else come right.
Everything.
Just please don't allow any of them to marry Mr Collins.
In as much as it is in my power to allow anything in this famlly, I shall strive to that end.
Not even the silliest of my daughters deserves the Promethean misery of marriage to Collins.
Mr Collins.
Such a pretty day.
You find me picking roses.
Every rose would be this litte hand if it only could.
Sir, you kiss my glove.
I would kiss your every garment.
Charlotte Miss Lucas.
We need to talk.
You and I got off on the wrong foot.
You caught me out about the pig.
It made you think I am a liar.
But I did not lie to you about Elizabeth.
I don't know her the way that you know her but I know her very welI.
And she loves you, Charlotte.
You are her dearest, dearest friend.
This is all of a piece.
I am plain and rebarbative.
I'm 27 years old and I am lonley and Listen, there is someone here who's prepared to take you on.
I mean, dying to meet you.
Now move.
Oh, no.
- Mr Collins? - Miss Price.
- You're going to ruin those trousers.
- It is a possibllity a man must face.
- I fear, Miss Price, we intrude.
- That's exactly what we do.
Mr Collins, I can't help noticing that you are about to ask Miss Bennet here to marry you.
That would be a bad mistake.
For the sake of her famlly, she'd feel obliged to say yes.
But she's not the right person for you.
She just isn't.
There is someone else here who could give you love like no other.
(Gasps) Jane.
(Sobs) You bring Miss Lucas to Iend you the courage to tell me this.
I brought her because No, no, no.
what? No! The person I'm talking about Lady Catherine urged me to seek out spirit.
"Seek out spirit, Mr Collins," she cried.
The person I'm talking about is Charlotte Lucas.
But she is not the person of whom I speak, Miss Price.
I wish you to instruct Miss Price to quit this house.
At once, sir.
If you do not oblige me in this matter, sir, l believe I shall scream.
I believe you shalI.
Allow me to distract you with an observation.
Miss Price just announced her engagement to Mr Collins.
There must be a reason for this.
Though, I confess, I The reason is to spit on the territory of this deluded famlly.
Do you not think, Mrs Bennet, it might be in the interests of this "deluded famlly" To treat kindly the future Mrs Collins? Our survival, as you so assiduously remind me, my dear, at frequent intervals, depends on Mr Collins thinking of us with affection.
I'm not really going to have to marry Collins, am I? Oh, God, I am.
I'm bewitched.
I no Ionger have possession of my souI.
You must find that a nuisance.
It's not a nuisance, Darcy.
It's a passion.
It consumes me.
Yes.
You must permit me to remind you, Charles, that yesterday your soul had passed quite fully into the possession of Miss Price.
I was mistook.
Lord, that was a fancy.
Today your consumption by passion is the privllege of Miss Bennet.
Come to me in a year's time and protest your love for Miss Bennet, then shall I hear you.
Mr Bingley, Mr Darcy! Our rather grizzly relation Mr Collins is staying with us.
Don't say I said that.
You won't say I said that, you? He's only been here one night and he's proposed to Miss Price.
- Good Lord! - Isn't it immense? - ColossaI.
Has she accepted him? - They are to be married within a fortnight.
Come in and see this Collins for yourselves.
Oh, do say you shalI.
- We shalI.
- Hurrah! we shall have cake.
Are women not curious, Darcy? That a girl as decorative as Miss Price, who is not demonstrably occupied with husband hunting, should agree to marry this Collins? Altogether a rum business.
It is composed of egregiously rum ingredients.
So, let us view the sordid world of the Bennets.
Bingley, if you don't wake up and propose to Jane and I end up married to Collins, I shall have to invent mains electricity and kill myself.
- well, isn't this nice? - (Mrs Bennet sobs) So, who here Iacks acquaintance? Mr Bingley, let me present Mr Collins.
- And you, sir, are? - Papa, this is our saviour, - Captain Wickham.
- Very welI.
Our saviour Captain Wickham.
This gentleman is Mr Darcy.
Mr Bennet, may I have your permission to play the piano? At this hour? what would Lady Catherine say, Mr Collins? Her Ladyship has impeccable manners.
She would merely pretend not to notice.
Do it, Mary.
Captain Wickham, I at least I understand we must congratulate you, Miss Price.
Don't worry about me.
All that matters is that Jane remains free for Bingley.
But I must worry about you, Miss Price.
How you amuse yourself in a cottage on the boundary of my aunt's estate in the country? you not miss the society and cultural excitements of London? Well, I Um I intend to keep in touch.
Might we speak together for a moment? By all means.
Jane Do not presume to address me by my Christian name, Miss Price.
I may have few possessions to dispose as I please but that is one of them.
You led me to suppose that Mr Bingley loved me.
He does not.
Mr Collins was poised to make me an offer that would save my father I know exactly how it looks, but believe me, that isn't how it is.
Lady Ambrosia looks, sounds and smells like a pig.
When the time comes, l dare say she shall taste like a pig.
I call her a pig.
My dear? You are not chatty.
No.
The company of the Bennets is indeed demeaning.
But when we are conjoined in matrimony, with my exalted patronage and your income, we can turn our face toward more distinguished Iiaisons.
