The Elizabeth Papers

by Jenetta James

  Lydia’s left hand lay palm up on the blanket, and the child slipped slightly against the cushions that Hannah had piled up against her right side. I looked at my sister’s face, motionless in the odd light and overwhelming heat, and thought of her laughing louder than she should and careering around the ballroom at Netherfield. I recalled the sight of her parading about Meryton on Wickham’s arm and pushing Kitty off the swing in the Longbourn garden. I could not credit that she could be so still now. From somewhere far away, I was brought back to the present by Hannah’s voice.

  “Madam, shall you take Miss Victoria now?”

  Hannah leant over and gently took the child, who had begun to squirm slightly. She jiggled her around for comfort and straightened her shawl before kneeling down before me.

  “Madam, do you feel able to take her? I shall attend to Mrs. Wickham.”

  I nodded, and into my arms she placed the warm, solid babe who was now my daughter in every sense but the biological. My arms tightened around her, and I fought the tears that were welling up in my eyes. Seeing Hannah and Mrs. Reidy hurrying about my sister, my vision blurred. I was silent as Hannah straightened out my sister’s body and closed her eyes. Mrs. Reidy left the room with an armful of bloody rags, and in spite of the horror of it, my senses seemed to awaken.

  “Hannah?”

  “Yes, madam.”

  “Thank you.”

  There was a beat of silence before she smiled and looked at her feet.

  “Do we have a wet nurse here? I believe this baby shall need feeding shortly.”

  “Mrs. Reidy says there is a lady in the village. She is on her way.”

  I touched her hand lightly as she moved out of the room. I know not how long I sat in the dark, hot chamber with my sister and our child, but it was probably for a shorter period than it seemed. After some time had passed, the child began to move around in my arms and grow discontented. I heard steps and voices in the hall beyond, and Hannah returned with a lady from the village who took the baby into the next room to nurse her. I wondered how many hours after my sister’s death we could expect the arrival of the physician, who would need to be paid and accommodated for the night. I made a note in my mind to attend to it. Unsteadily, I rose, and before departing the room, I kissed my sister’s cheek for the final time. The air in the corridor was icy cold on my face as I closed the door behind me, and my shaky hand struggled to turn the handle.

  From some small distance away, Fitzwilliam advanced towards me and said, “I know,” as he folded his arms about me.

  Chapter 24

  We buried Lydia in the village churchyard. Although ladies do not usually attend funerals, on this occasion I did. We were far from home, and matters were far from regular. I wished to attend my sister’s burial, and Fitzwilliam did nothing to dissuade me. The sky was grey, and the wind howled mercilessly around us. The words of the liturgy were spoken, but I hardly heard them. After the thing was concluded, his warm hand helped me back into the carriage. As we pulled away from the lychgate, I turned back and saw my sister’s burial place vanishing to a pinprick on the horizon.

  “Fitzwilliam?”

  He turned to me and smiled kindly.

  “I believe I should like to go home.”

  “Then you shall.”

  Again, a physician was summoned from Dublin, and he pronounced that, provided that she be kept warm, Victoria would be safe to travel to Derbyshire some weeks hence. Hannah attended to the packing of our belongings, and Mr. Darcy’s local steward believed that he had found a new tenant for the property. I visited Mrs. Reidy at home to thank her for her services to my sister, but in a bid to fight the melancholy that threatened to consume me, I did not revisit the chamber in which she had died. I had written to Jane with a story that Lydia had died of a local fever. It shamed me to write lies to her, but there it was. She was tasked with telling Mama and Papa and Mary and poor Kitty, a challenge I did not envy. It had always been my plan to inform Jane of the truth in person at some private moment, but Fitzwilliam was not in favour of this. On our last day at Rosschapel, he and I sat in the drawing room, the late afternoon sun spilling through the leaded windows, a sleeping Victoria in my arms, and he took up the subject.

