A Season Lost

by Sophie Turner

  Before he had undertaken the changing of his daughter, it seemed Matthew had been writing a letter at the little secretaire in the corner of the room, for when Georgiana’s breakfast came in, he moved the secretaire closer to her, but continued with his writing.

  “Whom do you write to?” she asked, presuming it to be one of his uncles.

  “Fitzwilliam and Elizabeth,” he said, hesitantly.

  “Oh, I should have written to them myself,” Georgiana said, feeling guilty she had not done so. Anything beyond caring for her daughter and herself had not merited any thought since Caroline’s birth, however. “But will the letter arrive before us?”

  “It may or it may not. The embassy has a desire to put in at St. Helena, and I will be glad to do so. Perhaps it is strange to be thinking of anti-scorbutics already when we are still here, but I shall be glad to take on another supply of them.”

  Georgiana knew without his saying it that she and Caroline were the reason for his concern over anti-scorbutics. “You see, Dr. Hornby, he is taking every care of my health, and our daughter’s,” she thought, directing all the wrath she could muster towards the physician.

  “May I add a few lines to the end of your letter?” she asked. The thought of taking up pen and paper and writing an entire letter seemed alien and daunting, as did finding the letters she had been writing to her brother and sister before the birth, but Georgiana felt certain they would worry over her if she did not write something in her own hand.

  “Yes, of course,” he said, and then they were silent, Georgiana eating her breakfast, Matthew scratching away at his letter, and Caroline drifting into sated sleep as her cradle rolled gently on the deck beside them. Georgiana gazed down at her and smiled. While her mother was recovering more slowly, Caroline’s health had been good from the beginning. Georgiana was glad that the winds had not required them to go so far south, and that in this part of the world, it was autumn, a warm, dry autumn, for she did not know how she could have kept the baby warm in such temperatures as they had experienced in that first trip around the Cape. But no, Caroline had been peculiarly blessed, so far as the seasons of her young life were concerned. As long as her namesake progressed home as expected, Caroline would not know a winter until she was much older.

  Chapter 34

  The roads were in somewhat better condition this second time of the entire Darcy family’s venturing south, but as this journey was made with three boys grown more rambunctious with age, it had been more trying for those charged with their care. Of those attempting to vex Mrs. Darcy, Mrs. Nichols, Miss Sawyer, and Martha, James achieved perhaps the most notable success by managing to cover himself in mud in the time it took to change horses at Bedford.

  Elizabeth, who had been more amused than vexed at her son’s precocious and ultimately unsuccessful dash through the muck in the Swan’s yard, was still plucking little flecks of mud from his hair when the carriage stopped in front of the Darcy town house on Curzon Street. It was strange to be back here, and of her own offering, back at this house where she had passed what could not be called the happiest months of her life. Yet some of her old worries, namely that she should never have a child, had been thoroughly eliminated; and the others, of how she had been received by some of society, seemed to matter so little after all that had passed since.

  James had been seated on her lap and asleep for some miles now, and as the chaise door was opened, Darcy stepped out and held out his arms. “I’ll take him up,” he said, and thus the Darcy heir was somewhat unceremoniously introduced to the servants of what would someday be his London house, by being carried into the house in the arms of his father. Such an entrance entirely startled Mrs. Miller and Mr. Parker, who had known of course that the boys were coming and had readied the nursery, but had not expected such a paternal entrance from their master.

  James’s brother had been walking with Miss Sawyer, but made his own dash, running to where his mother had just climbed the stairs, clinging to the railing and climbing them himself with wobbling steps. “Mama!” he cried, and Elizabeth turned to find him there, reaching for the hem of her dress.

  “And how did you get here so fast, my little monkey?” Elizabeth asked. He wished to walk with her, it seemed, and so she offered him her fingers to clasp. They entered the house together; Mrs. Miller asked if this was young Master James or Master George, and Elizabeth answered her. Mrs. Miller curtsied, Mr. Parker bowed, and George turned and buried his face in his mother’s skirts.

