The Pemberley Affair
Clean Regency Romance
Charity McColl
Contents
1. A Personal Word From Charity
2. The Pemberley Set
3. At Dinner
4. A Request from Lady Descartes
5. Lady Thomasina Descartes
6. Clearly a Belle
7. Callers
8. The Problem of the Poet
9. A Summons
10. Lady Catherine de Bourgh
11. Surprising News
12. The Stage is Set
13. Denouement
Also by Charity McColl
Thank You For Reading
A Personal Word From Charity
Thank you so much for choosing to read one of my stories. Each one of them is like a tender flower that has grown and bloomed in my heart, and it is such a pleasure to share them with you.
May God bless you richly as you read!”
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The Pemberley Set
Fitzwilliam Darcy, attired as always in a manner of fashion which enhanced the best of what Bond Street had to offer, while eluding the absurdities of dress the elegant men of the ton would adopt, stood behind his wife at her dressing table, meeting her eyes in the reflection of the mirror.
“You look,” observed his wife of less than a year, “as if you were about to be shot.”
“Given a choice between a pistol and a dinner party with Caroline Descartes as a dinner guest,” her husband replied, “I’m hard put to determine why not to choose a bullet.”
“She’s not at all trying,” Elizabeth Bennett Darcy disagreed with a smile. “You simply dislike people.”
The palm of her husband’s hand rested upon her neck, touching the bare skin above the bodice of her pale-lemon silk gown. “I’m quite fond of some people,” he said to her reflection. “I’m simply particular.”
Elizabeth smiled. Emotional protestations of affection did not come easily to her husband, which made his passion for her all the more satisfying. They had not had a smooth courtship, but once each was ready to confess love, the course had grown steadier.
She leaned her head against his arm, enjoying the sight of him. He was a handsome man. And a proud man, she conceded. As she was too quick to make up her mind before she possessed all the facts. Their personalities had clashed and likely would again. But now there was no doubt about their feelings for one another.
Elizabeth’s feelings about the haute monde were another matter. She knew that, despite her marriage to the very affluent Mr. Darcy, she was regarded as a rustic parvenu by London. Her husband’s hauteur was forbidding to others and they were cautious in their comments, but Elizabeth had no such arsenal. She spoke as she thought – never rude or improper, but always candid. She was more comfortable with the country gentry, but she was a Darcy now and that meant living in London during the Season. The London house in Mayfair was no less impressive than Pemberley House, which was now her home. But London was different: a swirl of parties, dinner engagements, balls and social calls, and vastly removed from the life that Longbourn had prepared her for.
Elizabeth dabbed perfume behind her ears. It was easier to engage her husband in banter than to confess to her trepidation about the evening’s dinner party. “I quite like Caroline,” she declared. “She is engaging and you will own that her singing voice is a delight.”
“It is not her singing to which I object,” Fitzwilliam said. “It is her talking. One never knows what she is going to say next.”
Not everyone in Society would have welcomed the presence of Caroline Descartes to their dinner table. She was, after all, an actress, or at least a former one, and her marriage to an elderly earl had been the subject of much speculation. But to everyone’s surprise, and the dismay of those who had hoped for more notoriety of the sort that had accompanied her before her nuptials, Caroline had proven to be an attentive wife, faithful to her husband and dedicated to her marriage. The couple had had only one child, a daughter named Thomasina, after her father. The Earl had fallen into a decline when little Tommy, as she was called, was only a young child. He was rarely in London, due to his frail health, and the Countess seldom left his side. Gossips held that she was looking for a suitable marriage for her daughter, who now was sixteen and ready to make her entrance into Society. That was all that Elizabeth had learned, from gossips who were disappointed that Mrs. Darcy showed no alacrity at the prospect of launching from biography into fantasy.
But Lady Clementine Fortescue was known for her rather daring dinner parties, at which one might actually find one’s self seated next to an archbishop or an actress, or a Member of Parliament, or a foreign composer. Lady Clementine was a wealthy widow who could afford, both in terms of her affluence and her own sterling reputation, to do exactly as she pleased and what she pleased was unpredictability.
“She has a lovely voice, whether in song or prose. You enjoyed her singing as much as I did when we dined at Lady Albert’s home last week. She has been most congenial to me.”
Fitzwilliam was silent. He knew that Elizabeth felt constrained by the rigid social protocol of the London Season. He himself had learned to prize her vitality and her open nature, even if it was the opposite of his habitual reserve. That had been what first attracted him, although at the time he had resisted the allure of her personality. He had been a fool, and it had taken a break in communications, the threat of scandal involving her witless sister Lydia and that rogue George Wickham, and the risk to Georgiana’s reputation to make amends. Fortunately, both Fitzwilliam and Elizabeth had realized their error and rectified matters.
Gently he rubbed his finger along the alluring line of her chin. “No one could avoid being congenial to you,” he replied.
“If they are congenial, it is to Mrs. Darcy,” she answered him, rising from her seat. “Not to Elizabeth Bennet Darcy. Except for Lady Descartes. I believe that she sees me as I am and likes me for it.”
