“Oh,” said Mrs. Peters, looking after them. “Oh, dear, dear, dear.” Then she seemed to notice Elizabeth for the first time. “Oh, excuse me. What have we here?”
Elizabeth smoothed her skirts. “Hello. I’m Mr. Darcy’s wife.”
Mrs. Peter’s eyes widened. “Indeed?”
Elizabeth nodded.
“Wife, you say?” Mrs. Peters looked up at the steps, at Mr. Darcy’s wake. “Married?”
“Yes,” said Elizabeth quietly.
Mrs. Peters looked at Elizabeth, pity written all over her face. “Oh, you poor thing. Why, we had no idea, dear. I curse the loss of that letter.” She rushed over to Elizabeth, cupping the woman’s face in her hands. “You’re chilled to the bone, mum. We must get you warmed up.” She looked back at the fire. “Oh, heavens, that dog! Stuff and nonsense, and no supper started either.” She threw up her hands. “Come with me, mum, come with me. I’ll manage it all somehow. I always do.” She sighed and hurried over to the steps. She began to climb. A moment later, she looked over her shoulder. “Well, come on, then.”
Elizabeth squared her shoulders and followed the woman.
CHAPTER NINE
Mrs. Peters showed Elizabeth into a large bedroom, bigger than two of the drawing rooms in Longbourn. There was a sitting room outside the bedchamber, and Mrs. Peters set about starting a fire in the fireplace and helping Elizabeth out of her coat, which was soaked. She said she would send someone else up immediately, and then she left.
Elizabeth sank down in front of the fire.
It was freezing in her room. Indeed, the whole of Pemberley seemed to be drafty and dank and cold. She had been here but a quarter hour and she already despised the place.
She struggled with tears that were forming in her throat, trying to tell herself that she must not succumb to crying. She distracted herself by thinking of what she would say in her letter to Jane.
Dearest Jane, she composed inwardly. My husband is a raging maniac who becomes unhinged at the sight of dogs. He terrifies me. My new home is like a dungeon that never gets warm. Write soon, hope all are well at home.
No, no, no, she mustn’t say anything like that.
What positive things could she say of Pemberley?
It is very big. And grand. And… big.
She sighed. Perhaps she could be spared writing a letter tonight. She was tired after all. It had been quite a long journey. She would write tomorrow morning. Surely, in the morning light, things would seem better.
A rapping at her door.
She sprang up from her seat. “Yes?”
The door opened and in came a young lady followed by several other male servants who had brought in her trunk and a large tub.
The girl curtsied. “Mrs. Darcy, my name is Meg, and I shall be your maid. Mrs. Peters thought you would like a bath. They’ll be bringing up the water next.”
“Oh, that sounds heavenly,” said Elizabeth. She smiled at Meg. “It is good to meet you, Meg.”
“I hear that Mr. Darcy threw one of his fits,” said Meg. “I’m sorry you had to see that. I don’t know what your courtship was like, though. Perhaps you’ve seen him lose his temper already.”
“No,” said Elizabeth. “Never.”
“He never used to be that way,” said Meg in a low voice. “Before losing dear Georgiana—that’s the late Miss Darcy, his sister, you understand—he was quite happy and amiable. I can’t say I ever heard him raise his voice with a servant. We used to boast to anyone who visited about what a wonderful master we had.”
“It is the pain of his injuries, I suppose,” said Elizabeth.
“It is that dog,” said Meg. “He was very clear he didn’t want it about, but some of the staff are rather attached to her.”
“I don’t understand,” said Elizabeth. “I gather the dog belonged to someone name Georgie. Is that a nickname for his sister?”
“No, no,” said Meg. “That’s what they called Mr. Wickham. He grew up in the house as Mr. Darcy’s playmate. They ran all over together, being little boys. I daresay Mrs. Peters thought of them both as like her own. She hates it what became of them.”
Elizabeth went very still, thinking of what Mrs. Hurst had accused at that dinner all that time ago, that Mr. Darcy had murdered someone named Wickham. “What did become of them?” she whispered.
