by Pamela Aidan
“Well, if not a crow, then a raven…a very Brummellian raven, if you must have it so, Caroline!” Bingley laughed, but the smile behind his eyes was faint. “But come, Darcy. Dinner is ready, and it is just the three of us tonight.” He sighed then and lapsed into silence as they crossed the room and hall.
“You must wonder to see me in Town, Mr. Darcy.” Miss Bingley eyed her brother nervously, and her voice quavered. “Charles was most surprised, thinking he had left me well situated in Hertfordshire, which, of course, he had. But, alas, I am not as enamored of the country as my brother…at least, not of Hertfordshire. I ask you, sir, what would I do with only Louisa and Hurst for company! And at this season!” She laughed, but its pitch rang false. Darcy noticed Bingley flinch at the sound.
“The neighborhood was at your feet, Caroline,” Bingley said quietly. “You would not have lacked for company, I am certain.”
“Perhaps you are right, but I should have greatly missed our friends in Town. And the shopping, you know! What is Meryton to London for shopping?” Miss Bingley had looked to Darcy for confirmation.
“I would gladly have squired you on a shopping expedition,” Bingley replied before Darcy could come to his sister’s assistance. “There was no need to close Netherfield.” She began to protest, but he cut her off. “But this is ground already covered, and I am sure we do not wish to bore Darcy with family squabbles.” Miss Bingley colored at his words, casting a brief, pleading look in Darcy’s direction.
Darcy hesitated. The atmosphere was fraught with tension, and for perhaps the first time, he was finding it difficult to read his friend. Had Miss Bingley followed his instructions, or had the two gone toe-to-toe over Miss Bennet? Bingley offered him no clues; his eyes focused upon his plate as servants flittered about, performing the well-choreographed motions of serving a gentleman’s dinner.
Miss Bingley delicately cleared her throat. “How went your interview with Lawrence today?” Bingley’s eyes came up, his countenance suggesting that he was willing to be amused.
“Quite well, actually,” Darcy replied, thankful to be relieved of the responsibility of lighting upon a topic of conversation. “I expected to be treated to all manner of high, artistic sensibilities and nerves, but Lawrence was quite civil, and his studio was in every way respectable.”
“No paint thrown against the walls or scandalously clad models lying about, then?”
Darcy laughed. “No, nothing of the kind. I am sorry to disappoint you, but it was all rather businesslike. I was shown to his study, offered tea, and asked what sort of portrait I had in mind. We then repaired to his studio, where he showed me samples of his finished work and some in progress. We agreed upon a date for Georgiana’s first sitting, I was thanked for my patronage and shown out the door. Done and done in a matter of three-quarters of an hour!”
“Shocking! All my notions of artists are tumbled over,” Bingley quipped in a manner more like himself. “I suppose I must content myself with Lord Brougham’s description of L’Catalani’s hysterics on Thursday last to sustain my impression of the artistic temperament.”
The rest of their dinner was taken in the same light manner. Miss Bingley relaxed and talked somewhat as they ate but refrained from her customary domination of the conversation. Instead, she occupied herself with indulgent attention to her brother’s stories, punctuating them with meaningful glances in Darcy’s direction, the content of which he could only guess. By the time Bingley had excused Darcy and himself to his study after dinner, she was biting her lower lip, but whether in vexation or agitation of nerves, Darcy could not tell.
Charles again fell silent as they strolled to the study, and not finding a creditable way of relieving it, Darcy had followed suit. The door had not even clicked behind them before Charles was extending a heavy, cut-glass tumbler of light amber liquor toward him. His own he held up in salute and downed it entire as Darcy looked on in consternation.
“Charles…” he began, but was stopped by the closed eyes and uncharacteristically grim line of his friend’s mouth. Bingley opened his eyes then and tilted his head at him.
“Do you remember our conversation at the coaching inn? You warned me there of my propensity to exaggerate.” Bingley’s gaze bore into his own, and it required a good deal of command on Darcy’s part not to look away.