I confess it, Miss Price, you fascinate me.
I think you have endured great hardship in your life, as have I.
Oh, God.
Come on, then.
Get it over with.
Give me the shtick.
Tell me all about Darcy robbing you of what was rightfully yours.
So you have heard about this? I read about it.
Take my tip, Wickham.
Don't waste your time with this lot, especially Lydia, because I'm watching you.
Every time you try to pull a stroke, I be right behind you with a big neon sign, saying, "Don't trust this guy!" What is neon? Wait and see.
Miss Price, I fear that your life with Mr Collins may be short of gaiety.
And if you find yourself nonplussed by the anticipated pleasures of married life, call upon me and I shall redress the deficit.
Full marks for trying, George, but I wouldn't have my deficit redressed by you if you were the last man on earth.
- Oh, such great happiness.
- Ladies.
You, too.
Stick with the plan.
Mr Bingley, you take a turn with me around the garden? I find myself fantastically interested to see a vole.
Miss Bennet, Mr Bingley and I are going to look for voles.
Join us.
Who knows what we might discover.
Do say you , Miss Bennet.
I myself cannot navigate.
Without guidance I might easlly find myself in the duck pond.
Right, you go that way, I'll go this.
Sing out if you find anything.
What would you have me sing, Miss Price? For I have found something of great interest.
- What? - You.
You are not what you seem.
I can't disagree with that.
I know you have a very poor opinion of me.
That's the way you are at the moment and that's OK.
But one day, Mr Darcy, you thank me.
In the meantime you must content yourself with a warning.
If you wound Bingley, you find my displeasure baleful and entirely unrelenting.
- For my - Good opinion once lost is lost forever.
Yes, I know.
I have an announcement to make.
I am persuaded by the wisdom of Miss Price's advice and I am resolved to give a ball at Netherfield.
OK, I have cleaned my teeth with chalk, shaved my legs with some sort of potato peeler.
Oh, Lizzie, where are you? I cannot face Darcy without backup.
Miss Price, might I just trifle with your little cylinder? Oh.
You could park a bloody jumbo! I mean, it's an impressive facade.
My dear, wait untll you behold the clasping buttresses of Lady Catherine de Bourgh.
I'll bet her buttresses are pretty hardcore.
Miss Amanda Dawn Price, Mr william Zeal of the Lord Collins.
Zeal of the Lord? My parents were most devout.
Ah, I see the others are here before us.
I do so like this dance, Mr Bingley.
- It is so delicate.
- Exceedingly delicate.
- Also, it affords one the chance to talk.
- Yes.
Mr Bingley, it is clear that he sets great store by your advice.
Put in a good word for my Jane, hm? I certainly not hesitate to make my opinion known.
That's better.
He really is the most intractable man l ever met.
At Longbourn I said to him, "Mr Darcy, I have a wager with my sisters "that I can extract three whole words from you.
" Says he, "You lose.
" He's enough to make one park a bloody jumbo! Mr Darcy, you're not going to speak? All right, you'll have to Iisten.
I am right about Bingley and Jane Bennet.
Why else would I marry a muppet like Collins? To protect Jane.
You'll see.
You'll also see that I have the right woman for you.
You haven't met her yet but you're going to love her.
It's your duty.
I know everything.
Test me.
Ask me what I know about Wickham and what he did to your litte sister.
Darcy has many virtues.
Gallantry on the dance floor is not one of them.
For God's sake! Wickham? Wickham, we're so confused.
If Miss Price has such an income, why does she borrow Elizabeth's clothes? - The rich do as they please.
- I have litte enough interest in clothes, but even I would have a dress run up for a ball if I could.
- It is most eccentric.
- Hm.
Wickham, you cannot make a face like that and not explain it.
- Alas, I am sworn to secrecy.
- No, that not do.
This is the country.
In the country to keep a secret means that you tell it only to one person at a time.
- We three count as one.
- Then I have no choice.
The sartorial diffidence, the general demeanour of Miss Price may be ascribed to the oceanic origins of her fortune.
Maritime insurance? No, not exactly.
Right, this is good.
Is she not glorious? Miss Bennet, Darcy.
What's your opinion of her now? You must not ask me, Charles.
What I say may wound you.
Oh, it cannot.
I'm in love.
I'm invulnerable, like Ajax.
Ajax cut his own throat in a fit of pique.
Don't quibble, Darcy.
Miss Bennet is the instrument of Miss Price.
Miss Price is quite possibly the instrument of Satan.
A fool and his money.
The Bennets have not a farthing.
This is all a plot to gull you.
I don't care.
If you refuse to connect your actions to their inevitable consequences, you are a chlld.
Charles, the Bennet father fiddles whlle his fortune burns.
The mother, accordingly, is on the make.
The daughters are her pawns.
Miss Price gazes down on the whole pack of them and twists the strings to make them dance for her amusement.
They're all tainted.
Please have a care.
Miss Bingley.
It is a triumph.
I cannot conceive a more accomplished, elegant hostess.
Not even Lady Catherine de Bourgh? - Oh.
Oh, I - Do not tax yourself, Mr Collins.
