‘You must tell us how you met,’ said Gustav. ‘We have heard nothing about it.’
‘We never hear of anything here!’ said Clothilde.
‘Yes, do tell us,’ said Isabella.
‘Indeed,’ said Frederique.
‘We met in Hertfordshire,’ said Elizabeth, ‘when Darcy’s friend rented a house in my neighbourhood. Darcy attended the local assembly with his friend…’
‘And it was love at first sight. I comprehend!’ said Louis.
Elizabeth laughed.
‘Far from it!’ she said.
‘No? But what is this? Darcy, you did not fall in love at once with the beautiful Elizabeth?’ He turned to Elizabeth. ‘If I had been there, I would have prostrated myself at your so-charming feet.’
‘When, then, did Darcy see the error of his ways?’ asked Gustav.
‘It was not until many months later,’ said Elizabeth.
‘No? Darcy! You are a veritable blockhead!’ said Frederique.
Darcy smiled.
‘Ah, yes, my friend, you can afford to smile, you have at last won the hand of the beautiful Elizabeth and you bring her to us as your bride.’
‘But how did it happen?’ asked Carlotta. ‘You must tell us how Darcy changed his mind.’
Nothing would do for them but to hear a full recital. Elizabeth left out any mention of Georgiana and Wickham, and she passed lightly over Lydia’s elopement, saying only that Darcy had come to the aid of her sister when that sister found herself in difficulties a long way from home.
They were still asking her questions when dinner was announced, and over that meal, which consisted of venison, root vegetables, and partridge, they teased out more information about Elizabeth’s home in Hertfordshire. Gustav announced that he had been to England many years ago and he discussed its merits with Elizabeth.
The women were engaging and the men were attentive, so that Elizabeth felt herself charmed. For all their shabby clothes, they knew how to set her at her ease, and the men knew how to flatter her delicately and how to make her laugh.
After dessert, the port was passed round and the ladies withdrew. The Count’s female guests were full of admiration for Elizabeth’s gown and they were eager to hear about the Paris fashions.
‘Tell me, how are the sleeves this year? Are they long or short?’ asked Clothilde.
‘They are scarcely there at all,’ said Elizabeth. ‘They are nothing but frills at the top of the arm.’
‘That is all very well for a heated drawing room where the press of bodies makes one hot, but it will not do for the mountains where we have snow for half the year,’ said Isabella, laughing.
‘It might, if we sit close to the fire,’ said Clothilde. ‘I like the thought of sleeves that are nothing more than a frill.’
‘Do you really want to sit close to the fire all day?’ Isabella teased her. ‘No, you cannot sit still for more than a few minutes at a time. You would be jumping up and going somewhere, doing something.’
‘Not all the time; in the evening now and then sitting still would not be so bad if it meant I could be comme à la mode. And how are the skirts, are they all like your dress, with the waist very high?’
‘Yes,’ said Elizabeth. ‘They have been this way for some time.’
‘We have much to catch up with,’ said Carlotta. ‘We used to get the fashion journals, but since the troubles, they have not been so easy to come by.’
‘Then we must go to Paris,’ said Clothilde. ‘We must treat ourselves. Too long have we been content to live in the forests. We will take a trip to the capital and return laden with gowns and shawls and gloves and fans. We will startle our men folk with our fashionable dress and perhaps it will prompt them to go to town themselves and get some new clothes, too. I am sure they could benefit from them. They look very clumsy, our friends, next to Mr Darcy.’
‘I cannot believe Frederique will wear new clothes; his old ones are too comfortable,’ said Clothilde. ‘He will wear them until they fall from his back! Have you men like this in England, Elizabeth?’
‘We have men of all kinds,’ she said, ‘some who follow the fashions closely and some who dress as they please.’
‘Ah! Then it is the same everywhere, I think! But here they are now. We were just saying how we would like to go to Paris and buy some new clothes, and that you should come too,’ she said, as the men entered the room.