“Yes, I remember,” he replied quietly.
“Also, you cautioned me of becoming so enthralled with the phantoms of my imagination that I would estrange myself from my family, friends, and society in general.” Bingley withdrew his gaze and turned to pour another round from the decanter.
“You were more than tolerant of my advice, Charles,” Darcy offered, still unsure of his friend’s state of mind. Bingley held out the decanter to him, but he refused it.
“I have thought a great deal about what you said, Darcy. I have argued with myself and, in my mind, with you as well.” He bent and snatched away the scattering of papers from the chairs by the hearth, then indicated they should sit down. “I have spent the last two days since her surprising arrival testing what I believed true against Caroline’s observations.”
Darcy now remembered squirming in his chair at this point in Bingley’s narrative, but he hoped it had not been so. Bingley had paused and looked into the flames of the hearth for so long a time that Darcy had been hard put to maintain a disinterested attitude. Then, with a small sigh, his friend had continued.
“I have also thought long on Lord Brougham’s admonition, and in the light of the love my friends and family bear me, I have come to a conclusion.” He lifted his eyes again and with a self-deprecating smile confessed, “You were right, Darcy. I have greatly misled myself in believing Miss Bennet offered anything more than her friendship. It was all my own doing. No blame should ever be attached to her, ever.” He took another swallow from his glass. “She will always be my ideal of womanhood…her beauty, her gentleness. I shall carry her always with me, but to further my desires would only cause her distress; and that I could not bear,” he ended in a whisper.
As the coach sped north through the gathering dawn, Darcy recalled how he had looked down into his glass, unable to think of what he should reply. He had achieved his object with, as it seemed, fewer tedious confrontations than he had feared and had retained Bingley’s friendship in the bargain. Yet he could not entirely rejoice in his success. Relief, he concluded, was his chief emotion. There was little danger of encountering the Bennet sisters ever again. Charles would survive his heartbreak and not blame Darcy for it. But it pained him to see Charles, whose habitually sunny disposition had supported his own more reserved one on so many occasions, so dispirited.
“It is for the best,” he had finally uttered, and he found himself repeating the maxim now.
“Mr. Darcy?” In the opposite corner Fletcher struggled to attention from a doze that had begun mere blocks from Grosvenor Square. “Pardon me, sir. Did you say something?”
“‘It is for the best,’ Fletcher. It usually is; is it not?”
His valet gave him a brief, curious look before sliding back into his restful position against the cushions. “If it has been placed in the hands of Providence, sir, it is invariably so.”
“Heigh-yup, there!” Darcy leaned forward, almost pressing his face against the coach’s window as James encouraged the team’s leader to take the curve that would bring them into Lambton at a safer pace. He knew their temperament, as the horses were Darcy’s own, kept against his return at the last posting inn before Lambton; and their eagerness to get back to their familiar stable boxes was keeping James well occupied with the ribbons. Snow lying a foot deep glinted and winked at Darcy under a brilliant but chill winter sun as the coach jounced and labored through the ruts carved into the road. It was late afternoon as they approached the village, yet despite the dusting of snow that morning, Lambton bustled in its own country way, shaking out its apron and getting on with its small concerns as confidently as any great London establishment.
“Strapping curl, that,” Fletcher commented as he sat back again after joining his master at the window. Darcy grunted a cordial agreement, his attention already engaged in taking note of any changes in the village since his departure in early fall. New rooftile here and a bit of whitewashing there were the only differences, but the snow hugging the corners and o’erhanging the eaves of the snug houses and familiar establishments of Lambton framed a view for him second only to Pemberley itself in dearness.
A shout from the street caused Darcy and Fletcher to look ahead. With effort Darcy repressed the smile of anticipation on his face as the keepers of both the Green Man and Black’s Head inns emerged from their doors on opposite sides of the street at the same moment. For several years now it had been a point of honor between the two to be the first to greet any Darcy equipage that passed through the village. Last fall Matling, of the Black’s Head, had hustled out his wife to add her curtsy to his tug of the forelock when Darcy had left for London, causing old Garston of the Green Man to look daggers at his rival as the coach had passed. Today, Darcy could see, Matling had his wife by his side once more, and he nodded an acknowledgment of the pair’s greeting as he passed by. But as Matling looked to the steps of the Green Man to crow his victory, Darcy observed the pleasure his regard had brought fade away, to be replaced with a terrible scowl.