  “I fear he is a little shy,” said Elizabeth, and she wondered if this was what had caused him to run after her. Aside from her, Darcy, and Mrs. Nichols, he had been exposed to many new people, some of them responsible for his care, and now he had once again been uprooted to travel to a new home. Yet he showed no signs of vexation, until she made to pick him up to carry him up the stairs.

  “No!” he cried, twisting and wriggling in her arms. “No! No! No! No! No!”

  It had been James who had first learned the meaning of this word, but now both twins were able to apply it, and at great volume. As George showed every sign that he would continue with this until she set him back down again, Elizabeth did so, wondering if she would need to have a crib brought down so her son could sleep in the drawing-room that night. Recalling his desire to stay with her, though, she tested him by climbing a few stairs, and found he followed willingly after her. Although he did so clinging firmly to the railing, Elizabeth still feared his falling, and descended so she could walk up beside him, with her hand hovering just behind him should his own grip fail.

  They climbed the stairs in this manner, all the way up to the nursery, observed from the top of the last set of stairs by Darcy, who drily asked, “Is George inspecting the cleanliness of the railing?”

  Elizabeth laughed. “He did not wish to be carried.”

  “I heard. As did all of Mayfair, and his brother.”

  “Oh dear, was he upset?”

  “Not upset, precisely, merely confused. I believe all will be alleviated once he sees George.”

  Darcy was correct in this. Once James saw George – not at all exhausted by his climb – enter the nursery, he called out in a sort of nonsense gibberish the boys sometimes used to “speak” to each other, and George replied in turn.

  “Sometimes I truly believe they have their own language,” said Darcy.

  “Oh, I believe they do, and they use most of it for plotting how to vex their nurses,” said Elizabeth. “I love that they shall have each other to grow up with, that they shall always have a companion.”

  “I do as well. I would have liked a twin brother, growing up.”

  “I am sure you would have, so long as he was a younger twin,” Elizabeth said. “I hate knowing there will come a day when we have to tell them of the vast difference in their expectations. Now, and for some years, they will be innocent of it, they will feel themselves equals, but at some time they will have to know.”

  “I hope we will know when the time is right to tell them,” said he, “but as to them being equals, they will be so until they complete their educations. After that, George will need to embark on his career, but they are both our sons, and they will be expected to make the most of their opportunities.”

  Elizabeth smiled faintly, soothed by his words.

  Darcy took up her hand. “There is nothing we can do beyond that. I could not, in good conscience, divide the estate.”

  “I know,” said Elizabeth, “and I would never ask you to. I just feel for poor George, and I hope this will not divide them when they learn of it.”

  “That may happen,” he said, kissing her forehead, “but we have a very long time to plan the best way to tell them of it, so let us hope it does not.”

  +++

  Darcy called on Lord Anglesey at the earliest appropriate hour the next morning, and returned with the somewhat expected but still disconcerting news that the earl had received no additional correspondence from his niece or nephew. Lord Anglesey did, howe
ver, know better of when post might be expected from the ship: mail posted from Batavia and China faced a hundred possible vagaries that might prevent its delivery, but a Company ship might have left Bombay before the Caroline, might still outpace the frigate back to England, and might therefore provide letters before the Stantons themselves returned. The same applied, he said, for mail posted from the Cape.

  When this had been explained to her, Elizabeth said, “So we might not have any more post at all?”

  “I suppose we will still receive the post, but it may be some weeks or months after Georgiana herself may tell us of what was in it,” Darcy said. He still looked concerned, but it appeared his conversation with Lord Anglesey had assuaged at least some of his worry, and thus Elizabeth felt the trip to London had been worthwhile.