It makes you look like a fish.
It is my pleasure Of course it is.
But what type of fish, Miss Price? A cod? A carp? I'm not an authority on fish.
Fish are in your blood.
Curious image, but you take my meaning.
Don't ask me.
I've never understood her as a character.
I need a drink.
Fishmongers? "Good money to be made in mongering fish," says Wickham.
Though, of course, Miss Price's father has drunk it all away.
On guard, Charles.
You're being pursued by one of the Misses Bennet.
I can't say for certain which one.
Ah, the lolloping one.
Lollops about after you like a litte spaniel.
Oh, here she comes.
Miss Bennet, I do so like your dress.
- Such wonderful materiaI.
- Thank you.
Charles, do go on.
Mr Bingley, you forget, you promised me this dance.
I have not forgotten.
Alas, events have overtaken my promise.
I am now engaged here.
- Woof! - Caroline What is the noun of assembly for all these Bennets? Clutch? Grasp? Infestation? I do as I am advised by Darcy to safeguard the honour of our name.
But I not tolerate unkindness.
Is that understood? I bring unfortunate news of Lady Catherine.
- Has she died? - No.
No! But her good opinion of her parson is gravely imperilled.
Lady Catherine could not entertain a union in which the dowry was founded on fruits of the sea.
The disciplines episcopal, if I might peek a litte into my own future, and piscatorial could never combine with propriety.
Do you understand? No.
A man marked for a bishopric cannot marry the daughter of a fishmonger.
It not do.
What? I withdraw my offer of marriage.
A fishmonger? Who told you that? It is common knowledge.
You litte tinker.
Miss Price, now that our formal relations are at an end, might I offer you a morsel of guidance? If you think that's wise.
It is unseemly for you to pursue the society of persons like Mr Darcy.
No, I am not candid.
It was unseemly when you were misthought a lady.
Now that you are disclosed as an impostor, it is a towering impertinence.
To be direct, I find, is best.
Me, too.
Oh! I do believe Miss Price just assaulted Mr Collins.
What? Is this an extra entertainment we have laid on? Miss Price.
- Still here? - Indeed.
An oversight you are now at lliberty to correct.
This is the ball at Netherfield.
Elizabeth's not here.
You're throwing me out for kneeing Collins in the balls.
It isn't quite how I imagined it.
I suppose he gets used to it, God, having fleets of cherubims singing hosannas to him for all eternity.
I shouldn't care for it.
How was the dancing? Was it gruesome? You are more of use to this famlly than all your sisters together.
For you are elegant and kindly and obedient.
And in the morning you shall come prettlly to breakfast and sit beside Mr Collins that he may see this lovely, lovely long neck.
Miss Bennet, good morning.
Good morning, Mr Collins.
What a bloody mess! On the whole, Miss Price, l find myself decided as to my future.
- I am for Africa.
- Africa? That be safe? I doubt it, but I mean to devote myself there as a missionary.
l cannot say Lizzie has behaved well.
Jane smlles and laughs but she is wounded that her sister is not come to see her wed.
In Hammersmith this means we part as friends.
The time is come, Miss Price, when we cannot, in all conscience, detain you further with our hospitality.
Upon your return to Longbourn, you will collect what is yours and surrender what is not, and you will Ieave my house.
Are you very angry about my fishy tales? My dad's an accountant.
Much more interesting if he actually was a fishmonger.
How very alike we are, Miss Price.
We see the world the same way.
We have the same scent.
I can smell myself on you.
Why didn't you do something about it? Collins is ghastly.
How would you like to go to bed and have his hand slithering all over your arse? - Miss Price! - I'm sorry, but My God, I'm so close to jacking this whole thing in.
But you You should not have given up.
It was badly done, Bingley.
Badly done.
And now you're running away.
It's not that I am especially weak, Miss Price, but that my friend is strong.
He construes truly where others falter.
I am a falterer.
I rely on his construction.
Darcy.
This is what is so frustrating.
You're better than this.
I know you are because I've had you in my head, Fitzwilliam Darcy, since I was 12 years old.
So why are you behaving like such a total git? Jane has no money.
So what? Bingley's got stacks.
What right have you to trash their love because of an accident of birth.
There is no accident in birth.
- Do you know why I am so angry? - You were born thus.
I have been in love with your life for 14 years.
Cut my heart out, Darcy, it's your name written on it with Elizabeth's.
God almighty, here you are.
One half of the greatest love story ever told.
You.
And do you know what? You don't deserve her.
Is this interview concluded? It is very difficult to tell.
You are such a disappointment, l can hardly bear to look at you.
A deprivation I shall endure as stoically as I can.
You're so relentlessly unpleasant.
- I just can't get at the real you.
- Madam Behold, Fitzwilliam Darcy.
I am what I am.
If you find yourself unable "to get at" an alternative version, I must own to being glad.
I despise the intrusions of a woman so singularly dedicated to mendacity, disorder and lewdness.
They repel me.
You repel me.
You are an abomination, madam.
Good afternoon to you.
If I dream about him tonight, l shall be really angry.
I'm going to dream about him.
Well, I hope in my dream you choke.
Hateful man!