Mr Darcy's Mail-Order Bride
Page 4
A sickening dread began to fill his stomach. Could it be possible? He decided to find out.
“Pardon me, Miss Bennet.” Once he had the full attention of all at the table, he continued. “Your sister and I were discussing the qualities of an accomplished woman. What is your opinion of this sentiment from a book I recently read? It says, in part:
“I can't praise a young lady who is alive only when people are admiring her, but as soon as she is left alone, collapses and finds nothing to her taste--one who is all for show and has no resources in herself.”
Jane was quick to respond. Waving her hand as if it was completely unimportant, she said. “Oh, you will have to ask Lizzy. Most likely she has read the same book. I am unfamiliar with the text.”
Darcy was stunned. The quote was from the same book she had referred to in her letters—twice. Was it possible?
He looked across the table to Elizabeth, where she sat with a look of mock innocence on her face. No, it could not be! Then he spied the twinkle and fully discerned the situation. To make sure, he asked her, “Do you have an opinion on the book?”
“Mr. Darcy, in our short acquaintance you must surely be aware that I always have an opinion. Whether or not you agree with my opinions is, in my opinion, unimportant.”
He saw the truth on her face. Just as he had written Bingley’s letters, she had written Jane Bennet’s to his friend. Had she figured it out yet? With the events of the past hour, Darcy became aware that he would need to be on his toes with this young woman, so he decided then and there to keep his secret to himself.
That night, Elizabeth and Jane were snuggled under the covers of the hotel bed. For years, they had shared the same room, so the closeness was familiar. In fact, it was a convenience as it easily allowed for sisterly confidences.
“What did you think of Mr. Bingley?” Elizabeth was grateful Jane hadn’t yet snuffed the candles on her side of the bed.
Jane sighed through her smile. From the look in her eyes, her vision had to be covered with dreams.
“He is just as a young man should be.”
“Handsome. Wealthy. Besotted?” Elizabeth chuckled as her sister’s giggles danced around the air.
“I’ve never met a man so suited to me, Lizzy.” Her soft smile showed her pleasure. “Do you know that he told me the most shocking thing. Be prepared, Lizzy, as you will truly be surprised.”
“Mr. Darcy wrote his letters.”
Jane turned on her. “How did you know?”
“Is it really important?” Elizabeth did not want her sister to be disappointed in Mr. Bingley. “How did Mr. Bingley happen to mention something of such weighty significance so soon upon acquaintance?”
Jane could barely control her giggle. “I asked him about an expression he referred to in his first letter.” She covered her face with her hands. “Apparently, in the west the ‘call of nature’ refers to something entirely different from animal sounds as he, blushing profusely I might add, pointed the way to the water closet.”
Elizabeth burst into laughter and soon they were both in tears.
Jane wiped her eyes with the sleeve of her nightgown. “Needless to say, I was mortified when I understood his meaning. He was as well.” Jane gulped. “At that point, he confessed to me that he had asked Mr. Darcy to write the letters. His sole motive was not to deceive me, Lizzy. He feared making a poor impression. Thus it was easy for me to admit the same to him.”
“I believe Mr. Bingley is perfect for you.” Elizabeth was relieved to let go of even a smidgeon of attraction she felt for him based on letters he, in fact, had not written.
“But what about Mr. Darcy? His pen crafted the sentences you absorbed as much as I did. Now that you know this, aren’t you happy you are to marry him?”
Elizabeth was horrified at the thought, and it must have shown on her face because Jane started laughing again.
“Don’t even think about it, Jane. Mr. High-and-Mighty Darcy is the last man on earth I would ever have chosen to marry.” Squeezing her eyes closed, she shuddered at the thought. Unfortunately, she would stand next to him in front of the Justice of the Peace in less than twelve hours, promising to love, honor, and obey him. She shuddered again until she feared losing her equanimity. By tomorrow morning, Jane would be Mrs. Charles Bingley and she would become Mrs. Fitzwilliam Darcy.
The two men had loaded their lady’s possessions in the back of their wagons and returned inside the hotel to escort them to the official’s office. Bingley almost bounced as he walked next to Jane, while Darcy, resigned to his future and resolved to make the best of the situation, stepped alongside Elizabeth.
The ladies wore the same dresses as the day before, however their faces and hair were lovely and fresh under their bonnets. Jane Bennet carried a parasol to shade her fair complexion from the rays of the early July sun. Elizabeth wore white gloves and held a well-used Bible in her hand. Darcy wondered if she prayed the marriage would succeed or if something could be done to stop the wedding from being performed. Was she praying for a hero to rescue her from her fate?
He was fairly sure the ceremony was not what Elizabeth had hoped for, but it was the way it needed to take place so they could make it back to their homes before the heavy rain started falling. Less than ten minutes after stepping in front of the Justice of the Peace, the two couples walked outside as husbands and wives.
Darcy had not kissed his new bride. He had not been willing and she was not welcoming. It was a poor start to their union.