  “If you wish to tell your sister, Elizabeth, then you must, but I would urge you to think on it. Jane will have to tell Bingley. The more people who know, the greater danger there is that one day some unreliable person will discover the truth.”

  My mind flew to Caroline Bingley chattering away in Jane’s wake, feathers bobbing, lurid colours flashing, her eyes primed for the misfortunes of others.

  “The truth is that I now regret having told Galbraith. It never occurred to me that we would be returning home without Lydia. I thought that we would need his help with legalities, but now that we have lost our sister, nothing shall be necessary. Fortunately, he is completely trustworthy, and if I instruct him to destroy my letters on the subject, then I know he shall do so. Although it is not necessary for him to know, I do not believe it shall pose a problem.”

  “Do you suppose Jane a problem, sir?”

  “No, of course not. I do not mean that. It is not that I do not trust Jane. I do trust her. It is more that I think the smallest number of people possible should know this truth. We have to think of Victoria. Think of the impact on her were this to be known.”

  He looked at her tiny form, and a shadow of softness played across his face. She shifted slightly in my arms, and a corner of her blanket fell away.

  “Do you think she is warm enough? Shall I call for another shawl?”

  “She is fine, Fitzwilliam. But if you wish to hold her yourself to verify this, I shall not betray your secret.”

  He smiled, knowing a tease, and offered his arms into which I gently transferred Victoria.

  “I hope you can accept her, Fitzwilliam, as if she were your daughter…”

  “It is not a matter of hoping, Elizabeth. There is nothing for which to hope. I do accept her. I accept her, and I love her. Let us resolve that Victoria is my daughter and yours and say no more about it?”

  He looked at me searchingly, and his thumb absently stroked Victoria’s plump cheek. I spoke not, and he continued.

  “No doubt in the next few days, we will need to discuss matters. We need to agree on how we shall present this when we return to Pemberley. There is the question of dealing with your family and the children. There is also the fact that you have been greatly injured in your feelings. You have lost a sister and gained a child, and you shall need to speak of it if you are to survive the cruelty of the thing. But may I suggest that those discussions being had, we say nothing further, even to each other? If we live it, then it shall become the truth. If we talk of these events beyond the time that it is necessary, then we run all manner of risks. We risk being overheard or raising the suspicions of others. We risk our own feelings. You are one for turning matters over, Elizabeth, but sometimes, it is as well to be silent. Live as if Victoria is your child and mine, and she shall be.”

  I reached over and kissed him.

  ***

  September 27, 1821, Dublin, Ireland

  The inn at which we are spending our last night in Ireland is half in darkness even with all the candles lit, and the ceilings are so low as to whisper above my head. In the early morning, we shall board the boat to Holyhead and be gone. Hannah is presently in her room with Victoria and the Irish wet nurse we have with us. I hear my dear maid through the wall, sorting and shuffling, no doubt ensuring that all the right things are in the right trunks for the English part of our journey home. It is a journey that cannot be too soon completed. My letters to Mrs. Reynolds and Nanny and Georgiana shall have arrived before us, and my heart sings to think that within days my eyes shall rest on their recipients.

  Our rooms here were the best available, but they are rat
her dark, and noises creep up from below on all sides. I hear the sound of men’s voices in the bar, and a dog barks without. The clunking of the great gates opening and a horse’s hooves upon the uneven ground of the unmade road outside echo in my ears. I pull my shawl tighter about me and wonder where my husband is and when he shall return. He said he had business in the bar, but I cannot think what it is at this hour when we are to stay in this land for a matter of mere hours. I shiver, close my book that I have long ceased to read, and just as I am about to snuff out the candle, I hear his familiar gait approach. His appearance in the light of the door makes me start forward in our bed.

  “Do not disturb yourself, Elizabeth.”

  “Is all well, sir? You have been below stairs a long while.”

  He sat on my side of the bed and brushed my arms with his warm hands.

