A Season Lost

by Sophie Turner

  Yet after the initial shock of this thought, Elizabeth moved well enough past it. Longbourn was her childhood home, and now her home was at Pemberley, or in the worst of circumstances, its presently nameless dower house, and her son James – her sweet boy, James – was heir to the estate that encompassed both. She sympathised with Charlotte and she hoped Charlotte would follow her heart, but Elizabeth’s every care was with James’s father.

  That man emerged from Longbourn’s library with a weary countenance shortly after Elizabeth and Catherine returned to the house. He came into the drawing-room with the rest of the men, looking as though the presence of his wife in his bed the previous night had prevented his getting the rest he likely needed after the events of the past several weeks.

  Elizabeth watched him emerge with the others, and found her chest tightening at the sight of him. “There he is,” she thought, “He is my husband: he is handsome, and intelligent, and good, and he is mine. And, thank God, he is well.”

  Chapter 35

  Mary Stanton had a secret, that she had not shared with her husband. She was desirous of sharing it with him, but in such a troubling season, she had not yet found a time that seemed right, and she was worried over how he would respond. Her secret would mean additional expense for them, when presently their glebe lands were doing as poorly as the other fields surrounding Wincham, and David had said that in good conscience he could not tithe at the established rates this year.

  Mary’s secret was that she believed herself to be at least three months with child. That it was a secret was not due to any inattention on her husband’s part. Her symptoms had been very mild compared to what her sisters had told her to expect, and so the primary indication of her present state was having missed her courses, when they had always been very regular.

  Contemplating the time and manner in which she would tell David of her present state had become her primary occupation, and on this evening, when they were dining with the Winterleys, she was engaged most fully in it. David and the Winterleys might have noticed her absorbed in something beyond her usual quietude, but that the weather and the state of the crops had once again dominated conversation at the dinner table.

  Lord Winterley was concerned for his tenants, and David his parishioners; the former had done all that could be done through active management with his steward, while the latter did all that could be done through prayer. It had to be admitted, however, that little improvement had come from either tactic, and the faces of those visited throughout the week and greeted in the parish church on Sundays had a look of deep, haggard worry that in turn worried those entrusted with their care. Were it not for Mary’s secret, such worries would have dominated her mind as they dominated her time in visiting her parishioners, where she did what she could to alleviate their worries and provide charity.

  Shortly after their marriage, Mary and David had discussed the possibility of setting up a carriage, but as their income was to be reduced, such talk had dissipated. Lord and Lady Winterley, however, would not allow them to walk home, particularly in such weather as they were having, and once they had all repaired to the drawing-room, and Mary and Lady Winterley had played the pianoforte, the carriage was called.

  Mary did not know if it was the finest carriage the Winterleys possessed, but it was very fine by her standards, with the family arms painted upon the door and very fine upholstery inside. It was in this space that they made the ride back to the parsonage, the rain pattering heavily against the windows. David watched it fall silently; having already discussed it through most of the evening, there was nothing left to be said on that topic.

  “I – ” said Mary, who had determined she should tell him now, and almost immediately after making this determination, thought that it was not the right time, that she should at least wait until they arrived home.

  “Yes, Mary?” he asked, turning towards her with an expression so solicitous Mary decided she should speak now, rather than wait any longer.

  “I – I am in the family way,” she said, and then continued, in a rush: “I am sorry, for I know the timing is not good, in such a summer, and – ”

  “Mary, Mary,” he soothed, taking up her hand. “This is wonderful news – this is the happiest news I could have in such a season. Why should you think it anything else?”

  “I fear the additional cost will be a burden on us,” she said.

  “Please do not worry yourself over that. We shall have no concerns over being able to feed and shelter the child.”

  Mary nodded, knowing there were some in the parish who did have such concerns.

  “I would like to hire on additional help for the nursery, if we can, and by the time he or she is born, we should know whether we can afford to do so,” he said. “I am hopeful that we can, but I would rather be prudent about it.”

  “Yes, I agree, it would be wise to be cautious.”

  “Beyond that, there will be very little additional expense until the child is much older, and this weather is hopefully nothing but a distant memory.”

  “So you are pleased by the news?” Mary asked.

  “Mary, I am far beyond pleased. I hope you did not think I would be otherwise. I noticed you have been a little quiet lately.”

  “It never seemed the right time to tell you.”

  “Well, I am glad you have told me now, for you and our child shall be my one bright light in such a dark season.”

  With this said, he drew his arm around her shoulders and pulled her close. Mary leaned against him, and now having been given leave to think of her child as a development that was nothing but positive, did so with a growing happiness.

  Chapter 36

  Now that the Darcys were all reunited, the adults of the family were eager to make their return to Pemberley. There were several obstacles to their doing so, however: several days of thunderstorms and hail made it clear they would need to wait for some break in the weather to consider travelling, and Anne de Bourgh’s presence at Longbourn meant that even when travelling was possible, Mr. Darcy would be required to return her to Rosings before any trip north could be contemplated.

  Upon their application to Anne to be ready to travel whenever the weather broke, however, the Darcys were told by their cousin that she did not wish to return to Rosings, for her health continued to improve in her absence from that place.