If there had been any other option, Elizabeth would not now be Mrs. Darcy. However, after spending the night coming up with plan after plan, they were all rejected as impractical for a female with no funds and no real knowledge of the area. In spite of knowing Oregon was short of ladies, she would have no means of comprehending who was an honorable, honest man and who was not. At least with Mr. Darcy, she had the hope that, being Mr. Bingley’s friend, he had at least a few redeeming qualities.
The one constant thought that kept cycling through her mind was that the situation could not get any worse.
Darcy assisted Elizabeth up to the seat, using only his fingertips. He looked to the wagon behind them in time to see Bingley lift Jane into his arms to place her on a bench the same height as the one Elizabeth currently sat on. The new Mrs. Bingley giggled. His own wife seemed to lose all of her color at the sound. It was a dismal beginning.
Two wagons, both filled with an abundance of trunks containing personal items, pulled away from town, the men’s horses tied on behind.
There was much to inspire interest in Elizabeth. Neighborhoods filled with solidly built houses bore witness to the existence of families who had been living in the area for several decades. As they moved up the steep incline to the bluff above, the land became much more sparsely populated.
Once past the hilltop, the road was lined with heavy timber so tall it filtered the sunlight, chilling the air and darkening the sky. Elizabeth pulled her shawl tighter as she contemplated this new land she would now call her home. Occasionally the trees would part and she could catch a glimpse of the river below so the roadway was somewhat parallel to the Willamette.
“Shall we be silent for the length of the journey?” Elizabeth refused to allow the man to stew in the quiet. Before dessert the night before, she had been aware of his longing gaze on her sister. Apparently, it had been much as she had felt towards Mr. Bingley when she read his first letter. Yet, the affection was based on a falsehood, that of misrepresentation as to who the authors of the letters were. Or, possibly, he was enthralled by Jane’s ethereal beauty. Elizabeth had no idea and no desire at this point in time to discover the truth.
“What would you like me to talk about?”
She caught his look as he briefly pulled his eyes from the road. “We could speak of the number of families in the neighborhood or the distance we need to cover,” she offered.
“Do you always need to hear the sound of your own voice while traveling?”
“Then you do not enjoy the sounds of nature?”
“I hear only the jangle of the harness and the clopping of the hooves muffled by the muddy road.” She looked at him closely, in time to catch his grin before his mouth settled back into its unyielding position. It was the first sign from him that he was not completely dissatisfied with her company. “What is it you hear?”
Darcy looked around them and then up at the sky. Taking one hand off the reins he extended his arm and swept it from left to right in front of them. “See what surrounds you and listen. Don’t you hear the gentle breeze in the treetops and the twigs of the undergrowth tapping against each other? The rustling of the leaves as the branches are swaying to and fro sound like a symphony of soft whispers in a large room. I hear a distant woodpecker knocking his beak against the hollow of a tree and the caw of the crows circling over there.” He moved his head to the left as he again clasped the leather straps in both hands, his chin pointing towards where the birds flew around and around. “You don’t hear the same?”
Who was this poetic rancher to whom she was married for better or for worse? Was his rudeness of the night before or his brusqueness of the morning an anomaly?
“Yes, I hear it.” And she did. The smell of damp earth and wood pitch filled her nostrils with an earthy fragrance pleasant to her senses. Various shades and hues of green covered the long branches standing stiffly from the sides of each tree. Occasionally a twig would snap as an animal moved across the forest floor.
“When you have lived in Oregon for a while, you will learn to smell the rain coming hours before it arrives. You will learn that dampness does not stop the need for chores to be done or for enjoyment to be had. Most Oregonians will tell you that ‘anything you can do in the sunshine can be done in the rain’.”
“Except hang out the wash?”
He chuckled. “No, even that can be done in the rain. It just takes a while longer to dry. Sometimes days.”
“I will have to remember that for when the winter rains set in.” She laughed at his wry expression. She was used to hard work—if that was what worried him.
As she looked closer at her surroundings, Elizabeth pondered their life in Maryland in comparison to her new life here. Jane’s dreams of having her own home and a marriage to a man she admired had been fulfilled. Her dreams? They ended as soon as she had said, ‘I do.’ She had no one to blame except herself. She had been the one to accept his marriage proposal and his ticket to Oregon.
Again, she endeavored to reach out to this stoic rancher who was now her husband. She was not borne for unpleasantness. One of them would have to begin this marriage and if it had to be her, then so be it.
“Have you always lived in Oregon City?” Curious about the man beside her, she thought there was no time like the present to inquire.
“No. I spent two years at university in New Haven, Connecticut.”
“Did you like it?” Knowing he had written the letters, she was not surprised.
“There were aspects of my years there I particularly enjoyed. Unlike Bingley, I don’t make friends easily. Most likely, it’s due to the isolation we faced from not having close neighbors and being schooled at home when I was young. There, I was forced to learn to get along with others from a variety of social and economic levels.”
“Hmmm.”
“The forests surrounding Yale were made up of deciduous sugar maple, beech, birch, and hemlock trees. Where the evergreen trees here retain their color year around, the changing of the leaves from summer to fall painted the hillsides with vibrant oranges, yellows, and reds. I have never seen the like in all my travels back and forth.”
