A Season Lost

by Sophie Turner

  Elizabeth was glad Marguerite had not said this quite so confidently as she had the previous night – there was certainly a chance Marguerite was wrong. Nor was Elizabeth entirely certain Marguerite should be giving her encouragement to such a match: save Lady Catherine, Darcy’s family had accepted Elizabeth, the daughter of a small country squire, and they had been willing to accept Marguerite even when they thought she had little fortune. Yet Marguerite had still been of excellent family, and for Anne to marry a tenant of Darcy’s, a farmer – even if he was a gentleman farmer – was quite another thing entirely. Yet what good would come of discouraging the match, if they were truly in love with each other? With this thought, Elizabeth finally spoke: “If he is in love, I do not think he will speak of it.”

  “Because of my station,” Anne said, flatly.

  “Yes, because of your station,” Elizabeth said. “If anyone will speak, I believe it will have to be you.”

  “This is much easier plan,” said Marguerite. “Elizabeth and I will find way to give you some – oh, oh, what is the word for intimité?”

  “Privacy,” said Anne, turning back once more, and now looking very pale.

  Anne considered what Marguerite and Elizabeth had said as they rode the remaining distance to Smith’s farm. She had been shocked that Marguerite should speak of such a thing directly, but encouraged by Marguerite’s thinking Mr. Smith was in love with her. It would be difficult, to be the one to speak, but then at least she would know whether he returned her affections, would know whether they could move forward with a marriage. She could not remain at Pemberley forever, seeking opportunities to ride past his farm and see him in company, in the hopes that he might someday make a declaration.

  It made a difference, as well, to receive what seemed approval from her cousins: her female cousins, at least; she could not know what Fitzwilliam, Edward, or Andrew would think, nor her aunt and uncle. They were approaching the drive to Smith’s house, and Anne slowed Buttercup. This plan had come about suddenly, and although she had seen the sense in it, now it felt too sudden, as though she was being flung headlong down a hillside. The next half-hour would decide her fate – would decide whether she was to return to Rosings alone, or as the wife of the man she loved.

  The Darcys’s groom had been riding well behind them, but he came up past her now at a canter so that he could tether his own horse and then see to helping the ladies dismount. Anne felt her pulse pounding as her boots touched the ground, and she waited until Elizabeth and Marguerite were standing beside her before she moved to go inside. She would lose the support of their presence for the critical moment, but took what comfort she could from it now.

  They entered, they were asked by the maid to sit in the parlour while Mr. Smith was located. Anne felt herself seized with terror as they sat to await him. She ought to take more time to think this over, to at least think of what she would say, and she opened her mouth to speak, to tell them she did not wish to go forward with this plan so soon, but it was too late: Mr. Smith was striding into the room.

  He acknowledged their call as a pleasing surprise, although in truth it must have been far more than a surprise, for three ladies to call upon a bachelor in this manner. It would have been a great breach of propriety, if not made small in comparison to what Anne was about to do. She felt herself blushing profusely again, for he was looking very well that day, so very well that she felt some greater motivation to see through what she had come here for. It could not be helped now, anyway, for after less than five minutes of conversation, Marguerite began looking shrewdly around the room. What Marguerite found was not within the room, but in the drawing-room across the hall: Mr. Smith’s pianoforte.

  “Oh, Mrs. Darcy, look at this fine little instrument,” she said, rising and walking across the hall. “You play, do you not? You must play for us a little something. I will – I will turn the papers for you.”

  Elizabeth played her part as well, giving Anne a glance of some significance before she followed Marguerite to the drawing-room. The pianoforte was not in tune, which could be heard as soon as Elizabeth began playing, but Elizabeth played on, and Mr. Smith looked to Anne with a smile that seemed embarrassed, but still kindly. Then he began speaking of their favourite topic of late, poetry, Anne growing increasingly tense. Now was her chance and she must seize it, but her heart was beating so wildly she felt a little faint.