‘New clothes!’ said Louis in horror. ‘I cannot abide them. Always they are uncomfortable. They scratch or they are too tight or they are too loose, and they are never the right shape. A coat needs to be worn for a year before it is comfortable.’
‘You see, Elizabeth, we can do nothing with them!’ said Carlotta with a laugh.
A game of cards was suggested and everyone readily agreed to the plan. They were just taking their places at the card table when there came a sudden loud knocking on the front door.
Elizabeth looked up in surprise and all eyes turned towards the hall.
‘Now who can that be?’ asked the Count.
There was the sound of voices in the hall. The butler’s voice was angry and contemptuous, and the other, a woman’s voice, was feeble with age and yet at the same time resolute. A moment later the door was flung open and the old woman entered, followed by the outraged butler, who said something in his own language to the Count. Although Elizabeth could not understand his words, his indignation was clear, as was his step towards the old woman. But the Count lifted his hand and the butler stepped back, muttering.
‘We have before us an old crone who asks to tell our fortunes. What say you?’ said the Count.
‘Let her in!’ said Frederique, laying down his hand of cards. ‘It would be a thousand pities to miss such sport.’
‘What do the ladies say? Would it amuse them?’ asked the Count.
‘Certainly,’ said Clothilde.
‘But assuredly! I would like to discover what she makes of my hand,’ said Isabella with an impish smile.
The Count, his eyes glittering in the candlelight, turned to Elizabeth. ‘Do you object, Mrs Darcy?’
The old woman came forward. By the light of the fire Elizabeth could see that she was not as old as she had at first appeared. Her face was lined but not wrinkled, and her stoop was assumed. Elizabeth guessed that the woman was a friend of the Count’s, someone who had agreed to pose as a fortune-teller in order to amuse his friends, and she said, ‘No, I don’t object at all.’
‘Alors, then please, come closer to the fire,’ said the fortune-teller.
She spoke with a heavy accent, but she spoke in English, confirming Elizabeth’s opinion that she was a friend of the Count’s and not the peasant woman she appeared to be.
She established herself on a stool by its side, protected from the brightness of the candles by the shadow of the mantelpiece.
Clothilde stepped forward, but the old woman said, ‘Not yet, my dark lady. There is one here who must come before you; I see a bride.’ She fixed her eyes on Elizabeth. ‘I would give a fortune to the bride.’
Elizabeth went over to the woman and sat opposite her and the woman held out her hand.
‘You must cross my palm with silver,’ she said.
‘Ah! Now we come to it,’ said Frederique, laughing. ‘The fortune is nothing, the silver is all.’
There was a murmur of laughter amongst the Count’s guests and then Darcy stepped forward, placing a coin in the old woman’s hand.
The fortune-teller nodded, bit it, and then slipped the coin into the folds of her cloak.
‘Now, come close, ma belle.’ She took Elizabeth’s hand and turned it over so that it was palm upwards. ‘I see a young hand, the hand of a woman at the start of her journey. See,’ she said, pointing to lines that ran across it, ‘here are the dangers and difficulties you will face. Your hand, it is the map of your life and the lines, they are the dangers running through it. They are many, and they are deep and perilous. You will be sorely tried in body a
nd spirit, and you must be careful if you are to emerge unscathed.’
‘That all sounds very exciting!’ said Gustav.
‘And very general,’ said Clothilde with a laugh.
She had drawn closer and was now standing by the fire.
‘You think so?’ asked the fortune-teller sharply. ‘Then give me your hand.’
Before Clothilde could react, the fortune-teller seized her hand and turned it palm upwards. She ran her finger across its lines and then let out a moan and began to rock herself.
‘Darkness!’ she wailed. ‘Aaargh! Aaargh! The emptiness! The void! Everything is darkness!’
‘She puts on a fine show,’ said Frederique in a stage whisper.