“Oh, they quarreled after they grew,” said Meg. “None are sure why, but Mr. Wickham he stalked out of the house, angry, yelling that Mr. Darcy would see him ruined. And then… it wasn’t long later that the accident happened. However Mr. Wickham was involved, only Mr. Darcy knows.”
Elizabeth was quiet, feeling fresh horror wash through her. So, Mr. Darcy had a reason to kill Mr. Wickham, then, or at least, there was enmity between them. And the way that Mr. Darcy felt about that dog, well, she had never seen such hatred. She felt ill.
But then the door opened and the servants were coming in with steaming water to fill the tub, and soon she had no other thoughts than of how wondrous hot water felt on cold skin.
* * *
Dinner was late on account of the servants not having any idea of the arrival of Mr. Darcy. The food, when served, was hot and delicious, and there was a lot of it.
The dining room was enormous. It also boasted a massive fireplace, with orange flames roaring inside it. And yet, the room was still cold, its high ceilings swallowing all the warmth. The walls were stone and so was the floor. The dining table was long and rectangular and the chairs had lion’s heads carved into the arms.
Mr. Darcy did not apologize to her for his outburst earlier. He drained several glasses of wine as they ate. When he did speak to her, his voice was a bit slurred.
“You must make yourself at home, Mrs. Darcy,” he said. “Explore wherever you would like, except the the east wing. Don’t go in there.”
“Why not?” she said.
He gave her a tight smile. “Because I forbid it.”
She narrowed her eyes at him.
He chuckled, low in his throat. “Mrs. Darcy, I’m aware you’re a woman who doesn’t take well to being given orders, but I promise you, if you disobey me in this matter, you will live to regret it.”
She made herself small, growing interested in her food. Mr. Darcy had been rather awful back in Hertfordshire, but she thought he was worse here. She tried to summon the pity she could usually find for the man, but it had dried up.
Maybe that was for the best. Maybe a man like him used pity to excuse his poor behavior, and he should not be allowed to do so.
She raised her chin, looking down her nose at him. “Do not threaten me again, Mr. Darcy. Somewhere in there, I believe there is a gentleman. I suggest you find him. When next we meet, I would prefer not to converse with whatever barbarian currently is wearing my husband’s clothes.”
He flinched, looking down at his plate. “Forgive me,” he said. “I am… it has been a rather long day.”
“For me as well,” she said. “Perhaps it might be easier if we finished our meal in silence.”
He nodded once.
And they did not speak again that night.
When she went to bed, she had a sudden panic that perhaps Mr. Darcy might come to see her, intent on exercising his husbandly rights to mount her in whatever way men mounted women.
But he did not come, which was good, because she was fearfully tired.
She slipped easily into slumber and slept like the dead all night.
CHAPTER TEN
When she awoke, it was still dark in her room, but she could see that it was only because the draperies were so heavily blocking out the windows. She could see daylight peering around the edges, and so she sprang up to pull aside the curtains.
The sun shone brightly in the sky, but it only illuminated a dreary and dead world below. The grass was brown, the trees were bare, and everything looked a bit soggy from the rain the night before.
Still, sun was better than gloomy rain, so she sat down to compose a letter to Jane, just a
s she had promised herself. She glossed over the uncomfortable travel and the temperament of her husband. Instead, she wrote of the grandness of her new home and the kindness of the servants she had met. She even wrote of the dogs, but made it seem as if they were also her new friends.
She didn’t like it. The letter had an air of forced cheerfulness that Elizabeth knew her sister would see through.
But to put pen to paper and explain how she truly felt would only make it worse. No, it was better to put a bright face on it.
She rang for Meg and dressed. Meg showed her downstairs to the dining room again for breakfast.
The room was brighter now, for there were windows at the top of the room, letting in the morning light. However, the windows only seemed to illuminate cobwebs and dust that had gathered in all the corners. Elizabeth gazed up at them, wondering how a servant would even get up there to clean. They must have to bring in ladders. How often would they even go to the trouble?