“So we have both crossed the country.”
“And I have crossed the sea.”
“You have?” One of her most long-standing ambitions was to see other parts of the globe.
“Yes. Before war was declared in 1861, my father decided I needed to finish my education at Oxford in England.”
“I am aware of the university’s location, sir.”
He smiled at her defensive response. “I am not surprised.”
“You aren’t? Why not?” He puzzled her exceedingly.
“Because of the content of Bingley’s letters. Each time he received one, I had to read it before I could write the reply. I thought Miss Bennet one of the most intelligent women of my acquaintance. Now that I realize you were their author, I will try to keep in mind that I am not in company with an ignorant miss.”
“Do you even know how condescending you sound? I may not have been educated at Yale or Oxford, but I know better than to refer to anyone as ignorant. The word is judgmental and patronizing. Do you know, there is a man who used to wander the streets of Baltimore knocking on back doors in search of shoes to repair. His clothes were ragged and his own shoes desperately needed new soles.” Elizabeth watched his hands as they adjusted the reins in his hands. Control and power. “Old Elias appeared to me to be the most uninformed man I had ever seen. I thought of the differences that education would make in his life, so I offered to show him how to read and write.”
“And did you help him?”
“I did not.” She scoffed. “Years before, he had been a barrister in London, so, yes, he knew better than I how to read and write. He was the second son of a disreputable and dissolute nobleman. His older brother followed closely the pathway of their sire.”
“He lost his parents and his sibling in a reckless carriage race. When the legalities cleared, he lost his family home and its assets to debt.” Elizabeth sighed at the memory. “Unfortunately, it was not enough. They still owed a considerable amount. Since Old Elias was now the earl, the debts became his own.”
“Taking the only ready money he had, he purchased passage to the Americas and settled in Baltimore. Though the war with the British had ended more than a decade before, attitudes towards his citizenship made it difficult for him to find work. So he decided to try his hand at a trade others felt was too humble to perform—fixing shoes.”
Darcy frowned. “He was an educated attorney. Surely, the better choice would have been for him to set himself up with a law practice. He would’ve been far more able to support himself had he done so.”
“I had that exact same thought, Mr. Darcy.” With the depth of the conversation she had forgotten he was now her husband and she could call him Will. “He laughed when I shared the same with him. Then he helped me see the value of a simple life. Old Elias would have been constrained by society’s expectations and his family’s debt had he returned to England. Had he established a law practice in Baltimore, he would have had to remain in that one place until he retired or died. By repairing shoes, he could travel and roam, working only when needed, which was his heart’s desire. No debt encumbered him. Neither did a surplus of possessions. He was truly one of the most contented people I have ever met.”
She looked at the man beside her. “Was he ignorant or wise?”
He took a long time before he replied. “Though it was not the decision I believe I would have made, I can’t condemn him for his choice of employment or his manner of life. I am not the judge, Elizabeth.”
“Then I pray you remember that thought as I settle into the role of wife, sir.”
The couples rode for another half an hour before they stopped by a stream to partake of refreshments packed by the hotel kitchen. The fork in the roadway was a mystery to the ladies. Nevertheless, as soon as they inquired, they were informed that Pemberley was to the left while Bingley and Jane would take the right.
After the horses were watered and the bread and meat consumed, the sisters hugged tightly and said their goodbyes. They would not see each other until Sunday services in town. For three days, Elizabeth would be alone with Mr. Darcy. She shivered with worry, her mind swirling with imagining what
those seventy-two hours would bring.
Twenty minutes of silence passed until they rounded a bend and the house came into view. To say it was glorious would have been an understatement. Pleasantly settled on a bluff overlooking the horseshoe-shaped waterfalls in the distance, the front of the house was lined with windows allowing a view from almost every room. A wide porch ran the full length of the house with several groupings of chairs and small tables inviting a person to sip their coffee to enjoy the panoramic vista. Elizabeth had never seen such a home.
Heavy logs rested on top of each other, nestled into notches at the corners. The chinks were filled with material that retained the color of the aged wood so a visitor was first impressed by its solidness and then by its beauty.
The approach curved to the east, which afforded a view of the area at the back of the house. Behind the home was a large garden filled with tall cornstalks, bushes of beans, hills of potatoes, and the tops of carrots and beets swaying above ground. A grassy field extended across a large meadow-like area bordered by a barn bursting with baled hay. Next to the back of the house was the largest stack of wood Elizabeth had ever seen in one place. It rose to the roof of the shed and filled it from wall to wall.
“You have ice and snow during the winter months?”
He nodded. “And rain. Lots of rain.”
Pulling the wagon close to the back of the building, he set the brake and helped her down. Again, he touched her hand as briefly as possible. She was relieved.
Walking alongside him, he opened the door and waited for her to enter ahead of him. Once they moved down a hallway, the walls opened to a large living area where comfortable over-stuffed furniture, beautifully carved tables, and chairs were arranged around an enormous fireplace built from huge stones. The burning fire told Elizabeth before her husband could that they were not alone at Pemberley.