  She had greater reason to be glad later in the morning, when they both called upon the Fitzwilliams. There they found Marguerite Fitzwilliam and baby Andrew – named, presumably, to stake the child’s claim on family continuity – both looking hale and healthy, but the father of the family unit absent. This was explained when he came in, somewhat boisterously, having been in Hyde Park with his stepson, teaching the boy how to ride on the pony that had been purchased following Jean-Charles’s enthusiastic rides on Buttercup at Pemberley. Likely because of this, the child appeared to be exceedingly happy, and directed no jealousy towards his new half-brother.

  He was, of course, likely to someday be outranked by his younger brother – this family was the best possible reminder for Elizabeth that there were stranger situations, as regarded inheritance, than the one her sons faced – but he appeared perfectly cheerful at present, chattering effusively in French. Upon gentle prompting by his stepfather, he shyly said to the Darcys: “Good mawning,” and had his greeting more enthusiastically repeated.

  Jean-Charles was led off by a nurse, leaving the adults to sit together in convivial spirits until little Andrew made clear he needed to nurse. Elizabeth, Darcy, and Edward then left Marguerite and her youngest son within her bedchamber, and went down to the drawing-room, where Lord and Lady Brandon were sitting.

  There seemed a lightness in spirit in all the Fitzwilliams, Elizabeth realised, and she attributed it to the knowledge that both Marguerite and her son were well. Was this, she wondered, what it was to be an adult, to leave behind those carefree days of youth – those days where sisters and parents lived in generally good health at Longbourn – and instead spend life seeking those few weeks or months when there were no loved ones whose health and welfare must be worried over? Perhaps, she thought, this was a reality she had come to more slowly than most – certainly more slowly than Darcy, with only one sister surviving and both parents gone. Perhaps, she thought, this was why he felt his worry so strongly: his previous experiences had given him more reason to worry.

  +++

  The Darcys returned home to find a note from Lord Anglesey awaiting them, accompanied by Lord Anglesey’s servant, who was to carry their response back. The note established in quick form that Lord Anglesey had been engaged to dine with the Castlereaghs tomorrow, that illness had suddenly left the Castlereaghs one couple short of filling their table, and that Lord Anglesey had thought the Darcys, so recently returned to town, most likely among his acquaintances to have no fixed engagements for the evening.

  “Well, he is correct in his assumption,” said Elizabeth.

  “That he is,” said Darcy, “and I suppose we would be well-served by dining amongst such a crowd, but I cannot say I shall enjoy it, nor do I think you shall, either.”

  “No, I do not think I shall, but you may take me to Richmond in the phaeton the day following, and I will find that adequate reward for my punishment.”

  He gave her a wry smile. “Should I write to say we are free to attend the dinner, then?”

  Elizabeth smiled and nodded, and shortly thereafter, Lord Anglesey’s servant was sent back to his master with the news that the Darcys would be available to complete the party. They made their entrance the next evening, therefore, with each of them feeling pessimistic as to any pleasure that could be derived from the hours before them, and Elizabeth feeling the benefit of the trim Sarah had spent the entire day furiously sewing onto her gown. She was grateful for Sarah’s attention to such things, for she felt her dress carefully assessed by those ladies present when she arrived; to Sarah’s credit in gauging the latest fashions, it seemed by their reaction that it had passed muster.

  Although Lord Anglesey was quick to introduce the Darcys to the host and hostess, and they were politely received, neither of the couple could claim particular acquaintance with anyone presently inside Lady Castlereagh’s drawing-room, save Lord Anglesey. He, in his usual form, had introduced his distant relations to the host and hostess and some others in the dining party and then – with every pleasantness of manner – abandoned them.

  The only person Elizabeth recognised, unfortunately, was Lady Stewart, a woman who had snubbed her during her early days in London, but then as circumstances changed, had indicated an eagerness for Elizabeth’s company. On this evening, she was a distant acquaintance, acknowledged from across the drawing-room with a nod of Elizabeth’s head, and by Darcy’s noticing her and emitting the slightest, “hrmpf.” He followed this by murmuring, “A cousin of Viscount Castlereagh’s by marriage, I believe.”