‘I put on no show,’ said the woman, turning to him sharply. ‘Never have I felt such emptiness, such terror and such darkness. The cold, it terrifies me. It turns my bones to ice. But you, ma belle,’ she said, giving her attention once more to Elizabeth and looking at her earnestly, ‘you are of the light. You must beware. There are dangers all around you. Believe this, if you believe nothing else. The forest is full of strange creatures, and there are monsters in many guises. Not all who walk on two legs are men. Not all who fly are beasts. And not all who travel the path of ages will pass through into the shadow.’
Elizabeth could make nothing of the old woman’s words, but she was impressed despite herself by the woman’s intensity and her glittering eye.
‘Mais oui,’ said the old woman, nodding. ‘You begin to believe. You have seen things in your dreams. And you are not the first. No, assuredly you are not the first. There was a young woman like you, many years ago, who came to this castle. They called her la gentille, because she was kind and good, and because she loved the flower gentiane. She wore a spray of it always in her hair. She was young and in love, and like all young women in love, she thought she could conquer everything. And she was right, for love, it can conquer everything if it is deep and true. But when the terror came, she doubted. And when the horror came, she fled. Through the forests she ran, and the wolves, they pursued her and in the end, they ran her down. Take care! Take care! There is darkness all around you. Do not falter. Do not doubt, or you too will share her fate.’
Elizabeth stared into the old woman’s eyes, chilled, despite herself, by the woman’s words. Then a touch on her arm brought her back to her senses—to the drawing room with the dancing candles and the air of bonhomie and good cheer—and she laughed at herself for being drawn in by the fortune-teller, and she agreed with the other guests that they had all been well entertained.
The woman was paid handsomely by the Count, but as she walked out of the door, Elizabeth glanced at Darcy and she could see that he was not smiling. Instead, his look was dour.
There was much laughter as the fortune-teller’s visit was discussed and then it was dismissed as attention once again turned to the game of cards. They separated into groups and played at cribbage, with Elizabeth coming second to Clothilde in her group and Darcy winning in his.
‘Darcy, he always wins,’ said Louis.
‘Not always,’ said Darcy, and a shadow crossed his face.
But then it was gone.
The evening at last drew to an end. One by one, the guests said their goodnights and withdrew to their rooms. Elizabeth excused herself and she too retired. It was cold in her room, the fire having burnt down low. She undressed quickly and was soon in bed. But as she was about to blow out the candle she caught sight of the tapestry and something caught her eye. She lifted the candle to see it better and she saw to her horror that the woman peering out from the mass of strange creatures was wearing a spray of gentian in her hair.
Chapter 7
It was as she had suspected, thought Elizabeth the following morning as she made ready to visit the hunting lodge with Darcy, the fortune-teller was one of the Count’s friends. How else could the woman have gained access to the castle, and how else could she have known about the figure in the tapestry? But even so, the evening had left its mark, and Elizabeth found it difficult to put it out of her mind. There had been something uncanny about the woman, and her story had seemed out of keeping for someone wanting to entertain a group of friends.
As the coach rolled out of the gate, Elizabeth found herself glad to be leaving the castle, even for a short time. She was not looking forward to the journey through the forest, but to her surprise, she found that it had taken on a different aspect in the daylight. Gone were the dark and gloomy shadows and in their place were dancing sunbeams and sunlit clearings. The undergrowth was full of nature’s bounty, with nuts and berries growing profusely, and here and there she could see patches of mushrooms, too.
‘When we were children, Jane and I used to take a basket and go out blackberrying,’ said Elizabeth. ‘We would set out early in the morning and Hill would give us whatever she could spare from the larder, a piece of chicken pie, perhaps, with an apple and a slice of cake. We would go out into the fields and woods round about Longbourn, and we would spend the day filling the basket. We would at last return home, laden down with fruit, tired but happy. Kitty and Lydia would dance around us and Mary would look up from her pianoforte and her eyes would gleam. Mama would scold us for dirtying our dresses—or at least she would scold me, for Jane never ruined her clothes—and Papa would smile at us and say we had done well. Having shown off our spoils to the rest of the family, we would take the basket to the kitchen. Hill would say that it was the finest crop she had ever seen and she would bake a pie for tea. I well remember the taste of that first blackberry pie of the season; it always tasted better than any other.’
