by Meg Osborne
“It is not so unusual,” he grumbled, at last. “I am more like my father, whereas Georgiana favours our mother in colouring.” And temperament. He could already feel a flare of irritation at being forced to be polite to a group of laughing ladies.
“Indeed!” Mrs Bennet blinked as if she had a particle of dust in her pale, watery eyes. “I see the same differences in my own daughters. Mary and Lizzy, over there, take after my dear departed husband, whereas Kitty, Lydia and Jane are much more my own daughters.”
Jane reached out and took her mother’s hand, giving it an affectionate squeeze, and the motion recalled Darcy to the knowledge that she was but recently widowed, and he instantly repented of his irritation towards her. Poor Mrs Bennet was still adjusting to life without her husband, living in an entirely new county. If part of her settling into her new life included making asinine observations about her new acquaintances, then he ought to allow it. What harm did it cause?
“You need not strive so completely to disown Mary and me, Mama,” Elizabeth called from her corner. “Mr Darcy will take you at your word and think he has wandered into the midst of a great family divide.”
Darcy frowned, but when he glanced at Elizabeth he saw her eyes sparkled with fun and he realised she was teasing Mrs Bennet. He braced, waiting for some angry rebuff from her mother at speaking so freely before the man who had become their landlord, but instead, Mrs Bennet waved her away, dismissing her daughter with a wry smile. She turned to Georgiana, seeking to engage her once more in conversation.
“Tell me, Miss Darcy, are you not lonely spending so much time at your estate and not surrounded by other young ladies?”
Darcy’s ears were attuned to his sister, wondering the very same thing himself. Ought he to have striven more to encourage Georgiana to socialise? He had assumed her to be like him, prone to finding her own company far preferable to that of others. Seeing her as she was now, laughing and smiling and surrounded by other young ladies of her approximate age he wondered if he had done her a disservice. Her answer, when it came, confirmed it.
“I am not prone to loneliness, Mrs Bennet,” she began, her voice softening as her answer continued. “But I confess that often Pemberley can seem a very large, very empty house. I am very happy, therefore, to know that within the walls of this very cottage I might find friendship. At least, I hope I might.”
“Indeed you must!” Mrs Bennet asserted, her voice rising in both pitch and volume. “Mr Darcy! Tell your sister she must spend just as much time as she wishes in our home. I will not care to think of her wasting away alone in that elegant estate. No, indeed! It is not good for young girls to lack company. Miss Darcy, you must get to know my daughters better, and find friends in each of them. Mr Darcy!”
This was spoken in such a staccato of agitation that Darcy was not sure how much of it was addressed to him, and how much his name was merely used as punctuation for Mrs Bennet’s own thoughts on what was truly necessary to the benefit of young ladies. He had never felt more male, and more out of his depth than he had at that moment. He expected a discussion on the merits of muslin to follow and then he really would be lost. Instead, Elizabeth Bennet was the next to speak.
“Are you musical, Miss Darcy? I fancy I heard tell that you are. My sister Mary is also musical, although we are without a piano.”
“Oh! Then she must play mine!” Georgiana turned to Darcy. “Must she not, brother?”
Darcy nodded, turning to Elizabeth and poised to say that each of the sisters must feel as free as they liked to come up to the house and play the piano, or tour the rooms. We have a very well-stocked library, also, if your sisters care to read, Miss Elizabeth, and gardens...
He did not say any of this, however, and it was not until Mrs Bennet prompted Mary to speak that the silence was broken.
“You see Mary? There is a solution for your complaining! Mr Darcy, my daughter would scarcely remark on the beauty of our little home without bemoaning the lack of space it afforded a piano. A piano! I ask you. What use have we for such an instrument, for Mary is the only one that plays it -”
“Yes, and doesn’t she just! Banging up and down scales and alternating dreary old church hymns.” Lydia shuddered, teasing her sister in a manner that bordered on cruel. Her own eyes flashed, but it was not the warm, gentle light that tempered Elizabeth’s teasing. He felt a striking realisation of how different the sisters were, and turned, himself, to Mary.
