The Trials: A Pride and Prejudice Story

by Timothy Underwood

  Elizabeth opened each drawer of the dresser, and one after another moved pieces of clothing into her trunk. Hopefully, Mrs. Shore would kill the old woman. The dress she’d worn the previous night had been hung in her closet. Elizabeth took it down to fold, and she stared at the lacing around neckline for a long time. There had been a half hour when she had been so happy.

  She was now free to marry Darcy. This did not make Elizabeth happy. She was frightened.

  Lady Catherine would beat and hurt, and maybe kill, Emma.

  Elizabeth carefully folded the silk dress and packed it away into the traveling chest. She might never have the heart to wear it again.

  The remaining packing went quickly, as Elizabeth did not have much clothing remaining. She blinked to keep back tears. She wiped them away.

  Even if Emma’s physical safety could be ensured, what fate would she have with her education and happiness controlled by Lady Catherine?

  Elizabeth closed the chest and sat on it. Through the window she saw how the sky had turned black and the stars were visible. A single tallow candle burned on her nightstand. Elizabeth opened her chest again and pulled out a piece of stationery from where she had strapped writing supplies on the top and a thin board she used as a surface to write upon.

  She snuffed the candle and began writing a letter: Dear Jane, I do not know how to act. I cannot abandon Emma. No matter what I cannot. Yet I have no choice. If only Lady Catherine would conveniently die, like a character in a novel whose death allows everyone to become happy. But such a thing shall not happen.

  The door between Elizabeth’s room and the nursery was still open. Emma ran in and grabbed Elizabeth’s stomach. She spilled the ink over the board and the paper. “Don’t leave me here! Please don’t!”

  Elizabeth put the board and paper on the nightstand and held the girl tightly. She sobbed with Emma. The two clung to each other, frightened.

  Emma slowly relaxed and her sobs became subdued as Elizabeth held her. She fell asleep in Elizabeth’s arms. Elizabeth snuggled the child against her chest. She blew out the candle and laid down on the bed holding Emma.

  The ceiling was barely visible in the darkness. It seemed to waver between there being a roof above her and an endless blankness. Elizabeth preferred the blankness.

  She couldn’t leave Emma.

  The girl’s slow breathing rose and fell against Elizabeth’s side. There must be some way to protect Emma from Lady Catherine.

  Slowly the desperate measures that had passed earlier through Elizabeth’s mind solidified and became real. She would act.

  For several hours Elizabeth rehearsed her plan and added details, until the entire house was asleep and the deepest hour of darkness had arrived. She left the bedroom, quietly, to keep from waking Emma. When she returned Elizabeth shook Emma and put a finger over the girl’s lips. “You must be completely quiet. You will never need to see Lady Catherine again.”

  *****

  Bang. Bang. Bang.

  The terrifying sound woke Mr. Hawdry. With a shock he sat up straight in bed.

  Bang. Bang.

  The night was still black. Hawdry could not see his hands in front of his face. There was no fire in the grate due to season and no fringe of light peeked around the closed curtains. Before her death his wife had kept a light burning on the mantelpiece, in case she woke during summer, but he’d not kept the habit.

  Robbers! Were they attacking the house? A desperate mob, like the ones who gathered in France. There had been hints of such a thing.

  The pedestrian part of Hawdry’s mind knew that it was probably a message sent by express. That meant bad news.

  Bang. Bang.

  The door below opened after the knocks.

  There was a tension in Mr. Hawdry’s stomach. He strained to hear some blow landed against his butler by a band of robbers. Instead he heard the barely audible whisper of voices.

  Hawdry let himself fall back into the bed. Any matter that would bring someone to his door at this hour must be important, but his butler would bring the message up once he’d heard it.

  Just as Hawdry’s heart ceased to race and he began to drift back to sleep, the butler knocked on the door to his own room. His servant entered carrying a flaming lamp whose brightness made Hawdry flinch away and cover his eyes.

  “What the deuce is it to drag me awake at this hour?”

  “Lady Catherine… she…she’s been murdered.”

