No Thank You, Mr Darcy

by Lucy Tilney

  He paused and smoothed his hands over his face, “Then when Lady Fitzwilliam suggested that even Leopold with his one functional brain cell might not want to hitch himself to an unstable cannon she managed to slip out of Alndale Castle in the middle of the night and took off to Eastbourne with the appalling Honourable Lotty Bellamy.”

  “The girl the newspapers call the Dishonourable Lot? Oh, Fitzwilliam, Georgiana is leading you a merry dance!”

  “Merry wouldn’t be my first choice of adjective,” he said inspecting an iridescent beetle making its way down the sleeve of his fine, dove grey wool suit, “Lotty is the hapless Lord Bellamy’s too happy daughter and I’m sure it was she who introduced her George. The private detective I have keeping an eye on them in Brighton suspects she is a cocaine addict.”

  Georgiana had said she had very few friends her uncle approved of and that she desperately wanted his approval. She wondered if it was worth mentioning and decided against it but just then he put his arms around her and drew her close with a kiss. Elizabeth sighed with contentment and helped the beetle now continuing his peregrinations along her leg onto a convenient leaf. He watched her do it with a smile.

  “If Leopold wasn't such a twit I'd give him Pemberley, change all our names to Smith, and you and I and Annette would sneak off to my villa on Lake Geneva. All mail regarding Aunt Catherine, Georgiana, and Ophelia would never get further than my lawyers in Paris and we'd all live happily – and ignorantly – ever after.”

  “Fitzwilliam!”

  “But unfortunately,” he said with a twinkle, “Leopold is a twit and the legal rigmarole to give Pemberley to anyone else would take up the rest of my life, so alas my love, we will have to live with my family. Now I must away, as excellent as my secretary usually is except when dealing with certain telegrams, I need to go into my office.”

  “Very well, but does that mean I have to stop sitting here kissing you?”

  “I'm afraid so,” and with one last, long, caress of the lips he stood up.

  “By the way, have you told your family? I'm not quite sure about your father, should I be going to ask him for your hand or will he dismiss me with a well-aimed volume of Nazianzen?”

  Elizabeth had already determined to tell her father herself to soften him up for the idea - a notion he would undoubtedly say should be left in the novels of Maria Edgeworth. She also didn’t want to steal Jane’s glory and explained to Darcy that, being twice as rich as Charles, he might eclipse him in her mother’s eyes. If Darcy privately thought that Charles and Jane, might enjoy an eclipse of Mrs. Bennet’s attentions he was too polite to say so and Elizabeth continued content in the notion she was promoting her sister’s happiness.

  She walked with him to the door and watched him straighten his gloves and slip into the driver’s seat of the now familiar Silver Ghost marvelling at how a career woman from the provinces ended up engaged to ‘the most eligible bachelor in the British Empire’ and that the splendid townhouse on whose steps she stood would soon be her home for part of the year. She chuckled in anticipation of telling Lily.

  Lily! With a shock, she realised she was still employed at the ‘Twenty’ magazine and apart from a brief phone call from Calais her they were in ignorance. She let the car disappear around the corner and dashed indoors.

  He had told her if she needed to make a telephone call to use his personal ‘phone so she found his study in shades of cream and myriad greens and settling in behind the carved William Morris desk she telephoned her aunt with all the news she could possibly share.

  Later that morning she took Annette to Georgiana’s dressmaker. Annette had never been to a dressmaker at all, all her clothes had been made on a little treadle machine Mrs. Younge had sponged from a neighbour in Sittingbourne and nothing but the fact that the appointment had been made by Snooty himself (Elizabeth was not above a nickname for her future husband's secretary) would have convinced Madame Justine to permit her across her threshold. Elizabeth's experience was wider from Mrs. Porter in Meryton to the establishment catering for ladies on the fringes of Bohemia where most of her own clothes were made but nothing could have prepared her for the opulence of Maison Justine. From the pale peach walls to the silk covered chairs and the elaborate, exquisite chandeliers the effect would not have been out of place in Buckingham Palace and Madame Justine herself, severe in black relieved only by a rope of stupendous pearls, was only slightly less approachable than Queen Mary. Elizabeth could barely take her eyes off the pearls but Annette, who had been filled in on much by telephone conversations with her mother’s old lady’s maid, whispered that her lover was the Duc de Turenne and that explained that.