  He was looking at her expectantly; it appeared he had asked her a question.

  “I am sorry – I beg your pardon.”

  “I had asked if you were well, Miss de Bourgh. You look – you look a little unwell.”

  “I am rather nervous,” said she, “for I must say something to you: I love you.”

  He rose immediately from his seat, sighed, and turned away from her. “Oh, how I wish you had not said that.”

  Anne’s eyes filled with tears, and she was required to choke back a sob before she spoke, “I must be given to understand our feelings are not mutual, then.”

  He spun to face her, seeming most grieved by the effect of his words, and seated himself again, hesitantly taking up her hand. “They are – that is the difficulty of it.”

  Anne sobbed again in relief. “Then there is no difficulty!” she cried, with emotion.

  “There most certainly is, and I am sure you know it. Someone from your sphere cannot be seen to marry someone from mine. What would your connexions in society say, were you to become Mrs. Anne Smith, wife of a farmer?”

  “I am one and thirty years of age, and I have hardly participated in society. I am forgotten – no one will care whom I marry outside of my own neighbourhood, and there I would be Anne Smith, mistress of Rosings Park.”

  “Your family will care.”

  “I cannot say they will not, but most of them would reconcile themselves to the match, I think. My cousins in the other room are already aware of my intent,” Anne said, carefully omitting that the person who was least likely to be reconciled was her nearest relation. “Please, please consider this. I shall have to return to Rosings and take on a role I have never held, although it was supposed to have been mine since the death of my father. I do not want to do it alone – I want someone by my side. I want you by my side. Do you think I would be better off marrying someone like Laurence Sinclair, who would care nought for me and see my land as nothing more than his own field for sport?”

  “No, of course not, but I do think you would be better off marrying some other gentleman.”

  “How should I be better off marrying someone else, if my heart is bound to you? I am well past the bloom of youth – any gentleman who should look at me with an interest in matrimony sees only Rosings Park. Do you not see? I know neither of us intended to allow our affections to fall where they have, and that is why you are the best person I could marry. You are my only chance at marrying for love. I do not know how long my health shall last, but I want to be happy for as long as it does, and I want to know I am connected to someone who will put my interests first, if it fails again.”

  He seemed much affected by what she had said, but remained silent.

  “It is not only the emotional qualities you could bring to a union between us, though, that are your merits. With your knowledge, you could turn the estate around – I am sure of it. You could help me see Rosings prosper again.”

  “You would be better off having me for a steward. That is more aligned with my birth than the position you propose.”

  “I do not want you for a steward – I want you for an husband!” Anne cried, so loudly it seemed she prompted Elizabeth, still playing at the pianoforte, to make a tremendous blunder in her song.

  Elizabeth was heard to recover and continue with her playing, and Mr. Smith shook his head. “May I take a little time, and consider it? I do not want to disappoint you, Miss de Bourgh, but I do not want to see you regret the choice of marrying so far beneath you. That I could not bear.”

  “Yes, of course, but I would never regret marrying an ho
nourable man.”

  “Thank you,” said he. “And Miss de Bourgh?”

  “Yes?”

  “Pray do not say you are past the bloom of youth. ‘Tis not a statement I can agree with.”

  “That is why you must marry me,” whispered Anne. “No one else would ever think so.”

  +++

  Elizabeth and Marguerite were only briefly informed that their mission had not entirely been a success, although at least it had not been a complete failure. Anne seemed exceedingly preoccupied with whatever had passed between her and Mr. Smith in the parlour, and the other ladies let her ride on ahead of them.

  When there was enough distance between Anne and the two of them, Marguerite slowed Spartan so that she and Elizabeth were side-by-side, and said, “I think he will come around, her Mr. Smith.”

  “I hope so,” Elizabeth said. “I believe if he was set against it, he would have refused her. Oh, it is very strange to speak of a man refusing a woman!”

  Marguerite laughed. “Yes, it is strange, but I like it, that the woman was one to ask!”

