by Jessie Lewis
Godfrey slowed before the door, and Bingley’s insides lurched at the prospect of seeing Elizabeth again and then twisted with guilt and vexation for being still so hopelessly affected by her. The door swung open, and husband and wife stood to greet him.
“Has Jane not come with you?” Elizabeth enquired.
“Er, no, she is still abed.”
“Oh.”
She sounded horribly disappointed, and he scrambled to preserve her feelings. “But she does not know I have called. We did not return home until very late last night, and I did not wish to wake her so early.”
“Early? ’Tis nearly ten o’clock!”
“That is early for Bingley,” Darcy stated, resuming his seat and motioning for a footman to clear the table at which they sat. Only then did Bingley notice it was laid out for breakfast.
“Forgive me, I would not wish to interrupt your meal. I did not expect to find you eating.”
“That is my doing,” Elizabeth admitted. “Your poor friend—I am imposing my will at every turn. His life will be unrecognisable within a twelvemonth.”
“What else remains for you to alter that you have not already?” Darcy replied seriously. How the man could be so advantageously wed, yet remain perpetually dissatisfied, Bingley knew not.
At Elizabeth’s insistence, he accepted a cup of coffee and sat down. He consciously chose a seat facing Darcy, which afforded him naught but a stiff neck since she proceeded to do all the talking and Darcy barely any, requiring him to twist awkwardly towards her for most of the visit.
“How did you like all Darcy’s other friends?” Bingley enquired when it came to discussing the dinner he had declined to attend.
“I thought them universally charming,” she replied. “I got on particularly well with Mr. Ferguson and his wife, and Mr. Montgomery was his usual, gentle self.”
“Montgomery is liked wherever he goes,” Darcy agreed.
“More so now he has made his fortune, I imagine,” Bingley quipped. “Perhaps I ought to introduce him to Caroline.”
“You must act quickly then, for I do not think he will remain available for long,” Elizabeth said. “Not now that Mrs. Sinclair has set her sights on him.”
Bingley almost choked. “I do not think even Montgomery is that amenable.”
“Not for herself!” Elizabeth protested, laughing. “For Miss de Bourgh! In lieu of Colonel Fitzwilliam, who has been Lady Catherine’s preferred suitor ever since a certain other gentleman married elsewhere.”
Bingley turned to Darcy, ready to share a laugh at Fitzwilliam’s expense, but he was deterred from commenting by his friend’s fierce glower.
“This again?” Darcy clipped. “I have told them Montgomery deserves better. Would that Mrs. Sinclair cease pushing the match.”
“I am not sure the acquaintance can be avoided now. I understand she has invited him to dine at Matlock House this evening with the particular purpose of introducing him to your aunt.”
“Then it is fortunate that my aunt will not be there.”
“Oh?” Elizabeth smiled wryly. “Is it safe to assume that is because I shall be?”
That lost Darcy his ire. His mouth worked to find words that seemed stubbornly to evade him.
“Lady Catherine and I, you see, are not the best of friends,” Elizabeth said to Bingley. “But given my beginning with her nephew, I shall not be discouraged. I have high hopes we shall be inseparable by next Christmas.” She grinned. Darcy only shook his head.
“Er…are you looking forward to seeing Pemberley?” Bingley enquired, feeling rather awkward.
“I am thoroughly impatient to see it. I have grown weary of hearing strangers eulogise about my own home and being unable to join in their raptures.”
“I imagine so,” Bingley replied. “You will enjoy the journey almost as much as the destination. There is some uncommonly pretty countryside to be seen en route. I have not been north of Hertfordshire in months. I am quite jealous.”
“Will you not soon be travelling north yourself?” Darcy enquired. “I presumed you would take Jane on a wedding tour.”
“You are not taking Lizzy on one,” he answered, feeling rather petulant at having his oversight called out.
“Elizabeth has met all my relations. You have enough to fill half of Yorkshire. I imagine some of them would like to meet your wife.”