  “I am sorry to be so long, but I hope it shall not be wasted time. I have been speaking to an associate of the captain and believe that I have secured us the best cabin for tomorrow’s sailing. I am afraid that I cannot predict the weather, but if it is bad, we shall have all the comfort the boat can provide. I know you did not enjoy the sea journey here. Now of course, we also have to think of Victoria.”

  I pictured my restrained husband in the raucous bar below, bargaining with Irish sailors for a better berth, and I wanted to fold him up in my arms. I held his hand, and our fingers knitted together.

  “Thank you. You are too kind to us.”

  “No, I am not. There is no kindness that you do not earn every moment.”

  He looked up, and a light in his eyes sparked. The air of the room shifted, and suddenly, something new and familiar was at large. His hand went to my shawl, a mauve affair from Mama, and deftly, he removed it, never taking his eyes from mine. The soft side of his thumb moved over my cheeks and eyelids, and my pulse quickened in a beat. I heard a roar of laughter from the bar below and the muffled sounds of tankards crashing down on wood as his lips found mine in the semi-darkness. He moved to me, and his hands moved down my cotton-clad body in a motion I knew well. He pulled at my nightgown.

  “May I?”

  When I was a younger woman, learning his touch, I had nodded and shuffled about to allow this custom. As a young bride, I believe I closed my eyes. But now, in my middle years and having seen life break forth and expire, I fixed him with a stare to match his own and spoke clearly. “Yes.” My gown removed, he beheld me in the flickering light against the thin pillows and unfamiliar bed linen.

  “Beautiful.”

  I could not but laugh at this.

  “Why do you laugh, Elizabeth?”

  “Because I love to laugh, and…well, because it is humorous to hear such a word on your lips upon beholding such a sight.”

  “Humorous?”

  “Yes. Once, it was true maybe. But you could not possibly think such a thing now, Mr. Darcy. I am not a girl of one and twenty.”

  “You are not. You are much more.”

  “That, I know too well! Much more in terms of years traversed!”

  “I did not mean that.”

  “I have had children. I am far from perfect. I do not expect you to pretend, Fitzwilliam.”

  “I am not pretending. Every part of you is as I would have it. The changes wrought by the years, they are nothing to me.”

  With this, his lean body crashed against me, and I felt his lips press upon mine—upon all the parts of my person. Candlelight caught the silvery threads in his hair, and my fingers pressed into the flesh of his arms, his back, his shoulders, his face. The mark of them shall always be there, known only to us. When he said my name, tears sprang from my eyes. Was this relief or grief delayed? Was it the unvarnished joy of loving and being loved in return? To know him so well and still to be touched by him in darkness and light is surely the greatest fortune of all.

  Chapter 25

  Pemberley, 19 September 2014

  Charlie read the last sentence aloud, closed the book, and looked up from his seat by the dressing table. Elizabeth’s journals were piled up beside him, dusty and a little worn but essentially well preserved. Evie lay back on the bed, barefoot and in her jeans and T-shirt, trying to digest the words. The black of the night pressed on the windows like thick soup, and she had no idea of the time. He had not read it all; there was so much. He had focussed on the dates around the time that Victoria was conceived and then born. Now that she knew the truth of her descent, she felt unaccountably shocked by it. Charlie’s voice broke through the muddy silence.

  “So you were right…about Elizabeth, I mean.”

  She was silent for a moment and rolled over onto her side to face him across the room.

  “I was right that she was faithful. But she wasn’t my fifth great grandmother—her sister Lydia was. And my fifth great grandfather was a complete unknown. So, it is true that I am not a Darcy at all. Not even a poor and distantly related one.”

  She smiled, and he smiled back.

  “It’s okay, Evie, because we have it now. No one need ever know.”

  “Except you and me.”

  Charlie inhaled and looked down at his feet before raising his gaze to meet hers.

  “Your secret’s safe with me. Surely, you know you that by now?”