  Lady Stewart’s eagerness for Elizabeth’s company was to continue, it seemed, for almost immediately upon her recognising them, she strode across the room and made her curtsey in a dress even more heavily trimmed than Elizabeth’s. “Mr. and Mrs. Darcy, this is a pleasant surprise – I had not known you would be here. Indeed, I had not even known you were in town, or I certainly would have left my card.”

  “We arrived only a few days ago,” said Elizabeth.

  “Well, you must come and sit with me, and have a little tête-à-tête,” said Lady Stewart. “I understand you had twin boys – how remarkable! – and how convenient, to have your heir and spare all done in one go.”

  Reluctantly, Elizabeth allowed Lady Stewart to take up her hand and lead her over to one of the sofas, where the promised tête-à-tête proved as dull as could be expected, the only thing to enliven it being Elizabeth’s amusement over the hypocrisy of her friend. She was startled when she realised someone standing beside her was trying to gain her attention, and thrilled when she looked up and saw that someone was Lady Tonbridge.

  “Oh, look at you, my dear!” that lady exclaimed. “Stand up, so I can see you fully – yes – yes – I believe you look even lovelier than you did before you had twins.”

  Lady Stewart was looking at Lady Tonbridge with respectful deference, but received only the slightest little nod in return, and Elizabeth soon realised that the purpose of Lady Tonbridge’s telling her to stand had been to draw her away from the other lady.

  “Thank you,” murmured Elizabeth, when they had got far enough away. She indicated she had not realised Lady Tonbridge was at the party, learned she had only just arrived from a prior engagement, and then asked, “How did you know I needed rescuing?”

  “Everyone talking to that woman needs rescuing,” stated Lady Tonbridge. “Now, I want to hear all about those little boys of yours, but first I promised Countess Esterházy I would introduce you.”

  Elizabeth wondered at such a personage as Countess Esterházy, wife of the Hungarian Embassador and patroness of Almack’s, requesting an introduction to her, but upon the introduction’s being made, felt she better understood the request. Countess Esterházy was of about her height and her age, with a thoroughly pretty countenance and a lively, though always proper, manner. The three of them conversed easily during the half-hour before they were to go in to dinner, and Elizabeth thought she had never been so well entertained in a London drawing-room as she was during that time.

  Unfortunately, however, Elizabeth’s place in the line at dinner was nowhere near the two higher-ranking ladies, and she found herself at Lady Castlereagh’s end of the table, just
near enough to Darcy to give him sympathetic glances, but not enough to converse. The conversation at their end of the table alternated between insipid and political, the former brought forth by Lady Castlereagh, who had, it seemed, the ability to converse endlessly on the most trivial matters, and the latter raised by the gentlemen at the table in those openings they could seize amongst Lady Castlereagh’s prattle. Once again Elizabeth resorted to amusing herself in observation of the characters of those around her, but she still found herself relieved when Lady Castlereagh indicated the ladies should go through.

  In the move to the drawing-room, Elizabeth was waylaid by Lady Stewart, and encouraged by that lady to come and meet two other ladies of the party, who shared with Lady Stewart a propensity for vicious gossip. It was as Elizabeth was determining she had spent enough time with them to be polite and could now break away and seek out more preferred company, that Marguerite Fitzwilliam was raised as a subject, although it was not immediately clear they were speaking of her. Elizabeth had forgotten the names of the other ladies – largely because she had no desire to remember them – and had for the past few minutes been thinking of them as Lady Malcontent and Mrs. Bitter.

  “The French frog had a son, I understand,” said Mrs. Bitter.

  “Well, she ought to have done so, after parading herself around town with that enormous belly of hers,” said Lady Malcontent. “I hope Lord Fitzwilliam remarries, so the little half-breed doesn’t inherit the title.”