“Oh, do bring Jane north!” Elizabeth appealed. “You could visit us at Pemberley.”
“No!” His heart was not yet resilient enough for that manner of test! “No, I would not dream of invading your privacy so soon after you arrived home.”
“Nonsense! Darcy will have had quite enough of me by then. And you can be sure we will have no other visitors, for I am persona non grata with all his family.”
Bingley looked at Darcy, but he only rolled his eyes and said nothing at all to contradict her. It was as though he saw nothing wrong in his relations’ disdain for his wife.
“Well then,” Bingley said defiantly, resolved to offer her the comfort Darcy seemed unwilling to provide. “I shall not countenance being the cause of any further distress of yours. Leave it with me. I shall see what I can arrange.”
***
Saturday, 25 July 1812: Derbyshire
At the sight of Pemberley’s home farm from the carriage window, Darcy grew taut with anticipation. Another few minutes’ travel would bring them within view of the house, a moment of which he had dreamt more often than he would like to admit.
“Elizabeth?” he whispered, gently rubbing her arm to rouse her. With Georgiana and Mrs. Annesley dozing in the opposite seat, she had dared to lean against him, where she too had then been lulled to sleep by the carriage’s steady sway. She did not awaken, but nestled deeper into his embrace, broadening the smile he already wore. “Elizabeth, we are almost there.”
She peeled herself reluctantly from his side and rubbed her eyes then squinted at him. How she could sleep so soundly in a moving coach he knew not, but he found her drowsy confusion tremendously endearing. Wordlessly, he placed his hands upon her shoulders and turned her towards the window. After a quick glance to determine that the others still slept, he snaked one arm about her middle and rested his chin on her shoulder that he might perceive the unfolding panorama as she did.
She said naught, only pulled his arm more tightly about her, raised her free hand to rest against his cheek and waited. Together they held their silent vigil as the carriage crested a final rise, and Pemberley at long last came into view. The hand that cupped his face fell away and Elizabeth sat forward. “Oh my,” were her only words, exhaled on a breath of wonder.
When several moments passed without further comment, Darcy leant sideways to gauge her expression, and for the first time in the whole of their acquaintance, saw her altogether stripped of courage. He could not deny the gratification of her being thus affected by the place he loved so well. Nonetheless, he would banish all her trepidation for good ere they reached the house. He touched her chin and turned her gently to face him.
“I have wrestled senselessly with many mistaken scruples in the past, love, but I never doubted you. I have always known you belonged here.”
The day was by no means glorious. Clouds concealed every inch of blue sky, and rain earlier in the day had tramped down much of the surrounding flora. Yet, the affection to be seen in Elizabeth’s eyes at that moment rendered it a picture Darcy would never forget.
She kissed his cheek. “Thank you, my darling man.”
“Oh, we are here! Lizzy, how do you like it?”
At his sister’s pronouncement, Darcy withdrew his arm and sat back a little from Elizabeth, not missing the look she wore, which satisfied him her courage had returned. He watched her, anticipating mischief of some kind, and was not disappointed. She withdrew from her r
eticule a rather scruffy piece of paper, which she unfolded and held up to the window, looking repeatedly from it to the house.
“I must say, I am rather disappointed, Georgiana. It is not at all what I was promised. All the windows are symmetrical, there are no crooked columns—and I had quite set my heart on there being a haunted chimney, but it is very clearly not there.” She lowered his sketch to her lap and sighed loudly. “At least the roof is level.”
***
Mrs. Reynolds waited in a vanguard of staff in front of the house and watched the approaching carriage with trepidation. She had been employed at Pemberley for four-and-twenty years and had never been given cause for complaint. Yet, whomever Mr. Darcy had chosen as his wife had the potential to significantly affect her own life and work, and she wished, at her age, that neither would be too grievously disrupted.