“Mr. Darcy, look, sir!” Fletcher’s voice almost choked with laughter as he motioned at the opposite window. There on the steps of the Green Man, arranged from the oldest to the youngest, were all of old Garston’s grandchildren, curtsying or tugging, with Garston himself beaming and tugging behind them.
The children gave a cheer as Darcy, shaking his head at the innkeepers’ rivalry, waved to them. When the carriage turned the corner, he settled back into the seat with a grin matching that upon his valet’s face. The horses were permitted to pick up their pace a bit as they reached the end of the line of shops on St. John and turned onto King Street. In moments they passed the village well, its pure waters famous for staving off the Black Death of one hundred and fifty years before. Next came the tree-bordered lane that led up a gentle hill to St. Lawrence’s Church, whose embattled tower and spires had stood against the world for five hundred years, answering to Heaven for three of those centuries for the well-being of Darcy souls. Then it was over an ancient stone bridge spanning the Ere, which met and meandered along Pemberley’s border, and on to the gates of the park five miles beyond at as spanking a pace as the road would allow.
“It will be good to be home, sir,” Fletcher offered as Darcy once again turned to the window, eager for the long-desired sight of his ancestral lands and home.
“Mmm” was all he replied as the coach pulled into the lane and up to the imposing gates that were, even now, being flung open in welcome. Pemberley’s gatekeeper waved the team and coach through and, pausing to tug at his forelock, lifted a wide smile in greeting to the travelers before scurrying to close the wrought-iron barrier behind them.
“Is that a sprig of holly in Samuel’s cap, Fletcher?” Darcy nodded appreciatively at his gatekeeper’s warm welcome.
“I believe it is, sir. Yes, indisputably holly. Entirely appropriate, because of the season, sir.”
“Ah, yes…the season.” Darcy fell silent once more, his attention wholly focused on their passage down the long drive. The private lane wove its unhurried way through the wood that girdled the outer reaches of the park. Designed a century ago under the aegis of Darcy’s great-grandfather, it required approaching visitors to slow their horses to a collected trot and then rewarded their patience with more than a few charming views of the secluded glades and tumbling streams that formed the natural beauty of Pemberley’s lands.
The great trees bordering the lane were heavy-laden with snow, and in the late afternoon sun, they cast long, lavender shadows across the lane and into the wood beyond, enveloping the coach in a frosty stillness that defied the reality of its steady progress. Darcy opened the window and took a deep breath of the sharp air, savoring the familiar, tangy taste of it like a fine wine. They were almost there. The team quickened their gait, their excitement transmitting itself to the occupants of the coach moments before they broke free from the wood at the crest of the hill. Suddenly, all of Pemberley lay before them.
The mellow walls of the west façade glowed rosily in the light of the setting sun, the corners cooling to violet as they glanced away from the fading glow. Despite that orb’s impending retreat, the windows of Pemberley seemed to gather the remaining fire. Themselves ablaze with reflected glory, they mirrored the red-gold rays out upon the surrounding snow, the effect immeasurably heightened by its twin reflected in the frozen pond below. Seeing it, Darcy felt his heart turn over and the weight of the past weeks lighten.
They began their descent from the crest immediately. The horses, atremble with desire for home, broke into a canter from which no one in the coach wished to dissuade them. The pounding of their hooves beat at counterpoint to the creak of leather and wood and the rattle of glass as they reached the bottom of the hill. Rounding the last curve of the lane, they flung stones and mud about in a grand show of homecoming. As they reached the straight-laid approach to Pemberley Hall, Darcy could hear James calling to the leader while he worked the ribbons upon the team’s tender mouths. The horses slowed to a trot, then a fast, stiff-legged walk, and finally, a stroll that brought the coach to a gentle stop before the arched entrance of Pemberley’s enclosed courtyard.