“As do I,” her husband replied, “but I have other methods, not contingent upon attendance at a dinner party, to exhibit my affection.”
“Mr. Darcy!” she exclaimed playfully, slapping his importunate hand with her fan. “You are quite out of fashion to display such an unseemly interest in your own wife. What will the ton think?”
“The ton be d__d,” Fitzwilliam Darcy said witheringly as he followed her out of the bedroom where, in defiance of social custom, he spent his nights in the company of his wife.
Once in the carriage and on their way to Lady Clementine’s London home, Elizabeth continued the conversation. “I believe that Caroline Descartes has presented her daughter at court so that she can take part in the Season. But if her husband is as ill as it’s been said, I wonder that she cares to leave him for so long.”
“Doubtless she realizes that marrying off a daughter is an obligation that would be better accomplished while the Earl yet lives,” Fitzwilliam said.
“That’s very cynical.”
“My dear Elizabeth, if he dies, as he is likely to do, being of an advanced age and in poor health, she will no doubt remarry. Her daughter’s matrimonial prospects, even as the daughter of an Earl, may be diminished by Lady Descartes’s choice of a second husband.”
“Why should you assume that she would marry unwisely?” Elizabeth wanted to know.
“I did not say unwisely,” he corrected. “She is unlikely to marry a second title. I do not believe the Descartes estates are particularly munificent; there isn’t a great deal of money to inherit
, even if she is the heiress. There will be the title, certainly, for the girl, while she lives, and the manor. But the time for the girl to find a husband is while her mother is the wife of an Earl.”
“I do not care for that reasoning,” Elizabeth said coolly.
“You may not care for it, but that does not change the fact that marriage among the aristocracy is a pragmatic business. Be glad that we are not bound by Debretts, and had the fortune to marry for love.” He took her hand, and kissed it.
She was mollified by his affectionate gesture and by his words. Her husband was not a sentimental man and he viewed the rigid rules of Society with jaundiced but resigned eyes. In marrying the poorly dowered Elizabeth Bennet, Fitzwilliam Darcy had committed the most outrageous act of his life. He had not yet regretted it for a moment, even if the marriage did mean that he was now related to the silly, prattling Mrs. Bennet, the reckless Lydia Wickham and her dissolute husband, Darcy’s nemesis, George Wickham, and two more sisters-in-law with neither sense nor charm to recommend them. However, Jane, the eldest sister and the one closest to Elizabeth, was a commendable woman and one, moreover, he could regard with affection as she was not only his sister-in-law, but also the wife of his close friend, Charles Bingley. The Bingleys would be coming to London for the Season soon, no doubt, which would, he guessed, provide Elizabeth with a welcome confidante.
At Dinner
Lady Descartes was seated first, as befitted her rank. The other guests were seated around the table with men and women alternating in order, Lady Clementine clearly preferring vivacity of conversation over social precedent. Elizabeth was seated next to Colonel Petherington, who proved to be an amiable dinner guest with interesting discourse on the situation in France. On her other side was young Mr. Cavendish, a friend of Lady Clementine’s son William. Mr. Cavendish was a quiet man who seemed to prefer the graces of his soup spoon to conversation, and as the lady on Colonel Petherington’s other side was engrossed in dialogue with the gentleman on her other side, Elizabeth and the Colonel were soon engaged in a discussion of Bonaparte’s intentions on the Continent. Conversation was flowing along as they enjoyed their meals, until Lady Clementine, seated across the table, said, “Colonel, what are you talking about that is so engaging? You are quite monopolizing Mrs. Darcy.”
“Not at all, Lady Clementine,” Elizabeth protested. Across the table, she could see her husband watching the exchange with an unreadable expression on his face. Fitzwilliam was obviously not so fortunate as she to be engrossed in an entertaining conversation. “Colonel Petherington is relaying his impressions of the rumors that Napoleon will invade Russia this summer.”
Lady Clementina made a face. “I’m very tired of that Corsican upstart,” she said. “It seems as if we have talked of nothing else over the past twenty years and more but what the French are doing. I much preferred it when they were simply naughty and licentious.”
“I daresay Wellington would agree with you, ma’am,” concurred the Colonel cheerfully. “Alas, the French will not cooperate.”
“I wish that this dratted war would conclude swiftly and victoriously so that we would be safely able to travel to Paris once more,” said Caroline Descartes. “I am quite willing to be patriotic but I do wish that I could procure French perfumes again.”
“Oh, you still can,” said the Colonel. “It’s still smuggled in with regularity. I reckon that it’s cheaper to go to Paris yourself to get it, though. Smugglers know they have a product that everyone wants to have and they charge accordingly.”
“You are very familiar with smugglers,” observed a guest on the other side of Fitzwilliam, a sour-looking, middle-aged woman dressed in drab clothing; Elizabeth could not recall her name.
“The Colonel is a magistrate,” Lady Clementine explained politely with just a hint of frost in her tones at the implied insult to the Colonel’s character. “I should imagine that, with trade as it stands, smugglers are doing a profitable business.”
“Most profitable,” the Colonel agreed, “but I expect Boney has extended himself too far. If he’s going to invade Russia, I’ll wager he’ll find an enemy he can’t defeat easily.”