  It took three hours and the making of subsequent appointments for both of them but she rejoiced to see under the tutelage of the corsetière and the lady who advised on colours that Annette began to look like the granddaughter of an earl.

  When they, at last, returned to the house in Berkeley Square, not even having been to a tea room, they found Darcy pacing around the hall.

  “My love, we have an important appointment.”

  “An appointment?” Elizabeth had just begun to remove a hat pin.

  “In Albemarle Street,” he smiled and behind him, Robards unsuccessfully tried to hide a smile of his own.

  “Why Albemarle Street and why is poor Foster being left behind?” She slid into the seat next to him.

  “Because this is none of Foster’s business. He’s taking Mrs. Foster out to dinner on me and we are going to make an important decision. Then we going to dinner at Claridges.”

  Elizabeth decided to let it go and be surprised. “I love being in the car with you. You drive differently from Jane, it’s fun.”

  He chortled, “I choose to be flattered that my driving a Rolls Royce in London is a different experience from your sister ferrying you around the country roads of Hertfordshire in your father’s Austin. You must learn to drive yourself. I'll have Foster teach you.”

  “Not you?”

  He laughed, “Not me. I don’t have the patience. I tried to teach Georgiana during one of our truces; it was a terrible experience for us both and all my fault. I handed her over to Foster and she was proficient in no time.”

  Elizabeth wanted to feel he was, underneath it all, a patient man but, despite the fact that he had told her he had never been on a bus, she couldn’t help but remember Mrs. Hill’s maxim: If you’re not on the bus before the one you need to be on, you’re late. It was Darcy to a tee.

  “Ah, here we are,” he said pulling into the kerb and not noticing the smile around her lips, “and exactly on time.”

  A liveried doorman stepped out from the pavement to make sure they parked safely. The heroine of a ‘Twenty’ story would have gasped because they had parked immediately outside Garrards who had made the Imperial crown of India, Queen Mary's coronation crown, and cut the Kohi-Noor but, she noted with a private grin, she was already getting used to what it meant to be a Darcy. She half wondered how even Fitzwilliam was going to top the perfect diamond encircled periwinkle sapphire that Charles had given Jane.

  They were escorted through the magnificent shop to a small but beautifully appointed room at the back with formal yet comfortable chairs, a small table, and a mirror.

  “If you will wait here, Miss Bennet, Mr. Darcy, I will return in a moment,” the manager all but bowed and a much less observant person than Elizabeth would have been aware that this was quite a day for him.

  “I am glad I am to be allowed to choose my own ring,” she said squeezing his hand, “Charles chose Jane’s for her.”

  “To match her eyes,” he murmured as their eyes met in an affectionate laugh at the romantic notions of their nearest and dearest.

  “I have to confess I am not quite as…” but his confession was prevented by the appearance of a young man with a tray of sparkling rings followed by the manager bearing a salver containing a single glimmering gem.

  Elizabeth would never have described herself as a
connoisseur of precious stones but she knew of diamonds, rubies, emeralds, and sapphires although her personal collection consisted of nothing grander than citrines and moonstones and the aquamarine cross that had been her sixteenth birthday present.

  The jewel being held out to her by the white-gloved manager of the king’s jeweller was a deep clear heliotrope and when he moved the tray under the light brilliant lavender meteors flashed in its blue depths.

  “What is it?” she breathed.

  ”It’s a purple diamond,” said Darcy, “my mother always wanted a purple diamond but they are extremely rare and it’s even rarer to find one this clear at this size. I telephoned yesterday to ask if there were any unusual stones available and when they told me about this I simply had to let you see it.”