  “Yes, I like that very much indeed,” Elizabeth said, laughing with her.

  They continued on companionably, Marguerite speaking of more things she found strange about England, and Elizabeth entertaining her with some of her own tales of the foibles of her countrymen and women. As they neared the stables, a man could be seen leading a horse about the paddock, and Elizabeth said, “You know, if you do wish for a different mount now that you have recalled yourself to riding, we may speak to my husband. I am sure he would have a recommendation.”

  “No, I am happy with my friend Spartan,” said Marguerite, patting the cob’s neck. “I wish for horse I can trust, and I trust him. I am – how is the English way, to say you will have baby? Edward always reminds me of it, but it make – makes – no sense to me, and I am always forgetting.”

  “In the family way, is how we say it, and that is wonderful! I am sure – I am sure Edward is happy he is to have a child,” Elizabeth said. She had intended to say she thought Lord and Lady Brandon should be delighted, but she was not sure delight could be applied to such a case, when the last woman thought to be carrying the heir to the earldom had died following childbirth.

  “He is! He is already such good father to Jean-Charles. I know he will be good to our son or daughter,” said Marguerite, smilingly.

  “Do you know when you will have the child?”

  “March or April next year, I think,” said Marguerite. “I have it for some months already, but we did not wish to tell everyone im-immediate-ly. Is sensitive, in the family.”

  “Yes, of course. I hope deeply that everything shall go smoothly for you.”

  Marguerite thanked her, and they rode on quietly. As they drew closer to the stables, Elizabeth was surprised to see the man leading the horse was her husband. The horse was Kingfisher, and he did not look well, even to Elizabeth’s untrained eye. The horse’s feet seemed to be flipping wildly with every step, and when Darcy encouraged him up to a trot for a few steps, it looked strikingly painful to the animal. Darcy pulled the horse to a halt immediately and stroked its cheek, his shoulders sagging as the animal nudged him affectionately with its nose. Elizabeth felt tears come to her eyes at such a sight; she readily saw the tragedy that the horse her husband had described as the best jumper in his stables should be brought to such a state, and she could hardly imagine how it must have felt to him.

  She encouraged Flora into a trot, hoping he would not notice her. That moment she had seen should be reserved for the man and his horse; it was too private, Elizabeth thought, even for a wife to observe.

  She was, though, particularly solicitous towards him when they went to bed that night, although she knew as well that she had something to tell him of, and she did not think he was going to like it.

  “Did something happen to Anne, today?” he asked, as he was climbing into bed. “She looked quite downcast this evening.”

  Elizabeth was glad that at least she did not need to broach the subject. With sudden inspiration, she went to the cabinet and poured him a brandy before she followed him into bed. Perplexed, he took it from her, then waited for her to speak.

  “She – I believe the best way to say it would be that she proposed to Mr. Smith, and did not receive an answer in either the affirmative or the negative. He wished for more time to think on the matter. I presume you will not like the match, and I must tell you that Marguerite and I played a role in giving her the opportunity to do so.”

  “Oh, is that all? You had me a bit worried with the brandy. Of course it is not all to Anne. I am sure this must be difficult for her, but I believe he will agree to marry her, in time.”

  Elizabeth gaped at him. “You – you are not concerned over her making such an alliance?”

  “Do you not recall, Elizabeth, that in my past someone roundly chastised me over pride of position, and prompted me to rethink a great many things? I had realised some weeks ago the possibility that there was a mutual admiration between the two of them – indeed I thought when you and I spoke of his making someone a good husband, that we were both referring to Anne. Smith is an excellent man, and I value him highly. My only concerns were over losing him as a tenant – which I would be tremendously selfish to stand upon – and that the attraction on her part was due to rebellion against her mother. She could not be so affected, though, if this was mere rebellion.”

  “I had not thought you could astonish me so thoroughly, after we have been married so long as we have.”

  “I think you do not realise how much I have taken your lessons to heart. They were difficult lessons, I assure you, but I learned a great deal from them.”