“Miss Mary, you are welcome. My sister is indeed musical, and I am sure she will value having a companion who shares her interests.” He cleared his throat. “Miss Elizabeth, are you musical?”
“Me?” Elizabeth laughed, and Darcy felt a flicker of embarrassment at being caught out in some way he did not quite understand. He straightened, determining he would not speak again, for he seemed perennially to be a source of amusement to these women.
“No, Mr Darcy,” Elizabeth said, quietly, her voice softening. “Alas, I am not musical. But I love to hear it played, and played well.”
“Well, there are other things at Pemberley,” Georgiana said, stoutly. “You must come anyway. You must all come. There is a beautiful garden, and oh! William, the hot-house. We must cut some flowers. If only I had thought, we might have brought them with us. And the library...”
“You have a library?”
Darcy turned back to Elizabeth, then, unable to avoid her, in spite of his determination to no longer be a point of ridicule. He saw her features enlivened with interest.
“Do you read, Miss Elizabeth?”
The question was out before he was even aware of asking it.
“My sister is an avid reader, Mr Darcy.” Jane’s soft voice rang with pride and loyalty. “I fear now that she hears tell of a library you will never be rid of her.”
Darcy smiled and was gratified to see it returned in Elizabeth’s features. He opened his mouth to say more but before he could form his words, Georgiana clapped her hands.
“Exactly so! You must all come, just as often as you please, for I have decided we shall be friends, and so you must think yourself welcome, always, in our home.”
ELIZABETH COULDN’T sleep. It was late, and the family had retired to bed hours ago, but she lay awake, listening to the strange sounds made by their new house and wondering how many nights she would spend like this until they became familiar.
Jane let out a sigh, and Lizzy stated, surprised to realise that her sister, who had lain motionless and silent all night, was also wide awake.
“Jane?” She whispered into the darkness.
“Sorry, Lizzy,” Jane’s murmured voice came back. “Did I wake you?”
Elizabeth shuffled into a sitting position.
“Can’t you sleep either?”
“No.” Jane chuckled. “I keep listening for the creak of the gate at home, even though I know we are not in Longbourn anymore. It did not bother me in London! Truly I never lay awake at Aunt and Uncle Gardiner’s expecting to hear sounds from Hertfordshire but here...”
“Here is like home, but it is not home,” Lizzy agreed. “Yet.” She smiled, injecting her voice with an optimism she did not entirely feel. “It will soon become so, I am sure. We have been here but a day, and can hardly expect things to feel natural at first.”
Mary let out a muffled snore and rolled over, and both older girls held their breaths lest their whispers wake her. When she was certain that Mary still slept, Lizzy threw her bedsheets back and slipped out of her bed, tiptoeing across the bare wood floors to Jane’s own bed, which she clambered into.
“Move over!” she whispered, and, giggling, Jane complied, shifting over so that she lay flat against the wall and Lizzy had just enough room to slide in beside her. “There. Now we can talk and not worry about disturbing Mary. I envy her her sleep. You and I shall be half-dead come the morning!”
“As if you are ever bothered by a lack of sleep!” Jane said, stifling a yawn. “I do not know how you do it. One late night and I am a wreck for
days.”
“Nonsense!” Lizzy countered her. “You are a joy to behold, always, and far better tempered than I, even when I have the luxury of a whole night of dreamless oblivion!”
She turned so that her face was inches away from her sister’s.
“Jane, do you regret coming here?” Her breath hitched. “Tell me truthfully. Do you wish you might have stayed in London, closer to Mr B- closer to Aunt and Uncle Gardiner?”
Jane did not reply straight away, for which Lizzy was grateful. A pause to collect her thoughts suggested she would share them honestly, rather than answering with the memorised response she knew Lizzy longed to hear. Lizzy took a breath, preparing herself for her sister’s answer.
“I do not regret coming here,” Jane murmured, softly. “I think you are right, it shall become a home to us and we might be very happy here. It is not unlike Longbourn, after all, with its greenery. And how pleasant we shall find it with Miss Darcy at the big house to call on. And Mr Darcy of course.” Jane fixed Lizzy with a look she could not quite understand, but before she could question her on it, Jane had moved on and spoken of the other matter Lizzy had unintentionally alluded to.