Grooms from the stable caught at the ribbons of the leader, welcoming the horses home with rough affection. A small army of footmen appeared to wrest the trunks from the coach’s boot while the butler himself opened the coach door.
“Welcome home, Mr. Darcy! Welcome home, sir!” Reynolds’s voice shook slightly as Darcy climbed down from the coach.
“Reynolds! It is good to be home…more than good.” Darcy smiled back at another of his people who had known him since boyhood and then looked up at the greenery that bedecked the archway into the courtyard. “You have received my instructions, I see.”
“Yes, sir! We have made a beginning, but Miss Darcy wanted to consult with you more particularly before we proceeded any further with decorations.” Reynolds leaned forward conspiratorially and whispered, “She’s been happy as a grig, sir, going through all the gewgaws in the attics and inspecting the Christmas linen and plate. Thanks be!” He straightened then and turned to direct the disposal of the trunks while Darcy strode through the archway.
As Darcy lengthened his stride toward the double-flighted stair leading into the hall, he looked up to catch a flash of color at the second-floor window that commanded the most favorable view of the approaching. He stopped and with narrowed eye searched the window for another glimpse. None was vouchsafed to him; so, with a smile to himself, he proceeded up one of the stairs, his hands already working at his greatcoat buttons so as to divest himself of encumbrances as soon as he was inside the doors. The task was completed as the doors swung open and the coat neatly shrugged off into the care of a footman, but to no purpose. Georgiana was not in the hall. He looked about questioningly but recalled himself as Mrs. Reynolds and the upper staff bowed their greetings to the master.
“Mr. Darcy, welcome home, sir!” The housekeeper repeated both the words and the heartfelt sincerity of her husband’s greeting.
“Mrs. Reynolds! Thank you. It is very good to be home, ma’am.” Darcy grinned down into the face of a woman who had been intimate with the life of his family since he was four years old. “Is Miss Darcy not here to greet me?”
“Mi
ss Darcy will receive you in the music room, sir, as is proper, she being no longer a moppet-miss, arunning down the stairs the moment you come home,” Mrs. Reynolds scolded him affectionately. “Now it is you who must run! Up to the music room with you, sir, to a sight that will gladden your heart.” Her words caught in her throat for a moment as her old eyes misted. “As it has gladdened this old soul’s.” She whisked a handkerchief from her apron pocket and wiped her eyes as she motioned with the other hand to the stairs. “Go on with you!”
“Yes, ma’am,” Darcy responded obediently, then qualified it with a sly smile. “If you will have dinner early this evening. The talents of the new cook at the Leicester Arms were somewhat questionable; thus, I have not partaken of more than bread, cheese, and local brew since before noon.”
“No more than we suspected, sir.” Mrs. Reynolds sniffed. “Miss Darcy has planned a fine welcome dinner that will be ready at six o’clock, if it pleases you, sir.”
“Miss Darcy has?” Darcy looked up the stairs in wonder. “You will excuse me, ma’am.” He nodded to her curtsy and made for the stairs to the first floor. A spark of hope made common cause with his ever-vigilant caution in all things touching his sister as Darcy hurried up to the music room. A few quick strides from the top, he slowed his pace in happy expectation of being welcomed with enticing strains from the pianoforte or a soft, melodious voice, but neither fell upon his ears. Only the tick of the great hall clock celebrated his approach.
What is Georgiana about? His brow furrowed in puzzlement. She had not come down to welcome him home nor, would it appear, was she occupied in greeting his arrival with song. Perhaps Mrs. Reynolds was mistaken and his sister did not await him in the music room. He stopped at the conjunction of the hall he now traversed with another, which led to the private family rooms, and bit his lower lip as he peered down each in turn, the accumulating silence preying upon his hopes. Could it be that he had deluded himself? Had the changes in her letters been merely his wishful thinking?