  “I am glad of what you say,” said she, much affected, “but are you sure? You would not have liked for Georgiana to make such a connexion, I think.”

  “The only direction I gave Georgiana on such matters was that I wished for her to marry for love, but that I would prefer it if she did not fall in love with a chimney sweep.”

  Elizabeth giggled, but lost her humour rapidly as his countenance soured, and he said, “Although if I had it to do again, I would have discouraged her from any naval captains, I think.”

  “Oh, my darling, she loves him, and it was her choice. I think we must hope for the best, until we have new letters from her.”

  “Hope for the best, and be glad of a wife who serves me a last brandy in bed, when she knows I have had a troubling day.”

  “I wish my motivations were so honourable, this time, but in truth I was endeavouring to ply you with it as I gave you the news of Anne’s proposal.”

  “I prefer to think that did not form all of your motivations, merely the most recent of them,” said he, caressing her cheek. “I know you saw me, in the paddock.”

  “I did not want to intrude. It is bad, is it not?”

  “It is. He will never jump again – never even be suitable for riding, I think. All we can hope is that he improves enough to live out his retirement without too much pain. Marshall thinks some alteration to the way he is shod may make a difference.”

  “I hope that it shall,” Elizabeth said. She felt for him, deeply. The things that had worried her still did, but the worries had lessened. Dr. Alderman’s recommendation for patience had, she realised, done something to assuage her concerns for her son, but Darcy’s concerns seemed to show no sign of abatement.

  Chapter 14

  Moll was laughing again. Some of this, perhaps, could be attributed to the natural progress of her recovery from Lieutenant Holmes’s attack, but of late, Georgiana had seen a difference in her manner beyond this. It indicated, Georgiana thought, that Moll had taken her mistress’ advice that she must act as though she wished to be asked for her hand in marriage, for Moll’s laughter was always at its most delighted when she was around Taylor.

  It pleased Georgiana, to see Moll returned to something nearer her old spirit. It pleased her as well to see that Taylor seemed most affecte
d by the change in Moll. Georgiana passed them as she came in from her morning airing on the deck, eating their early dinner with the rest of their mess and conversing most intensely with each other, and she brought this pleasantness with her as she passed through to the great cabin and seated herself to begin her pianoforte practise. They were anchored off the island of Lintin, now, awaiting permission to go up the Pearl River to retrieve the embassy, and the ship wallowed heavily in the swell, which made concentration more difficult, although she persevered.

  Georgiana practised for an hour complete, and then seated herself on the sofa to earn a little more progress on her needlework before dinner. She had been hoping Matthew might come down and join her for a little while, so they could have some time in privacy before the officers dined with them that evening, but they had been awaiting Chinese mandarins, who were to visit the ship and inform them of when they would be given a pass and a pilot to proceed further up the river. Georgiana expected they must have arrived, and detained him.

  Finally, the door clapped open, and Matthew entered with such a stormy countenance that for a time, Georgiana had difficulty reconciling whatever had happened to him with her own thoughts of such cheer over the last few hours. When finally she did, she rose and went to him, asking him whatever was the matter.

  “They are saying we cannot go up the river,” said he. “There will be no pilot, nor a pass.”

  “But what of the embassy? What has happened to them?”

  “They are saying the embassy has made fools of them, that Lord Amherst was sent away in disgrace from Pekin, and he will be sent to board this ship and then we must be gone immediately. I worry for everyone in the embassy. I do not believe the Chinese have been telling me complete truths.”

  “What shall you do?”

  “For now, I informed them that we required a safer anchorage than our present one, for the passage here was not easy,” he said, referring to their voyage there, through rough waters and even rougher weather, which had undone some of the Caroline’s Lewchew repairs. “And I insisted the Caroline ought to have the same respect given to her as HMS Lion received in the previous embassy. She ought to be afforded the same protected position, up-river. I insisted they return tomorrow with a pilot and an official pass.”