“Mrs. Darcy, good morning,” came a voice.
She turned and there was Mr. Darcy, striding into the room without his cane, looking almost cheerful.
She smiled. “Good morning.”
He went straight to the sideboard, where breakfast was set out and began to serve himself some sausages and ham. “How are you? I am sorry about yesterday. The wet weather seems to make everything hurt so badly. Drinking on top of that did not improve my temperament, I’m afraid. I fear I was quite horrid. My apologies.”
Elizabeth did not speak, because she was beginning to be aware that Mr. Darcy had a bit of a pattern. He behaved poorly, and then he apologized about it. But he continued to behave badly. But there was no reason to ruin breakfast, so she inclined her head and said, “Of course, sir.”
He regarded her. “That is not forgiveness, but perhaps I don’t deserve that.” He gestured. “Do you enjoy drinking chocolate? I confess I am more in favor of tea, but I am told that our kitchen staff makes a fine cup.”
She came forward. “I do drink chocolate, indeed.” She poured herself a cup and tasted it. It was quite good. Sometimes the chocolate at Longbourn was more egg white and spices than actual chocolate. The staff there was wont to make a bar last as long as possible by putting increasingly less chocolate shavings into every pot.
She also filled her plate at the sideboard and sat with Mr. Darcy.
“After breakfast, what would you choose to do?” he said. “I could show you the library or you could play the piano if you liked. You do play, don’t you? I am certain I saw you play on one occasion or the other.”
“I play, but badly,” she said, shaking her head.
He scoffed. “Ah, what does that mean? Women are always trying to measure themselves against some arbitrary standard. It hardly matters. In my experience, all young women are called accomplished, regardless of their actual abilities.”
Elizabeth cleared her throat, trying to puzzle that out. Was he agreeing with her that she was bad at the piano? If so, she supposed she didn’t care. She was awful. Not perhaps so awful as her sister Mary—well, that wasn’t fair. Mary was quite diligent about her piano playing, but she’d been cursed with a braying singing voice, and—while she was capable of hitting the proper notes—she was not pleasing to listen to.
Thinking this, she was suddenly hit with a bracing wind of homesickness. It nearly knocked her off her chair. She choked on her chocolate.
Why, she had barely been gone a few days, and she and Mary hardly had a deep and abiding connection, but somehow, she felt the distance between herself and everything she had ever known quite acutely.
Mr. Darcy was still talking. “…I think that it puts too much pressure on young ladies, and for what reason? To attract someone to marry them? It’s preposterous. Women should be allowed to do whatever it is that gives them pleasure, regardless of what society thinks. I think people will become more accomplished at trying their hands at their actual passions, regardless of gender, at any rate. Why, when I was in school, I had no head for dates and history. Simply couldn’t keep it in my head. I have somehow survived without being able to name the kings of England in order from William the Conquerer.” He paused, looking at her. “I’m sorry, are you well? Here I am, going on and you are quite pale. Is it something you’ve eaten? Perhaps it doesn’t agree with you. I shall ring for something else, just name it.”
“No, no, don’t go to the trouble.” She forced herself to smile. “I am sorry. I was thinking of something, that is all.”
“Something that bothered your constitution?”
She looked down at her plate. “Never mind it. I do find that I agree with what you are saying to some degree. There is a frightful amount of pressure on women to conform to some sort of standard. And I have never, well, quite conformed.”
He pointed at her with his fork. “No, I see this about you. I like this about you. It was what I meant when I said that you were not like other women. But I did not mean… of course, you are very feminine and lovely and the epitome of womanhood in a great many ways.” He blinked. “I don’t seem to be very skilled at giving compliments, do I?”
She chuckled. “I would not say that, sir.”
“But you are being kind,” he said, cutting his sausage with a fork. “Heaven knows I don’t know why. I do not deserve your kindness.”