“As for Mr Bingley - do not fib and pretend his was not the name that was on your lips just now. I was sorry to leave him, and his sister, both. I felt certain they were becoming, or at least had the chance of becoming, friends.” She smiled, but it was not an entirely happy one, and Lizzy felt her heart sink. “It was not to be, however, and I cannot mourn what was not real!”
“You can,” Lizzy countered. “How many times have I been in the depths of despair over the fate of some hero in a book? Do not discount your feelings, Jane! I only wish that Mr Darcy might have had a spare cottage to rent us in Hertfordshire, then we might have stayed close by and you might not have been wrenched away so suddenly from your beloved!”
“He was not my beloved!” Jane sighed. “Lizzy, you think too much of romance, and ensuring I marry! You ought to spare at least the same amount of concern for your own heart.”
Elizabeth stiffened. What did Jane mean by that? She opened her mouth to quiz her sister further, but Mary murmured in her sleep and both sisters fell silent once more. When all was still, Lizzy looked back across at her sister and was surprised to see Jane watching her carefully. Fearing some deeper inquisition, she grinned and pulled the sheets up to her sister’s nose.
“Goodnight, sister dear! No more listening for creaking gates. You must dream of balls and handsome young men, and imagine what larks we shall get up to when we go exploring tomorrow. I intend on discovering the gardens Georgiana mentioned, and I’ve no doubt you shall be enraptured by the works of art that are sure to reside within the walls of the great house. Get some rest, or I shall be forced to rethink my opinion of you, bad-tempered sister that you are!”
With a whispered laugh, she slipped away from Jane’s bed and back into her own, rolling over to face the wall. She listened as her sister’s breaths grew slower and more measured until at last, she was sure she was the only one still awake when her mind turned once more to Jane’s words. You ought to spare at least the same concern for your own heart. What foolishness! There was nobody Lizzy was even close to admitting any affections for. If only life could be so easy as to drop a gentleman for Jane in Mr Bingley and another just like him for Lizzy. Alas, it did not seem likely. Even less so in Derbyshire than it might have been in London. I shall not mourn it! Lizzy told herself. She was far more particular than her sister, and could not countenance marrying without only the very deepest affection.
At last her eyelids grew heavy and it was then that the memory of Mr Darcy floated through her mind. Her eyes flew open as she made the connection. Jane thought a match possible between her and Mr Darcy! What nonsense. The thought made Lizzy’s heart pound, and as she struggled to find a comfortable position in which to lie she wondered what had possessed her sister to come to such an idea. Mr Darcy was handsome, of course, and intelligent, and, she supposed, kind, for he had offered her family a solution to a problem that was not of his making nor his responsibility to assist in. It was interesting to see him here, in Derbyshire, and contrast it to how he had appeared in London. There he had seemed stilted, ill at ease, removed to the point of rudeness. But here...he was almost a different person altogether.
If only he were a different person altogether... she mused, as sleep at last found her. Then, dear sister, I might be able to consider your proposal...
Chapter Twelve
“Perhaps we ought to wait a while before calling on the great house.”
The cottage had been in such a flurry of excitement that morning that Elizabeth’s suggestion that they postpone their visit to Mr and Miss Darcy at their home was met with a chorus of complaints.
“Why must you spoil all our fun?”
“Oh, but I am so longing for some music!”
“Miss Darcy said we may call.”
“Really, Elizabeth, they were so insistent that I quite honestly think it would be considered rude not to go.”
This last was offered by Mrs Bennet who was at least as excited as any of her daughters at the prospect of calling on their neighbours and seeing the inside of Pemberley with her own eyes, for she had heard of its elegance and longed to judge it for herself.
Only Jane remained silent, which seemed to Lizzy even worse a judgment than the volatile complaints of her other sisters. The back of her neck tingled as she recalled their whispered conversation the previous evening and she wondered what conclusion - erroneous or otherwise - Jane was drawing from this apparent about-face.