“Is the Russian Army so excellent, then?” asked Lady Descartes. With her auburn hair swept up on her head in defiance of the fashionable ringlets, she looked regal as well as beautiful.
“No, but the Russian winter is,” the Colonel replied. “As I was telling Mrs. Darcy, I expect that Bonaparte will leave Russia in a far different manner than he anticipates.”
“I wonder, Colonel, that you seek to engage a woman in such a conversation,” opined Sir Lionel Vassey, seated across the table from her. “Women are ill-suited for such talk.”
Elizabeth saw Fitzwilliam close his eyes briefly, as if what was likely to ensue offered him pain. She would not embarrass her husband at a social event by calling Sir Lionel to account for what she regarded as an ill-advised and erroneous comment. But she would not let the remark go unchallenged.
“I think that the mothers and wives of soldiers who have lost their lives in the war are likely to be very well-suited for such a topic. The sooner that the war ends, the more women will embrace living husbands and sons again.”
“Here, here, Mrs. Darcy,” called Lady Descartes. “Exactly right. Why should women refrain from expressing opinions on the war when we suffer so much from it?”
“I will not disagree with you, my lady,” said the colonel. His eyes winkled. “Perhaps someday there will be members of the gentler sex in Parliament and they may vote war out altogether.”
“Nonsense!” declared the drably dressed lady with the disapproving expression on her face. “Women are venturing into parts of society where they do not belong and, mark my words, it’ll bring down the Empire.”
Fitzwilliam’s face was a monument in stone, except for his eyes, which briefly captured Elizabeth’s glance long enough to demand to know, without words, why had she insisted on accepting the invitation to the dinner party. She smile at him in response. He did not smile back.
“I think the Empire is made of sterner stuff, Mrs. Norris,” said Lady Descartes with a laugh.
“There’s a shameful amount of license about these days,” Mrs. Norris disagreed. “One has only to look at how the aristocracy has lowered its standards to see the truth of what I say. Poets speaking in the House of Lords and living scandalous lives; actresses marrying earls and giving themselves airs. It’s an outrage!”
There was, for an instant, a moment of awful silence as her words landed, as had been the intent, upon the assembled guests. Lady Descartes merely continued chewing, but Elizabeth could see that her cheeks had taken on a red tinge that owed nothing to stage makeup. The colonel at her side fidgeted with his knife and fork, as if he were not prepared to continue eating but was unsure of what to do. At her other side, the silent Mr. Cavendish appeared to be holding his breath.
“Do you think so?” Elizabeth asked coolly. “I am quite new to society but I find that what you deem license strikes me as refreshing. Do we not benefit from the invigoration of conversation provided by a diverse guest list? I should find it very tedious to only dine with the same people all the time, and I quite appreciated Lady Clementine’s invitation.”
Fitzwilliam’s expression did not change but she saw the spark of admiration in his eyes. He doubtless would not have wanted her to speak up, but as she had, he seemed to find her response within the bonds of propriety. She felt someone’s gaze upon her and turned her head to see that Lady Descartes was studying her with interest.
“Thank you, my dear,” said Lady Clementine. “I am thinking of hosting, for my next party, a number of artists who are exhibiting at the Royal Academy. I’m sure it will be deliciously naughty. I should invite a member of the clergy, should I not, to ensure a lively conversation? Mrs. Norris, I do not believe you have sampled the mutton and you really should; my cook prides herself upon it. Colonel, you must tell us what you know of Lord Wellington’s strategy. I for
one am hoping to celebrate a victory soon and I shall invite you all to join me here. Lady Descartes, you will have to come as well.”
“I do not say it will be soon, Lady Clementine,” replied the colonel. “I have no doubt that our military will dispatch Bonaparte, but it will take some doing, and it will take time.”
The conversation safely steered to safer topics – there could be no dissension on the subject of the French war – and Elizabeth returned her attention to her food.
“That was grand, Mrs. Darcy,” said a quiet voice on her right.
“Mr. Cavendish?” she said, doubting that he had actually spoken.
“Yes,” he said. “I congratulate you for speaking up to that woman. She was unspeakably rude.”
“Lady Clementine took care of it most admirably, I think, and I doubt the matter will arise again.”
“I should jolly well think not. But how unfair of her!”
“Yes, indeed, but we must not dwell upon it. There is too much excellent food and company to allow one unpleasant interlude to ruin the evening.”
“Why should a poet not give a speech in the House of Lords?” Mr. Cavendish demanded hotly, his voice still low in tone but his indignation plain to hear.
“No reason at all,” Elizabeth answered, amused that the young man was oblivious to the insult that had been deliberately flung at a present guest and had instead risen to the defense of a poet who not even in the room.
“I should say not. I believe that Lord Byron delivered a most heartfelt speech when he spoke in the House of Lords, and I venture to say that if his speeches are at all akin to his poetry, it would provide a rarefied moment in British politics.”
Elizabeth raised her fork to her lips. “The mutton is indeed delicious, Mr. Cavendish. Pray try it. I think you will be quite pleased.
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