  By the time Hawdry had arrived at Rosings Park, wearing a coat hastily thrown on over his dressing robe, the surgeon had already arrived. He was a young man with neatly cropped hair who clinically looked over the body with his hands behind his back.

  Hawdry stared past him and then recoiled in shock. He nearly vomited.

  He had seen murdered bodies before; he’d seen the body of a dear friend before. But never before had he seen a friend with her throat cut wide open.

  There was blood over the sheets, over the bed, over the ground, over the surgeon’s gloves.

  Blood. Blood. So much blood.

  Hawdry’s stomach rebelled again, and he closed his eyes and breathed shallowly through his nose.

  He opened his eyes and forced himself not to flinch away from the body of his dear friend.

  Good god, Cathy, who would do this to you? Such a good woman, whose life had been dedicated to others.

  He looked at the surgeon. There was a pattern to these things, and he’d been involved in a similar procedure with other murders since he’d become the magistrate for county. “Mr. Brandweiss, have you discovered anything?”

  The surgeon studied the body with a sort of smiling fascination. He poked the gaping wound in Lady Catherine’s neck with one of his gloved fingers. He glanced up with a dark smile and said in an almost pleased tone, “She perhaps suffocated before the exsanguination ended her life. A deep cut right through the windpipe. A single blow. It was a strong man who made the strike.”

  The acid in the back of Hawdry’s throat rose. He forced himself to swallow it down. His throat felt rough and burnt. He saw in his mind the attacker swiftly pushing back the sleeping gentlewoman’s throat, and then in one quick movement, before she had opportunity to realize what was afoot, the knife slicing across her throat. Then choking, unable to scream as the blood sprayed out.

  Who would do such a thing to such a great woman?

  The surgeon pushed his finger deep into the ghastly chasm in Lady Catherine’s throat. “The windpipe was definitely severed. A damn good cut, I don’t know if I could have done so well myself. Whoever did it knew his way about knives.” He wiped his finger off on the bedding and placed his hands behind his back once more, and added with another dark smile, “I suspect the killer strongly disliked Lady Catherine.”

  Hawdry let out a shaky breath. He spoke to the body. “I swear. I swear I will find who did this to you, and I shall see them hang, though that punishment is far too easy for such a monster.”

  The surgeon glanced at Hawdry from the corner of his eye and had a half smirk that seemed to mock this solemn oath.

  His bailiff entered the room along with the butler, who flinched away from the sight of Lady Catherine and lowered his eyes. Hawdry asked, “Who did this! This horror! Have you caught them?”

  The bailiff and the butler exchanged a look, and the butler replied, “The governess, Miss Bennet, quarreled loudly with Lady Catherine in the evening, and Miss Bennet was dismissed and ordered to be gone from the premises by morning.”

  “Her! She lacked all subservience, but still, a gentlewoman…”

  The bailiff said, “She disappeared, without taking her packed clothes, and the girl in her charge is missing, and there is cloth spotted with recent blood on her nightstand.”

  The surgeon turned towards them with his hands still held confidently behind his back and said in a sarcastic voice, “A gentlewoman, I doubt that.”

  “She could!” The butler rubbed his hands together nervously and said to Mr. Hawdry, “She i
s a strong woman, and passionate. She flew into a rage and seized Lady Catherine’s cane this evening.”

  At that Hawdry understood the truth: Miss Bennet had done it.

  He turned to the surgeon. “Is it possible an enraged woman could make that strike?”

  The surgeon rolled his eyes. “It was a difficult strike.”

  “I ask your opinion, as a man of science. Could a woman have made the blow?”

  “If she were strong. And if she knew about knives, and…maybe. I’d believe it of a cook, but a gentlewoman?” The surgeon pulled the hand he’d been poking into Lady Catherine’s throat from behind his back and pillowed his chin in it. “It is very unlikely, but not impossible. If you hunt this governess, you will ignore the real criminal.”