  “It is 7.3 carat and one of the last stones to come from Russia before the revolution,” said the manager. “I have never seen one this splendid in nearly forty years in this business.”

  “As it’s a radiant cut I had thought to flank it with small white diamonds from my grandmother’s collection,” said Darcy, “but truly Elizabeth, if you want any other stone, please say so. The entire shop is at your disposal.”

  “I would love this,” she marvelled at even getting the words out, “it's the most beautiful thing I've ever seen.”

  The manager beamed, “I can say on behalf of everyone at Garrard’s that we are exceedingly honoured to be making a Darcy engagement ring. Mr. Darcy, if you can have Lady Victoria’s diamonds delivered to us our designer will be in touch with Miss Bennet shortly with some sketches.”

  “Are you alright?” he asked as they walked towards the car with the same liveried doorman standing by to see them back in it.

  There was no point in demurring and saying she was fine, with his hand on her elbow he could feel her shaking.

  “I suppose I expected to walk in, sit at a counter, and choose from some rings in a case,” she said, “forgive me, my darling, but an hour ago I couldn't have imagined there was such a thing as a Russian purple diamond or that you would have a ring especially made for me.”

  He tipped back the brim of her hat to better kiss her.

  “And I couldn’t imagine giving you anything ready-made.”

  “I lied about one thing, Fitzwilliam. You are more beautiful than the diamond.”

  CAMBRIDGE

  Elizabeth’s visit to her parents’ new home in Cambridge did not go well. To her mother’s fury, her father had persuaded Mrs. Hill it was her duty to remain as housekeeper to Longbourn’s new tenant whenever they should move in and Phoebe had been forced to find her own completely new staff with whom she found fault continuously and Gilbert avoided the issue by dining in college.

  He did, however, eat with them at home on her first night but after a short while, she began to regret it and would have preferred to have dealt with her mother alone. There was a definite tension between her parents and no sign of the much hoped for growing together.

  “Have you been for your final fitting for your bridesmaid’s gown?” demanded Phoebe the moment the soup was served.

  “Of course, and it now fits perfectly.”

  Phoebe sniffed. The clock that had hung in the morning room at Longbourn was now over the sideboard in the dining room where, for the first time, Elizabeth noticed it had a slow, almost humming tick which did nothing to improve her nervousness.

  “I think it very bad of Mrs. Bingley to simply take over and choose the wedding dress, that was my place as the bride’s mother. Who does she think she is? She has two girls of her own, after all.”

  She glared at Elizabeth as if she thought she might know.

  “Jane chose her gown,” said her father wearily as if for the hundredth time, “Rose Bingley simply paid for it.”

  “I still think it bad,” said Phoebe sourly, “we can afford to buy our own daughter a dress, thank you very much.”

  Elizabeth who had seen the dress and who had a pretty good idea of the price of the four bridesmaid’s dresses thought unlikely, at least there was no way they could afford it comfortably. With her mother at the table though there was no possibility of finding out what was going on - what had been spent, what would be spent, and what kind of financial mess they would be in afterwards.

  “Your father is being a miser. He refuses to give Jane a decent wedding despite the fact this house is so much cheaper to run than Longbourn, he no longer has to give Mary an allowance, and the vast amount of rent that is coming in from Longbourn.”

  Elizabeth took a deep breath and kept eating with the occasional twinge of desire to laugh that the idea that Mary’s allowance could make a dent in the cost of a wedding. The meal passed uncomfortably with Phoebe scuppering any attempt at conversation that wasn’t about Jane’s wedding and then complaining bitterly about Mrs. Bingley, Edith Leigh, May Oliver, and everyone else Jane had chosen to involve. After an age and clinging hard to old standards she took her coffee to the drawing room leaving Elizabeth, Lydia, and their father at the table.

  “I assume the issue is jealousy of Mrs. Bingley?” she asked as a conversation starter.

  “That’s about it,” said Lydia, “she’s been like a bear with a sore head since Mrs. Bingley wanted to buy Jane’s gown. Excuse me, I have verbs to learn.”