On either side of her were Mr. Barnaby and Mr. Maltravers, neither of whose thoughts on the master’s marriage were known to her. As steward and butler respectively, both men were of such assiduous loyalty as all but prevented either of them having an opinion on the matter, which left her alone in her trepidation.
Fortunately, her first impressions were favourable. Though very young, Mrs. Darcy seemed friendly, unaffected, and quaintly handsome. The master certainly appeared vastly taken with her, his manner well pleased as he introduced her to the household. In short order, the presentation was complete, the majority of the staff dismissed, and their party removed within doors.
“Would it please you if dinner was served at six, Mrs. Darcy?” Mrs. Reynolds enquired.
“It would please me better if it were served at five,” Mr. Darcy replied. “Our breakfast was abysmal.”
Mrs. Darcy regarded her husband with obvious amusement, but he either did not notice or chose to ignore it, turning instead to speak to Mr. Barnaby and Mr. Maltravers. Miss Darcy excused herself to change, and Mrs. Annesley went with her, leaving Mrs. Reynolds alone with the new mistress.
“We have been here but a few minutes, and already we are making more work for you,” said the latter. “You will wish us gone again by morning.”
“Oh, no, ma’am. We are all hopeful Mr. Darcy will choose to be here more often now. Pemberley is never quite the same when he is away from home.”
“He is well liked, then?”
“Oh, yes! The best landlord, the best master that ever lived.”
Mrs. Darcy’s eyes flashed with something Mrs. Reynolds did not recognise, but it rendered the young lady uncommonly pretty.
“I understand you have known him for many years.”
“Aye, ma’am, since he was four.”
“And never had a cross word from him in your life, I imagine?”
“Never!” she answered proudly. “But then, I have always observed that they who are good-natured when children are good-natured when they grow up.”
This further animated Mrs. Darcy’s countenance. “Was he good-natured as a boy?”
Mr. Darcy cast his wife a rather suspicious look then, but he continued in his conversation with the men, so Mrs. Reynolds continued hers with the mistress. “He was, ma’am. The sweetest-tempered, most generous-hearted boy in the world.”
Mrs. Darcy broke into a dazzling smile and even laughed a little. “It is as much to your credit as his that you speak so highly of him, Mrs. Reynolds.”
“I say no more than the truth,” she demurred, feeling suddenly foolish to be recommending the lady’s own husband to her.
“Indeed, and the truth often bears repeating,” Mrs. Darcy replied with an enigmatic smile.
“If you are ready, then?”
The housekeeper jumped slightly at the master’s interruption though the mistress seemed not in the least startled and answered very equably that she was. She took his arm, and as one, they turned to ascend the grand staircase, so easy together that they looked for all the world as though they had done it every day of their lives thus far.
***
“Slow down! You are going too fast for me to see anything!” Elizabeth said, laughing as Darcy all but dragged her through a maze of rooms.
He did not reply. She began to think he might be displeased in some way when he abruptly pulled her sideways through a door. She had barely time to deduce the room must be his bedchamber before he had torn off his coat, plucked her from her feet, thrown her onto his bed, and planted himself firmly atop her.
“What are you about?” she cried.
“I could ask the same of you,” he replied, leaning to kiss her neck. “You cannot pretend ignorance with me, wife. I well know how you look when you are being sly.” He peppered kisses across her breastbone. “What mischief were you up to just now?”
Elizabeth bit her lip, chagrined to have been discovered teasing the housekeeper and too distracted by Darcy’s wandering tongue to think of how she might explain it in a favourable light.
He lifted his head to look at her. “You will not tell me?”
His eyes danced with a playfulness she had never seen there before, and the slight curl of his lips gave him such an appearance of rakishness she wondered with some relish how he intended to extract her secret from her. She gave him a smirk of her own. “I think not.”