She was not sure how to respond to that. Ought she broach the subject of how he might simply stop doing awful things and then would have no need of constant apologies?
But he spoke again. “I suppose that your lack of interest in the piano means that we ought to find the library instead?”
She laughed. “Yes, I think so.”
“Excellent.” He speared a bit of sausage and popped it into his mouth.
* * *
The library was as massive as the rest of the place. It was lined with books, and some of the shelves were up so high that a ladder had to be used to reach them. The floor of the library was swathed in carpets and there were high-backed chairs arranged in front of the fireplace, four of them.
“When I was a boy,” said Mr. Darcy, gesturing to the chairs, “we would all sit here by the fire, I in one of those chairs which was frightfully too big for me, and my father would read aloud to us. Sometimes Greek myths or epic poetry, but once he did read Gulliver’s Travels. Also I must say I found all the business about the government at the time went right over my head.”
“I think Jonathan Swift was a rather vulgar man,” said Elizabeth.
“Well, yes, some of the humor is a bit… base and—”
“Disgusting,” said Elizabeth. “He seems obsessed with things better left in chamber pots.”
Darcy threw back his head and let out a deep, belly laugh. “Oh, you do have a way of putting things, I must say.”
Elizabeth smiled too. “That is not the only thing that stood out to me from the book, of course.”
“Yes,” said Darcy. “I think it there is much there to elevate it above some its worser tendencies.” He turned back to the chair. “But I would say that I am perhaps biased towards it because my father read it to me. I associate it with him.”
Elizabeth’s heart went out to him. Here she was, with all of her family living, both her parents, all her siblings, and Mr. Darcy had lost everyone and been badly scarred and injured in such a way that caused him constant pain. Perhaps no one could bear that and continue to be polite all the time. Perhaps…
He coughed. “Oh, no, please don’t look at me in that way.” He turned away from her and went over to one of the chairs, which she now realized was just a bit different than the others. It had obviously been made to copy the style of the other chairs, but it was newer and the color was just slightly different.
If these chairs had been made for the family, then the fourth chair must have been made later, for Mr. Darcy’s sister, the one who had died.
He brushed his fingers over the top of it.
Elizabeth had the urge to go to him and embrace him.
Which was ridiculous, of course. Why, you didn’t go about embracing people, not unless they were very small children. It simply wasn’t proper. True, he was her husband and they were alone, but…
He looked up at her, his eyes shining. “Well, this is the library. You must come here whenever you like, take as many books as you can carry, and read them wherever takes your fancy. This spot here is quite comfortable, I must say.” He smiled.
“Thank you,” she said, smiling back.
“Indeed, you must go anywhere you like in the house. It is yours now, too. We are married, and all that is mine is yours. Go and look at it all.
“Except the east wing,” she found herself saying, and then she cringed, because he was in a good mood, and why did she have to go and upset him?
But he only bowed his head and was quiet for what seemed like several eternities. Eventually, he raised his gaze to hers. There were tears in his eyes. His voice wasn’t strong. “I beg of you, Mrs. Darcy…” He swallowed, composing himself. When he spoke again, his voice was steadier. “Please leave that place alone. Anywhere else, you may go, but that place, please…”
* * *
Of course, she went there at once.
She tried to talk herself out of it, but she didn’t have the spirit for it. She was more curious about that wing now than ever. The fact it could make Mr. Darcy rage and then nearly cry in front of her, when gentlemen did not cry, ever, but especially not in front of their wives, well…
She had to see.
So, that afternoon, while Mr. Darcy was busy in his study going over the books for the estate and all the servants were scurrying around in other areas of the house, she crept up the steps to the east wing.
As she did, the air grew colder. They did not light fires in this part of the house. No one came here. She looked over her shoulder, making sure no one was following her, and then she kept going.
The east wing was dark, though there was light coming through a window at the end of the hallway. All of the doors here were shut, and she could see clouds of air coming from her mouth when she breathed. It was quite cold.
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