  She did know. She focussed on his shadowy figure sitting across the room and felt a slight dizziness. “The unvarnished joy of loving and being loved in return.” Evie let those words turn around her mind. She sat up on the bed and stretched. The air in the room was crisper than before, and they looked at each other in silence. From somewhere, a question cracked open. It ricocheted around in the space between them like a firecracker. What was this thing, and where had it come from? “Still to be touched by him in darkness and light.” A voice inside Evie spoke, and she felt bold—bolder than she ever recalled. Knowing that she had to act quickly or not act at all, she stood, walked across the floor, and stopped in front of him. Charlie looked from her bare toes on the carpet to her blonde hair falling across her face, and moved, seemingly on instinct. He stood up and, wrapping his arms around her, kissed her lips. It amazed Evie that she did not feel shyness or embarrassment or any of the other creatures of loneliness and insecurity with which she was so familiar. She did not. She reached her hands up to his stubbly face and kissed him back. His hands roamed around her body from the edge of her breasts, along her slim waist, and around her bottom, and she was on fire. Hurriedly and intertwined, they stumbled towards the high bed where he sat her on the edge and fixed her with a searching, almost unbelieving stare.

  “Yes?”

  With one movement and without taking her eyes from his face, she peeled up the bottom of her T-shirt and swept it over her head. He observed her perched on the edge of the bed in her bra and jeans, cheeks flushed, hair ruffled by his hands, and she knew she had made herself plain enough. He pushed her back against the covers and the excess of pillows, and in the dim light of Elizabeth’s bedroom, he slipped off the rest of her clothes and then his own. The feeling of his naked body above hers and the sound of his voice in her ear electrified her. Afterwards, they lay facing each other in the massive bed, his hand resting on the side of her tummy.

  “If I knew it was going to have that effect, I would have read aloud to you before.”

  She smiled at this and stroked his bare chest.

  “You do have a lovely voice.”

  “Thank you. You have a lovely everything.”

  She rolled to him and played with the curls in his hair, her breasts squashed against the side of his body. They regarded one another in silence for a moment before she spoke again.

  “Now, you are not allowed to avoid answering my questions when you are actually in bed with me.”

  “Really?” He raised his eyebrows.

  “Really. So, I want to know about you. You know everythin
g about me.”

  He began to kiss her neck and mumbled, “Not enough.”

  “Stop deflecting me. You do know everything. You mapped out things about me before I even knew your name. You know who my great, great, great, great, great grandparents weren’t. You’ve been to my house. You’ve met Clemmie. You’ve even seen me naked, and there aren’t many people in the world who’ve seen me naked.”

  “You’ve seen me naked too, Evie.”

  “I know, and that”—she paused to kiss his cheek—“was its own reward. But, I still think you owe me some information.”

  “What information do you want?” he asked, stroking her hair. The gentle pressure of his hand soothed her. She knew that he was distracting her, avoiding discussion, and she wasn’t going to let him get away with it.

  “Just—you know—who you are, what you’re about. That kind of thing. How on earth you managed to end up doing what you do.”

  “Sounds a bit deep. Can’t we just enjoy each other?”

  “I don’t even know how old you are. When is your birthday?” She paused for a moment. “What happened to your dad?”

  He rolled onto his back and swept his hair back from his forehead with his hand.

  “Now that really is deep. You sure you want to know now?”

  She rested her arm across his chest. “Yes.”

  “Okay. Well, I’m thirty-four. My birthday was the eighth of June.”

  “Hmm.” She planted a soft kiss on his chest.

  “My dad was a vicar in an inner-city parish in Hackney. He was an amazing guy. He was kind and intelligent and forgiving, and he always saw the best in people. He was willing to help people the world turned their backs on. He didn’t want wealth. He didn’t want glory.”

  “He sounds pretty saintly.”

  “He was pretty saintly. He even forgave me for not being as good as he was.”