He raised an eyebrow. Unhurriedly, he lifted her arms above her head and pinned them there with one hand then smoothed the other down her side. His head he lowered until their lips almost touched—then he took her utterly and completely by surprise by digging his fingers into her side and mercilessly tickling her. She shrieked and bucked beneath him, laughing in astonishment. The illustrious and stately Mr. Darcy surely did not tickle people! She implored him to stop.
“Not until you share your joke.” He moved his excruciating touch to under her arm, provoking her to squeal and writhe anew.
“Very well! I yield! It was Mr. Bingley’s fault! Pray desist!”
He did and squinted at her dubiously. “Bingley?”
“Aye! He was telling me about Mrs. Reynolds and did a little impersonation of her. It transpires it was an uncommonly good one.”
“And wherefore were you discussing my housekeeper with Bingley?”
She wrinkled her nose, feeling a little embarrassed. “Because we were speaking of you.”
He looked momentarily surprised then insufferably smug. She attempted to tug her hands from his grasp that she might tickle him, but he was having none of it. Still pinning her arms in place, he wrapped his other hand beneath her and brought his lips to hers for a blistering kiss, banishing all thoughts of retribution from her mind. She signalled her surrender with a groan of pleasure, and he promptly tickled her other side, making her yelp against his lips.
“What has come over you?”
He pulled away and smirked at her, his countenance, if possible, even more handsome than usual for his present liveliness. “I am home,” he said simply, as though informing her of nothing less obvious than that day broke when the sun rose.
Noises from beyond a door caught both their attention. He rolled his eyes, kissed her forehead, and removed from the bed, tugging his attire straight, then strode purposefully to the door to speak with whoever was without. She watched enthralled as her adoring and playful husband of moments before reverted effortlessly to the commanding, dignified, and extraordinarily alluring master of Pemberley.
“As am I,” she whispered, full in the belief she was the most fortunate woman alive.
***
Wednesday, 29 July 1812: Derbyshire
Elizabeth’s delight with her new home knew no bounds, though perhaps most precious to her was the fondness with which Darcy introduced her to every part of it. Three days had not been enough for her to learn all its passageways and rooms, but the orangery and the woods around the lake had already been settled as two of her favourite places in all of Pembe
rley. This morning, at her request, breakfast had been laid out on the veranda outside one and overlooking the other.
“What news from Grosvenor Street?”
Darcy ceased scowling at his letter and looked up. “I believe Bingley is proposing a visit, but it is high Dutch for the most part.” He dropped it onto the table. “The man is useless.”
“I shall send an invitation directly to Jane. It seems safest.”
“Are you certain you wish to receive them? You were upset after your last visit.”
Since they parted ways, Elizabeth’s feelings towards her sister had vacillated constantly between indignation to the deepest concern. Yet, on one thing she was decided: they would not resolve the matter whilst five counties apart. “I was, but we have quarrelled before. I am sure it will all be forgotten. Besides, I did not have the opportunity to show her our London home. I should dearly love for her to see Pemberley.”
That much agreed, Darcy turned his attention to his breakfast, and she turned hers to her correspondence, opening a letter from her friend in Kent. She read and relayed the happy news that Charlotte Collins was with child, though Darcy was far more animated by the next report—that Mr. Montgomery was presently at Rosings, paying court to Anne. Much to Elizabeth’s surprise, he threw his unfinished toast onto his plate and grabbed up his napkin, managing to make the innocuous act of dabbing the corners of his mouth appear the most resentful thing in the world.
“Are you truly so violently opposed to the match?”
“I am. Montgomery is an excellent man and the means of uniting us, for which I owe him more than I can ever give. He deserves better than a joyless marriage with a malicious harpy as a mother.”
“There is nothing to say it will be a joyless marriage, and I daresay that, since you are able to put up with my mother, Mr. Montgomery will find a way to tolerate Anne’s.”
“Your mother is neither malicious nor disloyal. She may be a total stranger to propriety, but everything she does is done in what she believes to be the best interests of her family.”