“We are here for a year. There is no hurry, surely?” Lizzy continued. “We might go tomorrow, or next week...”
“Or this very afternoon!” Lydia cried. “As we have said we will. Honestly, Lizzy, what is the matter with you? There is nothing wrong with us accepting an invitation. And we are neighbours!”
Lizzy glanced around the breakfast table, realising that each of her sisters opposed her, and without a sensible reason were not willing to listen. When pressed to consider her cause, she herself could find no suitable explanation for her sudden reluctance to visit Pemberley, only that for some reason she could not quite put her finger on the idea that only yesterday had been so appealing to her was rather less so now that the hour approached. Elizabeth drew in a long breath.
“Very well, then, if everyone is agreed. I merely feared our imposition.”
“It is no imposition!” Lydia replied, through clenched teeth. “We were invited. Anyone would think you do not wish to see Georgiana again or Mr Darcy, with your determination to spoil our plans!”
Lizzy felt a hot flush burn in her cheeks and busied herself with her breakfast, not daring to look up at Jane for fear her reaction would be noticed and held against her. It was all Jane’s fault to begin with, Lizzy thought. She had possessed no particular thoughts towards Fitzwilliam Darcy one way or another until her sister had raised the matter. Lizzy swallowed, waiting for the conversations around the breakfast table to return to normal. Her sisters soon fell to discussing what they most looked forward to visiting at Pemberley from the piano, to the grounds, to the library, and it became apparent that each sister anticipated finding her Palace Beautiful within Pemberley’s walls.
With such promise awaiting them, it was not long before they embarked upon their journey, with kitty and Lydia hurrying on ahead, flanked, to everyone’s surprise, by Mary, whose eagerness to sit before a piano once more gave her energy. Elizabeth and Jane walked side by side with their mother, at an altogether slower pace, their conversation dominated by Mrs Bennet’s running commentary on the trees, the pale blue of the hills in the distance, the greenery of the lawns, the grandness of Mr Darcy’s estate and so on. She could not tell if she imagined it or not but Lizzy was quite sure that at every mention of Mr Darcy that passed her mother’s lips, Jane turned to look at her, as if waiting for some reaction. Lizzy ignored both sister and mother, lifting her chin and gazin
g into the distance, so that of the three she was the first to spy the grand house that must be Pemberley, and her mouth fell open in shock.
She must have made a noise, for both Mrs Bennet and Jane looked up and were equally struck by the imposing building.
“Goodness!” Jane cried.
“What richness!” Mrs Bennet picked up her pace so that she was fairly running towards the house. “Girls! Come along quickly! We must not keep them waiting!”
“They do not know what hour to expect us, Mama!” Lizzy groaned, before clutching her skirts and hurrying after her.
“I did not realise Pemberley was as grand as this!” Jane hissed, as they slowed their pace on approach.
“Nor I.” Lizzy’s eyes widened as she glanced about them, taking in the wide lawns and gardens, which looked elegant but a little unkempt, even to her ill-educated eyes.
“Here, girls!” Mrs Bennet forced all of her daughters to stop, and breathe five deep, slow breaths before going a step further, to ensure they were not flushed or breathless upon meeting their neighbours. Lizzy complied, although she rolled her eyes at Mama’s ridiculous notions of propriety. The woman who had run was now fanning herself uselessly with her hand, and struggling to catch her own breath.
“Mama, must we wait here any longer?” she asked at length. “If Miss Darcy should happen to glance out of any one of four windows she would see us standing here in a circle and wonder whether we are all in our right minds!”
Mrs Bennet yelped, looking up at the house and seeing her daughter was right she hurried everyone once more into motion, waiting only for someone else to brave the door knocker. At length, Elizabeth stepped forward, but it was Lydia who darted in front of her to knock loudly and long on the door, which swung open almost immediately.
“Mrs Bennet and the Miss Bennets to call on Miss Georgiana Darcy,” Elizabeth said.
“And Mr Darcy,” Lydia put in, quickly. “Her brother.”