Darcy smiled and said, ‘I used to pick fruit in these very forests. I always felt free out here in the wilds. At Pemberley I was conscious of being the master and I had to set an example to those around me. Here I could be myself. I would wander through the forests from morning to night and not go home until dark.’
‘Were you not afraid of the wolves, or did you have outriders to watch over you even then?’
‘No, I didn’t have outriders, and no, I wasn’t afraid. I knew how to protect myself.’
She thought of the education of an English gentleman and knew that he would have learned to handle a sword and pistols, just as she had learnt to sew and paint. She imagined him walking through the forest self-reliant and unafraid.
‘Were your parents happy for you to wander?’
‘Yes, they were,’ he said. ‘They never prevented me from doing anything I wanted to do, and besides, they thought it was good for me to be out of doors.’
‘Did you used to stay at the hunting lodge, or did you stay with the Count at the castle?’
‘To begin with I stayed with the Count, but later I stayed in the hunting lodge.’
‘Do you have many hunting lodges?’ she asked.
‘Five. There used to be seven but two of them were in such a poor state of repair that I disposed of them some time ago. I seldom travel to Europe now; my time is tied up with Pemberley.’
‘The Pemberley estate is even bigger than I imagined and it stretches farther than I ever realised,’ said Elizabeth as she reflected, not for the first time, that she had moved into a very different sphere of life. ‘I knew about the house in London and Pemberley, of course, but not of anything in Europe.’
‘There used to be a town house in Paris but it was destroyed in the revolution. When the storm has finally spent itself, I intend to rebuild the house, or perhaps buy another house there.’
‘Do you think the wars with France will ever come to an end?’
He nodded.
‘Everything does eventually, and I hope it will be sooner rather than later,’ he said. ‘There are other properties in Europe, too, and there are smaller properties scattered throughout England, all of which I hope to show you in time.’
Elizabeth thought of how her mother’s eyes would widen at the thought of properties in Europe, as well as properties scattered throughout England. She could almost h
ear her mother telling Lady Lucas and Mrs Long all about it!
The coach followed the road through the trees until at last it came to a high wall running alongside the road. A little further on there was an iron gate, and through its bars Elizabeth could see a box-shaped house as high as it was wide. One of the footmen jumped down to open the gate, which creaked as it swung open, and then the coach bowled through. It went up an unkempt drive, full of encroaching weeds and tough grasses, which lay in the midst of overgrown grounds, and came to rest outside the lodge.
Although it was called a lodge, it was larger than many of the houses in Meryton, with three storeys and large chimneys. It seemed, at first sight at least, to be in a good state of repair. The steps leading up to the front door were sound, and the rooms, though smelling somewhat stale, were dry and in good condition. The floorboards felt firm as she walked over them and the window shutters were unrotted. There was no furniture and no decorations, save for the cobwebs that were strung from every corner and were hanging in festoons from every shelf or ledge. She went over to the windows and threw them wide, letting in the fresh air.
‘This is better than I had expected,’ said Darcy, as they wandered through the rooms, throwing windows open as they went. ‘It needs cleaning and the grounds need some attention, it needs furniture, too, but other than that I see no reason why it should not be let.’
Elizabeth thought of another letting, in another neighbourhood, just over a year ago, and remembered the excitement it had brought in its wake. Her mother had thought of nothing else for weeks! She wondered if there were any similar families in the mountains who might be as delirious at the thought of a new tenant at the lodge as her mother had been at the thought of a new tenant at Netherfield Park. She imagined them dressing in their finest and going—where? Not to the assembly rooms, for there were none nearby. To a private ball, perhaps.
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