  Verbs! Elizabeth’s sip of her coffee took a wrong turning.

  “It’s not only Mrs. Bingley and the gown,” said her father when Lydia could be heard running up the stairs, “it’s the whole do. She wanted the sort of wedding Charles can afford to pay for and Jane insisted on the wedding I can afford to pay for. Your mother’s response has been to go to town, literally. She’s ordering whatever she possibly can from London. Jane left her with the designs for the attendants’ dresses and as you know they’re being made in London instead of Meryton, she’s ordered a trousseau that Jane didn’t want from every fashion house she can think of, she tried to book caterers from London instead of using the Netherfield staff until Lady Hurst’s pride intervened, the cake is coming from Harrods and enough champagne to float a battleship has been delivered to Arnold and Florence so let’s hope Florence doesn’t slosh it all back between now and the day. It goes on and on, Lizzy. I’m at my wits’ end and I have no idea how I’m going to pay for it all. You know we’ve never been good at saving.”

  All of Elizabeth’s worst fears were realised. She took a mouthful of coffee to calm her nerves and asked how much.

  “Thousands,” he said with a little shrug, “I’ve got a valuer coming to look at your grandfather’s paintings. I don’t think he has anything magnificently value, no Rembrandts sadly, but I might be able to cover it if we’re lucky.”

  Elizabeth was briefly enveloped in that old familiar sorrow that came from knowing neither of her parents had ever had an ounce of sense about money. Her father spent his university salary on books and travel and the family lived on what was left plus the income from the indifferently managed estate. Phoebe spent merrily and her father had always let her up to the last farthing but never over. Until now.

  She asked although knowing it was a silly question if her mother knew how much money there actually was. Of course, she did. She was forever in the bank, she saw Longbourn’s ledgers, and even she could balance a cheque book. Her father made a steeple of his fingers and gazed into his cup. The furrow between his eyebrows had got deeper since she last saw him and she was unaccustomed to the thinness of his lips and the fact that he wasn’t adding a dash of brandy to his coffee. He shrugged.

  “I have told her but she’s run away with the idea of untold riches from the letting of Longbourn but, Lizzy, most of that is going back into Longbourn, there were so many repairs to do and God Himself only knows what the tenant will find when she eventually moves in. The house needed the promise of a great deal and there was so much on the estate itself but your mother refuses to accept any of that and chooses to believe I want to give Jane what she charmingly refers to as a ‘pauper’s wedding’. The reality is that ever
ything Jane originally wanted was well within my ability to pay for and rather lovely too.”

  Lydia was gnawing away at Italian verbs when Elizabeth found her. She had been put in touch by their old headmistress with some women undergraduates who did a little tutoring and Italian was the language on offer. Elizabeth made herself comfortable on the pink candlewick bedspread. At least the bed littered with toffee wrappers and magazines still looked like Lydia’s bed.

  “You were right, Lizzy,” Lydia put down her book and pinched the bridge of her nose, “at least you were right about Meryton being a stagnant, middle-class puddle and I'm glad I got into a scrape that will force me not to spend the rest of my life in it.”

  Elizabeth resisted the chiding that came to her lips. It was water under the bridge, she reminded herself, and Lydia had as much right to look on her past with pain, pleasure or even profitability, as anyone else.

  “Daddy brought a lot of old newspapers with him,” she stood up and produced a tin of biscuits from a shelf, “shall I make us tea? And I found an article about some character called Noel Pemberton Billing...”

  Elizabeth stifled a grin.

  “He was MP for East Hertfordshire at the end of the war and he wrote absolutely insane things in the papers about loose women being a danger to the country. He said that women doing war work were using it as a cover for laviscious behaviour even with each other... like Elsa and Pansy...” she broke off giggling for a moment, “and that the wives of senior civil servants were being seduced by German temptresses and spilling state secrets and that we were all crazy about men in uniform (nothing wrong with that, eh?) and British women only wanted dark-skinned men and the Germans were going to destroy Britain by making all our chaps effeminate…”