  “I do not know the cause of my present improvement in health,” said she, “but it has improved steadily since I left Rosings and ceased taking the blue pill, so I suspect one or both of those things to be the cause. Please do not make me go back there so soon – I am not ready.”

  “Of course you may travel with us to Pemberley if you wish, or if you would prefer, we can seek out a companion for you, who might attend you back to the seaside,” Darcy said.

  “I would like to stay with you, I think, and go to Pemberley. From there, I may take the waters at Matlock and see if they have any additional benefit. I think it is close enough that I may go for the day, with a man-servant to attend me.”

  “It is,” Darcy confirmed. “Then it is settled. You should feel welcome to stay with us as long as you wish, and I hope we shall continue to see such improvement in your health.”

  “As do I,” Anne said, “but I must ask for something more of you. When the time comes – when I am feeling well enough – I intend to take up my place as mistress of Rosings, and require my mother to retire to the dower house. I wish to ask for your support, when this time comes.”

  Darcy visibly gaped at this request, and Elizabeth did little to hide her own shock. Yet he responded as soon as he was able: “Of course you have my support, Anne. And if you wish it, we can go to town and meet with my attorneys there, so you know fully where all matters of the estate and your inheritance stand.”

  “I would like that – thank you,” said Anne. “There is one matter I would like to settle sooner, before my mother does. As you well know, the living at Hunsford is now vacant.”

  “
Yes – have you some candidate you wish to instal?”

  “That is the difficulty: I do not. Yet I would like the man given the living to be done so by me. My acquaintance is limited, and I wondered if you knew of any worthy candidates.”

  Here Elizabeth thought immediately of Herbert Ramsey, the younger brother of Captain Ramsey, who had but an ill-paying curacy to his name, and whom Darcy had desired to help, if an opportunity could be found. If Darcy did not recall young Herbert, Elizabeth determined she would remind him. She did not need to, however, for he said: “Captain Ramsey has a younger brother who is a curate – a most worthy young man. He does not have the interest that might have seen him to a good living thus far, but I believe he would serve your post very well.”

  “Good, I like that he is family – distant family, for myself, but family nonetheless. I only fear he may suffer from an excess of gratitude at being given such an unexpected living.”

  “I think he would be grateful,” Elizabeth said, “but I do not think he would suffer from an excess of gratitude in the same manner as – as the previous incumbent. He is a practical young man.”

  “Thank you, Mrs. – Elizabeth. I will speak to Captain Ramsey of it as soon as I may. Fitzwilliam, will you assist me in whatever is needed to see Mr. Ramsey installed in the living? I do not know what is required, but whatever is to be done, I wish to accomplish it before my mother does so on my behalf.”

  “If we presume Mr. Ramsey will accept the position – and I see no reason why he would not – then we may write to your bishop immediately,” Darcy said. “And perhaps it is for the best that Mrs. Collins vacated the parsonage so quickly, for there is nothing to prevent Mr. Ramsey’s taking up his residence there.”

  Andrew Ramsey was summoned and Anne, under direction from Darcy, began the letter to her bishop, only interrupting her laborious writing when Captain Ramsey entered the room. He was asked if he thought it likely that his brother would be willing to accept the living of Hunsford, in Kent, and responded in a shocked manner that he thought Herbert Ramsey would be honoured to receive the position. He was then informed that Herbert might experience some resistance at first, from the dowager of the estate to which the living belonged, whose protests – if they came – would be largely because he had not been her candidate. These protests could not be immediately silenced by the presence of Anne de Bourgh, whose living it was to bestow, for she would be travelling on to Pemberley. Andrew replied that he would travel with his brother, to provide additional support, and Darcy indicated this support could be supplemented, if needed, by that of Edward Fitzwilliam, to whom he would write of the situation. Darcy felt certain that if needed, Edward or his father would travel down to Kent and recall Lady Catherine to her legal rights as Sir Lewis de Bourgh’s widow, and no more, as regarded Rosings.

  Andrew, now, took up pen and paper, and began rapidly scratching out a letter to his brother, giving him joy of his good fortune and desiring him to resign his present curacy and travel to Hunsford as soon as it could be done. Elizabeth, watching him and Anne in their writing, found herself wholly approving of all her cousin had done. It was no easy thing that Anne intended to do, to throw off the influence she had known all her life, a life lived – until now – in such a debilitated state. Yet it was very possible that Lady Catherine had been responsible for this state; it had been Lady Catherine and her quack physician who had likely cowed Anne into taking this blue pill that was, at best, of questionable value to her health, compared to the obvious benefits a very little sea-bathing had clearly given her. Elizabeth gazed at both of her relations as they wrote and determined to put the irritations of Margate behind her, and assist Anne in every possible manner at her disposal in the future.

  When the time came, she went up to change for dinner and found Sarah even more subdued than her usual quiet manners. Elizabeth asked her what was wrong, and Sarah hastened to tell her that nothing was the matter. In time, though, with very patient questioning, Elizabeth prised out her maid’s concerns: after her time in Margate, worrying over the health of her mistress’s twins, this latest round of storms had recalled Sarah to worry over whether such weather was occurring in Ireland, and if so, what this must mean for her family. She was thankful of what her mistress’s generosity had enabled her to save up and send back to them, but if her family’s lands were anything like those of England, she feared it would not be enough.