  “Your duty here is to examine and report. Not to identify the criminal.” Hawdry remembered how Miss Bennet spoke sympathetically about the lower orders. By God, she had tried to comfort the thief who had taken Lady Catherine’s jewelry.

  She was no good woman. She had vicious propensities.

  “Send out word to every carriage stop and postal station roundabout and on the road to London. Look at every inn and boarding place. Miss Elizabeth Bennet must be found and brought to justice.”

  Chapter Eighteen

  Fitzwilliam Darcy hid in the seat of a recessed window along the ground side. He’d hunched himself in the small alcove to make himself smaller so that no one could see his limbs unless they looked at his refuge straight on. Part of his brain told him that he should act somehow to deal with the catastrophe. The crisis; the madness.

  There was nothing he could do. He didn’t understand anything any longer.

  A maid carrying black flowers to stick in vases around the sides of each window of the house stopped at seeing Darcy.

  He looked at her with dead, sad eyes.

  She went on, leaving the window he was seated in undone. The flowered chintz curtains for all of the windows had already been replaced by heavy black wool. Darcy’s eyes absently tracked the movement of the woman as she stopped in the next two alcoves, and then disappeared around the corner of the building. He leaned his head against the wooden frame of the window and stared at the slowly setting sun.

  From how Hawdry explained it, the evidence seemed so clear. She had run. There had been the blood found on the clothes she’d left behind.

  They would catch her, wherever she had run with Emma; the riders organized by Mr. Hawdry, or the Bow Street Runners that had been sent for by Anne.

  And when they caught her, they would hang her.

  Even if Elizabeth fled successfully, this ended his hope of making her his wife. She would never be able to return to England if she fled the country.

  Why hadn’t she trusted him enough to ask for help before she did such a desperate, violent thing?

  He had promised he would help her if she ever was in desperate straits. If she had simply fled with Emma, he would have hidden the girl from Lady Catherine.

  Darcy heard the sound of a half dozen horses riding back into the yard. It had been early in the afternoon when he arrived. Now it was beginning to turn dark, even though these were the longest days of the year.

  Darcy jumped from his seat and stretched automatically. He’d not moved from that spot for three hours. Not since he’d listened to Hawdry: “By God! Poor Cathy. It was the governess who did for her. They’d quarreled about the girl, and Lady Catherine dismissed her. Giving her the position was a matter of milady’s kindness, and see how she was repaid.”

  Elizabeth. No.

  In front of the house, Richard stood next to his horse without moving. He stared at the building for a long time. The grooms and gameskeeper who’d ridden with him in pursuit of Elizabeth were already caring for their horses or dispersing back to their rooms and other duties.

  Richard had a distant look in his eyes, like when he’d first come back from Spain.

  Darcy touched his cousin on the shoulder. “Elizabeth. Did they capture Elizabeth? Is she still free? Is she alive? What happened?”

  Richard looked through Darcy, as though he’d not heard him.

  “Elizabeth! What became of her! Tell me!”

  “Oh. Elizabeth. Miss Bennet.” There was an unbearable pause. Then Richard said, “Yes. She was caught with Emma — the child is well, though unhappy — it was along the coach road. They’ve taken her to the gaol.”

  “The gaol?”

  “There seems no question of her innocence. After all, she fled.” Richard shook his head and spoke with a dark mocking tone, “She did flee from the scene of foul murder. Murder most foul as foul it is at the best. But this, most foul.”

  “Richard! Damn you! ‘Tis no joke!”

  “Hahahaha. ‘Tis a joke of God. That is what we are made for. Sport for the amusement of our creator. Alas, the almighty set his canon ‘gainst self-slaughter.”

  Darcy punched Richard in the gut.

  Richard tumbled to the ground and looked up at Darcy from his dusty seat. Darcy glared down and said in a perfunctory tone, “I apologize. I had no call to strike you.”

  Richard laughed harshly. “You did. You do. I half forgot you love her.”

  “How can I love a woman who…who… Surely my feelings ought to be changed.”

  He had to see Elizabeth.

  He had to hear her explain.

  Richard laughed at him again, before pushing himself up. Darcy did not offer his hand to help his cousin.

  Darcy set off to the stables. He realized in an instant that he still loved Elizabeth. He did not care that she had murdered his aunt.

  Chapter Nineteen

  Elizabeth shivered despite the heat of the basement room they had stuck her in.

  Her face throbbed in pain. How had this happened?

  They planned to hang her.

  Darcy would come. He would know she was innocent. He would prove that Mrs. Shore had killed Lady Catherine. She would be released. This nightmare would end.

  It had been foolhardy to run with Emma, but Elizabeth had been sure that once she got away from Rosings she could contact Darcy. She had trusted him to help her protect Emma.

  The bruise in her face pulsed and pounded. She didn’t want to see how bad it looked. The man who’d caught them had struck her, right in front of Emma.

  Poor Emma. She’d been terrified when they dragged them apart.

  At least Lady Catherine was dead.

  Elizabeth paced frantically. The cell was tiny. She could barely take a full step, and in half of the room she needed to bend her head to avoid hitting the roof. Elizabeth wanted to pick something up and fiddle with it. There was nothing. Her bags had all been taken from her. The room was empty. Except a straw pallet on the floor.

  Elizabeth’s hand strayed to her cheek again. She flinched away at feeling how swollen it was. She didn’t want to know. She didn’t want to see. She didn’t want to feel so scared.

  They wouldn’t hang her. They wouldn’t. They wouldn’t.

  She was innocent.

  She hadn’t killed Lady Catherine. She hadn’t.

  Elizabeth frantically stepped from side to side in the tiny room. There was a window that was half buried by dirt, and which let in barely any light from the fading afternoon. She’d stay in here for the rest of her short life. She would never stretch her legs again with a morning ramble. She would turn around and around in tiny, tiny circles until they hanged her.

  There was pressure in her chest and her eyes began to swim with little black spots.

  She didn’t want to die.

  Elizabeth placed her head against the window and breathed slowly.

  She was innocent. They would learn she was innocent. Darcy. He would not abandon her. He would know she was innocent. She trusted him.

  As if called by the thought of his name the door was pulled open and Darcy stood there, bending his tall head to enter through the small door.

  The bailiff stood behind him and said, “There she is. Talk as long
as you wish.”

  Darcy looked at her with wide eyes. He had a pale expression and his lips were thin.

  Elizabeth’s hand went embarrassedly to cover the massive bruise on her face. “Oh! I am glad to see you!”

  “Elizabeth, why? I would have helped you hide Emma.”

  Elizabeth blankly looked at him in confusion. Then she sagged as she understood what he was saying. She said in a slow voice, unable to even look at him anymore, “You — you also think I murdered her? You believe it too? Even you?”

  Darcy pulled his hands through his hair and walked to the side in a manner reminiscent of how he’d walked around after she’d refused his offer of marriage. “I cannot blame you! I heard from the footman and the butler how Lady Catherine behaved. You were right to fear for Emma — surely you could have found some other way.”

  Elizabeth felt like she’d been struck a desperate blow. She crumpled to the ground and sat on the straw pallet with her arms around her legs. She refused to look at Darcy.

  He sat next to her and put his arm around her. “Elizabeth. Elizabeth. I do not blame you. I… It does not matter to me. Not this. I love you yet. I will find some way to free you. Perhaps the bailiff will accept a bribe to be careless and—”

  “I did not kill her.”

  Darcy was quiet for a long time. She would not know if his arm around her shoulder was a reassuring weight or not until he said if he believed her.

  When he said nothing, Elizabeth added, “I was going to you. We were going to hide in London and send a message to you begging for help. I did not know what would follow, but I could not leave her with Lady Catherine. I could not. It was maybe wrong. I stole a child from her guardian… I could not… please. Darcy… look at me. I did not kill her.”

  Darcy looked at her. Their eyes held.

  She could not read his expression. She looked away. Elizabeth buried her face in her hands and began to sob. “They are going to hang me. I did not commit the crime, and everyone — even you will believe that I deserved to hang.”