  Elizabeth soothed her as best she could with hopeful words that the weather would improve, and yet they did not sound convincing, even to her. What she could do, she realised, was to make even better on Darcy’s promise that they would take care of their own, and ensure none of her staff – especially Sarah – had reason to worry over their families. Most of Pemberley’s servants were from local families, which could be easily enough monitored, but if there was anyone causing worry farther afield, she would ensure they were taken care of – especially the family of a servant so valuable as Sarah.

  Chapter 37

  The weather could not be said to have entirely cleared, but it improved sufficiently for the Darcys and those travelling with them to begin their journey back to Derbyshire, and while this journey was not accomplished at its usual pace, it was accomplished.

  They were received at the house with pleasure by Mrs. Reynolds and Mr. Parker, and relief from Mr. Richardson, who had a deep desire to discuss with his master the success of the water-cress in certain fields, and the news from London that the price of wheat continued to rise, given the predicted scarcity of the crop.

  Elizabeth worried more about the health of her sons than the price of wheat, and was glad to see them settled back into Pemberley’s nursery, rather than the unfortunate nomadic life she had exposed them to, in requiring them to travel with her to Warwickshire, Norfolk, Kent, and Hertfordshire. With the resilience of youth, however, they settled back in with no ill consequences from their travels. Their mother was glad to be reunited with the Bingleys, who had returned from town barely a week before the Darcys. Charles she did not see until dinner, but Jane entered the nursery not long after she had laid the boys down in their cradles there, and when Elizabeth rose she was the recipient of an awkward, tender embrace.

  The awkwardness was due to Jane’s present size – her belly had grown noticeably since Elizabeth had seen her last – and when they had separated, Elizabeth said, “Oh Jane, I think it shall not be too long before your own child is born.”

  “I believe you are right, and I will be very glad when the time comes. The last few weeks are always the hardest, I think – I do not how you bore them with twins.”

  “They were not the most comfortable weeks of my life, but I have nothing to compare them to. I shall only know if they are worse with twins when I have a single child, and that will not be for some time, I think.”

  “You are not – in the family way yet?”

  “No,” Elizabeth said, then continued in a lower voice so the nurses would not hear her, “my courses have yet to return, since the birth.”

  “Is it because you fed them? I wish mama had not made me feel I could not do so for Bess,” Jane’s countenance turned downcast. “It would have been nice to wait a little longer before becoming with child again, but mostly I would have liked that connection with her.”

  “Well, there is nothing to prevent you from nursing this child, and all that follow.”

  “Yes, and I surely will.”

  “Now, you must tell me of the birth of little Miss Harrison,” said Elizabeth. “Or let me guess – Caroline was so busy looking through furniture catalogues she forgot to push, and the poor child had to climb out herself.”

  Jane giggled. “It was not so bad as that, Lizzy, although I have never heard a woman scream in such a manner as she did. She seemed almost angry that she should have to go through such a thing, and oh the awful things she said to Sir Sedgewick about having put her in that state – I blush even now to think of them. I did not know half of the words she used, but their meaning w
as apparent enough.”

  “Oh Jane, that you should have to attend such a woman in childbirth.”

  “It is my duty as her sister, Lizzy. I am sure other women have reacted in the way she did. I am only glad she married Sir Sedgewick. He truly loves her, Lizzy – I am sure of it. He was so patient, even when she was saying those things to him. And he was very kind to her when she was disappointed the baby was a girl.”

  “Well, I suppose there is a saucer for every teacup,” Elizabeth said drily, once again prompting giggles from her elder sister.

  +++

  Elizabeth was glad to dine quietly with Jane and Charles after the more raucous meals of Longbourn, and still more glad to retire that evening to the refined elegance of the master’s bedchamber. This had more to do with the man within than the decor, however, for she had not entirely recovered from her forced separation from Darcy, and she went there seeking every reminder of his presence as master of the house, as her husband, as the father of her sons.

  After he had provided her with these things in a convincing manner, Darcy asked his wife of whether she intended to finally redecorate the mistress’s apartment, now that she had returned to the house and was likely to remain there for some time.

  “Do you wish to be rid of me here?” Elizabeth asked, teasingly.

  He chuckled. “Oh, not at all. I do wish for you to continue to spend your nights here, but surely during the day you would prefer to have chambers more suited to your own taste.”

  Elizabeth sighed. “I suppose I should – I suppose it has been long overdue, for me to make those spaces my own. It seems such a frivolous expense to take on now, though.”

  “Our frivolous expenses provide others with work, and therefore a livelihood,” Darcy said, quietly but firmly.

  “That is very true, but we are already providing many with such for work on Bar – on the other house,” Elizabeth said. “That is why I have other projects I would rather begin. I know we shall aid those in Lambton and Kympton, and our tenants as needed, but I also wish to have interviews done with the servants, to see if any alms are required for their families. And I wish to make over the conservatory for food. It seems ridiculous that we should be growing ferns and flowers there, in this season.”